coronavirus

Despite Evidence To The Contrary, Ron DeSantis Tries To Assure Floridians “All Is Well”

August 2, 2021 By John DeProspo 6 Comments

Taking a page from a character in National Lampoon’s Animal House, Florida governor Ron DeSantis is attempting convince the good people of his state that the recent spike in Covid-19 cases is nothing to be worried about.

“It’s a seasonal virus and this is the seasonal pattern it follows in the Sun Belt states,” DeSantis told reporters at a press conference about one week ago. He also said that he expects Covid cases to decline soon.

He might as well be telling his fellow Floridians to “Remain calm. All is well.”

If you remember, “Remain calm. All is well” are the immortal words uttered by Kevin Bacon during the climax of Animal House, as his character – the Delta Tau Chi antagonist, Chip Diller – helplessly attempts to address a fleeing mob of shrieking parade-goers.

Today the Florida Hospital Association reported 10,389 Covid-19 hospitalizations, the most statewide during any point in the pandemic. This follows Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reporting over the weekend that Florida had more than 21,000 new coronavirus infections on Friday. It was the highest one-day total for the state, which now makes up roughly one and five new cases nationally.

As Florida’s coronavirus infections continue to spike, public health officials and local elected leaders have urged DeSantis to take more drastic measures to get the virus under control. DeSantis, however, has stubbornly maintained a strict “no-mandate” approach to the virus, including touting an executive order last week that prohibits districts from requiring masks in schools. He also vowed to fight any city or municipality that tries to institute Covid restrictions, including mask mandates or lockdowns.

DeSantis has been sucking up to Donald Trump, and his loyal base, ever since the start of the pandemic, downplaying the severity of the virus, in hopes of furthering his presidential ambitions.

If cases continue to soar in Florida will people remain accepting of DeSantis, or will this preventable surge, a direct result De Santis’s failed leadership, crush his dreams for 2024?

Things did not work out well for Kevin Bacon.

Photo | Butler Street Consulting

Dr. Fauci Hits Dr. Paul With A Respectful “Va Fungool”

July 21, 2021 By John DeProspo 4 Comments

He couldn’t take any more nonsense coming from the eye doctor at yesterday’s congressional hearing on the coronavirus pandemic.

The man who has advised seven Presidents on HIV/AIDS and many other domestic and global health issues; the man who is universally recognized as a leading immunologist, esteemed clinician and dedicated administrator in his position as Chief of the Laboratory of Immunoregulation and as Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases basically told Rand Paul to go f*** himself.

“Senator Paul, you do not know what you’re talking about, quite frankly. And I want to say that officially. You do not know what you are talking about” responded Fauci after the Kentucky ophthalmologist, turned U.S. Senator, accused Fauci of lying to Congress.

Fauci continued, “If anybody is lying here, senator, it is you.”

Of course, Paul’s attack on the good doctor had nothing to do with facts and everything to do with playing to an audience on the right, where Fauci has been turned into a political punching bag by conservative media and subjected to “lock him up!” chants at Trump rallies.

The hapless Dr. Paul from Bowling Green, Kentucky, known for his anti-science stances, learned a lesson ‘bout a-messin with a feisty man … if you attack a kid from Brooklyn, New York, be prepared to have your arse handed to you.

Screenshot | abcnews.com

President Urges All Americans To Wear Masks

October 4, 2020 By John DeProspo 4 Comments

Now that Donald Trump has been infected with the coronavirus, and is spending his days at Walter Reed Medical Center, the president is asking Americans to do their part in saving lives by wearing masks.

“We can save 100,000 lives in the next 100 days, according to the head of the CDC, if everyone wears a mask in public,” said the president on Thursday. “Be patriotic. It’s not about being a tough guy, it’s about doing your part.”

No … those are not the words of Donald Trump, the current president, but of Joe Biden, the soon-to-be president.

Instead of taking the opportunity to stress the importance of wearing masks, Trump recorded a four-minute video, from the hospital, focusing on his favorite topic, himself. “I feel much better now,” Trump said.

