Public safety becomes a casualty to the culture wars

Trump has been a source of amusement for years but the mind-boggling events of this week have changed all that.

US President Donald Trump gives two thumbs up from the Truman Balcony upon his return to the White House from Walter Reed Medical Center, where he underwent treatment for Covid-19.

Confession: it is easy to laugh when on the other side of the world, I suppose, but Donald Trump has been a source of great amusement for many years. However, as the mind-boggling events unfolded this week, the smile was wiped from my dial.

Telling people not to be afraid of COVID-19, which he has contracted — although when and where remains a secret — the President checked out of hospital and returned to the White House.

A day or so later, as the US death toll reached 211,532, reports on television claimed Trump was symptom free and had declared his infection a “blessing in disguise”.

Polls often are wrong but they have Trump on track to lose the election. If he does, it will be because of his COVID-19 response.

If the leader of any country has only one job, it is to keep their citizens out of harm’s way. Despite any other previous policy triumphs, if a leader doesn’t do everything to keep their people alive in the face of avoidable death, they won’t be appreciated.

To those embedded in the deepest trenches of the culture wars, responses to the pandemic have been framed along the clunky and dated left-right linear. Governments on the left can’t do a thing right while governments on the right are to be admired.

On the one hand, restrictions and lockdowns are opposed because the virus has to be allowed to spread, while the vulnerable are protected. Yet where a government did let the virus spread — despite badly bungled attempts to contain it — that government is condemned with an obsessive single-mindedness.

At the same time, when the government tasked with protecting the vulnerable (in aged care) fails, any criticism is short-lived.

The truth is, most people are not seeing the pandemic through the prism of politics. And in recent weeks, as the spectacle in the US unfolded, it was difficult not to reflect on the irony. On September 26, before Trump’s diagnosis, a government event was held in the White House rose garden. It looked like a scene from the pre-COVID era. People sat right next to each other without masks and mingled closely, even indoors.

Now there is a growing cluster in the White House. Only the most committed refuse to concede the obvious.

Imagine if someone on the other side of politics (say, Daniel Andrews) did a similar thing. Envisage a Victorian event at Trades Hall, where Labor and union people mingle closely without masks, ignoring social distancing. Imagine then that Andrews becomes infected, goes to hospital, takes a cocktail of experimental drugs, then leaves isolation to return to work, all the while claiming the virus is no big deal.

The same folk praising the President right now would be demanding the Premier’s arrest and wanting the whole of Victoria set on fire.

And this is where our lesson lies. Bitter battles between the left and the right, during a pandemic, help absolutely no one. In a time of crisis we need to unite for the common good. We need to reassure each other, lift each other up, preserve life and behave in a sensible manner. The pandemic is too serious to be used as a political cudgel.

Masks are uncomfortable and annoying, but they should not be cast as political statements. Social distancing feels weird, but we need to do it. Border closures and lockdowns are brutal, restrictive and damaging but, unfortunately, necessary. They are not a socialist plot to shut down capitalism.

In the US, one poll just released by Reuters-Ipsos surveyed 1005 US adults, including 596 likely voters. It found that 65 per cent of respondents, including five in 10 registered Republicans, agreed that “if President Trump had taken coronavirus more seriously, he probably would not have been infected”. Only 34 per cent thought Trump had been honest about the pandemic and 57 per cent disapproved of his overall response to the health crisis.

In the land of the free, another poll, by Gallup, found that by 2-1, most Americans think even healthy people should avoid returning to their normal lives and stay home to stay safe. It seems apparent that most would rather suffer the loss of freedom and wear restrictions than live in a society where the virus circulates freely.

Keep an eye on the next three elections: New Zealand on October 17, Queensland on October 31 and the US on November 3. Voters expect politicians to do everything to keep them safe, and many will vote along these lines.