A Very Normal Administration in the time of Coronavirus

[dorchadas]

I was at Mishkan meditation last night during the presidential address, and I came out to find out that the Mad King had flailed around and vomited everywhere while I was busy trying to disconnect and be mindful.

Within hours of the speech, the government had to go out and issue corrections on three major policy proposals because the Mad King got all of them wrong. From the transcript of the speech:

• Transcript: "To keep new cases from entering our shores, we will be suspending all travel from Europe to the United States for the next 30 days. The new rules will go into effect Friday at midnight. These restrictions will be adjusted subject to conditions on the ground."
  Truth: Travel ban only applies to foreign nationals, not permanent residents or citizens.


• Transcript: "There will be exemptions for Americans who have undergone appropriate screenings, and these prohibitions will not only apply to the tremendous amount of trade and cargo, but various other things as we get approval."
  Truth: The prohibitions do not apply to trade and cargo.


• Transcript: "Earlier this week, I met with the leaders of health insurance industry who have agreed to waive all co-payments for coronavirus treatments, extend insurance coverage to these treatments, and to prevent surprise medical billing."
  Truth: Waivers apply only to testing, not to treatment.

It's unbelievable. I even saw a suggestion that the original script said "these prohibitions will not apply" to cargo, but the Mad King fucked it up the way he fucks everything up, and since he's an illiterate narcissistic idiot child he just plowed on and didn't bother to correct himself. I wouldn't want to have been a European leader, woken up at 3 a.m. last night to the surprise news that America was banning all trade with the E.U., to say nothing of all the phone calls the White House probably got from every single major American corporation.

Part of the point of the message was to reassure the markets that we did have a plan and we were taking this seriously--the Mad King literally said "This is not a financial crisis"--and they proved exactly the opposite. I immediately said "The markets are going to crater tomorrow" and I checked when I got to work to find that trading was suspended again due to extreme drops. I've lost quite a bit of money in the last two weeks (about $80,000 last time I checked), but I can take schadenfreudilicious comfort in the fact that the super-rich are finally getting their due. They, and the Republicans, thought they could put a manifestly unqualified fool in the chair and as long as he kept it mostly together and his cult kept worshipping him, he could provide them all the tax cuts they wanted with a side of ideologue judges who hate women, the poor, and the working class and nothing could go wrong. Well, now we need leadership and the economy realizes there is none to be had.

And of course, it's not just the stock market. It's the cancelling of SXSW and the pushing back of ECCC, the suspension of the NBA season, the closure of schools and evictions of students from dorms across the country, the cancellation of St. Patrick's Day parades, the reductions in shipping and tourism and dining and the layoffs in the hospitality industry, and all the other effects that hit far more people. meowtima already had to cancel a trip to Ireland, and I have a lot of friends who were going to East Asia who also had to cancel their trips. I wonder whether my theatre friends will have their shows cancelled and all their work ruined.

If we had a competent government, or if the Republicans (who approve of Trump at 90%--always remember that, for the rest of your life, that all of them are guilty) had removed him at any point before now, we could have had a somewhat more reasonable response to this. But even now the Mad King is still calling for cuts to the CDC.

ימח שמו וזכרו yimakh shemo v'zikhro, "May his name and memory be obliterated."

Comments

[dewline]

DT-45 always imposes his intentions upon the facts.

[unicornduke]

Maybe this will prove to those people who like him that there are actual consequences to electing a shithead but I doubt it. They are pretty dense. It's truly unfortunate that a ton of people are going to die because of it.

[grayswandir]

ימח שמו וזכרו yimakh shemo v'zikhro, "May his name and memory be obliterated."

If only. :/

[earthspirits]

It was a terrible and very robotic speech, totally devoid of human empathy. Also - as usual - crammed with the usual lies and half-truths.

[omnipotent]

I'm sure you also heard that the Senate blocked a bill that would provide paid sick leave to those affected.

I have a rather morbid opinion on Trump's handling of this. I think he thought this virus would disproportionately affect poor people and minorities (even though you'd think he would pay attention to how quickly it spread in Italy and Germany), and that by sitting on his hands he could get some....ah, how shall we put it...."population control" without having to get his hands dirty.

I still think he's hoping for some "population control" as he's made it clear he doesn't care if Americans end up homeless or in foreclosure, unable to eat or pay bills, or unable to get the care they need.

I hope to hell that his handling of this costs him the reelection he so desperately wants.

[dorchadas]

It turns out Trump himself might be infected (Bolsonaro tested positive since that article was written). And from a party at one of his hotels, which is extremely "The Masque of the Red Death."

I wouldn't be surprised if you're right. We already know that he only considers himself president of the people who voted for him and doesn't care at all about anyone else, and that other countries' main goal in the world is to be out to get America, so he probably assumed that it wouldn't be that bad and, if it was, it'd just kill liberals (hence the Senate blocking paid sick leave like you said and recently Trump blocking Medicaid from helping by refusing to declare a state of emergency).

I hope to hell that his handling of this costs him the reelection he so desperately wants.

I really hope so too. I think there's a good chance--the one thing he's been able to point to to justify all his actions has been the economy, and that's going to evaporate as a casualty of containing the virus. And when he said the economy, he meant "the stock market," and that had its worst day since '87.

This is a great time for people to learn that elections matter and good government is important.

[dorchadas]

I had the scary thought earlier that if this is seasonal and comes back in October, right in time for the elections, it'll be their Reichstag Fire moment that will let them postpone elections "for the duration of the emergency."

It's a bit of comfort that so far they've been too incompetent to capitalize on anything else like that and it's only the devotion of the Republican death cult that's kept them where they are.