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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on May 8, 2024 at 12:10 am
Millions of Americans have forgotten the crimes and infamies committed by President Donald J. Trump during his four years in office.
Especially during the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020.
On March 26, 2020, during an interview on Fox News, Trump blamed the failures of his administration’s response to Coronavirus on Democratic state governors like Andrew Cuomo (NY), Jay Inslee (WA), and Gretchen Whitmer (MI).
On March 27, Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer told a local radio station: “What I’ve gotten back is that vendors with whom we’ve procured contracts—they’re being told not to send stuff to Michigan. It’s really concerning. I reached out to the White House last night and asked for a phone call with the president, ironically at the time this stuff was going on.”
On March 29, the Washington Monthly highlighted Whitmer’s inability to secure desperately-needed ventilators from her longtime vendors: “What If Trump Decides to Save Republicans But Not Democrats?”
A sub-headline read: “He’s providing vital resources to red states and ignoring blue states.”
Florida submitted a request to the Federal Emergency Management Administration (FEMA) on March 11 for 430,000 surgical masks, 180,000 N95 respirators, 82,000 face shields and 238,000 gloves—and received a shipment with everything three days later.
On Fox News, Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s personal lawyer, bluntly told governors: “Take the blame when you have to. When you play with your boss, sometimes it’s better when you don’t win the golf game. He’s the boss, he’s got all the resources.”
The mentality of the Black Hand had come to the Oval Office.
The Black Hand
Trump wasn’t simply refusing to provide states with vitally-needed medical supplies—he was illegally seizing those supplies that states had ordered.
According to an April 20 Forbes story: “Maryland Gov. Hogan Takes Extraordinary Steps to Keep Feds From Confiscating COVID Tests”:
Governor Larry Hogan had heard reports that the federal government had confiscated crucial medical supplies from other states—like Massachusetts. After obtaining 500,000 test kits from South Korea, Hogan ordered them flown into Baltimore–Washington International Airport rather than the larger Dulles International Airport in Virginia.
From there they were escorted under guard to a secret location and constantly protected by the National Guard. As they were sent out for distribution across the state, the tests remained under protection by the National Guard and state police.
The precautions were absolutely necessary. Hospitals in Florida and California reported that FEMA had seized their supplies without explanation.
Massachusetts ordered three million masks that were confiscated by the Federal Government at the Port of New York. This forced the state to ask New England Patriots’ owner Robert Kraft to use his team plane to fly in one million N95 masks from China.
N95 mask
The Federal Government seized vitally-needed medical supplies in at least seven states. FEMA did not publicly report the thefts, despite the outlay of millions of dollars of taxpayer money. Nor did the administration explain how it decided which supplies to seize and where to reroute them.
The Federal Government did not inform states whose supplies it had seized if they would receive the materials they had ordered and paid for. That fueled concerns about whether the Trump administration was fairly distributing scarce medical supplies.
“We can’t get any answers,” said a California hospital official who asked not to be identified for fear of retaliation from the White House.
Trump said it was the states’ responsibility to obtain critically-needed medical supplies. But when they weren’t outbid by the Federal Government, hospital systems and states found their shipments of medical supplies seized with no explanation.
Where did they go?
To China?
To Trump’s private warehouses?
To Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, for sale on the black market?
No one still knows.
A March 2, 2020 Washington Monthly story concluded ominously: “What if the White House simply gives all the masks and ventilators to red states and counties, leaving blue ones to struggle? What mechanisms of accountability are left?
“U.S. democracy wasn’t set up to deal with a president openly behaving like a James Bond villain while being protected by a political party behaving more like a mafia than a civic institution.”
By the time Trump left office, on January 20, 2021, more than 400,000 Americans had died of COVID-19.
* * * * * * * * * *
Seventy-four years earlier, Chief United States Counsel Robert H. Jackson had been assigned to prosecute the major Nazi defendants for war crimes at Nuremberg.
On July 26, 1946, Jackson delivered his closing remarks to the court. He might as well have been speaking about Donald Trump and Republicans’ treasonous refusal to protect American citizens from a raging and deadly pandemic:
Robert H. Jackson
Citing William Shakespeare’s play about the murderous Richard III, Jackson concluded:
“If you were to say of these men that they are not guilty, it would be as true to say that there has been no war, there are no slain, there has been no crime.”
If Americans find Donald Trump blameless for refusing to take decisive action against the Coronavirus threat, it will be as true to say there has been no plague, there are no thousands of dead Americans, there has been no criminal dereliction of Presidential responsibility.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on May 7, 2024 at 12:10 am
Voters often have hazy memories of the ex-Presidents they—or their opponents—had elected. One reason for this: Ex-Presidents can no longer affect the lives of Americans—or non-Americans.
When Donald Trump left the White House on January 20, 2021, his approval rating was 34%.
For most Americans—including even many Republicans—his inciting a violent attack on the Capitol Building so he could become “President-for-Life” was simply too much. He seemed to have forfeited any chance at a political future.
Yet today he’s the guaranteed Republican nominee for President—and may well win a second term in office this November against President Joseph Biden.
“What’s been clear for a while, especially among swing voters, is that Biden is just more front and center,” said Sarah Longwell, a Republican consultant. “They know about what they don’t like about Biden, and they have forgotten what they don’t like about Trump.”
Millions of Americans have forgotten the infamies and crimes Trump committed during his four years as President—such as:
- Repeatedly attacking the nation’s free press as “the enemy of the American people” for daring to report his growing list of crimes and disasters.
- Publicly siding with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin against American Intelligence agencies—such as the FBI, CIA and National Security Agency—which unanimously agreed that Russia had interfered with the 2016 Presidential election.
- Giving highly classified CIA Intelligence to Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak.
- Using his position as President to further enrich himself, in violation of the Emoluments Clause of the Constitution.
- Firing FBI Director James Comey for refusing to pledge his personal loyalty to Trump—and continuing to investigate Russian subversion of the 2016 election.
Donald Trump
- Shutting down the Federal Government on December 22, 2018, because Democrats refused to fund his useless “border wall” between the United States and Mexico. An estimated 380,000 government employees were furloughed and another 420,000 were ordered to work without pay for 35 days.
- Allowing the deadly COVID-19 virus to ravage the country, killing 400,000 Americans by the time he left office.
- Attacking medical experts and governors who urged Americans to wear masks and socially distance to protect themselves against the deadly COVID-19 virus.
- Repeatedly lying—while still in office and afterward—that the 2020 election had been “stolen” from him by massive voter fraud.
- Illegally trying to pressure state legislatures and governors to stop the certification of the vote that had made Joe Biden the president-elect.
- Inciting his followers to attack the Capitol Building where Senators and Representatives were meeting to count the Electoral Votes won by himself and Joe Biden. His objective: Stop the count, which he knew would prove him the loser.
But concentrating on the major event of 2020—the last year of his White House tenure—should stir up enough frightening memories.
For 2020 was the year of COVID-19—a new and deadly virus that originated in Wuhan, China, in December, 2019. By January 19, the first Coronavirus case appeared in the United States.
