I read Steve Brown’s column, “Who and what are the real threats to democracy?”. As usual, it was well written, but very one-sided. Every example he gave seemed to be oriented towards his view that Trump was very immoral, but a good leader whose policies were positive.

I do not believe the facts back that conclusion. I have been involved in public health for many decades and will use Trump’s Covid actions as an example.

Many of us have never heard of Dr. Jon Meacham, professor at Vanderbilt. Meachum has written for the NYT, Washington Post, Newsweek and Time. He doesn’t see the world as black or white. A very religious man, he doesn’t attack his enemies. He’s friendly with Republicans (for example, the Bush family) and some Democrats. Meacham’s a brilliant historian. He can get directly to the root of a problem and explain it so that the rest of us can understand.

During the Covid-19 crisis, I was fortunate enough to catch one of his TV appearances where he discussed the pandemic in objective historical terms. According to Meacham: “We have two tributaries in American life…a tributary of hope…in a journey towards a more perfect union” and “a tributary of fear… ‘they are coming for us.’”

Meacham stated that this fear goes back to 1790 when President Adams unconstitutionally threatened to shut down the free press and unilaterally deport undesirables (sound familiar?).

Meacham went on to describe how the right and left viewed the Covid crisis. The left was apprehensive, correctly concerned about the lack of an adequate safety net, but looked towards science, facts and experts.

On the other hand, the right was motivated by fear of government, so much so that science and facts become irrelevant. Meachum did not know it at the time, but he was also describing what would happen at our Capitol after Trump lost a fair and honest election later that year. MAGA people, encouraged by Trump, trying to overthrow democracy via election denialism.

Meacham indicated that we need Presidential leadership during a crisis. He went on to describe how various Presidents, including Reagan, JFK and Lincoln, overcame major obstacles to have successful Presidencies. He then compared Trump, who promoted a “partisan pandemic,” openly encouraging the misguided right wing “liberation” folks to protest against various Democratic governors’ pandemic measures, responses which were later proven to work quite well versus red states.

Maura Judkis of the Washington Post accurately described wild eyed anti-government regulation protestors in their MAGA hats: “The Ohio protest photo looked like a zombie movie.” Screaming, they looked hysterical, much like the violent January 6th insurrectionists inspired by Trump’s strongman rhetoric.

Per Meacham, the Covid-19 pandemic created a “break down of trust.” Like Lindbergh and the American neo-Nazis in the 1930s, Trump revived and rolled out the “America First” slogan to motivate the alienated MAGA masses forming his base.

Meacham talked about how Trump concentrated on “finding a ‘them’” to blame. Obviously, this was Trump’s goal…rather than addressing the crisis via a well-thought-out scientifically based plan as recommended by Dr. Fauci and others.

Trump wanted Americans to act “not rationally, but passionately” to distract us from his failures as a leader. Trump desperately wanted scapegoats, so he zeroed in on the World Health Organization, China, and Democrats in general.

Meacham explained how truly devastating the Covid pandemic was, comparing it to 9/11. In early 2020, he could not predict just how badly this war would be for both the US and Georgia.

Due to the lack of Trump’s presidential leadership, the USA had nearly 1.2 million dead from Covid… and a death rate much higher than other developed nations.

With 5,635 deaths, Georgia had the 19th highest death rate of all the states. Almost all of the other 18 states with the worst rates voted for Trump in 2016 (https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/sosmap/covid19_mortality_final/COVID19.htm ).

Unfortunately, Georgia is still listed as one of the worst prepared for the next epidemic, an inevitability. Even after Covid, 58% of Georgia residents are at high or very high risk, as opposed to 40% nationally (https://www.precisionforcoviddata.org/?metricId=ccvi&geoLevel=county&fipsCode=47&focusLevel=state&focusFips=47 ).

We could have fought that pandemic war effectively, based on facts and science. But Trump chose to fight it based on emotion and political partisanship. In November, when looking back at how things were under Trump, remember this fact.

Jack Bernard

Peachtree City, Ga.