At his next-to-last press conference, “President” Trump suggested that effective treatments for Covid-19 infection could include shining UV or “other” light into the body, either through the skin or in other ways. He then suggested that injection of disinfectant into the body could effect a remarkable cure. You can see his statement below, as well as his responses to questions by the press.
According to CNN, Trump now says his comments were “sarcastic”:
Doctors and the company that makes Lysol and Dettol warned that injecting or ingesting disinfectants is dangerous. But when Trump was asked about the comments during a bill signing on Friday, he said, “I was asking a question sarcastically to reporters like you just to see what would happen.”
He then suggested he was talking about disinfectants that can safely be rubbed on people’s hands. And then he returned to the sarcasm explanation, saying it was “a very sarcastic question to the reporters in the room about disinfectant on the inside.”
Here’s his garbled backtracking:
It’s clear from the first video that Trump was not being sarcastic; in fact, he was looking to two of his advisors, Dr. Deborah Birx and Homeland Security science officer Bill Bryan, implicitly asking for reassurance. It is to their shame that they somewhat buttressed Trump’s stupidity, or at least didn’t disavow it. Of course, if they did, they’d be fired.
Now Trump’s new press secretary (how many has he had?) says that the media misunderstood what Trump was saying, and that his remarks were taken “out of context.”
They weren’t. His words are clear. There was not a hint of sarcasm, and he was looking to his advisors, not to the reporters he was supposedly mocking. It’s not the President’s job to stand up before the press and tout untried remedies. He should have learned his lesson with hydroxychloroquine. “It couldn’t hurt,” he said. Well, yes it could, and it does: it’s worse to take it than to do nothing.
He has followed up a bout of stupidity with a bout of lying. It’s there for all Americans to see. When will people wake up and admit that Trump is a narcissistic and unhinged individual who has to go? Ceiling Cat help us that he’ll be at the helm during this crisis—until January at the earliest.
“a very sarcastic question to the reporters in the room about disinfectant on the inside.”
Unclear/garbled. Why does he refuse to speak English?
This post gives me hope in general.
For the record, tRump is on to his fourth press secretary. Clinton seems to be the record holder, with five. But of course that was in two full terms. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_House_Press_Secretary
Oops, meant to target the link a little better: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_House_Press_Secretary#List_of_press_secretaries
Grisham almost made it through her entire tenure without calling a single press conference.
Sub
“It is to their shame that they somewhat buttressed Trump’s stupidity, or at least didn’t disavow it.”
Utter cowardice.
And where are those idiots who wrote that idiotic op-ed in the NYT about how they are the secret resistance within the White House, protecting the nation from the worst in these difficult times?
This will of course be instantly forgotten, even by the media who should never have covered it in the first place. And the only thing that will be remembered by Trump’s fans (aka half the the US… ok sorry, sorry, only 47.3% of the US) is that Trump gave another 2 hour press conference and gave the fake media a beating.
Really? This is the president of the United States saying in a press conference that injecting yourself with disinfectant might save you from coronavirus.
The media absolutely has to report that because it shows him up as an absolute fucking moron.
Unfortunately, one or two people may try it and that would be terrible because being stupid is not a crime and not deserving of capital punishment. However, if this turd gets a second term, the body count will be higher.
Report on, yes. Live coverage daily for hours on end? In Cuba maybe. And, yeh, now in the US too, clearly.
I used to agree with you. And I don’t watch the Orange Menace Show myself. But it is important for people to see the idiocy and not pretend it doesn’t exist. His base will get the filtered/edited Faux News version designed to show him as a Great Leader. The rest of us need access to the actual full record of reality.
He’s the president of the United States. Of course people are going to report on what he says.
If the president of the US says “inject yourself with bleach” you must report it, ideally with lots of caveats saying that it is absolutely moronic to inject yourself with bleach, but you must report it.
I’m not sure who the British expert is, but yes, she should have walked out. If they all did, he couldn’t do it any more.
I don’t mean to be hard on her in particular — she probably didn’t know what her face was doing, and certainly didn’t know the media would pick up her reaction in particular.
