In a recent article for The Atlantic, Ben Rhodes, a former deputy national security adviser to Obama, recalls how inside of a windowless room in the bowels of the CIA, there is a sign that reads, “Every day is September 12th.” It was a sentiment he agreed with when he saw the towers come down in person in 2001, leading to a career in Washington, but by the mid-2010s, he had developed reservations.

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That campaign promise of a “90-day ban” of Syrian refugees turned into a years-long reality. And it existed still when the same 45th President of the United States exited the Iran nuclear deal, primarily because of its status as part of his predecessor’s legacy. He likewise followed suit by taking America to the brink of war with Iran in the same month that the World Health Organization eventually declared a public state of emergency due to the growing spread of the coronavirus outbreak, and the COVID-19 disease it caused. But by this point the POTUS had also inexplicably disbanded the National Security Council’s global health security office, but then that too was a part of Obama’s legacy.

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In the Showtime series’ fictional alternate history, a new inexperienced and weak minded president (Sam Trammell) took the U.S. to the brink of nuclear war with Pakistan in order to look strong after a seeming terrorist attack left his predecessor dead. The fact that President Warner (Beau Bridges) actually died in a helicopter crash caused by a mechanical malfunction is obscured by the drumbeat of needing someone to blame, and someone to bomb. It’s intentionally meant to echo the George W. Bush administration’s drumbeat to war with the Saddam Hussein regime in the early 2000s.

“When those helicopters went down, two things changed in my country,” Saul Berenson lamented in season 8. “An inexperienced president came to power, and the American people were wounded, demanding action. We know what happens next, we’ve been here before. How does a weak president show he’s strong? He goes to war. And that’s what will happen again unless sensible people can put aside their differences.”

In some ways, it’s fair to say we’ve never left that Sept. 12 worldview. We saw it last January when a POTUS, who shredded a credibly working nuclear deal, took actions that resulted in Iran firing missiles at a base housing American soldiers. Yet how out of step and senseless that all seems in a new, new normal where COVID-19 has brought the American people and economy to its knees.