How Trump Plans to Discredit Health Experts and Play Politics With a Crisis
Climate change denialism created the playbook to stoke fear and confusion — it is being put to use again
The political strategy of Trump turning “public health officials” into the equivalent of “climate scientists” is underway. The view from Trump advisors not directly involved in the rising death toll is that the CDC (i.e., EPA) wants to burden Trump’s chances of driving economic activity in the eight states he cares about.
The effort to discredit these folks is on. With the same playbook used in climate science. First, CDC guidelines are being ignored. Now expect to hear more from “counter-scientists”, discrediting the “doom and gloom” people who want to keep the economy down.
Anyone with halfway decent credentials, who is willing to say that economies should open now, will have an opportunity to make a new career as a cable pundit. The idea will be to drive the networks, Sunday shows, news publications, and cable news into the “both sides equal time” trap. Chris Christie was one attempt at this, but I assume they can do better.
They need surrogates I guess, because there’s only so many ways to say “it’s ok for some people to die” without sounding like an asshole. Their next trick will be to make it appear that roughly half the smart people are saying “stay closed” but the other half are saying “stay open.” So what to do?
This isn’t an effort at honest or balanced discourse. There are of course reasonable arguments for how to consider the economic impact of the pandemic. And how to find the safest way to re-open. But this disinformation effort is more about the president’s re-election prospects. Georgia and Texas are seen as a test. So far the early answer to the rest seems to be, shorter hair, more dead people. The refrain for many Trump loyal governors will now change to “personal responsibility”.
The next play we’ve seen them run? The Executive order. Pick a business in a key state:
- North Carolina, furniture making: Expect the Federal government to order massive new furniture for government agencies.
- Michigan, automobiles: Expect an Executive Order of incentives for vehicle trade-ins.
And of course de-regulation. Like when we deregulated nursing home regulations in November. Expect an Executive Order field day reminiscent of 2017. All that may sound like typical election year stuff. Add to that the power of the Defense Production Act — which Trump was slow to use to protect the country but more than happy to use to keep workers coming to unsafe meat processing plants — these things are all political tools. And dismissing experts, using executive power, and catering to businesses is an area of comfort with him. Makes me wonder what would happen if that productive energy was put towards the actual Covid-19 Task Force plan to reopen the economy.
Bipartisanship in Congress will also be tested when Pelosi sends the House CARES 2 bill over the Mitch McConnell. Pelosi will suggest they do this bill as they’ve don’t the past four, completely bipartisan. Expect McConnell to reject the bill as an “AOC special”, a campaign document, a “giveaway to the states”, dead on arrival, and harmful to the economy. He will then say the Senate needs to start from scratch.
From what I’ve seen of the House bill, there’s a lot of pragmatic stuff.
- Testing and contact tracing
- Fixing the food supply
- Ensuring the country’s prescription drug supply
- Support for state budgets
Will McConnell negotiate or opt for a do-over?
I haven’t talked to a Republican or a Democrat that doesn’t think we need to invest much more in testing. And now. A do-over from McConnell means we will be past Memorial Day before we have a reasonable shot at something. It’s not like anything urgent is happening in May. But while the president tries to stimulate the economy in his “8 states”, those states will be starving for state money.
At the same time Democrats will look at the people most threatened and indeed dying from this political shift away from health care — seniors and people with pre-existing conditions — and make sure what they see as Trump’s callousness speaks for itself. The only people who will show more video footage of Trump than his campaign, will be his opponents.
But while the devolution to the campaign season seems inevitable, Americans will feel abandoned by politics as usual as we die in record numbers.
The economy doesn’t come back until the death toll slows. It won’t matter how many cable TV pundits you throw at this. The better path is to do the actual job in front of us to safely open up with testing in place. Then watch the economy come back.
Maybe these tricks are political genius. Maybe there’s an executive order that’s going to change voters’ minds in battle ground states. But it also means this traumatic period will be needlessly prolonged.
You can listen to Ronald Klain and David Frum both discuss whether there’s a political “rabbitt in the hat” on my podcast this week. All I can say is Americans don’t need distractions. They need actions.
