Coronavirus

With the United States lurching from crisis to crisis, the Democrats want their convention to present them as the tough, mature, serious bunch who will clean up the mess the President has caused. Few men are as integral to this guise as Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York — whose popularity soared throughout the COVID-19 pandemic thanks to the care and seriousness he appeared to be displaying. But how much does reality match up with the image?‘In many ways, COVID is just a metaphor,’ said Cuomo on the opening night of the DNC. ‘A virus attacks when the body is weak and when it cannot defend itself.’ This can be true, of course. Undoubtedly, COVID-19 is far more dangerous for the old, the sick and the obese than for the young, the healthy and the trim.

More than half of registered voters support President Trump using executive action to bypass Congress and extend coronavirus relief measures, according to a new poll. Trump opted to sign a series of executive orders this past Saturday rather than wait for Congress to reach an agreement on legislation as a prior relief package was set to expire. Democrats and the White House met repeatedly over the past couple of weeks, but despite making 'progress' both sides said they were still too far away to be even close to making a deal. A new poll conducted by Redfield & Wilton Strategies and provided exclusively to The Spectator found that 51 percent of voters agreed that it was right for Trump to take executive action under these circumstances, while just 24 percent disagreed.

A major Associated Press report this week dove into New York’s nursing home COVID-19 death count and found the numbers outright wrong. The story was shocking. Reporters Bernard Condon, Matt Sedensky and Meghan Hoyer noted that ‘unlike every other state with major outbreaks, New York only counts residents who died on nursing home property and not those who were transported to hospitals and died there.’ But it wasn’t new. In fact, AP had sounded the alarm on the miscount as early as May. They learned New York’s Health Department wasn’t even trying to count the numbers: ‘New York's Health Department told the AP May 8 it was not tracking how many recovering COVID-19 patients were taken into nursing homes under the order.

Only part of the dramatic racial differences in age-adjusted COVID-19 death rates can be explained by racial differences. The remainder reflects a substantially lower black survival rate because, we are told, of poverty and inadequate access to healthcare. Once taking into account Latino outcomes, however, these factors alone are unlikely to explain the lower black survival rate. Why are the outcomes for Latinos so much better than for black Americans?There is no comprehensive national measure of cases by race and ethnicity. The CDC has estimates for only 57 percent of national cases. Using these partial estimates, together with population data, I estimated that the black case rate is 2.53 times the white rate, and the Latino rate is 11.

No one would argue that Rep. John Lewis doesn't deserve a proper memorial. He was a civil rights icon and a long-serving member of Congress who was beloved by his colleagues. In the middle of a pandemic, however, how do we decide who gets the pomp and circumstance of a traditional burial and who has to watch their loved one go six feet under via Zoom call? Funerals are important: they acknowledge the sanctity of life and allow friends and family to come together to grieve their loss. This reality doesn't change based on how famous or revered an individual was to the general public: it doesn't hurt any less to say goodbye to someone who was just a dad or just someone's child or just a dear friend. Their lives aren't any less significant.

Donald Trump’s tweet mooting an election delay isn’t a sign of strength but weakness. Maybe he’ll say it was just a joke. Maybe it was intended to distract from the bad economic news. Maybe he’s trying to inure the public to the idea of a postponement. Maybe he’s preparing for his post-presidency with a farrago of excuses and complaints and lies. Or maybe Trump is simply flailing, a prospective loser who is already losing it.His erstwhile champion Herman Cain, who denounced the idea of wearing a mask, has just died at 74 from coronavirus complications. His national security adviser has the virus. So does Rep. Louie Gohmert, who refused to wear a mask. Trump’s incessant attempts to depict the pandemic as a hoax have turned out be the palpable fraud.

Let’s face it: under the best of circumstances governing is a tricky and difficult task. This is particularly true in a democracy such as ours with its clashing interests, roiling ideological divisions, partisan passions, and a system of government that often places rank amateurs in charge of career civil servants. This is not a recipe for sound decision-making. Perhaps that explains why Gov. Gretchen Whitmer is mandating implicit bias training for all Michigan healthcare workers in the middle of a pandemic?Even for experienced politicians genuinely motivated by the common good, 2020 has offered up daunting challenges. The arrival of COVID-19, the teetering instability of our economy, and a ratcheting up of racial divisions would cause a seasoned professional many a sleepless night.