Yesterday Vice President Mike Pence visited the Mayo Clinic to do a photo op with recovering Covid-19 patients. Despite being advised by Clinic administration that all patients, staff, and visitors must wear face masks at all times, the Vice President opted not to wear one and be seen on TV defying the hospital rules.
Seriously?
What kind of message does that send to Americans about this pandemic? That we should disregard the advice of our medical professionals? That Covid-19 is not really a health threat?
Seriously?
Almost 60,000 of our citizens have died from this virus in a little over two months…and that happened despite lockdowns, “stay in place”, and “social distancing” measures. More people have died from this scourge in 60 days than died in battle during the seven long years of the War in Vietnam.
And, we’re not done with this “war”: two thousand Americans are still dying each day.
Of course, Pence and his boss, President Trump, have never taken the coronavirus pandemic seriously. For two months, in January and February, the Administration denied that there was a problem at all. Then, in March, the official line was “it’s one guy from China”, “we’ve got this under control”, and “it will just go away in the Spring”.
It didn’t go away, and it’s not going away anytime soon.
It appears that the Trump Administration’s standard operation procedure of lying and machismo is, in fact, the Federal “plan” to defeat this biological threat.
“We will just pretend that it doesn’t exist and we’ll convince citizens of that by not wearing face masks” appears to be Step 1 of the Plan.
Step 2 is apparently the Trump’s public posturing that there is sufficient testing going on to determine the extent of the pandemic. The Administration is now bragging that the United States has tested more people than any other country…which is blatantly false. Only 1 percent of Americans have been tested thus far, and medical professionals throughout the country are BEGGING for test kits, swabs, and reagents to accomplish their mission. Trump has lateraled the testing football to the states…without adequate Federal assistance…and then declared victory.
Step 3 of the Trump plan was for the Coronavirus Task Force to adopt recommendations on how States should cautiously re-open the economy, and, then…immediately begin public pressure on State governors to re-open the economy without following the Task Force recommendations.
Seriously.
That is the kind of leadership that we’ve all come to expect in this country during the past three years: “Winging it”, blowing off science in favor of quackery, and making decisions based on belief and “gut” instead of facts.
And, then, having the President of the United States act like a fool on TV spouting whatever nonsense comes to his head while talking to the American people.
Wear a face mask? The President announced a long time ago that he would not do so…but the rest of us should, he noted…with a wink.
More and more people are out in public right now, following the example set by our President and Vice President. The message is clear…they don’t take the coronavirus threat seriously.
What will it take? 100,000 dead? 150,000? A million?
The evening news this week shows thousands of people at the beach, 200 people partying in a house, an airplane full of passengers without face masks, a huge mob of Orthodox Jews congregating in Brooklyn for a funeral in defiance of “stay at home” orders, and numerous protest rallies at State capitols. They, like the President, are saying “Fuck it!”, as if Mr. Covid-19 can hear them…or cares.
Woe unto us if this pandemic starts to flare up again. With all the effort, sacrifice, and valor that our medical professionals have applied to this disaster, it would be unthinkable that we would have to ask them, once again, to put themselves out there on the front lines for us.
If we don’t take this pandemic seriously, how can we expect them to do so?