OPINION: Maddening week in the United States
Foment unrest
Our President has shown a total lack of empathy or sympathy for those affected by the COVID-19. His focus is on the “stock market” and creating “chaos” instead of focusing on the heart of the nation, the 735,287 infected individuals and the 39,000+ who have perished.
This week we saw the President of the United States, Donald Trump, suggest that the citizens of three states (Michigan, Minnesota and Virginia) foment unrest via his media outlet of choice, Twitter.
Washington State’s Governor Jay Inslee issued a statement in response, which in a nutshell noted that the President is acting in an unhinged manner, which “encouraged illegal and dangerous acts” and “fomenting domestic rebellion.”
The context of course is President Trump’s desire to bring the economy of the country back online – who doesn’t want this?
His irresponsible manner in pushing forward the transition will, due to basic biology, cause many more of our citizens to become infected with COVID due to lack of widespread testing.
What we saw instead was rallies and protests (both legal, but imprudent) where individuals arrived, some of them armed, to demonstrate that they wished to no longer stay in their residences and keep themselves and others safe. The media showed thousands on the streets in multiple locales. What the media didn’t show, and perhaps should have, is that these individuals represent a miniscule portion of our population and that the vast majority of the population is working as one, through self-isolation and limited engagement at flattening the curve of the spread of the COVID infection.
From where I sit, he demonstrates his lack of leadership via his daily faux-COVID updates. These marathon events are in reality infomercials, where he disparages those who don’t genuflect at his feet or shower him with praise.
The man was sworn in January 2017, the year is 2020 – he owns everything about the preparedness or lack of preparedness of the nation as he has been president for 3+ years. The old saw of blaming President Obama’s administration no longer holds water – the first 100 days a president may use that excuse, after that, as Harry Truman would often say, the “buck stops” at the desk of the President.
Testing for COVID
The White House press secretary, Kayliegh McEnany, shares hollow statistics, championing how the United States has conducted more than 4 million tests for COVID (the number is closer to 3,730,027 according to worldometers) . Which is about one percent (1%) of the population.
If we lack a means to test, trace and isolate, we will blindly be sending individuals back into the work force and negating much of the personal sacrifice the majority of the nation has been making these past 60 days, self-distancing, self-isolation, loss of employment (22 million and counting) and hunger (read how you can assist those who are food insecure).
Senator Warren sums it up in her commentary on the need to have tens of millions of tests, not tens of thousands prior to returning to business as usual.
25th Amendement
Asha Rangappa, law professor at Yale University and former FBI Special Agent summed up the situation concisely.
The President is more concerned about optics than he is about keeping you and me alive.
It’s now time we, as a nation, put pressure upon the Vice President to display some backbone and bring forward the discussion on Section 4 of the 25th Amendment, to the United States Constitution. The discussion may persuade the President to cease his fomenting of unrest.
Red Folder
A little over two weeks ago, my wife and I published both a hard-copy of Red Folder ($17.95 at Amazon) AND a no cost option (pdf and doc) via download.
In the ensuing 17 days we are pleased to report 775 copies of the Red Folder has been downloaded – a value of ~$13,500 have been given away.
If you don’t have your Red Folder in hand, get your copy now.
Click to play and learn about Red Folder