Category: Dickitude

Don’t Cry For Me, Dr. Fauci

The Daily Escape:

Autumn view from Lovers Leap Bridge, New Milford CT – November 2017 photo by Mike Jacquemin

The show must go on, and it did for Trump once he returned to the White House from his short stay at Walter Reed Hospital. His Evita-like photo op on the Truman Balcony was designed to show (to which demographic in America?) that his “recovery” is one for the ages, that he’s a strongman. Since he is only a few days into the course of the disease, his recovery might also be a myth.

He has now thoroughly politicized the pandemic. Before he tested positive, all of his efforts to deal with COVID looked first at the political value, before the value to the public’s health. Now he’s incorporated his illness into a mythology about COVID. From Charlie Sykes of the Bulwark:

“Last night, we got the full cinematic roll-out of “The Orange Evita,” PRODUCED, DIRECTED, AND STARRED IN by DONALD J. TRUMP.”

Sykes goes on:

“The video production of his triumphant return to the White House was quintessentially Trumpian. All the power moves: the helicopter, the music, the pageantry, the balcony, the dramatic removal of the mask — all perfectly choreographed by a man famous for his finely honed instincts for entertainment.”

And here’s what Trump said:

“I learned so much about coronavirus….And one thing that’s for certain: don’t let it dominate you. Don’t be afraid of it. You’re going to beat it….Don’t let it dominate you…Don’t let it take over your lives…I stood out front, I led…nobody that’s a leader would not do what I did….Now I’m better, and maybe I’m immune, I don’t know…”

He ignored that, as of Monday night, 210,117 Americans have died from COVID, none of whom received anywhere near the level of medical care that Trump did at Walter Reed.

Most of us would go through an experience like contracting COVID, and if we recovered, would think about what we learned now that we’re back to health. We’d consider ourselves fortunate. We’d also be extra cautious, having just survived an encounter with a potentially deadly virus. We’d almost certainly follow the proper precautions even if we may have previously ignored them. We’d now know that COVID is potentially deadly, and that we’re incredibly lucky to have survived it mostly intact.

But that isn’t Donald Trump showman, your president.

Trump could have shown empathy for those who have died from the virus. The NYT reports that some in the campaign thought that if Trump recovered quickly and then appeared sympathetic to the public about his own experience, he could have something of a political reset.

But instead, he channeled Evita, opting to show strength. Yet, in the video, he didn’t look strong or even all that healthy. He didn’t look robust, he looked reckless.

And then on Tuesday morning he tweeted that flu season is coming, and that the flu is more lethal than COVID, something he also said 210,000 deaths ago. BTW, Twitter has taken Trump’s tweet down as misleading.

It isn’t too soon to wonder how many more thousands will die because of Trump’s recklessness and refusal to take the threat of COVID-19 seriously.

And rather than the songs from Evita, Wrongo is reminded of this from Andrew Lloyd Webber:

Every time I look at you
I don’t understand
Why you let the things you did
Get so out of hand
You’d have managed better
If you’d had it planned

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America’s Frightening Militia Problem

The Daily Escape:

Guildhall, VT – September 2020 photo by Michael Blanchette Photography

Four years into the Trump era, Americans now realize that armed paramilitaries show up at most demonstrations. On some occasions, there is lethal violence. And Trump just called on one such group to “stand by”.  Apparently they are acting like storm troopers waiting Trump’s bat signal to help keep him in power after November 3rd.

The biggest problem will be in the post-election period when there will be a substantial chunk of Americans who won’t believe Biden is a legitimate president when he takes office. It won’t be Trump’s entire 40% of the electorate, but it will be a large group.

We’ve heard the names of these armed militias: the Proud Boys, the boogaloo movement, the Oathkeepers, the Three Percenters, and many others. Unlike other countries, the armed far-right doesn’t need a covert network to supply it with military equipment because America is awash in legal weapons. Militias and vigilantes don’t have to maintain underground communication networks because social media enables them to operate freely. Experts estimate that there are around 300 mostly right-wing militia groups.

On the same day that Trump asked the Proud Boys to stand by, the FBI issued an intelligence report warning of an imminent “violent extremist threat” posed by another far-right militia, the Boogaloo. The report, entitled “Boogaloo Adherents Likely Increasing Anti-Government Violent Rhetoric and Activities, Increasing Domestic Violent Extremist Threat in the FBI Dallas Area of Responsibility,”

The term “Boogaloo” refers to a coming second American Civil War, which the fiercely anti-government group has declared its intention to bring it about. They are willing to foment a race war, if it supports their goals.

