Suppose every Trumper out there went "well shit. Sarah Huckabee Sanders has never led me wrong before! I shall roll up my sleeve and Trump this virus!" in the next ten minutes.

They're partially protected tomorrow. They're partially more protected August 9. They're as protected as they gonna be by August 23rd.

This, more than anything, illustrates how reactive the Republican party has become. It's hard to believe there was any planning in this messaging. The most credible theory I've heard is every advertiser and lobbyist left jawboned every pundit and politician they could find after vague misgivings over Delta dumped the Dow 700 points last Monday.

So perhaps the money masters have taken over priority from the populism masters. You'd think any skillful pundit would recognize the danger of self-selecting their constituency for fully-preventable have-not status, let alone fully-preventable plague. "Hi, I'm a Democrat! I go to work every morning and Covid gave me the sniffles." "Hi, I'm Republican. I live in fear of ventilators so I snuggle with my AR to feel better."

They could point the finger at Putin. It's an easy gimme strategy - the Republicans have hated the Commies since Herbert Hoover. Trump's weird dance with Lavrov was never comfortable for them. But that would signal a full break from Trump.

I dunno, man. It seems like the Republicans are caught in one hell of an inverse prisoner's dilemma. Break too early, you're Liz Cheney. Break too late, they might not name a freeway after you when you're dead or some shit.

So they're all breakin' late.