Politics muddies the waters and often does the greater harm.

Russian President Putin's crass upstaging of globally coordinated research efforts into the Covid-19 virus is a cheap political ploy driven by his need for ego boosting.

No, they weren't wrong to do such research or to seek a solution.

They were just wrong in not sharing their notes with other health agencies to ensure a collective response to the crisis. 

In so doing they rushed it out before it was fully tested, which could ultimately impair the global health network. 

This is not a competition. We all need to solve the world's problems together in the face of a global existential crisis. 

Russia ought by now to know that rushing to show up the world is risky. They skimped in Chernobyl and paid a price and they rushed to upstage the US in the space and arms races. 

That ended up putting Russia in a lesser light, while cycling up arms spending to dangerous levels, at the expense of healthy economies.

But when Russia collaborated with the US on the space station or over nuclear disarmament, the world found peace and progress.

But let's not forget how President Trump tried to upstage China with a trade war he supposedly knew how to fight. 

Except that it backfired and left US farmers and consumers to foot the bill on tariff-increased goods. 

Now that same leader is putting his re-election prospects before the health of a nation by urging a return to work or school ...

... at a time when deaths are rising, again. Indeed, yesterday saw the highest number of deaths since 27 May.  

It is not impossible that Boris Johnson's rush to exit Europe, without a deal, to suit his ideal and his ego, has driven UK GDP growth down by 20% and raised the specter of a Scottish exit. 

And China is just as bad in putting its ideologies ahead of common sense in its heavy-handedness over Hong Kong and the South China Sea. Its backfiring as India, Japan and others turn on China. 

And I must add that President Bolsanaro of Brazil has amplified risks to his people by his laissez faire approach to Covid-19 and his blind insistence on exploiting Amazonia. 

How will the world progress if it reduces to the game board of powerful, ego-dependent leaders? 

How can we ever hope to solve our collective problems if we treat what are otherwise meaningful colleagues in other countries as subjective enemies in our dangerous political games? 

We have one shared biosphere that we all call home and it is in crisis while we knit before gallows. 

Its crazy, but its gradually putting our entire world at risk of the very thing that iniquitous spending on vanities like defense, should avoid. 

(c) Peter Missing @ me2u2all.blogspot.com