Thomas Friedman essay

Trump Is Asking Us to Play Russian Roulette With Our Lives - Are we really going to bet that we can go back to life as normal without proper coronavirus tracking in place?

By Thomas L. Friedman
Opinion Columnist April 18, 2020

“LIBERATE MINNESOTA!” “LIBERATE MICHIGAN!” “LIBERATE VIRGINIA.”

With these three short tweets last week, President Trump attempted to kick off the post-lockdown phase of America’s coronavirus crisis. It should be called: “American Russian roulette: The Covid-19 version.’’

What Trump was saying with those tweets was: Everybody just go back to work. From now on, each of us individually, and our society collectively, is going to play Russian roulette. We’re going to bet that we can spin through our daily lives — work, shopping, school, travel — without the coronavirus landing on us. And if it does, we’ll also bet that it won’t kill us.

More specifically: As a society, we will be betting that as large numbers of people stop sheltering in place, the number of people who will still get infected with Covid-19 and require hospitalization will be less than the number of hospital beds, intensive care units, respirators, doctors, nurses and protective gear needed to take care of them.

Because it is clear that millions of Americans are going to stop sheltering in place — their own President is now urging them to liberate themselves — before we have a proper testing, tracking and tracing system set up. Until we have a vaccine, that kind of system is the only path to dramatically lowering the risk of infection while partially opening society — while also protecting the elderly and infirm — as Germany has demonstrated.

And as individuals, every person will be playing Russian roulette every minute of every day: Do I get on this crowded bus to go to work or not? What if I get on the subway and the person next to me is not wearing gloves and a mask? What if they sneeze? Do I get in the elevator at the office if there is another person on it? Do I go into the office lunchroom or not? Do I stop for a drink at this bar, where the stools are six feet apart, or that crowded one my friends chose? Do I use this toilet or that drinking fountain? Do I send my kid back to school or not? Do I stay in a hotel? Ride an airplane? Let the plumber in? Do I go to the doctor to check that strange lump or not?

What will be so cruel about this American version of Russian roulette is how unfair it will be. Some people will have no choice but to take the subway or the bus to work. Some people will have to send their kids back to school because they can’t afford to stay home from work. Some bosses will demand that their employees show up to reopen their workplace, but some of those employees may be afraid to come back. Do you fire them? Do they bring a lawsuit against you if you do, or do they go on Twitter and post a picture of how closely together you forced them to work — six inches apart, not six feet?

This is the state of play when you have a president who one minute is responsibly issuing sober guidelines for when and how people should go back to work, and the next minute is telling states that they are responsible for getting the testing, tracking and tracing units that we need in place and then, in the third minute, is inciting people on Twitter to “liberate” their workplaces, cities and beaches — even though none of the conditions are in place to do so safely.

“Liberate”? Think about the use of that word. We were not in jail! We were not doing something wrong! We were doing what our president, governor, mayor, and national epidemic experts told us to do: behave responsibly and shelter in place to break the transmission of this virus.

CONTINUED ... next page
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Comments (35)

Originally lockdown was to avoid surges, flatten the curve, despite repeated pandemic warnings we were unprepared, it was a chance to let medical supplies and PPE and facilities catch up. It does worry me now that the trend is turning towards extended lockdowns, indefinite social distancing, and all the terrifyingly frequent comments about 'rest of the year' and '2021' even '2022' which we are hearing in Europe.

I'm no keener to get infected than anyone else and was quietly social-distancing before we went into strict lockdown - even then I didn't believe the 2 weeks we were sold. In plagues of old whole cities locked down for 40 days. Well, ours has been extended and extended and will probably extend again to mid May which will be 60 days and our situation is that the original hot spots are still hot spots and other parts of this large country are still not hot spots. Keep the hotspot airports closed, cautiously start opening up the unaffected areas?

Oh by the way I'm not in the US. We have the virus in Spain too. Along with 183 other countries, all trying to keep people both safe and from financial ruin. Balancing act of note to get right, I wonder if any country will crack the formula?
VivianLee2 - thank you for sharing - I have been following the news world wide on various news services, though it makes it far more personal to hear from people on location. Hopefully we will all come out this healthy and hail. Cuídate
Trump is a manipulator. He uses the gullible by their weaknesses, and the fools respond positively. Does he care that many of them will die ? Not in the least. All he cares about is the economy numbers. #1. He owns lots of mutual funds. #2. Even though he had inherited the previously positive economy situation, he's been boasting that it's his economy, and he sees the economy as his path to re-election. If it costs lots of other people's lives & families, no big deal.....to him. In November we need to "liberate" him from the White House and into the court room late February for the crimes he has committed. head banger
Thee & me, are on the same page, Jim.
How many people are going to die when the economy is destroyed and people can't buy food? Already there are mile long lines at food banks in Miami and other cities like LA. Lock down is unsustainable. People need to get back to work while they still have a job to go back to.
People waiting for food in Minneapolis.
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10,000 cars waiting for food in San Antonio, Texas
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Soonyuleknow - what is needed now is those offering Answers, not Distrasters like yourself - IF you can't offer anything positive, then practice being silent
Miami
Embedded image from another site
Tell me how it is distracting to show the effects the lock downs are having? You afraid of seeing the collateral damage oldguy?
Blame is easy - Answers are hard - the first step finding an answer is to define the problem in Clear, Concise Terms. - You sir, are but throwing out random distractions.

