Tag: Trump Bungling

Trump Reverses Course on Early Reopening, Hangs Ga. Gov Out to Dry

Jon Ponder

In a dramatic reversal, Trump announced yesterday that he opposed Republican Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp’s order to open businesses in his state, even though the state has not met Trump administration criteria for bringing commercial activity back online.

Trump’s advocacy for early reopening helped spur protests by armed tea party-type groups targeting Democratic governors across the country. Trump’s reversal comes at the same time a new AP-NORC poll found that just 12 percent of Americans favor early reopening, while 87 percent disapprove, among whom 26 percent say restrictions don’t go far enough and 61 percent say the lockdown rules are about right.

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Contrasts with South Korea Show How Badly Trump Team Failed at Early COVID-19 Efforts

Trish

There are facts that won’t change as the COVID-19 virus spreads, and the bungling of the crisis by the Trump Administration is etched in stone.

A story by Reuters contrasts the South Korean response with that of the United States. It ain’t pretty for the U.S. Both countries discovered their first cases on the same day but South Korea acted decisively, pioneered drive-through testing, and slowed the spread of the disease.

South Korea’s swift action stands in stark contrast to what has transpired in the United States…the Koreans have tested well over 290,000 people and identified over 8,000 infections. New cases are falling off: Ninety-three were reported Wednesday, down from a daily peak of 909 two weeks earlier.

The United States, whose first case was detected the same day as South Korea’s, is not even close to meeting demand for testing. About 60,000 tests have been run by public and private labs in a country of 330 million, federal officials said Tuesday.

As a result, U.S. officials don’t fully grasp how many Americans have been infected and where they are concentrated – crucial to containment efforts.

Read the whole Reuters special report.