1 00:00:00,120 --> 00:00:03,480 Speaker 1: Hi, This is new because of the coronavirus. I am 2 00:00:03,480 --> 00:00:06,960 Speaker 1: currently staying at home in Rome, where my wife serves 3 00:00:06,960 --> 00:00:09,800 Speaker 1: as the United States Ambassador of the Holy See. She's 4 00:00:09,920 --> 00:00:12,880 Speaker 1: leading the embassy in dealing with all the different changes 5 00:00:12,880 --> 00:00:16,440 Speaker 1: being brought about by the pandemic. To bring you this 6 00:00:16,520 --> 00:00:19,960 Speaker 1: episode this week, I'm recording from my home, so you 7 00:00:20,040 --> 00:00:26,040 Speaker 1: may notice a difference in audio quality on this episode 8 00:00:26,040 --> 00:00:29,440 Speaker 1: of News World. President Trump has faced the COVID nineteen 9 00:00:29,560 --> 00:00:33,239 Speaker 1: national urgency unlike any president who has faced the crisis 10 00:00:33,560 --> 00:00:37,519 Speaker 1: in modern American history, by responding to the COVID crisis 11 00:00:37,560 --> 00:00:43,599 Speaker 1: with deregulation and decentralization rather than centralizing power in Washington. 12 00:00:44,040 --> 00:00:47,240 Speaker 1: He has relied on state and local governments to make 13 00:00:47,320 --> 00:00:52,960 Speaker 1: decisions regarding social confinement, business closures, testing and treatment, and 14 00:00:53,159 --> 00:00:58,280 Speaker 1: private enterprise to manufacture urgently needed medical supplies and equipment. 15 00:00:58,800 --> 00:01:02,320 Speaker 1: President Trump has emphasized that the intensity of the epidemic 16 00:01:02,800 --> 00:01:07,480 Speaker 1: varies widely and is best met by state and local judgments. 17 00:01:08,000 --> 00:01:11,480 Speaker 1: The COVID nineteen crisis and government response will audibly lead 18 00:01:11,520 --> 00:01:16,039 Speaker 1: to important lessons and policy improvements. My guest today wrote 19 00:01:16,080 --> 00:01:18,720 Speaker 1: about this subject in The Wall Street Journal in an 20 00:01:18,800 --> 00:01:23,319 Speaker 1: article entitled Trump rewrites the book on emergencies. I'm really 21 00:01:23,360 --> 00:01:27,279 Speaker 1: pleased to welcome my guest, close friend and former boss, 22 00:01:27,840 --> 00:01:31,800 Speaker 1: Chris Dumouth, Distinguished Fellow at the Hudson Institute. He was 23 00:01:31,920 --> 00:01:35,520 Speaker 1: president of the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research 24 00:01:35,840 --> 00:01:39,280 Speaker 1: from nineteen eighty six to two thousand and eight and 25 00:01:39,440 --> 00:01:50,800 Speaker 1: was known as President Reagan's deregulations are Chris, how surprised 26 00:01:50,840 --> 00:01:55,240 Speaker 1: are you at the way that President Trump has consciously 27 00:01:55,280 --> 00:02:01,800 Speaker 1: avoided centralizing and federalizing the response Since the Reagan days 28 00:02:01,880 --> 00:02:07,160 Speaker 1: in the early nineteen eighties, I have observed that the 29 00:02:07,240 --> 00:02:13,079 Speaker 1: administrative state in Washington has grown inexorably, and it has 30 00:02:13,120 --> 00:02:18,320 Speaker 1: grown in part by taking over responsibilities that were formerly 31 00:02:18,760 --> 00:02:23,760 Speaker 1: state responsibilities. And it has grown because Congress has increasingly 32 00:02:23,919 --> 00:02:28,960 Speaker 1: delegated what are in fact lawmaking powers from the legislature 33 00:02:29,400 --> 00:02:32,919 Speaker 1: to the executive, so that we now have an executive 34 00:02:32,919 --> 00:02:38,760 Speaker 1: branch that is, in effect the main lawmaker for America, 35 00:02:38,919 --> 00:02:43,600 Speaker 1: and we have thousands and thousands of laws that probably 36 00:02:43,639 --> 00:02:47,600 Speaker 1: could not have passed the Congress and acted by agencies 37 00:02:47,600 --> 00:02:51,080 Speaker 1: of one kind or another. The reasons for this growth, 38 00:02:51,120 --> 00:02:54,640 Speaker 1: which has been continuous, are very deep, and they're in 39 00:02:55,040 --> 00:03:01,680 Speaker 1: modern cultural and political developments. But the growth has been animated. Mainly, 40 00:03:01,800 --> 00:03:06,120 Speaker 1: it has grown because of the two first crises of 41 00:03:06,160 --> 00:03:10,359 Speaker 1: the twenty first century nine to eleven and the two 42 00:03:10,400 --> 00:03:15,160 Speaker 1: thousand and eight financial crisis. Both of those large national 43 00:03:15,200 --> 00:03:22,360 Speaker 1: crises led to the creation of huge new bureaucracies in 44 00:03:22,400 --> 00:03:27,720 Speaker 1: the executive branch with powers of rulemaking, which is essentially 45 00:03:27,760 --> 00:03:34,280 Speaker 1: making the law surveillance of the population, discretionary enforcement, and 46 00:03:34,480 --> 00:03:39,280 Speaker 1: even adjudication of their own enforcements, all that within one 47 00:03:39,320 --> 00:03:43,120 Speaker 1: branch of the federal government. And we have seen this twice, 48 00:03:43,920 --> 00:03:48,119 Speaker 1: so you see a strong pattern. And the third crisis 49 00:03:48,160 --> 00:03:52,640 Speaker 1: comes along in these last several months, and the President 50 00:03:52,760 --> 00:03:57,480 Speaker 1: and his officials have not taken it upon themselves to 51 00:03:57,600 --> 00:04:02,040 Speaker 1: exercise powers that are on what the statutes give them, 52 00:04:02,440 --> 00:04:09,200 Speaker 1: and in fact have been emphasizing the importance of variegated, 53 00:04:10,080 --> 00:04:16,440 Speaker 1: diversified local responses led by governors and mayors and in 54 00:04:16,480 --> 00:04:22,440 Speaker 1: many cases health professionals at hospitals, epidemiologists, clinicians. This is 55 00:04:22,480 --> 00:04:27,200 Speaker 1: a dramatic departure, and I regard it as a highly 56 00:04:27,240 --> 00:04:32,039 Speaker 1: positive one. And especially remarkable is that the president has 57 00:04:32,200 --> 00:04:36,680 Speaker 1: put so responsibility and so much of a limelight on 58 00:04:36,920 --> 00:04:44,039 Speaker 1: private enterprise, pharmaceutical companies, and manufacturers of medical equipment. These 59 00:04:44,040 --> 00:04:47,120 Speaker 1: are people that are coming to the rescue. So this 60 00:04:47,240 --> 00:04:50,760 Speaker 1: is a very, very different form of emergency response than 61 00:04:50,800 --> 00:04:53,600 Speaker 1: we have seen any time within the last half century. 62 00:04:53,920 --> 00:04:57,239 Speaker 1: But why do you think the president made the decision 63 00:04:57,520 --> 00:05:03,920 Speaker 1: to literally have the recovery take place with the governors? 64 00:05:04,360 --> 00:05:07,880 Speaker 1: So you're going to have fifty competitive models out there, 65 00:05:08,279 --> 00:05:10,920 Speaker 1: and you can already see the differentiation with I think 66 00:05:10,920 --> 00:05:14,880 Speaker 1: eleven states now have begun to move towards opening up 67 00:05:15,360 --> 00:05:18,279 Speaker 1: while other states are sort of rigid. How do you 68 00:05:18,320 --> 00:05:21,000 Speaker 1: think that plays out with the states becoming the laboratory 69 00:05:21,000 --> 00:05:25,640 Speaker 1: of democracy. I would begin by saying that the conventional 70 00:05:26,040 --> 00:05:30,560 Speaker 1: explanation that one encounters in the national media in the 71 00:05:30,640 --> 00:05:35,600 Speaker 1: United States is wrong. Conventional explanation is that the president 72 00:05:35,680 --> 00:05:41,520 Speaker 1: is trying to deflect responsibility from himself to others. This 73 00:05:41,600 --> 00:05:46,039 Speaker 1: is a terrible episode that we're going through. Mistakes will 74 00:05:46,080 --> 00:05:48,000 Speaker 1: be made, there's going to be a lot of blame. 75 00:05:48,120 --> 00:05:49,920 Speaker 1: There may be a lot of praise at the end, 76 00:05:50,279 --> 00:05:53,440 Speaker 1: but that he's trying to deflect things from himselves to others. 77 00:05:53,839 --> 00:05:57,159 Speaker 1: The word onus is used in all of the newspapers 78 00:05:57,200 --> 00:06:00,560 Speaker 1: to say he's putting the onus on the governors and 79 00:06:00,680 --> 00:06:04,000 Speaker 1: the mayors. I think that that's wrong. I think that 80 00:06:04,080 --> 00:06:09,880 Speaker 1: in the American system, when something this momentous happens, the 81 00:06:09,920 --> 00:06:16,600 Speaker 1: president gets the blame or the praise in the end, regardless. 