Yeah, Trump said today in a press conference that we were rounding the final turn, and that vaccines plural were coming. You know, continuing to “lead” and “show strength” through the magic of bullshit.
Meanwhile, 20% of University of Wisconsin students on campus are covid-19 positive, and have been told to stay in their dorms. That’s the ticket.
America, we are SO fucked!
Excuse me, but I don’t understand the premise of this thread. Why does Trump saying “Covid is deadly” need to be spun at all?
Trump said before that Covid was going away or that it was going to be like the Flu, when he really knew then that that was not the case.
And, Trump was publicly saying “it’s going to be like the flu, it’ll fade away soon, we have it under control” at the same time that he was privately telling Woodward that he knew this to not be the case.
Because he didn’t tell America. He said it privately while publicly saying it was no big deal.
Here’s an analogy – let’s say that white supremacist violence was a big problem in the US and he knew it and de-emphasized that… No, wait, that happened.
OK, let’s say that Russian election interference was a problem and he knew it and de…OK, let me try again.
Let’s say that ISIS was a big threat to the US. Every week, ISIS was killing a few people here in the US. In private, Obama tells Woodward, “Yeah, I know ISIS is dangerous and deadly.” But, in public, he says, “ISIS is no big deal. In a few days or weeks, they won’t be a threat at all anymore.” Meanwhile, ISIS continued to kill Americans with greater frequency. After months of this, where Obama publicly discouraged people from wearing special ISIS detecting glasses and telling Michigan and other states to let captured ISIS agents go wild, we find out that Obama knew all along how dangerous ISIS was to Americans but underplayed it.
The fact that he knew all along how dangerous ISIS was while publicly downplaying the threat would seem like a big deal to me.
Got it, thanks. So a public official said two different things in public and in private. Who ever heard of such depravity?
Exactly. Because the question becomes: “Then why in the fuck were you actively unprepared?”
Of this level? A couple hundred thousand dead Americans? (as of 9/2020) You serious?
Saying different things in public and private would be:
PRIVATE: This is a potentially devastating disease. I’m worried that no matter what we do, the death toll will be enormous. We’ll keep it low-key so as not to create a panic, but I want a task force of top reps from DHS, HHS, and Commerce to start meeting this afternoon to strategize how we’re going to marshal the resources we need to stop the virus - and to plan what we’re going to do if, as I fear, we can’t contain it even with our best efforts.
PUBLIC: This is a challenge that will test our ability to work together for common cause and that will draw on every resource we have. But America is a strong country and I know we’ll beat this thing. Our top people are working on a multi-faceted strategy to keep us safe and I have every confidence in their ability.
What Trump did was more like:
PRIVATE: Shit, this thing’s gonna be a killer.
PUBLIC: La-la-la, it’s all fine, nothing to see here, don’t worry or prepare in any way, there’s no threat so we don’t have to do anything.
Are you aware that tens of thousands of Americans have needlessly died because of Trump’s inept (willfully it seems) response? Because this isn’t an especially arcane criticism of Trump.
Thanks for proving my phis base won’t care, they can’t care.
Looks like we have an exciting new spin from Trump. In my OP, I lacked the imagination to see how the third technique I listed (project - turn the accusation back on the accuser) could be employed in this case, but darned if Trump hasn’t done it:
I have seen this echoed among his supporters. “WHy dIdN’t WoOdWaRd go tO tHe meDiA? HoW uNeTHiCaL!”
A reporter today responded to that moronic, responsibility avoiding “thought” from Trump by saying: “Bob Woodward is not the President”, but he kind of got drowned out by Trump’s very loud gargling of his own saliva.
President Trump has taken every conceivable position on every possible issue. He has affirmed and disavowed every position he’s ever held. He was both deadly serious and totally kidding. The strategy ? No matter the outcome, he can point to ‘evidence’ that he called it right from the beginning.
At least, when told that “our nation is under attack,” George W. Bush only spent seven minutes reading ‘My Pet Goat.’
[Hastily scribbling a heartfelt apology note to ol’ Shrub…]
Yeah. He did an Enron, but – rather than screwing with peoples’ life savings – he went directly after their lives.
But her emails!
“To the authorities.”
Trump, after all this time, still can’t get his head around the fact that HE is in charge of the government. He still pictures “authorities” who have the responsibility for what happens in the USA—because he sure as hell knows he has no such responsibility.
(my bolding in the quote)
This carries the unwarranted implication that there was PLENTY of PPE lying around, and Fauci’s responsibility was to gather it up for those healthcare workers.
This, of course, is nonsense.
From March:
That was more than five months ago. There’s been little improvement in the Trump Administration response.
(my bolding in the first quote)
And we started from the same point as New Zealand and Switzerland. Yet we finished last. The blame is in Leadership or if you may, lack of Leadership.