U.S. Coronavirus Highest Day Ever

ThatRobGuy said:

Whether both countries did nothing, or both countries implemented the exact same measures at the exact same time, Canada's per capita numbers would still look much better than ours.

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You are trying to make a case that leadership doesn't matter. That public announcements and public policies and plans don't matter.

I don't buy it at all.

I've seen first hand, great leadership, a country banding together to fight of a pandemic and winning.
If we had Trump as our leader it would have been very different. We would likely be (just like Europe and USA) and in the midst of larger spikes than ever before.

Belgium was doing well, but then they relaxed their policies and are now doing poorly.

Quite clearly, actions can be taken to control and even eradicate this disease.
Western nations have largely failed, except for a few cases like NZ and Australia. Canada have done quite well considering they share a border with USA.

USA has performed miserably, with leadership publicly playing down the disease, working against WHO and CDC, trying to smear their scientists and own task force, trying to get people to rebel against their governors, politicising mask wearing and organising large political rallies.

Ring the bell. We hit 100,000 today for the first time.

stevil said:

You are trying to make a case that leadership doesn't matter. That public announcements and public policies and plans don't matter.

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I'm saying that regardless of leadership, we weren't going to have per capita numbers that resemble Canada or NZ.

Obviously Trump has done a poor job managing it, I've been open about that.

I reject the notion that we would've had Canada/NZ numbers if he'd been better.


The reality is, Canada's approach wasn't all that stringent either. They shut down a lot of things around the same time we did...their mask mandates are a patchwork approach much like ours is, and they still faired way better

Sorting Out Canada’s Patchwork of Face Mask Rules

The reality is, if Justin was in charge of the US, and Donald was in charge of Canada, Canada still would've have better numbers than us.

Leadership matters, but it matters in terms of comparing ourselves to other potential outcomes for our own country, not comparing us to other countries that have certain built-in advantages when it comes to pandemic scenarios.

We could have the most competent, science-influenced leader in history...the US was never going to have a 0.51/100k death rate from this like NZ has. Nor would we have a 27.4/100k death rate like Canada has.

There's simply too many wheels in motion that can't be stopped abruptly (without worldwide economic consequences) like other countries have the luxury of doing.

Like I mentioned in an earlier post, there were several 3rd world countries that faired better than most 1st world countries. It's not evidence of a more competency, it's simply because it's much easier to shut down certain vectors of transmission for countries that aren't major international hubs, and aren't "destination hotspots".

This isn't a claim of "US exceptionalism", but our country can't just shutdown all incoming flights as easily as other countries can. We're not in the enviable position of being able to just shut everything down without massive worldwide consequences.

ThatRobGuy said:

I reject the notion that we would've had Canada/NZ numbers if he'd been better.

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Noone is suggesting that USA could have had numbers like NZ.

What we are highlighting is the many things that USA leadership has done poorly on.
The USA response was abysmal and could have been much better.

If USA leadership took the virus seriously, communicated quickly and honestly, promoted social distancing and mask wearing, implemeted quality and accessible testing early on, implemented a contact tracing and isolation system. If they did everything well, and followed WHO and CDC and expert guidelines and still if the numbers were bad, then people wouldn't be criticising them so much.

They get the criticism because of all the garbage they put out publicly, and because they didn't promote what the experts have been saying.

I think it is bad to suggest that it wouldn't have made a difference.

USA is a large distance from China, they share borders with two countries only. Canada is one of them and is doing quite well. We will never know exactly what would have happened had USA had competent leadership. But there are lots of things to criticise this current administration and their current response and approach to this pandemic.

ThatRobGuy said:

There's simply too many wheels in motion that can't be stopped abruptly (without worldwide economic consequences) like other countries have the luxury of doing.

Like I mentioned in an earlier post, there were several 3rd world countries that faired better than most 1st world countries. It's not evidence of a more competency, it's simply because it's much easier to shut down certain vectors of transmission for countries that aren't major international hubs, and aren't "destination hotspots".

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NZ has paid a heavy price for our shutdowns and for closing our borders.
Tourism is a large industry for us and we have shut that right down.
Many businesses are now struggling due to having no income for two months.
It wasn't easy for us, but we did it, because we first wanted to get in control of the pandemic in our country and then to work on the economy later.

stevil said:

NZ has paid a heavy price for our shutdowns and for closing our borders.
Tourism is a large industry for us and we have shut that right down.
Many businesses are now struggling due to having no income for two months.
It wasn't easy for us, but we did it, because we first wanted to get in control of the pandemic in our country and then to work on the economy later.

