[Mick]

What was our government doing on January 21?

Convening an impeachment trial of the President of the United States.

Attempting to bribe/extort a foreign head of state with public money to frame a political rival has consequences. Who knew?

I admire your tenacity in missing the point. :-)

By all means, spell it out for me. 

If your point is that the impeachment "distracted" the White House, that explains neither Trump's ability to focus on the parts of the epidemic that mattered to him (calling for a poorly implemented travel ban from China), nor explains why heads of HHS and other parts of the vast Executive Branch were also entirely engulfed by impeachment.

If your point is that convicting the President of impeachment would have left the Executive Branch with ineffectual leadership (Pence) in the midst of a emerging pandemic, I suppose the fact that Pence was named head of the Task Force suggests that the same guy would have done the job either way.

Or am I missing something because I'm not fully familiar with the Faux News talking points?

The noise about Trump doesn't matter much.  He'll be voted out in November.  His (first) underfunding and (second) muzzling of the CDC will harm his status among all voters, but particularly among the elderly, given that we'll be between 350,000 and 450,000 coronavirus deaths by voting day:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/elections...r-BB13PxZ2

The sleazy things he did that used to stay hidden are now coming to light, things that a majority of voters can't ignore. 
https://www.greenwichtime.com/news/artic...256580.php 

I gather that it has impacted Trump personally, now that eleven of his Secret Service is testing positive, as has Mike Pence's press secretary:
https://news.yahoo.com/secret-service-co...44492.html
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/05/08...rus-244816

And, as noted, the economy will be in tatters with a ballooned deficit, as even Joe Biden can point out:
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/49...c-disaster

My concern isn't that Trump will be re-elected (he won't, he doesn't have a prayer), or that Biden will be elected.  Biden is leading where HRC failed three years ago.
https://www.brookings.edu/blog/fixgov/20...heres-why/

The country will necessarily take a Socialist tilt (it will be branded as progressive) when the Democrat candidate gets elected.  Bernie and Warren had a lot of popularity for a reason. Trump tilted the playing field towards the rich for three years, and between the Worse-Than-Great-Depression economy and unemployment figures and the concentration of wealth in the hands of the top 1/10th of 1%, we'll be ripe for a more-than-progressive-approach.
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cro...socialist/

Here's an opening salvo:
https://www.the-sun.com/news/801005/demo...s-payment/

[Mick]

What was our government doing on January 21?

Convening an impeachment trial of the President of the United States.

Attempting to bribe/extort a foreign head of state with public money to frame a political rival has consequences. Who knew?

I admire your tenacity in missing the point. :-)

By all means, spell it out for me. 

If your point is that the impeachment "distracted" the White House, that explains neither Trump's ability to focus on the parts of the epidemic that mattered to him (calling for a poorly implemented travel ban from China), nor explains why heads of HHS and other parts of the vast Executive Branch were also entirely engulfed by impeachment.

If your point is that convicting the President of impeachment would have left the Executive Branch with ineffectual leadership (Pence) in the midst of a emerging pandemic, I suppose the fact that Pence was named head of the Task Force suggests that the same guy would have done the job either way.

Or am I missing something because I'm not fully familiar with the Faux News talking points?

The noise about Trump doesn't matter much.  He'll be voted out in November.  His (first) underfunding and (second) muzzling of the CDC will harm his status among all voters, but particularly among the elderly, given that we'll be between 350,000 and 450,000 coronavirus deaths by voting day:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/elections...r-BB13PxZ2

The sleazy things he did that used to stay hidden are now coming to light, things that a majority of voters can't ignore. 
https://www.greenwichtime.com/news/artic...256580.php 

I gather that it has impacted Trump personally, now that eleven of his Secret Service is testing positive, as has Mike Pence's press secretary:
https://news.yahoo.com/secret-service-co...44492.html
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/05/08...rus-244816

And, as noted, the economy will be in tatters with a ballooned deficit, as even Joe Biden can point out:
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/49...c-disaster

My concern isn't that Trump will be re-elected (he won't, he doesn't have a prayer), or that Biden will be elected.  Biden is leading where HRC failed three years ago.
https://www.brookings.edu/blog/fixgov/20...heres-why/

The country will necessarily take a Socialist tilt (it will be branded as progressive) when the Democrat candidate gets elected.  Bernie and Warren had a lot of popularity for a reason. Trump tilted the playing field towards the rich for three years, and between the Worse-Than-Great-Depression economy and unemployment figures and the concentration of wealth in the hands of the top 1/10th of 1%, we'll be ripe for a more-than-progressive-approach.
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cro...socialist/

Here's an opening salvo:
https://www.the-sun.com/news/801005/demo...s-payment/