WAPO OP ED: Imagine if Trump were actually running things

[lindysalsagal]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/03/30/imagine-if-trump-were-actually-running-things/

By Jennifer Rubin Opinion writer March 30, 2020 at 12:30 p.m. EDT

President Trump seems to think he should have unfettered control over the country. Anyone who questions him or contradicts him is an enemy of the people or “a sick puppy,” as he called the head of an equal branch of government, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), on Monday. Thank goodness he does not have such power and that governors, Congress and his own medical advisers (when acting forcefully and in concert) restrain, block or work around him.

Consider his ill-conceived deadline for returning to business as usual by Easter. It was a dictate without force of law; governors have imposed a patchwork of stay-at-home measures that they, not Trump, will relax when they see fit. His decision over the weekend to change his imaginary deadline to a new imaginary date, April 30, provides him with a political escape hatch but carries no more weight than did the Easter deadline.

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Left to Trump’s own devices we know exactly what would occur at the federal level: nothing. For at least two months, he did not ramp up to meet the crisis, bollixed testing and blamed the media. As the virus has spread, he has refused to accept that the pandemic he made worse has no predictable end. He has ridiculed calls for help from states.

In short, if Trump had his way, we would be at that worst case scenario — “1.6 million to 2.2 million” dead, according to Birx. We now face the monstrous reality that 100,000 to 200,000 dead may be the best we can do. Left unsaid by Trump’s advisers: Many of these deaths will be the minimum price we pay for Trump’s utter incompetence and willful blindness.