I was talking about leadership. Making broad appeals to all constituents, to encourage people to do societally beneficial things without having to resort to the force of law. "Stay home and wear a respirator when you do go out" would have gone a long way to obviating the draconian state responses. In my state, the governor made such a stay at home suggestion but no actual order. It worked great because most people followed the advice rather than seeing the subject as an impingement on their rights to rage against.

I do agree that half of the sensationalist media reflexively reaches for the racism card to create outrage, and often times it's baseless or a red herring at best. But it takes two "sides" to stoke the "culture war", and Trump most certainly played the part.