By Andy Brack, editor and publisher  |  The horrible surge in coronavirus cases being experienced in South Carolina has one root cause:  a liberal impatience by conservatives who reopened the state too early. As a result, too many people have the disease.  Too many will die as exhausted medical workers are at their breaking point.

If there’s ever a textbook example that policy matters, it’s in South Carolina’s immature response to dealing with the silent terror of the pandemic.  And now, officials trying to play catch up with mask ordinances and other measures that should have been in place long ago.  

Just compare what happened in South Carolina, where Gov. Henry McMaster lightly shut down businesses for a few short weeks to states like New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, where governors locked things down tightly for much longer.  Those places have flattened the curve — albeit with big economic hits.  But the virus there is now manageable — as long as people are careful.  Here, it’s out of control.