A Spoonful of Clorox

When viral symptoms underlie
There are home remedies to try.
You find the one that works
And snap! You're safe.

And every product 'neath your sink
Might be a medicine to drink.
No need for tests, the president suggests .....

That a spoonful of Clorox makes your temperature go down
Your temperature go down-wown
Temperature go down.
Just a spoonful of Clorox makes your temperature go down
It's the latest Covid craze.

A politician who distracts
Has very little time for facts.
The scientists he's hired are perplexed.
While Dr. Birx is 'bout to barf
And hang herself with her own scarf
He diatribes and recklessly prescribes.

That some Pledge on your pancakes makes coronavirus pass
Coronavirus pass-ass
If it gives you gas.
Try some bleach in your beer
And shove a flashlight up your ass.
Heal yourself with UV rays.

Our president is no MD,
He only plays one on TV,
But of medical advice he's always full.
A little Drano in your cup
Will clear your sinuses right up
And quench your thirst unless it kills you first.

Slap your mom with a Swifter
'Til her temperature goes down
Her temperature goes down-wown
Temperature goes down.
Spray your boyfriend with Lysol
'Til he's six feet underground.
It's the latest Covid craze.

Since it's improbable you'll win with your hydroxychloroquine
Splash some Windex in your wine and you'll resolve.
And you won't likely get a pill
From Dr. Oz or Dr. Phil.
There's no
Vacine
So try some Mr. Clean.

Ooh-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h ooh!

Just a spoonful of Clorox makes your temperature go down
In the most destructive ways

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
A Randy Rainbow Song Parody     04/25/2020

No PR Act

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer is planning to push for a provision in the next coronavirus package that would stop President Donald Trump from putting his name on any additional stimulus checks.

The so-called No PR Act would prohibit the use of federal dollars toward any material that promotes Trump or Vice President Mike Pence’s names or signatures.

“President Trump unfortunately appears to see the pandemic as just another opportunity to promote his own political interests,” the New York Democrat said in a statement. “The No PR Act puts an end to the president’s exploitation of taxpayer money for promotional material that only benefits his re-election campaign.”

Schumer’s proposal comes after the Treasury Department ordered that Trump’s name appear on millions of stimulus checks sent out by the Internal Revenue Service, following the passage of a $2 trillion rescue package in March. Critics said the signature seemed designed to make it appear as if the money was due solely to the beneficence of the president.

Life's a Bleach

President Trump was angry after a day of punishing headlines Friday, largely about his comment at
the previous evening's briefing wondering if it would be helpful to inject disinfectant into people to fight the coronavirus. That idea drew loud warnings from health experts who said the idea was dangerous. Trump answered questions from reporters on Friday and claimed that his suggestion about disinfectant had been “sarcastic." That doesn't square with a transcript of his remarks.

In the aftermath of ridicule and alarm over Trump’s comments about the use of disinfectants to perhaps clean out the coronavirus from the human body, the White House first claimed on Friday that the comments were taken out of context.

Then, just hours later, Trump had a new walk back. “I was asking a question sarcastically to reporters like you just to see what would happen,” he said to a pool gathered at a White House meeting.

The problem is his comments, made during his nightly briefing on Thursday, certainly were not interpreted as sarcastic. They also beg the question of why, in the midst of a pandemic, when the stakes are so much, much higher, the president would be using the press conference to joke or riff so casually about potential treatments.

Fox News (which favors Trump) anchor Bret Baier told viewers that “it didn’t seem like he was being sarcastic when he was talking.” CNN anchor Anderson Cooper said, “Now he’s in like, Soviet fashion, trying to rewrite what we all know and saw as though we are morons.”

By Friday morning, a number of medical professionals were still dumbfounded at the crazy idea of even suggesting the ingestion of a disinfectant as a treatment — as even small doses can kill. Most household products are labeled with those warnings. Lysol and the Environmental Protection Agency issued guidance warning against it.

