Trump dodges responsibility as coronavirus spreads and markets crash
NB: In an argument two years ago about philosophical relativism and the tendency for linguistic theory to overtake philosophical questioning, a student upset by my criticisms of post-modernism told me 'language is ontologically creative.' I wondered whether uttering 'abracadabra' would do away with the ozone hole, but was too exhausted to say so. Since academic experts in 'deconstruction' have done away with the very notion of objectivity altogether, we should not be surprised if the demented narcissist named Donald Trump can reduce truth to what he likes to hear; and dismiss as fake news all that displeases him.
Sadly for everyone, animal flu has arrived to bite his arse. No amount of twittering abuse and no number of cheering crowds will cause the infection rate to dissipate. Meanwhile Corona has done to world capitalism what Chairman Mao with all his revolutionary hot air was unable to accomplish. Stock markets are collapsing, and all the spin artists in the world are faced with the stark truth: viruses don't watch TV and don't give a damn for advertising and spin. All the worlds racketeers (including our cow-urine enthusiasts and the 'post-truth' relativists) will be exposed like never before. Small comfort for us though.. DS
Why Donald Trump Can’t Just Tweet Through the Coronavirus
The president of the United States has long believed three things: The first is that reality isn’t real, there’s only “narrative.” The second is that he controls that narrative in accordance with his feelings (and Fox News). The third is that only his feelings are real or worth considering.
Trump dodges responsibility as coronavirus spreads and markets crash
Sadly for everyone, animal flu has arrived to bite his arse. No amount of twittering abuse and no number of cheering crowds will cause the infection rate to dissipate. Meanwhile Corona has done to world capitalism what Chairman Mao with all his revolutionary hot air was unable to accomplish. Stock markets are collapsing, and all the spin artists in the world are faced with the stark truth: viruses don't watch TV and don't give a damn for advertising and spin. All the worlds racketeers (including our cow-urine enthusiasts and the 'post-truth' relativists) will be exposed like never before. Small comfort for us though.. DS
Why Donald Trump Can’t Just Tweet Through the Coronavirus
The president of the United States has long believed three things: The first is that reality isn’t real, there’s only “narrative.” The second is that he controls that narrative in accordance with his feelings (and Fox News). The third is that only his feelings are real or worth considering.
Trump dodges responsibility as coronavirus spreads and markets crash
President Donald Trump is dodging responsibility as
the coronavirus outbreak morphs into a global pandemic
swiftly spreading across America and stock markets tank. He's instead accusing
Democrats and the media of inflaming the crisis.The deflection
campaign is a fresh example of Trump deploying his trusted method for winning
his battles: flinging disinformation, alternative facts and biting attacks at
his enemies. But the President's
efforts to create an alternative reality are being badly outpaced by the facts
of an emergency that defies political pressure. The total number of cases in
the US has soared past 560. His upbeat public rhetoric is also starkly at odds
with increasingly dire warnings from inside his own administration about
draconian steps that may need to be taken.
Trump's leadership
will come under new scrutiny Monday after a bruising open to the week on Wall
Street where trading was halted after the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged
7%. CNN's Kevin Liptak reported there is now growing
distrust between public health officials and the White House's political team
with the former trying to present a realistic picture to the public while Trump
aides seek to minimize the virus. The outbreak - which CNN now considers a pandemic -- and signs of a
disorganized response also raised questions about the President's apparent lack
of concern about the latest developments.
In a series of tweets
on Sunday and Monday morning, the President sought to deflect the blame for the
situation and downplay its seriousness. He rebuked New York
Gov. Andrew Cuomo for complaining about "mixed messaging," arguing
instead that Democrats and journalists were guilty the virus as "political
weaponization." "The Fake News
Media and their partner, the Democrat Party, is doing everything within its
semi-considerable power (it used to be greater!) to inflame the CoronaVirus
situation, far beyond what the facts would warrant. Surgeon General, 'The risk
is low to the average American,'" Trump tweeted.
Trump's travel restrictions imposed on people who had recently
been in China may well have bought the administration time to gird for the
disease's inevitable transfer to US soil. But the President's constant evoking
of the decision ignores the fact that the challenge to public health has moved
on. And the fact that there are serious questions over whether his team used the
time to properly prepare.
The building sense of
foreboding contrasts with the President's sunny mood. The State
Department warned US citizens against traveling on cruise ships. Dow
Jones Industrials futures were down 4.8% possibly portending another
week of routs on the markets. And two Republican members of Congress, Sen. Ted
Cruz of Texas and Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona, were self-quaranteening after coming into contact
with a person later confirmed as having the coronavirus at the Conservative Political Action Conference late last
month. The White House said that neither Trump nor Vice President Mike Pence,
who both went to the conference, were believed to have interacted with the
person.
Despite increasingly
worrying news about the spread of the virus, the President praised his own administration's
work again on Saturday. "No, I'm not
concerned at all. No, I'm not. No, we've done a great job," Trump said. The President's
confidence, however, contrasts sharply with increasing anxiety being expressed
by top public health experts in his administration. It also raises questions
about his capacity to lead in a time of crisis in which he has often seemed
most concerned about downplaying the situation, stoking stock markets and
minimizing the political impact of the virus in an election year.
Last week, the
President falsely blamed the Obama administration for slowing the
development of coronavirus test kits and cited poll numbers that he said showed
wide public support for his leadership that were more than two weeks old. He
claimed Friday to have "stopped" the virus. From the Mueller investigation to the impeachment drama, Trump
has succeeded in fogging accusations of wrongdoing or administration failures
and attacked the institutions that hold him accountable like Congress and the
press. He is also an expert at sowing narratives that his conservative media
cheerleaders seize upon to build political pressure that ensures that
Republican lawmakers pay a price for criticizing him.
But the widening
impact of the coronavirus drama, the constantly rising numbers of infections
and the hammering taken by US stocks in recent days are casting constant doubt
on the credibility of the President's assurances. Whether he will end up paying
a political price for the gap between rhetoric and reality -- that would begin
to erode the remarkable resilience of Trump's standing with GOP voters --
remains to be seen. Hopefully, the
epidemic will not be severe and will soon pass. But a botched handling of a
more serious crisis would be sure to damage a conventional President and it
would test even Trump's capacity to shake it off and win reelection....
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/03/09/politics/coronavirus-donald-trump-health-politics/index.html
see also