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Don't get me wrong, I fully understand that NZ had to face consequences as a result of the shutdowns, and your restaurant and entertainment industries took a bad beating just like ours did.

What I was referring to was being a country with heavy international implications. (in that more countries are negatively impacted by us shutting down certain sectors vs. NZ)

Our stock markets, and industries have a much larger impact on countries than that of NZ.

We're #3 in terms of exports, and #1 in terms of imports.

NZ is #51 in terms of exports, and #55 in terms of imports.


In essence, NZ hitting the "circuit breaker" on the economy for 4-6 weeks to contain the virus isn't going to have the same levels of disruption to the international supply chains and markets as if we were to do that.

I think that if the US had even talked about taking a swift (and deep) measure like NZ did, there would be tremendous international pressure urging us not to do so.

...which circles back around to what I mentioned before. As your leader said "go hard, go early"...that's great if you're in a position of having some certain built-in advantages (like being a much less critical importer/exporter in the global scheme of things).

ThatRobGuy said:

Our stock markets, and industries have a much larger impact on countries than that of NZ.

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This is the first time I have heard this argument.

Isn't Trump's platform that of "America first", one of nationalism and anti globalism?

Do you really think Trump cares about the impact on the rest of the world? and would be willing to have a raging pandemic kill 230K plus of USA folk in order to help out the economy for the rest of the world?


Where has Trump, Pence and the administration made a claim as to be sacrificing USA for the betterment of the global economy?

ThatRobGuy said:

Don't get me wrong, I fully understand that NZ had to face consequences as a result of the shutdowns, and your restaurant and entertainment industries took a bad beating just like ours did.

What I was referring to was being a country with heavy international implications. (in that more countries are negatively impacted by us shutting down certain sectors vs. NZ)

Our stock markets, and industries have a much larger impact on countries than that of NZ.

We're #3 in terms of exports, and #1 in terms of imports.

NZ is #51 in terms of exports, and #55 in terms of imports.


In essence, NZ hitting the "circuit breaker" on the economy for 4-6 weeks to contain the virus isn't going to have the same levels of disruption to the international supply chains and markets as if we were to do that.

I think that if the US had even talked about taking a swift (and deep) measure like NZ did, there would be tremendous international pressure urging us not to do so.

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Nonsense. I don't see any evidence such pressure exists.

Stop making apologies for the callous and wanton disregard for human life that the Orange Man has demonstrated.

FireDragon76 said:

Nonsense. I don't see any evidence such pressure exists.

Stop making apologies for the callous and wanton disregard for human life that the Orange Man has demonstrated.

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Again, people need to stop conflating "not sticking 100% to progressive talking points" with some sort of defense of Trump. I know the narrative is "if we had a democrat instead of Trump, we'd have half the deaths and half the cases"

I've stated in this thread that he handled it poorly, and that there was a lot he could've (and should've) done much better.

Me saying that "if US and Canada had swapped heads of state" or "If US and NZ swapped heads of state", the US would've still had a much poorer outcome than either of those two countries isn't a defense of Trump. It's an acknowledgment of the fact that there's more impactful factors at play than simply something claiming to take (or not take) it seriously during interviews.

Now, while Canada has done some things far better than we have, but even members of the Canadian Health Departments acknowledge that they have some built-in advantages that we don't have. As noted before, the disparity in cases per capita was similar for H1n1, and that was a time a when both nations had competent leaders who took it seriously.

Even the public health officials in Canada openly acknowledge that they have certain advantages when it comes to pandemic scenarios.

"Canada has the natural advantage of geography. It has less than one-ninth the United States’ population. Canadians aren’t evenly distributed — two-thirds of them live within 62 miles of the U.S. border — but no city here is as densely populated as, say, New York City. We have that geographic distribution between major centers,” said Jason Kindrachuk, a virologist at the University of Manitoba. “Undoubtedly, it has played a role."

"Canada was able to ramp up testing more quickly than the United States, enabling it to better isolate the sick, trace contacts and limit spread.

