23 April 2020
Pestilence
Trump’s Strategy
by J.R. Thomas
The Donald certainly faces differently motivated citizens to The Boris. UK citizens seem happy to stay locked-down in their residences, limited to a little shopping, exercise, and dog walking (if you haven’t a dog, private enterprise will rent you one). In the land of the free and sneezing, things are a bit different. It is the task of the Governor of each state to decide whether to keep citizens confined – and some of those that have turned the keys have found resistance to such constraints.
That is, maybe, not all that surprising – if home is a ranch on the Nevada prairie the chance of seeing a neighbour, let alone catching something from them, is pretty remote. Not surprisingly, Nevada folk were out last weekend protesting about their state administration’s attempts to make them stay home. More surprisingly, so were the citizens of Maryland. No cow poking ranchers these, but mostly workers in the Great Swamp, or Washington DC as it is more commonly known. Not all of them of course, but many derive their living from the swamp dwellers, and now many of them are not deriving a living at all. More than 300,000 Maryland workers have become unemployed in the last month or so. This compares with 12,000 cases of Covid-19 in the state. Marylanders are thinking they would rather risk the possibility of infection than the certainty of no pay-check.
Don’t let us mislead you. Polls suggest the lockdown has been popular with Americans of all political persuasions (Libertarians maybe not so much), but support is slowly ebbing as the economic consequences become apparent. It is not helping that outbreaks so far have been highly concentrated in areas such as Florida, California, and most dramatically and fatally, New York. In the US, as in every affected country, constraint and restraint has to be balanced against medium and long term consequences, economic and health. But in the US of A there is an additional dimension; this is the land of the free, a self-perception that colours most American’s views of who they are. They don’t take kindly to being told to not work, or close their businesses, and stay at home. The flag-waving gun-toting honking-SUV rallies are underlining that point.
There is another dimension; President D. Trump. Think what you like of the 45th President (no need to write in and tell us; we read Twitter too) he is remarkably skilled at picking up issues that resonate well with the voters – and make good campaign slogans. There is an election coming up in November and whatever strategies Donald was pondering six months ago – to the extent that Donald does any pondering or has any strategies – have now to be re-pondered. The opponent he was expecting to fight; perhaps feisty California Senator Kamla Harris (stumbled and fell), or New York billionaire Mike Bloomberg (found NY billionaires yesterday’s product), or Vermont firebrand Bernie Sanders (burnt out), or Hillary Clinton mark 2, Elizabeth Warren (Hillary mark 2 was never going to work), turns out to be the one he hoped not to come through, Joe Biden.
Joe has some baggage – age, a tendency to fumble and stumble, and a little complexity in Ukraine, but nevertheless, he, like Mr Trump, has a feel for the ordinary voter, and especially for the ordinary Democrat voter. As Mr Trump got in last time by stealing quite a lot of votes that would have been Democrat had their candidate not been Hillary, Mr Biden on the stump is not good news.
But maybe not so bad, Donald seems to be thinking. Joe has not impressed hugely in the primaries and it was not so much merit that left him holding the victors torch as the fact that most of his opponents did not seem to have it in them for the fight. There is no reason to think he will perform better in a long tiring presidential campaign this summer and fall. And Joe seems to have not quite grasped what natural strength he has – which is, we would argue, a common touch and ability to reach poor and disadvantaged Americans. Instead he has been infected by Starmerism – an urge to conciliate his erstwhile challengers. It is always nice to call for unity and mutual love, but not to the extent of adopting the policies that led to the defeat of his opponents in the first place. We suspect a bit less hipness and more regular folksiness is what could win the day. (We suspect that Sir Keir, founder of Starmerism, knows that and is making mere gestures, but this is not the place.)
And then we have this modern version of the plague. In times of crisis, voters tend to rally around the existing administration, wrapped as it is, in the flag. That will help Mr Trump. Also, Mr Trump may well suspect that things may turn out not as bad as the media predictions say. In which case there will be a sense of relief and gratitude. Hence Donald is leaving it to the state governors to make lockdown decisions whilst looking very sympathetic to those reluctant to stay at home and run up debts.
There are risks of course. The big one is the one standing next to the President at press conferences, Dr Anthony Fauci. Dr Fauci (aged 79 incidentally, these guys just go on and on) is running the national strategy on Covid-19. He and Donald are rumoured not to agree on much. Mr Trump’s body language is at times a picture as they stand at their press conferences, and Dr Fauci’s face as the President holds forth is also worth study. But at the moment they are sticking with each other. The doctor is a dedicated scientist and wants to see off this beastly virus. The President knows if that goes right he can share (alright, this is Trump; take) the credit. If it doesn’t, he can blame the doctor and fire him. Plus we repeat what we have said before: don’t just go on what the President says and tweets; look at what he does. And he is quietly doing a lot, probably on Dr Fauci’s guidance. Two million tests a day (what say you, Mr Hancock?) and federal powers being threatened to push private firms to increase that by a factor of three. All relevant medical exports blocked. US$2 trillion aid package. A virtual ban on travellers entering the US. The President may be playing to the gallery but he’s still running a tight theatre.
And Mr Biden? What can he do? Sit and wait for this to play out; get ready for the campaign even if nobody knows the issues.
