Can Trump Do Anything Right?
If the mainstream liberal media would stop tearing President Trump apart for every comment and action he makes or does not make, they might screw up and inject some actual facts into the national conversation surrounding COVID-19.
When news of the novel coronavirus broke on the global level, Trump quickly restricted travel from China, since COVID-19 originated in Wuhan. Some of his political opponents called him a racist. Others said it was too little, too late; the virus had already been present in China for several weeks before the travel restrictions were imposed.
Trump’s initial public reaction to the coronavirus’ arrival in America was to reassure the media and citizens alike that there was no need to panic or be an alarmist. He was criticized for being too lax about the virus, even though it has a relatively low fatality rate and 80-90% of infected people experience mild or no symptoms. His comments seem appropriate when coming from a national leader, though. Reassuring people that everything will be fine and that they should remain calm seems like the right thing to say when faced with an alarming situation. No matter how dire things may get, panicking at the start is a poor course of action.
The president has continued to communicate with officials and the American public regarding the novel coronavirus through press conferences, meetings, and his prolific tweets. One CNN headline read “Donald Trump seems to know very little about the coronavirus.” But, isn’t that true for everyone? Scientists and medical leaders say that we should be terrified of COVID-19 because it is a new virus that we don’t know anything about. Symptom guidelines directing people when to call the doctor and report a suspected infection have changed greatly since they were first announced. Some say only call a doctor for a combination of fever, dry cough, and sore throat; others say that digestive issues are also primary symptoms. It’s unjust to skewer any one person for knowing very little about this novel strain of coronavirus.
Trump tried to use a bit of common sense to combat hysteria concerning COVID-19, and that effort was soundly beat down as well. In early February, he tweeted that the coronavirus’ spread in America could slow as warmer weather approaches. Medical experts agree this is typically the case with contagious illnesses (which is why cold and flu season occurs during the winter, not summer), but media outlets quickly pointed out the error of Trump’s comment, based solely on the fact that he said it.
President Trump is not an expert on COVID-19. No one is. But, he is the leader of the free world, and constantly attacking him for his comments and actions as he tries to navigate this unprecedented medical and economic situation is counterproductive to the end goal. No matter our political affiliation, all Americans should strive for a healthy population and economy, both on the national and global scale. We need to focus on surviving this uncertain situation so that we can rebuild and thrive in the future. COVID-19 is not Trump’s fault, and uniting under his leadership is in the best interest of all citizens, whether or not they agree with every comment he makes.
POTUS is doing a terrific job! The haters will always cry and whine.
MAGA 2020
I have absolutely NO CONFIDENCE in the media anymore. They post any lie they wish, make up news that doesn’t exist then offer some poor excuse for their mistakes, and try to hold somebody else responsible for the fairy tales. All this comes from the exec. in charge and the reporters are told what to print It’s easy to see that these exec. are on somebody’s payroll and receive kickbacks to print the lies. It will never change because most of the garbage comes from politicians who “LEAK” what they want printed and there is no one to hold the media responsible. I firmly respect the constitution and the first amendment. But the media should be held accountable to print the truth and ONLY the actual news..
It’s usually the Democrats and anti-Trump people who attack the President no matter what he does or says. The left and RINO’s attack Trump because he’s draining the swamp and changing the way things are done in Washington DC. The President with help from others are interrupting the money machine in D.C. that has made a lot of politicians rich while they are in office and they don’t like it. When Joe Biden and other Dems say that they need to win back the soul of the country, they are talking about the way things were before Donald Trump took office. It is because the way things were before Trump is the reason we voted for Trump.
Maybe, just maybe the dreaded virus will only attack Democrats. It is possible that could happen since the Democrats are always opening the big mouths as they scream about everything Trump does or doesn’t do, and in the process, they’ll be the only ones who inhale the deadly virus and end up dying. Can you imagine having a country without Democrats? Since they’re all going to hell in a hand basket, that would be like heaven on earth for us hard working, industrious and respectable Republicans.
LOL – Poetic Justice!
I just heard on NPR that the medical teams are trying to account for a noticed higher rate of nCOVID-19 fatality in males with respect to females worldwide. The next thing they could look into is the voting records…..
Grin and bear it is NOT all we can do! Speak out and try to say pass along these observations to the best of your ability. If someone tries to drown you out or responds with slander, just say:
“Thank you for your opinion, I respectfully disagree”.
I t will not likely stop the offensive behavior, but all the other people will notice who held the moral high ground.
