By the time Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, posted a tweet on Sept. 7 declaring that “Real America is done with #COVID19,” the pandemic, and how one responded to it, had already metastasized into a political litmus test.

Jordan’s message accompanied a video posted by Barstool Sports showing a packed football stadium at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where tens of thousands of maskless fans, in what’s known as the “Jump Around,” exuberantly danced at the start of the third quarter at the first home game to be played before a capacity crowd since the beginning of the pandemic. Although the Delta variant of the coronavirus continues to spread, killing more than