In the 1997 film “The Postman,” set in post-apocalyptic America, Kevin Costner plays a drifter trying to restore order to the United States by providing one essential service, mail delivery. In the story, hate crimes, racially motivated attacks and a plague have caused the breakdown of society as we know it. In his quest to restore order and dignity to the nation, the Postman tries to recruit other postal workers to help rebuild the U.S. government. But Costner’s character is opposed by the evil General Bethlehem, who is fighting to suppress the postal carriers so he can establish a totalitarian government. Fortunately, our hero, gaining inspiration from the motto, “neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night,” fights on against Bethlehem and saves the country.
Not surprisingly, the movie was panned by critics and was a financial disaster. I mean really, racial strife and a plague so bad that it threatened our society? And even if that happened, who would try to destroy the Postal Service? Where do they come up with these crazy plots?
His conclusion is inescapable:
Today, as we struggle with social upheaval, soaring debt, record unemployment, a runaway pandemic, and rising threats from China and Russia, President Trump is actively working to undermine every major institution in this country. He has planted the seeds of doubt in the minds of many Americans that our institutions aren’t functioning properly. And, if the president doesn’t trust the intelligence community, law enforcement, the press, the military, the Supreme Court, the medical professionals, election officials and the postal workers, then why should we? And if Americans stop believing in the system of institutions, then what is left but chaos and who can bring order out of chaos: only Trump. It is the theme of every autocrat who ever seized power or tried to hold onto it.
A new ad from the Republican Voters Against Trump features the former Chief of Staff for Donald Trump’s Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
He published an even more damning article in the Washington Post today. He says that Trump turned DHS “into a tool used for his political benefit.” In particular there was “a near-total focus on issues that he said were central to his reelection”.
“What we saw week in and week out, for me, after two and a half years in that administration, was terrifying. We would go in to try to talk to him about a pressing national security issue — cyberattack, terrorism threat — he wasn’t interested in those things.”
“Trump showed vanishingly little interest in subjects of vital national security interest, including cybersecurity, domestic terrorism and malicious foreign interference in U.S. affairs.”
Even worse was the president’s response to the coronavirus pandemic. “In his cavalier disregard for the seriousness of the threat, Trump failed to make effective use of the federal crisis response system painstakingly built after 9/11. Years of DHS planning for a pandemic threat have been largely wasted. Meanwhile, more than 165,000 Americans have died.”
Even though he is still a Republican, he says that he has to support Joe Biden for president because he knows that Biden will keep us safe. And four more years of Trump “are unthinkable”.
Donald Trump’s attempt to throw the election by destroying the US Post Office is already backfiring. Here are articles from a number of key swing states:
Arizona Republic: “Postal Service warns 46 states about ballot delays”
Miami Herald: “USPS warns Florida some of its mail ballots could be rejected”
Remember that 91% of Americans have a favorable view of the US Post Office, which is higher than that of any other federal agency. Many Trump supporters depend on the USPS for medicines, social security checks, or other critical needs.
Donald Trump has nothing left to run his campaign on, except fear and hatred. As they say, will he be able to fool America twice? If he does, then shame on us.
President Trump, of course, long ago redefined what constitutes normal in the White House, but with 77 days left in a campaign that polls show he is losing, he is pushing all the boundaries at once. At the same time the champion of birtherism is again scraping the raw edges of America’s divisions over race, gender and national origin, he is propelling fringe ideas into mainstream conversation. And now, running as the incumbent, he has levers of power available to help salvage a flagging campaign.
Yet what once would have caused jaws to drop barely seems to register for long at this point because it is so quickly overshadowed by the next norm-busting statement or action.
At 11:09 p.m., just 15 minutes after posting on Twitter a statement mourning the death of his younger brother, he retweeted a message urging the abandonment of cities that he, as president, represents. “Leave Democrat cities,” the message read. “Let them rot.”
Filed in Hypocrisy|Comments Off on Welcome to the Future!
I assume that only people who have been avoiding the news don’t know that the Republicans are trying to throw the election by screwing with the US Postal Service. Trump has literally admitted it.
In only took a couple of days for Donald Trump to start spreading rumors that Kamala Harris does not meet the constitutional qualifications to be Vice President (and President for that matter). You know, like he did about Barack Obama during Obama’s presidency.
He is so predictable. I guess in Trump’s deranged racist brain, if someone is black (even half black) then they can’t be president.
The Atlantic has an interesting (and somewhat depressing) article pointing out that it is likely that COVID-19 will be with us for a long time, or even indefinitely. That would make it similar to the flu, which comes back pretty much every year, and we are able to deal with it. The title is “The Coronavirus Is Never Going Away“.