Everyone in the room should have walked out. But each of them were too scared, or didn’t like it. It’s a microcosm of the whole US. When half the population finds it normal, it’s too late to hope for people collectively to somehow wake up.
Just validates what JAC has been alluding to all this time: This man is a bombastic, arrogant, self-promoting, moron. He is incapable of telling the truth, much less provide accurate information.
I think that the three medical advisers to Trump should jointly resign. This will stop Trump to tell nonsense since he will have lost any say in medical matters.
Unfortunately if you jammed a shotgun up tRump’s nose (both barrels) and ordered him to stop the nonsense he wouldn’t. Or couldn’t. It’d be like asking a parrot to play the trumpet. The guy is constitutionally incapable of saying anything sensible.
cr
Alexander – the three medical advisors resigning wouldn’t really achieve anything. Trump would just pretend they were incompetent, and that he’d fired them, his supporters would believe him, and they’d all stand around chanting “drain the swamp!”
That thing he said during the election about shooting someone on 5th Avenue is true.
5th Avenue? Should be updated to include him shooting a reporter in a Press briefing. I honestly believe his supporters would forgive that, too. Hell… all he has to do it continue his personal attacks. His rabid right-wing followers are already gunning for Dr Fauci and some might even be willing to do it for Trump.
tRump’s approval deficit is getting bigger quickly. Keep it up, tRump.
Meanwhile other apologists are saying that tRump was really only [i]asking[/i] if this would work. No hint of sarcasm from them.
The various sides over there ought to get their lies straight.
To italicize use less-than and greater-than signs in place of the square brackets.
I know. Only I am a frequent commenter on a different site, and I swear over there its [ and ]. So I get ’em mixed up.
Square brackets are bbcode. Angle brackets are HTML and WordPress.
It looked to me as if he was doing one of his usual acts: the successful tycoon whose native acumen baffles the learned men & women of science, as he leads them to hitherto unsuspected truths.
I would like to see one or more of the other networks present Dr. Fauci and/or other medical experts at the same time slot as our
non-medical expert president. That’s if they can’t get tRump from blathering idiocies on
his presentation of Covid-19 misfacts.
Indeed. Sadly, if the networks had any concern for informing rather than disinforming their viewers, they would have done this long ago. So they must not have any such concern.
This episode was utterly incredible, I thought many months (years?) ago. I now only notice every second week how he continued to keep attention on himself practically every day.
In reality, there is always something. Each day. This time it’s also dangerous. I do not know if previous statements were as harmful, but it would not surprise me.
I don’t know what to make of it. It’s important to go through the motions and complain, but then again, half of the US likes the guy and he’s without a doubt a perfect representative of Republican America, and likely the next President, too (where he should be leading the opposition, Joe Biden is virtually invisible).
The stable genius looks more like the 2 year old toddler that he is. Think of it – enough people in this country voted to put this thing in the white house. After years of television exposure on that idiotic reality show they promote him to this. The country will be so screwed by next January, so broke and in debt, in depression. Way to go America, so exceptional. I hate to say it again but you get what you deserve. In another week or two the death rate will surpass the Vietnam war. Only takes about a month and a half.
Like most children, when caught in a lie, he uses the “I was only kidding” gambit. He certainly put to rest his claim that “I really get this stuff.” He is an idiot, and a dangerous one at that. We saw how his stable genius pronouncement of “What do we have to lose?” worked out for hyrdroquinone. And then there is this: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/24/revealed-leader-group-peddling-bleach-cure-lobbied-trump-coronavirus?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other&fbclid=IwAR2LDuYu0HVreDUCxrlipIfBPUUvA6hGu3qBrOicR39ho7SPlW9q2qKBgzc
Chlorine dioxide. Jeezus. Might as well try chlorine trifluoride, that’d *really* burn the virus.
But actually, I’m all in favour of tRump supporters and watchers of right-wing websites guzzling all the chlorine dioxide they like. Take plenty of it guys, the more the better, that way you’re less likely to clog up hospital beds while you CTD.**
cr
** Circling the drain, a cynical phrase that doctors never, ever use.
This article explains also why Putin has him in his pocket. He is absolutely susceptible to any mental virus.
