Donald Trump is famous for his wall, almost none of which he has built, but now mothers in Portland, Oregon have succeeded in building a better wall. In response to Trump sending in federal officers into Portland under the weak excuse that they are protecting federal property (like statues and other monuments), the city’s mothers have come to the rescue.
The federal agents have been running around wearing camouflage outfits and removing protesters using unmarked vehicles, violating the law that they are supposed to operate only on federally owned property. Their aggressive tactics, including the use of tear gas, rubber bullets, and other munitions have mainly made matters much worse.
In reply, the mothers arrived, linked arms and formed a human wall separating the peaceful protesters from the federal agents, chanting “Feds stay clear! Moms are here!”:
The Moms are back in Portland tonight. And there’s more of them.
— Read Let This Radicalize You (@JoshuaPHilll) July 20, 2020
Twitter lit up, making sure that if something happened to our mothers, the world would know. Here’s a tweet from a mom and preschool teacher (I guess her job gives her valuable insights into Trump’s behavior).
And now, Trump has announced he is going to send federal agents into Chicago, and even New York City. I sincerely hope that this totally backfires on him.
Trump is trying to act tough, a blatant attempt to position himself as the “Law and Order” candidate. Ironically, a new Washington Post-ABC News poll shows Joe Biden leading Trump on the issue of “crime and safety” by nine points, 50% to 41%.
I’m not sure, but this ad seems to have a somewhat different style than previous ads. I’m guessing that this might be the first ad since Ben Howe was let go from the project because of sexist remarks he made.
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Heather Cox Richardson has an excellent post about John Lewis. Here are two paragraphs from it, to entice you to read the whole thing:
Tonight, just before midnight, we heard the news that 80-year-old Georgia Representative John Lewis has passed away from pancreatic cancer.
An adherent of the philosophy of non-violence, Lewis was beaten by mobs and arrested 45 times. As chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC—pronounced “snick”) he helped to organize the 1963 March on Washington where the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., told more than 200,000 people gathered at the foot of the Lincoln Memorial that he had a dream. Just 23 years old, Lewis spoke at the event. Two years later, as Lewis and 600 marchers hoping to register African American voters in Alabama stopped to pray at the end of the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, mounted police troopers charged the marchers, beating them with clubs and bullwhips. They fractured Lewis’s skull.
I often tell people that I don’t hate Donald Trump. After all, he is who he is, and it is fairly obvious who he is. What tears at my heart are the people who enable him; who think he makes a good president. This includes the people who join his administration, ignoring the fact that he is obviously a fraud and a con man. And the Republican Senators and other politicians, who publicly praise Trump in order to avoid angering his base. And most of all, Trump’s base, the roughly 40% of Americans who believe that Trump is doing a good job and actually revel in his lies.
Like the people who risk the health and lives of their families and themselves by refusing to wear a mask or social distance just because Trump tells them not to.
Which brings us to the new book by Mary Trump: “Too Much and Never Enough”. Slate has a fascinating review by Dahlia Lithwick that points out something new and significant: This is the first book that doesn’t just attack Donald Trump, it goes after the enablers and explores why they get entrapped supporting him:
Too Much and Never Enough may be the first book that stipulates, in its first pages, that the president is irreparably damaged, and then turns a clinician’s lens on the rest of us, the voters, the enablers, the flatterers, the hangers-on, and the worshipers. It is here that Mary Trump’s book makes perhaps the most enduring contribution to the teetering piles of books that have offered too little too late, even while telling us that which we already knew. Because Mary Trump begins from the assumption that other analysis tends to end with: Donald Trump is lethally dangerous, stunningly incoherent, and pathologically incapable of caring about anyone but himself. So, what Mary Trump wants to know is: What the hell is wrong with everyone around him? As she writes in her prologue, “there’s been very little effort to understand not only why he became what he is but how he’s consistently failed up despite his glaring lack of fitness.”
The book is thus actually styled as an indictment not of Donald Trump but of Trump’s enablers.
I see this as being similar to the “big lie” — a lie so colossal that no one would believe that someone could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously. In this case, Donald Trump is a colossal fake who has conned so many people into believing that he is successful and rich. And once they get hoodwinked, they are trapped because admitting that you were so stupidly conned is unthinkable.
