The 1600 Newsletter: The Day When Everything Changed

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Good morning,

It’s rare for a single day to usher in an entirely new era, but I would put 3/11/20 up there with other dates of infamy in our history like 12/7/41, 11/22/63 and 9/11/01.

It was five years ago today that the following things happened in quick succession: the NBA abruptly cancelled the remainder of its season due to growing concerns about the novel coronavirus that was sweeping the world. Tom Hanks announced he had contracted the virus. The WHO used the word “pandemic” for the first time.

For many of us, this was the day that things got real. It’s worth taking a moment to remember what it was like in that wretched spring of 2020 because pretty much everything that is happening now is, I would argue, a downstream effect.

What started as a remarkable moment of collective solidarity quickly gave way to a tear, if not the whole-cloth destruction, of the social and political fabric. Within months, we went from clapping out our windows for healthcare workers to debating whether to nebulize bleach and publicly wishing for hospitals to turn away the unvaxxed. What happened to us?

Our president did not help matters. In a moment that screamed for a unifying, competent leader, his worst instincts came out instead—so much so that his behavior in that period cost him that year’s election (if not for his inept handling of Covid, Trump most certainly would have won that November and would now be playing golf at Mar-a-Lago instead of crashing the economy).

But Trump wasn’t the only one who badly damaged the national psyche in those heady days. Dr. Fauci advising against wearing masks in early March in an ill-conceived effort to avoid a run on PPE. School closures continuing long after it became clear kids weren’t at much risk. The hundreds of public health professionals who, after two months of telling us we needed to stay inside, suddenly advocating for people to gather en masse to protest systemic racism as its own public health threat. How much of the current distrust in our public institutions was sown by those decisions?

The problem with Covid retrospectives is that hindsight is 20/20, and humans tend to suppress traumatic events. We forget how scary it was then, before we knew much about the virus itself. What always upset me even during that year of misery, though, was how bad we were at pivoting.

The stay-at-home orders were originally designed to keep the hospitals in hot zones, like NYC, from overloading. Then they became “15 days to stop the spread.” Then they just went on. And on. Partial reopenings. Cases (obviously) increase, so close again. Local governments drunk with power. You can sit over here, but not there. Draconian and arbitrary rules to follow everywhere. Remember when California was arresting people walking alone on the beach? The destruction of entire industries while Big Tech monopolies thrived in making us lonely, isolated and angry.

Then the vax. A miraculous scientific breakthrough that is still paying dividends (follow the pancreatic cancer trials and tell me mRNA vaccines aren’t potentially the greatest invention of our lifetimes). This technology saved the lives of millions of people. Operation Warp Speed was the greatest thing that Donald Trump ever did or will do, and he takes no credit for it. RFK Jr., after musing that the pandemic was engineered to spare the Jews, petitioned the FDA to revoke the vaccine authorization as the most vulnerable were begging for it. He now runs the health department!

A Pew survey last month found nearly three-quarters of Americans say the pandemic drove us apart. It didn’t have to be that way. We can only hope that whenever the next “everything changed” day comes along—and I am increasingly of the belief we’re going to get that day, during this Trump term, with AI—we are better prepared to manage it.

The 8-month pregnant wife of pro-Palestinian student activist Mahmoud Khalil has pled for her husband’s release in time for the birth of their baby, following his arrest and detention by federal immigration officers over the weekend. “I urge you to see Mahmoud through my eyes as a loving husband and the future father to our baby,” she told Newsweek. Read the full story.

Also happening:

• Rubio tackles Ukraine war, Canada relations: State Secretary Marco Rubio is in Saudi Arabia, where he will hold a high-profile meeting with Ukrainian officials and seek to smooth tensions with Canada at a critical moment in his new role as the nation’s top diplomat. “He’s under pressure” to deliver wins for the administration while also acting as an intermediary who can help allies decipher Trump’s motivations, Vivek Astvansh, an expert on U.S.-Canada relations at McGill University, said. Read more.
• Will a recession lower interest rates? Wall Street is on edge as concerns about an impending recession continue to grow, fueled by market volatility, new trade tariffs imposed by the Trump administration, and fears that a slowdown could force the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates. Investors are closely watching how these developments could impact the housing market, which has already been strained by high mortgage rates and affordability concerns. Read more.
• SCOTUS rules against 19 Republican AGs: The Supreme Court on Monday rejected a lawsuit from 19 Republican-led states seeking to block climate change lawsuits filed against the oil and gas industry by Democratic-led states. The justices declined to hear the unusual GOP effort to challenge Democratic states for using their own courts to sue fossil fuel companies over allegations of misleading the public about the environmental risks of their products. Read more.
• Trump’s attack on Massie: President Trump received pushback from Republicans after calling for Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie to be voted out of office. The president said he would “lead the charge” in ousting Massie after the GOP lawmaker announced he would not support the Trump-backed government funding bill. Read more.

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