WILL AMERICANS INSIST ON HAVING A PRESIDENT THAT TELLS THE TRUTH? FINAL EPISODE

…New York Governor, Andrew Cuomo

Governor Cuomo’s daily press briefings, much better than the president’s

In March, as New York became overrun by the virus, Gov. Cuomo began holding daily press briefings that overshadowed the daily president’s coronavirus campaign update..

Cuomo’s scientifically literate sessions continued to point out, Trump’s constant failings.

Cuomo was particularly cutting when it came to Trump’s refusal to send enough ventilators to his state.

“How can we be in a situation where you have New Yorkers possibly dying because they can’t get a ventilator, but a federal agency is saying ‘I’m going to leave the ventilators in the stockpile,’ ” Cuomo said. “I mean, have we really come to that point?”

Trump’s disregard for New York was clear everywhere, including the $150 billion “Coronavirus Relief Fund” that was part of the $2.2 trillion package that was passed by Congress in March.

New York, which accounted for almost half of the nation’s coronavirus cases at the time the bill passed, and they had and more than one-third of its deaths.  New York was due to receive just 5% of the money, or $7.5 billion (The state of Washington, governed by what Trump called that “snake,” Jay Inslee, only got 2%, or $2.9 billion).

When the use of masks spiked at New York hospitals, Trump had the gall to speculated that masks may be “going out the back door,” suggesting they are being stolen.

But Cuomo tried to take the high road.

“Now is the time to gather supplies, do the preparations, because it’s too late the day before,” Cuomo said, in all but lecturing Trump saying. “Stop the politics. Listen to the scientists and plan, because otherwise . . .people will die who don’t need to die. That’s the real bottom line.”

Cuomo and other governors then pushed Trump to use the Defense Production Act,

which would allow him to have manufacturers to produce ventilators, masks, and other protective gear.

But Trump as usual, stalled, preferring to rely on voluntary measures.

Jared Kushner set up his own shadowy task force in the White House to try to sort things out, but of course that just added to the chaos. “It’s supposed to be our stockpile,” Kushner said at a White House briefing, sounding like a five-year-old defending his toys.

“It’s not supposed to be the states’ stockpiles that they can then use.”

By early April, the national stockpile was gone, and the US

was forced to fly in planeloads of supplies from, of all places, China.

However, instead of being distributed by the federal government,

the states had to bid for the equipment on the open market, often at 2 to 5 times the price.

And still, the shortage was very serious. Doctors were creating makeshift ventilators out of garden hoses and lamp timers.  Some medical workers were forced to wear plastic garbage bags as protective gowns.  And the pandemic was still growing. As Cuomo warned, “A tsunami is coming.”  For Trump, the tsunami hit on March 31st, when he stood in the White House briefing room and said that modeling suggested between 100,000 and 240,000 Americans could die in this pandemic.

A week later, thanks to strict social-distancing that was pushed by the infectious disease experts, projections were lowered to 60,400 deaths by the end of August, which Trump tried to spin as some kind of victory….?   Even in a best-case scenario, he is likely to see the deaths of as many Americans as the country endured in World War I and more than 10 times as many that died in Iraq and Afghanistan combined.

Does Trump look back with regret at his dishonesty and inaction?

Oh no, he’s now trying to recast himself as the hero of the pandemic.

“Any normal politician would be worried about saying anything wrong about a disease like this,” says Ben Rhodes. “Trump, because he has an incapacity to be shamed, clearly felt a certain freedom to just stand up there and lie or tweet things that weren’t true, because he knew in his mind that, if this does get bad, I can always rewrite the history of it.”

This story is far from over. This pandemic is not going to end in a week, or a month, maybe a year or more.  It’s then going to run through Africa and Latin America and other poor, communities around the world.

There will be economic wars and lost loved ones.  There is some hope that new anti-viral drugs will help protect people from the virus, similar to the way Tamiflu treats flu and they might stop some outbreaks.

But the pandemic will not end until a real vaccine is developed, which is, a best-case scenario, they say at least a year away.  Until then, the agenda of Trump and his allies in the Republican Party and Fox News will probably be to not accept any responsibility for this mess.  This is, just as they have not taken the responsibility for everything from massive tax cuts for the rich, and to the climate issues.

Look for more China bashing from Trump, more conspiracy threats from Fox, more Obama blaming, and more trillion-dollar bailouts.  Look for more rash regulatory moves, such as the EPA’s recent cut-back of vehicle emission standards.  This will lead of course, to more air pollution at the exact time when Americans are living through a virus that attacks their lungs.

But this will transform in ways that no one can see right now.  In dark times like these, when the suffering is so large and the grief is overwhelming.  This is when America’s better angels tend to appear.  By the time this is over, Americans will hopefully come to the new conclusions about listening to the scientists.  And about the dangers of going it alone in the world. 

But most of all, hopefully all Americans will see the virtues of having a real president who is capable of telling us all, the truth.

Copyright G. Ater 2020