The Donald’s Disastrous Fourth Year—Statist Dirigisme Like Never Before, Part 3

Another proof that the Trumpian lockdowns were unpardonable is available via the excess death statistics. The chart below tracks deaths from all causes per million population compared to projections based on the most recent pre-Covid years, and accumulates the difference or “excess” for the entire period between March 2020 and July 2023.

As it happened, the rate of excess deaths for Sweden at 1,435 per million was just two-fifth of that for the United States, which was 3,740 per million. Sweden’s result was also dramatically below that for most other European countries, all of whom had far more draconian public health control regimes.

But that made no never mind to Donald Trump. From day #1 he loudly denounced Sweden for eschewing lockdowns and allowing personal freedom to reign. On April 30, 2020 the Donald tweeted his culpable state of mind in no uncertain terms:

“Despite reports to the contrary, Sweden is paying heavily for its decision not to lockdown. As of today, 2462 people have died there a much higher number than the neighboring countries of Norway (207), Finland (206) or Denmark (443). The United States made the correct decision!”

Of course, cancelling the liberty and taking the property of the people wasn’t the President’s decision to make. The authors of the Constitution had settled that matter 233 years earlier.

Then again, the Donald was an ignoramus both ways. He’d never learned anything about the limits of governance under a constitutional republic nor the science that long before April 30th had established that the Covid was no Black Plague and that suspending the US constitution was utterly unjustified. The chart below leaves no doubt that Donald Trump’s foolishness in bringing the plague of lockdowns upon the American people cannot be excused or forgiven.

Of course, the flaws in the insane numbers diarrhea about tests, case counts, hospital counts, death counts and heart-rending anecdotes about individual suffering and loss are now more than evident. But the single most important thing to grasp is that when it comes to the heart of the narrative—the alleged soaring death counts—the narrative is just plain bogus.