I think Dr. Birx is in a very difficult position. This is The Madness of King George. Someone has to stay in the administration to try to manage this awful situation, which means trying to protect public health while pandering to his mental illness or whatever is going on here. If every medical professional ran away screaming we would be left with zero influence from the medical community. The idea is terrifying.Trump’s behavior can’t just be narcissistic personality disorder can it? These are the ravings of someone with serious problems. If my grandmother suggested fighting a virus by cleaning her insides with disinfectant I’d fear that she was a danger to herself. I’m not qualified to evaluate anything, but common sense says there is more to Trump’s behavior than a personality disorder.
You’re giving Dr Birx way too much credit, I’ve seen her support some of Trump’s silly statements, unnecessarily so 👎
I can’t forgive or forget her saying this about Trump in an interview: “He is so attentive to the scientific literature and the details and the data, and I think his ability to analyze and integrate data that comes out of his long history in business has really been a real benefit during these discussions about medical issues.”
🤢
Is the woman deaf and blind??
If I had to say all that, I’d let out a huge explosion of laughter immediately after I finished, if I got that far. I mean it’s really laid on thick!
Understatement of the week.
I strongly object to comparisons of tRump with King George III. If you google George, he was plagued by mental issues for long periods, but in between he was aware of his problem and in his periods of lucidity he was quite a good king, as kings went.
(I know it has always suited ‘Muricans to go on about George’s ‘madness’ because, after all, any sane king would have given the American colonies anything they demanded, wouldn’t he? [/sarcasm]. But the events of George’s long reign were complicated enough that you can cherry-pick almost any conclusion you want.)
But I can’t see any such redeeming qualities in tRump. And I don’t really see the parallel either. George had a full Parliament and establishment to moderate him. Dr Birx is not that, and is not capable of being that.
cr
Yes — it is unfair to pile onto her in particular. She tried to keep her composure but will be sacked for her facial expressions anyway now that it has gone viral.
Everyone in that room should have walked out.
I totally agree. He thought he was showing off his “genius” in making the suggestion–HA!
Reblogged this on The Logical Place.
What is so disturbing to me is not Trump but his loyal supporters (some who are family). It is just so sad to me. I guess it proves the truism “there is a sucker born every minute).
60 X 24 X 365 X 80yrs = 42 million suckers in the USA. That old adage is surprisingly close to accurate, isn’t it?
Well, maybe change it to: ‘…5 suckers born every minute’.
After all, something like 180 eligible voters failed to vote against him in 2016.
Okay, 4.316702, but that spoils it.
180 million
Yeah, Trump making off the cuff medical speculations about treatments that he’s just thinking up as he goes along, when addressing the country during a Pandemic, is madness.
And then playing it off like it was sarcasm is, first of all, such obvious b.s. to anyone who watches his initial comments that it’s like a 6 year old trying to come up with excuses for why the cookies are gone and the crumbs are all over his mouth. The fact he could think for a moment anyone would take his excuse seriously says so much about the shallowness of however his mind works.
But the excuse is possibly worse: that he’d take a briefing to the nation at the height of a pandemic to be “sarcastic” with everyone, including his medical staff, about treatments? How could that have even computed as an excuse in Trump’s head?
All that said, I DO think that many Trump-haters (I’m one!) can get a bit hysterical in terms of interpreting Trump always in the worst possible way. I think it’s irresponsible for Trump to wonder off the cuff about unproven treatments, but he certainly didn’t for a moment seem (to me) to be recommending that people go out and start injecting bleach or whatever. He was clearly musing about possible treatment-routes for the doctors to investigate, hence leaving the doctors to come up with a treatment if it’s even possible.
Dumb. But not quite accurately presented by all the “Trump’s telling everyone to inject bleach/alcohol” twitter freak outs and headlines.
But aren’t you just giving a dip shit a break. Let’s line up all those dummies in the Senate who have been carrying this water for the last 3 plus years and make them eat this. You know the ones who made sure he did not get impeached and out the door when it was obvious. The country is in the ditch so who has time for this clown.