This is going to be addressed by authorities higher than can be explained. This must be put under rule of law and the slanderers and gossips held accountable. This is treasonous and domestic terrorism. We shall protect the people from all enemies, foreign and DOMESTIC! So help us God
The press must go with their sponsors. Offending sponsors leads to losing ad space. The press needs crisis to sell news. The press cannot be impartial and therefore is worthless drivel. Third world countries use it as toilet paper and it is the best app.
it is a shame that facebook censors this this needs to get out to the american people if you can please pass this along
Ann …
The headline of your article had me thinking that you are a Trump enemy. I had to read through the entire article to realize that that was not true.
Funny … this is an election year, suddenly ALL 50 states are infected, Biden and his son have connections with China … too many ‘coincidences’.
Trump and his kids also have connections in China – Ivanka used her connections to get 18 trademarks in China, worth millions of dollars.
I wouldn’t consider “election year”, virus originating in China, and “infections in all 50 states” too many coincidences. The more likely explanation is just that Trump has fucked up the situation – no coincidences there, it’s what he does with everything.
Other coincidences – Trump screwing up the federal response to COVID-19, the stock market closing below where it was when became President, the unemployment rate rising, Trump losing the election. Get used to it.
The press is a master of that old adage and seems to fit right in:’Oh what a tangled mess we weave when we deceive’
I voted for Pres Trump and strongly support his agenda. But he surely shows how thin-skinned he is in all of his public pronouncements, including tweets. The press is as thin-skinned as the President and it is a tit-for-tat game. This does nothing to help anyone, and our leader needs to be the Bigger Person by not goading the press. A truce might make me believe a little of what I get from our news outlets.
You ask the right question, but your analysis and conclusion are incorrect.
The COVID virus outbreak began in Hunan province in December, and mid January the number of cases (and deaths) was doubling every 2-3 days. The Chinese government initially denied any problem (like Trump), and when they realized the severity of the pandemic, they shut down the entire province. That’s the equivalent of shutting down California – they locked people in their homes, welded doors and gates shut, arrested people out on the streets, restricted travel in and out of the province, and restricted travel to/from and within the country. Total cases of COVID-19 in China was 300,000 and 12000 dead, out of 67M people in Hunan, and 1.4 billion in China. That is a 4% death rate, compared to about .1% death rate for the common flu.
Trump didn’t speak publicly about COVID until January 22, saying “We have it totally under control.” Throughout February, Trump was still calling the COVID-19 pandemic a hoax (intended to affect his election). He didn’t start speaking seriously about the pandemic until a week ago. Senate Republicans were briefed on the impacts of the pandemic on February 27th, and at least 4 of them cashed in their stocks, a clear case of illegal insider trading, but also a clue as to when the administration started to realize that this pandemic would be bad.
Meanwhile, the number of virus cases in the US is roughly doubling every 2-3 days, just like in China. The administration restricted travel to China around February 3, and to Europe on March 12. By that time, there were already cases of COVID in the US. There are now about 20,000 cases and almost 300 deaths in the US, and yes, it is rising exponentially, doubling roughly every 2-3 days. Clearly, Trump’s handling of the situation is not working.
As far as what the President knows about the virus – the stock market tumbles every time that Trump opens his stupid mouth, and health officials are calling to take Trump’s COVID-19 press conferences off of live TV because of the misinformation he spreads. He has surrounded himself with bootlickers and ass-kissers, and fired anyone who disputes his bad advice. As President of the United States, he has access to the most up to date information and the best advisors in the world, but chooses to ignore them. Instead, he offers rumors and false cures.
Calling it the “Chinese virus” is just another dog-whistle to racists in this country. It endangers the lives of Asian-Americans living in this country. Trump and Pence both were exposed to the virus at his now-shuttered Mar-a-Lago club, and members of Congress and senior staff members are also infected with COVID-19. The only members of Congress to be diagnosed wit the virus so far are Republicans – should we start calling it the Republican virus? It may very well be Trump’s legacy.
Trump is still rating his handling of the virus as “extremely good”. He has told state governors to go find medical supplies themselves, instead of the federal government stepping in and doing it, which puts governors in the position of bidding against each other. There is no coordination of testing or supplying test kits. Trump disbanded the National Security Council Pandemic unit and proposed cuts in the CDC budget. There is no federal response to the pandemic, and no federal plan because Trump threw it all out. And yet, he praises his own handling of the pandemic and lashes out at reporters who ask him questions, while blaming Obama for something.
