Americans were offered alternative realities this week from their president and the government’s top coronavirus scientist. Donald Trump stood in the Rose Garden on Monday to…
Americans were offered alternative realities this week from their president and the government’s top coronavirus scientist.
Donald Trump stood in the Rose Garden on Monday to boast of his success in ramping up testing. “America has risen to the task,” he said. “We have met the moment, and we have prevailed.”
The next day, infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci told Congress that the path much of America has taken to rapidly reopen the economy could lead to “some suffering and death.”
Fauci was reacting out of concern that most states starting to allow businesses to reopen, at Trump’s urging, have failed federal health recommendations that they wait at least until they record a 14-day decline in coronavirus cases.
The stinging dissonance between Trump and science has persisted since the first infected person reached U. S. shores months ago. The harsh realities of informed scientific opinion have proved inconvenient for a president prone to embellish, exaggerate and push a narrative of glorious success.
“We will defeat this horrible enemy,” Trump said Monday. “We will revive our economy, and we will transition into greatness.”
Fauci, meanwhile, testified that while there has been success in reducing hospitalizations and infections in New York City and New Orleans, “in other parts of the country, you’re seeking spikes.