Right on. Plus I believe that Vaal underestimates the power of words spoken by this POSPOTUS. We know that when he was pushing hyroquinone, many of his slavering supporters were rushing to get the drug. So don’t be surprised when we hear about folks who become very ill or die because Agent Orange was serving up the kool aide.
“But aren’t you just giving a dip shit a break.”
In what way?
If wishing to be honest and clear about the context of someone’s remarks, even someone I hate, is “giving a dip shit a break” well…guilty as charged I guess.
I just hope we who find Trump abhorrent and dangerous don’t let this slide towards it’s own type of purity testing, where if you aren’t on board with giving everything Trump ever says the most uncharitable spin possible then “you aren’t WITH US and you’re letting down the cause!”
Again, Trump was stupid both in what he mused about, and in choosing that public moment to muse about his stupid ideas for his medical advisor’s to pursue. But he was clearly talking to his staff about possible routes for the medical community to pursue to come up with a treatment, not to the public.
Injecting disinfectant is on another level from people seeking something that was already a brand name, recognize medical treatment (hydroxychloroquine) that had been misleadingly touted as already having proven it’s worth against COVID 19.
I know we can always do the Little People Argument and say there are certainly some people dumber than we are who will think it’s a good idea to start injecting bleach or whatever. I think the more hysterical takes on Trumps remarks are of that form; you can’t really interpret his remarks as being other than suggestions/questions for the medical staff, so the worry is “but all the people who aren’t as smart as we are will hear Trump recommending to start injecting bleach!”
I doubt that will come to pass. Maybe I’m just too optimistic about my fellow man not being that much dumber than I am, and maybe news stories will show my optimism was unfounded.
I’m sitting on the fence about that.
Yes he was just musing in the general direction of his medical advisers. He didn’t actually say ‘drink bleach’.
Though apparently he was lobbied by a group pushing something called MMS (‘miracle mineral solution’ which is chlorine dioxide) who advocate exactly that.
And any other leader would know not to ramble on in such fashion at a press conference.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/24/revealed-leader-group-peddling-bleach-cure-lobbied-trump-coronavirus
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/apr/19/church-group-to-hold-washington-event-despite-fda-warnings-against-miracle-cure
So even giving Trump the benefit of the doubt he still comes bottom of the list in ‘who would you choose to head a press conference on disease control’.
cr
“But he was clearly talking to his staff about possible routes for the medical community to pursue to come up with a treatment, not to the public.”
I agree with that. However, I think it is insane that he would be talking to his staff about possible routes for the medical community to pursue to come up with treatment. He knows nothing about the subject.
It was an extraordinary display of lack of judgement. He is unable to judge his own knowledge and skills; unable to judge what subjects he should talk about; unable to judge what would be a reasonable point to make on a given subject. I seriously think that performance should earn him a dementia diagnosis. He is woefully unfit to carry out the duties of the president.
“It was an extraordinary display of lack of judgement.”
Yes, this. Even interpreted in the best possible light, Trump’s statement was an extraordinary display of lack of judgement.
Except Trump’s lack of judgement isn’t extraordinary at all, it’s just another day that ends in ‘y’.
Absolutely! Hence why I said: Trump making off the cuff medical speculations about treatments that he’s just thinking up as he goes along, when addressing the country during a Pandemic, is madness.
You certainly are.
https://twitter.com/AnnaESanders/status/1253818333243355136
“You certainly are.”
I saw that, and of course the media was going to start scouring for any evidence Trump’s idiotic words made people do something dangerous.
But it’s quite vague and speculative. No details about what anyone was actually doing to relate it directly to Trump. This is a science-minded web site so I’d think leaping to conclusions on slim or vague evidence isn’t being consistent.
I’d hold out for more specific information – e.g. showing that people were actually trying to inject disinfectants, or having ingested disinfectant giving the reason: “Because the president suggested it could protect against COVID.”
Same thing reported in Maryland. But “fake news”, eh Vaal?
It dismays me that anyone would think there aren’t a shitload of covidiots out there. Who do you suppose supports all of the right wing religious grifters in the US?
Some more for you, Vaal…
https://www.newsweek.com/coronavirus-food-drug-administration-bleach-1498751
GBJames,
That was not inspired by Trump’s press conference. They were doing that bleach treatment well before Trump said a word. In fact there is an article in The Guardian suggesting Trump actually got the idea from that church!
