Tom,
Being critical of our leaders and debating their policies is just part of being a Democracy. I don't think anyone here is blaming the President for the virus but there is legitimate criticism of his performance on addressing it. The facts are that he played it down, even called it a "hoax" and it would "disappear" on its own.........We lost valuable time in quarantining and developing testing on a massive scale. He did the right thing closing off China early but other things were not done timely or effectively.
My biggest problem is that we have not gone to a true national response and left it up to individual states who end up competing with each other and FEMA for life saving equipment. While Louisiana went on lockdown all the surrounding states (Mississippi, Arkansas, Texas and Alabama) stayed open.....how stupid is that. The governor of Florida was allowing people to congregate until today when he finally locked down. It only takes a few people traveling from state to state to start an avalanche of infections.
This is a war and should be treated like one. During WWII as you know, the government mandated factories to produce military equipment and put vital resource on ration. We worked together as one country and saved the world from fascism.
If we don't criticize, constructively, and civilly debate to help make decisions on who we want to be our representatives we are just sheep. We should not, however, get personal and insulting....that goes both ways.
Rich,
in all due respect, there is not one levy of criticism in public that has been levied against Trump with respect by the Press. There are way too many overt ulterior motives and that is a plain fact. Honestly and it really doesn't matter nor worth wasting our collective breath on!
Getting past that as I really don't care about that part in the least, the time is they need to move on together which arguably other than some of Pelosi's stunts, they have. I think the Governors and Feds have tried to work together and I give Cuomo the most credit in that area as they have put aside their differences and I think Trump respects him for a lot of reasons.
Regarding Louisiana, completely different due to the transient population of Mardi Gras, that is the direct correlation to the spike. I have a client with offices throughout LA, the problem they have is the Warehouse and Office in New Orleans, the rest of the areas are not nearly as inundated with cases (if at all), again, population is a key issue. I think we will continue to see dramatic spikes in areas of dense populations, its a mathematical equation. Regarding the other States mentioned, I think they addressed it as the need arose. In this case, being in front of the wave before it broke (As example Maryland by luck or what have you) has worked better than being reactionary. That can be said in all decisions and it is really hindsight you are fighting then.
Florida never dreamed people would flood there, why? I don't know but they didn't think ahead that is for sure and probably blameworthy, but I have a hard time blaming any of them, easier to sympathize with them as again, this was a blind tsunami no one dreamed of nor expected.
Again, all of this becomes Monday morning Q-backing at this point and honestly is a waste of breath. They have to deal with the here and now, only way to get through this, the other stuff has to wait. They have to fight it and that is about the only thing to do.
I am sure in 4, 5, 6, 8 ore etc month's time, somebody like Adam Schiff will use this as his next Waterloo moment and waste trillions more of our dollars pointing fingers instead of taking that money and learning from the mistakes and moving forward. That is an unfortunate consequence of our current Republic!
National unified response is hard to achieve in this day and age and probably has been since 9/11. Even then if you recall, there is a certain House of Representative Member from the State of California who voted against bombing the Taliban and Osama Bin Laden. If we could not unite as 100% against that terrible tragedy, then.....................i am sure you get my meaning. It is a sad state of affairs but one we are squarely in. My main focus is getting the hell out of this mess and moving on with life as soon as safe to do so. That is just about my only focus, anything else is frankly depressing.
TD
