Nihilist-in-Chief

 Nihilist-in-Chief

The strident call to rebellion by President Trump, to “liberate Michigan,” is one of the most nihilistic statements ever uttered by a US commander-in-chief. Its sheer audacity is only attenuated by the psychological deadening of hundreds of outrageous statements and acts this president has perpetuated on this nation during the past three years. This is not to dispute the importance of factoring in the economic turmoil caused by the pandemic crisis and the viability of different regions of the country gradually opening up as local conditions allow. The latter, however, is a prospect that is invariably complicated by the social reality of a highly mobile society. 

Clearly, the COVID-19 pandemic offers its own set of unique challenges.  With the flu, there is a vaccine. With the coronavirus there is not.  Moreover, this latter virus is highly contagious, with a death-to-case ratio hovering around 5%. Based on modeling projections compiled by a draft government report, the US, by June 1, is on target of suffering 3,000 daily deaths due to the explosion of this virus with a cumulative total of over 130,000. Whether or not precisely accurate, the upward trend for the next few months is evident enough. While some of our governors, inspired by Trump’s own prompting, are opening up their states without following the guidelines set up by the president’s task force, the US remains the world’s epicenter for this virus, outpacing many countries combined.  These include India and China, with populations four times that of ours. One wonders why this is the case when so many other countries, in comparison to the US, have dealt with the COVID-19 challenge in more effective ways.

There is no indication that these upward demographic realities will be changing anytime soon.  Moreover, without the social distancing that has been in place, the reported case and death rates will be considerably higher than they are now. The last thing needed at this point is to downplay the severity of the current health crisis, with credible threats of flare-ups and second waves breaking out this fall.

Instead of playing his nihilistic card of stoking rebellion, trashing legitimate criticism as “fake news,” and firing Inspector Generals who provide information that contradicts the preferred narrative of the president, our commander in chief should be focused on providing a national consensus toward solving both our health and economic crisis. If he had consistently done so, we would be in a much better situation than we are now. Instead, we have group lawbreaking on California beaches and rifle toting militias storming the halls of the Michigan state capitol, all in the name of freedom, with the explicit support of the president and no near-term federal solution to the national health crisis in sight.

The nation currently faces a set of problems that would test the acumen of the most astute of presidential administrations, which is clearly not what we have in place at this time.  To fill the void, we have more than a few former “pro-life” advocates making a cost-benefit calculus that it is a difficult, but ultimately better choice to expend some tens of thousands of lives than to continue to maintain the social distance needed to keep virus levels manageable at the cost of continued economic decline. 

Perhaps among those calling upon us to push forward in opening the economy at the risk of higher case and death rates, we might find some willing to make the supreme sacrifice for themselves and their family members.

2020

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