By Denny Gulino
WASHINGTON (MaceNews) – By one count there were 2,174 virus deaths in the United States in the latest 24 hours, not the worst day this week, yet the question that suggests itself is whether Thursday was the best day to encourage governors to start planning for recovery.
“Our experts say the curve has flattened and the peak in new cases is behind us,” President Trump said in his evening presidential news conference. “Corona Virus Task Force briefing” is so Wednesday, a term left behind by the White House.
“Nationwide, more than 850 counties, or nearly 30 percent of our country, have reported no new cases in the last seven days,” he added.
That brought to mind the words often quoted in different situations, “The best policy is to declare victory and leave.”
Those words are often attributed to Republican Sen. George Aiken who represented Vermont for 34 years until he retired in 1975. Described as neither a hawk nor a dove on the Vietnam War he nevertheless thought it best just to pick up and leave.
As is often the case with pithy phrases attributed to people long gone, after time has polished the phrases and made them more quotable, Aiken, it seems, never uttered those words. But his actual rambling remarks added up to the same thing.
The United States had the choice whether to stay or leave Vietnam. Neither choice would imperil national security. In Afghanistan, it could be argued in light of modern history, that leaving entirely could leave available a base for another 9/11-type plot. Still, there’s plenty of room for choice and now, with the virus complicating things, the U.S. is taking the opportunity to draw down some more.
To governors’ mansions around the country President Trump Thursday presented the challenge. On Wednesday it was presented in different form, with thousands circling the statehouse in Lansing, chanting “Lock Her Up.” The governor had added new restrictions on travel and business. Many of the demonstrators were wearing “MAGA” hats.
Asked his opinion Thursday evening, Trump refrained from any criticism and instead offered sympathy.
“They’ve been going through it a long time,” he said, “and it’s been a tough process for people. You know, I told you this: There’s death and there’s problems in staying at home too. It’s not just, ‘Isn’t it wonderful to stay at home?’ They’re having — they’re suffering.”
Republican governors might feel almost duty bound or at least tribally inclined to find a way to start the phases outlined at the White House. Democratic governors might be inclined to show they are independent of White House pressure and take their time, regardless of the facts, as they say, on the ground.
On the sidelines dozens, maybe hundreds, of Twitter feeds of conservative groups and MAGA hat wearers calling for the mitigation guidelines to be ignored, calling for more demonstrations in different states, a couple of which happened Thursday. So far, besides in Michigan, protestors have assembled in Kentucky, Ohio, Utah, North Carolina and Minnesota.
The question, however, that is most pertinent does not correlate with party affiliation. It is whether in this particular case, is there even a choice? Can a governor declare victory and leave even if the virus has not yet reached the state in any force?
Can a governor embrace the recovery phases knowing there’s a national shortage of, what? – swabs. The little Popsicle-stick-like devices to stick up noses in search of virus particles are apparently hard to find. As noted earlier this week, total virus tests being performed in the country first leveled off and then have declined.
Certainly in New York and New Jersey where the 30-day guidelines have already been extended two weeks into May, there is no choice and even the president is not expecting an early move into Phase 1. The next phases, II and Phase III may be months away.
“Look, New York, New Jersey are having very tough times,” Trump said. “They’ll be there at some point. But they’re not going to be one of the earlier states; they’re going to be later, obviously.”
For the 20 to 29 states the president sees as candidates to move along, maybe May 1 or later. Or maybe earlier. Or maybe … “They will be able to go literally tomorrow, yes – because they’ve met all of the guidelines if you go back — you’re going back 14 days, you’re going back even a month,” the president said.
That’s one of the requirements insisted on by the Task Force medical experts, at least two weeks of improvement in new cases. The president, to his credit, decided not to use his “very powerful” authority and said he’ll leave the pace of recovery up to governors.
Some states, “the ones that I’m thinking about, the ones that I’ve already spoken to governors about — they’ve met those guidelines, actually, pretty long ago,” Trump said.
A little fuzzy about those new guidelines? Weren’t paying attention? Here’s the link the White House provided to see those slides presented at the news conference: https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Guidelines-for-Opening-Up-America-Again.pdf
None of the few reporters present for the news conference asked the bottom-line question. What minimal level of American deaths is tolerable as different states move through the guideline phases at their own pace? Is there a line if crossed that would blow the whistle on the entire exercise?
Remember Singapore? Tiny Singapore was among the first to employ contact tracing, able to pinpoint clusters of virus victims and find out who they brushed against. Quick isolation of the carriers with no symptoms, those who are the tip of the spear for the pandemic, is key to fencing it in.
That was then. Now, in the past day, a record number of new cases, 447. Like nursing homes in the United States, there was what N.Y. Gov. Andrew Cuomo called “dry grass” that once ignited, quickly spread contagion in Singapore. So now its second wave is fueled by dormitories for the guest workers from India and Bangladesh and again, all those in Singapore are newly threatened.
Tribally inclined? Is there palpable partisan pressure to get businesses reopened? Do all those Twitter feeds mean anything to Republican governors?
What if the country was not riven by a big partisan divide that’s a way of life, of thought, of visceral reaction for so many people who gleefully return to keyboards again and again, especially now when they’re stuck at home, to eviscerate the enemy in well-chosen bons mots?
Which brings us back to Sen. Aiken. “If we were to wake up some morning and find that everyone was the same race, creed and color, we would find some other causes for prejudice by noon.” He was simply acknowledging the basic need to align with some greater cause, if it’s nothing more than to pillory someone, some policy, some political affiliation that can be construed to be in opposition to all that’s good and right in the world.
Which finally brings us back to President Trump, a veteran practitioner of the divisive arts – and for many that’s a compliment. He sent a signal early in the day that he’s near agreement with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on adding another $250 billion to the Paycheck Protection fund. For any small- to medium-sized business that didn’t get their application in by Wednesday night, the wait is just beginning.
Among Washington tribes the signal for impending agreement is to attack the person with whom you’re negotiating in the harshest terms possible, wringing every bit of partisan juice from the situation before everyone signs on the dotted line.
So for Trump, it was a morning tweet about the Speaker which said in part, “She’s an incompetent, third-rate politician!”
For Pelosi, returning the favor in her weekly briefing Thursday, all the president has done “is to make matters worse.” The reopening initiative “sounds careless” and, “The president continues to wage an assault on the truth.”
Wait, just in, China’s Wuhan, the city where the pandemic got its start, has just revised the death toll there by 1,290, to 3,869..
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Contact this reporter: denny@macenews.com