It should have been a 9/11 moment in America. A WWII-like show of national unity. And make no mistake, there is plenty of “Let’s put our differences and politics aside and work through this together” going on around the nation since the Covid 19 pandemic invaded our land. But there exists a sizable and very angry and vocal minority who have effectively turned a public health crisis and national emergency into another chance to throw one of their juvenile temper tantrums, throwing around words like “liberty” and “tyranny” while having not the slightest clue as to the nuanced meanings of these important concepts. If you ever would have told me that the simple and empirically effective tactics of social distancing and mask-wearing in public would become a political and cultural war, I would have requested that you share whatever you were smoking. But look at the protests, social media assaults, and yes, real assaults that are occurring daily because some dumb, impotent, assault weapon-toting white assholes, who have never tasted real oppression in their lives, are throwing hissy-fits over not being able to visit the barber shop or tattoo parlor. Oh, the tyranny!
Although admittedly suffering a bad case of “outrage fatigue” like most conscious Americans, I truly never thought it possible to rise to the DEFCON 1-like level of total absurdity to which the current administration has sunk. Ignoring specific and repeated warnings from medical experts and scientists from around the world for almost two months, not even trying to conceive, much less implement, a plan to prepare the nation they supposedly serve, and blatantly lying about the nature and scope of the pandemic, Trump and his cult have unquestionably promulgated a disaster of cosmic proportion, the effects of which will be felt for years, if not decades.
And it continues.
Week after week over the last three months, the situation has worsened, and to a degree far outstripping our worst original fears. And we get nothing but lies, incompetence, and stupidity from our so-called leaders. Lies like claiming the virus is under control, that no one could have ever predicted such a thing and blaming the previous administration for their lack of preparedness (the Obama administration left a 69-page playbook literally titled “Playbook for Early Response to High-Consequence Emerging Infectious Disease Threats and Biological Incidents”), among literally hundreds of others. Incompetence like utterly failing to get out in front of the virus’ spread by aggressively pursuing and implementing a national testing plan, completely botching the acquisition and distribution of PPE and other medical supplies without any kind of coordinated plan, going so crazy far as to have Jared Kushner construct a shadow organization to control said distribution. (Not to put too fine a point on it, but Kushner has zero experience in this field and completely blew the mission.) And stupidity? Too harsh? How about repeated claims that the virus would “disappear like magic”, that “no one understands what the virus is “(we do), and of course, possibly the dumbest thing Trump has ever said – and that’s a high bar – which deserves to be quoted in full:
"So I asked Bill a question some of you are thinking of if you're into that world, which I find to be pretty interesting. So, supposing we hit the body with a tremendous, whether its ultraviolet or just very powerful light, and I think you said, that hasn't been checked but you're gonna test it. And then I said, supposing it brought the light inside the body, which you can either do either through the skin or some other way, and I think you said you're gonna test that too, sounds interesting. And I then I see the disinfectant, where it knocks it out in one minute, and is there a way you can do something like that by injection inside, or almost a cleaning. Because you see it gets in the lungs, and it does a tremendous number on the lungs. So it'd be interesting to check that. So you're going to have to use medical doctors, but it sounds interesting to me, so we'll see. But the whole concept of the light, the way it goes in one minute, that's pretty powerful."
Absent a vaccine or even a proven drug therapy, we know how to confront this pandemic. We know from the success of many other countries, who (all but one, Sweden) have committed to early and aggressive testing, tracing, and isolating, immediate near-total lockdown, and a national commitment to social distancing and mask-wearing. What we have implemented on a completely scattershot basis due to the absence of any national plan has been weak, incomplete, and only partially effective. Where other countries have made a national commitment to eradicating Covid 19 from their nation, our catastrophic failure to act early and decisively has doomed us to mitigation efforts to “flatten the curve.” That this is the best we can do is a direct result of the president’s failure to lead.
And what to make of his constantly changing and frequently contradictory statements on the coronavirus? Searching for some thread of consistency in his typically unhinged remarks and tweets, I have noticed a few things. First, he has never really believed in testing, primarily because it will make his “numbers” look worse. Face it folks, he doesn’t care a whit about you, me, or how many people die. It’s obviously all about his reelection, which looks increasingly unlikely. Second, he is an anti-vaxxer, and has been for years. He has frequently claimed that both testing and vaccination are highly overrated, and that “we may not even need a vaccine.” And third, it is painfully obvious that he does not believe in even the weak and unspecific guidelines that came from his own task force. A very interesting editorial in the New York Times last week by Thomas Friedman (I am not normally a fan) posited: Has Trump Decided to Follow Sweden and Just Not Told Us? Friedman says:
“Sweden has chosen moderate social distancing, keeping a lot of its economy open, while trying to protect the most vulnerable and letting those least vulnerable — those most likely to experience the coronavirus either asymptomatically or as a mild or tough flu — continue to work, get the virus and develop immunity to it. Then, when enough of them are immune, they can sound the all-clear for the vulnerable. That’s Sweden’s strategy, but it is too early to say it’s the right answer.
If you listened to Trump last week you heard a president who was all over the place. One day he talked as though he wanted to follow Sweden in getting a lot of people back to work, even if many more would get infected. Another day, he boasted that we’re testing just like China — only more so. Another day he disputed the need for testing at all.
In brief: Trump talks like China, envies Sweden, prepares for neither and insists that his strategy is superior to both."
I think Trump is trapped. He's doing his best to distract the populace with his shiny objects, the latest and most ridiculous of which is his Obamagate fantasy. He knows there will more deaths, and probably lots more, but he feels that he needs the economy to rebound if he is to have any chance at all in the fall. How else to explain the “opening” of the country, when not a single state has achieved even phase one of the three-phase guidelines provided by the task force. As I’ve written before, the choice between battling the pandemic and restoring the economy is a false and dangerous one. Virtually every expert has decried this move. Even Time Magazine, in their May cover story, weighs in with an article called “There’s a Right Way to Reopen America: This Isn’t It.” But even the liberal media like CNN, as they report the experts’ opinion, will not come out and say the truth: this is suicide for the America we know and love. Plus, the disinformation, already an epidemic on its own, has worsened. Completely predictably, people are already pointing at the lack of a spike in infections in Georgia, the poster child for stupidity in “reopening, after just one week. The incubation period for Covid 19 is up to two weeks. You don’t have to be a scientist to figure out what happens next.
I am typically a glass-half-full optimist, but the only slight ray of hope I see is that maybe enough people will be smart enough to wear masks and continue rigorous social distancing and lobbying their leadership for a real testing regimen for workplaces and particularly schools. In fact, over two thirds (68%) of Americans feel that the states are relaxing restrictions too soon.
Trump famously claimed that he could "stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody" and "not lose any voters." Epidemiologists have estimated the 90% of the deaths in the USA form Covid 19 could have been prevented by early action from the national leadership. Today we stand at 86,537 deaths in the USA; 90% of that number is 77,883. To the Trump cult and the conscience-challenged Republican party, I say: Maybe your boy could shoot "somebody" and not lose your vote, but what if he let 77,883 of your fellow American die in loneliness and agony?
Does he still get your vote?
Portland, OR
May 15, 2020
