Trump Is Asking Us to Play Russian Roulette With Our Lives (T. Friedman, NYT)
By Thomas L. Friedman
Opinion Columnist
April 18, 2020
With these three short tweets last week, President Trump attempted to kick off the post-lockdown phase of Americas coronavirus crisis. It should be called: American Russian roulette: The Covid-19 version.
What Trump was saying with those tweets was: Everybody just go back to work. From now on, each of us individually, and our society collectively, is going to play Russian roulette. Were going to bet that we can spin through our daily lives work, shopping, school, travel without the coronavirus landing on us. And if it does, well also bet that it wont kill us.
More specifically: As a society, we will be betting that as large numbers of people stop sheltering in place, the number of people who will still get infected with Covid-19 and require hospitalization will be less than the number of hospital beds, intensive care units, respirators, doctors, nurses and protective gear needed to take care of them.
Because it is clear that millions of Americans are going to stop sheltering in place their own President is now urging them to liberate themselves before we have a proper testing, tracking and tracing system set up. Until we have a vaccine, that kind of system is the only path to dramatically lowering the risk of infection while partially opening society while also protecting the elderly and infirm as Germany has demonstrated.
And as individuals, every person will be playing Russian roulette every minute of every day: Do I get on this crowded bus to go to work or not? What if I get on the subway and the person next to me is not wearing gloves and a mask? What if they sneeze? Do I get in the elevator at the office if there is another person on it? Do I go into the office lunchroom or not? Do I stop for a drink at this bar, where the stools are six feet apart, or that crowded one my friends chose? Do I use this toilet or that drinking fountain? Do I send my kid back to school or not? Do I stay in a hotel? Ride an airplane? Let the plumber in? Do I go to the doctor to check that strange lump or not?
What will be so cruel about this American version of Russian roulette is how unfair it will be. Some people will have no choice but to take the subway or the bus to work. Some people will have to send their kids back to school because they cant afford to stay home from work. Some bosses will demand that their employees show up to reopen their workplace, but some of those employees may be afraid to come back. Do you fire them? Do they bring a lawsuit against you if you do, or do they go on Twitter and post a picture of how closely together you forced them to work six inches apart, not six feet?
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more: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/18/opinion/trump-coronavirus-testing.html?algo=top_conversion&fellback=false&imp_id=945879421&imp_id=922852637&action=click&module=trending&pgtype=Article®ion=Footer
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dem4decades
(11,269 posts)Newest Reality
(12,712 posts)It seems like a sawed off shotgun, point blank in America's face with an itchy trigger finger to me.
Skittles
(153,113 posts)they scream about "government tyranny" while taking advice from politicians instead of medical professionals
Stuart G
(38,414 posts)Igel
(35,277 posts)That's exactly what was discussed and how it was presented a month ago, after containment not only failed but was finally shown to be difficult to attain without some fairly draconian methods.
Friedman hasn't really thought through what he wants, I don't think. He's seen the good side for what he wants and the bad side for what flattening the curve meant. He hasn't see the bad side of what he wants, and it's very likely quite dystopian.
I'm still surprised that he missed the quite clearly stated goal of curve-flattening, however. Or feigns sudden outrage. But if he missed that for so long, when it was explained to him, maybe we can cut him slack for not seeing the underbelly of his utopian vision, for what it would mean for anybody in the US until the US was completely SARS-CoV-2 free and what it would mean for the border the US has with a tainted world.