On February 7, Trump shared his thoughts—and the latest medical Intelligence—about the Coronavirus with Washington Post editor/investigative reporter Bob Woodward:
“It goes through air, Bob. That’s always tougher than the touch. The touch, you don’t have to touch things, right? But the air, you just breathe the air and that’s how it’s passed. And so that’s a very tricky one. That’s a very delicate one. It’s also more deadly than even your strenuous flues. People don’t realize, we lose 25,000, 30,000 people a year here. Who would ever think that, right?”
Yet from January to early March, Trump and his allies within the Republican party and Fox News Network repeatedly assured Americans they had nothing to fear.
Coronavirus
In addition, Trump pitted cities and states against each other. He made it clear that each state was responsible for securing its needed supply of Personal Protective Equipment (PPEs) for its doctors and nurses aiding Coronavirus patients.
This resulted in a dog-eat-dog atmosphere of cutthroat competition and scarcity, with Americans not only fighting the virus but each other.
Even worse: Trump and Republicans used the deadly plague as a weapon against those Americans they hated.
On March 26, during an interview on Fox News, Trump blamed the failures of his administration’s response to Coronavirus on Democratic state governors like Andrew Cuomo (NY), Jay Inslee (WA), and Gretchen Whitmer (MI).
On March 27, during his press briefing, Trump said he told Vice President Mike Pence—officially in charge of the White House’s response effort—to not call Inslee and Whitmer because they weren’t “appreciative” enough of his efforts.
Gretchen Whitmer
Trump said this even as hospitals in each of their states were being overwhelmed with Coronavirus patients:
“I tell him—I mean I’m a different type of person—I say, ‘Mike, don’t call the governor in Washington, you’re wasting your time with him. Don’t call the woman in Michigan. If they don’t treat you right, I don’t call.”
At his March 27 press briefing, Trump echoed French King Louis X1V’s infamous remark—“I am the State”: “When they’re [governors] not appreciative to me, they’re not appreciative to the Army Corps, they’re not appreciative to FEMA [Federal Emergency Management Agency]. It’s not right.”
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, RELIGION, Social commentary on August 22, 2022 at 12:13 am
In the 1960 movie, “David and Goliath,” the hero and his girlfriend are sitting in a cave during a thunderstorm. David assures her of his undying love, and they share a passionate kiss.
Then, amidst the sound of thunder, she says, “I must go—I cannot tarry.”
David tries to talk her out of it, but she rushes out of the cave into a nearby flock of sheep—and is struck dead by lightning.
David is horrified—and grief-stricken: “Why, Lord, why?”
In the ancient world, lightning bolts were seen as the arrows of Zeus—or Yahweh (the Hebrew name of God). There could be no clearer sign of Heaven’s anger at a particular person that s/he was struck by lightning.
Today, we know that lightning, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) National Severe Storms Laboratory, is “a giant spark of electricity in the atmosphere between clouds, the air, or the ground.”
At least, those who believe in science—not superstition—know this.
And if you are the tallest object around, or are close to water or trees or metallic objects, you are likely to be struck. It doesn’t matter whether you’re good or evil.
Lightning
Yet millions of superstitious Americans continue to believe that their lives are ruled by forces of Good (as symbolized by God) or Evil (as symbolized by Satan).
One of these is Assemblywoman Shannon Lee Grove, who represents Kern County in Central California. A Republican, she served as the minority leader of the California State Senate from 2019 to 2021.
Grove has a unique explanation for California’s worsening drought: Climate change/global warming has nothing to do with it. It’s God’s wrath over legalized abortion.
Speaking before the California ProLife Legislative Banquet held in Sacramento on June 8, 2015, Grove said:
“Texas was in a long period of drought until Governor [Rick] Perry signed the fetal pain bill,” she told the audience. “It rained that night. Now God has his hold on California.”
Grove was referring to House Bill 2, a Texas bill banning abortions 20 weeks after fertilization, four weeks earlier than the standard set by Roe v. Wade. It was based on the unproven assertion that fetuses can feel pain after 20 weeks.
In addition, the bill:
- Required all clinics to become ambulatory surgical centers, even if they did not provide surgical abortions; and
- Mandated that abortion clinics have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of the facility.
Shannon Lee Grove
“This is the infallible word of God,” Grove said, holding a Bible above her head as attendees clapped. “I fear Him more than I fear anyone.”
Among her audience at the Grand Hotel were anti-abortion activists and clergy, including Catholic Bishops for Life, Pray California, Californians for Life and the California Republican Assembly.
Apparently, God still has his hold on Texas, even though Texans passed a rabidly anti-abortion bill.
Almost all of Texas is facing a severe level of drought. Only a few parts of the state—such as El Paso—aren’t abnormally dry.
The website of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said the drought was primarily caused by natural climate variability and climate change caused by human activity.
Drought
Asked specifically about her comments, Grove refused to expound on the relationship between abortion and drought.
But on June 11, 2015, she issued a statement on her Facebook page: “I believe—and most Americans believe—-that God’s hand is in the affairs of man, and certainly was in the formation of this country.
“Is this drought caused by God? Nobody knows. But biblical history shows a consequence to man’s actions.
“We do know for sure that California’s water shortage crisis has been compounded by liberal politicians’ poor decisions—not properly managing our water resources and refusing to build water storage for decades.”
Clearly embarrassed at being unable to prove her own statement, Grove retreated to a safer line of attack: Drought is the fault of “liberal politicians.”
Even some anti-abortion activists didn’t agree with Grove’s theory.
Pro-Choice Kern County called her comments “absolute lunacy” and created a mock-up of a T-shirt: “I made a desert with my abortion and all I got was this lousy t-shirt.”
Grove isn’t alone in believing that God’s displeasure lies behind natural disasters.
Another is Bill Koenig, the conservative editor of World Watch Daily. God, he asserts, is righteously enraged at California’s acceptance of same-sex marriage and abortion.
“We’ve got a state that over and over again will go against the word of God, that will continually take positions on marriage and abortion and on a lot of things that are just completely opposed to the scriptures.”
Abortion isn’t mentioned as a sin in the Bible. Yet it’s a ready culprit for natural disasters—in the sermons of fundamentalist preachers.
Evangelist Pat Robertson blamed abortion for Hurricane Katrina in 2005.
And Steve Lefamine, the director of Columbia Christians for Life in South Carolina, agreed with Robertson that abortion caused Hurricane Katrina.
In an interview with the Washington Post, he claimed that when he viewed the full-color satellite map of the hurricane, he saw an eight-week-old fetus in the image.
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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on December 27, 2021 at 12:10 am
President Donald Trump frittered away two vital months—January and February, 2020—by refusing to take Coronavirus seriously. Even worse, he repeatedly downplayed the virus in a series of public appearances.
Consider:
- January 22: “We have it totally under control. It’s one person coming in from China.”
- February 24: “The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA.”
- February 26: “The 15 cases within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero.”
- February 27: “One day it’s like a miracle, it will disappear.”
- February 28: “Now the Democrats are politicizing the Coronavirus….We did one of the great jobs….One of my people came up to me and said, ‘Mr. President, they tried to beat you on Russia, Russia, Russia’….They couldn’t do it. They tried the impeachment hoax….It’s all turning, they lost….And this is their new hoax.”
