The pandemic has changed everything. So why does the race for president look the same?

A favorite story involves a patient, on a couch, calmly recounting his deepest inner fears to a psychiatrist. Suddenly, the patient yells, “They’re all over me!” And frantically brushes the invisible insects off his body. The psychiatrist jumps up, too. “Well, don’t get them on me!”

So much of our national life in 2020 seems affected by such invisible fears and often inexplicable reactions to them. The primary one obviously has been the microscopic coronavirus, which has now infected upwards of 5 million people worldwide and reportedly killed more than 300,000.

In February, America had a booming economy. Since then, because of fears of this invisible virus and even worse fears of it somehow spreading further, the entire economy is paralyzed. More than 36 million men and women have filed unemployment claims. Schools are closed indefinitely, as are most offices.

With little debate and virtually no opposition, the federal government is blithely spending trillions of dollars we don’t have. Many Americans have begun fighting each other over when, or even if, to resume normal social and economic activities.

Life has fallen into such inchoate turmoil that one person reasonably tweeted the other day that the only possible explanation for 2020 is that while God was out of the room, his cat walked across the desktop keyboard.

Yet, also without seeming explanation, one thing has remained static: politics. Twenty-four weeks out from an unimaginably complex national election decision, the presidential field is static, as it has been for months.

Nothing has changed. Joe Biden (if you don’t know by now that he’s a former vice president, you’re on your own) was way ahead of an immense Democratic field of 29 would-be White House challengers for several months before he even announced the obvious, that he would for a third time try to reach the Oval Office on his own.

In debates and on a largely genteel campaign trail, the others in a diverse field came after him with brief sporadic moments of media success. Biden failed to do well or look good in early contests. But his lead in national polls never faltered. And when it appeared that an even older white guy with scary socialist ideas could capture the Democratic nomination and doom them to four more years of the Usurper, voters flocked to Joe, who’s even less exciting than his first name.

Now, he’s stuck in his basement launching rhetorical missiles at President Donald Trump via sympathetic cable outlets and Zoom chats. But guess what? In national polls, Biden’s still ahead of Trump.

The incumbent president, who has yet to test positive for decorum, is still where he’s been since his term began 1,215 long days ago: disapproved of by a majority of his countrymen.

With national voter turnout of about 56%, Trump was elected with only 46% of the popular vote, 2% or about 2.8 million fewer votes than what’s-her-name. Her votes were overloaded in a few predictable places. His came in just the right numbers in just the right states to give him 56% of the Electoral College and 100% of the White House.

Trump’s job approval has hovered around the mid-forties, sometimes sinking into the upper 30s or skipping, as now, to 49%. But never has a majority of Americans consistently told pollsters they approve of Trump’s job performance. And like Biden’s poll standing, that hasn’t changed during all this other turmoil.

Trump has done virtually nothing to expand his political base. But he’s paid assiduous attention to its stubbornly loyal conservative members, especially evangelicals, who’ve stood by him through turmoil and outrage. They might not be expected to stick naturally with a thrice-married, occasional church-goer. But the alternatives and their liberal policies are seen as far worse.

Republicans are a minority. But Trump taking on anyone in Washington, versus Biden, who’s spent almost a half-century getting along there, is an easy choice. Ninety percent of the GOP still back Trump.

One major reason for the candidates’ unchanging support is the country’s unchanging partisan split. Arguments we got, often mean, even vicious. Reasonable discussions to persuade we don’t got. Whether naturally or strategically, Trump picks regular fights with opponents to keep his people inside the wire.

From election night in 2016, Democrats have united behind the goal of ousting Trump one way or another. The empty Russia probe and vain impeachment effort failed. Now, there’s just Nov. 3 and the often-addled Biden. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi wants to appear to be angling for vast additional virus spending measures to rouse Democratic constituencies.

“This is not a Christmas tree,” she said of her new $3 trillion proposal that will go nowhere legislatively beyond her House. As Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton taught us, when a Washington politician so adamantly denies something, it’s usually true.

This story was originally published May 19, 2020 at 6:00 AM with the headline "The pandemic has changed everything. So why does the race for president look the same?."