These are my observations and opinions from my select news of the day.
TOLD YOU SO – I cannot count the times I’ve remarked that no matter what President Trump does or says, he can’t win. In my most recent recollection, I mentioned the criticism in store for him if the virus outbreak picked up once he opened the country for business.
Yesterday, I wrote how the media was again taken aback by his decision to listen to the advice of scientists and medical experts. After cleverly stirring them up with talk of his authority, they were sure that this “know it all businessman” would ignore expert advice and tell Americans to go about their normal daily activities.
After days of consultation with health experts and all of the state governors, he announced his Guidelines for Opening Up America Again, a phased-in approach to open the country based on the evidence of good science and a touch of common sense.
After Dr. Deborah Birx presented the details of the phase-in, the preparedness steps required to before reopening could take place, Dr. Anthony Fauci fully endorsed it.
The media was clearly caught off-guard, evident in their questioning, although they still concocted questions that simply could not be answered at that point in time, like ‘when will we be able to go to a concert or ball game.’
When they heard that 29 states were close to reopening, they pressed for the names of those states. No dice.
As I listened to the president reveal his decision, I detected an air of disappointment, yet an assuredness that it was the correct decision. Missing was his usual upbeat delivery. It was visible, too, as he stood to the side while Birx and Fauci were speaking. His aspirational dates for reopening the country had come and gone.
Although he’s still new to politics, he’s a quick learner. He knows that in about six months he will be judged, in part, by the success of his efforts to get the economy back on track. But his instincts told him that a premature opening leading to new outbreaks would be disastrous. It explains why the governors are on the hook as partners in the phase-in process.
There are sufficient ventilators out there, considering we are already sending them to other countries. Some states are sending their unneeded ventilators to states in need. Hospital capacities seem to be meeting the needs as field hospitals are not being fully utilized and others have been cancelled
Masks, too, and hand-sanitizer supplies have multiplied to meet the needs of first responders and hospital workers, but not so for the general public.
Testing capabilities are expanding across the country, but still represent the greatest need if reopening is going to be a success.
Nancy Pelosi wants “the president to guarantee Americans a safe reentry into their normal life,” something she knows isn’t possible. She sees this as an opportunity to blame the natural course of a disease on the White House, according to Kimberly A. Strassel in the Wall Street Journal.
Clearly, Americans are tiring of sheltering at home, and having the government dictate their movements, and it goes beyond those you saw demonstrating in Michigan his week. Their personal freedoms and religious practices in the Bill of Rights and Constitution are being infringed.
John Hinderaker of PowerLine, who I often quote, caught my eye with his piece headlined, “We are Needlessly Devastating our Country.” He shares with his readers, e-mail exchanges he has had with an east coast college professor about the shutdown.
“I am having real difficulties watching the country destroy itself and its future in an effort to do something that has never been successfully done in the history of the world,” she wrote, “distance people from other people in society sufficiently and for sufficiently long in order to stamp out or control the spread of a virus.
“We will fail at this, and in our future we will have destroyed the livelihoods of a vast share of Americans (and the world’s) people, along with their children’s futures.”
The professor voices beliefs that many of us have considered. “There will be great, inevitable economic damage from the pandemic,” she says and we compound it by staying at home and shutting everything down.
“People should be able to consider their own risks,” she believes, “as long as hospitals aren’t at risk of being overwhelmed.
“Restaurants and bars should be free to test the market,” providing safe distance seating and assuring patrons of super clean surroundings in dining area and in the area of food preparation.
It’s important that all of us continue to practice safe distancing and proper hygiene in the weeks ahead, but understand that this will not kill the virus, it will only slow down the spread; to give hospitals breathing room should they be overwhelmed with virus patients. It appears that they are not.
We are already hearing about some of the states repealing pieces of their shutdown orders, and I think we will see more taking place as governors restore their backbones.
BEWARE of the fake news outlets reporting that 66 percent of Americans say they are concerned that the government’s restrictions will be lifted too quickly. The data comes from a Pew Research Center survey conducted before Thursday’s announcement – between April 7 and 12, 2020.
You should also know that the left is at work, trying to convince Democrats that President Trump is moving too quickly – 81 percent.
THE VIRUS BRIEFINGS have been the bane of the left-leaning media that view them as campaign rallies for President Trump, and they want to see them end.
NBC’s Katy Tur put her intellect out there for all to see in social media when she tweeted @KatyTurNBC: “Keep in mind, Americans are dying during these briefings. During yesterday’s briefing, between 5:30 and 7:45, there were 93 reported deaths.”
To which, Steven L. Miller responded @redsteeze: “Katy Tur has had a daily show since January of 2017, roughly 3 years. That’s essentially 8 million deaths since she’s been on the air. More than Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot. Katy Tur belongs next to history’s greatest monsters.”
MORE POLITICAL CORRECTNESS – Perhaps you haven’t heard that the makers of Land O Lakes butter have removed the Indian maiden from the label, the centerpiece of the company’s logo for 100 years.
Eunice (Abraham) Davidson of the Spirit Lake Sioux tribe in North Dakota said she’s “tired of Native American imagery being expunged from the national consciousness.”
Land O Lakes Inc, the Minnesota-based agribusiness, commented only that it saw a need to seek different packaging without saying why.
I prefer that response to that of Minnesota Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan, a Democrat, who tweeted @LtGovFlan: “Thank you to Land O Lakes for making this important and needed change. Native people are not mascots or logos.”
May God continue to bless the United State of America.