- March 6: “I think we’re doing a really good job in this country of keeping it down. A tremendous job of keeping it down.”
By April 14, more than 23,000 Americans were dead—10,000 of them alone in New York—and Trump’s fanatical defenders were desperate to rewrite history.
The outbreak of Coronavirus, first detected in Wuhan, China, in late December, 2019, has taken more American lives in the 21st century than any other disaster—natural or man-made.
Consider:
- 9/11: 2,977 deaths
- Hurricane Katrina: 1,836 deaths
- Benghazi Embassy attack: 4
- Ebola: 2
- Hurricane Maria: 2,982,
- Coronavirus: 400,000 (by January 20, 2021)
One of these defenders was Republican South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham.
On April 9, appearing on the Fox News network’s “Sean Hannity” show, Graham said: “The first thing I want to do is get the United States Senate on the record where we don’t blame Trump. We blame China.
“The Chinese government is responsible for 16,000 American deaths and 17 million Americans being unemployed. It’s the Chinese government and the way they behave that led to this pandemic. This is the third one to come out of China.
Lindsey Graham
“I want to make our response to this so overwhelming that China will change its behavior. I want to get the medical supply chain back into the United States, and I want to stop cancelling some debt that we owe to China because they should be paying us, not us paying China.”
Graham said that the “wet markets” in China should be shut down, because they have been the source of three pandemics that originated in China.
“So, I think you’re going to see a bipartisan push back against China to punish them so severely to deter them in the future.”
[As for “getting the medical supply chain back into the United States”: In 2018, China accounted for 95% of American imports of ibuprofen, 91% off hydrocortisone, 70% of acetaminophen, 40% to 45% of penicillin and 40% of heparin, according to Commerce Department data. Eighty percent of the American supply of antibiotics are made in China.]
* * * * *
Seventy-three years earlier, Chief United States Counsel Robert H. Jackson had been assigned to prosecute the major Nazi defendants for war crimes at Nuremberg.
On July 26, 1946, Jackson delivered his closing remarks to the court. He might as well have been speaking about Donald Trump and his cheerleading—and misleading—chorus on Coronavirus:
“Lying has always been a highly approved Nazi technique. [Adolf] Hitler, in Mein Kampf, advocated mendacity as a policy. {Foreign Minister Joachim] Von Ribbentrop admits the use of the ‘diplomatic lie.’
“….Nor is the lie direct the only means of falsehood. They all speak with a Nazi double talk with which to deceive the unwary….’Final solution’ of the Jewish problem was a phrase which meant extermination. ‘Special treatment’ of prisoners of war meant killing. ‘Protective custody’ meant concentration camp.
Robert H. Jackson
“Besides outright false statements and double talk, there are also other circumventions of truth in the nature of fantastic explanations and absurd professions.
“[Rabid anti-Semite Julius] Streicher has solemnly maintained that…his reason for destroying synagogues…was only because they were architecturally offensive….
“This was the philosophy of the National Socialists. When for years they have deceived the world, and masked falsehood with plausibilities, can anyone be surprised that they continue their habits of a lifetime in this dock?
“It is against such a background that these defendants now ask this Tribunal to say that they are not guilty of planning, executing, or conspiring to commit this long list of crimes and wrongs.”
Citing William Shakespeare’s play about the murderous Richard III, Jackson concluded:
“They stand before the record of this trial as bloodstained Gloucester stood by the body of his slain king. He begged of the widow, as they beg of you: ‘Say I slew them not.’ And the Queen replied, ‘Then say they were not slain. But dead they are…’
“If you were to say of these men that they are not guilty, it would be as true to say that there has been no war, there are no slain, there has been no crime.”
If Americans find Donald Trump blameless for refusing to take decisive action against the Coronavirus threat, it will be as true to say:
- There has been no plague,
- There are no tens of thousands of dead Americans,
- There was no dereliction of Presidential responsibility.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on March 4, 2021 at 12:19 am
On February 7, 2020, President Donald Trump told legendary Washington Post investigative reporter Bob Woodward:
It goes through air, Bob. That’s always tougher than the touch. The touch, you don’t have to touch things, right? But the air, you just breathe the air and that’s how it’s passed. And so that’s a very tricky one. That’s a very delicate one. It’s also more deadly than even your strenuous flues. People don’t realize, we lose 25,000, 30,000 people a year here. Who would ever think that, right?
Yet, in public, he played down the lethality of the virus and attacked those who sought to take it seriously:
- January 22: “We have it totally under control. It’s one person coming in from China.”
- February 24: “The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA.”
- February 26: “The 15 cases within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero.”
- February 27: “One day it’s like a miracle, it will disappear.”
- February 28: “Now the Democrats are politicizing the Coronavirus….We did one of the great jobs….One of my people came up to me and said, ‘Mr. President, they tried to beat you on Russia, Russia, Russia’….They couldn’t do it. They tried the impeachment hoax….It’s all turning, they lost….And this is their new hoax.”
- March 6: “I think we’re doing a really good job in this country of keeping it down. A tremendous job of keeping it down.”
By April, 2020, the virus had claimed 23,000 Americans. And Trump’s fanatical defenders were desperate to rewrite history.
One of these was Republican South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham.
On April 9, 2020, appearing on the Fox News network’s “Sean Hannity” show, Graham said: “The first thing I want to do is get the United States Senate on the record where we don’t blame Trump. We blame China.
“The Chinese government is responsible for 16,000 American deaths and 17 million Americans being unemployed. It’s the Chinese government and the way they behave that led to this pandemic. This is the third one to come out of China.
Lindsey Graham
Graham said that the “wet markets” in China should be shut down, because they have been the source of three pandemics that originated in China.
Now, with more than 500,000 Americans dead, Trump’s fanatical defenders have decided to simply ignore history.
How else to explain the “Golden Trump” statue unveiled at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) on February 25?
But non-Fascistic Americans should not ignore that Trump:
- Lied about the lethality of the virus.
- Attacked masks, science and social distancing.
- Attacked Dr. Anthony Fauci, the country’s top infectious disease expert.
- Urged his followers to protest governors who championed wearing masks and socially distancing.
- Refused to establish a central command to supply states with Personal Protective Equipment (PPE).
- Seized vitally-needed medical supplies in at least seven states.
- Promoted quack “solutions” (such as injecting bleach to ward off the virus).
* * * * *
On July 26, 1946, Chief United States Counsel Robert H. Jackson, prosecuting Nazi war criminals at Nuremberg, delivered his closing remarks to the court. He might as well have been speaking about Donald Trump and his cheerleading—and misleading—chorus on Coronavirus:
“Lying has always been a highly approved Nazi technique. [Adolf] Hitler, in Mein Kampf, advocated mendacity as a policy. {Foreign Minister Joachim] Von Ribbentrop admits the use of the ‘diplomatic lie.’
“….Nor is the lie direct the only means of falsehood. They all speak with a Nazi double talk with which to deceive the unwary….’Final solution’ of the Jewish problem was a phrase which meant extermination. ‘Special treatment’ of prisoners of war meant killing. ‘Protective custody’ meant concentration camp.
