Trump’s words and inactions about the coronavirus are literally killing people. You could say we are experiencing the Donald Trump Holocaust.
As of today, there were 120,763 coronavirus cases in the U.S. and 2,016 deaths. Trump was warned back in December that this was coming. He did nothing.
Last week Trump told the governors of all the states to source their own medical equipment and not rely on the federal government, cracking that “we’re not a shipping clerk.” Then it was revealed that states were not only competing with each other for needed equipment, they were competing with the federal government as well. All of this drives up prices.
Trump’s response? He laughed it off.
Trump’s sociopathic need for loyalty comes into play even during a national crisis. It’s obvious that he wants governors from blue states to start playing by his rules. “They have to treat us well, also. They can’t say ‘Oh, gee, we should get this, we should get that,” he said.
The latest call with the governors shows they are now, to an extent, playing to his ego to try to get needed supplies that should never, ever, be withheld or questioned in a national health crisis.
Trump was impeached for trying to extort Ukraine. This time the quid pro quo is ventilators for fealty.
Then there is Trump’s attack on Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer. As usual, Trump can’t deal with strong women, so he made the claim that he “doesn’t know if she knows what’s going on.” He didn’t even know her name. Whitmer has followed procedure to try to get needed medical supplies, and she has asked that Michigan be declared a major disaster area. Trump’s response is that she needs to work harder and be more proactive.
Let’s hope the people of Michigan, a key state for Trump’s re-election, remember this in November.
The governors from the red states are basically taking their cues from Trump on how to manage their situations. Among Trump’s loyalists are Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. In a state with the most retirees, DeSantis still refuses to implement a shelter-in-place order or close down public spaces.
DeSantis is doing something Trump would love to do – conduct business as usual and ignore the potential devastation that is coming.
South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster, another Trump bootlicker, is also refusing to issue a shelter-in-place order. “When will it become necessary? How will we know?” McMaster asked. He says he will rely on data, facts, science and expert knowledge and opinions.
Trump is still pushing to get the economy going again by April 12. He wants to re-think social distancing and other guidelines by ranking areas as high, medium or low risk. As Bob Gatty wrote the other day on Not Fake News, looks like Trump wants to lead a joyous Easter Parade through Washington, DC's cherry blossoms.
The Coronavirus Guidelines for America were only published March 16 and yet Trump thinks he can have supporting data for relaxing these guidelines less than a month after they were implemented. Guidelines that should have been drafted in January.
Should we even be talking of loosening restrictions while cities like New Orleans are just now showing an increased rate of death and New York City is not yet at the apex of the pandemic? The assumption here is airlines and other forms of cross-country transportation would get back on track to help the economy. How do you keep potentially infected people from high risk areas going to low risk areas?
As Trump supporters overlook all of his corruption and mis-management because of a strong economy, getting it back to where it was in January of 2020 is crucial to his re-election.
Then there’s Congress blatantly displaying politics over people with the stimulus bill this week. The $2 trillion package was finally passed Friday, but only after Sen. Mitch McConnell blamed Democrats for delaying it in the Senate when it was drafted only by Republicans and Rep. Thomas Massie, also a Kentucky Republican tried some costly political grandstanding in the House.
And, there’s South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham. He attempted to block the bill from going to the House because, as it states in his email blast Friday:
“The CARES Act does contain a particularly egregious provision which I strongly opposed. The provision allows some individuals to make significantly more from unemployment benefits than they would working at a 40-hour a week job. I coauthored an amendment with Senator Ben Sasse to alter this provision to ensure that those who were forced out of work by the virus were made whole, but would not make more than they were making while working. Unfortunately, our effort to correct this provision was defeated by a vote of 48-48. I will continue working to correct it in the weeks to come."
It's clear that Sen. Graham and Donald Trump want money to be the driving factor for the success of the United States. As long as they get to stay comfortable.
A few thousand lives and increased poverty are, apparently, an acceptable cost for a strong economy.