The FBI report concludes by citing concerns of the Boogaloos’ “increased ‘patrolling’ or attendance at events”. Remember that at the presidential debate, President Trump called for his supporters to patrol polling places:

“I’m urging my supporters to go into the polls and watch very carefully because that’s what has to happen…”

It’s illegal for them to “go into the polls’.

A troubling aspect is the deep involvement of America’s military and law enforcement in these militias. The Atlantic has a long article on the Oath Keepers where the author reviewed its members list: (emphasis by Wrongo)

“About two-thirds had a background in the military or law enforcement. About 10% of these members were active-duty….There were members of the Special Forces, private military contractors, an Army psyops sergeant major….There were Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, a 20-year special agent in the Secret Service, and two people who said they were in the FBI.”

The NYT also wrote about the military involvement in the militia movement: (emphasis by Wrongo)

“Although only a small fraction of the nation’s 20 million veterans joins militia groups, experts in domestic terrorism and law enforcement analysts estimate that veterans and active-duty members of the military may now make up at least 25% percent of militia rosters. These experts estimate that there are some 15,000 to 20,000 active militia members in around 300 groups.”

This toxic stew has been on a low boil while the top leaders of the Department of Homeland Security directed agency analysts to play down threats from white supremacist groups, according to a whistle-blower complaint released earlier in September.

These militias have proclaimed themselves enforcers of Trump administration policies, and as protectors of businesses in cities with BLM protests. The confrontations with protesters have also dovetailed with actions to protest coronavirus containment measures as in Michigan.

But the threats have recently focused on Antifa, Black Lives Matter, and others on the left. And between here and the election, we may well see Trump encourage their help with certain state and local governments around the ballot counting process.

The common denominator of these militias is armed intimidation and violence in the service of a political agenda. They alone will decide to act if triggered, or if they think in their sole judgement, that the Constitution has been violated. In a functioning democracy operating under the rule of law, it’s difficult to see these movements as anything other than a demand for the benefits of the society they want, with none of its obligations.

They want to “solve” what they perceive to be the nation’s problems through Second Amendment absolutism that legitimizes armed confrontation instead of political activism.

Back to the post-election scenario: There could easily be incidents where people get hurt or killed, a slow grind that keeps people scared and stressed all the time.

Please, this November, we must vote in overwhelming numbers.

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Hot Take on the Bad Debate

The Daily Escape:

Sentinel Pass at Lake Moraine, Banff, Alberta, CN – 2020 iPhone 11 photo by Zestful9

I’m old enough to remember when Al Gore got slammed for sighing during a debate in 2000. And now, Trump has taken us to a galaxy far, far away. Trump had three messages last night:

First, the rules don’t apply to me. If I want to talk, I talk. I’m above other men. Paraphrasing from 2016, “When you’re a star, they let you do it”. Chris Wallace, playing the role of wimpy Moderator, says: “You agreed to the rules”. But Trump shows he sets the rules, not the wimpy moderator guy. Classic primate dominance behavior. All Wallace had to do was just keep telling the president to stop until he did. Hard to imagine Trump being more rude.

Second, Trump’s strategy wasn’t to try for more votes, but to discourage people from voting. A smaller turnout helps Trump stay in office. If you’re turned off by his truculent performance, maybe you’ll decide it’s too much trouble to wait in line to cast your ballot. Of course, Trump’s shit show may have had the opposite effect. It may have motivated you to stand in the rain, snow or hurricane to vote him out of office.

Third, Trump activated his fascist supporters, the Proud Boys. What he told them by saying “Proud Boys — stand back and stand by” is that the rest of us should stay home on November 3, or we might find some trouble.

That wasn’t a dog whistle, it was a dog bullhorn. Brandy Zadrozny and Ben Collins of NBC News call the Proud Boys:

“…a self-described ‘Western chauvinist’ organization, is considered a violent, nationalistic, Islamophobic, transphobic and misogynistic hate group.”

Finally, as Wes Kennison says, Biden is a stutterer. Kennison points out that stutterers have great difficulty with abusive tones of voice, rapid fire interruptions, zigzagging change of topic, personal insult and humiliation, all are tripwires that can scramble a stutterer’s ability to speak. From Kennison: (emphasis by Wrongo)

“There was nothing unplanned or spontaneous in the President’s strategy. The bastards did not prep him to attack Joe. They prepped him to attack Joe’s disability hoping that by triggering his stuttering they might deceive an audience unfamiliar with the disability into thinking that Joe was stupid, weak, uncertain, confused, or lost to dementia.”

