The ghost of Herbert Hoover is back
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
The ghost of Herbert Hoover is back
APRIL 13, 2020
Helpers load food into cars at Traders Village to get food from the San Antonio Food Bank on April 9.A new USA Today/Ipsos poll finds that in the past month — while President Trump has been setting phony back-to-work dates, denying responsibility for leaving the country unprepared for a pandemic and touting unproven cures — the public has woken up to the severity and potential duration of the pandemic:
In the space of a month, those who see the virus as a high threat to the USA have more than doubled, to 71% from 34%. The sense of a high threat to the global economy (to 76% from 47%) and to the stock market (to 68% from 47%) also spiked.The assessment that the coronavirus poses a high threat to “you personally” nearly doubled, to 29% from 15% in March. More than 6 in 10 are concerned that their hospital won’t have the resources needed to treat infected patients.
In addition, “By an overwhelming 3-1, 69%-21%, Americans endorse a nationwide lockdown through the end of April, requiring people to stay at home except for essential work. The idea is backed by solid majorities across partisan lines, by 8 in 10 Democrats and 62% of Republicans.” If we are going to err, the public would prefer it be on the side of keeping the country closed down too long.
Most important, if they are going to pay attention to elected officials, it is governors, not Trump, whom they will trust. “Sixty-nine percent of those surveyed express trust in their governors, an increase of 16 points since March. The view is bipartisan: 65% of Republicans, 81% of Democrats, 55% of independents,” the pollsters found. “Governors as a group are more highly trusted than the president by 25 percentage points, a difference that could be significant if there is a clash between statehouses and the White House about when parts of the nation can safely reopen.”
Trump’s aim over the past few weeks has been to shift both the blame and the responsibility going forward to the governors. (Logically, if he thinks the governors are to blame for lack of preparation, why would he demand we look to them for a plan to return to work? Logic is not the strong suit of Trump nor his enablers, certainly.) But the public wants the feds to take a more active role in addressing the crisis: “By 92% to 4% — close to unanimous — Americans want the federal government to make the COVID-19 test widely available.”
The pandemic understandably is stoking demand for more government intervention in the economy. “More than 8 in 10 support expanding paid sick leave so more workers would be eligible. Six in 10 support temporary financial help for airlines and other affected industries.”
None of this should come as a surprise. The Great Depression discredited Republican federal leadership for a generation and stoked demand for the alphabet soup (e.g. WPA, TVA, FHA, NRLA) initiatives of the New Deal, laying the groundwork for the modern welfare state. The Great Recession similarly cast Republicans into the wilderness in 2008, making way for President Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act, bailout of the car companies and stimulus bill. Great domestic crises expose the fault lines in capitalism and bolster support for domestic interventions that go well beyond the causes of the original crisis. As former Obama chief of staff Rahm Emanuel put it, “Never allow a good crisis go to waste. It’s an opportunity to do the things you once thought were impossible.”
Instead of a giant shantytown (“Hooverville”) in the nation’s capital, the quintessential symbols of the Trump pandemic and recessions are the miles-long lines of cars at food banks. (“In cars and on foot, they are snapping on masks and waiting for hours to stock up on groceries, file for unemployment assistance, cast their ballots and pick up boxes of donated food. The lines stretch around blocks and clog two-lane highways,” the New York Times reports .)
Republicans’ hostility to government is now their downfall. Aversion to expertise, know-nothingism, cronyism and anti-regulatory fervor make Republicans particularly ill-suited to the demand for effective, energetic government. Even without an incompetent, unfit narcissist at the helm, why would voters embrace a party that has been telling us the “deep state” is the enemy and marginal tax rate cuts are the answer to every ill? That’s a little long for a bumper sticker for presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden. “Throw the bums out,” however, works nicely.
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Right, the virus doesn't touch countries that love activist government, like France, Italy, Switzerland etc etc....
Don't let reality intrude on your idealogical obsessions, John.
The last thing this country will get from the Democrats is NOT "effective, energetic, government....especially with sleepy, creepy, old Joe in the Oval Orifice.
As the election draws closer, the left wingers and their toadies in the media are trying to mount a full court press to....one more time...."Get Trump"!!!
Once again, it won't work...the citizens have seen the Dems multiple attempts to get Trump removed...from the Mueller hearings, to the impeachment hearings, to every low handed and dishonest attempt to another...and all of them have failed. The public knows the truth...it is made plain to them every day now that the steps the president and his team are taking are starting to work, and that all the left and Dems are doing is trying to prolong the epidemic and slow down the recovery, as shown by the now holding up funding until they get more pork. They seem to have no decency and appear to be only interested in regaining power...rather than contributing to the health and well being of American citizens.
In case some on the on the left have not been paying attention, the "curve" in the US has flattened. and will trend downward if the current positive efforts continue. Later this year the worst of this pandemic will be over and Trump and his team will get the well deserved credit.
The article contains nothing but the usual left wing horse shit and is best ignored by rational and sane people. .
The writer of this article is Jennifer Rubin, a long time republican conservative, until Trump came along and she became a never Trumper.
She is not a left winger by any stretch.
No just another deranged person with chronic TDS.
Still have jack shit of nothing about what anyone would have done differently than Trump. Just that Trump bad, Trump should have done better. Name one damn country that has handled this well. Just one.
This is an example of what we're talking about when we say that some are trying to use the crisis as a political tool. This article needlessly and irrationally attacks Trump for no productive purpose.
Phony? what does that mean? Is he scamming somebody? This doesn't make sense. All he has done is to say that he would like to be able get things going again. It's not as if contracts are being signed based on dates Trump is throwing around. The doctors and other experts are throwing around dates and numbers, too. No outrage for them?
It's pretty clear no one was "prepared" for this pandemic. That's how it got to be a pandemic in the first place. We are probably all responsible for that at some level, however the steps required to make us totally prepared to fend off a thing like this would never have been widely supported in the absence of the actual pandemic. Catch-22.
This lie should stop, but I guess it never will. Being hopeful about potential cures is not the same thing as touting them. Trump is not selling, advertising, or prescribing anything. You want to swallow fish tank cleaner? Go for it. But don't be twice an idiot and blame it on someone else.
That's fine! We live in a federal system and states have more control over the things that are being manipulated during the crisis. We should be looking to the governors. The federal government is there to help if the governors need it to. That's how it's supposed to work. So far, there has been quite a bit of cooperation between states and fed, with a lot of praise going back and forth, even between Democrats and Republicans.
What does that mean? This statement makes it sound like the federal government is holding on to some secret stockpile of tests that they won't release. I don't think that's the case, though. So what is the point?
Actually, that makes perfect sense. If you think governors are responsible for the first thing, why wouldn't they be responsible for the second. I haven't gotten the impression, though, that Trump is putting a lot of thought or energy into blaming governors as a general matter, nor does he appear to be walking away from the problem of restarting the economy. I suspect the author is more worried about blame than Trump is.
Republicans are not hostile to government. They favor a limited government operating with enumerated powers, as per the Constitution. That's very different.
"...the Trump pandemic and recessions are the miles-long lines of cars at food banks."
The sensationalism sounds like rampant destitution. This shit happened during week one when these chumps bought all the toilet paper. They didn't even have a can of spaghettios on the shelf so they went in search of free food.
Hoover's economy was built on debt, speculation and fraud. Are the underpinnings of Trump's economy similar?