[Mary Trump] blames his family that propped him up (also her family, it should be noted), and then in concentric and expanding circles, the media that failed to scrutinize him, the banks that pretended he was the financial genius he was not, the Republican Party, and the “claque of loyalists” in the White House who continue to lie for him and to him in order to feed his insatiable ego and self-delusion. Even the phrase “too much and never enough” is perhaps deliberately borrowed from the language of addiction, and what Mary Trump describes here is not just her uncle’s addiction to adulation, fame, money, and success, but a nation’s—or some part of a nation’s—unfathomable addiction to him.
Donald Trump’s rise to power was perfectly timed, coming at a moment when Americans have a morbid fascination with being a “winner”, or at least acting like a winner even if you aren’t one.
Taking [Donald Trump] on for transactional purposes may seem like not that big a deal at first, but the moment you put him in your pocket, you become his slave. It is impossible to escape his orbit without having to admit a spectacular failure in moral and strategic judgment, which almost no one can stomach.
I encourage you to read the book review in its entirety. Not surprisingly, the book itself is selling like gangbusters. It sold just under a million copies in its first day, outpacing all other anti-Trump books.
The Trump campaign has released a new political ad, “You won’t be safe in Joe Biden’s America”.
There’s just one problem — the video is completely in the present tense. The voice-over uses present tense — as if Biden is already president — and the images and video of protests and violence are also from the present, which is in Donald Trump’s America.
The ad seems rather weak, actually. It claims that Biden wants to “defund the police”, even though Biden has consistently said the opposite. Instead, they have Biden saying “Yes. Absolutely!”, which sounds like it was taken out of context and could have been about almost anything. The entire ad has production values of a cheesy horror show, or of a melodramatic movie like “Reefer Madness“. So, watch it if you DARE!
The Washington Post fact checked this ad, and gave it 4 Pinocchios (a whopper of a lie).
The Lincoln Project has another very strong ad directly comparing Dr Anthony Fauci to Donald Trump. The Trump administration has started attacking Fauci, trying to discredit him because he often disagrees with (and occasionally contradicts) Trump, when Trump lies. In other words, Fauci is just doing his job, and doing it well. Trump can’t tolerate that.
I really love the ads that The Lincoln Project is doing. I know that many people worry that they won’t move the needle much, because probably very few Trump voters will ever even watch these ads. And the people who are watching them probably already hate Trump.
But I think they may be missing the point.
First of all, (and it has been mentioned that) it is particularly important that the people behind The Lincoln Project are all Republicans. They can say things that the Democrats dare not say and get away with it, because this is not your run-of-the-mill partisan fight. And that may give some die-hard Republicans permission to (perhaps just this once) not vote for someone who is clearly unfit to be president.
But in some ways, it is even more significant that these ads get Democrats excited and energized (it sure does it for me). The Democrats have a bad tendency to take their base for granted. In fact this was one of the biggest mistakes that Hillary Clinton made in the 2016 election. She assumed the “blue wall” would hold and didn’t campaign there, instead running ads in other states in the hope of getting a landslide.
Meanwhile, Trump concentrated on his base and won. This can work for Democrats too — the rise of Bernie Sanders shows how important it is to feed your base, as they were able to accomplish far more than their numbers would normally indicate.
I’m not saying that focusing on your base will guarantee success. Indeed, Trump seems unable to do anything but focus on his racist and angry base. But in this case we are talking about more than the behavior of the candidates. The Lincoln Project is completely separate from Biden. And not only are they energizing Biden’s base, they are demoralizing Trump himself. And that’s wonderful.
Do you ever wonder why the US has so many more Covid-19 cases and deaths than anywhere else in the world?
Yes, DisneyWorld really did reopen last weekend, despite the fact that Florida now holds the record for most new cases in a single day, and right now has the most number of active cases of any state.
Just in case you think this is not a fair comparison because of population size, Flurida has less than 3 times the population of Hong Kong, and even that is probably offset by the fact that Hong Kong has a much higher population density.
Here’s the numbers from Worldometers:
Can you even imagine what opening up our schools is going to do to us?
Donald Trump said during his campaign “We’re going to win so much, you’re going to be so sick and tired of winning.” Is this what he meant?
I don’t understand why some people claim that product boycotts are an attempt to silence free speech. After all, the Citizens United decision clearly established that money was free speech (especially it is money given to politicians for their campaigns!). So isn’t my choice of what products to buy also free speech?
Which brings us to Goya Foods, whose CEO effusively praised Donald Trump in a ceremony at The White House (emphasis on “white”), saying “We’re all truly blessed at the same time to have a leader like President Trump.”
