Astonishingly united
MAY 6, 2020
David A. Graham
... What if government reopened the country, and no one came?
A poll from The Washington Post and the University of Maryland released yesterday finds that eight in 10 Americans oppose reopening movie theaters and gyms; three-quarters don’t support letting sit-down restaurants and nail salons reopen; and a third or less would allow barber shops, gun stores, and retail stores to operate. An NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll last week found similar numbers: Nine in 10 Americans don’t think sporting events should have crowds without more testing; 85 percent would keep schools closed, and 80 percent would keep dine-in restaurants shut. There is no significant difference in views between residents of states that have begun loosening restrictions and those that have not ...
The result is all the more striking because views on Trump’s handling of the crisis follow the usual pattern, remaining deeply split along partisan lines. The Post/University of Maryland poll found 56 percent disapproving and 44 percent approving of his response to the coronavirus. The approval numbers closely track Trump’s overall job-approval rating, which has remained strikingly stable throughout his volatile presidency. In pandemic-related polls, Republicans approve of Trump’s handling of the crisis much more highly than Democrats do. Democrats are more likely to identify themselves as worried about the virus than Republicans, and Republicans are more likely to approve of opening business than Democrats—in some cases significantly so. Yet even then, majorities of Republicans only support reopening retail shops and golf courses, the same sorts of businesses that most Americans overall want to open. The polling suggests that there’s a sizable tranche of Americans who approve of Trump’s handling of the pandemic but do not agree with his calls for a swift reopening ...
... people are heeding the experts on the coronavirus. Faced with a choice between Trump’s Pollyannaish declarations of victory and Anthony Fauci’s measured realism, which often stands in direct contradiction to the president, Americans are following Fauci and his colleagues. That doesn’t mean that expertise is back in vogue; it may mean only that Americans are willing to hear experts out when they’re terrified and disoriented. But for the time being, they are deferring to their knowledge ...
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/05/what-if-they-reopened-country-and-no-one-came/611182/
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