82 00:06:16,600 --> 00:06:21,799 Speaker 1: Following the Patrina hurricane in New Orleans, the federal government 83 00:06:21,920 --> 00:06:25,599 Speaker 1: certainly did not distinguish itself in its response, but the 84 00:06:25,760 --> 00:06:29,720 Speaker 1: major errors were made by the governor of Louisiana and 85 00:06:29,960 --> 00:06:33,719 Speaker 1: the mayor of New Orleans. That's where the problems lay. 86 00:06:34,160 --> 00:06:37,279 Speaker 1: And yet who got to blame. George W. Bush got 87 00:06:37,279 --> 00:06:41,320 Speaker 1: to blame. And I think that President Trump understands that, however, 88 00:06:41,880 --> 00:06:46,080 Speaker 1: this terrible emergency we're going through hands out, whether the 89 00:06:46,160 --> 00:06:50,000 Speaker 1: American response is regarded as a success or a failure, 90 00:06:50,560 --> 00:06:53,080 Speaker 1: he is going to get the praise or the blame, 91 00:06:53,240 --> 00:06:56,800 Speaker 1: and probably a large measure of both of them. So 92 00:06:57,000 --> 00:06:59,479 Speaker 1: I think that the idea that he's trying to deflect 93 00:06:59,520 --> 00:07:02,320 Speaker 1: things is not true. If you were trying to deflect things, 94 00:07:02,360 --> 00:07:06,080 Speaker 1: he wouldn't have spent two hours in press briefings every 95 00:07:06,160 --> 00:07:10,520 Speaker 1: day over the past month. I do regard President Trump 96 00:07:10,640 --> 00:07:14,440 Speaker 1: as a constitutionalist. I think that he and his White 97 00:07:14,480 --> 00:07:18,600 Speaker 1: House officials and Department of Justice have been very careful 98 00:07:18,640 --> 00:07:23,200 Speaker 1: about presidential prerogatives. He realizes that the course of the 99 00:07:23,240 --> 00:07:28,120 Speaker 1: pandemic and the appropriate responses to it are going to 100 00:07:28,200 --> 00:07:34,520 Speaker 1: be highly various across this vast and heterogeneous country. What 101 00:07:34,720 --> 00:07:37,080 Speaker 1: is right for New York City is not the right 102 00:07:37,400 --> 00:07:42,600 Speaker 1: thing for South Dakota, and that the major elements of 103 00:07:42,760 --> 00:07:46,520 Speaker 1: the response are going to fall within the traditional police 104 00:07:46,520 --> 00:07:51,160 Speaker 1: powers of the states and localities. So if we're going 105 00:07:51,200 --> 00:07:54,240 Speaker 1: to have an effective response, it is not going to 106 00:07:54,320 --> 00:07:59,400 Speaker 1: be a one size fits all national plan that requires 107 00:07:59,760 --> 00:08:05,520 Speaker 1: the local government's private enterprise, but not for profit sector, 108 00:08:05,520 --> 00:08:09,480 Speaker 1: health professionals, and ordinary citizens. So I think he's had 109 00:08:09,480 --> 00:08:13,240 Speaker 1: a clear view of that and has acted on it 110 00:08:13,640 --> 00:08:17,640 Speaker 1: as his idea of what is most likely to produce 111 00:08:17,960 --> 00:08:40,680 Speaker 1: an effective response. You can't compare to any country in 112 00:08:40,720 --> 00:08:44,160 Speaker 1: Europe because we actually geographically are bigger than all of 113 00:08:44,160 --> 00:08:49,240 Speaker 1: Europe outside of Russia. It's a remarkably diverse country. My hunches, 114 00:08:50,080 --> 00:08:53,839 Speaker 1: the states that open up first, if they do it 115 00:08:53,920 --> 00:08:57,839 Speaker 1: carefully and they do it with minimum kick back from 116 00:08:57,840 --> 00:09:03,280 Speaker 1: the virus, are going to dramatically draw resources and energy 117 00:09:03,360 --> 00:09:07,439 Speaker 1: and people away from the states that open up least, 118 00:09:08,280 --> 00:09:12,440 Speaker 1: and that they will actually be a significant shift as 119 00:09:12,480 --> 00:09:15,800 Speaker 1: people realize that they're now living in a state that's 120 00:09:15,800 --> 00:09:18,840 Speaker 1: still closed, while they're cousins living in a state that's 121 00:09:18,880 --> 00:09:22,280 Speaker 1: now pretty open. What's your reaction to that kind of concept. 122 00:09:22,880 --> 00:09:25,480 Speaker 1: I think that you're exactly right. I think i'd go 123 00:09:25,559 --> 00:09:29,520 Speaker 1: a little bit farther. I think that in retrospect, the 124 00:09:29,600 --> 00:09:34,520 Speaker 1: wave of sort of total lockdowns, quarantining healthy people as 125 00:09:34,520 --> 00:09:37,920 Speaker 1: well as people that were sick or at risk, and 126 00:09:38,080 --> 00:09:43,080 Speaker 1: closing down things such as offices and parks and golf 127 00:09:43,120 --> 00:09:46,559 Speaker 1: courses all around the country, I think we can see 128 00:09:46,640 --> 00:09:51,400 Speaker 1: in retrospect that although perhaps at the time these steps 129 00:09:51,400 --> 00:09:55,120 Speaker 1: were justified simply because we were dealing with a virus 130 00:09:55,200 --> 00:09:58,720 Speaker 1: that was, as we said, novel, meaning that human beings 131 00:09:58,720 --> 00:10:03,320 Speaker 1: had never encountered this bund and that its lethality and 132 00:10:03,760 --> 00:10:08,360 Speaker 1: infection and other characteristics were essentially unknown. I don't think 133 00:10:08,360 --> 00:10:10,720 Speaker 1: that those things were wrong, but I think that we 134 00:10:10,800 --> 00:10:13,760 Speaker 1: have learned that there was a good deal of overreach. 