Robert H. Jackson
“Besides outright false statements and double talk, there are also other circumventions of truth in the nature of fantastic explanations and absurd professions.
“[Rabid anti-Semite Julius] Streicher has solemnly maintained that…his reason for destroying synagogues…was only because they were architecturally offensive….
“This was the philosophy of the National Socialists. When for years they have deceived the world, and masked falsehood with plausibilities, can anyone be surprised that they continue their habits of a lifetime in this dock?
“It is against such a background that these defendants now ask this Tribunal to say that they are not guilty of planning, executing, or conspiring to commit this long list of crimes and wrongs.”
Citing William Shakespeare’s play about the murderous Richard III, Jackson concluded:
“They stand before the record of this trial as bloodstained Gloucester stood by the body of his slain king. He begged of the widow, as they beg of you: ‘Say I slew them not.’ And the Queen replied, ‘Then say they were not slain. But dead they are…’
“If you were to say of these men that they are not guilty, it would be as true to say that there has been no war, there are no slain, there has been no crime.”
If Americans find Donald Trump blameless for refusing to take decisive action against the Coronavirus threat, it will be as true to say there has been no plague, there are no thousands of dead Americans, there has been no dereliction of Presidential responsibility.
9/11 TERRORIST ATTACKS, ABC NEWS, ADOLF HITLER, ALTERNET, AMERICABLOG, ANTIBOTICS, AP, BABY BOOMER RESISTANCE, BENGHAZI EMBASSY ATTACK, BLOOMBERG, BUZZFEED, CBS NEWS, CHINA, CNN, CORONAVIRUS, CROOKS AND LIARS, DAILY KOZ, DEMOCRATS, DONALD TRUMP, DRUDGE RETORT, EBOLA, FACEBOOK, FINAL SOLUTION, FIVETHIRTYEIGHT, FOX NEWS NETWORK, HARPER’S MAGAZINE, HURRICANE KATRINA, HURRICANE MARIA, JOACHIM VON RIBBONTROP, JULIUS STREICHER, LINDSEY GRAHAM, MEDIA MATTERS, MEIN KAMPF, MOTHER JONES, MOVEON, MSNBC, NBC NEWS, NEWSWEEK, NPR, NUREMBERG WAR CRIMES TRIALS, PBS NEWSHOUR, POLITICO, POLITICUSUSA, RAW STORY, REPUBLICANS, REUTERS, RICHARD 111, ROBERT H. JACKSON, SALON, SEAN HANNITY, SEATTLE TIMES, SLATE, TALKING POINTS MEMO, THE ATLANTIC, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE DAILY BEAST, THE DAILY BLOG, THE GUARDIAN, THE HILL, THE HUFFINGTON POST, THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE NATION, THE NEW REPUBLIC, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE VILLAGE VOICE, THE WASHINGTON POST, THINKPROGRESS, TIME, TRUTHDIG, TRUTHOUT, TWITTER, TWO POLITICAL JUNKIES, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT, UPI, USA TODAY, WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, WONKETTE
In Bureaucracy, History, Medical, Politics, Social commentary, Uncategorized on October 9, 2020 at 12:32 am
By January, 2020, President Donald Trump knew how deadly Coronavirus was.
On February 7, during a taped interview with Washington Post investigative reporter Bob Woodward, he said: “It goes through air, Bob. That’s always tougher than the touch. The touch, you don’t have to touch things, right? But the air, you just breathe the air and that’s how it’s passed….It’s also more deadly than even your strenuous flues.”
Even worse, he repeatedly downplayed the virus in a series of public appearances.
- January 22: “We have it totally under control. It’s one person coming in from China.”
- February 24: “The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA.”
- February 26: “The 15 cases within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero.”
- February 27: “One day it’s like a miracle, it will disappear.”
- February 28: “Now the Democrats are politicizing the Coronavirus….We did one of the great jobs….One of my people came up to me and said, ‘Mr. President, they tried to beat you on Russia, Russia, Russia’….They couldn’t do it. They tried the impeachment hoax….It’s all turning, they lost….And this is their new hoax.”
- March 6: “I think we’re doing a really good job in this country of keeping it down. A tremendous job of keeping it down.”
Now, with more than 212,000 Americans dead and 7.58 million infected—Trump’s fanatical defenders are desperate to rewrite history.
The outbreak of Coronavirus, first detected in Wuhan, China, in late December, 2019, has taken more American lives in the 21st century than any other disaster—natural or man-made.
Consider:
- 9/11: 2,977 deaths
- Hurricane Katrina (2005): 1,836 deaths
- Benghazi Embassy attack (2012): 4
- Ebola (2013): 2
- Hurricane Maria (2017): 2,982,
- Coronavirus (2020): 212,000 (by October 8, 2020)
One of these defenders is Republican South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham.
On April 9, appearing on the Fox News network’s “Sean Hannity” show, Graham said: “The first thing I want to do is get the United States Senate on the record where we don’t blame Trump. We blame China.
“The Chinese government is responsible for 16,000 American deaths and 17 million Americans being unemployed. It’s the Chinese government and the way they behave that led to this pandemic. This is the third one to come out of China.
Lindsey Graham
“I want to make our response to this so overwhelming that China will change its behavior. I want to get the medical supply chain back into the United States, and I want to stop cancelling some debt that we owe to China because they should be paying us, not us paying China.”
Graham said that the “wet markets” in China should be shut down, because they have been the source of three pandemics that originated in China.
[As for “getting the medical supply chain back into the United States”: In 2018, China accounted for 95% of American imports of ibuprofen, 91% off hydrocortisone, 70% of acetaminophen, 40% to 45% of penicillin and 40% of heparin, according to Commerce Department data. Eighty percent of the American supply of antibiotics are made in China.]
Seventy-three years earlier, Chief United States Counsel Robert H. Jackson had been assigned to prosecute the major Nazi defendants for war crimes at Nuremberg.
On July 26, 1946, Jackson delivered his closing remarks to the court. He might as well have been speaking about Donald Trump and his cheerleading—and misleading—chorus on Coronavirus:
“Lying has always been a highly approved Nazi technique. [Adolf] Hitler, in Mein Kampf, advocated mendacity as a policy. {Foreign Minister Joachim] Von Ribbentrop admits the use of the ‘diplomatic lie.’
“….Nor is the lie direct the only means of falsehood. They all speak with a Nazi double talk with which to deceive the unwary….’Final solution’ of the Jewish problem was a phrase which meant extermination. ‘Special treatment’ of prisoners of war meant killing. ‘Protective custody’ meant concentration camp.
Robert H. Jackson
“Besides outright false statements and double talk, there are also other circumventions of truth in the nature of fantastic explanations and absurd professions.
“[Rabid anti-Semite Julius] Streicher has solemnly maintained that…his reason for destroying synagogues…was only because they were architecturally offensive….
“This was the philosophy of the National Socialists. When for years they have deceived the world, and masked falsehood with plausibilities, can anyone be surprised that they continue their habits of a lifetime in this dock?
“It is against such a background that these defendants now ask this Tribunal to say that they are not guilty of planning, executing, or conspiring to commit this long list of crimes and wrongs.”
