Letters to the editor | Tuesday, March 24, 2020: Trump’s irresponsible approach to coronavirus

Blame for coronavirus misplaced

Mark Thiessen’s opinion column criticizing China’s response to the coronavirus is a perfect description of Trump’s response and his irresponsible mouthpiece, Fox. They lie to themselves and to the world — “It’s just the flu or a cold and we have great numbers, the best numbers and it’s totally under control and will disappear soon” — despite all evidence to the contrary. And in what administration do the experts need to be more afraid than under Trump where telling a truth he doesn’t like gets you fired?

Had we implemented stringent containment and testing immediately perhaps we wouldn’t be looking at the devastating situation we now face. Ironic that China is now looking at blocking people from Europe and America — where we didn’t react adequately — so they aren’t recontaminated.

China’s response surprised no one

Can someone at the Washington Post please drug-test Marc Thiessen before he gets his hands on a keyboard again? Maybe just a simple urine test? He is obviously cooking or smoking something. It appears he woke from a stupor and was told that China is a “brutal totalitarian dictatorship.”

In an attempt to describe this heinous regime, he inadvertently reveals the authoritarian instincts of the Trump administration itself. This is what totalitarian regimes do: They lie to themselves, and then they lie to the world. The system creates such fear that people are afraid to report up the chain, causing authoritarian blindness. Think climate change. If flashing red lights caused sunburn, Marc would need treatment for third degree burns.

It is now common knowledge that much of the damage to the U.S., socially and economically, was caused by the slow and haphazard response of this administration. Trump disbanded pandemic teams, cut funding for the CDC, and we find out that few public labs are testing for the coronavirus.

Thiessen’s solution is to “drain the swamp....in China.” Do we have the results back yet on that urine sample?

Scary headlines aren’t helping

Re “Labor shortfall could affect food supply” (Front page, Mar. 20-21) and “Stanislaus County’s coronavirus response still needs work” (Page 10A, Mar. 20-21): I applaud The Bee for holding the county’s leaders’ feet to the fire for their poor performance in handling the coronavirus crisis.

At the same time, I scold The Bee for publishing a headline on March 20 about “food shortages.” The article relates only to the possibility of the lack of fresh vegetables because of labor shortages, not to a general food shortage. This kind of scare headline will only cause people to do more unnecessary hoarding.

Is this any way to treat a hero?

How messed up is it that a family renting a room can get kicked out of the house they thought was home due to this coronavirus?

We were living with another family and they decided to kick us out because my wife works in the medical field and she is around people that might have the virus. So we are forced to leave and live on the streets?

This story was originally published March 24, 2020 at 5:45 AM with the headline "Letters to the editor | Tuesday, March 24, 2020: Trump’s irresponsible approach to coronavirus."