135 00:10:14,240 --> 00:10:19,320 Speaker 1: Michigan does not have to ban lawnmown and many other states, 136 00:10:19,360 --> 00:10:22,600 Speaker 1: including Virginia, where I live, a lot of people who 137 00:10:22,640 --> 00:10:25,720 Speaker 1: live in the suburbs, are sprucing up their loans in 138 00:10:25,760 --> 00:10:28,240 Speaker 1: their gardens and they can use a lot of help 139 00:10:28,280 --> 00:10:32,440 Speaker 1: from gardeners, and that provides some employment to people that 140 00:10:32,520 --> 00:10:35,160 Speaker 1: in Michigan has just been closed down. So I think 141 00:10:35,240 --> 00:10:39,720 Speaker 1: we're already seeing a certain amount of learning. Where I 142 00:10:39,800 --> 00:10:43,280 Speaker 1: live in the Washington area, the mayor could open up 143 00:10:43,480 --> 00:10:47,959 Speaker 1: downtown offices so the people could go to work, taking 144 00:10:48,040 --> 00:10:51,920 Speaker 1: all the proper precautions that would be permitted by the 145 00:10:52,080 --> 00:10:55,720 Speaker 1: President's opening up guidelines. It could be done. Now. I'm 146 00:10:55,760 --> 00:10:59,520 Speaker 1: starting to see a shift here. Whereas two weeks ago 147 00:10:59,559 --> 00:11:03,240 Speaker 1: everybody he was saying opening up too soon is going 148 00:11:03,280 --> 00:11:06,080 Speaker 1: to cause problems, and even where governors or mayors did 149 00:11:06,200 --> 00:11:08,920 Speaker 1: open up, people didn't want to go to work. There 150 00:11:08,920 --> 00:11:11,480 Speaker 1: seems to be a shift, and it's beginning with things 151 00:11:11,480 --> 00:11:15,360 Speaker 1: such as parks and open spaces. I think it will 152 00:11:15,400 --> 00:11:19,160 Speaker 1: continue with kind of standard offices such as the one 153 00:11:19,240 --> 00:11:22,760 Speaker 1: I work in, where social distancing is not a problem, 154 00:11:22,920 --> 00:11:24,960 Speaker 1: and there's going to be a lot of learning and 155 00:11:25,040 --> 00:11:28,240 Speaker 1: a lot of progress. We still have a lot of 156 00:11:28,320 --> 00:11:31,120 Speaker 1: learning to do. Frankly, while we've been on a very 157 00:11:31,160 --> 00:11:34,800 Speaker 1: steep learning curve for the past two months, there are 158 00:11:34,840 --> 00:11:37,240 Speaker 1: still much that we don't know, and there are new 159 00:11:37,320 --> 00:11:41,800 Speaker 1: things that just this week, it suddenly appears that this 160 00:11:42,000 --> 00:11:45,959 Speaker 1: virus has a capacity to cause bloodcotting and strokes, even 161 00:11:46,000 --> 00:11:48,280 Speaker 1: in young people. We didn't know that a month ago. 162 00:11:48,679 --> 00:11:53,280 Speaker 1: That may affect the parameters of opening up, and there 163 00:11:53,320 --> 00:11:56,480 Speaker 1: will be a certain amount of trial and error, but 164 00:11:56,600 --> 00:11:58,800 Speaker 1: it will be the kind of trial and error that 165 00:11:58,960 --> 00:12:02,760 Speaker 1: is essential to the acquisition of new knowledge, you know. 166 00:12:02,800 --> 00:12:06,080 Speaker 1: It's interestingly I was looking at some epidemiologists who are 167 00:12:06,120 --> 00:12:09,640 Speaker 1: looking at the reopening of the beaches, and they've actually 168 00:12:09,679 --> 00:12:13,400 Speaker 1: come full circle. They now believe that you are more 169 00:12:13,480 --> 00:12:16,240 Speaker 1: likely to get the virus indoors than out of doors. 