Efforts in the United States were hindered in part by a flawed test."
"

It also has to be acknowledged that the things many people are divided on, had some seriously mixed messages early on. There was a time early in the pandemic when people wanted to hoard masks for it, I saw lots of "Maga-hat" wearing Trump lovers raiding Home Depot and Lowes N-95 and respirator inventory, there were mixed messages regarding the masks. Much like there were mixed messages regarding travel bans (and neither of those were one-sided).

If Trump would've said "everyone, you'd better get to the store and buy every mask you can!", while Fauci was saying "There's no need for your average person to wear a mask, those should be reserved for healthcare workers and people who have close exposure to people with the illness", how do you think the media narrative would've played out for that one?

stevil said:

Isn't Trump's platform that of "America first", one of nationalism and anti globalism?

Do you really think Trump cares about the impact on the rest of the world? and would be willing to have a raging pandemic kill 230K plus of USA folk in order to help out the economy for the rest of the world?


Where has Trump, Pence and the administration made a claim as to be sacrificing USA for the betterment of the global economy?

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I don't think Trump does, but I don't think he knows what he's doing most of the time and his advisors are telling him what to say to pander to his base.

There's a big difference between "what Trump wants" and what multi-national organizations (both for-profit corps, and international organizations of more of an aid nature want).

You have a lot of countries that rely very heavily on nations like UK, US, France, and Italy for certain necessary provisions.

You look at some nations in Sub-Saharan Africa, they rely on the US exports for a major of their poultry and pre-prepared foods, as well as certain crops that don't grow well in their climate.

If the US (along with Italy & Spain) shut all of that down in one swoop for 4-6 weeks. Any guesses on what the UN (or international community) response would be if the US said "Sorry Africa and South America, all of that food you were buying from us...yeah, sorry, markets' closed for 6 weeks, you'll just have to find somewhere else to get your food, we're going to have to use our reserved to keep our own people fed for a while".

The backlash would be severe, and Trump would likely get accused of nationalism even more than he already is.

If you look at the pattern of countries that did well, they were the ones that were able to implement your countries model of "Go early, go hard". And if you look at the data for the countries that did that vs. the ones that didn't, there's a clear disparity in terms of where they fall on the list in terms of international imports/exports.

ThatRobGuy said:

The backlash would be severe, and Trump would likely get accused of nationalism even more than he already is.

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Uh huh. Sure. Meanwhile, Trump pulled the US out of the WHO in the middle of the pandemic.

This "America took a hit for the rest of the world" argument is pure malarky.

Tanj said:

Uh huh. Sure. Meanwhile, Trump pulled the US out of the WHO in the middle of the pandemic.

This "America took a hit for the rest of the world" argument is pure malarky.

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I'm not saying "we took a hit for the rest of the world"...far from it.

I'm saying that if the US had a different leader, and they even hinted at taking the same approach as New Zealand, there would almost certainly be major backlash from IMF, UN, and numerous international foreign aid organizations.

The #1 importer/#3 exporter in the world even hinting at taking the New Zealand "circuit breaker" approach would tank markets all over the world...and whoever the president was, would likely have a phone ringing off the hook saying "please don't do it, let's talk this through and see if we can meet in the middle"

The bigger you are the global supply chain, the more sweeping and dire impact you have by "pulling the plug" for 4-6 weeks.

ThatRobGuy said:

I'm not saying "we took a hit for the rest of the world"...far from it.

I'm saying that if the US had a different leader, and they even hinted at taking the same approach as New Zealand, there would almost certainly be major backlash from IMF, UN, and numerous international foreign aid organizations.

The #1 importer/#3 exporter in the world even hinting at taking the New Zealand "circuit breaker" approach would tank markets all over the world...and whoever the president was, would likely have a phone ringing off the hook saying "please don't do it, let's talk this through and see if we can meet in the middle"

The bigger you are the global supply chain, the more sweeping and dire impact you have by "pulling the plug" for 4-6 weeks.

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You made an argument, I called it malarky. Your response is to restate the argument. It's still malarky. It's your own economy that your people were and are being sacrificed to, not others.

Tanj said:

You made an argument, I called it malarky. Your response is to restate the argument. It's still malarky. It's your own economy that your people were and are being sacrificed to, not others.

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How is it "malarky"?

