"I will not turn in my neighbors"

    Pleading wasn't enough. Now it's fines and jail.

     "For the last eight months I have been asking Oregonians to follow the letter and spirit of the law, and we have not chosen to engage law enforcement. At this point in time, unfortunately, we have no other option."

           Oregon Governor Kate Brown

Sign in front of a home near mine

She pleaded, sympathized, and said she hated to do this. But enforcement and penalties are a matter of life and death, she said.  

"I know Oregonians have made tremendous sacrifices throughout this pandemic and that these new, temporary restrictions may seem daunting. But, we are at a breaking point. If we don't take further action, we risk continued alarming spikes in infections and hospitalizations, and we risk the lives of our neighbors and loved ones."

In Oregon, the rules on in-home social distancing for Thanksgiving went from an advisory to an order: No more than 6 people from no more than two households. Violators face fines of up to $1,250 and up to 30 days in jail.

This order gets predictable pushback. Ohio congressman Jim Jordan commented on Oregon in a tweet, picked up by Fox News: "In Oregon you can be jailed for having too many people over for Thanksgiving. But if you want to riot and loot in Portland, no sweat!"

People who consider COVID overblown think efforts by governors to limit in-home activities as invasions of privacy. A newly elected county commissioner in the Portland suburbs defiantly and proudly announced she would have a large number of friends and family over for Thanksgiving. She was interviewed on Fox News and said Governor Brown "wants to arrest law abiding citizens in their homes for eating dinner." 

If it were a gathering of people firing guns into the air, with bullets coming down randomly into the surrounding neighborhood, presumably that gathering would be considered dangerous and criminal, not law abiding. But if COVID is an overblown hoax designed by Democrats and the media to damage Trump and kill freedom, then the gathering of whatever size is, indeed, the reasonable behavior of the law-abiding, or would be if the Governor had not overstepped and made it illegal.

Americans disagree on just how dangerous COVID is. People are dying, but maybe no one you know, and maybe people who would die soon anyway, and maybe they should have protected themselves if they were so worried about getting sick. This is how a lot of people consider the disease, possibly a majority of Americans. The cure is worse than the disease.

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Efforts to stop the rapidly expanding case count run into the "what-about-them" problem. To the person or business being injured, the actual operation of a shutdown gives lots of opportunity to feel aggrieved. As Jim Jordan and Fox point out, if Oregon is so worried about COVID spread, why didn't leaders do more to shut down Portland protests? If eating Thanksgiving with relatives is so bad, why is it OK to shop for food next to strangers? If seven for dinner is bad, why is six OK? Gym owners complain, why us and not dentists? Why do church schools have in-person classes but public schools not? 

"Choice." There is the big switch on the language of privacy and autonomy. Democrats are the party that argues for personal body autonomy on contraception and abortion: "My body, my choice." Now Democrats are saying government can and must regulate personal space and behavior for the protection of the innocent; wear a mask, social distance. What irony, in both directions. COVID skeptics throw the language of choice back at Democrats, "My face, my choice, mind your own business." 

For pro-reproductive-rights Democrats the issues are different, a risk of harm to real living people versus leaving uncreated something that has not yet happened. But there is the quiet pleasure in hearing Republicans acknowledge body autonomy. For anti-abortion Republicans, it is pleasant to use their argument against Democrats, and it is a winning one in their minds, pitting the remote chance of injury due to a virus whose danger they question, versus the certain death of a human life and soul through an abortion.

COVID cases and deaths keep rising. My little portion of the state of Oregon had 89 new known cases yesterday and 2 more deaths. We are in the "extreme freeze" group of counties, with the highest incidences of the virus. 

The mental framework that defined the politics of COVID has been muddled. As President, Trump carried some political responsibility for the virus, and his administration's virus experts urged controlling the spread, even as he took the position that the cure was worse than the disease.

With Trump on his way out, the messaging and battle lines become simpler. The political costs of virus control are solely the responsibility of Biden and the public health nannies, mostly Democratic governors but some reluctant Republican ones as well. Trump is already claiming the responsibility and political benefit of the coming vaccines. He did it, brought to America at warp speed by him, his baby. His message is that everything else--businesses shut, unemployment, Thanksgiving intrusions, schools closed, and shortly the complications and controversies over the distribution of the vaccine--those are on the governors, especially Democratic ones.

The politics of this are difficult for governors. Closures and Thanksgiving regulations are unpopular. The virus got away from us here in the United States and we are paying the price. We chose this path, by whom we elected as president and how we like to live our lives. Our bodies belong to us, not society. Choice is popular. People need their jobs to pay bills. We aren't our brother's keeper, not unless we agree to it voluntarily. America will soldier on during a frustrating and contentious period, as COVID spreads, as unpopular controls work poorly, and as we await the vaccines. Governors will do what they must and be disliked for it. 

Biden and Governors would be well advised to associate themselves with the vaccines and try to muscle Trump out of claiming sole credit, although he will resist that mightily. There may be something they can point to that Trump did that slowed the vaccines. They should find and share that message. Biden got us the vaccine; Trump slowed it down. Repeat that. The Biden vaccine, the Trump delay. Again. 

The vaccine distribution under Democratic governors needs to go better than did the ACA rollout or the distribution of unemployment benefits. Democrats have a challenge and an opportunity. They better not screw this up.