Journalist Bob Woodward’s new book, Rage, had pre-release bombshell when it was revealed last week that President Donald Trump essentially confessed to downplaying his knowledge of the coronavirus.
“I think Bob, really, to be totally honest with you,” the president said on audio tape to Woodward. “I always wanted to play it down. I still like playing it down. Because I don’t want to create a panic.”
It was Trump’s monumental miscalculation. As Benjamin Franklin might have said, “A stitch in time saves nine.” Or in the coronavirus situation 192,000 lives and counting. All dead Americans from the virus the president knew was five times more deadly than the flu. That’s what he told Woodward. And now that we know the result of inaction, forget the idea of “downplaying.” Woodward smells a cover-up when he sees one. Whatever you feel about the word, just think of the panic the Trump slow roll has created now in higher ed.
If states are a patch work quilt of governors trying to do their best without federal support, what of the chaos created now at every college and university in the country? Each one is essentially on its own to maneuver and find a solution that may or may not work. Or to find something that is still based on an hypothesis, but sounds reasonable enough to keep the doors open.
Some schools planned to start early, like Notre Dame, then reversed course. The California State University system cancelled classes early and went online. Now the system has announced massive layoffs. Other schools were going hybrid, then remote only. Some were sending their students home after setting up shop and realizing it was a disaster. Now some schools are realizing, sending students home is like a super-spreader event. In those cases, campuses have become quarantine centers.
And then there’s testing. We have no national plan. What is the testing plan for schools? University of Illinois-Urbana after developing a quick testing method has become a model of sorts. But some schools still don’t test enough. Is one and done enough?
But if Trump, the down-player-in-chief is our national model, then maybe the message is we should all be doing as much as possible to obscure the truth with minimal testing and number fudging—so as not to panic the public. Is that really a Trump COVID “best practice”?
