Levin Report

White House: We’re Going to Have to Let Some People Die So the Stock Market Can Live

“We’re gonna have to make some difficult trade-offs.”
Donald Trump and Larry Kudlow at the White House on October 31 2018.
By Mark Wilson/Getty Images.

One of the major reasons the United States is in the midst of a health crisis that has killed 427 people and infected at least 34,354 so far is the fatty mass inside Donald Trump’s head that told him If you pretend like none of this is happening, it’ll all just go away. Singularly obsessed with the stock market, the president squandered his opportunity to contain the novel coronavirus out of fear that taking strong action would damage the economy, telling advisers in February not to “do or say anything that would further spook the markets.” Obviously that plan of “action” backfired so spectacularly that it would be quite funny if not for the whole life and death thing; weirdly, not doing anything about a deadly disease and insisting it was a hoax didn’t actually make investors feel better. Terrified about the fact that the Dow and S&P were still regularly recording some of their worst days since the crash of ’87, Trump decided roughly eight days ago to stop calling the pandemic “fake news” and actually advise people to take it seriously and stay home. One week, however, apparently represented the president’s upper limit for acting quasi-responsibly. Last Thursday, he reportedly began talking privately about getting people back to work, just three days after the CDC rolled out a campaign to encourage everyone to stay home for at least 15 days. On Sunday, he all-caps tweeted, “WE CANNOT LET THE CURE BE WORSE THAN THE PROBLEM ITSELF. AT THE END OF THE 15 DAY PERIOD, WE WILL MAKE A DECISION AS TO WHICH WAY WE WANT TO GO!”

Needless to say, telling people to get back to their normal lives within a fortnight is not at all what health experts have recommended. In fact, many agree we’ll have to practice social distancing for at least a year and perhaps up to 18 months, the alternative literally being the death of hundreds of thousands of Americans. Faced with that choice, most people would probably go with the former, even if it meant major damage to economy. And then you have the ghouls of Team Trump:

Appearing Monday morning on Fox News’ America’s Newsroom, Trump’s top economic adviser Larry Kudlow agreed that a pivot away from strict coronavirus measures could be on the horizon. “The president tweeted at midnight that we can’t let the cure be worse than the problem,” Fox News anchor Ed Henry declared. “He seemed to be talking about, in another week or so, making a decision to try to get the economy back open…How do you do that?”

Kudlow responded that “we’ll have to try to do that” because the “economic cost to individuals is just too great,” adding that the administration will need to see how everything plays out after more Americans are tested for the virus. “But the president is right,” he exclaimed. “The cure can’t be worse than the disease, and we’re gonna have to make some difficult trade-offs.”

To be clear, the “trade-offs” Kudlow—who isn’t actually an economist!—is referring to here are the deaths of a huge number of Americans. And, in fact, those people might be okay with the “economic cost to individuals” versus dying a horrible death. Also, apparently no one in the administration has considered the hit the economy will take if six or seven-figures worth of people are out of the workforce permanently. Nor has Trump’s former National Economic Council chairman:

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…or the ex-CEO of Goldman Sachs, who, incidentally, tweeted just last week that we should “go all-in on social separation” for at least three months:

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…or, of course, Fox News:

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Anyway, sorry to y’all who’ll have to take one for the team!

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This is where we’re at now

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Donald Trump Jr. can’t believe his dad is getting shit for pushing a drug that killed a few people

Remember, last week, when Donald Trump hyped the drug chloroquine as a possible game changer to treat COVID-19, even though it hadn’t actually been approved to do so by the FDA? As a refresher, he said: “It’s shown very encouraging—very, very encouraging early results. And we’re going to be able to make that drug available almost immediately. And that’s where the FDA has been so great. They—they’ve gone through the approval process; it’s been approved. And they did it—they took it down from many, many months to immediate. So we’re going to be able to make that drug available by prescription or states.” And then here’s what happened next:

Health officials in Nigeria have issued a warning over chloroquine after they said three people in the country overdosed on the drug, in the wake of President Trump’s comments about using it to treat coronavirus. A Lagos state official told CNN that three people were hospitalized in the city after taking the drug. Officials later issued a statement cautioning against using chloroquine for COVID-19 treatment.

According to the first son, though, that’s no reason for the president to start giving out factual information at his daily press conferences:

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There you have it, folks

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Ivanka Trump thinks we’re all going to emerge from this stronger

We mean, not if her husband or father get their way, but sure:

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Elsewhere!

Trump Says U.S. Isn’t “Built to Be Shut Down” Over Virus (Bloomberg)

The Federal Reserve just pledged asset purchases with no limit to support markets (CNBC)

SEC warns on coronavirus insider trading after stock sales by NYSE chair, his wife Sen. Loeffler, 3 other senators (CNBC)

Bruised Hedge Funds Ask Clients for Fresh Cash to Buy the Dip (Bloomberg)

Dr. Anthony Fauci will “keep pushing” with Trump despite disagreements (NYP)

As Trump touts an unproven treatment, supplies vanish for patients who need those drugs (Washington Post)

How South Korea Flattened the Curve (NYT)

Accused Auto Thief Claimed the Coronavirus Made Him Do It (TSG)

More Great Stories From Vanity Fair

— Trump Awakens to the COVID-19 Danger
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— Jared Kushner Told Trump the Coronavirus Was Fake News
— Tucker Carlson on How He Brought His Coronavirus Message to Mar-a-Lago
— The 12 Most Insane Moments From Trump’s National Emergency Presser
— How a QAnon Coronavirus Conspiracy About Oprah Went Viral
— From the Archive: Inside the Week of Hurricane Katrina, Revealing the Foolishness, Fear, and Politics That Turned a Natural Disaster Into a Man-Made Catastrophe

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