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"Trump news is so terrifying I can barely stand to read it."
--from a British reader and friend
Trump news is terrifying, not just because of the things he does but from the disastrous effects on health, human rights, and the environment, that are posed by the people he hires and the judges he appoints. For instance, yesterday, a court upheld Texas' efforts to prevent abortions during the pandemic, and the day before that, another court forbade the governor of Kansas from banning church services during the pandemic.
When Trump took office, I wondered if this was what it was like to live in Germany when Hitler came to power, and the feeling has intensified. The only hope I can find is that his approval rating has generally been in the low forties, but sadly it is now at 49%. I, of course, can't see what there is to approve of, but when he turned his daily pandemic briefings into lie-strewn taxpayer-financed political events at which he boasted of how well he was handling things, blamed the Democrats and the Chinese for the pandemic, and insulted reporters when they asked such questions as, "What do you have to say to people who are afraid?" his popularity increased among those who favor "strong man" regimes. Last week, he even boasted: “When somebody’s the president of the United States, the authority is total." Although his supporters claim to favor a weak federal government and strong local governments, they didn't object to this, suggesting that they actually like a strong federal government when their candidate is running it.
The fact is that the laws that are supposed to protect America from would-be dictators only apply if the people of America respect those laws. A man like Trump will override them to the extent that the people allow him to, and with federal judges in his pocket, he won't even encounter resistance from that quarter.
Now, there is enormous pressure here to go back to pre-pandemic behavior, and much of that pressure is coming from Christians, from the far-right, and from the gun crowd (there being overlap among the three). Most governors are trying to prevent this, but Trump has been countenancing insurrection against them through such tweets as, "Liberate Michigan," "Liberate Minnesota," and "Liberate Virginia." It's also true that some governors are themselves backing a return to pre-pandemic behavior. For example, the governor of Georgia didn't bother to consult with his state's mayors before decreeing--today--that Georgia return to business-as-usual. If the medical authorities are right, this will lead to disaster, but here's what I think.
A week or two ago, it was reported that black people, Hispanics, Asians, and Native Americans die of Covid-19 in much higher numbers than Americans of Northern European ancestry, and it has long been known that sick people and the elderly are at greater risk, so is all this pressure to reopen society inspired by the thought that, "Hell, this virus probably won't hurt us much, and here is our chance to rid society of all the undesirables who are sponging off the government and draining "our" Social Security. Let's get out there and spread this thing around before scientists come up with a way to prevent it"? I suspect that, in the minds of millions (a third of Americans favor a return to what they refer to as normalcy), this is true, and my suspicion is intensified by the sight of guns (in states with open-carry laws), the Gadsden Flag (see image), and Confederate Battle Flags at these rapidly growing demonstrations. These are not people who care about the "rights" of anyone but themselves and their select group.
Another factor is that many Christians imagine that Jesus will keep them from getting sick (as the signs proclaim, "Jesus is My Vaccine"). Ironically, the parts of America in which evangelicals are dominant are the same parts that have a high incidence of obesity, diabetes, and heart disease, problems that make Covid more deadly. So, on the one hand, you have people who see the pandemic as a way to rid society of "undesirables," and, on the other, you have such Christians as imagine themselves immune.
19 comments:
You will be unsurprised to hear that I also watch Trump (and his acolytes) with fear and horror.
Sadly there have been some churches here insisting that the virus won't enter their church. Our churches have ALL been locked down just the same (despite a pentecostal Prime Minister).
We are now making some slow steps to re-opening the country for business and I hope they are not premature.
I am currently described as vulnerable in political speak, but I am certain that expendable is a close synonym in this context.
I truly fear for the citizens of your country because of this pandemic. The statistics are unbelievably distressing.
It's unbelievable. The contorted messages, like one day he'll tout social distancing and shutdowns, the next he's tweeting "Liberate Michigan" to encourage the folk running around claiming their rights are being trampled. Now the attorney general is threatening action against states who lockdown. WTF. The mixed messages are just grand. We sure need an adult in the white house right now. No chance of that. I saw a funny facebook meme the other day. It showed a Prepper gun hanging off his shoulder, showing off his little prepper buried storage unit and saysing "I can last here ten months". Next image is him protesting the lockdown screaming "I want to go the hairdresser." About right I'd say for those types. I get the impression, watching those folks with guns slung, and low pulled ski hats and three day beard stubble that they aspire to looking like third world thugs. And I bet they all took selfies before they left for the rally. In other words, I think they may be playing dress up, to some extent.
Snow, you’re spot on with every word here. I refuse to be afraid so instead I’m disgusted. Let’s hope joe Biden can run a coherent campaign. He’s a decent man.
