Real Genius

It's somehow forgotten now, but back in March the whole country did basically shut down. To varying degrees and with varying local senses of urgency - ambulances were keeping people up all night NYC - but schools, for example, did shut down everywhere. It worked, almost, but then there was the MAGA uprising and the Republican (especially) politicians reopened too early and...

The point being most of these places shut down without having much of an outbreak. The dumb way to look at that is that it proves they didn't need to. The right way to look at that is that it worked. You can't wait until it's too late.

With Texas continuing to break records for new coronavirus deaths and hospitalizations this week, Gov. Greg Abbott reiterated Friday afternoon that things will continue to get worse. And if people keep flouting his new statewide mask mandate, he said, the next step could be another economic lockdown.

“Things will get worse, and let me explain why,” he told KLBK TV in Lubbock. “The deaths that we’re seeing announced today and yesterday — which are now over 100 — those are people who likely contracted COVID-19 in late May.

“The worst is yet to come as we work our way through that massive increase in people testing positive.”

Maybe the masks are enough. I don't know. But if "the worst is yet to come" with things as bad as they are... they're probably not enough. Things were as bad as they were in New York because they did wait too long.