To acknowledge the fact that when you're a major link in the global supply chain, you don't live in a vacuum?...and that in a globalized economy, international forces have an influence on policy making?

I thought that was common knowledge.

The fact that it doesn't neatly fit within some canned talking point about how "things would've been great if we just had a different president" doesn't make it any less true...

Trump is terrible and mismanaged this thing from top to bottom...if I give you what you want and say that, will you at least acknowledge the point I'm making?

We could have a 2-person president team of Justin Trudeau and Jacinda Ardern, with Barack Obama as head advisor, and a team of a dozen top scientists (who they believe in 100% and don't discredit them in public the way Trump does to scientists). The US would still have a worse outcome than Canada and NZ, and the international community would still put tremendous pressure on us if we even hinted at doing what NZ did to address the pandemic.

Or is the only acceptable talking point "orange man bad, he's the baddest orangest man to ever exist who was bad and orange and bad and also a man...if it weren't for him, we'd have had only 11 cases, we'd already have a vaccine, and would all be attending indoor concerts and the virus would be eradicated as we speak"

ThatRobGuy said:

How is it "malarky"?

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Because there is not a single shred of evidence to support your claim that the current US administrations gives a small flying fig for anyone or anything outside its borders.

To acknowledge the fact that when you're a major link in the global supply chain, you don't live in a vacuum?...and that in a globalized economy, international forces have an influence on policy making?

I thought that was common knowledge.

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And I thought the Democratic leadership not running a pedophile ring out of the basement of a pizza parlor which doesn't even have a basement was common knowledge.

Guess what, we were both wrong.

The fact that it doesn't neatly fit within some canned talking point about how "things would've been great if we just had a different president" doesn't make it any less true...

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And the now fantasy opinion you have of your country doesn't make it any less false.

Trump is terrible and mismanaged this thing from top to bottom...if I give you what you want and say that, will you at least acknowledge the point I'm making?

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Nope. Sans Trump is like saying what if we invented a time machine and killed Hitler as a baby. A pointless hypothetical.

We could have a 2-person president team of Justin Trudeau and Jacinda Ardern, with Barack Obama as head advisor, and a team of a dozen top scientists (who they believe in 100% and don't discredit them in public the way Trump does to scientists). The US would still have a worse outcome than Canada and NZ, and the international community would still put tremendous pressure on us if we even hinted at doing what NZ did to address the pandemic.

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Too many hypotheticals to parse.

Or is the only acceptable talking point "orange man bad, he's the baddest orangest man to ever exist who was bad and orange and bad and also a man...if it weren't for him, we'd have had only 11 cases, we'd already have a vaccine, and would all be attending indoor concerts and the virus would be eradicated as we speak"

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I'd argue 100 000 dead at this point would be better than 220 000. and I never said it had to be eleven.

Searching1God said:

The idea apparently seems to be that if the president tells people to do something, they will do it.

So if president Trump says to people, do not riot, they will not riot. If he says do not protest, they will not protest. If he says do not steal, they will not steal. If he says do not cheat on your wife, people will not cheat on their wives or spouse

Pandemic problem could be solved in an instant, if Trump said to people, wear masks. Who knew the president was so allmighty...

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If only it were that easy.

Tanj said:

Because there is not a single shred of evidence to support your claim that the current US administrations gives a small flying fig for anyone or anything outside its borders.

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I didn't say he did, please go back and read my posts carefully instead of succumbing to the first visceral reaction based on skimming.

Trump never suggested a total circuit breaker shutdown like NZ did. I'm saying, if there was a president who did, they would face tremendous international pressure not to.

It'd be like saying "We're going to withdraw all of our peace keeping troops, and all of our Naval ships that are currently protecting shipping routes tomorrow...good luck everyone else!", the international community who is heavily reliant on those things are going to present some opposition to that idea.

As much as you want to call it malarky, it's a matter of fact that the #1 importer and #3 exporter in the world threatening to pull the plug on their economy for 6 weeks is going to draw immediate attention from the IMF, UN, NATO, etc... the #51/#55 (respectively) doing that isn't going to raise as many eyebrows and send the global economy into panic mode.

Trump doesn't care about anyone else, so he never suggested it...what I'm saying is that if we had a president who did care, and they tried to do the NZ approach, they'd be met with a lot of international opposition.