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/24/revealed-leader-group-peddling-bleach-cure-lobbied-trump-coronavirus
This is what I mean about guarding against the bias of always seeking the worst possible interpretation and grabbing on to anything to support the interpretation; it can lead to this type of sloppy inference.
“ame thing reported in Maryland. But “fake news”, eh Vaal?”
Oh goodness, no need to spin my post like that, please. This is suggestive of the “purity testing” I’m talking about. “Not excoriating Trump in lock-step with the way I am? You may as well be on the other team shouting fake news!”
Jesus, Vaal.
Washington. Maryland. Kentucky. New York. Illinois.
Enough make-believe.
Jesus, Vaal.
Washington. Maryland. Kentucky. New York. Illinois.
Enough make-believe.
Thanks for the links.
To sum up so far:
I argued that Trump was not recommending that the public start injecting bleach/disinfectant, but was stupidly and dangerously musing off the cuff to his medical advisors as to possible treatment routes to pursue.
I said I wasn’t as pessimistic that this would lead many people to injecting bleach/disinfectant, but that evidence to the contrary may show my optimism is unfounded.
(Notice the open-minded approach, waiting for evidence?).
You first provided a link to a story that was intriguing, but inconclusive and lacking the type of detail we’d want if carefully investigating the claim “Trump’s remarks caused people to start injecting disinfectant.”
When I pointed this out, you provided more “evidence” that turned out to be flatly wrong. Trump’s remarks didn’t influence the bleach-using church, if anything it was the other way around. (You didn’t acknowledge this error on your part. Why?)
Ok, now you are providing more evidence. GOOD.
Though I note: much of if is a re-hash of the first line of evidence – the uptick in calls to the NYC poison centre, so doesn’t add more to the evidence.
About Illinoise, the articles say:
The Illinois Poison Center had a 36 percent increase in March in calls statewide concerning “inappropriate use of disinfectants and cleansers,” according to Danny Chun, a communications and marketing employee at the center. “Since the president made his remarks Thursday night, we have gotten two specific cases where we got calls.”
So, in other words, the large increase had to do with the MONTH OF MARCH, NOT calls after Trump’s remarks. They got “2 calls” after Trump’s remarks. We don’t even know what the callers said or what happened – how or if it was directly related to Trump. Could be.
But the report does not spell out the details of those 2 calls.
It’s the same with the Kentucky “news.”
“Kentucky Poison Control Center receives 1,000 calls a day related to COVID-19 issues.”
That’s talking about the uptick in calls during the Covid Crises, NOT directly after and related to Trump’s remarks.
Similarly, the remarks from the The American Association of Poison Control Centers:
“During January – March 2020 poison centers received 45,550 exposure calls related to cleaners (28,158) and disinfectants (17,392) representing overall increases of 20.4 % and 16.4% from the same time period January -March 2019,” the AAPCC said in a statement.
“Although NPDS does not provide a definite link between exposures and COVID -19 there appears to be a clear temporal association with increased use of these products.”
Again…this is all BEFORE Trump’s remarks and is therefore not evidence of people injecting cleaners due to Trump’s remarks.
So up to this point you have not provided strong evidence for the proposition that people are injecting disinfectants due to Trump’s remarks. Much of it is actually irrelevant on that count.
Does it feel strange to have your claims put under scrutiny? Welcome to critical thinking, where we subject our OWN side and claims to the type of evidence evaluation as we subject Trumptards. I’m not going to just accept everything you throw at me as directly relevant or strong evidence if it’s not the case, anymore than I’d have those low standards for evaluating Trump supporter claims.
Now the BEST evidence so far that you’ve posted is for Maryland:
“In Maryland, the Emergency Management Agency received over 100 calls inquiring about the president’s suggestion, forcing the service to issue an alert to remind citizens that “under no circumstances should any disinfectant product be administered into the body through injection, ingestion or any other route.”
That does sound like alarming news! That story DOES directly relate the calls (even without details) to Trump’s remarks.