Love
kj
My hopes are on a vaccine. Coronaviruses are hard, in that regard. We still don't have one for SARS, although it was far less contagious than Covid 19. I am skeptical of the antibody tests. At some point, the economy will have to open. I think Americans will become creative at discovering ways to do so safely. Normal people don't want to risk lives, at their place of business. Only anti lifers would do that. And we all know how pro life those alleged far right Christian types are (giggling, because their behavior suggests the opposite).
You said: "When Trump took office, I wondered if this was what it was like to live in Germany when Hitler came to power, and the feeling has intensified."
Really?
Then expect a loud door banging some night at your front door. Expect a bunch of men to come into your home, yank you out of bed, throw you on a train and then send you to a gas chamber with a lump of soap under the left arm of your naked body.
What?
It ain't gonna happen? Exactly. That's because in no way does Trump have any resemblance to the Nazi party. Trump is doing an excellent job saving American lives despite what you Democrats have been throwing at him. And if you think that dementia ridden Biden could do any better, I'll personally make sure you don't miss your 'train' next time it passes through your imaginary neighborhood.
Peace, bro.
Your President scares the bejeebers out of me, he's so crazy. He's ruining your country.
For my own country, I just hope we don't relax the rules too soon. I'd much prefer to wait until there is no sign of the virus at all.
Sad isn't it? And frustrating and heartbreaking.
"It ain't gonna happen? Exactly. That's because in no way does Trump have any resemblance to the Nazi party."
I didn't compare Trump to the Nazi Party; I compared Trump to Hitler, although I would compare the Republican Party to the Nazi Party in that their evil isn't limited by willingness but opportunity. To argue with you that Trump--and his party--is horrifically dangerous would be like arguing with you that Covid-19 and global warming are horrifically dangerous, the last two being other things that right-wingers deny. I will take the time to point out that Trump's lies as president started on the day he was inaugurated when, with despite ALL of the evidence being to the contrary, he claimed that his crowd was larger than that of any other president in history.
Last I heard, the number of times that out dictator-adoring president has assaulted truth during his presidency was pushing 16,500. If lying could be banned, Trump would explode like an overfilled balloon, leaving behind nothing more than a wrinkled skin and the stink of shit. How does he get away with it? He does so because his supporters are divided among fascists, worshipers of firearms, rich people who profit by his pandering, and poorly educated white Catholics and evangelicals who believe that "their" country is being stolen out from under them by socialists and minorities. These people would vote for Satan himself if Satan supported their "right" to own military weapons and force their depraved religious values and rituals on the rest of society.
Even so, I can but assume that these people really are stupid enough to trust Trump, but how do they do it? How do even stupid people manage to, in Jesus' words, "strain at a gnat and swallow a camel"? The following is from Mein Kampf, and bad writer that Hitler was, his point is clear:
“In the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily; and thus in the primitive simplicity of their minds they more readily fall victims to the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods.
“It would never come into their heads to fabricate colossal untruths, and they would not believe that others could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously. Even though the facts which prove this to be so may be brought clearly to their minds, they will still doubt and waver and will continue to think that there may be some other explanation. For the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down, a fact which is known to all expert liars in this world and to all who conspire together in the art of lying.”
Hitler's buffoons read this garbage and goosestepped into hell anyway, and so it is with Trump in that the man is convicted daily by his own words, yet his people lick his filthy ass.
Scary times indeed.
Strange times Snow. I was thinking we would have a nuclear war by now with Trump. Instead a pandemic with no leadership. Just checking see if all is well with you.
"Just checking see if all is well with you."
Joe, Peggy and I are certainly do better than millions in that we have the resources to stay home, and have everything either delivered or loaded into our SUV without us having to go into a store.
It's sad that politicians & people are battling against each other & not the virus.
I'm not a fan of the politicians here in the UK but at least they've put their differences aside to fight the virus.
The president is the person who could and should be leading and communicationg but he's not. He couldn't take the criticism from the press at the daily briefings so he opted out of them.
It's times like these you see the calibre of a country's leaders.
Take care.
"He couldn't take the criticism from the press at the daily briefings so he opted out of them."
He restarted them because the election is coming up in November, and he has been using these "briefings" as free campaign appearances. While I'm quite sure that some of the presidents who served during my lifetime were good men (Carter, Ford, and perhaps, Kennedy stand out), I will leave it to history to determine whether any have been great presidents. As for Trump, he is less principled than Nixon, scummier than Clinton, and wins first place for being the person whom I have most hated. Millions wish him dead, but, death being too good for him, I wish him years of nightmarish suffering, although it would grieve me to know that his suffering was taxpayer financed. Ironically, Trump's main support comes from Christians, the same people who uphold themselves as the moral bedrock of American society, which makes them an object lesson in it being naive to simply take people at their word for what their values are. It's actually scary to hate someone as much as I hate Trump, because when I reflected upon such hatred, I previously thought of it in regard to, for example, parents whose daughters were raped and murdered. If only notice of him wasn't thrust into my face as an existential threat to my nation month after weary month and year after weary year.