The media today has again fallen into the “Both sides” trap, saying how awful Trump AND Biden were. How uncouth, unpresidential and impolite. Given the context, was saying “Shut up man” uncouth? Wrongo listened to BBC, who was full of: “With so many difficulties facing the world, this crap is what the next leader of the free world decides to talk about”?

More debates? The Commission on Presidential Debates wants “additional structure” for remaining debates. But whatever they do won’t materially change Trump’s performance. Trump has no upside even if he puts on a better, more compliant act going forward. The damage is done.

When you think about it, Biden is the conservative in the race. He values established institutions and alliances. He recognizes the need for change, but wants a moderate, considered approach. He has a strong moral sense. He values the rule of law, while Trump and the GOP in general, value none of those things.

The only rational response to this debate debacle is to vote, and make sure your friends vote.

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For My Friends, Anything. For My Enemies, the Law

The Daily Escape:

“Life in 2022” – 1962 painting by Walter Molino. A foretelling of COVID?

Attorney General Bill Barr thinks that there has been too much expression of First Amendment rights:

“Attorney General William P. Barr told federal prosecutors in a call last week that they should consider charging rioters and others who had committed violent crimes at protests in recent months with sedition, according to two people familiar with the call.”

Break a window and go to jail for sedition, for conspiracy to overthrow the government through violence? Barr also went after the mayors:

“The attorney general has also asked prosecutors in the Justice Department’s civil rights division to explore whether they could bring criminal charges against Mayor Jenny Durkan of Seattle for allowing some residents to establish a police-free protest zone near the city’s downtown…”

It used to be a Republican article of faith that “The government closest to the people serves the people best.” No longer. America is filled with king Trump’s enemies. They’re everywhere! By suggesting possible prosecution of a Democrat, Ms. Durkan, Barr is taking aim at an elected official whom Trump has attacked repeatedly.

Barr then jumped into the deep end of the pool on Wednesday. Addressing a Constitution Day meeting hosted by the conservative Hillsdale College, Barr suggested:

“…that the calls for a nationwide lockdown to prevent the spread of the coronavirus were the ‘greatest intrusion on civil liberties’ in history ‘other than slavery.’”

Would Barr also have been against food and gas rationing, and other measures necessary to help win WWII?

Health and safety regulations have always been around. And they are well established in American law, see Jacobsen v. Massachusetts, which said in a case about mandatory vaccinations, that individual liberty isn’t absolute, and is subject to the police power of the state.

Barr went on to say that the Supreme Court had determined that the executive branch had “virtually unchecked discretion” in deciding whether to prosecute cases:

 “The power to execute and enforce the law is an executive function altogether….That means discretion is invested in the executive to determine when to exercise the prosecutorial power.”

He was telling his federal prosecutors to start prosecuting protests as something akin to treason. And he can do all of the above, as long as he’s Trump’s AG.

The AG is a politician who is supposed to be apolitical in enforcement of the law. But not Bill Barr. He told a Chicago Tribune columnist that the nation could find itself “irrevocably committed to the socialist path” if Trump lost.

Back to the sedition thingy. The federal sedition law is rarely invoked, but the wording has wiggle room. It says that sedition can occur anytime two or more people conspire to use force to oppose federal authority, hinder the government’s ability to enforce any federal law or, unlawfully seize any federal property.

That could include a plot to break into and set fire to a federal courthouse.

The WSJ quotes Jenny Carroll, a University of Alabama law professor, who says that turning to statutes like sedition would mark an escalation in the government’s effort to quell the violence:

“There are all these different statutes the government can use if they are worried about things like property damage….If you start charging those people, even if you don’t get a conviction, it may make people think twice before going out to exercise their right to free speech.”

Do yourself a favor, and don’t read the WSJ comments. There’s a fine line between the expression of antigovernment sentiment, which is protected speech under the First Amendment (even if it included discussions of violence), and a plot that presented an imminent danger sufficient to justify a charge of sedition.

No one can justify property damage, looting or killings, but more than 93% of the protests in the US this summer were peaceful, according to a report by the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project, which monitors political upheaval worldwide. They looked at 7,750 protests from May 26 through Aug. 22 in 2,400 locations across all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

But if Barr gets to define “force” his way, everyone will get to go to jail.

