To get a sense of what the pandemic response will look like when we elect Joe Biden and Stacey Abrams, observe how Washington, D.C.’s all-Democrat city government is handling things.
Every news organization is reporting that “all 50 states” have begun reopening their economies. True, but the district is not a state. We’re still on lockdown. And the order has, for the third time, just been extended after the weekend saw an uptick in confirmed infections, according to the mayor.
Washington, D.C., has been deemed a “hot spot” by the White House, with a higher infection rate than most states, but the transmission and deaths have largely occurred within nursing homes and government-funded shelters. The city, each day, releases the number of people whose deaths were recorded as coronavirus-related, and it looks a lot like the report from Sunday. There were eight deaths recorded, and the average age of the victim was 77. No one was younger than 65, and the data does not say who, if any, had an underlying condition that served as a contributing factor.
None of that data would justify a continued, indefinite shutdown of restaurants, clubs, bars, and recreational venues.
Even so, the latest lockdown extension came just two days before we were scheduled to begin the first “stage” of our “reopen” plan, which was put together under the trusty oversight of former Obama administration official Susan Rice.
The reopening plan, just like almost every other government action taken in this pandemic, is a joke.
At stage one, we’re allowed to gather in groups of no larger than 10, restaurants can have outdoor seating only (which is extremely limited in the district), and most outdoor recreational areas such as golf courses can reopen “with safeguards.” Bars and schools, however, are to remain shuttered, retail outlets can only offer curbside sales — have fun trying on that dress from Nordstrom Rack while standing on the sidewalk! — and hair salons can only service five people for every 1,000 square feet.
The place I used to go for a haircut might be 1,000 square feet, meaning that, at one time, they could provide service only for two full-sized customers, plus Michael Bloomberg, after you account for two hairstylists. Typically, that place has at least five stylists working. On weekends, it’s more like 10.
How could that establishment, and the countless others like it, possibly make a profit under the stage one criteria? How could it afford rent, insurance, and other bills, let alone payroll?
One of the local bartenders here posted a Facebook note on Saturday explaining what would happen to his business, which doubles as a restaurant, should he open under stage one. He said that at 10,000 square feet and with the maximum number of people allowed in under the order, he would still lose money. “I could stay open all month with this current plan and not even be able to pay all of my insurance payments,” he wrote. “Forget about payroll, rent, electricity, cable, gas and buying product.”
Stage one, by the way, is only achievable, according to Susan Rice’s plan, after Washington, D.C., has had 14 continuous days of declining infection rates. We got to day 12, which was Sunday, and apparently saw a “spike” in confirmed coronavirus infections, according to the city, resulting in the rollback.
Sisyphus shrugged.
We don’t reach “stage two” of Rice’s plan until we see localized, or contained, transmission of infection, at which point restaurants can open their doors to customers at 50% capacity, and gyms can start up again, but only under the same conditions as hair salons in stage one. Bars still remain closed, and public schools end up with some convoluted “A/B schedule” for students to come on alternate days, but only kids who really need it.
It isn’t until stage three, when we see something called “sporadic transmission,” whatever that means, before communal pools are even allowed to open. That includes outdoor pools found in the sunlight, which, other than inside by yourself, is literally the safest place to be right now.
Stage four? We don’t get there until there is “an effective vaccine or cure.” At that point, we see a “new normal” for the city, “with all activities as close to normal as possible.”
Why, children, don’t you want to wear a mask for the rest of your lives?
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, apparently thinks that’s a good idea. At his daily press briefing on Tuesday, he said masks are “officially cool.”
Is there anything more depressing than that statement?
And yet the media like to call President Trump an irresponsible idiot for insisting that, someday, sooner than later, we will go back to the way things we were — back to when we were free to make new friends at bars.
It’s very unfortunate that the Chinese allowed a deadly virus to blaze around the world, but we’re now living with it. That’s better than letting Susan Rice turn the rest of the country into Washington, D.C.