Paul Levinson, professor of communication at Fordham University, said via email that “it doesn’t matter if Trump’s disinfectant advice was taken in or out of context. First of all, not everyone watches the entire or even a big part of his press conferences,” Levinson wrote. “Some people, even many people, may tune in and just hear Trump say we should get disinfectant inside our bodies. That’s all they hear, and that’s terribly dangerous advice.” He added, “In general, a rule of thumb in communicating about serious subjects is try to never say anything that can be misunderstood. The more serious the topic, the more crucial that is. When it comes to this deadly pandemic, there’s nothing more serious these days on the face of the Earth.”

“People expect presidents to speak with authority all the time,” said Edward Frantz, a presidential historian at the University of Indianapolis. “You can’t pick and choose the times as president when you are going to act presidential ... and then say to the public, ‘You’re supposed to understand I was being sarcastic.’”

He Wants It Both Ways

To hear President Trump tell it, it is simply ridiculous to expect that the federal government of the United States should be operating drive-up coronavirus testing facilities in big-box-store parking lots.

On April 13, he ridiculed the idea, disparaging governors (who he identified as Democrats) who wanted the federal government to provide more help with testing capacity.
“Washington shouldn’t be doing that,” he said the next day. “We can’t be thinking about a Walmart parking lot that’s 2,000 miles away where we’re doing testing, but a governor of a state can, and a mayor can, and right down the line.”

He said something similar April 15. And on April 16. And on April 22. Over and over, Trump has disparaged the idea that the federal government should be figuring out whether there should be a testing facility outside a Target in whatever state.

But . . . . .

It was Trump himself who first raised the idea of having testing facilities in parking lots.

“We’ve been in discussions with pharmacies and retailers to make drive-through tests available in the critical locations identified by public health professionals,” Trump said March 13. “The goal is for individuals to be able to drive up and be swabbed without having to leave your car.”

The federal government has been very active in providing localized resources for states — and Trump’s been happy to take credit. For instance, on more than two dozen occasions over the past three weeks, Trump has boasted about how the military built field hospitals under his direction.

On the other hand, he has simultaneously sought to take credit for the country’s coronavirus testing capacity — while demanding that states bear accountability for any complaints about it. There’s an aspect of all that testing that Trump downplays when he’s bragging about it: It’s being conducted at the state level. Only a smattering of the tests have been completed by the federal government.

Trump wants all of the following:

• Credit for the number of tests being conducted nationally
• No blame for limits on testing at the state level
• Credit for an increase in economic activity, and
• No blame for outbreaks that derive from insufficient testing as distancing measures are scaled back.

So tests overall are a sign of success and tests at a state level are nothing to do with him.

“Again, testing is local,” Trump said Sunday. “You can’t have it both ways. Testing is a local thing. And it’s very important. It’s great. But it’s a local thing."

Except that Trump also crows about how “we’re doing testing at a level nobody has ever done before.” He said that Sunday, too — about 15 seconds after he said that testing was a local thing.

You can’t have it both ways.  Unless you’re President Trump.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
The Washington Post     04/24/2020

Blame WHO?

At a press conference on April 14, Trump explained his reasons for withholding money to the World Health Organization. “The reality is that the WHO failed to adequately obtain, vet, and share information in a timely and transparent fashion…. The delays the WHO experienced in declaring a public health emergency,” Trump said “cost valuable time, tremendous amounts of time…. The WHO has not addressed a single one of these concerns nor provided a serious explanation that acknowledges its own mistakes.”

Sounds hypocritical.

The WHO declared a global epidemic on January 20

Trump made his epidemic declaration on March 13

He completely skipped February.

There’s a good reason the Cuban Missile Crisis wasn’t solved by the Beverly Hillbillies. 

Reaction from experts:

“Trump has a penchant for rewriting history,” Adam Kamradt-Scott, a professor of global health at the University of Sydney says. “So it’s not surprising to see him blaming the WHO for mistakes ultimately attributable to his own administration.”

“WHO is not responsible for America not heeding the warnings of its own scientists and security apparatus — for two months,” says Ashish Jha, a professor at Harvard. “That’s laughable.”

