These governors re-opening their states without even trying to put together a working testing plan is an absurdity that even I am struggling to comprehend. They better pray that people just self-isolate on their own, but the most likely scenario is that they are going to use the fact that the current shutdown stalled the virus to crow for the next two months that this wasn’t as bad as everyone said, and when the deaths (which are a lagging indicator) finally come due in July and August and the hospitals collapse it will all be the Democrats fault somehow. They certainly aren’t going to shutdown everything twice when they are proven wrong, to be this catastrophically incompetent twice in a row would be political suicide.
They have made the determination that a million deaths is a small price to pay for their re-election.
Just remember in November that: A) The Republican party under Trump spent 2 years gutting pandemic response; B) They dithered for 2 months claiming it wasn’t as bad as we thought and failed to get testing rolled out; and C) They have decided instead of owning their mistake and doing the right thing, they are going to reopen everything and let people die on the long-shot crap-shoot that they can somehow spin this and the economy will magically come back before November.
I am sure the states that are staying shutdown and have pacted together to coordinate re-opening are going to have to block transit from these other states somehow mid-summer. I look forward to seeing why that’s a violation of constitutional rights and how everyone in those states needs to put up with the infections from some moron in Florida who happens to have a summer home up north.
Jade Zahreddine Member, Madison County Democratic Executive Committee