It is a study unto itself the way in which politics has informed people's views and words and actions regarding the Covid-19 Pandemic. Literally dozens if not hundreds of academics have and are studying various aspects of the intense politics of the Pandemic. The media has opinions. Politicians have opinions. Voters have opinions. Heck The Bigger Tent Podcast always has opinions! So after researching the mountain of newly minted literature on the subject, distilled here are a few thoughts on the subject.  For a long time Republicans have been skeptical of science and government and being told what to do. All of these suspicious forces converged with the Pandemic causing a vomiting of consternation and distrust and rejection of what most of the rest considered good advice from well-meaning people in positions of authority and expertise to make a difficult situation better. Vaccines are not new. George Washington had his men take the small pox vaccine in 1777. Vaccine mandates are not new. We have had them since the civil war. But neither are anti-vaxxers new.  What is new is the size of the resistance to what the health and science community are advising and most importantly, the placement of a true believer in conspiracies and disruption and a wholesale lack of norms. Donald Trump has been the X Factor giving cover and leadership to views that in every earlier iteration in our history have been a tiny minority and generally dismissed or ridiculed by the majority.  They used to say you can have your own  opinion, but you can't have your own facts. The anti-science/anti-fax/anti-mask/anti-vax crowd are proving otherwise. They used to say facts are stubborn things, but this new sizable crowd is perhaps even more stubborn in the face of harsh realities and some very cold, hard facts.  The more people get sick, the more they resist. The more people die, the more they minimize the risk and the threat. But the new Covid politics is more than facts. There's plenty of anger. For more than a year we heard the anger of folks refusing to believe the virus was that dangerous. We've all heard and seen that anger on the news and on social media and live and in person. But now there's a new anger - from the rule followers and believers in science. They have worn their mask and taken the vaccine. Now they are being denied their reward of no more masking  and no more to fear by those who refuse to gain immunity by getting a vaccine. They are seeing with the Delta variant and the 4,000 other variations going around that as long as the pandemic continues and is not snuffed out, it will only take one variant to mutate that is resistant to the vaccines we have, and we will be starting all over again.  In fact, it is on rich nations like the United States to take the lead to see that the world is inoculated and made safe and free of further mutations and variations of the virus. This is the humanitarian approach and it is also in our interest to wipe it out. As Mona Charen has written it is in our DNA to do this; to do well and do good at the same time. An nod to those before us who did similarly (i.e. the Marshall Plan, etc.) and those who will come after us who need to see and feel the generous American Spirit modeled for them that they may do the same someday for someone in need.