At the same time, Mitch McConnell is stalling bills in Congress to get aid to states and people. Every day of delay counts when deaths are doubling every couple of days. In the state where I live, the number of cases has doubled 4 times since last week. A coordinated response from the federal government could have stopped COVID in its tracks. Instead, it’s spreading like wildfire. We have 300 needless deaths so far, next week it will be 600, then 1200, then 2500 by the end of the week.
So, the answer to your lede question is “No, Trump can’t do anything right”. Your conclusion is wrong, there is no Trump leadership to unite under. Trump’s inaction and lack of leadership will undoubtedly kill thousands if not hundreds of thousands of people, and we’re left with the uncoordinated leadership of individual states. Ironically, the worst health care is in the Republican-led states, so Trump is hurting his own core supporters the most.
So you don’t think Trump is taking this seriously? Most of the country is shut down. Did someone else do this? Cuomo asked for the Army Corps of engineers to help him build hospitals. He got them. Congress is considering a $2 Trillion economic package. Trump is leading, the country is following. The Democrats are still trying to play politics.
And since you have pulled the race card like you usually do, Chinese is not a race, its a nationality. And as far as I have seen, nobody is blaming Asians in America. The Chinese government lied to us, and as far as anyone can tell they are still lying. Unless of course you actually think that the virus came from the U.S. Army…
Governors have taken matter into their own hands, without federal coordination, because Trump has done nothing. “Cuomo asked”… not “Trump ordered”. “Congress is considering…”, not “Trump proposed”, or even “Trump (not a shipping clerk) helped”, and even then McConnell went on vacation in the middle of the pandemic, and is blocking legislation from moving forward.
Look here to see Trump’s comments over the last 2 months- https://twitter.com/i/status/1241533348742180864. I dare you to watch it all the way through – it’s Trump’s own comments, put on a calendar.
He denies responsibility, calls it a hoax, says “everything is under control, it’s not a problem”, until last week, then he says “I said all along it was a pandemic”. By the time he said that 5 days ago, it was up to 5000 cases in the US. And now, a week later, Sunday 3/22/20, it’s at 27000 cases and 350 deaths – 7000 cases and 50 deaths more than my last post 1 DAY ago. And you believe this liar! The stock market doesn’t though – it’s almost 1000 points below where Obama left it. Maybe they were tracking the crooked Republican Senators that sold off all their stocks.
I didn’t pull the race card, Trump did. He’s associating a disease with a whole class of people that his followers consider foreigners. And most of his followers don’t know the difference between Chinese and Asian, and every time he does this people get attacked in the streets. Even stupid Kelly Ann Conway crawled out of her crypt and said “I’m married to one”, when her husband is actually half Filipino. And Trump’s only purpose is to take attention away from the fact that he has totally screwed up the federal government response to COVID-19.
At the current rate of infection, in 10 days or so the number of people infected (and probably the number of deaths) in the US will exceed China’s – then it will be the “Trump virus”. 350 deaths and counting, all on Trump. He fiddles while the nation burns.
Addendum: It’s 10 hours since my last post, and the number of infections is at 33000 and deaths at 420. Trump had another disastrous live news conference, and the Dow futures dropped almost 1000 points. Expect the Dow to open at around 18000 points tomorrow, 2000 points below Trump’s first day in office.
And by the way, not only did Trump have nothing to do with all the quarantines and business shutdowns, as Joe implied in his previous post, he attacked the governors of Washington and New York as soon as they shut down schools and businesses.
Not according to any Democrat you ask.
this country needs a president not a racist, rapist, and a president with respect for the people and the women rights respect for Mother Nature and support solair and wind energy and let the more money you make the more taxes you pay support social security and healthcare and stop the influence of corporations in the government decisions let the American people being involved in decisions making this was a country for the people let be this way again
Holy crap! You have picked up on every piece of anti-Trump propaganda there is. Do you ever think for yourself or do you just read Nancy Pelosi’s web site?
Those are all valid criticisms of Trump, even if off topic and not eloquently written. For time reasons, I have cherry-picked which ones I jump in on in PBP, but could easily write on any one of those topics (with sources and citations) as much as I have above. Every one of those topics is well documented in the MSM (as opposed to the far-right propaganda sites that you usually cite). You should be saying, “Holy Crap! How have I managed to support Trump for 3 long years? Everything he touches goes to shit!”
And to continue with the pandemic topic – since my first post on Saturday, the number of cases of COVID-19 in the US is now 55,000 with almost 800 deaths., doubled and half again. Trump had yet another disastrous press conference, and networks actually cut away from it. Some idiot Republican from Texas proposed letting seniors take one for the economy, go ahead and go to work and go shopping, and die “for the love of America”. And McConnell proposes a $500B slush fund, to be paid to businesses, in secret, under Trump’s direction. Huh? Does he know Donald Trump? Guaranteed that Trump would take billions into his own hotels and casinos (you know, those essential industries). This is what the Republican Party has become.
