Op-Ed: New COVID strains are coming. It’s no time to let down our guard
COVID-19 has given us some strange bedfellows of characters. The president has a new enemy in the media, the public and the Democrats. The House of Representatives and Senate are controlled by Republicans who hate the president, and there are Democrats who are angry over the president’s response to COVID-19.
And finally, the president has allies among the NRA and other gun rights groups who are furious with his response to the coronavirus, which many gun groups blame for an influx of gun sales leading to gun violence, and those who question whether he has violated the Second Amendment.
I should know. I spent two weeks in Washington, D.C. on the front lines of the coronavirus crisis last month. I watched and did some reporting for The New York Times.
A few times, when I’d gotten wind of a story in the news and told my colleagues about it, they told me that I was reporting on the gun issue.
I looked at them and said, “You’re lying to me. I’m not a reporter. I’m a medical reporter, for The New York Times.”
I explained to them that it felt like that to me.
A few moments later, before I could say anything, one of my colleagues had said, “Gloria, the media loves you and you love the media.”
In the end, I gave up and let them think it was my job to tell them that I was a medical reporter. I couldn’t prove it, but I could convince them.
No one was listening. So much of what I learned would later be turned on me. And not only am I a medical reporter for The New York Times, but I’m the author of my column