It was all fireworks at CNBC Friday morning when two hosts went toe-to-toe arguing over the wisdom and efficacy of state-imposed coronavirus lockdowns.
In the first corner is host Andrew Ross Sorkin, who believes it makes sense that big-box retailers should be exempt from the pandemic restrictions placed on restaurants and churches.
In the opposite corner, on the anti-lockdown side of the debate, is analyst Rick Santelli, the man who helped launch the Tea Party movement in 2009 with an impromptu anti-bailout speech shouted from the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange.
The moment occurred after CNBC host Joe Kernen made an offhanded crack about hypocritical pro-lockdown Democratic governors.
“We’re seeing calls for, not necessarily closing things down,” he said, “but certainly there are some calls to close things down, except for the politicians themselves, but for their constituents they are talking about.”
Santelli responded, saying, “I believe in careful, and when I point out governors cheating, it’s not for the hypocrisy, which exists, it’s the fact that I think many of these governors are intelligent people and they love their families, which they have taken out into restaurants.”
“There is,” he continued, “an ongoing debate as to, you know, why a parking lot for a big-box store, like by my house, is jampacked, not one parking spot open. Why are those people any safer than a restaurant with plexiglass? I just don’t get it, and I think there are a million of these questions that could be asked, and I think it’s really sad that when we look at the service sector, and all the discussions we have had about job losses that that particular dynamic isn’t studied more, isn’t worked more, we don’t put more people in a room and try to figure out ways so that the service sector employees and employers can all come back in a safer way. You can’t tell me that shutting down, which is the easiest answer, is necessarily the only answer.”
Sorkin interjected to deliver what he characterized as a “public health and public service announcement for the audience,” saying there is a world of difference between “a big-box retailer and a restaurant or, frankly, even a church, are so different, it’s unbelievable.”
That’s when the fight really began:
The differences are so stark, Sorkin argued, “it’s unbelievable. Going into a big box retailer, you’re wearing a mask.”
“I disagree!” shouted Santelli.
Sorkin persisted, saying, “You’re required to wear a mask. It’s science, I’m sorry. It’s science. If you’re wearing a mask, it’s a different story.”
“It’s not science!” Santelli responded. “Five hundred people in a Lowes aren’t any safer than 150 people in a restaurant that holds 600 … And I live in an area where there is a lot of restaurants that have fought back, and they don’t have any problems, and they’re open.“
“Okay,” Sorkin said, “you don’t have to believe it, but let me just say this: You’re doing a disservice to the viewer because the viewers need to understand it … I would like to keep our viewers as healthy as humanly possible. The idea of packing people into restaurants and packing people into a Best Buy are completely different things.”
“I think our viewers are smart enough to make part of those decisions on their own,” Santelli shot back. “I don’t think I’m much smarter than all the viewers like some people do.”
It was at that point that CNBC host Melissa Lee interjected to get the discussion back on track.
If there is a purer distillation of the current debate between the pro- and anti-lockdown teams, where one side suggests there is maybe a way to survive the pandemic that does not also involve chronic administrative inconsistencies and economic ruin while the other side just keeps screaming “Science!” over and over, I have yet to see it.