Citing William Shakespeare’s play about the murderous Richard III, Jackson concluded:
“They stand before the record of this trial as bloodstained Gloucester stood by the body of his slain king. He begged of the widow, as they beg of you: ‘Say I slew them not.’ And the Queen replied, ‘Then say they were not slain. But dead they are…’
“If you were to say of these men that they are not guilty, it would be as true to say that there has been no war, there are no slain, there has been no crime.”
If Americans find Donald Trump blameless, it will be as true to say:
- There has been no plague
- There are no hundreds of thousands of dead Americans
- There has been no dereliction of Presidential responsibility.
9/11 TERRORIST ATTACKS, ABC NEWS, ADOLF HITLER, ALTERNET, AMERICABLOG, ANTIBOTICS, AP, BABY BOOMER RESISTANCE, BENGHAZI EMBASSY ATTACK, BLOOMBERG, BUZZFEED, CBS NEWS, CHINA, CNN, CORONAVIRUS, CROOKS AND LIARS, DAILY KOZ, DEMOCRATS, DONALD TRUMP, DRUDGE RETORT, EBOLA, FACEBOOK, FINAL SOLUTION, FIVETHIRTYEIGHT, FOX NEWS NETWORK, HARPER’S MAGAZINE, HURRICANE KATRINA, HURRICANE MARIA, JOACHIM VON RIBBONTROP, LINDSEY GRAHAM, MEDIA MATTERS, MEIN KAMPF, MOTHER JONES, MOVEON, MSNBC, NAZI GERMANY, NBC NEWS, NEWSWEEK, NPR, NUREMBERG WAR CRIMES TRIALS, PBS NEWSHOUR, POLITICO, POLITICUSUSA, RAW STORY, REPUBLICANS, REUTERS, RICHARD 111, ROBERT H. JACKSON, SALON, SEAN HANNITY, SEATTLE TIMES, SLATE, TALKING POINTS MEMO, THE ATLANTIC, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE DAILY BEAST, THE DAILY BLOG, THE GUARDIAN, THE HILL, THE HUFFINGTON POST, THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE NATION, THE NEW REPUBLIC, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE VILLAGE VOICE, THE WASHINGTON POST, THINKPROGRESS, THIRD REICH, TIME, TRUTHDIG, TRUTHOUT, TWITTER, TWO POLITICAL JUNKIES, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT, UPI, USA TODAY, WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, WONKETTE
In Bureaucracy, History, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on May 13, 2020 at 12:08 am
President Donald Trump frittered away two vital months—January and February—by refusing to take Coronavirus seriously. Even worse, he repeatedly downplayed the virus in a series of public appearances.
Consider:
- January 22: “We have it totally under control. It’s one person coming in from China.”
- February 2: “We pretty much shut it down coming in from China. It’s going to be fine.”
- February 24: “The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA.”
- February 25: “I think that’s a problem that’s going to go away. They have studied it. They know very much. In fact, we’re very close to a vaccine.”
- February 26: “The 15 cases within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero.”
- February 27: “One day it’s like a miracle, it will disappear.”
- February 28: “We’re ordering a lot of supplies. We’re ordering a lot of, uh, elements that frankly we wouldn’t be ordering unless it was something like this. But we’re ordering a lot of different elements of medical.”
- February 28: “Now the Democrats are politicizing the Coronavirus….We did one of the great jobs….One of my people came up to me and said, ‘Mr. President, they tried to beat you on Russia, Russia, Russia’….They couldn’t do it. They tried the impeachment hoax….It’s all turning, they lost….And this is their new hoax.”
- March 6: “Anybody right now, and yesterday, anybody that needs a test gets a test. And the tests are beautiful.”
- March 8: “We have a perfectly coordinated and fine tuned plan at the White House for our attack on Coronavirus.”
- March 9: “The Fake News Media and their new partner, the Democratic Party, is doing everything within its semi-considerable power to inflame the Coronavirus situation.”
- March 10: “It will go away. Just stay calm. It will go away.”
Today, the United States has more than 1.4 million confirmed at least cases of Coronavirus—and more than 83,019 Americans dead.
So Trump’s fanatical defenders are desperate to rewrite history.
One of these defenders is Republican South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham.
On April 9, appearing on the Fox News network’s “Sean Hannity” show, Graham said: “The first thing I want to do is get the United States Senate on the record where we don’t blame Trump. We blame China.
“The Chinese government is responsible for 16,000 American deaths and 17 million Americans being unemployed. It’s the Chinese government and the way they behave that led to this pandemic. This is the third one to come out of China.
Lindsey Graham
“I want to make our response to this so overwhelming that China will change its behavior. I want to get the medical supply chain back into the United States, and I want to stop cancelling some debt that we owe to China because they should be paying us, not us paying China.”
Graham said that the “wet markets” in China should be shut down, because they have been the source of three pandemics that originated in China.
“So, I think you’re going to see a bipartisan push back against China to punish them so severely to deter them in the future.”
Seventy-three years earlier, Chief United States Counsel Robert H. Jackson had been assigned to prosecute the major Nazi defendants for war crimes at Nuremberg.
On July 26, 1946, Jackson delivered his closing remarks to the court. He could have been speaking about Donald Trump and his cheerleading—and misleading—chorus on Coronavirus:
“Lying has always been a highly approved Nazi technique. [Adolf] Hitler, in Mein Kampf, advocated mendacity as a policy. {Foreign Minister Joachim] Von Ribbentrop admits the use of the ‘diplomatic lie.’
“….Nor is the lie direct the only means of falsehood. They all speak with a Nazi double talk with which to deceive the unwary….’Final solution’ of the Jewish problem was a phrase which meant extermination. ‘Special treatment’ of prisoners of war meant killing. ‘Protective custody’ meant concentration camp.
Robert H. Jackson
“This was the philosophy of the National Socialists. When for years they have deceived the world, and masked falsehood with plausibilities, can anyone be surprised that they continue their habits of a lifetime in this dock?
“It is against such a background that these defendants now ask this Tribunal to say that they are not guilty of planning, executing, or conspiring to commit this long list of crimes and wrongs.”
Citing William Shakespeare’s play about the murderous Richard III, Jackson concluded:
“They stand before the record of this trial as bloodstained Gloucester stood by the body of his slain king. He begged of the widow, as they beg of you: ‘Say I slew them not.’ And the Queen replied, ‘Then say they were not slain. But dead they are…’
“If you were to say of these men that they are not guilty, it would be as true to say that there has been no war, there are no slain, there has been no crime.”
If Americans find Donald Trump blameless for refusing to take decisive action against the Coronavirus threat, it will be as true to say there has been no plague, there are no thousands of dead Americans, there has been no dereliction of Presidential responsibility.
