1/ Saving lives, and in general mounting a competent response, is clearly in his interest. It still isn't happening.
Partly this is just Trump. As far as I can tell, he is incapable of long-term planning, and seems to think that all problems are PR problems.
Partly this is just Trump. As far as I can tell, he is incapable of long-term planning, and seems to think that all problems are PR problems.
2/ I think it's hard for normal people to imagine just how impaired he is in terms of dealing with issues like this.
All short-term impulses and pettiness; no ability to understand that such a thing as a serious response even exists, let alone that he is not now engaged in one.
All short-term impulses and pettiness; no ability to understand that such a thing as a serious response even exists, let alone that he is not now engaged in one.
3/ People who know me from my blogging days know that I have no great love for GW Bush, but I think that by now, even he would have been knocking heads to get things done.
Not Trump.
However ...
Not Trump.
However ...
4/ I think part of the blame also falls on today's GOP. I can remember (decades ago) when the GOP was basically a sane party with a DEFEASIBLE skepticism of regulation and government interference in the market.
Those days are long gone.
Those days are long gone.
5/ They are now mostly a bunch of hacks who have reflexive responses to everything. It's always time for more tax cuts. Any government anything will turn us into Venezuela. Regulations are not just presumptively bad; they are ALWAYS bad.
6/ When Trump says that if he invokes the DPA to get companies to manufacture ventilators or PPE, we will turn into Venezuela, I hear his advisors talking. (Many bad thoughts are second nature to him, but I do not think that this is one of them.)
7/ And I think that having people around him who are not just the sycophants he deserves, but also contemporary Republican hacks who would never think that it's appropriate using the government's power to get industry to manufacture things, or to coordinate production, AND ...
8/ Who lack the seriousness to think: wait, stop, maybe I should rethink things at a time like this -- that is, I think, a necessary condition for Trump's total failure to act.
9/ He LIKES dictatorial powers! He likes declaring emergencies and ordering the army to the border and trying to browbeat Jeff Bezos and stuff like that!
The fact that NOW, of all times, he's gone all "oh no, mustn't interfere with the FREE MARKET!!!" is not, imho, HIM.
The fact that NOW, of all times, he's gone all "oh no, mustn't interfere with the FREE MARKET!!!" is not, imho, HIM.
10/ You need both a President who is seriously impaired in terms of his ability to recognize the need for or to execute a long-term response, AND advisors who are just a bundle of Heritage Foundation reflexes, not beings capable of independent thought, to get where we are now.
