This week's biggest stories involved the protests against shelter-in-place orders in several state capitals (including N.C), which Trump tweeted his support for despite the recommendations from his administration that those orders not yet be rescinded. I think most people recognize these protesters (some of whom intentionally disregarded physical distancing ordinances) are idiots. But the numbers are starting to bear out that significant numbers of people are not taking physical distancing seriously enough. For one, N.C.'s number of new cases per week actually increased last week despite my hope last week that it was plateauing. And similar things are happening in many other places around the country, urban, suburban, and rural. Though case numbers are not exploding most places, the R-naught is still above 1 in many locales-- and we STILL don't have enough testing capacity to know even a ballpark figure on numbers of true cases. Though officially around 730,000, I'd bet that well over 2 million have actually contracted the virus.
Which brings me to the question: when to relax restrictions. The biggest limitation in our ability to relax restrictions is our testing incapacity. Hotspots will be missed for too long if we open up in the next few weeks before we have the ability to test enough people with enough frequency. And since new cases are still increasing week-to-week in many parts of the country even with our current restrictions, there's no question that many locales will see a major surge in new cases if enough people stop physical distancing. So in my mind, most of us have another month of this before we can even think about turning the lights back on.
I'd also like to offer my thoughts on the initial $2.2 trillion stimulus package, and the upcoming packages that are currently held up in Congress. Firstly, it's startling how quickly we burned through that much money. It's also frustrating that so much went to corrupt big business, and that basically no strings were attached-- but I get that they just wanted to get the money out the door to avoid widespread bankruptcies. The Community Care Clinic and several of my friends have benefitted from the relief package, so even though my job hasn't been hit, the stimulus does hit pretty close to home. Hopefully the next bill(s) will be more small-business- and environmentally- friendly. And it seems obvious that people and businesses will need much more money from the federal government over the coming months to keep the lights on and food on the table.
It's remarkable that Republicans have been so willing to pass large stimulus packages this time around after rebuffing Obama for additional aid after the initial $1 trillion package was passed in 2009. The obvious reason for the difference is that they wanted Obama to look responsible for a shaky recovery, while they certainly want to give the economy every chance to get back on track by November for political reasons (ie to effect Trump's reelection and Republican congressional victories). It's also remarkable that there are essentially no public voices condemning the aid, except probably a few hard-core libertarians. This belies the libertarian case for pure free markets. If we didn't have a government that could send out checks right now, the entire economy would crash and burn, with an enormous human toll. Much as my former self hates to say it, we desperately need the government right now. Although we will have to pay the price in the future.
It's simply cruel that Trump (who still has no coherent plan to face this crisis and whose approach has been to assume that nature will simply bend to his will, then blame everyone else when things go poorly) is in charge of said government, rather than someone like Elizabeth Warren who came up with a very impressive plan back in JANUARY. If we could roll the tape back to January and put her in charge, literally thousands of dead Americans would be alive today, billions of dollars would have been saved, and we would not be facing many more weeks of physical distancing. Once you read her plan, you'll realize that what I just claimed is as close to a fact as one can get in the realm of hypotheticals. The inadequacy and incompetence of the Trump administration's response remains staggering, and it's not getting any better with time.
Politically, Trump disastrous response to the pandemic has the significant potential silver lining of making him less likely to be reelected in November. Millions of people and the economy as a whole will almost certainly still be suffering no matter how many bills get passed. And the economy in the 6 months leading up to an election is the most important factor in whether a president gets reelected. I hate to get my hopes up about the Senate flipping to Democrat, but I am saying there's more of a chance for that, too. If someone like Corey Booker rather than Joe Biden was the nominee, I'd feel even better about the chances of those things coming to pass.
Stepping off my political soapbox... it's been a nice week around here. I had the whole week off, spent a lot of quality time with the baby, and Mindy and I got a lot done around the house. The vegetable garden is getting off to a good start, the mulch is getting spread, and we are having rock steps put into our side gardens, which has been one of Mindy's dreams since we moved into the house. We've enjoyed watching Boone UMC's live-streamed services every Sunday, and are keeping up with people pretty well with phone calls and video chats. Things have settled into a rhythm. And I've had a little time to literally dream and engage in a few Active Imagination sessions-- more of that to come shortly!
Stay well, stay calm, and keep up that physical distancing.
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