Interesting view point that I agree with. We get a lot of news about America here and though I am not into politics and commenting about another country, I was very surprised reading about certain communities who feel they are protected from Covid-19 because of their religion. With most news on the pandemic, the ruling government has taken total responsibility of managing the situation, but it appears to me that Trump has thrown that responsibility to individual states. Kestrel from jom colour me in Malaysia
Marion, because you recently wrote that you might have Covid-19, I didn't know if you would be coming around. Now...
"Hmmmm, nothing here about Wuhan, China"
I'll see your hmmmm and raise you a Hallelujah Chorus, but, speaking of China, is it your contention that it's more important that Trump place blame than that he save lives, and double-hmmmm, surely you're aware that you wrote an entire response without labeling my post "fake news," and triple-hmmmm, you even failed to follow Trump's lead in blaming Nancy Pelosi for his inadequate response (for now, suffice it to say that Trump's point was that he might have responded better had Pelosi not distracted him with talk of impeachment). You also, quadruple-hmmmm, neglected to point out that Trump has blamed the nation's governors for the problem.
"2 Corinthians 4:7 'But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.'”
If we're going to turn our thoughts to "God's Holy Word," we mustn't forget Romans 13:1, which commands Christians to subject themselves to their leaders without regard to those leaders' wickedness: "Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers, for the powers that be are ordained by God."
cont.
But to return to Corinthians, if Trump is an "all-surpassing power," what then was Hitler, an all-surpassing power twelve times over? For those who don't live in America (most of my active leaders are not Americans), a partial listing of recent events might be useful: (1) Upon admitting that the country had fifteen virus cases, Trump said that he had the situation "under control," and that, within days, the country could expect to have "zero" virus cases. (2) When virus cases instead multiplied exponentially, Trump blamed the problem on Nancy Pelosi (a prominent member of America's Democratic Party) and declared himself a "war president" in the fight against the virus. (3) Trump immediately abandoned the states to compete with one another for medical supplies, and to otherwise fight the "war" without federal assistance. (3) Trump urged rebellion against states with Democrat governors: "Free Minnesota," "Free Virginia," "Free Michigan," he tweeted. (4) Trump's supporters put on their bullet-proof vests, armed themselves with assault rifle and marched into Michigan's state capitol building. (5) Just as Trump had previously called the Charlottesville, Virginia, neo-Nazis "good people," he now called the Michigan neo-Nazis "very good people," (it's unknown whether the feelings of the Virginia neo-Nazis were hurt), and urged Michigan's governor to "negotiate" with them. (6) Upon learning that bleach kills viruses, Trump gave a press conference at which he asked one of his medical experts about the feasibility of curing Covid-19 by ingesting bleach. Bleach manufacturers advised that Trump's supporters NOT drink bleach, but, as might be expected some did. (7) Trump's advisor, Kelly Anne Conway, corrected a reporter by insisting that the disease isn't Covid-19, but Covid-1, her rational being that this is the world's first Covid. She hasn't said if she has since learned that the number 19 refers to the year that the virus first appeared.
If the first five of these things don't sound like what one might expect from a Hitler-wannabe, then what would it take to sound like a Hitler-wannabe?
When the virus took hold in America, I idly wondered if, perhaps, Trump might actually try to bring the country together in the coming fight. I would have bet heavily against it, but since it was the first time in his presidency that the nation had faced a prolonged threat (aside from the threat of having a truly stupid and outrageously wicked man as president, that is), there was at least a minuscule reason to hope that he would rise to the occasion, but of course, he did not.
Kesrel, I'm so glad you're here. More later...
Watching from afar and having been born in post war Hannover as a refugee babe I must write that the anan commenter is way off course. In No way is Trump making US great. In fact he is causing a huge population of jobless and homeless who are bound to rise up in condemnation asthe depression crashes around him and businesses fall . He has failed those who needed means to stay well. 33 million are jobless. And hotels and airlines and oil industry are heading to bankruptcy . The man lives in a fiction of self grandeur. US has no leadership at its head. And I fear all will soon crash as more realize the virus was around before China got hit. Both in Freunde and other locations there were cases as early as November. And a vaccine is tough to create when the virus is actually an RNA change in individuals.
It is a complex health issue ever changing . It has changed how medicine prioritises Sickness and who to treat. Trump has no clue that he may go down as the egomaniac who failed the most powerful country by his ill advised chosen ones. I fail to see how any of any faith can change what lies ahead. One must go beyond Trump as it is a global issue and all people will face new challenges as time will show. No one has yet understood the magnitude of the altered minds created by this pandemic.
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