The Guardian has reported a study that finds that “Young and previously healthy people with ongoing symptoms of Covid-19 are showing signs of damage to multiple organs four months after the initial infection.” Yet on CNN a nurse in South Dakota reveals that many of her patients still don’t believe that the virus is “real”: “Their last dying words are, ‘This can’t be happening. It’s not real. The hardest thing to watch is people are still looking for something else and they want a magic answer and they don’t want to accept that COVID is real. Even after positive results come back, some people just don’t believe it.” Even on their deathbeds they are in angry denial, blaming medical staff for not curing them of what they believe is just a common, everyday flu.
In the Dakotas, the rate of COVID-19 cases and deaths are on pace with the worst hit countries in the world, yet while the governor of North Dakota has taken steps to prevent the spread of the virus, it is a very different story in South Dakota, where Republican Gov. Kristi Noem is too busy acting like a cowboy on the range and ignoring the pleading of medical professionals in the state. Noem’s communications director insisted that “She’ll continue trusting South Dakotans to exercise their personal responsibility to make the best decisions for themselves and their loved-ones.” Yet how can people be “trusted” to make the “best decision” when their own “rising star” governor has been telling them that the virus is nothing for them to be concerned about?
Noem is clearly not one of the adults in room, and neither is the person who she most takes after, Donald Trump. Cases and deaths from COVID-19 are again on the rise in the U.S. and around the world; while the WHO is accusing India of deliberately under-counting virus cases by halving its testing for the past few weeks, in Germany people are in “shock” because total cases have doubled in just the past month despite being convinced that it was “under control.” So what about in this country? Is Trump “taking control” of the situation?
Of course not; Trump is too busy being concerned about himself and his own future, although I don’t think he has much of one as a “swinger” anymore. He did try to take “credit” for Pfizer’s vaccine, but the company stated that it had no help developing it from the Trump’s “Operation Warp Speed” initiative, which is basically nothing more than relaxing safety protocols and throwing money at select private companies, rather than the U.S. government actually being involved in research and development; given its CEO’s “insider trading” of company stock, it is clear that Pfizer was trying to be the “first” all on its own.
But otherwise Trump has been what he has always been during the pandemic: missing in action, and deliberately so. When the virus didn’t just magically disappear by the time June rolled along, Trump lost interest as the second wave of cases and deaths was underway, because there wasn’t any “victory” to falsely take credit for. Remember that the “revised” COVID-19 death estimates in the U.S. was between 100,000 and 240,000 with proper protective measures taken, for however long the pandemic lasted. According to the John Hopkins numbers, there were 166,000 new cases reported today, and just under 1,000 deaths to over 248,000 total, and those numbers are not stopping any time soon.
Everything that was done to contain the virus has been done by state and local governments; the fact that Trump continues to downplay the danger and has provided zero leadership on the issue--save for offering bizarre and dangerous medical “advice”--underlines the fact that everything Trump has done has had a personal political dimension. Early, decisive leadership on his part could have at the very least have convinced his most hard-headed devotees that they should “trust” him when he says that the pandemic was serious, and that they should engage in strict safety measures to protect both themselves and their fellow Americans. But Trump never believed in it himself; he was only thinking of himself--if he didn’t believe in virus protocols, then why should anyone else? Those who did were just “losers” and “suckers.” But the real suckers and losers were the ones who believed Trump.
But the COVID-19 isn’t the only issue where Trump abused his supporters by making them believe his own dangerous fantasies and endangering everyone else. There are people still out there who cling to this fantasy that the second stimulus check will be in the mail tomorrow--just as they have been telling themselves every day for the past three months. Many of these rumors of additional income arriving “soon” have been peddled by authors of YouTube videos; if such a video suckers in at least 120,000 views, the video composer at least is paid the equivalent of the last stimulus payment.
But in the meantime, the reality is that while the Trump administration’s latest stimulus number is just $300 billion off the House Democrats’ number, it just ain’t happening because it is all just a game for Trump; he puts all the “blame” on Democrats while he does nothing to convince the real stonewaller, Sen. Mitch McConnell, who opposes any second COVID stimulus package at all, and he knows his “targeted” plan of $500 billion--which does not include a second stimulus check--doesn’t have a prayer of passing anyways.
That was the “plan” all along, and Trump has done nothing at all to press McConnell to move his numbers up; in fact McConnell has less incentive to work with a lame-duck Trump, and let’s be “frank” about this: does McConnell want to “help” Joe Biden help the average working American anymore than he did Barack Obama? Of course not; its all about partisan politics for Republicans. Unless the Democrats somehow win both of Georgia’s runoff Senate races (very unlikely), keep dreaming that pipe-dream that there will be another stimulus check if one doesn’t pass this year.
Alright, so we can check off that item that Trump is “pretending” to want for his supporters, but in fact is just faking he wants it. So while Trump is doing all this for you, he expects something in return. The official Trump-Pence website is calling for the following:
Well, at least in the bold red part, it is “suggesting” that your contribution is going to some sort of legal defense fund. But in the “fine print” below it is not exactly clear that this is the intended purpose:
Contributions to TMAGAC made by an Individual/Federal Multicandidate Political Committee will be allocated according to the following formula:
60% of each contribution first to Save America, up to $5,000/$5,000, then to DJTP’s Recount Account, up to a maximum of $2,800/$5,000.
40% of each contribution to the RNC’s Operating account, up to a maximum of $35,500/$15,000.
Any additional funds will go to the RNC for deposit in the RNC’s Legal Proceedings account or Headquarters account, up to a maximum of $213,000/$90,000.
On the face of it, it appears the 60 percent of your “donation” is going to “Save America,” which according to ABC News is “a ‘leadership PAC,’ which can be established by former and current members of Congress as well as by other prominent political figures, often with the purpose of advancing their political influence, according to its FEC filing.” Then it tells us that the other 40 percent will go to the Republican National Committee’s account.
Well, that does add up to about 100 percent for something other than Trump’s legal fund for contesting the election, doesn’t it? There is a mention here about Donald J. Trump’s “recount account,” but “reading between the lines,” we see that if you are a small donor, nothing that you contribute is going to such an election “defense” fund, unless you “donate” at least $8,330; after that, a maximum of $2,800 goes to the, uh, “recount” account. This is obviously a con-job meant to con Trump’s most fanatical supporters who still believe he “won” the election, but probably believe funding the RNC and Trump’s new political PAC should be left to billionaire Republican donors.
Reuters noted that other Trump post-election fundraising shenanigans were initially “intended to pay down campaign debt, but are now largely going to his Save America PAC,” which “Unlike campaign funds, which have tight controls on how they can be spent, leadership PACs such as Save America carry few restrictions. Republicans and Democrats alike have drawn criticism for using them to pay family members and to fund luxury events in exotic locations. A 2018 report by the Campaign Legal Center and Issue One, two groups that advocate campaign finance reform, said some leadership PACs have been used as vehicles to ‘subsidize lavish lifestyles’ of politicians ‘on their donors’ dimes.’”
So, what have we learned about Trump post-election? Well, nothing that we didn’t already know about him. He personally doesn’t care one-wit about the health and well-being of the American people during a pandemic; he makes “promises” he either has no intention of keeping or is too lazy to arm-twist the intransigents in his own party to make happen, if it has anything to do with helping working people and not the rich; and finally Trump is taking his supporters for the suckers they are in believing in him and allowing themselves to be swallowed into his own dark world by being conned into giving him their money under false pretenses to further enrich himself and his “future.”
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