For Bill Barr, the crime is to oppose the regime. Those who enable Trump, by definition, can’t be criminals, and so do not deserve punishment. If they are prosecuted like General Flynn, Paul Manafort, or Roger Stone, they should be pardoned, or their prosecutions withdrawn. Accordingly, those who oppose the regime are the real enemy. They deserve prompt and merciless retribution.

Barr could have delivered his new testament in Minsk or Manila, not at an American college.

These people must go.

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Monday Wake Up Call – July 20, 2020

The Daily Escape:

Alpine lake, High Uintas Wilderness, UT- 2020 photo by anteaterpinkytoe.

Which is better: Gorbachev’s Chernobyl response, or Trump’s COVID response? It’s a high bar for Trump’s response to be worse than Gorbachev’s.

The Chernobyl disaster exposed the Soviet government’s ineptitude to both the Soviet people and the international community. The reactor’s core meltdown and its aftermath drained the Soviet Union of $billions in clean-up costs. It led to the loss of a primary energy source and dealt a serious blow to national pride. Thirty-four years later, the site remains a waste land.

Gorbachev would later say that he thought the Chernobyl meltdown, “even more than my launch of perestroika, was perhaps the real cause of the collapse of the Soviet Union five years later.”

But Trump is up for the challenge! From Umair Haque at Medium:

“America’s in free fall. It’s having a public health crisis, an economic crisis, a social implosion, and a political implosion all at once. And all those things have been brought to you by Donald Trump, whose negligence, irresponsibility, recklessness have allowed them to flourish.”

Nobody in the world is in free fall like America. America has the highest number of new cases in the world, higher than Brazil’s 50K, or India’s 30K. Even individual Red States have worse outbreaks than many of the world’s poorest countries with far higher populations.

The EU has about 5,000 new cases. America has more than fifteen times the number of cases Europe has. Texas alone had more than twice the number of cases, (more than 10K) and the population of Texas is 7% of the EU’s.

Trump nails the win over Gorbachev with his most egregious action, putting armed secret police on the streets of Portland, OR. Dozens of federal agents in full camouflage seized protesters, threw them into unmarked cars, and took them for interrogation without specifying a reason for arrest.

It appears that at least some of the agents involved belonged to the US Customs and Border Protection (the Border Patrol), a US government organization that has no business conducting actions against Americans in Portland.

Both the mayor of Portland and the governor of Oregon have asked them to leave. A US Attorney for the State of Oregon is calling for an investigation into the arrests.

Now, the acting head of Homeland Security, Chad Wolf, is vowing to ramp up these actions both in Portland and elsewhere. This is Wolf on the DHS website:

“Each night, lawless anarchists destroy and desecrate property, including the federal courthouse, and attack the brave law enforcement officers protecting it. A federal courthouse is a symbol of justice – to attack it is to attack America.”

We’ve seemingly reached a point where Trump’s brown shirt police force is reality.

Could it be that Trump is trying to foment unrest? His campaign can’t be happy that protests and urban unrest have quieted down across America in the last few weeks. Is Trump hoping this action will spark a revival of what we were seeing in June?

The calculation would be that an upsurge in protest will divert the country’s attention from the ongoing COVID-19 disaster while scaring moderate voters. It allows Trump to keep playing the law and order president, someone who will protect white suburbanites from scary black/brown anarchists.

This is the same week when Trump claimed Biden wants to abolish suburbs.

We’ve heard this Republican tune before during earlier presidential elections. It’s a mash up of Nixon’s law and order strategy, and Bush I’s Willie Horton strategy. It’s important to point out that both won their elections.

Trump is using Executive Branch agencies that he controls. AG Barr knows there is nothing “Constitutionally” Congress can do about this. They’re trying out various actions to see what they can get away with: for now, it’s the dreaded ANTIFA. Before that it was immigrants and asylum seekers. Later, it could be any opposition.

Time to wake up America! This is who and what we have become. The only question remaining is whether enough non-authoritarian Americans will vote in November to stop the madness.

To help you wake up, here is Big Country’s “We’re not in Kansas” performed live in 1991 in Bonn Germany:

Sample lyrics:

What did you learn in school today
Did you learn to run when the teachers pray
Did they teach you enough to know the state you’re in
Not enough to get out, not enough to win

What did you learn at home today
Did you learn to hate in the proper way
Did your liberated parents patronize your friends
Cos they had enough money cos they had the right skin

Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.

