The Selfishness

 

We are supposed to be assured that the president is doing much better than he was Friday when he was sent by helicopter to Walter Reed after having been given a cocktail of monoclonal antibodies from Regeneron (which is kind of experimental and Hail Mary-ish for someone only about 24 hours from his positive test, you think?) and having maybe been given just a bong-hit's worth of oxygen (I'm estimating based on the vagueness of White House messaging) because, you know: "abundance of caution" and all that.

I don't trust anything coming out of the White House or the Trump campaign any more than I would trust anything out of Trump himself. Trump's doctors gave an impression today that maybe Trump did not get his positive COVID test Thursday, but possibly Wednesday. As it was, if he knew Hope Hicks had a positive test Thursday, his fundraiser at Bedminster (a buffet! why not apple-bobbing while we're at it?) seems super-ill-advised. But heck, he came into close contact with a whole lot of people lately--like on Air Force One and Marine One for example. So let's not kid ourselves--Trump's highly-packed campaign schedule and carelessness in a time of pandemic has been extremely irresponsible, and so has the behaviors of many people around him,

The shabby behavior of Trump's circle has threatened the health of people working in the White House, as well as Secret Service members.  They aren't exactly going out of their way to help anyone sort out who got infected and when. And it is very possible that Trump may have been infected when he attended the debate Tuesday--and may have even suspected as much, then. 

Wallace was also saying Friday that the Trump campaign didn't arrive to the debate in time to get tested beforehand, so they were on the "honor system."

He noted as well that members of Trump’s family didn’t wear masks while they were watching the debate. 

“People in the hall did notice that while they were all wearing masks, including my wife and four children, that the first family did not wear masks during the debate. ... It is worth noting that different people treated the safety rules inside the hall differently,” Wallace described. 

And I have no explanation for this behavior except extraordinary selfishness. It's depraved indifference to other people's health and well-being. Former NJ Governor Chris Christie assisted Trump with debate prep and was at the White House superspreader event announcing Amy Coney Barrett's nomination to SCOTUS--and he found out he might be infected by way of the media. He's a big guy with a history of asthma and has since tested positive and been checked into hospital--because of sheer carelessness, there's a real threat to his life.  And he was present with ABC news staff during the debates--all of the folks who came into contact with him also need to be concerned. And tested!

VP Pence, supposedly testing negative, has done rallies and plans to do more. Pop-up Trump demonstrations (often with indifferent masking and social distancing) are occurring in support of Dear leader. I don't see Trump's unfortunate brush with the virus making anyone on Team Trump behave any smarter; they are only ready to lionize Trump as a hero of unparalleled fortitude if he overcomes the illness and to depict him as a martyr to the People if he succumbs. 

And don't get me started on the behavior of the several senators who have also been exposed and revealed as positive. There has been plenty of selfishness to go around. 

The picture I chose for this post is a comparison of a picture Trump Tweeted in early January 2017 showing him supposedly working on the inaugural address from the "Winter White House", Mar-a-Lago, and the most recent picture of Trump, well enough to be "reviewing documents" from the presidential suite at Walter Reed. They both are staged, and display nothing about the fitness or work of the subject. 

I feel lied to, and all of us should.