They point out that SARS, which is closely related to COVID-19, “was snuffed out through intense isolation, contact tracing, and quarantine” and is no longer found in humans. But unlike SARS, COVID-19 can be spread by people who have no symptoms and don’t know they are infected, which makes it harder to eliminate.
Their conclusion?
The most likely scenario, experts say, is that the pandemic ends at some point — because enough people have been either infected or vaccinated — but the virus continues to circulate in lower levels around the globe. Cases will wax and wane over time. Outbreaks will pop up here and there. Even when a much-anticipated vaccine arrives, it is likely to only suppress but never completely eradicate the virus. (For context, consider that vaccines exist for more than a dozen human viruses but only one, smallpox, has ever been eradicated from the planet, and that took 15 years of immense global coordination.) We will probably be living with this virus for the rest of our lives.
The good news is that treatments and vaccines should make COVID-19 “much less dangerous and less disruptive”. But that will take time.
There are two good articles out recently, detailing exactly how Donald Trump screwed up the response to the Coronavirus, and his staff enabled him. You may think you already know all about that, but it is interesting to see it all laid out for you.
In Slate, “The Trump Pandemic, A blow-by-blow account of how the president killed thousands of Americans” by William Saletan.
In the Washington Post, “The lost days of summer: How Trump fell short in containing the virus” by Philip Rucker, Yasmeen Abutaleb, Josh Dawsey, and Robert Costa.
Yes, it is possible, and not even all that hard to defeat the coronavirus. New Zealand did it — they just celebrated 100 days (more than three months) without anyone inside NZ catching COVID-19. And all domestic restrictions were lifted… in June. No more social distancing, no more masks, the economy is fine, schools are open, almost everything back to normal.
How did they do it? If you’ve been paying attention, I’ll bet you already know the answers:
NZ locked down early, when it was easier to use contact tracing to find people who were exposed and isolate them. Nobody said stupid things like “it will just magically go away”.
They ramped up testing early. Nobody left it to local governments. They worked together.
They made sure that people would not violate isolation orders, which meant that they only needed to do it for a short time. Nobody decided to hold campaign rallies or motorcycle festivals.
They closed their borders, preventing anyone who is not a resident of NZ from arriving. And they tested all arrivals, and had them quarantine for two weeks.
Are you seeing a pattern here? NZ responded early, and enforced restrictions, which allowed them to return to normal much more quickly. In other words, they did the opposite of what Trump did.
Currently, NZ has 23 active coronavirus cases. All of them are residents who returned from abroad with the virus, and were promptly isolated. They are tested three times before they can leave.
They even have officers stationed by quarantine facilities to make sure nobody in isolation sneaks out. It might sound drastic, but keeping the spread contained meant that far fewer people had to be isolated, and with restrictions lifted in June, far less inconvenience for everyone.
Bottom line: New Zealand had 22 deaths from COVID-19. The US is currently at 165,617 deaths. Adjusting for population the US already has — per capita — 112 times the deaths of NZ, and we are still dying here.
New Zealand had 1,219 confirmed cases. The US has passed 5 million cases (and rising).
Today, Donald Trump signed several executive orders to provide economic relief for the coronavirus pandemic. Let’s ignore the fact that the constitution says that only Congress (and in particular the House) can allocate funds. Instead, Trump is going to redirect money from FEMA’s Disaster Relief Fund (DRF).
Meanwhile, here’s a headline from Fox News: “Most Active Hurricane Season on Record So Far”. They go on to say that even though we are only two months into the 2020 Atlantic Hurricane Season, it is already one of the most active on record, ever. But the DRF has far less money in it than needed for coronavirus relief, so it will be exhausted, leaving absolutely no money for hurricane relief. Oops!
Furthermore, and far worse, Trump directed the Treasury Secretary to defer payroll taxes. At the same time, the White House announced that if Trump is reelected, he plans to terminate the payroll tax permanently.
If you don’t know what payroll taxes do, you might be forgiven for thinking that sounds ok. Payroll taxes pay for Social Security and partly for Medicare. No more payroll tax means no more Social Security. And less money for Medicare, which will eventually kill that too.
Heather Cox Richardson had a great article yesterday about blatant corruption in the Trump administration. But what I found interesting was that she started the article with this sentence:
Trump dominated the news today, which is usually a sign of negative news stories and his need to create distractions from them.
Indeed, Trump had said all kinds of outrageous things, and the news media ate them up and talked about them non-stop. And most of them then didn’t publish the real news, which was that the inspector general for the state department resigned, effective today (even though he had been on the job less than three months). He didn’t give any reason for his departure, but it was probably because he was investigating that blatant corruption.
There was also even more corruption, including by Attorney General William Barr and by Lindsay Graham.
If you want to know more about that corruption, I suggest you read HCR’s column. But to me, the main point is that Trump is still able to manipulate the media by acting out. And we let him get away with it.