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Saturday Soother – June 13, 2020

The Daily Escape:

Spring in Grand Teton NP, WY – photo by MaxFoster098

Posting on her Instagram, AOC answered a question that read: “What does an America with defunded police look like to you?” AOC’s answer:

“It looks like a suburb…”

She continued:

“Affluent white communities already live in a world where they choose to fund youth, health, housing etc. more than they fund police. These communities have lower crime rates not because they have more police but b/c they have more resources to support healthy society in a way that reduces crime.

Why don’t we treat Black and Brown people the same way?”

Words to live by.

On to the issue for Saturday. From the WaPo: (brackets by Wrongo)

“Federal officials responsible for spending $660 billion in taxpayer-backed small-business assistance [PPP Loans] said Wednesday that they will not disclose amounts or recipients of subsidized loans, backtracking on an earlier commitment to release individual loan data.”

Since 1991, the Small Business Association (SBA) has previously released detailed loan information for the federal 7(a) program, on which the PPP is based. More from WaPo:

“The SBA initially intended to publish similar information for the new coronavirus-related loans. An SBA spokesman told The Washington Post in an April 16 email that the agency “intend[s] to post individual loan data in accordance with the information presently on the SBA.gov website after the loan process has been completed…”

Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin is saying that the Treasury Department won’t disclose the recipients of more than $500 billion in bailout money delivered to 4.5 million businesses through the PPP, because that the information is “proprietary” and “confidential”.

As Charlie Pierce says:

“In one sense, of course, the money is “proprietary information” and we’re the damn proprietors. It’s our damn money.”

According to filings with the SEC, nearly 300 publicly traded companies received $1 billion in stimulus funding. That led to a subsequent ruling from the SBA that public companies with access to credit elsewhere didn’t qualify. Many of those businesses subsequently returned the money, although the SBA has declined to say exactly who, or how many did so.

The reversal on disclosure comes amid a waning belief that the $2.2 trillion pandemic relief package approved by Congress in March will be subject to any oversight. The GAO, which is responsible for preparing a mandated report on the relief spending by the end of June, has requested loan data for both the PPP and a separate program for economic “disaster” loans, but has not been told if or when their request will be honored.

Republicans are not even trying to hide their true intentions any more. The overlap of people who believe in “small government” and people who do not object to Trump’s handing out $500 billion in unmarked bills is total.

But, we’ve had enough body blows for one week. Time to take a few minutes, and escape from all of the world’s chaos. It’s time for our Saturday Soother.

We’re expecting a beautiful weekend in Connecticut, and Wrongo hopes there’s fine weather wherever you are reading this. Start your weekend off by brewing up a cup of Ethiopian Suke Quto coffee ($19/12oz.) from the Greater Goods Roasters of Austin, TX. This is the fourth time they have been featured in the Saturday Soother.

Now, settle back in a physically-distant chair in the shade, and listen to Playing For Change (PFC) perform Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going On”. The message in his song is as relevant today as it was in 1971:

PFC’s focus is to record musicians performing in their natural environments as part of a series called “Songs Around the World”.

Sample Lyric:

Picket lines and picket signs

Don’t punish me with brutality

Talk to me, so you can see

Oh, what’s going on

What’s going on

Ya, what’s going on

Ah, what’s going on

Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.

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Saturday Soother – May 23, 2020

The Daily Escape:

Sand Dunes NP, Colorado – NPS photo by Patrick Myers. The animals are elk.

Happy Saturday, fellow disease vectors! And welcome to Memorial Day Weekend.

Trump isn’t alone in peddling conspiracy theories. The WaPo reports that conspiracy theories and political smear campaigns are as old as American politics. From the WaPo:

“As far back as the campaign of 1800 — the first contested presidential race in US history — pamphlets circulated that accused John Adams of possessing “a hideous hermaphroditical character,” which was a suggestion that he had the sex organs of both a man and a woman.”

WaPo lists some others:

  • In 1828, a newspaper reported that Andrew Jackson’s mother was “a common prostitute” brought to this country by British soldiers, who married a mulatto man with whom she had several children. Actually, Elizabeth and Andrew Jackson Sr. married in Ireland, and then came to America to escape religious persecution.
  • In 2004, a right-wing group, the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth made up lies about Democratic nominee John F. Kerry’s military service in Vietnam. Kerry had piloted a swift boat, and the group’s tarnishing of Kerry’s war service came to be known as “swiftboating”. A shorthand for an outrageous kind of smear.
  • Bill Clinton’s presidency brought many crazy stories, including claims that Bill and Hillary Clinton had been involved in drug-running and murder in Arkansas. Or, accusing them of murdering Vince Foster, an aide who committed suicide. Or, the convoluted theme of the “Clinton Body Count” conspiracy theory, promulgated by Newsmax publisher Christopher Ruddy among others, which says the Clintons are responsible for as many as 50 deaths.

