Hypotheical question

[ArtD]

SUPPOSE the leader of some country in a pandemic, downplayed the danger, lied, and discouraged people from wearing masks.
SUPPOSE as a result about 200,000 people died instead of perhaps the 100,000 that would have died anyway.

Would it be unchristian to wish on that leader the same suffering and death that he brought to so many of the country's citizens?

[Spero]

I guess TDS is still alive and kicking.

[ArtD]

I expect he's been deranged his entire life.

[Harvey]

SUPPOSE the leader of some country in a pandemic, downplayed the danger, lied, and discouraged people from wearing masks.
SUPPOSE as a result about 200,000 people died instead of perhaps the 100,000 that would have died anyway.

Would it be unchristian to wish on that leader the same suffering and death that he brought to so many of the country's citizens?

Sure, but the reason for 200K dead is:

1) China suppressed information about the disease letting people travel internationally while rrstricting travel to other provinces.
2) The previous administrations did not procure enough PPE and as a result the CDC did not recomnend, in the early days, mask wear to allow first responders to procure masks and other PPE.
3) Governor Cuomo would not allow Trump to enforse an interstate quarantine as other countries (like Italy and South Korea implemented early on).

If any of these were otherwise maybe less than 10K people die. None of them are Trump's fault but 2 of 3 are Democrat fault.

[ArtD]

Harvey,
Speaking roughly, 100,000 would probably have died anyway. The remaining 100,000 watched Trump not wear a mask, went to one of his rallies, or were infected by someone who did.

[Harvey]

Harvey,
Speaking roughly, 100,000 would probably have died anyway. The remaining 100,000 watched Trump not wear a mask, went to one of his rallies, or were infected by someone who did.

But the rallies were outside. I believe most of the illness is spead in closed spaces.

[Mammal]

Sure, but the reason for 200K dead is:

1) China suppressed information about the disease letting people travel internationally while rrstricting travel to other provinces.
2) The previous administrations did not procure enough PPE and as a result the CDC did not recomnend, in the early days, mask wear to allow first responders to procure masks and other PPE.
3) Governor Cuomo would not allow Trump to enforse an interstate quarantine as other countries (like Italy and South Korea implemented early on).

If any of these were otherwise maybe less than 10K people die. None of them are Trump's fault but 2 of 3 are Democrat fault.

With regards to points 1 & 2, those factors were pretty much the same elsewhere in the world. I explained in my other response that the public wearing medical masks were initially discouraged by CDC and by WHO (internationally) for reasons that you alluded to and that were later changed (that was when most sane people started wearing cloth masks).

You need to make a case to defend the USA very poor Covid-19 response compared to other countries, so the above two factors do not count as they were similar elsewhere.

Conservative people have opposed the wearing of masks, Trump himself has shown it throughout (this trend was/is widely reported in the media).

As for interstate travel, that is also a rather skew view that I addressed in my other response as well. The president, the federal government and the CDC have the authority to do what would have been necessary to manage the spread of the pandemic. Go and look it up. It has been widely reported on. Fauci even publicly stated that he would support the president closing down interstate travel. There are furthermore examples where both Clinton and Obama interfered in state matters when there were health issues that warranted such actions. The difference of course was that the states cooperated with them as there was mutual trust and buy-in. In this case the Democrats were at first very reluctant for Trump to interfere as they did not trust a situation where he could override them and potentially abuse such sweeping authority. In other words Trump did have the authority to intervene, but he did not have the influence as he was not trusted by some governors (I even linked an interesting comparison between what Trump said and did and what Cuomo said and did). However, as would become evident if you research this a bit further, he would have had the support a couple of weeks later into the pandemic, with Fauci's backing, to do exactly that. Instead he chose to ignore that as, at that time, he was already starting to talk about opening up the economy and about the pandemic that would simply disappear on its own by the end of April. Do you see the difference here, the difference in approach (and perhaps why he was never trusted in the first place), the difference that it might have made in the final (and ongoing) count?

Conservative people frankly did not want to take the pandemic seriously. In America it was mostly poor non-white people (with associated socio-economic comorbidity) who suffered the consequences of the pandemic. Not an important enough consideration compared to the health (wealth) of Trump's economy that he banked on for his re-election.

[Harvey]

You need to make a case to defend the USA very poor Covid-19 response compared to other countries, so the above two factors do not count as they were similar elsewhere.

Well, Asia instinctively wears masks no matter what. It isn't like North America wear only bank robbers wear masks. I don't know about Europe, but I imagine it is either the same as the US or slightly better in terms of people owning masks and using them regardless what WHO says.

But, the quarantining of districts with high infection rates is what distinguishes the US from Europe and Asia. South Korea was an early infection zone and they immediately quarantined the hot areas and was able to control the virus. Italy also became a high infection zone and they too began early quarantining the hot zone area. In the US people left NYC and spread the disease. It was utterly ridiculous but that's what happened.

Conservative people have opposed the wearing of masks, Trump himself has shown it throughout (this trend was/is widely reported in the media).

True, but we're talking about the 210K who died. I believe most of those deaths happened because of the early spread of the disease that didn't as much occur in most other countries.

