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9/10/20
It matters who the president is. Millions of lives and livelihoods depend on the character, competence, altruism and integrity of the person in the Oval Office -- whatever their party or ideology. But President Donald Trump -- as he devastatingly revealed in his own voice to Bob Woodward -- met the great crisis of his age with ineptness, dishonesty and an epic dereliction of duty. Rarely have a president's actions -- or inaction -- and individual decisions on such a critical issue been so consequential and so exposed in his own time -- in this case in taped interviews with The Washington Post reporter for his new book, "Rage." Throughout history, presidents responded to moments of great trial by leveling with the American people about often-dire challenges, but also summoned a collective sense of mission toward a less perilous destination. Twice, in the 1930s Great Depression and after Japan attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941, a Democrat, Franklin Roosevelt, told the country the truth, and it listened and followed. On another day of infamy -- 19 years ago on Friday -- a Republican, George W. Bush, consoled and united a people violated by a shocking act of terrorism on 9/11.
When Trump's time came -- in February -- we now know that he perfectly understood the pernicious nature of the threat posed by the novel coronavirus. But while he told Woodward in a phone call "this is deadly stuff" and that the pathogen caused a viciously contagious illness much worse than the flu, Trump didn't level with the American people. In fact, he deliberately misled them and failed to prepare the government for a vast national effort. Worse, for weeks he continued to misinform the country about the severity of the pathogen that caused the worst global pandemic in 100 years. The 190,000 American families who lost loved ones and could never say goodbye, the millions of unemployed, the business owners who went bust, a generation of kids who haven't been in class for months and everyone else self-distanced from their regular lives now face the same question: How different would things have been had the President done his job properly? However the political chips fall, Woodward's account is the most authoritative judgment yet on Trump's handling of a crisis that will define his term -- and that the author described in a CBS "60 Minutes" interview airing Sunday as "a tragedy."
You would think this would be the kind of thing that would offend the bulk of Americans and get a significant portion of them to turn away from Trump.
But for whatever pathalogic reason this will steel his most ardent supporters. He again will be painted as the sympathetic victim here. Poor Donald. Everyone is mean to him.
You would think this would be the kind of thing that would offend the bulk of Americans and get a significant portion of them to turn away from Trump.
But for whatever pathalogic reason this will steel his most ardent supporters. He again will be painted as the sympathetic victim here. Poor Donald. Everyone is mean to him.
Trump's historic dereliction of duty laid bare
Americans -- the Trump administration is now pouring out torrents of denials, disinformation, and lies to save Donald Trump from his own recorded words.
Stop listening to them. Just stop listening to this criminal cabal. Vote them out on November 3rd.
Since the media was doing such a good job trying to panic the public, Trump decided to just give the public the facts and some words of encouragement.
I guess that's now a bad thing to do. He should have joined the media.
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He refused to act in a way that could have greatly reduced American deaths
What do you think he should have done that he didn't?
What do you think he should have done that he didn't?
All we have to do is look to those countries that had the greatest success, and when we compare what they did to what Trump did, the answers reveal themselves.
Each of those countries had a comprehensive and coordinated testing, tracing, and quarantining strategy.
For instance, South Korea, had a massive national testing program:
How South Korea managed to flatten the COVID-19 curve | CBC News
Germany made sure it had enough ICU beds:
The Best Global Responses to COVID-19 Pandemic | Time
Canada's government had a coordinated anti-Covid-19 message that was not impaired by partisan politics like in the U.S:
The Best Global Responses to COVID-19 Pandemic | Time
Then we look towards Trump's active, public campaigning against scientists and the science. Trump encouraged states to open up sooner than the guidelines suggested. It's hard to combat a virus when you have news outlets like Fox News and the President saying things like Covid-19 is not a big deal, don't wear your mask, and everyone needs to open up as soon as possible. The things people say matter. The things the President says matter. The anti-science propaganda promoted by Trump and Fox News and other Republicans, it matters. And it had a huge impact on how people behaved, because they didn't believe it was a problem. Many Trump supporters still think it's a hoax. Even some people who contribute to this forum who support Trump think Covid-19 and how we should react to it is all some sort of hoax to hurt Trump.
Trump also recommended unproven and dangerous approaches to treat the virus, trying to push treatments that haven't been adequately tested, for instance.
It also took several months for the federal government to get its act together with respect to acquiring enough PPE and ventilators to support the states.
Everyone on this forum has been over this stuff, over and over again, in thread after thread, but Trump supporters stubbornly refused to admit that Trump did anything wrong.
When is enough, enough?
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