While these tactics aren’t new, social media amplifies and spreads disinformation more efficiently than ever before. In 2020, the real force behind it is Trump, who has both a knack for branding along with zero capacity for shame.

Trump’s constant hammering on birthergate, accusing Obama of being foreign-born, built Trump a big following among people with “white grievance” by trafficking in lies about Obama’s birthplace.

With the 2020 presidential campaign about to get active, Trump has now come up with Obamagate! Something he calls “the biggest political crime in American history, by far!” It’s a hazy set of accusations that Trump and the GOP are trying to plant in the public consciousness.

The gist is this: After Trump was elected in 2016, senior Obama administration officials, including Obama and Joe Biden, tried to entrap his incoming National Security Adviser, Gen. Michael Flynn, in the then-emerging scandal about Russian election interference. There will be Benghazi-style Obamagate hearings by the GOP-controlled Senate. It must be true, since the term contains the word “gate”.

But can Obama be guilty of something he did as POTUS, when Trump claims that POTUS has ‘absolute immunity’ for everything?

He clearly hasn’t thought that one through.

It’s time for our Saturday Soother, and we need to move past these petty conspiracies and talk about a real conspiracy. The trees on the fields of Wrong are attempting to have sex. All. The. Time.

That means tree pollen is covering everything, including those of us of the non-tree persuasion.

But much yard work still needs to be completed, so this beautiful weekend in Connecticut must include a sinus spray. Yard work is a form of Saturday Soother, it lets you escape from all of the problems and issues of the day, and focus on the great weed conspiracy that our main stream media refuses to cover.

But before grabbing your work gloves, take a moment in a comfortable and socially distant space to listen to “The President’s Own” US Marine Band play Gustav Holst’s “Chaconne” from his Suite No. 1 in E-flat, Opus 28, No. 1. Here it is played by 34 US Marine Band Musicians, all social distancing:

Holst apparently wrote it as the “1st Suite for Military Band Op. 28A” in 1909, but there is no record of a performance until 1920. Holst was one of England’s most prominent twentieth-century composers. He composed hundreds of works, the most famous of which was his orchestral suite, “The Planets” (1922).

Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.

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Saturday Soother – May 8, 2020

The Daily Escape:

The Second Wave, Coyote Buttes North, AZ, bu\ it’s easiest to reach from Kanab, UT – March 2020 photo by thatstheguy

“You know, that might be the answer – to act boastfully about something we ought to be ashamed of. That’s a trick that never seems to fail.” – Joseph Heller

Happy Saturday, fellow disease vectors! That’s quintessential Trump. He’s doing with the Coronavirus what was patented by Richard Nixon in Vietnam: “Declare Victory and Get Out”.

Trump had no intention of using the agencies of the US government as a positive force to deal with the pandemic, and now he’s backing out of any role helping the country to recover. From Eric Boehlert:

“Trump has no plan to “reopen” the country and he has no plan to manage this pandemic moving forward. The way I see it, the press dutifully starts each day assuming today is the day Trump gets serious and finally provides serious leadership. It’s not going to happen, though.  We’re on our own, yet the press stubbornly pretends otherwise because presidents are supposed to provide leadership in times of crisis.”

Boehlert refers us to Jay Rosen, an NYU journalism professor, who writes:

“The plan is to have no plan, to let daily deaths between one and three thousand become a normal thing, and then to create massive confusion about who is responsible— by telling the governors they’re in charge without doing what only the federal government can do, by fighting with the press when it shows up to be briefed, by fixing blame for the virus on China or some other foreign element, and by “flooding the zone with shit,” Steve Bannon’s phrase for overwhelming the system with disinformation, distraction, and denial, which boosts what economists call “search costs” for reliable intelligence.”

Trump’s playbook is to have his re-election ride on manufactured confusion. There won’t be a plot for us to expose, it’s happening right before our eyes. We all know that Trump has no intention of leading. That he has no desire to get involved in helping to solve the greatest American crisis since 9/11. And the disconnect is, that a president acting like this would have been inconceivable before Donald Trump.

It isn’t debatable: Trump has washed his hands of the pandemic, and plans to blame the governors when things go wrong, while taking credit for anything that goes right. He isn’t even trying to hide that anymore.

