Columnist
Washington Post
Michael Gerson writes in the WashPost:
Those who complain about the media’s relentless focus on President Trump during a pandemic have yet to internalize the horrendous reality of his pandemic response: Trump’s failures of leadership and character have increased the death toll and continue to threaten lives.
For me, that is a difficult sentence to write. Having spent time in the executive branch, I realize how complicated presidential decisions can be. America’s chief executives are often forced to make momentous choices, based on scant information, under the pressure of a ticking clock. It is easier to attack such decisions than to make them.
But the fact of Trump’s deadly negligence is now demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt. Detailed investigative articles in The Post and New York Times have established that there were six weeks of denial and dithering between a credible warning about the virus and decisive action by the president. It is now evident that Trump:
• ignored early intelligence reports of a possible pandemic;
• delayed the ramp up of practical preparations;
• was often more focused on political considerations, on the news cycle and on stock market performance than on epidemiological reality;
• deceptively played down what he knew to be a rising threat;
• coddled China when it should have been confronted;
• instinctively distrusted experts and seemed unable to absorb simple information and sound advice;
• lashed out at aides who took the crisis seriously;
• shifted reluctantly and belatedly from a strategy of containment to mitigation;
• is strangely obsessed with unproven treatments for the novel coronavirus; and
• has systemically lied about the promptness of his own response.These accounts reveal a White House staffed by incompetent loyalists, distracted by turnover and riven by feuds. A White House carefully pruned and shaped to resemble the chaos in Trump’s mind.
[Full coverage of the coronavirus pandemic]
I urge you to read the articles themselves. In this case, it is a duty of informed citizenship. Americans need to understand the epic smallness of our president in times that demanded something more.
The tension between National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director Anthony S. Fauci and President Trump has been simmering for weeks. (Monica Akhtar/The Washington Post)
All this is bad enough. But our interest, unfortunately, should not be merely forensic. Trump draws bitterness and resentment out of his experience of the world. He does not draw lessons or wisdom. And he remains just as dangerous to public health on the back side of the curve as he was on the front.
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Read the complete op-ed at the link.
“Deadly negligence,” “ malicious incompetence,” “criminal recklessness” — call it what you will, there is more than ample proof that Trump is unqualified in every imaginable way for the office he holds.
Of course, Trump will remain a danger to our national health, safety, and welfare. He has neither the capacity for nor interest in anything beyond himself.
PWS
04-14-20