The United States Treasury proudly presents the Donald J Trump commemorative coronavirus check. Each check is emblazoned with Donald Trump's actual signature and features a dramatic image of the president punching the virus in the face. Each check is lovingly dated April 1st in memory of the date the president assured us this crisis would miraculously go away. So commemorate everything the president didn't do. Order your coronavirus check signed by Donald Trump today. Please allow 10 to 12 weeks for delivery or longer if his hand cramps up.

portions of this from The Late Show with Stephen Colbert     04/15/2020

Trump Backs off -- Then Whammies WHO

Trump appeared to back off his claim of absolute authority to decide when the time was right when states could re-open. He said the concerns of governors about his assertion of power would amount to an insurrection. Hours later Trump abruptly reversed course, saying he would leave it to governors to determine the right time and manner to revive activity in their states.

“The governors are responsible,” Trump said Tuesday. “They have to take charge.” [More than likely he said this so if anything goes wrong he can point his finger away from himself.] Still, he insisted, “The governors will be very, very respectful of the presidency.” [One should be respectful of others if he wants respect for himself.]

Also on Tuesday, Trump instructed his administration to temporarily halt funding to the World Health Organization (WHO) over its handling of the coronavirus pandemic. [How can we halt HIM over his mishandling of the situation?] Trump said the WHO “failed in its basic duty and it must be held accountable.” He said it promoted China's “disinformation” about the virus that likely led to a wider outbreak.

Dr. Patrice Harris, American Medical Association president, called it “a dangerous step in the wrong direction that will not make defeating COVID-19 easier” and urged Trump to reconsider. Dr. Amesh Adalja, an infectious disease expert at Johns Hopkins University, said the WHO does make mistakes, but “It's not the middle of a pandemic that you do this type of thing.”

“This is nothing more than a transparent attempt by President Trump to distract from his history downplaying the severity of the coronavirus crisis and his administration’s failure to prepare our nation,” said Leslie Dach, chair of Protect Our Care.

“With each passing day of this worsening crisis, the president is showing us his political playbook: blame the WHO, blame China, blame his political opponents, blame his predecessors—do whatever it takes to deflect from the fact that his administration mismanaged this crisis and it’s now costing thousands of American lives,” Eliot Engel (NY-D), Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

Furthermore, “It seems almost every day the president thinks this crisis resolves around him, and his desires, his needs, his enemies.” -- Senator Chuck Schumer (NY-D). “How is it going to make the country better by going after the WHO one day, or the press one day, or the governors one day or [Speaker Nancy] Pelosi one day or me one day. That seems to [be] where his energy is.”  Schumer goes on to say, “It seems too much of what he says, does and thinks about is about himself.”

News Conference: April 13

Today on The View, former Governor Chris Christie (NJ-R) talked about yesterday’s Coronavirus news conference.

The Press has been in a death spiral that the president participates in. It hurts both of them. The questions are often combative and “gotcha.”  His response at times is beneath what he should be doing.  I’ve said to him any number of times that his press briefings should be much shorter .... he should leave it to his team. I don’t think it helps the president in the long run to be in a hand-to-hand combat with any member of the media. Also, the media has some measure of responsibility as well for some of the things that they do. So, unfortunately, I think they’re both hurting the situation here. The president should be shorter, and the media should stick to topics that are direct and that the people want to know the answers to.

I have to agree with Christie.  The press does try to catch Trump up, partly because of his reactions.  And because it’s so easy to do because Trump just invents things.

Stephen Colbert. (Some of this is said for laughs):  It is clear that Trump is over his head. And I am not the only one who feels that way. Evidently so does Donald Trump because at the beginning of the spread of the coronavirus President Trump reportedly felt shell-shocked and deflated. One reporter described him as “subdued” and “baffled” by how the crisis had played out. And for weeks he did nothing even though Axios counted 10 times Trump and his administration were warned about coronavirus. Not to mention CNN's sounding the alarm twenty-four hours a day. It’s the classic children’s story “The Boy Who Cried Wolf.”

