In This Together?

It may be premature, but sooner or later we will all be going back to work. There is no other way, and when we do there will be risks involved. The goal is to minimize them and to create an environment we can operate in and gradually grow into and eventually thrive in.

This has to be approached with care and forethought, weighing each new freedom that is afforded us to make sure it doesn’t spark a new uncontrolled condition that overwhelms our health care system again.

To that end the scientists and medical professionals in the Administration worked hard on a careful, seriously considered plan for a way to emerge from hiding without having to quickly run in again. There are three Phases to the plan, each with qualifying landmarks to either enter the first or proceed to the subsequent steps.

We will look at Phase 1 with a little detail.

The first thing that has to happen under the Plan is that a state must see 14 days of decreasing cases or even symptoms with a continuous or increasing amount of testing to make these determinations. Hospitals must not be in a crisis situation, be able to expand ICU usage quickly and be able to protect their employees by having sufficient supplies of PPE, even in the case of a surge.

Individuals are encouraged (though not required) to wear face masks, wash hands on a fairly continuous basis, avoid touching the face and disinfect the things around you constantly. If feeling ill, stay home. Vulnerable people should still be staying home, and all others should maintain social distancing practices and not socialize in groups greater than ten.

Schools should remain closed in Phase 1 recommendations and visits to hospitals and nursing homes should be prohibited. Elective surgeries can begin again, gyms and large venues can open but only when following strict social distancing guidelines, and bars should remain closed.

Those are the major features of Phase 1. We all will have our quibbles with this or that within it, but the fact is serious consideration was given to these guidelines and if adhered to would go a very long way to getting us going again with a relative amount of safety. The other Phases also have their check points and litmus tests that were not arrived at in a cavalier manner. This was a serious piece of work by professionals that care about the safety and well-being of the American public.

The plan was rolled out at the Coronavirus briefing on April 16th.

Trump attacked his own administration’s plan on April 17th. He called for three states to be “liberated” from the opressive lockdowns – Michigan, Minnesota and Virginia. All had some form of stay at home order in place, and all had Democratic governors. All were states he would need or certainly be helped by in November.

None of them met the qualifying criteria to enter Phase 1.

As far as I know or can remember, the April 16 rollout of the 3 Phase Plan to Open Up America was the last time it was mentioned. It is available on Administration websites, but it has never publicly been referenced again and there is no enforcement of it of any kind. No one has chastised any state for attempting to open before it is deemed safe to do so by the Federal guidelines. The President of the United States has encouraged the states to ignore the document, to open up now and to do it aggressively. The three states he singled out had enjoyed protests by people who were feeling what we are all feeling: financial insecurity, frustration at being isolated, fear of the unknown. These folks decided that their freedom should trump public safety, and some carried semi-automatic weapons to emphasize how serious they were while ironically wearing face masks and gloves to protect themselves from – what? It was unclear what the weapons were for, who or what they would shoot if the shooting imperative was reached. The virus? The Governor? It just wasn’t clear.

What was clear was where their political sympathies lay. Among the many American flags on display there were also more than a smattering of Confederate flags and the occaisional swastika just for good measure.

Oh, and Trump signs. Lots of Trump signs.

So when Trump had to face the crossroads of supporting the incredible team he had working on this viral crisis by encouraging each state to hold themselves accountable to the new guidelines carefully crafted by professionals, or to ignore it and actively tear it down with prejudice, it took him less than 24 hours to come down firmly against his own team.

The decision was very simple. The protestors were all going to vote for him. That was blatantly clear. His pandemic team was a mixed voting block. He tore it all down before the ink was dry on the paper.

Almost no one references the Plan anymore. Certainly not the White House. The press seems not to have noticed that it was announced at all. Occaisionally Dr. Birx will mention it, but only in passing and only when referencing the activities in a state that the President has already villified. Otherwise, it never happened.

This is a real tragedy, as following these imperfect but nevertheless substantial guidelines would have saved countless numbers of lives. That was their sole purpose, crafted with that as the primary goal. It was instantly a punchline to the President, put on a back shelf of a White House website, never to be referred to again.

As Georgia’s Governor Kemp opened up his state before it qualified to enter Phase 1, he ignored the guidelines completely. Bars would open, tatoo parlors, movie theaters, beauty salons, pretty much everything except large sporting events. He probably thought he was going to be the President’s new hero, that it was a savvy political move given POTUS’s proclivities. But the national push-back against the Governor was swift and intense, and the President saw that on TV all day. At first he gently disagreed with the Governor on his excess zeal, thinking the Governor would take the hint. He didn’t. It led to a phone call between the two where they broke into seperate camps over the liberality of the re-opening. I speculated a couple of days ago about what might have been said on the call, but no one really knows.

It is ironic that the first victim of Trump’s betrayal of his own pandemic team was a GOP governor who wanted to please him. The governor was operating on the premise he could get on Trump’s side and leverage that to career gains. The fault in the premise is Trump doesn’t have a side to get on. There is only one person that is ever safe from Trump, and that’s Trump. No others need apply. Things turn on a dime near the Boss.

You can understand the Governor’s confusion. All the public signals coming from the White House indicate GO! You know the litany of justifications. “The people want to work!” “The cure can’t be worse than the disease!” “This country wasn’t built for this!” “We are over the worst. We can’t have our businesses closed.” “We have to get up to capacity, not 25%.” It goes on and on, but no wonder the poor Gov was caught in a trap. The signals were all there that he was making a good move from his perspective.

Never underestimate the duplicity of this President. He will never disappoint you.

The President’s son in law and Senior Advisor Jared Kushner did his version of George W’s Mission Accomplished speech today, crowing about the great victory achieved by the Administration and the incredible success they had achieved. That should be the story written today, he told us. He also crowed about how fast they had rolled out the testing. It had been incredible, he seemed to think.

We passed 1 million cases of coronavirus in the United States, one third of the total cases on the planet, and more than 60,000 have passed, a quarter of the world’s dead, all in less than three months.

If we all agree that the King is naked, I have a way to retrieve a bit of confidence in the government response. Open government facilities and have all our representatves take the same risks the people must take at every re-opened business. Share the burden. Know the fear. A state wants to open? The State House needs to be open too. If we’re in, you’re in. Either we are all privileged or none of us are. All senators and representatives, state or federal, must be at their desks working for the people, just like the deli guy at Krogers.

Too risky?

I feel you.