Though, note that even there what EXACTLY has been established in those brief remarks? First, it’s clearly not the case those 100 people had begun injecting disinfectants. They didn’t just uncritically make such a move from Trump’s remarks. They at least thought critically enough about what they heard Trump say to SEEK WHAT EXPERTS SAY on the subject by calling about it. So, while, yes, the calls are on one level alarming, on another it’s not evidence of those people starting to inject disinfectants or even uncritically accepting whatever they think Trump said.
So, again, I agree Trump’s speculation was stupid and reckless, and that it’s possible it could lead to some people being dumb enough to ingest or inject disinfectants.
That’s a worry! But my sense was that the worry, in terms of what it would actually result in terms of people starting to inject disinfectants, was likely overblown by the type of hyperbole one found in twitter and some of the media. And I was going to wait on strong evidence that people have ACTUALLY harmed themselves by ingesting or injecting disinfectants directly due to Trump’s recent remarks.
If this level of caution means I fail your Trump-Hater purity test, I guess I’ll have to make my own Jersey’s 😉
POTUS gets up and “muses” to the public about “looking into” injecting people with disinfectants and somehow getting bright lights into their bodies as a solution to the greatest pandemic in a century. His followers have shown themselves repeatedly willing to take the word of this very stable genius. He’s passing on the worst quack “medical” advice that can be found floating on the fringes of wack-a-loon America and you don’t think there’s any reason to think there’s a problem here? Meanwhile poison response centers report increases in their caseload.
But this is all just about me having a Trump Hater Purity Test. Because stupid and reckless behavior by POTUS doesn’t have real-world consequences?
Oy.
“He’s passing on the worst quack “medical” advice that can be found floating on the fringes of wack-a-loon America and you don’t think there’s any reason to think there’s a problem here?”
How many times did I agree that Trump musing was madness, stupid and dangerous? But, nah, ignore that and strawman my position as being “there’s no problem here.”
“Meanwhile poison response centers report increases in their caseload.”
Something other than the statements I already analyzed? Not that I’ve seen.
Anyway, this is now going in circles with no new content. Thanks again for the links.
S’long.
I’ve just inadvertently engaged with some trump fans on YouTube about this. (Yes I realise this was a mistake)
One of them said he wasn’t talking about normal household disinfectant and I’d been mislead by the mainstream media, and it was all out of context. This was on a video that had the entire context and had the first guy talking about the readily available disinfectant. It was truly remarkable.
The other guy kept on posting the quote where Trump says something about injecting inside the disinfectant and then saying Trump wasn’t saying what he just said.
I’ve never seen anything like it. I’m from Britain and I though brexiteers were bad in their delusion. This was a whole new level.
One of my relatives tried to make that same argument on FB – left wing radicals taking it of context and all that. I replied that it’s too bad that liars have to deal with video and transcripts, and gave him the exact transcript. Thankfully his post disappeared.
I engage daily with Fox youtube commenters. They live in an alternate reality. Facts do not matter to them. When cornered with facts they fall back on insults or “Four more years!”
They’re convinced that everything is a fake news story. Quite brilliant really. Serve the idiots fake news and then program them to think that the real news is the fake news.
The Wooden Head of State have never made it more clear that he is a snake oil salesman.
He doesn’t care about his subjects and how many he kill. Worst President Ever.
Yes. At 50,000+ deaths and rising, I’d confidently call him the most dangerous world leader since Adolf Hitler. Worse than Stalin and Mao. He is personally responsible for at least half the years of life lost. It will be triple that, maybe much more before it’s finished.
My ‘Drumpf’ needs to change to the blunt and over lengthy
‘Mass Murderer Donald Trump, plus massive Liar, Rapist and Thief’.
First time for me with the T-word online.
Interestingly, according to an article from The New Yorker, Mitch McConnell really dislikes Trump for reasons that everyone here can relate to. Only he has been completely controlled by big money interests, and he (and we and the entire Republic) have paid a very large price for it. The author of the article is reviewed on NPR by Terry Gross, and y’all ought to give it a listen: https://www.npr.org/2020/04/23/842579283/mitch-mcconnells-calculated-decision-to-become-trump-s-enabler-in-chief-explaine
It’s my opinion (and mine alone) that the reason this occurs is that Trump is deathly afraid that some treatment might work and he won’t be given any credit for it. To stop that from happening, he vocally mentions and supports every idea mentioned on Fox or elsewhere, just to be sure that whichever idea eventually pans out (if any), he’s on record as saying something positive about it.
