This pandemic has laid bare the lack of faith in our institutions in this country.
In the best case scenario (best reasonable case), this was going to be awful. The chances that everyone played this just right from the beginning--no matter who--were low. But assuming that it isn't handled perfectly, not because of malice, but because of the reality of how the world works, one of the real tragedies is everyone's mistrust of others, based largely on politics and nothing else.
I'm not immune to it. My biases aren't hard to find, so I'll state one of them bluntly here: if this White House says it, I don't believe it. Full stop. Not unless it gets independently verified.
In different times I would not have assumed that the administration's response to a terrible pandemic was automatically not just questionable, but likely false. I thought both Bush administrations did a lot of things wrong, but in the immediate aftermath of emergencies, I believed they were doing all they could to respond as effectively as possible. I believe that the career government officials still are, but my trust in the current administration is so low that even in the face of an actual emergency--like this one--I doubt its motives.
My response is not a healthy one in a democracy (or any government, really).
Although I believe this administration is uniquely untrustworthy, I also recognize that there has been an intentional attack on our faith in our governmental institutions, and in many ways where we find ourselves today is an entirely predictable result of that attack.
This is not to say that we should just trust our government. Clearly we have an obligation to test it to make sure that those we put in charge are acting in We the People's interest, not their own. Reagan's admonition to "trust, but verify" rings true.
I remain surprised that the response to a pandemic is so highly politicized. It isn't as though our government made some deliberate decisions that created this pandemic. It was always going to be reactive, not proactive. And yet--even in this reactive mode, a complete lack of trust (whether it's for the White House--in my case--or for governors--in other cases). Whatever the case, right now there are large blocks of people who don't believe that the democracy they elected works for them. That is deeply concerning. I still believe in the electoral process for selecting my government, but I fear that too many others do not.
I assume this pandemic--as all others--will pass, or at least come under control. My bigger concern is the health of our democracy when our levels of vitriol and lack of trust are so high.