9/11 TERRORIST ATTACKS, ABC NEWS, ADOLF HITLER, ALTERNET, AMERICABLOG, ANTIBOTICS, AP, BABY BOOMER RESISTANCE, BENGHAZI EMBASSY ATTACK, BLOOMBERG, BUZZFEED, CBS NEWS, CHINA, CNN, CORONAVIRUS, CROOKS AND LIARS, DAILY KOZ, DEMOCRATS, DONALD TRUMP, DRUDGE RETORT, EBOLA, FACEBOOK, FINAL SOLUTION, FIVETHIRTYEIGHT, FOX NEWS NETWORK, HARPER’S MAGAZINE, HURRICANE KATRINA, HURRICANE MARIA, JOACHIM VON RIBBONTROP, JULIUS STREICHER, LINDSEY GRAHAM, MEDIA MATTERS, MEIN KAMPF, MOTHER JONES, MOVEON, MSNBC, NBC NEWS, NEWSWEEK, NPR, NUREMBERG WAR CRIMES TRIALS, PBS NEWSHOUR, POLITICO, POLITICUSUSA, RAW STORY, REPUBLICANS, REUTERS, RICHARD 111, ROBERT H. JACKSON, SALON, SEAN HANNITY, SEATTLE TIMES, SLATE, TALKING POINTS MEMO, THE ATLANTIC, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE DAILY BEAST, THE DAILY BLOG, THE GUARDIAN, THE HILL, THE HUFFINGTON POST, THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE NATION, THE NEW REPUBLIC, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE VILLAGE VOICE, THE WASHINGTON POST, THINKPROGRESS, TIME, TRUTHDIG, TRUTHOUT, TWITTER, TWO POLITICAL JUNKIES, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT, UPI, USA TODAY, WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, WONKETTE
In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on April 14, 2020 at 12:30 am
President Donald Trump frittered away two vital months—January and February—by refusing to take Coronavirus seriously. Even worse, he repeatedly downplayed the virus in a series of public appearances.
Consider:
- January 22: “We have it totally under control. It’s one person coming in from China.”
- February 24: “The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA.”
- February 26: “The 15 cases within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero.”
- February 27: “One day it’s like a miracle, it will disappear.”
- February 28: “Now the Democrats are politicizing the Coronavirus….We did one of the great jobs….One of my people came up to me and said, ‘Mr. President, they tried to beat you on Russia, Russia, Russia’….They couldn’t do it. They tried the impeachment hoax….It’s all turning, they lost….And this is their new hoax.”
- March 6: “I think we’re doing a really good job in this country of keeping it down. A tremendous job of keeping it down.”
Now, with more than 23,000 Americans dead—10,000 of them alone in New York—Trump’s fanatical defenders are desperate to rewrite history.
Donald Trump
The outbreak of Coronavirus, first detected in Wuhan, China, in late December, 2019, has taken more American lives in the 21st century than any other disaster—natural or man-made.
Consider:
- 9/11: 2,977 deaths
- Hurricane Katrina: 1,836 deaths
- Benghazi Embassy attack: 4
- Ebola: 2
- Hurricane Maria: 2,982,
- Coronavirus: 23,604 (by April 14, 2020)
One of these defenders is Republican South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham.
On April 9, appearing on the Fox News network’s “Sean Hannity” show, Graham said: “The first thing I want to do is get the United States Senate on the record where we don’t blame Trump. We blame China.
“The Chinese government is responsible for 16,000 American deaths and 17 million Americans being unemployed. It’s the Chinese government and the way they behave that led to this pandemic. This is the third one to come out of China.
Lindsey Graham
“I want to make our response to this so overwhelming that China will change its behavior. I want to get the medical supply chain back into the United States, and I want to stop cancelling some debt that we owe to China because they should be paying us, not us paying China.”
Graham said that the “wet markets” in China should be shut down, because they have been the source of three pandemics that originated in China.
“So, I think you’re going to see a bipartisan push back against China to punish them so severely to deter them in the future.”
[As for “getting the medical supply chain back into the United States”: In 2018, China accounted for 95% of American imports of ibuprofen, 91% off hydrocortisone, 70% of acetaminophen, 40% to 45% of penicillin and 40% of heparin, according to Commerce Department data. Eighty percent of the American supply of antibiotics are made in China.]
* * * * * * * * * *
Seventy-three years earlier, Chief United States Counsel Robert H. Jackson had been assigned to prosecute the major Nazi defendants for war crimes at Nuremberg.
On July 26, 1946, Jackson delivered his closing remarks to the court. He might as well have been speaking about Donald Trump and his cheerleading—and misleading—chorus on Coronavirus:
“Lying has always been a highly approved Nazi technique. [Adolf] Hitler, in Mein Kampf, advocated mendacity as a policy. {Foreign Minister Joachim] Von Ribbentrop admits the use of the ‘diplomatic lie.’
“….Nor is the lie direct the only means of falsehood. They all speak with a Nazi double talk with which to deceive the unwary….’Final solution’ of the Jewish problem was a phrase which meant extermination. ‘Special treatment’ of prisoners of war meant killing. ‘Protective custody’ meant concentration camp.
Robert H. Jackson
“Besides outright false statements and double talk, there are also other circumventions of truth in the nature of fantastic explanations and absurd professions.
“[Rabid anti-Semite Julius] Streicher has solemnly maintained that…his reason for destroying synagogues…was only because they were architecturally offensive….
“This was the philosophy of the National Socialists. When for years they have deceived the world, and masked falsehood with plausibilities, can anyone be surprised that they continue their habits of a lifetime in this dock?
“It is against such a background that these defendants now ask this Tribunal to say that they are not guilty of planning, executing, or conspiring to commit this long list of crimes and wrongs.”
Citing William Shakespeare’s play about the murderous Richard III, Jackson concluded:
“They stand before the record of this trial as bloodstained Gloucester stood by the body of his slain king. He begged of the widow, as they beg of you: ‘Say I slew them not.’ And the Queen replied, ‘Then say they were not slain. But dead they are…’
“If you were to say of these men that they are not guilty, it would be as true to say that there has been no war, there are no slain, there has been no crime.”
If Americans find Donald Trump blameless for refusing to take decisive action against the Coronavirus threat, it will be as true to say there has been no plague, there are no thousands of dead Americans, there has been no dereliction of Presidential responsibility.
1991 GULF WAR, 2003 IRAQ WAR, 2016 ELECTION, 9/11, 9/11 ATTACKS, ABC NEWS, BARACK OBAMA, BILL CLINTON, CBS NEWS, CLINTON FOUNDATION, CNN, DEBBIE WASSERMAN-SCHULTZ, DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL COMMITTEE, DEMOCRATIC PARTY, DONALD TRUMP, EMAIL SERVER, FACEBOOK, FEDERAL EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT AGENCY, FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT, GEORGE H.W. BUSH, GEORGE W. BUSH, GLASS-STEAGALL ACT, HILLARY CLINTON, HURRICANE KATRINA, JEB BUSH, KUWAIT, MICHAEL BROWN, MONICA LEWINSKY, NBC NEWS, REPUBLICAN PARTY, Ronald Reagan, SADDAM HUSSEIN, SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE, SAUDI ARABIA, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE WASHINGTON POST, TIMOTHY MCVEIGH, TWITTER, VLADIMIR PUTIN, WHITEWATER
In History, Politics, Social commentary on November 9, 2016 at 11:38 am
If there is one thing Republicans, Democrats and Independents can agree on, it’s this: 2016 gave America perhaps its most divisive Presidential election in modern history.
