Explaining “COVID Death Count Indifference”
And the meaning of the SCOTUS draft decision on Roe, too
As we now have strong data that America has passed the 1 Million mark in COVID deaths, many are asking how this tragedy could be so seemingly easily tolerated. The main explanation I see in the commentariat is, essentially, that tens of millions of our fellow Americans are pretty callous and that America’s gun culture and related culture of violence has simply numbed us to mass casualties. I think this and related explanations are vastly missing the boat on this moment in our history and politics, with increasingly dire consequences.
I think the die was cast for tolerating, if not, for some, embracing, the COVID death count when it was reported early-on that minorities were far more vulnerable and were being hospitalized and were dying at far higher rates, than non-minorities. From then on, the collateral damage didn’t matter to much of the Tump crowd, so long as far more minorities were dying, especially in New York, where Andrew Cuomo (very responsibly) held forth everyday about the death toll there and criticized Trump for not providing adequate support.
I also think that the Trump reaction to COVID and his “management” of it developed, from possibly an initial ambivalence and doubt about the nature and severity of the threat, to a showcase on how easily one could derail and de-legitimize the “nanny state” status quo that has been the bane of conservative and right-wing ideologues for well over a century. The “normie” pressure to mount a heroic national effort to defeat COVID was met and relatively quickly overwhelmed by the newly cohering impact of a new, Trumpian, approach: no-handout self-reliance. What we libs and others interpreted as rank incompetence or worse, was simply the manifestation and assertion of a new paradigm, rooted in: “We now can and will stop the libs from using “the flu” or anything else to further their socialist, many-state agenda.”
Among many other effects, this emboldened a lot of the white resisters of vaccines and masks. They quickly came to understand that masking and other public health measures were a massive effort to assert the liberal nanny state and, in particular, to protect inner-city minorities. Neither Trump, nor his acolytes wanted any parts of that. This is nothing new in American culture. Reagan and so many before him, were all about this. But this time the impact was unprecedented, at least in the modern, post WWII era:
Trump’s COVID “response” successfully undermined public confidence in key elements of the authority and trustworthiness of the liberal state, including of some of the heretofore most revered sources of knowledge and expertise, including medicine and public health, the FDA, and others.
The Problem
What is really alarming and frustrating is that we Dems just haven’t learned many of the right lessons from Trump.1 Especially in light of the decades of Republican-led economic policies (Trickle-down, etc), where the working and middle class were economically eviscerated and essentially stripped of their community-integrity and their identity and dignity, we still haven’t absorbed the critical lesson:
The overriding issue is that, for the mass of disaffected people in the US, for whom politics-as-usual has been devastating for more than a generation, Trump has provided a whole new model of personal, political, and civic agency. On behalf of the disaffected heartland and other voters, Trump has told both parties to shove it up their @$$. He has introduced a new order — a new way of thinking about our national past and future, about personal and political agency, and about getting things done. He has given tens of millions of working and middle-class people, for the first time in living memory, the experience of being embraced with solidarity and agency.
What is the reason that so many millions are willing to tolerate mass casualties and to either cheer or look the other way in the face of obvious corruption, thuggery, and lies? It’s because Trump has told them over and over that this is just the nature of things when the established order is being overturned. You gotta break a few eggs . . . (read: heads). All of this Trumpian dissonance and disruption proves to them that politics on their behalf has moved from promises to implementation.
To moderates and liberals (and, unfortunately, the Dem Party throughout), this modeling by Trump of a new path forward — and its embrace — are almost wholly misunderstood. They are simplistically seen (using outdated lenses) as ghastly, immoral, deplorable, intolerable. That’s always the view of the establishment and of the privileged.
Instead, these developments and actions need to be seen for what they really are: the lightening-quick evolution of a powerful pathway for the voices of tens of millions of very disgruntled people who want to be “centered” with good jobs, vibrant communities, and a say-so in their lives. They want leaders who represent THEM. The Trump experience is one very foreseeable and very dangerous model for this and it has gained great traction.
Why?
BECAUSE WE HAVE FAILED TO PRESENT A COMPETING MODEL; ONE THAT IS MORE COMPELLING THAN WHAT TRUMP HAS PIONEERED — OR EVEN ONE THAT BEGINS TO SUGGEST A NEW AND BETTER WAY FORWARD FOR THE VICTIMS OF DECADES OF BRUTAL CONSERVATIVE/NEOLIBERAL ECONOMIC POLICY.
Liberals and moderates, by and large, are still operating in the old politics-and-promises-as-usual paradigms that these people have experienced only as major-party and corporate covers for the hollowing-out of their lives and aspirations by the powers that be.
The solution?
Dems and moderates need to come together and make explicit, to our working and middle classes, their complicity in creating the state of the world that so many millions find themselves stuck within: a world of little opportunity, voice, or agency. And with this mea-culpa (required to have any chance of establishing some foundation for rebuilding trust), very explicit and concrete actions must be taken, right away, by executive order and other means, to address the evisceration of so many lives and livelihoods.
Unfortunately, Build Back Better was simply another version of the typical political-speak, promises-as-usual that have not accrued to the benefit of our working and middle classes for decades. Not understanding the moment, Biden and we dems have blindly just continued to offer temporary “bailout” hand-outs along with promises of “plans and programs.” Trump and followers like Govs. DeSantis and Abbott, and so many more MAGA crazies, have promised -- and delivered -- disruption, catharsis, impact (power), and a sense of dignity/pride.
Trump has created for these people a new hope and a renewed sense of the potential greatness of America, a greatness centered on them, which is reinforced minute-by-minute by the defensive (essentially confirmational) reactions of the rest of us. We are all the proof that Trump, et al, need to show they are providing a viable model for self-actualization and power.
AND, the SCOTUS opinion on ROE is just another proof-point: The extremist judges that Trump appointed are doing exactly what he said they would do. And they are apparently about to do it quickly and decisively. One couldn’t ask for a better illustration of the power of the Trump model to shake things up and get things done.
Bottom line
The bottom line is that we are going to suffer the plague of Trumpism unless and until we dems and moderates get a clue, regroup and offer immediate, serious, meaningful, tangible, transformative alternatives to the Trumpian version of empowerment through authoritarian thuggery and corruption. I now fear that there is barely a crack left in the window of opportunity to avoid our suffering this fate for the foreseeable future.
And further, what is left of the moderate Republican Party simply refuses to look in the mirror and to acknowledge how thoroughly their Reaganesque “mainstream” policies created all of this in the first place. I was hopeful as The Bulwark and Principles First, and other moderate/conservative groups emerged. They are full of really smart, sophisticated people. But they collectively have this huge blind spot, which is their unwillingness to take-on their party’s culpability in all of this. It is quite striking, actually, how thoroughly any such accounting has been avoided. Their overall approach, from what I’ve seen and read, is to treat this whole Trump phenomenon as simply an aberration, as cult-like behavior, as people going out of their minds. That is just so delusional and so wrong. Unfortunately, so long as this continues, they will be hamstrung in their abilities to help craft a way out of our national dilemma.