MCDONALD'S POSTS SALES GROWTH

            I've always said we'll know our side is getting traction when McDonald's starts suffering significant market decline over the long term.  No business is assured perpetual success.  And no business should be too big to fail.  Bailouts, whether auto makers, bankers, or cities simply prop up failed policies and protocols.

             Today's news that McDonald's posted a 4.6 percent sales increase in the last quarter shows the lopsided beneficiaries of this Covid fiasco.  I know of no artisanal integrity restaurant that has thrived during this crisis.  I'm sure there is one somewhere, but I don't know about it.  Many have already or will collapse completely.

             Looking back on the policies emanating from government officials, it's clear that any eatery with a take-out window was able to handle things better than those that don't have one.  Slicing through an entire business sector like this, arbitrarily helping one model and hurting another model, is unconscionable.

             If the government had made no edicts, eateries with in-house dining could have made their own decisions about what to do.  Some no doubt would have closed.  But some could have taken an aggressive stance:  "We're serving food that builds your immune system and we think paranoia reduces immune function, so we're soldiering on and invite anyone with the spirit of D-Day to join us.  If you'd rather enjoy socializing than sequestering, we're glad to serve you. "

             This narrative may or may not have worked; we'll never know because nobody was allowed to try.  My mother, soon to be 97, has this to say about masking and sequestering:  "We took Iwo Jima and Normandy and I'm certainly not going to flee in the face of the coronavirus.  When a bullet's meant for me, it'll find me."

             This is not fatalistic or reckless; it's a spirit of courage and affirmation.  The government's involvement and edicts preclude those of us who would rather face this with faith and positivity from being able to express our character.  People will respond to information.  I wear a seatbelt not because it's a regulation, but because I saw too many horror films in high school driver's ed class showing bodies flung from cars.

             Ditto motorcycle helmets.  When we collectivize responsibility we eliminate individual responsibility.  When history writes this chapter, I think the death toll from Covid-19 will pale in comparison to the rapid unprecedented extension of big brother into our personal lives and businesses.  The arbitrary edicts keeping beer stores and abortion clinics open while closing churches, keeping Wal-Mart open while closing farmers' markets, declaring one job essential and another one nonessential--this radical restructuring of society through mandates will be the story of the ages.  Looking back, we'll either see this as the event that destroyed the American civilization or the one that awakened a new desire for personal responsibility and liberty.

             Which do you think it will be?