Are tests useless because they only come up positive when people are sick? Views differ

Shorter Verbatim Donald J. Trump: “Katie, she tested very good for a long period of time, and then all of the sudden she tested positive … this is why the whole concept of tests aren’t necessarily great … today, I guess, for some reason, she tested positive.”

One would think that there would be no way of reporting this to make it sound like a coherent, reasonable thought rather than the utter gibberish of a semi-literate man in twenty miles over his head. Even the most dedicated both-sideser, the most experienced practitioner of false equivalence, the most venal access journalist, would be facing an impossible challenge here.

You would be wrong:

Amazing! NYT found someone to clean up Trump’s “tests aren’t great because they tell you that you’re sick” argument. pic.twitter.com/1xvPpqsL9w— Peter Kafka (@pkafka) May 9, 2020

That is a stupendous achievement. World-class. Legendary. When they open up the Both-Sideserism Hall of Fame this will go in unanimously on the first ballot.