It shouldn't be "good" or surprising, and it tells you how successful the Left has been in subverting this country that the vast majority of conservatives sit around dreaming up ridiculous excuses for how what transpired in 2020 was okay, or something there really wasn't any choice about because ... reasons, and it's only in hindsight that anyone can see how retarded and damaging Covid response was.

When insane ideas like lockdowns and suspensions of liberties were floated because of the data and "science" coming from the CDC, Trump should have remembered that the CDC was his - a part of the executive branch, all those frickers worked for him - and made 100% sure what his administration was reporting/advising about Covid was accurate and real science. At this point, all the soft conservatives squeal "he's not an MD or infectious disease expert!" but this doesn't matter. Tens of millions of adults without the resources at their fingertips like a POTUS has, knew in real time that the data being reported were bullshite. Some of them were experts and if I (and thousands of others, including others on PT) could find them, so could the Trump administration.

So Step 1 was due diligence about the actual risks of the virus, and it's something any decent chief executive of a substantial organization would do if he was being told that his company needed to crater the balance sheet because of some perceived threat.

Second, outside of efforts to isolate those legit at risk and treat those that needed it, Trump should have fought tooth/nail funding Covid nonsense. It's interesting how how Covid dollars were spent is rarely ever mentioned on this board. Covid dollars, and I mean billions, flooded all sorts of Lefty special interests and groups. Example - nearly $100 billion went to shore up the balance sheets of blue state/city pension funds - wtf did that have to do with Covid? A ton of Covid dollars went to an education industry that did yeoman's work to ruin kids and get Dems elected, and some even went to funding election bullshite. How weak is that? - to sign off on spending designed to cheat you out of reelection a few months later.

So Trump championed trillions in spending to support his CDC's/WH task force's guidance on a virus that the stupid and weak believed was a threat that it clearly was not. In doing so, he was a major player in fricking up the economy, getting inflation off the ground, and funding Democrats' assault on this country.

Trumpussies will argue he had no choice because if he had fought the bullshite, the media would have crucified him and Democrats would have impeached him. But so what? The media crucified him and he was impeached any way.

Moreover, think about this - consider what Trump has done to Ron DeSantis. A year ago DeSantis was a conservative star. Even today's Trump superfans LOVED him - example, famously around here GumboPot posted that he hoped Trump didn't run in '24 because DeSantis was better/more effective than Trump. DeSantis was the most prominent/successful conservative elected official in the country. And then, what, 7-8 months ago? - Trump decided to burn Desantis down. He posted/said dishonest things about him - and MAGA ate it up. He posted/said things about him that a Democrat would post/say - didn't matter, MAGA not only ate it up, MAGA grew. Trump took decidedly liberal positions in opposition to DeSantis - MAGA enthusiastically lurched Left. Trump even convinced retards that DeSantis was "establishment" in ways DT wasn't. And today DeSantis polls like a pedophile KKK member, and Trump polls like the second coming.

Are you going to tell me that that guy couldn't have successfully led resistance against the Left on Covid response? He wouldn't have had to lie about anything, and in fact would have been the one spouting facts. For every MAGA superfan he lost because they believed CNN about the virus, he'd have added 2 voters that understood how important it was that we didn't let the Left take full control of the country, especially over a scamdemic.

Had he not taken a knee for the establishment on Covid, it would have been a tough road but by the time November rolled around I think he would have had a better chance of winning reelection, especially when you consider it would have made it much tougher for Dems to cheat.