That sort of hedging might actually be a workable political strategy…for a reasonably smart politician. After all, even your average politician knows enough about basic health and science to know drinking bleach is a potentially fatal idea. But Trump is soooo ignorant that he can’t tell the truly terrible ideas from the merely unfounded or potentially promising ones.
I said this on another thread but I’ll repeat it here. A reporter could literally say “Mr. President, what do you think of Ruritania’s current effort to research an oral hemlock solution cure for the virus?”, and where a normal politician would answer “Ruritania is a fictional place” or “hemlock is a poison,” Trump would say “I think we should check it out.” He’s too ignorant to tell how bad the idea is, and too scared to remain neutral.
eric,
Excellent and astute observation, I completely agree. It’s totally something Trump would do.
I’m making a mental note to remember that. Well done!
eric,
Excellent and astute observation, I completely agree that is something Trump would do. Well done!
I really hope someone puts that exact question to tRump at his next White House coronavirus waffle-a-thon!
I think you’ve hit the nail on the head with your hypothesis.
I read a good Atlantic article that outlines how America is a failed state. I never thought of it that way but it makes convincing points. Then I felt scared & sad.
Welcome to America. If we paid 10% more taxes and didn’t have a corrupt healthcare system, we might be okay. We have our freedom, though, and guns, and higher education. We’ll be okay.
The people who might fight for us are already retired and they are old. It actually happened that divide. Grab a hold to something. If you’re already in Canada, that’s a plus. They’re nice there. With healthcare.
Unfortunately being in Canada is only going to delay the pain, not avoid it. The US and Canada, indeed, the rest of the world is just too interdependent and the USA is just too big a part of the global economy for it to go into the toilet without causing massive problems for everyone.
Also, Murdoch and his far right brethren are busy exporting their particular brand of crazy as far and wide as they can.
Voting out Trump will help lessen the problem but as long as Republicans hold large parts of the country and the right wing media keep getting crazier, I don’t see things improving. Even if the right lose power, I expect that will drive them to further extremes. I hope I am wrong, I fear I am not.
“…the USA is just too big a part of the global economy for it to go into the toilet without causing massive problems for everyone.”
The best joke there, in February anyway, was about the only country whose leader is so full of shit that humanity ran out of asswipe.
“…as long as Republicans hold large parts of the country”
So much for the original poster’s many mentions of “normal politicians”, as though that’s all of them except Mass Murderer Donald. Perhaps I misunderstood.
So a random woman’s tweet came up on my twitter feed. She has like 45k followers. Which is 45 k more than I have lol. No hate here. Anyway, she tweeted “if you actually think President Trump said to drink Lysol.. you’re the problem in the country.” So she actually thinks that the idea of ingesting disinfectant is a completely ridiculous idea. So she is actually thinking rationally with respect to that. But she does not want to admit that her President is actually that stupid. How can this type of thinking be explained? I am not sure if this sounds like psychoanalytic voodoo, but it does seem like she is kind of suppressing something she knows about Trump. Also, per her twitter bio she is a follower of Jesus. I know a lot of people that are religious and often times they are quite decent people. Religious democrats and religious republicans. I think that religion can have a mollifying effect on people or at least some people. Maybe there is a substantial genetic component. The stories they believe in are of course ridiculous and I think that a lot of them know they are ridiculous. Just like the disinfectant for curing covid 19 is ridiculous. Nonetheless, they still follow Jesus. I am not concerned about the religious democrats because I presume they will largely vote Biden or maybe not vote at all. I have a feeling though that there is not much stopping the religious republicans from voting Trump.
Fox’s “The Five” are using the gaslighting approach. “Yeah, Trump said it but only an idiot would take him seriously.”
He is a used car salesman who really believes that the wreck he is selling is in mint condition.
And he didn’t see the puddle of oil under the car he is selling!
That’s not gaslighting. It’s true.