170 00:12:17,160 --> 00:12:21,760 Speaker 1: The beaches are actually much safer than being inside. Now 171 00:12:22,000 --> 00:12:24,080 Speaker 1: that was the opposite of where they were a month ago. 172 00:12:24,720 --> 00:12:28,400 Speaker 1: On Sunday, I went on along bike ride into Washington 173 00:12:28,480 --> 00:12:32,319 Speaker 1: and I did the Washington perimeter along Rock Creek Park 174 00:12:32,800 --> 00:12:36,559 Speaker 1: and the Capital Cresset Trail. I've been doing that regularly 175 00:12:36,679 --> 00:12:39,760 Speaker 1: during the lockdown. It's not illegal, although some parts of 176 00:12:39,800 --> 00:12:43,480 Speaker 1: it had been closed. I saw many many more people 177 00:12:43,520 --> 00:12:48,200 Speaker 1: and families out the parks starting to be populated. They 178 00:12:48,200 --> 00:12:50,760 Speaker 1: weren't packed, but there were a lot of people out 179 00:12:50,800 --> 00:12:55,160 Speaker 1: and down by the Potomac River, there were hundreds of 180 00:12:55,200 --> 00:13:00,679 Speaker 1: people fishing. They were practicing social distancing by family, and 181 00:13:00,800 --> 00:13:05,440 Speaker 1: the fishing was great, and the spirits were very, very high, 182 00:13:05,520 --> 00:13:08,400 Speaker 1: and it made me so happy seeing the world coming 183 00:13:08,400 --> 00:13:11,760 Speaker 1: back to life. Did you understand why Governor Whitmer in 184 00:13:11,880 --> 00:13:14,920 Speaker 1: Michigan said that you could kayak which you could not 185 00:13:15,040 --> 00:13:19,079 Speaker 1: use a motor boat? In general, I think it was 186 00:13:19,120 --> 00:13:22,880 Speaker 1: a mistake to try to define all things that are 187 00:13:23,600 --> 00:13:29,280 Speaker 1: forbidden versus permitted in terms of what is essential activity 188 00:13:29,640 --> 00:13:33,600 Speaker 1: as defined by the government, and that permitted a lot 189 00:13:33,720 --> 00:13:36,560 Speaker 1: of you. You can open a liquor store, but you 190 00:13:36,600 --> 00:13:40,880 Speaker 1: can't have an eastern morning sunrise service, or marijuana shops 191 00:13:40,920 --> 00:13:44,520 Speaker 1: in Denver that's an essential service, but churches. It's not 192 00:13:44,800 --> 00:13:47,920 Speaker 1: entirely paranoid to be able to see some ideology creeping 193 00:13:47,960 --> 00:13:51,720 Speaker 1: into this. And the important thing is to move not 194 00:13:51,880 --> 00:13:55,680 Speaker 1: toward what the government says is essential, but to move 195 00:13:55,800 --> 00:14:00,800 Speaker 1: toward what sorts of activities create greater or a lesser 196 00:14:01,400 --> 00:14:05,319 Speaker 1: risk for the spread of the epidemic. Can you imagine 197 00:14:05,720 --> 00:14:08,720 Speaker 1: what the federal bureaucracy would have come up with, have 198 00:14:08,800 --> 00:14:12,480 Speaker 1: they been told to produce the list for all of America, 199 00:14:12,600 --> 00:14:14,480 Speaker 1: and then how hard it would have been to change 200 00:14:14,480 --> 00:14:17,640 Speaker 1: it once they produced it, it would have been I 201 00:14:17,640 --> 00:14:22,160 Speaker 1: think a running nightmare. One here is now many calls 202 00:14:22,200 --> 00:14:24,760 Speaker 1: that we can't open up. This is in the national 203 00:14:24,800 --> 00:14:34,360 Speaker 1: media until we have a comprehensive, nationally directed plan for testing. Okay, well, 204 00:14:34,760 --> 00:14:39,640 Speaker 1: we did have a federally directed comprehensive plan for testing 205 00:14:39,960 --> 00:14:43,720 Speaker 1: in February. It was the plan of the FDA and 206 00:14:43,840 --> 00:14:48,240 Speaker 1: the CDC. And here was the plan. Only one kind 207 00:14:48,520 --> 00:14:53,080 Speaker 1: of coronavirus testing was permitted, and that was the test 208 00:14:53,120 --> 00:14:56,240 Speaker 1: that was developed by the CDC in Atlanta and would 209 00:14:56,280 --> 00:15:00,200 Speaker 1: be administered by it, and every other kind of test 210 00:15:00,440 --> 00:15:05,760 Speaker 1: as proposed by eminent epidemiologists and clinics and clinicians and 211 00:15:06,080 --> 00:15:10,800 Speaker 1: pharmaceutical companies was verboten. That's what a national plan looks like. 212 00:15:11,080 --> 00:15:14,800 Speaker 1: The government test is okay, everybody else's test, we don't 213 00:15:14,840 --> 00:15:17,400 Speaker 1: know about that, not invented here, We're not going to 214 00:15:17,480 --> 00:15:20,120 Speaker 1: do it. It was not a very successful plan, and 215 00:15:20,240 --> 00:15:22,880 Speaker 1: it does not speak very well of the potential for 216 00:15:22,920 --> 00:15:25,760 Speaker 1: a national plan. When people talk about the need for 217 00:15:25,800 --> 00:15:28,840 Speaker 1: a national plan, what they're really saying is I wish 218 00:15:28,920 --> 00:15:32,240 Speaker 1: this problem would go away, and they're just sort of 219 00:15:32,480 --> 00:15:38,600 Speaker 1: imagining this perfect national plan that does everything right, but 220 00:15:39,000 --> 00:15:42,720 Speaker 1: you actually have to think about how the real institutions 221 00:15:42,760 --> 00:15:47,120 Speaker 1: that we know actually operate in practice. Well. Of course, 222 00:15:47,160 --> 00:15:50,360 Speaker 1: in the case of the CDC, they totally screwed up 223 00:15:51,120 --> 00:15:54,920 Speaker 1: creating the test. Apparently the laboratory was corrupted, and they 224 00:15:54,960 --> 00:15:57,240 Speaker 1: may have set back the development of tests by three 225 00:15:57,280 --> 00:16:01,720 Speaker 1: weeks just by their own internal mistake. I was actually 226 00:16:01,760 --> 00:16:06,080 Speaker 1: in South Korea when this began. Because of stars, all 227 00:16:06,120 --> 00:16:10,240 Speaker 1: of those countries right around China, South Korea, Taiwan, Japan, 228 00:16:10,520 --> 00:16:14,760 Speaker 1: Hong Kong, and Singapore, they all were prepared for something bad. 229 00:16:14,760 --> 00:16:16,680 Speaker 1: They had no idea would be, but they were confident 230 00:16:16,720 --> 00:16:19,400 Speaker 1: that at some point something would come out of China again. 231 00:16:19,840 --> 00:16:23,760 Speaker 1: And within days they had moved to wearing masks at 232 00:16:23,760 --> 00:16:27,360 Speaker 1: the airport and if you went into a hotel, the 233 00:16:27,480 --> 00:16:31,640 Speaker 1: dorman took your temperature, which is not a guaranteed. But 234 00:16:31,760 --> 00:16:34,920 Speaker 1: they were rapidly looking for people who had a fever, 235 00:16:35,080 --> 00:16:38,040 Speaker 1: trying to isolate people, and did a reasonably good job 236 00:16:38,080 --> 00:16:42,000 Speaker 1: of it. In America, we are isolated, and we're rich, 237 00:16:42,040 --> 00:16:44,080 Speaker 1: and we're free, and we like life the way it 238 00:16:44,200 --> 00:16:47,280 Speaker 1: is and we don't like to be disturbed. And we 239 00:16:47,280 --> 00:16:49,920 Speaker 1: were late to the party. In World War one. We 240 00:16:49,920 --> 00:16:52,360 Speaker 1: were late to the party in World War two. We 241 00:16:52,360 --> 00:16:54,960 Speaker 1: were late to the party here. But when we actually 242 00:16:54,960 --> 00:16:58,160 Speaker 1: get our act together, get out of the way, because 243 00:16:58,200 --> 00:17:02,640 Speaker 1: we are going to succeed. And the CDC in its 244 00:17:02,640 --> 00:17:07,280 Speaker 1: initial coronavirus tests in mid February, it made some big mistakes. 245 00:17:07,640 --> 00:17:10,600 Speaker 1: But you know, when you're just starting in doing something 246 00:17:10,960 --> 00:17:14,600 Speaker 1: that involves an enormous amount of uncertainty, you make mistakes. 247 00:17:14,800 --> 00:17:18,000 Speaker 1: And the challenge is to have a system that learns 248 00:17:18,040 --> 00:17:24,600 Speaker 1: from mistakes corrects them quickly, and a single, unitary, bureaucratic 249 00:17:24,680 --> 00:17:27,760 Speaker 1: approach is not the way to do that. If we had, 250 00:17:27,920 --> 00:17:31,440 Speaker 1: let a lot of clinical testing proposals that were coming 251 00:17:31,440 --> 00:17:35,160 Speaker 1: out of the Mayo Clinic, the University of Washington Clinic 252 00:17:35,560 --> 00:17:38,280 Speaker 1: in those days, they may have made some mistakes at 253 00:17:38,320 --> 00:17:41,080 Speaker 1: the beginning too, but there were a lot of different ones. 254 00:17:41,119 --> 00:17:44,360 Speaker 1: They would have been coordinating with each other and they 255 00:17:44,359 --> 00:18:02,359 Speaker 1: would have fixed the problems much more quickly. So let 256 00:18:02,400 --> 00:18:04,000 Speaker 1: me ask you, though, because one of the things which 257 00:18:04,040 --> 00:18:10,160 Speaker 1: pervades this whole conversation as a country is the degree 258 00:18:10,200 --> 00:18:13,800 Speaker 1: to which the national media, for a variety of reasons, 259 00:18:14,600 --> 00:18:19,159 Speaker 1: is both deeply biased in favor of centralization and is 260 00:18:19,440 --> 00:18:24,439 Speaker 1: almost unable to cover the actual process of COVID nineteen 261 00:18:24,480 --> 00:18:27,120 Speaker 1: because it's so busy trying to find a way to 262 00:18:27,119 --> 00:18:30,399 Speaker 1: trip up, or embarrass or attack President Trump. And I 263 00:18:30,480 --> 00:18:33,720 Speaker 1: know you said the national media really would like one 264 00:18:33,760 --> 00:18:37,760 Speaker 1: authority to go to. Can you expand on that. I 265 