Im-Politic: Georgia Evidence that Trump-ism Needs to Transcend Trump

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CCP Virus, conservatives, coronavirus, COVID 19, Covid relief, election 2020, election integrity, establishment Republicans, Georgia, Georgia Senate runoff, GOP, Im-Politic, Populism, Republicans, Trump, Wuhan virus

Good luck to anyone (including me!) in trying to figure out what the results of yesterday’s Georgia Senate runoff elections will mean for American politics – especially since there are so many reasons to waffle, and lots of them are very compelling. For example, although as of this morning, it looks like a Democratic sweep, but because the margins are so close, and non-trivial numbers of military and other mail-in ballots won’t be counted until 5 PM EST Friday, the final verdict may not be known until Friday. Largely as a result, recounts are practically certain.

In addition, so much about this entire national election cycle was unusual, and not at all sure to cast long shadows – especially the CCP Virus pandemic and its damaging economic consequences. As a result, on top of events’ impressive abilities to throw curveballs, it’s intimidating to try predicting two years out (when the 2022 midterm elections will be held) much less the outcome of the 2024 presidential and congressional races.

Weirdly, however, despite these yawning uncertainties, today at least I’m feeling more confident about a big question I found tough to answer shortly after the election: whether it’s best for the kind of Trump-ian populist policies I generally support strongly for the President to run for reelection the next time around, or call his political career quits.

Many of my reasons for equivocation still matter greatly. But the passage of two months, and particulary the apparent Democratic Georgia victories, have now convinced me that both Trumpers and therefore country will better off if with Trump-ism without Trump. And even though America’s pollsters overall still need to work hard to get their acts together and rebuild their reputations, it’s been the Georgia Senate exit polls that have mainly tipped me into the anti-Trump column, and two sets of findings in particular.

Several of these surveys are available; I’m using the one conducted by Fox News and the Associated Press because it featured what I regard as more of the most pertinent questions. As for the two sets of findings?

First, it’s clear that Georgia voters back the kind of unorthodox mix of policies that have marked Trump-ist economics. For example, by a whopping 72 percent to seven percent margin, respondents said Congress is doing “too little,” rather than “too much” to help the “financial situation” of “individual Americans” during the CCP Virus crisis. (Twenty-one percent credited Congress with doing “about the right amount.”) This sounds like a strong endorsement of the President’s (last-minute) call for $2,000 virus relief checks, and equally strong disagreement with the opposition of most traditional Republican politicians.

Ratings of Congress’ efforts to help small businesses were nearly identical to the individuals’ results. By 52 percent to 28 percent, however, these Georgia voters felt that Congress was providing “large corporations” with too much rather than too little support. (Twenty-eight percent viewed these efforts as about right.)

Yet by an almost-as-impressive two-to-one, respondents favored “reducing government regulation of business.” Nothing was asked about one of Mr. Trump’s signature issues – trade – but with China so deeply and increasingly unpopular among Americans, it’s tough to imagine that most Georgians would object to his tariffs and other crackdowns on Beijing’s economic predation. Immigration is a tougher call. Only four percent viewed it as “the most important issue facing the country,” but answers to this question understandably were dominated by “the coronavirus pandemic” (43 percent) and “the economy and jobs” (27 percent).

All told, though, these Georgians look like they’d be entirely comfortable with at least much of Trump-ism. But the President himself? Not nearly so much. Thus:

>Mr. Trump himself earned 51 percent-to-47 percent unfavorable ratings from the sample, which consisted of 52 percent Republicans or Republican-leaners, 42 percent Democrats or Democratic-leaners, and seven percent Independents; and 43 percent self-described conservatives, 34 percent moderates, and 23 percent liberals.

>The greater concerns expressed above about the CCP Virus than about its economic consequences clashes with the President’s clear priorities over the last year.

>Indeed, they also endorsed mandatory mask-wearing outside of the home by 74 percent to 26 percent. 

>Moreover, by 62 percent to 38 percent, respondents expressed confidence that, nation-wide, November’s presidential votes “were counted accurately” (with 56 percent “very confident”) and by 61 percent to 39 percent, they think Joe Biden “was legitimately elected president.”

>Therefore, Mr. Trump’s handling “of the results of the 2020 presidential election” were disapproved by a 56 percent to 44 percent margin.

