Entering the unthinkable led by the unconscionable
There are 92,258 Americans dead from the Coronavirus as of Tuesday night. Let me put this number in context. In 2017, the average number of passengers on a U.S. domestic flights was 90.7. That means that the COVID-19 death toll for under three months is the equivalent of more than 1,000 domestic flights crashing with no survivors.
If Covid 19 keeps killing at the same rate it has to date over a full year, COVID deaths would total more than 276,000. And all because of a disease that Donald Trump dismissed as a minor flu.
It may not get quite that bad if we are lucky or if, after all this time, we start getting it right. That seems unlikely given that the administration is laser-focused on “opening the economy” at the cost of letting the pandemic grow. What is clear is that what already is a disaster is sure to become a catastrophe.
The coronavirus is not going to go away by Memorial Day as Vice President Pence claimed in a radio interview with Geraldo Rivera. Nor by the Fourth of July, when Trump would love to have big rallies with his pseudo-patriot base cheering him on.
In fact, spikes in new cases of COVID-19 are being reported across the country that have followed Trump’s mandate to open the country. Over the weekend, cases rose sharply in Miami-Dade County; Texas just experienced its highest number of deaths in a single day; and new hot spots have been identified wherever economic health trumps human health.
And so it goes, as Kurt Vonnegut would have said. Call it Slaughterhouse-19. Right now, the curve of cases and deaths nationally reflects two opposite realities. Areas like the tri-state New York megalopolis that got hit first and hardest have been trending downward for weeks, ever since they put in place mitigation policies like stay at home orders. That is the good news.
The bad news is the curve of cases and deaths is going up fast in states in the South and the Midwest that never took tough mitigation measures and have been dropping those they adopted in pursuit of Trump’s illusory “transition to greatness.”
What sort of greatness is Trump talking about? We already have by far the most pandemic deaths in the world. The only greatness in store for us is the greatest number of deaths of any country in the world. These are the numbers for the countries with the most deaths.
United States 92,258
United Kingdom 34,716
Italy 31,908
France 28,111
But there is still room for more Trump-style greatness.The United States does not have the highest per capita number of deaths. Belgium, for one, has a higher per capita death rate from COVID-19 than this country. But Sweden beats everybody with the highest per capita death rate in the world.
At first blush, this makes no sense. Sweden is a highly advanced country, with universal access to health care, an extensive welfare state style safety net, a high per capita income, low poverty, and a relatively small number of marginalized minorities. So, why Sweden? Thereby hangs a tale that is ominous for the United States.
From day one, Sweden used the approach the United States is now heading toward at warp speed. The Swedes decided essentially to ignore the virus, live normally, keep the economy open, issue no stay at home orders, establish immunity through a survival of the fittest approach (fittest meaning the youngest, the healthiest, and the luckiest), and bury the bodies.
The approach of the United States to COVID-19 has been belated, weak, erratic, deplorable, fragmented, and criminally ineffective. But it was never as calculatedly inhumane and disastrous as Sweden’s. The difference is that in Trump’s dis-United States of America, an incompetent government fortunately was unable to roll out a bad policy efficiently on a national scale.
That in no small measure thanks to the many smart, decent people in this country like Dr. Fauci, Governor Cuomo, Governor Newsom, who were able for a long time to hold their own against Trump and the solar system of toadies who revolve around him like dead stars. They managed to sneak some science and some sense into lunacy. Ultimately, however, they could not overcome.
Now we are heading fast toward Sweden, only in a more disorganized way. It probably will not get as bad here as in Sweden. They got a head start. They carried out a risky field experiment with human lives. We know the results. Now we are carrying out a similar experiment. We will get similar results. Look for per capita deaths here to rise.
Meanwhile, rather than unifying the nation, marshaling all available resources to slow the pandemic, and leading by example, Trump has unleashed the full fury of the most abominable aspect of his warped personality: the vilest vindictiveness.
Like a wounded bull, Trump is a frenzy of rage. It is now all attack and threat: Obama, Biden, China, the World Health Organization, Dr. Fauci, Dr. Bright, the CDC, all the scientists, Inspectors General, Nancy Pelosi; anybody can be a target. Blame anybody to deny that your own denial and delusion has brought death.
This country has been dealing with President Trump’s demented actions and statements for over three years, with awful consequences. But this is the mother of all of Trump’s self-inflicted disasters.
The rest of Trump’s outrages all pale: The illegal killing of an Iranian military commander; the coddling of a Saudi royal who murdered a journalist for an American newspaper; a sham deal with a North Korean despot; a shabby, failed blackmail attempt against a weakened country’s leader to get dirt on a political opponent, and much, much more. So much we forget. Who is Stormy Daniels again?
He did it all and he did it his way, down and dirty. He got away with it, until now. But this time, maybe not. Coronavirus is his first adversary he cannot fire, intimidate, smear, or assassinate. The Coronavirus is the first adversary Trump has faced that has even less empathy than himself. A war between a lethal virus and bloated ego is no contest. The American people are suffering and dying because they have a president at war against everyone and everything except the deadly virus.