Tanj said:

And I thought the Democratic leadership not running a pedophile ring out of the basement of a pizza parlor which doesn't even have a basement was common knowledge.

Guess what, we were both wrong.

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What does PizzaGate have to do with anything, I'm not a conspiracy theorist.

Tanj said:

Too many hypotheticals to parse.

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No, it's not a hypothetical, we've been through pandemics before where we did have a competent leader, and we still did worse than Canada. We had Obama who had the "pandemic playbook for dummies" (as they called it), and Canadian conservative Stephen Harper still had better outcomes. That's not all a reflection on those two leaders (I think both Obama and Harper were good guys and competent and really cared about their people). There are logistic reasons why holding US to the same per capita standards as Canada or NZ is unreasonable.


If I put the prefix/suffix my posts with "Trump is worst the the last 5 presidents", will that get you to read the substance of the posts instead of pouncing on the parts that you feel make me "a Trump apologist?"

For the record, I voted for Biden today (but that's the last favor I do for the woke democrats...I go back to the libertarians in 2024 lol)

ThatRobGuy said:

I'm saying that regardless of leadership, we weren't going to have per capita numbers that resemble Canada or NZ.

Obviously Trump has done a poor job managing it, I've been open about that.

I reject the notion that we would've had Canada/NZ numbers if he'd been better.


The reality is, Canada's approach wasn't all that stringent either. They shut down a lot of things around the same time we did...their mask mandates are a patchwork approach much like ours is, and they still faired way better

Sorting Out Canada’s Patchwork of Face Mask Rules

The reality is, if Justin was in charge of the US, and Donald was in charge of Canada, Canada still would've have better numbers than us.

Leadership matters, but it matters in terms of comparing ourselves to other potential outcomes for our own country, not comparing us to other countries that have certain built-in advantages when it comes to pandemic scenarios.

We could have the most competent, science-influenced leader in history...the US was never going to have a 0.51/100k death rate from this like NZ has. Nor would we have a 27.4/100k death rate like Canada has.

There's simply too many wheels in motion that can't be stopped abruptly (without worldwide economic consequences) like other countries have the luxury of doing.

Like I mentioned in an earlier post, there were several 3rd world countries that faired better than most 1st world countries. It's not evidence of a more competency, it's simply because it's much easier to shut down certain vectors of transmission for countries that aren't major international hubs, and aren't "destination hotspots".

This isn't a claim of "US exceptionalism", but our country can't just shutdown all incoming flights as easily as other countries can. We're not in the enviable position of being able to just shut everything down without massive worldwide consequences.

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This kinda makes me laugh.
In one instance Americans will day, justifiably that their country can do anything. They are rich. Their brain capital is literally better than any other country.

So to argue that the us couldn't have done better is just not reasonable...and I agree that it's the public response that is the major contributor. But I do believe that if Trump had taken this disease seriously and conveyed that to his worshippers, we would see vastly different numbers. He created an environment that fostered apathy

ThatRobGuy said:

I didn't say he did, please go back and read my posts carefully instead of succumbing to the first visceral reaction based on skimming.

Trump never suggested a total circuit breaker shutdown like NZ did. I'm saying, if there was a president who did, they would face tremendous international pressure not to.

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And I'm saying Trump would toss that international pressure into the dustbin the same way he did all the other international pressures.

Trump doesn't care about anyone else, so he never suggested it...what I'm saying is that if we had a president who did care, and they tried to do the NZ approach, they'd be met with a lot of international opposition.

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Right, but Trump is the president. So your hypothetical is pointless. In fact flipping it around, Trump is the only president in recent history that had a hope of containing the US COVID rates because he couldn't care less about international pressure. He was (or at least someone with his international sensibilities was) the best option the US could have had. Unfortunately, he lived up to his reputation and ended up being the worst.

What does PizzaGate have to do with anything, I'm not a conspiracy theorist.

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It was an analogy. Not a great one, TBH.

For the record, I voted for Biden today (but that's the last favor I do for the woke democrats...I go back to the libertarians in 2024 lol)

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Good luck. Looks like the US system is winning despite all the sky is falling protestations to the contrary.

rambot said:

This kinda makes me laugh.
In one instance Americans will day, justifiably that their country can do anything. They are rich. Their brain capital is literally better than any other country.