You should be scared – Trump has mismanaged this crisis from day one, just like everything else. I saw this virus exploding in China as early as January. I’m not a health professional, but as an engineer I could see it growing exponentially and out of control. And hell, when the Chinese cancel the Lunar New Year celebrations, when everyone takes two weeks off and visits family, you KNOW it’s bad. He should have had a team organizing supplies, putting plans in place, contacted states and hospitals to coordinate a response, and yet he did nothing except lie about it until mid-March. And even now he’s talking about miracle cures and giving misinformation in live press conferences. What Trump did was/is criminal and dangerous for the country, and tens or hundreds of thousands of Americans will die before it’s under control here. He squandered a 3 month lead time on this crisis, and now the country will have to pay for it.
OK, knocking this off one issue at a time.
Your idea of mainstream media is, of course, CNN, MSNBC and other liberal media who have decided to make it their mission to trash Trump at every opportunity.
So far, everything Trump has touched has turn to gold. The economy, the trade deals, and much more.
It appears that he has handled the corona virus appropriately, since the number of deaths is way below the number in much smaller places.
McConnell proposed a slush fund? In secret? Have you not been watching the news? The Republicans and Democrats are attempting to forge a bipartisan agreement. It was going well until Pelosi got back into the picture and started proposing ridiculous things that had nothing to do with the pandemic. Like carbon footprint b.s. for airlines, like new negotiating priviledges for Unions, like tax credits for windmills, and other garbage that they have been trying to pass for a long time but never could. Who tries to blackmail for useless crap when there is a pandemic?
Trump also saw the crisis coming very early and shut off travel to China. Joe Biden made sport of Trump for doing it, calling him racist (and yes, Chinese is not a race, its a nationality).
Organizing what supplies? Obama and Biden didn’t arrange for much to be organized as far as equipment. There was no treatment at the time – and of course, now we think we have a treatment and we have the beginnings of a vaccine, but you can’t organize stuff that doesn’t exist. And where do you organize it to?? In January the total cases were less than a hundred nationwide.
All in all, the Administration moved heaven and earth to get to where we are. Cuomo is still complaining about a lack of supplies in New York, but governors always want to cover the worst case. DeSantis did the same thing during the last hurricane. Trump and Cuomo and California’s Newsome have actually worked together very well.
Theory says there was the potential for 10 million people to die here (3% times 330 million people). So far there are less than 600 (as of tonight). We tolerate the regular flu with a death rate of .1%, killing as many as 40,000 in a year. If we have treatments and vaccines, then whatever the number of cases, we will be within the tolerable range, since death rates will be low.
Trump hasn’t lied about anything. I know that MSNBC and CNN are telling that he has. For example, one of the MSNBC hosts said that Trump said a cure would be available right away, and she made a big deal of calling him a liar. Of course, he never said that at all.
Looks like your hindsight is 20/20. You can spiritually tell from reading the news for the last three months that this is serious. Funny I don’t see any of your comments from December predicting that the virus would become a global pandemic.
So peddle your liberal B.S. if you must, but at the PB Post, we are having none of it.
By definition, Trump has totally screwed up his response to the coronavirus. It has doubled twice and then some since my first post on the subject. If he had acted when his security advisors warned him, he could have stopped most of the cases of COVID-19 and the 1700 deaths so far. It is not “way below number of deaths in smaller places”. By Sunday, it will have doubled again. In states where governors shut things down early, they’re doing better. Feel free to check the numbers at https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/.
Trump is demanding that governors be “appreciative” of his efforts, and yet he continues to withhold respirators and masks from the (Democratic) states. Presumably he’s saving them for states that might vote for him. He’s trying to get businesses to reopen businesses by Easter, at the cost of accelerating the spread of cases and an increase in COVID deaths, because his hotels are losing money and he needs the business. Witness his little temper tantrum when Democrats added a clause to the latest spending bill that his businesses can’t benefit from the stimulus. He also knows that he’s lost the economy that he inherited from Obama, and is desperate to get it back, not matter how many die.
Check your numbers – doubling every 3 days means that 1700 deaths so far would get to over 100,000 in two weeks, and from there it’s not too many more doubles until it gets to millions. That’s all on Trump.
You can gloat about his 1-2% rise in popularity – Americans will support a President in times of trouble because they hope he will do succeed. But Biden’s lead over Trump has also increased. Trump has lost the stock market gains that he bragged about, and in one week, his policies killed the unemployment gains that he had too.