He then went on to say how ready he is to get back on the campaign trail.

“I have to be back, because we still have to make America great again,” said Trump. “We’ve done an awfully good job of that, but we still have steps to go, and we have to finish that job, and I’ll be back. I think I’ll be back soon, and I look forward to finishing up the campaign the way it was started, and the way we’ve been doing, and the kind of numbers that we’ve been doing.”

Referring to how great a job he’s been doing in fighting the virus, Trump said, “We’ve been so proud of it, but this was something that happened, and it’s happened to millions of people all over the world, and I’m fighting for them. Not just in the US. I’m fighting for them all over the world.”

But, at what could not have been a more opportune moment, Trump couldn’t do the one thing his own director of the CDC, Robert Redfield, did last month at a congressional hearing … stress the importance of wearing masks.

Asked about the significance of mask wearing, Redfield replied, “I’m not gonna comment directly about the president, but I am going to comment as the CDC director that face masks, these face masks, are the most important powerful public health tool we have.”

“They are our best defense,” Redfield added. “I might even go so far as to say that this face mask is more guaranteed to protect me against COVID than when I take a COVID vaccine.”

Is anyone surprised Trump didn’t seize the moment to actually do something that could make a difference in saving lives? God forbid! What would his supporters think … now that he has it, he’s gone soft?

The next president, who will be sworn in on January 20, 2021, will not feel the need to play Macho Man.

Memorial Day – Opening Up The Shallow End Of The Gene Pool

May 24, 2020 By John DeProspo 2 Comments

Americans have finally gotten back their God-given freedom! After months of being ordered to stay at home and to social distance, it’s time to partay!

Crowds all over the country are packing pools, parks and beaches for the big Memorial Day weekend. No masks, no distancing, no problem! The coronavirus has been defeated, right? And, anyway, wasn’t it all a hoax?

Ignoring public safety guidelines or just misinterpreting the loosening of coronavirus restrictions, we are seeing videos and photos of people eating, drinking and swimming in close proximity. One photo shared by station KSDK in Missouri shows dozens of people crammed on an outdoor patio underneath a sign reading, “Please practice social distancing.”

Unfortunately for those who believe the war against covid-19 has been won (I wonder where they could have gotten such an idea?), some will contract the virus and a few may die. Unfortunately, some will unwittingly spread it to others who will get sick and die.

Many people witnessing this Memorial Day “reopening of America” are angrily shaking their heads in disgust. “Don’t they care about their fellow human beings?” they might be wondering.

The simple answer is “no.” We are perhaps as selfish an America as we’ve ever been. Thanks to the sociopath in the White House and his Republican enablers, we are a deeply divided country.

As Umair Haque writes in Eudaimonia and Co.:

When I look around the world today, it strikes me that we’re living in the age of the sociopath. I don’t just mean that in the technical psychological sense of the word — a certain head of state and his goons come to mind — but first, in a deeper, truer, broader sense. Sociopathic: hostile to the idea, the notion, the purpose of society. You don’t have to look much further than America — the world’s reigning champion of sociopathy — to see all this in action.

What’s truly alarming is that in many of the states where restrictions have been lifted, and people are partying like it’s 1999, the number of coronavirus infections and deaths are still on the rise.

You do not have to be an epidemiologist to know these “congregating masses” will only help spread the virus and push back the day when we can actually get back to some semblance of normal.

You don’t have to be a scientist to know that there is no cure for human stupidity. Yet, for the good of mankind, at least the dim-witted have always had a knack of selecting themselves out of the gene pool. Maybe good old Charlie was on to something?

Photo | lasvegasnightclubs.com

In A Sane World, Trump’s Reelection Would Be Considered Unthinkable

April 28, 2020 By John DeProspo 4 Comments

After one of the biggest governmental screw-ups in the American history, the president overseeing such a fiasco would be run out of office on a rail. He certainly would have no chance at reelection … right?

But of course, we do not live in a sane world, do we?

