Tuesday, June 23, 2020

The View from the Hermitage, Day 100

We're in triple digits now! I have faith this daily posting will not make it to quadruple digits. Dr. Fauci says we may very well have a vaccine by late 2020, and I'm praying he's right.

The governor announced that with all the numbers trending in the right direction (I disagree with him on that, but he's the governor and I'm not), the state will move into Phase 3 a week from tomorrow, July 1. The only problem with that date, for me, is that it's my birthday. I know the state administration is thinking that July 1, the start of the new fiscal year in Virginia, is a good date to choose. I happen to disagree. I do not want almost maximal reopening for a birthday present. I'm not going to obsess about it, though. I have enough other things to obsess about.

A reporter did ask the governor if he would take the state back to Phase 1 or 2 should cases start to grow as they have in some of the other reopened states. He hedged a bit but finally said he really didn't want to have to do that, but he would if absolutely necessary. He said the numbers were going down because Virginians had been so compliant with social distancing and wearing "facial coverings" and stressed the need to continue those behaviors.

Racial justice protests in South Carolina have been suspended after at least 13 people who had participated now test positive for the coronavirus. Richmond has had something in the neighborhood of 25 straight days/nights of protests. There's been no mention of coronavirus circulating at those, but you have to wonder with that much daily contact. Mention may well be coming.

HWSNBN now claims that he was not joking when he said that he'd ordered staff to slow down coronavirus testing. He does not kid, he said. He cares nothing about people, even people he is hoping will re-elect him. If I start to wonder how anyone could support him, I have to remind myself that he was elected in 2016, at least as far as the Electoral College went. It could happen again. If it were to come to pass, I expect the husband's comments about retiring to Canada (he has dual citizenship) will be made with a new fervor. If HWSNBN is not re-elected, it will take whoever is elected a whole four-year term to undo the debacle that will be there on January 20, 2021. If we have four more years of HWSNBN, we may never undo what has been done. We might also have a constitutional crisis with HWSNBN wanting to serve a third term.

And we might not. Not having hope is counterproductive, so I choose to believe that re-election will not come to pass.

1 comment:

Caroline M said...

I couldn't believe that he got in the first time, what with that AND Brexit it really pushed the envelope of belief. He's very....special

We open up from July 4th, libraries (my mother's most important thing), restaurants, cinemas, hairdressers (but not gyms, beauty salons or theatres). We will be able to go on holiday but having looked at some of the pricing today, I'll be staying home. All the motorhomes and caravans will be hitting the roads together - it will be traffic chaos. It is currently illegal to spend a night away from home except in very limited circumstances so the May move of caravans just never happened.