I won’t argue Trump’s other policy fuck-ups, there isn’t enough time in the world to argue all of those. Anyone who’s paying attention sees it anyway, even if you can’t. PB can peddle bullshit, but only a few stupid few Trump supporters are listening (at least the ones who haven’t eaten industrial fish tank cleaner because Trump told them too!)
OK, once again.
Trump has worked magic with the virus. Compare the number of deaths with Italy. He acted early by closing the border with China. Joe Biden called him xenophobic because of that. Trump is moving fast,and so far medical facilities are not being overwhelmed like they have been in Italy.
Trump is not withholding anything. Cuomo got 4000 respirators and they are still in the warehouse. Cuomo is also getting 4 new temporary hospitals courtesy of the Army Corps of Engineers plus a medical ship from the navy. No matter how much Cuomo gets, he wants more. This is typical of a governor.
Trump obviously wants to restart the economy. If we are able to keep people alive from the coronavirus, then why not. And if the current treatments that are in testing are successful then the death rate may fall to that of the normal flu. With a vaccine it will be even lower. But we have to let people back to work otherwise there will be a lot more suffering later. And for you so say that Trump needs the money is just liberal propaganda.
Just because you can do math doesn’t mean that people will die according to your schedule of numbers. That is what the shut down is about. To slow that down so it doesn’t overwhelm our medical system and to delay until treatments are ready.
Biden is toast. He has proven his irrelevance.
You can’t argue Trump’s fuckups because there aren’t any.
Look at the numbers: 112000 cases and still increasing exponentially. By his self-imposed dealine to get businesses back to work, it will be over a million cases, and 20,000 dead. Trump can’t call it the Chinese virus anymore, we’re already surpassing them (with only 15% of the population). The economy is going to shit, and the stock market is voting with their money. He’s actively refusing to cooperate with Democratic Governors. He dismantled the team that should have been preparing for this, and 3 years into his term, still trying to blame Obama for everything. He has daily live press conferences, than networks have started to cut away from because there’s so much misinformation and lying. He touted a “miracle cure” which hasn’t even been tested yet, but caused shortages of the drug and killed at least one idiot who ate some of the chemical. If health officials try to correct his mistatements, they get replaced by lackeys that toe the company line. He’s doing worse than Bush and “Brownie”. By definition, each one of those points is mismanagement. Trump, while not taking responsibility for anything, will be held responsible for tens of thousands of deaths (if we’re lucky enough not to get into hundreds of thousands of deaths).
First, the infection rate is starting to slow because of the quarantine measures. This is a fact. If we stop those the infection rates will go back up. That’s how infection works. There is no doubt that a large portion of the population will eventually become infected. But we can slow it so that we have more time to develop treatments and eventually a vaccine. Its a matter of death rates not infection rates.
Make no mistake H1N1 infected more than 60 million in the U.S. and killed over 12,000. That’s a death rate only a tenth of that of the regular flu (0.1%). Obama (and Biden) did nothing to stop it, but the medical system of the U.S. (not Obamacare at the time) found ways to treat it. The Chinese Coronavirus kills a much higher percentage of people.
Obama left us a legacy of nothing in this respect. The facilities he set up were in no way adequate (even though he experienced his own epidemic), and Trump had to essentially start from scratch to gather resources and respond to this. This will play badly with Biden during the election. Not that Trump needs this to beat Biden in the election…
Diseases are frequently named after where they originated. West Nile Virus, MERS, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, Lyme disease, Ebola, etc.
The economy will bounce back, there is nothing wrong with it. The current emergency is not related to anything in the economy.
Trump has not denied anything to anyone. Cuomo wanted the Army corp of engineers, he got it. He wanted more hospitals, he has eight more. He has just received 4000 ventilators and is getting a navy hospital ship.
He has daily press conferences that are as long as anyone wants them to be, and includes his experts and managers.
This “miracle cure” has a small French study behind it, and may in fact be a good treatment. The person who ate the fish cleaning chemical was probably a Democrat.
He is head and shoulders above Bush and Obama as far as handling outbreaks but their outbreaks were not as infectious or as deadly (I don’t know who “brownie” is).
Trump acted early to restrict travel from China, saving as many as 9000 people (per the death rate of Italy) up to this point.
Watch over the next week, you will see the number of cases go up, because we are tesing more. You will see the rate of new cases level off because of the quarantine measures. You will see the death rate, currently at about 1.6% fall substantially. I predict less than 1% by the end of next week.