And more signs that the President himself turned off many Georgia runoff voters – especially with his election challenges: According to the RealClearPolitics averages, as his protests of the presidential votes continued, both Georgia Democratic Senate candidates, Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock gained momentum at the expense of their Republican (incumbent) opponents David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler, respectively.

None of this is to say that creating a politically successful Trump-less Trump-ism will be easy. As I wrote right after the presidential vote, the President’s charisma-based ability to excite a large mass of voters is not yet remotely matched in Republican ranks. Yet the Georgia runoff results strike me as more evidence that his disruptive instincts represent a growing liability, and Mr. Trump’s insistence that he was the actual 2020 winner virtually rules out the chance that he’ll change spots that he obviously believes won him both election and reelection.

Right now, therefore, it seems clear that, as someone wrote someplace yesterday (unfortunately, I can’t find the quote), Republicans can’t win with Trump, and they can’t win without him.

Yet going forward, I suspect that two truths will begin weakening the President’s support. First, the fact that (as I’ve seen first-hand during my working life), the founders of movements tend to be lousy managers and sustainers of those movements. Second, any movement so heavily dependent on a single personality won’t likely be a lasting movement. So for those reasons, along with the Mr. Trump’s age, the sooner his supporters and leaners can choose a successor, or identify a group of plausible successors, the better.

But don’t think for a minute that I’m highly confident that this transition can take place in time for the 2024 campaign cycle’s kickoff. In fact, I am highly confident that the process will be loud and heated and messy – that is, pretty Trump-y.

Im-Politic: How Much Did the Lockdowns Really Help?

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African Americans, CCP Virus, coronavirus, COVID 19, economy, Georgia, hospitalizations, Im-Politic, lockdowns, public health, reopening, shutdown, Virginia, Washington Post, Wuhan virus

Is it time to start putting the CCP Virus economy-reopening debate shoe on the other foot, at least when it comes to one key measure of progress or backsliding against the pandemic? More specifically, is it time to put less emphasis on finding out whether states that have reopened relatively quickly have seen their virus situations worsening, and more on whether states that closed early and/or have stayed largely closed have achieved progress that’s been any better?

This question occurred to me this morning upon reading in my Washington Post that when it comes to new infections and fatalities, Virginia has just seen record highs recently whether we’re talking about single day totals or the more informative seven-day averages. That’s striking because Virginia has been one of those states that shutdown substantially quite early, and has reopened very slowly.

So I began wondering how Virginia’s record compares with a state that reopened very early – Georgia. And the numbers clearly show that their performances over the most relevant timeframes have been…pretty comparable. Which represents new evidence that the economically devastating lockdowns have been under-performers for containing the virus’ spread.

Virginia and Georgia are particularly interesting to compare because of their similarities. The latter’s total population is estimated this year at 8.63 million while the latter’s is a not greatly bigger 10.74 million.

Both states also have relatively big populations of African-Americans – who have been among the virus’ biggest victims. Blacks represent 31.03 percent of all Georgians, and 18.81 percent of all Virginians.

That Washington Post Virginia article did mention one area of continuing improvement for the state: new hospitalizations. They’re especially important both because fears of hospitals getting overwhelmed by the pandemic were prime justifications for the original shutdown orders, and because they’re the best measures of whether the virus is being contained or not. After all, numbers or new cases seem to depend heavily on increases in testing (which naturally reveal more and more infections). And controversies over identifying genuine CCP Virus-induced deaths remain heated – in large part because methodologies vary so greatly state-by-state.

By contrast, there have been no debates over how many patients with virus symptoms have been admitted to healthcare facilities. The only uncertainties are those stemming from how promptly these facilities report their admissions to state health departments.

That kind of uncertainty is still clouding Virginia’s data. As of today, (see this link and scroll down till you see the option for hospitalization data) the state has only reported new hospitalizations through May 20, and these data are divided between confirmed cases and probably cases. (The former are the great majority, though.)

Even so, because of Virginia’s lockdown policy – which began in earnest at the end of March, began easing in phases for the state’s least populous areas in mid-May, but which largely continue for its most populous areas (those closest to the District of Columbia)– it should be among the gold standard states for virus progress if turning off most economic activity is considered crucial. (Here’s an unusually informative lockdown timeline for Virginia, Maryland, and the District.)

