Below is first what I submitted to CNN when they asked people to respond to Biden's win, and below that is another note about Trump and COVID-19. The first one hasn't been edited by me since I submitted it to CNN.
1. I'm really glad. I had a lot of anxiety about it, which won't completely leave until Trump either concedes or it's clear that he's isolated and alone. But Trump is worse than George W. Bush and Bush was worse than his Dad and most republicans. In addition to everything else, Trump has been a disaster in relation to the pandemic. He would actually make fun of people for wearing masks. We have suffered disproportionate to our numbers as a nation. At the end of May we had lost 100,000 people. At the same time, at that point Israel had lost just 284 people- in America, 30 times bigger, that's 8,520 people. As much as I dislike Netanyahu, if he were our President in the early months of the pandemic, we would have lost 8,520 people instead of 100,000. I'm sure something similar can be said about the time since late May. He predicted a pandemic while Trump was calling it a media hoax, he was putting his foot down about social distancing while Trump was prematurely talking about re-opening. I write at greater length about this at- https://theblackandthegreen2.blogspot.com/2020/04/trump-netanyahu-and-covid-19-coronavirus.html But the main thing is that we had a horrible President when we needed, more than ever, a good one, and now (what will hopefully be) the final months of COVID-19 will be more bearable and less anxiety producing if we have a President who encourages mask-wearing, who doesn't seek political favors in exchange for desperately-needed medical supplies, who doesn't push us too far as far as re-opening, who will allow the scientists and doctors to develop a vaccine that is safe and effective without political interference, etc.
2. Somewhere in my COVID-19 posts I need to put something. I am a very strong believer in masks and I also respect Dr. Fauci. Trump likes to point out that in the very early weeks of COVID-19 Dr. Fauci opposed the idea of encouraging the general public to wear masks. Dr. Fauci's main or only argument was that there weren't enough masks for medical personnel AND the general public. Now, in hindsight and maybe for some people at the time, opposing mask use by the general public was a stupid mistake. There would have been fewer deaths in the Spring if we had all been wearing masks. I understand that medical personnel were a priority, but this is another example of Trump failing to use the Defense Production Act like a sledgehammer. We could have had enough masks in early March if he had. I don't know how Netanyahu did on this question, but Trump failed. Before he started making fun of people for wearing a mask, at one point in April or May he made some half-hearted suggestion that people "might" want to wear a scarf over their mouth and nose. And he seems to think that masks are primarily for the benefit of the wearer, when it's for the people around them. He also doesn't understand that you should wear a mask when no one's around but there's a decent chance someone will come up to you unexpectedly, instead of just when there ARE people around you. We all forget sometimes to wear a mask when we go out, but if you plan on putting one on when you leave the house instead of just when someone unexpectedly comes up to you outside, it’ll work out better.
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