Many pundits have correctly noted that both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump–especially Trump–brought a coarseness to the election never before seen.
Saturday Night Live brutally captured this in a series of skits featuring Alec Baldwin as Trump and Kate McKinnon as Clinton.
But if basic civility proved a casualty of this campaign, there were two other casualties that the overwhelming majority of Americans will be glad to see finally buried: The Bush and Clinton family political dynasties.
Since 1980–36 years ago–there has been only one American Presidential election that did not feature a Bush or Clinton as a candidate. Consider:
- 1980: George H.W. Bush–first as a Presidential candidate; then, losing the Republican nomination to Ronald Reagan, as Reagan’s pick for Vice President.
- 1984: Bush--as Reagan’s continued choice as Vice President.
- 1988: Bush–as Reagan’s anointed choice for President, and then serving as President for four years.
- 1992: Bush--as President running for a second term, only to be defeated by Bill Clinton, whose star now rises.
- 1996: Clinton–as President, running for and winning a second term until 2001.
- 2000: George W. Bush, son of the former President and Governor of Texas, runs for and wins the Presidency.
- 2004: Bush, running for a second term and winning it.
- 2008: Hillary Clinton–former First Lady and now New York Senator runs for the Democratic nomination and loses it to Barack Obama. Even so, he picks her to be his Secretary of State for the next four years.
- 2012: The only Presidential election year since 1980 when neither a Bush nor a Clinton is a Presidential or Vice Presidential candidate.
- 2016: Jeb Bush–son of George H.W. and brother to George W., he seeks the Republican nomination but is easily humiliated and defeated by Trump.
- 2016: Hillary Clinton–having resigned as Secretary of State, she wins the Democratic nomination and loses the race to Republican nominee Donald Trump.
Among the “legacies” of both the Clintons and the Bushes:
- George H.W. Bush: Sends a half-million American troops to Saudi Arabia to “liberate” Kuwait from Saddam Hussein. The real reason: To secure continued American access to Kuwaiti oil.
George H.W. Bush
- Presides over one of the worst recessions in American history–causing him to lose the 1992 Presidential election.
- Bill Clinton: “Romances” White House intern Monica Lewinsky–and gets impeached (but not convicted) for it.
Bill Clinton
- Repeals FDR’s Glass-Steagall Act, which separated commercial and investment banking. This allows big banks to merge, becoming “too big to fail”–and sets the stage for the 2008 financial meltdown.
- After Right-wing terrorist Timothy McVeigh blows up the Oklahoma City Federal Building, Clinton refuses to condemn Republicans’ 50-years’ demonizing of government that is largely responsible for it.
- George W. Bush: Repeatedly ignores intelligence warnings of a coming attack by Al Qaeda, which results in the slaughter of 3,000 Americans on 9/11.
George W. Bush
- Lies the United States into a needless war in Iraq, which costs the lives of 4,486 Americans and costs the treasury at least $2 trillion.
- Assures his fellow Americans that he has “looked into the soul” of Vladimir Putin and found him a man “very straightforward and trustworthy.”
- After Hurricane Katrina devastates New Orleans, his Federal Emergency Management Agency–staffed with political hacks–bungles getting desperately-needed aid to America’s stricken citizens. Bush famously congratulates FEMA Director Michael Brown: “Heck of a job, Brownie.”
- Hillary Clinton: As First Lady, refuses to release documents about Whitewater, a failed Arkansas land deal. This brings on a needless, seven-year investigation by a Republican special prosecutor which turns up–nothing.
Hillary Clinton
- After leaving the White House, she and her husband set up the Clinton Foundation, a public charity to bring government, businesses and social groups together to solve problems “faster, better, at lower cost.”
- As Secretary of State, more than half of Clinton’s meetings with people outside government are with donors to the Clinton Foundation. If there isn’t a “pay-to play” system at work, there certainly is the appearance of one.
- Clinton casts further suspicion on herself by her unauthorized use of a private email server. She claims it’s so she doesn’t have to carry two cell-phones. But, as Secretary of State, she travels with a huge entourage who carry everything she needs.
- As a candidate for President, she “secretly” works with Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, the chair of the Democratic National Committee, to ensure that she will get the nomination.
- She wins the nomination–but is so unpopular she loses to Donald Trump by an overwhelming margin in the Electoral College.
Millions of liberals and Democrats are no doubt dismayed at the outcome of the 2016 election.
And Republicans who sided with Trump will now find themselves at odds with those who refused to do so.
But Democrats and Republicans alike can rejoice that these two embarrassing–and disastrous–family political dynasties have finally been swept into the ashcan of history.
ABC NEWS, ABORTION, BARACK OBAMA, BIBLE, CALIFORNIA DROUGHT, CALIFORNIA STATE ASSEMBLY, CBS NEWS, CNN, EVOLUTION, FACEBOOK, GLOBAL WARMING, GOVERNOR RICK PERRY, HURRICANE KATRINA, NBC NEWS, PAT ROBERTSON, SCIENCE VS. SUPERSTITION, SHANNON GROVE, TEXAS, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE WASHINGTON POST, TWITTER, USA TODAY
In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Politics, Social commentary on July 1, 2015 at 1:03 pm
Bureaucracies are not made up of robot-like machines. They are comprised of flesh-and-blood men and women.
That includes even the most important bureaucracies–such as those of the House, Senate and White House.
And as much as Americans like to believe their elected leaders always behave rationally and intelligently, they don’t. In fact, they can’t.
In a democracy, those who hold public office reflect the values of those who sent them there.
The issue of climate change/global warming vividly illustrates this truth.
From 2012 to 2014, more than 9,000 scientists published research about climate change. Each report reached the same conclusion: Climate change was manmade.
Yet during that same period, 23% of Americans–one in four–said they didn’t believe in climate change, according from the Yale Project on Climate Change Communications in January, 2013.
Meanwhile, the winter of 2014-15 was the warmest on record worldwide, according to a report released by the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) on March 18.
For meteorological record-keeping purposes, NOAA defines winter as lasting from December through February in the Northern Hemisphere.
During those months of 2014-15, the temperature was 1.42 degrees Fahrenheit above the 20th-century average for all land and ocean areas. This topped the previous warmest winter of 2007 by 0.05 degrees Fahrenheit.
Global temperature records are available for the period 1880-2015.
California, for example, is now entering its fourth year of extreme drought–its worst in a generation.
The state’s Save Our Water’s campaign is urging Californians to “Let It Go” by limiting outdoor water use and letting lawns turn brown during the summer, while saving water for trees and other important landscapes.
Click here: California Drought
And when people reject science, they usually fall back on superstition for their “solutions” to life’s problems.
One of these is Republican Assemblywoman Shannon Grove, who represents Kern County in Central California.
Shannon Grove
Grove has a unique explanation for California’s worsening drought: Climate change/global warming has nothing to do with it. It’s God’s wrath over legalized abortion.
Speaking before the California ProLife Legislative Banquet held in Sacramento on June 8, Grove said:
“Texas was in a long period of drought until Governor Perry signed the fetal pain bill,” she told the audience. “It rained that night. Now God has his hold on California.”