So to argue that the us couldn't have done better is just not reasonable...and I agree that it's the public response that is the major contributor. But I do believe that if Trump had taken this disease seriously and conveyed that to his worshippers, we would see vastly different numbers. He created an environment that fostered apathy

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Again, I'm not arguing that we couldn't have done better...I've mentioned that a few times.

My argument that was no matter what we did, it was never in the cards to have the same kinds of per capita rates of a Can or NZ.

If you want to make the argument that our death count could've been 175k right now instead of 235k? Sure, I'd say that likely could've been a possibility given what we know.

But some things would have had to have been done differently by both sides (and the health experts community) back in January and February in order for that to happen.

-Trump would have had to shut our borders much sooner, and not just to China because it made for a politically convenient "hey look, I'm tough on the Chinese virus!" talking point, but to Europe as well, and in return, the Democrats shouldn't have encouraged certain types of gatherings simply to "spite Trump's travel ban" and "show how tolerant we are of Asian Americans" as a virtue signal.

-The public health community would've needed to give a consistent message on a couple of key points regarding social distancing and mask-wearing. Those messages got more consistent over time, but about a month too late.

-We would've had to have some sort of contingency in place for the nations that heavily rely on us for certain things, as it would be an international relations/PR nightmare if there were countries that rely on us for 60% of a certain type of export, and we just shut it down overnight.

-Politicians on both sides would need to stop picking and choosing what sort of large gatherings are okay based on political leanings of the people participating in them. (IE: Republicans saying "Lockdown protests good; BLM protests bad...and Democrats doing the inverse)

-Trump would've had to have stopped trying to undermine public faith in science, but the left-leaning news outlets would've needed to be more honest about the data. Counterbalancing every report of mortality rates by age group, with digging deep for a one-off story about "how this perfectly healthy 24 year old died of Covid" in order to support Democratic governors having needlessly overreaching lockdown policies (like the ones that said you're not allow to go surfing by yourself at the beach).


There would've needed to have been some sort of strategy (and I've yet to hear of an effective one apart from sending in swat teams wearing hazmat suits to point guns at people) for getting 18-25's to comply. Several were still meeting up for parties during the stay at home orders, and they weren't just the Trump-loving ones. LA, Detroit, and Chicago also had huge problems with people in that age range not complying with the orders and still throwing parties.

ThatRobGuy said:

Again, I'm not arguing that we couldn't have done better...I've mentioned that a few times.

My argument that was no matter what we did, it was never in the cards to have the same kinds of per capita rates of a Can or NZ.

If you want to make the argument that our death count could've been 175k right now instead of 235k? Sure, I'd say that likely could've been a possibility given what we know.

But some things would have had to have been done differently by both sides (and the health experts community) back in January and February in order for that to happen.

-Trump would have had to shut our borders much sooner, and not just to China because it made for a politically convenient "hey look, I'm tough on the Chinese virus!" talking point, but to Europe as well, and in return, the Democrats shouldn't have encouraged certain types of gatherings simply to "spite Trump's travel ban" and "show how tolerant we are of Asian Americans" as a virtue signal.

-The public health community would've needed to give a consistent message on a couple of key points regarding social distancing and mask-wearing. Those messages got more consistent over time, but about a month too late.

-We would've had to have some sort of contingency in place for the nations that heavily rely on us for certain things, as it would be an international relations/PR nightmare if there were countries that rely on us for 60% of a certain type of export, and we just shut it down overnight.

-Politicians on both sides would need to stop picking and choosing what sort of large gatherings are okay based on political leanings of the people participating in them. (IE: Republicans saying "Lockdown protests good; BLM protests bad...and Democrats doing the inverse)

-Trump would've had to have stopped trying to undermine public faith in science, but the left-leaning news outlets would've needed to be more honest about the data. Counterbalancing every report of mortality rates by age group, with digging deep for a one-off story about "how this perfectly healthy 24 year old died of Covid" in order to support Democratic governors having needlessly overreaching lockdown policies (like the ones that said you're not allow to go surfing by yourself at the beach).


There would've needed to have been some sort of strategy (and I've yet to hear of an effective one apart from sending in swat teams wearing hazmat suits to point guns at people) for getting 18-25's to comply. Several were still meeting up for parties during the stay at home orders, and they weren't just the Trump-loving ones. LA, Detroit, and Chicago also had huge problems with people in that age range not complying with the orders and still throwing parties.