Calls for a boycott of Goya exploded on Twitter. I guess some people haven’t forgotten that Trump opened his campaign by calling Latinos “rapists”, said an American judge couldn’t do his job because he’s “Mexican”, who continues to ignore and insult Puerto Rico, and is currently trying to deport dreamers and kick college students from outside the US out of the country.
I guess I should not be surprised that Ted Cruz (never a paragon of consistency) condemned the Goya boycott. Cruz somehow forgot that just a year ago, he called for a boycott of Nike for supporting NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick. For Cruz, perhaps it is only free speech if it benefits Republicans.
And let’s not forget that Goya profits by selling products that are full of sodium and preservatives. So boycotting them is simply a healthy choice.
A thirty-year-old went to a “COVID party”, where someone who has tested positive for the disease gets together with people who want to know if the disease is a hoax, by seeing if it gets transmitted to them. It did.
The thirty-year-old ended up in the hospital. Just before they died, they said to the nurse, “I think I made a mistake. I thought this was a hoax, but it’s not.”
Like many people, I’m curious what the future will look like after we spend a few years fighting the novel coronavirus into some kind of submission. Andy Slavitt, who was the Medicare, Medicaid, and ACA head for president Obama, talked to three scientists and came away with the conclusion “There is a Light at the End of the Tunnel“. Originally posted as a series of tweets, here it is all gathered together into a single story:
I spent the last 24 hours with three scientists, all of whom have seen vaccine data, two of whom are former regulators, all of whom have opinions. My core question was: What is the world going to look like in three years? (But I asked other things as well.)
I’ll start with a slew of good news.
The vaccine data from Oxford (being run in Brazil) looks strong. No real safety issues so far. Gives people the antibodies. People are getting it post-Covid-19 and some will get it in a challenge trial.
What “works” means, and for how long, and for whom is less clear. But probably more like a flu vaccine (40%?) versus MMR (97%). There will be multiple vaccines after the first expected in the Fall. Each likely progressively better.
The monoclonal antibody therapy is also very exciting. Maybe even more so than a vaccine. If you get infected, it’s another way to confer immunity and prevent the infection from advancing.
Therapy trials are easier and quicker than vaccine trials. There’s frustration that some vaccine trials are moving too slowly and developers are not sharing data other than in press releases. That’s something people can advocate for.
Everyone — and I can’t emphasize this enough — was a huge proponent of masks. Efforts to invalidate masks were considered absurd.
The reason I mention these things is that the principal thing I learned is that the future will be defined by all of these things in combination: vaccines, therapies, masks, and other human interventions.
Mutations yes, but there wasn’t much concern that vaccines could keep up. Also, viruses become less deadly over time and there is cross-immunity and other potential.
T-cells are more important and less understood than antibodies.
What is the FDA’s hurdle for approving an Emergency Use Authorization? Safety and a 50% or greater chance of improvement.
In six months or so, so far science is doing as well as our leaders are doing poorly.
The future is always murky but given what I heard I asked: So, optimistic about reducing lethality but not eradication? Basically that’s what it sounded like. Yes, there will be a new normal.
What’s in this new normal? Will I be able to hug my mother? The answers landed on “I hope so.” But no promises.
Will people wear masks in the future? Hope that we are more like Asia where this becomes a norm, particularly when people are sick.
Crowds, arenas? Take it slowly. Masks and immunity and digital apps will help. But people will be taking risks. Antibody therapies could make catching the coronavirus less deadly and therefore a more acceptable risk.
What will the time before a vaccine look like? Crappy. Horrible response in the U.S. Way too many unnecessary deaths. Fall will be awful.
Chance that the early vaccines turn out to be unsafe or don’t pan out? Possible but low.
Will people be able to trust what they hear from the FDA or Trump administration? It’s an issue. Will you? Likely. Will look at the data. Would you take a vaccine? Depends on the data. Expect there to be data before approval? Yes. Will you speak out no matter what? Yes.
This felt like a realistic glimpse into the future: continuously better. Not one dramatic moment. No “life before vaccine” or “life after vaccine.” But gradual changes.
The major takeaway. There absolutely is a light at the end of the tunnel even if it’s hard to see sometimes. Even if our leaders have made this harder. Even if it’s very dispiriting.
The hard things will pass if we’re patient (which is hard) and pass more quickly if we make tougher decisions. I know the marathon is harder to run when you don’t know what mile you’re at. But if you count on and help others, I view it better as a relay race.
Two weeks after Donald Trump held an in-person rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, COVID-19 cases are surging in that city. Since the rally, the number of new cases has more than tripled, setting new records highs.
