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It would be irresponsible, as the country works to restart and recover from COVID-19, to recuse ourselves from coverage of the recent riots. As if the virus didn’t damage enough businesses who rely on manufacturers to make goods for retail sale, whether it is bacon for breakfast at a restaurant, or fabrics for clothes, destroying retail outlets, or any other structure, business, or property, is not protest – of anything, in any name.

These disturbances further upset the state of America, and accomplished nothing – in fact, they further alienated people who were trying to come together for many reasons: to overcome the damage wrought by the virus, to mend racial fences, or to find peace or solace in an upside-down world. George Floyd’s unnecessary and cruel death sparked pent-up racial anger, but rioters and looters were not there to protest one more outrageous act of brutality – they were there knowing the protests, and darkness, would provide them an opportunity to steal and act without regard for life, liberty or personal responsibility.

The U.S. recovery, and the world recovery, from COVID-19, will be reliant upon the consumer feeling confident to buy, and to do so in public, and safely. COVID-19 will put many business into bankruptcy, as small business owners and national retailers alike are unable to hold on with zero revenues and on-going expenses of rent, refrigeration, equipment leases, aging inventory, and other financial commitments that don’t just evaporate. They still have to pay their fixed expenses. But when criminals, anarchists, rioters, looters and people who get caught up in mob-mentality at the moment burn and plunder businesses that were on the verge of collapse, they virtually guarantee those business’s won’t reopen, and as past riots have proven, it is more than a decade before those painful memories pass for shop owners and customers. More jobs have been wiped out; more damage has been done to the mental state of America.

Ultimately, this ripples across the economy, not just in Minneapolis or New York or Denver or Santa Monica, but through neighboring cities and towns, through the public consciousness, and through the emotions of good people trying to find peace and prosperity to raise a family. If what you have worked for can be taken from you or destroyed by a rioting mob, all we will have is anarchy. No one can deny that areas of cities and towns plagued by racial inequality have even more of these distressful impacts on residents there, where opportunity is scarce, jobs pay subsistence wages – if that, where education has failed the children, and where crime has reared its ugly head every day, not just on a night when there was a riot.

So, as we recover from COVID-19, as we recover from riots and looting, let’s also recover from racial divide, sparse opportunity, subsistence wages, entrapment welfare, broken homes and education that fails children. We have seen great equalizers expand across America – the Internet, smart phones, and tablets that can make education available to every child, and information available to every adult. As we seek a cure for COVID-19, let’s be sure it is available to every person, not just those who can afford it. That cost has to be borne by drug companies, insurance companies, businesses, and taxpayers. It should be part of the cost of a healthy workforce, healthy homes, and a healthy future.

A great opportunity faces America. Let the 2020’s be a decade of healing, which will usher in a decade of prosperity, a decade of manufacturing and good paying jobs, a decade and more of K-12 education that works for every student, so all households will rise up and lift America to fulfill its promise that all are created equal and have an equal opportunity for life, liberty, and the pursuit of peaceful happiness.

Lewis A. Weiss, Publisher

Lewis A Weiss, Publisher Contact laweiss@mfgtalkradio.com or text “RADIO” to 66866 for comments, suggestions and ideas and guest requests for MFGTALKRADIO.COM podcast.