(04-01-2020 11:28 AM)At Ease Wrote: - Trump disbanded the NSC pandemic unit, weakening the speed by which we could respond to this threat
- NSC protocols are that procurement of PPE should be an immediate priority at the earliest possibility of a potential pandemic; Trump's administration didn't do this (remarkably, PPE was even being given away to China) and medical workers are facing shortfalls
- SARS-CoV2 testing has been and remains woefully inadequate; executive decision making in the CDC and FDA, as parts of the Trump administration, bear clear culpability
- Trump dismissed the threat of this virus at the earliest stages, calling it just a flu, saying it was a Democratic hoax, and making irrational predictions of the course of the disease, despite data and reports from intelligence stressing the potential severity
Taking them from the top:
- I would argue that "disbanding the NSC pandemic unit" (which is a more accurate description than "firing" them) had little or no impact. If you want to claim that it did, please indicate how and why. And no, "it stands to reason that it would have helped" is not responsive to that question. They don't actually DO anything. They just ponder and pontificate. And we were short doers, not ponderers and pontificators.
- As I understand the facts, the staff requested $2 billion in supplies purchases, and Trump agreed to $500 million. It's pretty unlikely that we would have gone through more than $500 million to date, and we have vastly ramped up production in the last week or so, by forming public/private partnerships that would not likely have happened with other more command-and-control regimes in place. As far as what was sent to China, it is less than one truck trailer load. If that little is a critical shortage, we have major, major problems.
- The testing was inadequate at the start because FDA refused to certify the WHO test, and CDC took forever to develop a suitable test, including sending out one batch that was flawed. I will argue that Trump should have told FDA to stuff it, but he is getting plenty of criticism for even pushing them to fast-track certification of chloroquine. I keep hearing that Trump should listen to his experts. Well, the experts screwed the pooch, and Trump had to intervene to take it away from them.
- Trump was trying to play down the threat in order to try to avoid panic. It was an attempted reprise of, "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself," probably with more substantive support to go on. But the left has been so firmly "Orange Man Bad" that any positive impact this would have had has been lost.
I am not saying that Trump has handled it perfectly. IMO he should have stifled CDC and FDA, and gotten state, local, and private organizations involved a lot sooner. But at least he did it eventually. I would also have done the 9/11 thing and done a universal shutdown for a week or so, including banning all international flights (except maybe to return US citizens) and having the exchanges suspend trading for a week. During that time I would have gotten state, local, and private leaders together to work out a response (maybe better a teleconference than a meeting, to set a proper example). But those things are all judgement calls, and with them I still give him a B+ overall.
If you've never done crisis or emergency response, you have no idea how difficult it can be.