Its interactive hospitalization chart is a little hard to read, but it seems to show that on March 31, the seven-day moving average of new admissions stood at just under 59, and through early May (when the lockdown began to be lifted). moved up steadily to a little over 81. So they rose by just under 39 percent. By May 20, this average had decreased all the way to just under 45. In other words, daily hospitalizations dropped by a little less than 45 percent. And for the entire period, the seven-day moving average for new hospitalizations dipped by 2.34 percent.

Georgia’s lockdown began only a bit later than Maryland’s (on April 2) but serious easing began much earlier (on April 24). Indeed, Governor Brian Kemp was widely pilloried for the decision.

During its three weeks of lockdown, Georgia’s seven-day average daily hospitalization numbers went from about 80 to about 130. (The non-interactive chart below is even harder to read precisely than Virginia’s interactive graphic, but check it out for yourself below.)

This roughly 62.50 percent rise in daily hospitalizations was much higher than Virginia’s during its lockdown period Did this discrepancy mean that Georgia ended its lockdown too soon? Or was its somewhat heavier African-American population density the major difference? Search me.

Georgia’s reopening has been more aggressive than Virginia’s, and that could well explain why its seven-day average hospitalization figure remained just about flat from the start of this phase through May 22.

But I’m not entirely persuaded that the lack of improvement during this period means that Georgia’s relatively fast reopening has flopped. Because for the first three weeks of this reopening, the state’s seven-day average new hospitalization figure fell by about half – faster than Virginia’s during its slower reopening. And as the Post has reported, despite Virginia’s caution, daily (although not yet seven-day averages) have been rising recently, too.

The fairest conclusion to me seems that the hospitalization data give an edge to Virginia’s more cautious lockdown-reopening strategy, but that the edge is on the modest side. And most important, it’s far from clear that this margin justifies both the economic and healthcare costs of relatively longer and/or more thorough lockdowns.

 

 

Im-Politic: Why Georgia Should be on Your Mind in the Virus Reopening Debate

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Atlanta, Brian Kemp, CCP Virus, coronavirus, COVID 19, Georgia, Im-Politic, reopening, restart, Wuhan virus

Even President Trump has criticized Georgia (Republican) Governor Brian Kemp for starting to reopen his state’s economy too fast. So now that Georgia’s loosening of CCP Virus-related restrictions, which began on April 24, is now more than two weeks old, its deaths and new cases are skyrocketing, right?

Well, as that old Hertz car rental ad went, “Not exactly.” In fact, not at all. And since Georgia (along with much less populous Oklahoma) was “first in the nation” in this regard, its real experience is worth more than a casual perusal. (A handful of states never approved all-embracing stay-at-home orders, so they belong in yet another category.)

Let’s start with three quick observations:

First, Georgia did not restore the pre-CCP Virus status quo immediately, or even close. The process is being phased in, assuming the virus’ grip continues to ease.

Second, predictions of disaster were everywhere. See here (from Atlanta’s Mayor), here (from the state’s leading – Atlanta-based – newspaper), and here, for example.

Third, It’s still early. So Georgia (like the rest of the country) could see new outbreaks, or a full-fledged second wave.

So far, though, so good.

Specifically, on April 24, according to state’s health department, the seven-day moving average of newly confirmed cases was 746.6. Since then, it’s fallen dramatically – to 315.3 as of yesterday. Moreover, this decline has taken place as the state has ramped up testing, which all else equal, should be revealing many more new cases.

The improvement in Georgia’s virus death count has been even better. On April 24, the state recorded 36 virus-related fatalities, according to its health department. Yesterday? None. And it was none on Saturday also.

In addition, as with many other states (like New York and Michigan), Georgia’s CCP Virus problem is concentrated in and around the state’s biggest city. It’s true that the metro Atlanta area’s five counties (Fulton, DeKalb, Gwinett, Cobb, and Hall) account for much lower shares of total state confirmed cases (27.10 percent) and deaths (31.67 percent) than elsewhere. But it’s still understandable that counties elsewhere would be agitating for some easing of the lockdown. (These figures come from the state health department, too.)

The worst-case scenarios predicted for Georgia and other early reopening states could still pan out. But as of today, the data are telling a very different story.