Anyway I have had my say here. The floor is yours to distort as please.
Oldguy you have the solution?
How to feed hungry people when the food bank has no more food to give them
How many have died in line so far ? 0
How many have died due to the virus ? Thousands !

Try to think a little clearer.
Lockdown helps keep a lot of people from getting infected.
It's not permanent. But the longer it goes on, the more effective it is.
The virus has a shelf life, as do the infections.
Thanks for showing the photos. It makes sense now of peoples anger. Our surge in Ireland was supposed to be flattening but still 40 deaths today and similar yesterday and for a small island it's alot when you think that we are all isolating.
bcjenny - check out the essay I attached about what is happening in Germany - there are answers happening there, unlike the US under Trump.

Politically here is a fact to think on --
> The Newt Gingrich lesson - IF you want things to move fast, you act on the Federal level. IF you want things to happen slow, you move them to the state and local level
> when it comes to Covid and Trump, the lesson of Newt is obviously in play
And here is something else that should concern all Americans. US debt is now 22 trillion dollars and rising fast.

Even without the virus 2020 is the year Social Security begins paying out more in benefits than it takes in. There was projected to be enough money to maintain payments at the current levels till 2035, at which time a 25% cut in benefits is forecast to be necessary. All the money that is not being paid in now will move that 2035 date forward. I hope all Americans are planning accordingly. professor
Soon it is no use talking to the Trump haters they can not see straight, only the negative sides
Of course those of us who would rather trust Trump than having been stuck with Hillary, are stupid,
ignorant and uneducated etc.
It is easy to see that the revolt of the people has just began..............
bcjenny - belittle and berate are two of favorite tools employed by your ilk, the conservative wrong thinkers. Again I say blame is easy - answers are hard
Olde, it appears jenny and soonyule do have the answer... open the gates. Lets get back to work.
chancer, this is a GLOBAL problem.
What are leaders of the rest of the world doing?
How many of the corona virus death are all due to the virus?
How does anyone know, that in the total death count there are not included some who died of the
flue or other natural causes like in the care homes?
That is funny oldguy it is Jim who does the belittling part and is sarcastic next
Jenny you are right a lot of deaths that would have happened anyway are being blamed on COVID-19 to make the body count look as high as possible. In the US anyway, in China not so much.
bcjenny - I am not responsible for what Jim writes - As a teacher I found positive answers far more effective that negative blame hunting. But as I have said repeatedly - Blame is Easy, Answers are Hard.

Failure is another thing people are not good at accepting - they rather blame others for their mistakes. Better one should learn from mistakes than pile up one blame atop another.
Oldguy you are really something else YOU and the other haters do all the blaming on others. on you know who really, lol lol lol wave
Where below this blog, did I belittle ? I just agreed with part of YOUR statement.
Meanwhile, you are labeling people as "haters". That seems like projection.
You hate what you don't understand.

I do admit, I am sarcastic, when people make ridiculous statements.
seem like ur land of opportunity has run out my friends
The solution is NOT worse than the problem. That is a very ridiculous excuse.
The problem is a virus that's killing lots of people.
No one is dying from being in a TEMPORARY social distancing situation UNTIL adequate testing and/or an effective vaccine is available. It's not worse. It's not even close to being as bad.
No 'genius' it's on TEMPORARY hold.
Well it was fun while it lasted. Last one out turn out the lights. crying
to jim why does it take so long to get the vaccine when usa have everything like planes weapons missile rockets etc ur economy was good at that for making all this stuff and u got the best sciences so whos holding it ur opportunity and why did trump say that Obama left u all without weapons ? and if it wasn't for him usa will have be taken by whom
trump needs to see a good doctor I think cause he does not care about the people he only cares about the economy but with no people u cant build it again
There are several vaccines currently in human trials.
It takes a long time to determine whether they are effective and safe.
England is predicting that theirs will be somewhat ready in September.
There might be an earlier one. Canada was in the lead and in human trials for a while.
We can all take comfort in the knowledge that one of the countries that believes in science will soon have the cure for us. professor
People who want to open the country are the ones that work from home and don't go outside with the crowd. frustrated
The pictures posted here tell me a very different story Amicable, these don't look like people who work at home nor do the people showing up in the streets showing signs saying they want to go back to work...........
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