This, despite the fact that the rally fizzled, attended by less than a third of the capacity of the venue. The Trump campaign had even built an outdoor stage for the expected overflow crowds, which never materialized.
Another day, another killer ad from the Lincoln Project. This one goes after the GOP senators who were too chickenshit to say no to Donald Trump, and instead repeatedly kissed his rear and enabled the destruction of our country.
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Donald Trump says that the cure must not be worse than the disease, and is trying very hard to jump-start the US economy by eliminating public health interventions, including reopening most retail businesses, eliminating quarantines, and (strangely enough) discouraging the wearing of masks. Now they are even trying to force schools to reopen in the fall.
The result in terms of deaths is beyond dispute. US states that reopened prematurely (even as COVID-19 cases were rising), such as Florida, South Carolina, Texas, and Arizona, have seen dramatic surges in both deaths and new cases.
The only remaining question is whether taking drastic health measures to reduce the spread of the pandemic hurts the economy. Or to put it more bluntly, is the cure really worse than the disease? Unfortunately, there is now strong evidence that the answer is no, you cannot trade lives for jobs.
The evidence comes from the fact that when the pandemic reached Scandinavia, Sweden had a very different response than its neighbors Norway, Denmark, and Finland. These four countries are all rather similar to each other, so this becomes a good comparison of their respective responses.
Sweden, unlike the other countries, did not impose social distancing, they left businesses such as restaurants, schools, playgrounds, and gyms open, and didn’t restrict larger gatherings of people. They depended on their citizens to voluntarily take measures to reduce the spread of the disease. In comparison, other Scandinavian countries opted for strict quarantines, banning large groups, and locking down shops and restaurants.
The result? Per million people, Sweden has suffered 12 times more deaths than Norway, seven times more than Finland, and six times more than Denmark. That’s a dramatic (and heartbreaking) increase in deaths. They’ve even had 40% more deaths than the United States, because at least some US states imposed lock-downs and other restrictions on their citizens.
So did these dramatic increases in deaths in Sweden save jobs and paychecks? Sadly, we now know the answer is no.
They literally gained nothing. It’s a self-inflicted wound, and they have no economic gains.
Letting the economy run unimpeded, Sweden still suffered economic damage the same as its neighbors. Sweden is on track for its economy to contract by 4.5%, and the unemployment rate is currently 9%. In Denmark, the economy will contract by 4.1%, and unemployment is 5.6%.
Norway imposed aggressive measures when the pandemic first started, but that allowed them to relax these measures earlier. As a result, their economy is expected to see a more rapid economic return to normalcy. Norway’s economy will contract by only 3.9%. Taking dramatic measures early not only saves lives, it actually helps the economy.
Bottom line:
It is simplistic to portray government actions such as quarantines as the cause of economic damage. The real culprit is the virus itself. From Asia to Europe to the Americas, the risks of the pandemic have disrupted businesses while prompting people to avoid shopping malls and restaurants, regardless of official policy.
The economic damage from the coronavirus is likely to be even worse in the US than in Sweden:
Collectively, Scandinavian consumers are expected to continue spending far more robustly than in the United States, said Thomas Harr, global head of research at Danske Bank, emphasizing those nations’ generous social safety nets, including national health care systems. Americans, by contrast, tend to rely on their jobs for health care, making them more cautious about their health and their spending during the pandemic, knowing that hospitalization can be a gateway to financial calamity.
In addition, the Trump administration did not take advantage of the shutdown time to ramp up testing and contact tracing. Instead of creating national guidelines for fighting the virus, they sent out confusing and mixed messages, and even claimed there was nothing to worry about. On top of those fatal mistakes, they are now opening up the country recklessly. The result is that we already lead the world in cases and deaths, and it will only get worse.
The NY Times got an early copy of the book by Mary Trump, Donald Trump’s only niece, titled “Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man”. They just published an article about it.
The book answers a question that I’ve wondered about Donald Trump: how did he get into the prestigious Wharton Business School? He cheated, including hiring someone else to take the SAT test for him, and having his older sister do his homework. The book says our president practices “cheating as a way of life.”
According to Mary Trump, “By the time this book is published, hundreds of thousands of American lives will have been sacrificed on the altar of Donald’s hubris and wilful ignorance. If he is afforded a second term, it would be the end of American democracy.”
UPDATE: A similar, but longer article in CNN. And another in WaPo. And OMG the Lincoln Project has come out with a devastating new ad about this:
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