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Hmmm. It seems like the majority of your complains about the health experts really stem from the first month or two of the virus.

Sadly, they were only following the best advice that they could have given at the time based on research, data and trends (which I'm sure you know). And since likely about May (maybe June) they've been pretty consistent with their messaging. And that is 5 month ago.

If you don't mind, I'll take a couple inquisative stabs at your other points:

-We would've had to have some sort of contingency in place for the nations that heavily rely on us for certain things, as it would be an international relations/PR nightmare if there were countries that rely on us for 60% of a certain type of export, and we just shut it down overnight.

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Yeah. I don't think so. Every country around the world had situations similar to that in some way and yes, there were some issues but there was no "PR nightmare". As I recall reading shipments of medical radiative materials were affected but I can say Canada (a major exporter) didn't get that much guff. I mean come on. This CERTAINLY should be expected.
That said, I'm curious whta goods you'd put in that catagory? I'm sure not Chryslers....(blech).

-Trump would've had to have stopped trying to undermine public faith in science, but the left-leaning news outlets would've needed to be more honest about the data. Counterbalancing every report of mortality rates by age group, with digging deep for a one-off story about "how this perfectly healthy 24 year old died of Covid" in order to support Democratic governors having needlessly overreaching lockdown policies (like the ones that said you're not allow to go surfing by yourself at the beach).

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1) I disagree they were dishonest about the data. 2) I see why you would come to understand the manipulation in using the "healthy 24yr old". At the same time, I think they SHOULD have reported it. It's important to know what CAN happen. Now, I never really read those articles. I would LIKE to assume that htye had a tenor of "now this is pretty rare", but I can't comment on that. In the meantime, this sounds a bit too conspiratorial. And when you talk about "Democratic governors having needlessly overreaching lockdown policies", honestly, all I can say to that is: How are their infection rates going? Are they ACTUALLY overreaching.
There were places around the world that had FAAAAAAR more stringent measures thta even the most stringent governors. Fact is, those measures got results.

-Trump would have had to shut our borders much sooner, and not just to China because it made for a politically convenient "hey look, I'm tough on the Chinese virus!" talking point, but to Europe as well, and in return, the Democrats shouldn't have encouraged certain types of gatherings simply to "spite Trump's travel ban" and "show how tolerant we are of Asian Americans" as a virtue signal.

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1) I agree to an extent. I think travel bans, when there are epidemics happenning, should be implemented FAR sooner until a better understanding of the disease has occurred. 2) My problem with Trump's travel ban to china is that it WASN'T a travel ban....like, at all. Something like 90,000 people STILL came from China in the weeks after that announcement. Tehy just weren't Chinese nationals.
3)Honestly, I think I've found about 3 or 4 democrats who alluded to "racism" or "xenophobia" around the travel ban specifically. Listen, instituting an ACTUAL travel ban would NOT have been either of those things.
But that is not what was instituted.
IT was a ban on Chinese nationals. NOT a ban on travel to OR from China for anyone else. Regardless, his naming of the disease the "China virus" ABSOLUTELY is xenophobic, in my opinion anyways.

-Politicians on both sides would need to stop picking and choosing what sort of large gatherings are okay based on political leanings of the people participating in them. (IE: Republicans saying "Lockdown protests good; BLM protests bad...and Democrats doing the inverse)

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. I would agree with this. Here is MORE my thinking:
1) If people are at protests, generally staying distant and wearing masks outside, that is alright.
2) If you are protesting near other people with no mask, then YES, that is bad.
I wasn't paying super close attention but it did seem to me that many BLM protesters wore masks (not all). I can say that in my hometown way up here in Canada, we had a BLM protest that had a few thousand people. EVERYONE was spaced....probably about 98% of people had masks (most of those who didn't were carrying cameras and seemed to look like they were proud boys or something.....no proof though).
Lockdown protests that minimized the risk and didn't take proper safety precautions (and why SHOULD they if they think the disease is a conspiracy anyways) ABSOLUTELY should castigated as unsafe.

It's not the content of the gathering; it's the behaviour of the people AT the gathering that should be the deciding feature.