I’ve been accused more than once of being cynical and of imputing the worst motives in every action of those I dislike. I suppose that’s fair – I’m certainly no better than most people in that particular category of failing. And I’m sure that fans of Donald Trump (yes, I’m looking at YOU) will take issue with what I have to say in this post, just as they are likely to frown at the title and decry it as a cheap shot. Again, it’s a fair cop. I think after what we’ve gone through over the last three and a half years, we’re due a few cheap shots, right? Friends can disagree on that point. As it happens, I take little interest in stories of the president’s personal boorishness, such as some of what is currently being reported with respect to his niece Mary Trump’s new book. Tales of his moronic sexism are as unsurprising as they are nauseating. He said his young niece was “stacked” – shocker! More evidence that he’s a titanic douche. Moving on.
No, I’m guessing that Trump supporters, if they read this blog, would take issue with my contention that the president doesn’t care about what happens to most COVID-19 victims … perhaps more than they would with my observation that he’s fat. Here again, it’s just acknowledgement of an obvious fact. If Trump cared what happened to COVID victims, he would do something about the pandemic (other than brag incoherently about how well he’s handling it). He is not doing anything to prevent these deaths, and in fact is going out of his way to advocate for policies and practices that will result in further spread of the disease. He lies about it incessantly, has done from the beginning, and attempts to push off responsibility for fighting the pandemic on other people, politicians, countries, etc. Why? Why would a president not want to preserve more lives?
I think the answer’s pretty obvious. Trump only cares about how things affect him personally. The people being killed by this virus are overwhelmingly drawn from communities that are less likely to support his re-election. The death rate for African Americans is more than twice that of whites. Indigenous and Latinx are dying at higher rates as well. Frankly, Trump doesn’t give a shit about those people. If more of them drop dead, there will be less of them marking a ballot for his opponent. Trump’s friend Bolsonaro offers an even more crass example of this – COVID is absolutely tearing through indigenous communities, the same people Brazil’s insane clown president thought should have been wiped out even more back in the days of conquest. Trump is a hair more subtle, but it doesn’t take Kreskin to work out his campaign calculus with regard to COVID victims. Fewer old white people, yes, but many, many fewer black people. What you lose on the milk you make back on the oranges.
What can we do? Defeat Trump in November, among many other things. This crisis has cast so many societal problems in stark relief – it’s clear what we need to do, and getting rid of Fat Donnie would be a good first step.
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Of course, the North Charleston Police Department would likely have stuck to the police officer’s original story if the video hadn’t surfaced; that Scott had grabbed the officer’s taser, that he had posed a threat to the officer’s life, that the cops had administered CPR in some kind of timely fashion. Feidin Santana’s video put the lie to all of that, and in so doing, threw into question every official claim of following proper police procedures. Those initial reports sounded like what we heard after Michael Brown’s shooting. But then, so did the web cam video that captured the police killing of 12-year-old Tamir Rice. Has anyone gone to jail over that? Not yet.