The problem is that they think it doesn’t matter that the president of the United States stands up in briefings about the worst disaster to hit humanity since the Second World War and spouts dangerous nonsense that only an idiot would take seriously.
Trump was clearly not looking at reporters and clearly not sarcastically questioning them. This is a blatant lie by Trump, there is no other plausible interpretation.
on her hands or…wherever.
Sorry, couldn’t resist. I contemn Trump.
Sub
Increasingly as time goes on I get an out of context verse by The Doors going through my mind whenever I hear Trump speak. Frequency just recently hit 100%.
“I can’t seem to find the right lie
I can’t seem to find the right lie
Insanity’s horse
Adorns the sky
Can’t seem to find the right lie”
Even if Trump was being sarcastic (he wasn’t), it’s still pretty egregious to be playing games with the press in a briefing about how thousands of Americans are dying every day from this.
I can’t help but contrast Trump’s briefings with our government’s briefings. The British government puts one senior political member up with two non political advisors, each at a separate lectern – two metres apart. The only other people in the room are the camera man and presumably a sound recordist. The press are all teleconferenced in from their own homes.
So, even before anybody starts speaking, there is a visual message for the public.
Then most of what follows is a factual briefing detailing what has happened in the previous days and the measures the government is taking. There’s usually a message to say “stay at home” too. Nobody goes off script until the Q and A section. Nobody fantasises about quinine, chlorine bleach or internal sunburn. Nobody calls the press fake, even when the press point out problems with the government’s story.
This is how to do a crisis press briefing.
Alexandra Petri (WAPO) says it best to the monster’s disciples:
“..given the choice to listen to a plastic bottle or the president of the United States, I beg you: Listen to the plastic bottle.”
😁
This whole thing has reminded me of a Ricky Gervais tweet that has aged rather well:
“If we removed “Do not Drink” from bottles of bleach, & “May contain Nuts” from packets of nuts, I think we would strengthen the gene pool.”
Had everyone walked out on Trump when he was peddling that quackery, he would now be backing away from it in a context that makes look weak even to his own followers.
It would have been the first clear victory against Trump since he started.
Instead of a humiliating back down it’s business as usual, with Trump dominating the narrative even on his own back down.
The problem is there’s a selection effect with things like this. No-one who had the necessary character to make a statement by walking out on Trump on live TV would have agreed to work for him in the first place.
I’d also imagine that they also wouldn’t have even been approached if they had those traits either – Trump and his people don’t want that kind of person working for him.
Every time I read Trump’s lunatic statments, I am glad that I am ruled by a physicist, Dr. Angela Merkel.
Disclaimer: I am NO fan nor follower of the Christian democracy.
Next up, phenol.
My guess is that this episode is doing a lot to get some of those that voted for him in 2016 to abandon him now. Not his core supporters of course but those that were bamboozled into “giving him a try” and those that voted for him because they hated Hillary.
Everyone knows that drinking or injecting cleaning products is a bad thing to do. This is what makes me think he was just yanking the chains of his health professionals. He hates being dependent on them but really has no choice. It just got to him so he thought he would prod them with a sharp stick. Instead, it backfired on him.
In past time when Trump has said something horrible and/or stupid, he has been just vague enough that he or his cronies can spin it the next day and at least convince his followers. In this case, it was so clear that he was making serious proposals and talking directly to his health pros. His claim of being sarcastic with the press has absolutely no chance of being taken seriously.
If they haven’t already abandoned him, they will not now. They will not until he is soundly defeated at which time even they will not be able to cling to the fantasy of being a winner. Until then they will very much buy the “being sarcastic” bullshit.
We can and should add his claim that he was being sarcastic to the more than 18,000 lies he has told since becoming President.
Randy to the rescue
https://youtu.be/xlET8mUe3Ow
Whoops. Wrong link.
https://youtu.be/DPDPzbLFeP4
Randy Rainbow is always great.
A friend just sent ma hilarious video on FB of Trump spouting his BS on disinfectants and light and Dt. birx’s thoughtbubbles saying things like “Christ on a bike”.🤣 I can’t seem to figure out how to extricate it from FB Messenger.