00:18:37,800 --> 00:18:43,119 Speaker 1: do think that the problem of the national media trying 266 00:18:43,160 --> 00:18:49,000 Speaker 1: to undermine the president is an important phenomenon here. It's worrisome, 267 00:18:49,119 --> 00:18:51,680 Speaker 1: and I can't go back in history to a period 268 00:18:51,720 --> 00:18:57,160 Speaker 1: where a very large part of the national political media 269 00:18:57,440 --> 00:19:02,040 Speaker 1: intellectual establishment wanted the president of the United States to fail. 270 00:19:03,280 --> 00:19:06,159 Speaker 1: There have been critics, I mean, there's always lots of criticism, 271 00:19:06,400 --> 00:19:10,000 Speaker 1: but to this longing to find a way to create 272 00:19:10,200 --> 00:19:14,600 Speaker 1: a political failure for our head of state, that's a 273 00:19:14,640 --> 00:19:18,080 Speaker 1: new thing, and I think it's confused. The coverage of 274 00:19:18,160 --> 00:19:25,240 Speaker 1: this emergency and the administration's response new. The desire for unified, 275 00:19:26,080 --> 00:19:31,639 Speaker 1: centralized national approaches to anything is very, very powerful in 276 00:19:31,680 --> 00:19:36,320 Speaker 1: the national networks, in two of the three big national newspapers. 277 00:19:36,800 --> 00:19:39,120 Speaker 1: I think that a lot of it is simply in 278 00:19:39,160 --> 00:19:42,040 Speaker 1: the economics of the news business. If you can have 279 00:19:42,320 --> 00:19:44,480 Speaker 1: a couple of people covering the White House and you 280 00:19:44,520 --> 00:19:47,879 Speaker 1: can cover everything of political importance and come into the country. 281 00:19:48,040 --> 00:19:51,800 Speaker 1: That is a great business model for media. If you 282 00:19:51,920 --> 00:19:56,280 Speaker 1: have a country where as many important decisions are being 283 00:19:56,280 --> 00:20:01,920 Speaker 1: made in San Antonio and in Portland, in Peoria and 284 00:20:02,040 --> 00:20:06,280 Speaker 1: in rural Georgia, that's a lot more complicated to cover. 285 00:20:06,359 --> 00:20:08,919 Speaker 1: If you have lots of lots of centers of initiative 286 00:20:09,119 --> 00:20:14,000 Speaker 1: and authority, it makes local newspapers and local coverage and 287 00:20:14,080 --> 00:20:17,000 Speaker 1: commentary are much more important. So I think that this 288 00:20:17,359 --> 00:20:21,880 Speaker 1: instinct for centralization you see it in many politicians because 289 00:20:21,960 --> 00:20:25,719 Speaker 1: they're in the Washington political game and they want more power. 290 00:20:26,560 --> 00:20:28,879 Speaker 1: But I think you also see it in the media 291 00:20:28,960 --> 00:20:31,760 Speaker 1: and because they are the ones who are delivering the 292 00:20:31,880 --> 00:20:35,120 Speaker 1: news to many people. I think that it is a 293 00:20:35,240 --> 00:20:39,560 Speaker 1: dangerous phenomenon that people have to be aware of. But 294 00:20:39,680 --> 00:20:41,679 Speaker 1: I would also say I think a lot of people 295 00:20:41,720 --> 00:20:44,960 Speaker 1: are aware of it. I think that the glorification of 296 00:20:45,440 --> 00:20:49,320 Speaker 1: centralized national planning tends to be something that is taken 297 00:20:49,400 --> 00:20:51,760 Speaker 1: much more seriously by people who live and work in 298 00:20:51,840 --> 00:20:55,679 Speaker 1: Washington than people who live and work out around the country. 299 00:20:56,680 --> 00:21:00,919 Speaker 1: When you look out towards the future, are you an optimist. 300 00:21:01,800 --> 00:21:06,400 Speaker 1: I'm sort of an intellectual pessimist and a temperamental optimist, 301 00:21:06,800 --> 00:21:10,280 Speaker 1: and I don't know exactly what the future will bring. 302 00:21:10,880 --> 00:21:14,760 Speaker 1: I can see a lot in this emergency that could 303 00:21:14,800 --> 00:21:18,960 Speaker 1: conduce over the next couple of years to a great 304 00:21:19,119 --> 00:21:24,199 Speaker 1: centralization of government. We now have people saying that the 305 00:21:24,280 --> 00:21:28,040 Speaker 1: federal government has to take over the pension obligations of 306 00:21:28,080 --> 00:21:30,720 Speaker 1: the states, which are now well north of one point 307 00:21:30,800 --> 00:21:35,639 Speaker 1: five trillion dollars that are a result of decades of mismanagement. 