That Trump could so mishandle the national response to the coronavirus pandemic and set the stage for an economic downturn possibly not seen since the Great Depression, and still win reelection, is mind-boggling.

Then again, in a sane world a pathological liar would never be elected to the most powerful office on Earth in the first place. In a functioning American democracy, a corrupt, incompetent leader would be removed from office as the Constitution prescribes.

Yet here we are, seven months away from the next presidential election and Donald Trump is only marginally trailing Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic nominee, in some battleground states. Marginally … as within the margin of error.

Yes, the latest USA Today/Suffolk national poll has Biden with a commanding lead over Trump (50-40 percent) but national polling strength does not necessarily equate to Electoral College strength, as we so well know.

With an unemployment rate increasing by the day; with so many families unable to pay their bills; with so many of our fellow citizens needlessly stricken by the coronavirus, how could a good chunk of Americans still want four more years of Trump at the helm?

As Chauncey DeVega writes in Salon:

A culture of distraction and spectacle has rendered many Americans incapable of being responsible engaged citizens. Our public educational system does not teach critical thinking skills.

Add to that a right-wing propaganda network, Fox News, ranked the most-watched cable news network 18 years in a row; throw in the Republican Party’s efforts to limit access to voting among predominantly Democratic folk and you have Trump with a good chance of stealing another election, pandemic or no pandemic… depression or no depression.

In politics, seven months is a lifetime. But for current polling to still have Trump with anywhere near a shot at reelection while we are in the middle of one of the worst health and economic crises in the nation’s history should scare the daylights out of us.

Photo | cnn.com

Don’t Blame Trump For Being Trump … Blame Senate Republicans for Keeping Him In Office

April 24, 2020 By John DeProspo 3 Comments

Our country is facing a health and economic crisis like never before. Nearly 900,000 Americans have been infected by the coronavirus, with over 50,000 deaths. The U.S. economy has now wiped out all the job gains since the Great Recession. In the last month and a half, over 26 million workers have applied for unemployment insurance. Congress has approved a massive $2 trillion coronavirus relief package … with more money to go out the door.

It didn’t have to be this way. The situation didn’t have to be this bad.

The fact that Donald Trump is a total incompetent who is mishandling the pandemic response, which is on pace to be the deadliest since the 1918 Spanish flu, comes as no surprise. Could we have expected anything else?

The man has demonstrated his ineptitude … and complete lack of respect for science, facts, expert opinion … from the moment he stepped into the White House.

Remember when candidate Trump boasted he knew more than the generals? Now he stands in front of the White House press corps claiming to know more than the scientists and doctors.

That we find ourselves in this mess is a direct result of Republican senators failing to do their Constitutional duty by removing Trump from office when they had the opportunity.

So, lest we forget, and in order to highlight their shame, here is a list of the 53 Senate Republicans who voted to acquit Trump on Impeachment Article 2, Obstruction of Congress (52 Republicans voted to acquit Trump on Impeachment Article 1, Abuse of Power, with only Mitt Romney voting guilty):

Alexander (R-TN)
Barrasso (R-WY)
Blackburn (R-TN)
Blunt (R-MO)
Boozman (R-AR)
Braun (R-IN)
Burr (R-NC)
Capito (R-WV)
Cassidy (R-LA)
Collins (R-ME)
Cornyn (R-TX)
Cotton (R-AR)
Cramer (R-ND)
Crapo (R-ID)
Cruz (R-TX)
Daines (R-MT)
Enzi (R-WY)
Ernst (R-IA)
Fischer (R-NE)
Gardner (R-CO)
Graham (R-SC)
Grassley (R-IA)
Hawley (R-MO)
Hoeven (R-ND)
Hyde-Smith (R-MS)
Inhofe (R-OK)
Johnson (R-WI)
Kennedy (R-LA)
Lankford (R-OK)
Lee (R-UT)
Loeffler (R-GA)
McConnell (R-KY)
McSally (R-AZ)
Moran (R-KS)
Murkowski (R-AK)
Paul (R-KY)
Perdue (R-GA)
Portman (R-OH)
Risch (R-ID)
Roberts (R-KS)

Romney (R-UT)

Rounds (R-SD)
Rubio (R-FL)
Sasse (R-NE)
Scott (R-FL)
Scott (R-SC)
Shelby (R-AL)
Sullivan (R-AK)
Thune (R-SD)
Tillis (R-NC)
Toomey (R-PA)
Wicker (R-MS)
Young (R-IN)

No, we did not have to been stuck with the worst possible leader at the worst possible time.