Grove was referring to House Bill 2, a Texas bill banning abortions 20 weeks after fertilization, four weeks earlier than the standard set by Roe v. Wade. It’s based on the unproven assertion that fetuses can feel pain after 20 weeks.
In addition, the bill:
- Requires all clinics to become ambulatory surgical centers, even if they do not provide surgical abortions;
- Mandates that abortion clinics have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of the facility; and
- Requires abortion providers to administer the abortion-inducing medication RU-486 in person, rather than allow women to take it at home.
“This is the infallible word of God,” Grove said, holding a Bible above her head as attendees clapped. “I fear Him more than I fear anyone.”
Among her audience at the Grand Hotel were anti-abortion activists and clergy, including Catholic Bishops for Life, Pray California, Californians for Life and the California Republican Assembly.
Grove serves on the Agriculture Committee in the California State Assembly.
And in a June 11 post on her Facebook page, she wrote:
“I believe–and most Americans believe–that God’s hand is in the affairs of man, and certainly was in the formation of this country.
“The Founders put God in the center of this nation by recognizing Him as a giver of our rights.
“Is this drought caused by God? Nobody knows.
“But biblical history shows a consequence to man’s actions; we do know for sure that California’s water shortage crisis has been compounded by liberal politicians’ poor decisions – not properly managing our water resources and refusing to build water storage for decades.”
But not all anti-abortion activists don’t agree with Grove’s theory.
“We are huge fans of Shannon Grove and all her efforts in Sacramento on behalf of life,” Marylee Shrider, executive director of Right to Life of Kern County, told The Bakersfield Californian.
“That being said, we have not made a connection between the drought and abortion here in California.”
Pro-Choice Kern County called her comments “absolute lunacy” and created a mock-up of a T-shirt: “I made a desert with my abortion and all I got was this lousy t-shirt.”
Grove isn’t alone in believing that God’s displeasure lies behind the drought.
Another is Bill Koenig, the conservative editor of World Watch Daily. God, he asserts, is righteously enraged at California’s acceptance of same-sex marriage and abortion.
“We’ve got a state that over and over again will go against the word of God, that will continually take positions on marriage and abortion and on a lot of things that are just completely opposed to the scriptures.”
Abortion is a ready culprit for natural disasters–in the sermons of fundamentalist preachers.
Evenaglist Pat Roberts blamed abortion for Hurricane Katrina in 2005.
And Steve Lefamine, the director of Columbia Christians for Life in South Carolina, agreed with Robertson that abortion caused Hurricane Katrina.
In an interview with the Washington Post, he claimed that when he viewed the full-color satellite map of the hurricane, he saw an 8-week-old fetus in the image
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TIME TO REFRESH OUR MEMORIES OF EVIL: PART TWO (END)
In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on May 8, 2024 at 12:10 amMillions of Americans have forgotten the crimes and infamies committed by President Donald J. Trump during his four years in office.
Especially during the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020.
On March 26, 2020, during an interview on Fox News, Trump blamed the failures of his administration’s response to Coronavirus on Democratic state governors like Andrew Cuomo (NY), Jay Inslee (WA), and Gretchen Whitmer (MI).
On March 27, Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer told a local radio station: “What I’ve gotten back is that vendors with whom we’ve procured contracts—they’re being told not to send stuff to Michigan. It’s really concerning. I reached out to the White House last night and asked for a phone call with the president, ironically at the time this stuff was going on.”
On March 29, the Washington Monthly highlighted Whitmer’s inability to secure desperately-needed ventilators from her longtime vendors: “What If Trump Decides to Save Republicans But Not Democrats?”
A sub-headline read: “He’s providing vital resources to red states and ignoring blue states.”
Florida submitted a request to the Federal Emergency Management Administration (FEMA) on March 11 for 430,000 surgical masks, 180,000 N95 respirators, 82,000 face shields and 238,000 gloves—and received a shipment with everything three days later.
On Fox News, Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s personal lawyer, bluntly told governors: “Take the blame when you have to. When you play with your boss, sometimes it’s better when you don’t win the golf game. He’s the boss, he’s got all the resources.”
The mentality of the Black Hand had come to the Oval Office.
The Black Hand
Trump wasn’t simply refusing to provide states with vitally-needed medical supplies—he was illegally seizing those supplies that states had ordered.
According to an April 20 Forbes story: “Maryland Gov. Hogan Takes Extraordinary Steps to Keep Feds From Confiscating COVID Tests”:
Governor Larry Hogan had heard reports that the federal government had confiscated crucial medical supplies from other states—like Massachusetts. After obtaining 500,000 test kits from South Korea, Hogan ordered them flown into Baltimore–Washington International Airport rather than the larger Dulles International Airport in Virginia.
From there they were escorted under guard to a secret location and constantly protected by the National Guard. As they were sent out for distribution across the state, the tests remained under protection by the National Guard and state police.
The precautions were absolutely necessary. Hospitals in Florida and California reported that FEMA had seized their supplies without explanation.
Massachusetts ordered three million masks that were confiscated by the Federal Government at the Port of New York. This forced the state to ask New England Patriots’ owner Robert Kraft to use his team plane to fly in one million N95 masks from China.
N95 mask
The Federal Government seized vitally-needed medical supplies in at least seven states. FEMA did not publicly report the thefts, despite the outlay of millions of dollars of taxpayer money. Nor did the administration explain how it decided which supplies to seize and where to reroute them.
The Federal Government did not inform states whose supplies it had seized if they would receive the materials they had ordered and paid for. That fueled concerns about whether the Trump administration was fairly distributing scarce medical supplies.
“We can’t get any answers,” said a California hospital official who asked not to be identified for fear of retaliation from the White House.
Trump said it was the states’ responsibility to obtain critically-needed medical supplies. But when they weren’t outbid by the Federal Government, hospital systems and states found their shipments of medical supplies seized with no explanation.
Where did they go?
To China?
To Trump’s private warehouses?
To Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, for sale on the black market?
No one still knows.
A March 2, 2020 Washington Monthly story concluded ominously: “What if the White House simply gives all the masks and ventilators to red states and counties, leaving blue ones to struggle? What mechanisms of accountability are left?
“U.S. democracy wasn’t set up to deal with a president openly behaving like a James Bond villain while being protected by a political party behaving more like a mafia than a civic institution.”
By the time Trump left office, on January 20, 2021, more than 400,000 Americans had died of COVID-19.
* * * * * * * * * *
Seventy-four years earlier, Chief United States Counsel Robert H. Jackson had been assigned to prosecute the major Nazi defendants for war crimes at Nuremberg.
On July 26, 1946, Jackson delivered his closing remarks to the court. He might as well have been speaking about Donald Trump and Republicans’ treasonous refusal to protect American citizens from a raging and deadly pandemic:
Robert H. Jackson
Citing William Shakespeare’s play about the murderous Richard III, Jackson concluded:
“If you were to say of these men that they are not guilty, it would be as true to say that there has been no war, there are no slain, there has been no crime.”
If Americans find Donald Trump blameless for refusing to take decisive action against the Coronavirus threat, it will be as true to say there has been no plague, there are no thousands of dead Americans, there has been no criminal dereliction of Presidential responsibility.
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