We heard this week that Trump buried the CDC’s detailed advice about reopening. The administration doesn’t want the public to know what the scientists are recommending. That means people won’t be in a position to hold their employers, or their local governments, to a standard that they either can’t, or don’t want to meet.

At this point, all we can do is grit our teeth, and try to protect ourselves and our loved ones as best we can.

It seems likely that Trump, because of opting out of what a president is supposed to do in a crisis, will be the proximate cause of the deaths of thousands. All as a cover for his callous ineptitude.

And there’s little that we can do about it, except hunker down and be careful as we try to get through it.

We need a break from all of this negativity.

We need to settle back in a comfy chair at a socially distant spot, and de-stress from another difficult week. It’s time for another Saturday Soother, those few moments when we move to a different and better emotional plane. This weekend includes Mother’s Day, so it’s also a time to think about family and how we got to where we are.

To help with that, take a few minutes and listen to some of the world’s biggest current musical artists who collaborated on a BBC Radio 1 cover of the Foo Fighters’ “Times Like These”. Each performing from their own homes, as has become the standard these days. The group was dubbed the “Live Lounge Allstars” and included the Foo Fighters’ Dave Grohl:

Wrongo knows very few of these artists, perhaps showing his age. But this also shows that they should make more music outside of their usual genre. Those who read the Wrongologist in email can watch the video here.

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What Should Biden Do?

The Daily Escape:

Theodore Roosevelt NP, ND – photo by lightcrafterartistry

Happy May Day! Look on the bright side: Halloween is 184 days away, and everybody already has their masks.

Joe Biden is the likely Democratic presidential nominee, and he’s carrying the hopes of many Americans that the Trump era will be just a single term. There are many hurdles for Biden to overcome on his way to winning the presidency, and a new one has emerged from an old story.

Tara Reade, a former Biden aide has accused him of sexually assaulting her in 1993. That story had been reported many times without really touching Biden politically, largely because the media was skeptical of Reade’s story when she came forward initially.

Recently, she changed her story from a creepy sexual harassment to sexual assault. And we now find out that she may have told others of the more serious allegation 25 years ago. That puts her story in a very different light.

Business Insider reported that two sources came forward to corroborate details about Reade’s new claims. One, a former neighbor of Reade’s, says that Reade disclosed corroborating details to her about the alleged assault in the mid-1990s, possibly one-to-two years after it happened.

Dealing with this sort of accusation when we’re focused on the political rather than the legal consequences, is tricky. People point to the Brett Kavanaugh nomination hearing and say that Kavanaugh and Biden are in the same boat. The WaPo says that at the time, Biden insisted that Christine Blasey Ford, who accused Kavanaugh of sexual assault:

“…should be given the benefit of the doubt…for a woman to come forward in the glaring lights of focus, nationally, you’ve got to start off with the presumption that at least the essence of what she’s talking about is real, whether or not she forgets facts.”

The HuffPo reports that Tarana Burke, a founder of the Me Too movement in 2007, thinks that Reade’s accusations against Biden are being felt differently because of the stakes in the 2020 election, which will feature two men in powerful positions who have both been accused of sexual assault.

Burke has suggested that Biden could be both “accountable and electable” for Democrats in 2020:

“The defense of Joe Biden shouldn’t rest on whether or not he’s a ‘good guy’ or ‘our only hope.’ Instead, he could demonstrate what it looks like to be both accountable and electable…”

Standards for evaluating evidence in the context of a job interview should be different than standards for evaluating evidence in a legal proceeding, or in a criminal trial.

Nobody has a right to become president of the US, or to be on the Supreme Court. If you think there’s a reasonable chance that Reade’s sexual assault allegation is true, it’s perfectly appropriate to take your estimate of that probability into account when deciding whether to support Biden or not.

Wrongo thinks that it would be better for the country if Biden replaces Trump. That’s true for Wrongo even if he assumes Reade’s allegation is 100% accurate.

So what should Biden do? He has to put this behind him. He should say he believes her, even if he has no memory of the event. And he should earnestly apologize.

Fess up and move on.

Republicans know that dividing the left radically improves their chances in November. They can see how easily the Dems’ laudable virtue of “believe all women” could be weaponized.

One thing an apology will do is make it easier for Biden to select a woman VP, as he has promised to do. Biden’s shaky past behavior around women will also be a part of the opposition’s message in the fall. He has worked to overcome some of that over the years by co-sponsoring Clinton’s Violence Against Woman Act. He has improved his views on both abortion and the Hyde Amendment, and he’s sort of apologized to Anita Hill.

