But the point is that we acted extremely slow to this threat and the numbers are reflecting that.
I am going to agree that New York, and Florida, were slow to act. It was not particularly helpful that Bill de Blasio was saying that the virus was not that contagious, and that people should get out and about; the Spring Break on the beaches in Florida didn’t help matters in the least.
Comparing different cultures (e.g. South Korea) to the US starts off with unequal reactions to local/country requests/demands concerning health responses. Korea has done pretty close to a fantastic response to the threat.
New York in particular show an obliviousness to danger (and we could likely throw Nancy Pelosi’s comments into the same category).
Whether we want to ascribe lack of information (as in de Balsio and Pelosi) for the laissze faire response to the danger, or the middle of the impeachment process as a distraction from the seriousness, or Trump Derangement Syndrome, both are Democratic leaders who put out a message “Oh this is no big deal”.
Or we can blame Trump for not being borderline hysterical “The sky is falling!” publicly. There was little that the Federal Government could do to make people shelter in place; there are certainly legal arguments that even the States do not have some of the authority they have exercised.
In short, our attitude of independence has its pluses; but when it comes to responding to a pandemic, it has seriously negative consequences. And the "social distancing (I am trying to be polite) between our two political parties has done no favors to getting this virus under control.
Oregon did a bit of a hesitation waltz in getting a response headed in the right direction, but we appear to have been spared any massive infection rate - and that in spite of being a seriously liberal bent in politics.
And so it goes.
The new turn is how much intrusiveness people will put up with concerning tracking, which is eminently capable of assisting us in preventing a rebound once we have leveled off in the rate of infections. It also raises hackles about Big Brother.