As for interstate travel, that is also a rather skew view that I addressed in my other response as well. The president, the federal government and the CDC have the authority to do what would have been necessary to manage the spread of the pandemic. Go and look it up. It has been widely reported on. Fauci even publicly stated that he would support the president closing down interstate travel. There are furthermore examples where both Clinton and Obama interfered in state matters when there were health issues that warranted such actions. The difference of course was that the states cooperated with them as there was mutual trust and buy-in. In this case the Democrats were at first very reluctant for Trump to interfere as they did not trust a situation where he could override them and potentially abuse such sweeping authority. In other words Trump did have the authority to intervene, but he did not have the influence as he was not trusted by some governors (I even linked an interesting comparison between what Trump said and did and what Cuomo said and did). However, as would become evident if you research this a bit further, he would have had the support a couple of weeks later into the pandemic, with Fauci's backing, to do exactly that. Instead he chose to ignore that as, at that time, he was already starting to talk about opening up the economy and about the pandemic that would simply disappear on its own by the end of April. Do you see the difference here, the difference in approach (and perhaps why he was never trusted in the first place), the difference that it might have made in the final (and ongoing) count?

Once the virus spread beyond a specific region it would have crashed the economy and led to severe shortages to stop interstate travel. Why didn't authorities do that in 1917-1918 when a lot more people died? Heck, 36 million people died of AIDS and no one took such severe steps and destroying their economy which would have taken many years to repair (longer if Dems introduced a "New Deal"). I think the window of opportunity was early on, and that window was lost.

[Mammal]

I think the window of opportunity was early on, and that window was lost.

I don't agree with you. Studies do show that NY was the epicenter, but there is good reason to think that the difference between early on and not at all might have contributed significantly to the numbers today. I mentioned those April holidays in my other post; the point is Trump and his conservative followers let it slipped way too early. The real infection of the larger USA only got started, while he was saying it's over and people could get back to normal. Studies will (still) confirm this.

[Harvey]

Well, that would have decimated people's livelihood.

[Mammal]

Right.. I was not responding to that part of your earlier post as I assumed you would know that the destribution of essential goods don't need to be stopped, just controlled. This has been done all over the world. So it's not an excuse, I am afraid.

PS. Not sure I understand your objection though. Are you claiming that there was no choice but to open up the economy and that the high fatalities were simply collateral damage? Because there are many articles that have been written about this and the consensus seems to be that the various protocols were not adhered to (e.g. masks, social distancing) and/or were lifted too soon mainly due to a false sense that the worst was over. There were two critical stages that are well documented, Trump's initial lacklustre uncoordinated response and the period during early- and midsummer leading up to what became a very deadly pronounced secondary wave (where CDC & Fauci's recommendations were often ignored).

[Harvey]

I think once the contagion spread beyond the Tristate area any quarantining of the populace would be impractical. You would basically cause traffic jams for miles which would cause all sorts severe shortages of goods and services.

I realize that once the contagion spread, a complete shutdown was possible, but again that would be totally destructive to the national economy.

[Mammal]

At this point we are talking past each other. Nobody is saying the USA and Trump performed miserably because of these factors that you are alluding to now, factors that were pretty much a universal logistical challenge (perhaps not on the same scale). This is not really why the USA ended up with so many more deaths. There were periods during which many states managed these situations. But there were certain periods when they did not, there were certain protocols that were not always adhered to; these are the issues.

[Harvey]

At this point we are talking past each other. Nobody is saying the USA and Trump performed miserably because of these factors that you are alluding to now, factors that were pretty much a universal logistical challenge (perhaps not on the same scale). This is not really why the USA ended up with so many more deaths.

I totally disagree. If Obama orders enough PPE, and if Trump is allowed to quarantine the growing hotspots (as Wuhan, South Korea, Hong Kong, and Italy all did), the US would have had a very low number of COVID deaths. Where I blame Trump is he could have pursued PPE buildup after coming into office, and right now his administration has been very careless getting infections in the WH. But, overall he made a lot of great moves too. The latest scandal is a huge embarrassment though. 

[Mammal]

I totally disagree. If Obama orders enough PPE, and if Trump is allowed to quarantine the growing hotspots (as Wuhan, South Korea, Hong Kong, and Italy all did), the US would have had a very low number of COVID deaths. Where I blame Trump is he could have pursued PPE buildup after coming into office, and right now his administration has been very careless getting infections in the WH. But, overall he made a lot of great moves too. The latest scandal is a huge embarrassment though.

But your assessment seems like a personal opinion rather than based on facts. You really ought to do some fact checking too. Whatever shortages there might have been, were known beforehand and not rectified by the Trump administration. This Time Magazine expose highlights the flaws and failures of the Trump administration's as well as the collective of USA government's early reaction to the pandemic. Throughout it you would get numerous references to Trump's failures to take responsibility and to take proper charge of a coordinated effort. As I already said, he had the authority, he had experts advising him, yet he seemingly did not have the influence, neither was he prepared to be honest about the scale and dangers of the pandemic, instead he preferred to downplay that as well as the safety protocols in favor of talking up the need for the American economy (seemingly more so than its people) to survive and to get back to normal. This also came out in the other article that I linked earlier that reflected back on what Trump has said and done vs what Cuomo has said and done during March. This is exactly what also came out of journalist Bob Woodward's book about his interviews with Trump.

The BBC did an insightful series whereby they assessed the American response, both good and bad, during various stages. This is helpful for reminding us what transpired and what were the main factors that might have contributed to successes and failures. The first article was published on 1 April, the second article on 13 May, while the third follow-up was published on 8 July. The collective USA response, supposed to be led by Trump (as the responsible man in charge), did not only fail once, it did so repeatedly.