This Republican Party President keeps doing just that---he keeps proving he's no way up to or capable of fulfilling the duties of this office. I and a great deal of others---lots of them conservatives and members of the Republican Party---keep point in out.
Here's yet one more.
It was clear that the email writer was a supporter of President Donald Trump. He was incensed about an item that had appeared on the Post-Dispatch editorial page referencing Trump’s recent suggestion that intravenous injection of disinfectant might be a way to kill the coronavirus.
“Who on earth would believe that Trump actually suggested that a sane civilian should do this to themselves?” he demanded. He angrily dismissed it all as “fake news.”
That was confusing, because there is absolutely no debate about what Trump said, in front of the entire country, during his April 23 coronavirus briefing: “I see the disinfectant, where it knocks it out in one minute. And is there a way we can do something like that by injection inside or almost a cleaning?”
Injection inside. Not much room for interpretation there.
Yes, Trump came back later with one of his typical schoolboy lies, saying he was just being “sarcastic” (revealing in the process that he doesn’t really understand what that word means). But no rational English speaker who watched the original comments could doubt that he was serious. The president of the United States really, truly suggested that, because chemical disinfectants can kill the virus on hard surfaces, it might be worth seeing if that would work in the bloodstream.
(It’s one of the oddities of our time that we must pause here to stress the obvious: Don’t inject or ingest a disinfectant. Ever. It could kill you.)
On the third reading of the email, the realization dawned: Trump’s dangerously bonkers suggestion — which, again, he absolutely, positively made — was so outlandish that this Trump supporter, upon reading a factual account of it, simply refused to believe it. Ipso facto, the newspaper made it up.
Some folks are unreachable. They’re the army of core Trumpers who, as he once bragged, wouldn’t abandon him even if he shot someone on Fifth Avenue. It’s the truest thing he ever said.
But that army may, finally, be getting smaller.
While most presidents benefit from a rally-around-the-flag effect during crises, Trump is currently going in the other direction. After a brief polling bump early on, his approval rating percentage now sits in the mid to low 40s — as low or lower than before the pandemic hit. Worse, head-to-head polling with presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden now has Trump losing in the battleground states that were crucial to his Electoral College asterisk of a victory in 2016.
Some of it may stem from the growing realization of just how badly Trump botched this from the start. I wonder, though, if it might be a more fundamental shift, driven not just by his terrible handling of this specific crisis, but by a broader recognition of his general unfitness for office, by people who didn’t see it, until now.
We’re sheltered in, after all. People who in normal times have better things to do are now watching TV throughout the day. That happened just as Trump started taking the stage, day after day, to impart his wisdom to the world regarding the coronavirus. (Note to the president: The previous wisdom reference is the definition of “sarcastic.”)
For the relative sliver of Americans who closely watch Trump’s Twitter account, his daily descent into narcissism, grievance and bile is nothing new. But to normal people with normal lives — many of whom wouldn’t necessarily call themselves “Trumpers,” but who perhaps had been assuming that all the fuss about his behavior was just standard partisan sniping — these briefings must have been full of dark revelation.
Think of what the blissfully uninitiated have had to see lately: A president bragging about his TV ratings as thousands of Americans die. Savaging journalists for asking softball questions, savaging governors for desperately seeking help. Threatening to withhold aid from states that have voted against him. Taking undue credit for action while rejecting any responsibility for failure. Repeatedly spewing useless or dangerous nonsense, as medical professionals stand nearby looking like they’re in a hostage video.
Among quarantined viewers with previously busy lives, this has all surely spawned lots of “WTH?!” moments. Like the distant uncle they’d always heard was crazy, but they didn’t necessarily believe it until he showed up on the doorstep for an extended visit. Now they’re seeing with their own eyes that the self-proclaimed “stable genius” is neither.
For people like the incredulous email writer, even Trump’s Lysol Moment — which in a rational universe would be the final nail in any political coffin — can be, if not defended, then simply denied. That self-deception will be further enabled if Trump’s minions are successful in keeping him off the podium now. Which is why they’re doing it.
But Trump’s falling approval numbers indicate they may be too late. Many of those on the fence have already seen something that they won’t be able to unsee: Irrefutable proof — live, in their own living rooms — that this man belongs nowhere near power. Especially during a crisis.
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