308 00:21:36,000 --> 00:21:41,280 Speaker 1: With the government engaging in discussion of spending. It's possible 309 00:21:41,560 --> 00:21:44,680 Speaker 1: for there to be lots more centralization. We could move 310 00:21:44,760 --> 00:21:48,600 Speaker 1: up to a world where forty percent of state finances 311 00:21:49,000 --> 00:21:51,720 Speaker 1: are coming from the federal government. That is a world 312 00:21:51,720 --> 00:21:55,679 Speaker 1: where there's going to be much less room for flexibility 313 00:21:55,880 --> 00:21:59,600 Speaker 1: laboratories of democracy at the local level. There's a lot 314 00:21:59,640 --> 00:22:04,160 Speaker 1: to fear and to be cautious about. I don't want 315 00:22:04,160 --> 00:22:07,200 Speaker 1: to minimize the horrors of what we have been through, 316 00:22:07,600 --> 00:22:11,760 Speaker 1: but as far as our institutional architecture is concerned, we've 317 00:22:11,800 --> 00:22:15,320 Speaker 1: gotten off to a very good start, a better one 318 00:22:15,359 --> 00:22:19,560 Speaker 1: than in previous emergencies. Things could go badly, but we've 319 00:22:19,600 --> 00:22:23,680 Speaker 1: laid the groundwork for having a strong set of arguments 320 00:22:24,200 --> 00:22:29,040 Speaker 1: for preserving the diversification of our system. Of government in 321 00:22:29,080 --> 00:22:31,680 Speaker 1: these big debates to come. So I can see lots 322 00:22:31,720 --> 00:22:35,200 Speaker 1: of threats, but I'm not sure what to do with 323 00:22:35,240 --> 00:22:40,959 Speaker 1: the idea of intellectual pessimism. That can actually be a 324 00:22:41,080 --> 00:22:44,720 Speaker 1: very helpful attitude, because it means that you are not 325 00:22:44,880 --> 00:22:49,040 Speaker 1: just listfully ignorant of all the threats around you. If 326 00:22:49,080 --> 00:22:52,040 Speaker 1: we've been a little bit more pessimistic about the possibility 327 00:22:52,080 --> 00:22:55,360 Speaker 1: of a pandemic a year ago, that might have had 328 00:22:55,400 --> 00:22:58,959 Speaker 1: a happier result. That was a long winded way of 329 00:22:59,000 --> 00:23:02,400 Speaker 1: saying that starting out with an attitude of pessimism can 330 00:23:02,480 --> 00:23:07,240 Speaker 1: actually lead you to steps that try to maximize the 331 00:23:07,320 --> 00:23:10,679 Speaker 1: positive potentition. I want to thank you, and I'll just 332 00:23:10,720 --> 00:23:13,560 Speaker 1: say for the record that having a chance to spend 333 00:23:13,560 --> 00:23:16,439 Speaker 1: some time with you brings back a great range of 334 00:23:16,520 --> 00:23:20,000 Speaker 1: fond memories of the time you spent tutoring me when 335 00:23:20,040 --> 00:23:22,679 Speaker 1: I was allowed to hang out with you. Thank you, Thanks, 336 00:23:22,720 --> 00:23:31,359 Speaker 1: thank you very much, Take care very well. Thank you 337 00:23:31,400 --> 00:23:34,399 Speaker 1: to my guest, Christa Muth. You can learn more about 338 00:23:34,440 --> 00:23:38,719 Speaker 1: President Trump and his administration's efforts to defeat the COVID 339 00:23:38,840 --> 00:23:43,480 Speaker 1: nineteen virus on our show page at newtsworld dot com. 340 00:23:43,640 --> 00:23:48,000 Speaker 1: Newtsworld is produced by Gingwish three sixty and iHeartMedia, our 341 00:23:48,080 --> 00:23:53,000 Speaker 1: executive producers Debbie Myers and our producers Guards Stock. The 342 00:23:53,200 --> 00:23:56,920 Speaker 1: artwork for the show was created by Steve Penley. Special 343 00:23:57,040 --> 00:24:00,359 Speaker 1: thanks to the team at Gingwish three sixty. Please email 344 00:24:00,440 --> 00:24:03,520 Speaker 1: me with your comments at news at newtsworld dot com. 345 00:24:04,359 --> 00:24:07,080 Speaker 1: If you've been enjoying Newsworld, I hope you'll go to 346 00:24:07,119 --> 00:24:10,879 Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts and both rate us with five stars and 347 00:24:11,000 --> 00:24:13,600 Speaker 1: give us a review so others can learn what it's 348 00:24:13,600 --> 00:24:21,040 Speaker 1: all about. On the next episode of Newtsworld, China, what 349 00:24:21,280 --> 00:24:24,720 Speaker 1: role to day play in the spread of COVID nineteen globally? 350 00:24:26,080 --> 00:24:29,919 Speaker 1: What responsibility should they bear for the devastation the virus 351 00:24:30,000 --> 00:24:34,159 Speaker 1: has cost. I'm devoted a three part series booking at 352 00:24:34,280 --> 00:24:39,359 Speaker 1: China and COVID nineteen. I'm New English. This is Newtsworld.