This is how we win

| 11:00 pm EDT September 24, 2021
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Jay Inslee might have been one of the more longshot candidates for president when he briefly ran in 2019, but his track record as governor of Washington state has highlighted his strong leadership and he effectively managed a state that was hit badly by the COVID pandemic at a time when the experts still knew very little about the virus – managing to keep the state’s number of cases down as the second and third waves built up across the country. However, the fairly red state of Idaho bordering the evergreen state hasn’t shown the same degree of caution. As a result, COVID cases are multiplying much more than they should be, more than available beds in the state, forcing Washington state to take up the extra cases.

“Today in my state, Washington citizens in many cases cannot get heart surgery, cannot get cancer surgery that they need, because we are having to take too many people of unvaccinated nature and unmasked, many of whom come from Idaho, and that’s just maddening frankly,” Inslee said in an MSNBC interview.

“Many states are in the same position and many governors will experience the same frustration I have. So it’s time for people to start pulling on the rope and do an American duty. Get vaccinated, have useful use of masks where appropriate. If we do these things, we know we can best this pandemic,” he said.

This is the right messaging to counter the GOP’s usual deceitfulness. As much as they try to make mask mandates and vaccines a matter of personal choice – COVID cases affect everyone with destructive chain reactions like this. It’s time to take back the Republicans’ phony claims to patriotism and make this about restoring the economy and opening up the country – something that can be done more quickly and safely if the number of vaccinations continues to go up.