It’s not Trump’s fault. Blame those 53 Senate Republicans who voted to keep the most incompetent president in American history in charge of the federal response to one of the most serious crises the country has ever faced.

Photo | alternet.org

Coronavirus Reminds Us Once Again … There Is No Cure For Stupid

April 19, 2020 By John DeProspo 3 Comments

Remember the anti-Obama Tea Party movement, when thousands of crazies hit the streets protesting that communist plot … Obamacare?

It seems we are now in the midst of a relapse of that decade-old anti-government activism. Demonstrations are popping up in many places protesting the stay-at-home orders issued by state governors because of the coronavirus.

“They have a very Tea Party feel,” said Tea Party Express co-founder Sal Russo of the demonstrations.

So far, however, the protests have not been as big as the ones from the Tea Party days. But that could change rapidly as Trump and his favorite network, Fox News, support and encourage the demonstrators.

And just like with the Tea Party protests, we are witnessing stupidity, and illogic, at its highest level through signs the protestors are displaying.

Perhaps the most iconic, and dumbest, anti-Obamacare sign during the Tea Party days was the “Keep Government Out Of My Medicare! You Damn Socialists!”

Now we’re seeing signs such as “Give Me Liberty … Or Give Me Covid-19”

We have “Social Distancing = Communism.”

Then you have “That Face Mask You Were Duped Into Wearing Symbolizes You Losing Your Freedom Of Speech.”

Yet, among these wacky signs, you occasionally see one that actually hits on the real hardships brought about by the coronavirus lockdown orders.

My favorite one of these? “I need a haircut.”

Photo: pbs.twimg.com

Wuhan Virus? Chinese Virus? How About “The Trump Virus?”

April 13, 2020 By John DeProspo 4 Comments

Donald Trump and his toadies love calling the coronavirus the “Wuhan Virus” or the “Chinese Virus.” The sad fact remains that foreign ministers of the G7 countries failed to agree on a joint statement on the pandemic, in part, because the Trump administration insisted on calling it the “Wuhan virus.”

I suggest it’s about time we start calling the coronavirus, or COVID-19, “The Trump Virus.”

Am I being unfair? Too harsh? Is it too early to go there? Should we just leave all this to the history books?

Let’s get one thing straight … Donald Trump is not responsible for the coronavirus. He did not cause it to become a global pandemic.

But Trump’s actions, or inactions, did make the situation in the United States much worse than it needed to be. A Boston Globe editorial even went so far as to say, “Much of the suffering and death coming was predictable. The president has blood on his hands,”

David Frum recently wrote in The Atlantic:

That the pandemic occurred is not Trump’s fault. The utter unpreparedness of the United States for a pandemic is Trump’s fault. The loss of stockpiled respirators to breakage because the federal government let maintenance contracts lapse in 2018 is Trump’s fault. The failure to store sufficient protective medical gear in the national arsenal is Trump’s fault. That states are bidding against other states for equipment, paying many multiples of the pre-crisis price for ventilators, is Trump’s fault. Air travelers summoned home and forced to stand for hours in dense airport crowds alongside infected people? That was Trump’s fault too. Ten weeks of insisting that the coronavirus is a harmless flu that would miraculously go away on its own? Trump’s fault again. The refusal of red-state governors to act promptly, the failure to close Florida and Gulf Coast beaches until late March? That fault is more widely shared, but again, responsibility rests with Trump: He could have stopped it, and he did not.