Right now Trump is talking about ending the stay-at-home order by May 1. He says he’s not sure what he is going to do. On Friday a reporter asked Trump how he is going to make this difficult decision. [Trump pointed to his head and said] “The metrics are right here.”

Colbert continues: Here’s the point: Reopening the country is not up to Trump. Because from the very beginning Trump has left all the hard decisions in fighting coronavirus to the individual states. Even on Friday he was boasting on his buck-passing. “I like to allow governors to make decisions without overruling them. Because from a constitutional standpoint that’s the way it should be done.”

Right now a lot of governors are coordinating when to lift quarantines. But Trump wants to be the only hero who opens things back up.

Colbert: Reopening the country is not up to you because you did not have the balls to shut the country down in the first place. You were the one who said you were just a cheerleader. You put yourself on the sidelines. Cheerleaders don’t get a Super Bowl trophy. In fact, they barely get paid. They’re just supposed to look good and to spell words right, and you can’t do either.

The Late Show with Stephen Colbert     04/13/2020

Total Authority

President Trump flexed his executive power and claimed that he has total authority over the reopening of states impacted by the coronavirus pandemic. Trump made the remarks at a White House news conference today, which reiterated tweets from him earlier in the day in which he said that reopening states was not up to governors but “is the decision of the president.”

“The president of the United States has the authority to do what the president has the authority to do, which is very powerful. The president of the United States calls the shots,” Trump said. “They can’t do anything without the approval of the president of the United States.”

One reporter brought up the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution that orders powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people. “When somebody is the president of the United States, the authority is total, and that's the way it's got to be. It’s total, and the governors know that,” Trump said during the news conference.

But when it comes to a public health crisis like the one we are facing today, states have quite a bit of say. Because the effect of an infectious disease on a locality is generally better understood by local authorities, states have had the power to decide when and how to contain illness at the local level.

Robert Chesney, a professor of national security law, said last month that the president simply cannot override state-mandated “shelter in place” orders issued during the coronavirus crisis. That would be unconstitutional. “He is free to advocate,” Chesney said.

My own observation:  Trump was not willing to make a national stay-at-home order.  He now says he will know “in his head” when the time is right.

Approval Ratings

Ya think?

April 9, 2020

President Donald Trump's job approval has taken a negative turn as a growing number of Americans harbor doubts about his handling of the coronavirus crisis. After seeing a late-March spike as the pandemic ravaged the U.S., his approval ratings have fallen back to the mid-40-percent range, where they were before the death toll and jobless claims exploded.

The latest numbers suggest the surge in job approval that presidents tend to enjoy during a crisis was modest and short-lived for Trump. New polls this week by Quinnipiac, Reuters and CNN all find disapproval of Trump's handling of the coronavirus rising to a majority of Americans.

Trump's messaging strategy has been to portray himself as a wartime president leading the country to victory. The president has led televised briefings on the pandemic almost every day, flanked by medical specialists and top officials at the White House podium. But he has tended to veer off-topic into a rally-like atmosphere with a mixture of self-congratulation, derisive nicknames to mock political rivals, blaming his predecessor for recent failures in COVID-19 testing, picking fights with reporters, and issuing a stream of dubious or false assertions.

Hopefully voters will have long memories when November rolls around.

Former Candidates Speak

The Late Show with Stephen Colbert      04/08/2020

Bernie Sanders: "I will do everything that I can to make sure that Donald Trump is not re-elected. I believe that Trump has been the most dangerous president in the modern history of this country. And we're seeing his narcissism and his ignorance playing out in terms of the pandemic we're experiencing right now."

 

The View      04/09/2020

Pete Buttigieg: "A lot of folks, I think, in 2016 took their ball and went home not believing a Trump presidency could actually happen. Not only did it happen, it's worse than we thought. We're seeing now, in the midst of a national crisis, just how costly that is. Donald Trump is not going to change, and crises will continue to come. He does not get up in the morning thinking about how he can make life better for other people or how America can become a more decent place. He just doesn't and he won't and that's not going to change. So let's remember what's at stake."