Whichever woman Biden chooses will be forced to answer questions (probably endlessly) about Biden’s treatment of women, including the allegations of assault by Tara Reade. His VP choice may become the leader of the Democratic Party in four years, and the only way to inoculate the VP nominee against this is a full Biden apology.

Will a heartfelt apology hurt Biden? Certainly with some progressive voters. But even those whose only issue is a principled stand against sexual assault, will have to choose between Biden and Trump. If they do so based only on which man has sexually assaulted fewer women, it’s likely that Biden would be their choice.

This isn’t the choice Wrongo had hoped for, but it’s the choice we have.

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Monday Wake Up Call, Social Cohesion Edition – April 20, 2020

The Daily Escape:

Alstrom Point overlook, Lake Powell, AZ – photo by Gleb_Tarro

World War II lasted six years. Americans from coast to coast planted victory gardens; turned bacon grease into bombs; recycled paper, metal, and rubber. Staples like sugar were rationed. Mothers went to work in defense plants. The war lasted six years, and half a million Americans died.

Fast forward: While some might say we’re not at war, it sure feels like we’re under attack. But our flag-waviest Americans today can’t even last six weeks, much less pull together.

Turns out, we have lost most of our social cohesion, the collective will to commit to a path, and work together to make the goal a reality.

In the past, we had a set of unwritten expectations that members of our society were expected to comply with, like voting, paying taxes, and displaying tolerance for others. Even these deminimus expectations are fraying today.

We’re being told that we’re on one team, or the other: Team working, or Team lockdown. Each is supposed to do the best it can to help control the virus, but people are becoming frustrated and angry.

If you need a visual representation of the reasons why, take a look at this chart from Visual Capitalist:

You can view a bigger version of the chart here.

The chart graphs jobs by income and degree of risk of catching COVID-19. They used the following criteria to establish level of risk:

  1. Contact With Others: How much does this job require the worker to be in contact with others in order to perform it?
  2. Physical Proximity: To what extent does this job require the worker to perform tasks in close physical proximity to others?
  3. Exposure to Disease and Infection: How often does this job require exposure to hazardous conditions?

Visual Capitalist then assigned a Risk Score between 0 and 100, with 100 representing the highest possible risk to each job. More from Visual Capitalist: (emphasis by Wrongo)

“Many individuals have been practicing social distancing by working from home in recent weeks. While this arrangement can be a great way to reduce one’s exposure to COVID-19, it’s a luxury that’s available to just 29% of Americans.

The situation for the remaining 71% is uncertain, to say the least. A significant portion of the population has lost their jobs due to business shutdowns and mandated lockdown orders. Others employed in “essential services” have continued working as usual, but may face a higher risk of potential exposure to the virus.”

Andrew Noymer, a public-health professor and an expert on the 1918 influenza pandemic, observed:

“Someone is at home wondering how he’s going to make rent and feed his family,” he said. “And someone else is wondering if they can binge-watch the first season of The Sopranos…”

So it’s understandable that at least 71% of America want to end the lockdown. They are business owners who stand to lose plenty, or unemployed workers who have nothing left to lose.

There’s a disconnect with the end the lockdown reasoning and the world in which we live. We live, work, play, and eat together. We buy from and sell to each other. We depend on the farmers, the truck drivers, the street repair people, and the bankers. More than ever, we depend on the medical people, the teachers, and the people who run all kinds of business, big and small. And they depend on all the people who work for them.

The virus has disrupted all of that.

Are the lockdown protesters ready to pitch in and take the high risk jobs above? Will they drive the buses? Wait on tables? Deliver the groceries? Clean hospital rooms? Work with people who may be infected in nursing homes?

Time to wake up, America! We need to reach back and try for more social cohesion, or we’re lost. To help us wake up, we turn to Bob Dylan. Let’s listen to his “Slow Train Coming”:

Today, it’s no longer a Slow Train. It’s high-balling down the track.

Sample lyric:

Big-time negotiators, false healers and woman haters

Masters of the bluff and masters of the proposition

But the enemy I see wears a cloak of decency

All nonbelievers and men stealers talking’ in the name of religion

And there’s a slow, slow train comin’ up around the bend

People starving and thirsting, grain elevators are bursting

Oh, you know it costs more to store the food than it do to give it

They say lose your inhibitions follow your own ambitions

They talk about a life of brotherly love show me someone who knows how to live it

There’s a slow, slow train comin’ up around the bend

 

Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.

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