Frum did not stop there:

The lying about the coronavirus by hosts on Fox News and conservative talk radio is Trump’s fault: They did it to protect him. The false hope of instant cures and nonexistent vaccines is Trump’s fault, because he told those lies to cover up his failure to act in time. The severity of the economic crisis is Trump’s fault; things would have been less bad if he had acted faster instead of sending out his chief economic adviser and his son Eric to assure Americans that the first stock-market dips were buying opportunities. The firing of a Navy captain for speaking truthfully about the virus’s threat to his crew? Trump’s fault. The fact that so many key government jobs were either empty or filled by mediocrities? Trump’s fault. The insertion of Trump’s arrogant and incompetent son-in-law as commander in chief of the national medical supply chain? Trump’s fault.

Trump needs to forever be linked to what he has wrought … “The Trump Virus.”

In his “fight” against the coronavirus, Trump has likened himself to a “wartime president.” Unfortunately for the United States, and the world, we have been saddled with the worst possible leader at the worst possible time.

To paraphrase an old Donald Rumsfeld quote, “You go to war with the president you have, not the president you might want.” God help us.

November 3, 2020 can’t come soon enough.

Photo | politico.com

In Trump’s Defense, Nobody Could Have Known Fighting A Pandemic Could Be So Complicated!

April 8, 2020 By John DeProspo 5 Comments

Donald Trump is a very smart man. Some people (namely, Donald Trump) have gone so far as to call him a “stable genius.”

Yet even this modern-day Einstein, who some people (namely, Donald Trump) keep telling us graduated at the top of his class at Wharton, was ambushed by the coronavirus.

The man who said recently he “should have been a doctor” due to his natural ability for science and because his “genius uncle” taught at MIT, now finds himself surrounded by a vicious virus that has attacked the country, and the world.

That such a brilliant leader, who some people (namely, Donald Trump) have praised for his “great and unmatched wisdom,” should find himself in such a difficult position is sobering.

As Trump said on Fox & Friends a little over one week ago, “Nobody could have predicted something like this.”

After all, the man is a da Vinci, not a Nostradamus!

Yet some critics are attacking Trump for his botched response to combating the virus once it hit the U.S. They say things might not have been so complicated if he just paid closer attention to the people around him.

They point to Trump’s trade advisor, Peter Navarro, who warned him in January the coronavirus crisis could cost the United States trillions of dollars and put millions of Americans at risk of illness or death.

They mention that U.S. Intelligence agencies, both in January and February, warned Trump of the nature and scope of the virus, and China’s apparent downplaying of its severity, as well as the potential need for the government to take measures to contain it.

They even bring up Dr. Anthony Fauci, the country’s top infectious disease specialist, who warned in early 2017 that a “surprise outbreak” would occur during Trump’s time in office, and that more needed to be done to prepare for a pandemic.

What Trump’s critics fail to understand, however, is that Donald Trump, who some people say has the “highest IQ” (namely, Donald Trump), has a plan for stopping the spread of the deadly virus. And someday, in his abundant wisdom, he will tell it to the American people.

Photo | insider.com/ Shealah Craighead/White House

Washington Post’s Max Boot … Trump Worst President. Ever.

April 5, 2020 By John DeProspo 4 Comments

On a day when conservative columnist Max Boot makes a persuasive case in the Washington Post for why Donald Trump is the worst president … ever, another writer, Becket Adams, in the Washington Examiner, writes how George W. Bush is gaining a “strange new respect.”

“The man who is held personally responsible for the state and local failures of Hurricane Katrina,” writes Adams, “ is enjoying some positive press this weekend following the publication of a report detailing his efforts as president to prepare the United States for a viral outbreak.”

Adams notes that, in 2005, Bush uttered, “If we wait for a pandemic to appear, it will be too late to prepare. And one day many lives could be needlessly lost because we failed to act today.”

If only the current occupant of the White House shared such respect for preparedness.

In the movie Airplane!, Lloyd Bridges plays the stressed-out air traffic controller who laments he picked the wrong week to give up amphetamines.

Unfortunately for the nation, in 2016, we picked the wrong time to elect the worst president. Ever.

Photo | chron.com