Why would Donald Trump and many of his acolytes want to blame Chinese people for creating COVID-19? Why make this claim where there is no evidence to support the claim and where the U.S. national intelligence director’s office said it had determined Covid-19 “was not manmade or genetically modified.” I would suggest the following three reasons:
- Because Trump and Mike Pence are proudly ignorant of science. . Relatedly, Trump has expressed skepticism about the use of vaccines. Pence is hostile to the scientific theory of evolution by natural selection. And see here.
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Due to their hostility to science, Trump and Pence are not likely to entertain the possibility that the coronavirus could have evolved naturally, despite the fact that viruses do evolve and the fact that coronavirus did, in fact, evolve naturally.
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Because Trump and Pence have established themselves as xenophobes, they would be inclined to blame “outsiders,” i.e., the Chinese, for the coronavirus.
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Erich:
It’s far more sinister than you think.
Trump has a time proven three step process he engages in when he steps in it or trips on his wanker.
Deny, Distract, distort.
Denial is blanket in its initial phase then comes well, if he did it , others do it or it wasn’t wrong, illegal or was “locker room talk.”
Distraction is the phase where Trump says others did it like “it’s a Democrat[sic] hoax,” or It’s Obama’s fault!” “It’s -fill in the blank’s fault!” Trump blames “enemies” or the “Deep State.”
Distortion is the ultimate and complete bat shit crazy phase where chaos is introduced with the intent to so roil the waters with false conflations, false dichotomies, false equivalencies and outright magical and insane thinking to create chaos and make “truth” a tribal decision rather than one based upon objectively verifiable facts. This phase is critical to firming the base and ANYTHING may be said. Eric Trump is now out there claiming that the entire COVID-19 pandemic is a “Democrat plot to keep my father from holding rallies” so Trump is denied his “greatest strength” of serial Nuremberg-style rallies filmed by Trump’s version of Leni Riefenstahl.
Trump, Republicans and the chemical and biological war profiteering industries got together and passed a bill to centralize all disaster response and preparedness in a politically appointed and Republican Senate confirmed HHS Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (ASPR). The legislation took control of the Strategic National Stockpile from the civilian experts at CDC and gave the $7 billion Stockpile budget to a Trump appointee confirmed by the Republican Senate. Remember, “It’s OUR stockpile!”
Trump appointed Dr. Robert Kadlec as HHS ASPR. Kadlec was a retired Cold Warrior who was convinced the only credible threat to the U.S. from any diseases were those made and weaponized by man, smallpox and anthrax. Kadlec duped all the preparation, response, and money into fighting biological weapons and bought $2.8 billion in smallpox vaccines and another $533 million in disease disaster preparedness from his old boss and business partner. Kadlec increased the budgets to fight chemical and biological weapons of mass destruction by some 30-40 percent or more and, most critically, zeroed out the ASPR budget of $250,000,000.00 for fighting an emerging disease like COVID-19.
Kadlec was formally on the record as saying that such a disease would not and could not be created by Mother Nature as early as 2011 in testimony to Congress. Kadlec not only zeroed out the budget to fight emerging diseases like COVID-19 but, ignored an after-action report for an exercise gaming a COVID-19 like pandemic and showing the lack of preparedness we have in N95 masks, PPE, ventilators and infrastructure to fight such a pandemic. Kadlec was specifically warned by Congress and disease control experts that if a COVID-19 style pandemic hit the U.S., the numbers of infections and those killed could be in the millions. Kadlec not only ignored the people warning him of his folly to abandon preparations and response to a COVID-19 style pandemic but, he took steps to actively gut the left-in-place efforts of the Obama administration for fighting such a disease, including canceling a $35 million contract of a machine which could make 1.5 million N95 masks per day. Kadlec now pays that same company $62.3 million for N95 masks.
When Dr. Richard Bright, a world famous vaccine expert, wouldn’t toe the line on Trump’s repeated illegal medical quackery on TV, and would not stop complaining about misplaced priorities and corruption and cronyism by ASPR, Kadlec transferred the good doctor from leading our efforts to make a COVID-19 vaccine “to the North Pole.” Dr. Bright filed a “whistle blower” complaint which the HHS IG has initially found to be ‘substantially credible.” My guess is that fool will be fired by Trump and HHS Secretary Azar, asap.
Kadlec is a complete creature of politics and the chemical and biological war profiteering industries. Kadlec is convinced of his own omniscience and a complete Trump loyalist. Kadlec has given out billions in contracts to his friends, former bosses and business partners and GOP operatives and mega-donors. Kadlec, canned our best and brightest vaccine expert for purely personal, partisan reasons to benefit the Trump and Republicans’ 2020 election efforts. Kadlec, with both the support and approval of Trump and the Republicans, intentionally left us all exposed as they bet our 329,000,000 lives that the next disease disaster to hit the U.S. would be man-made and NOT an emerging disease pandemic like COVID-19.
WE lost their bet. The first COVID-19 case was on January 20, 2020 in Washington state . A million and a half infections and nearly a hundred thousand dead Americans later, Trump, Kadlec, and Republicans still have no plan to test, trace and isolate to stem the onslaught of the COVID-19 pandemic in the U.S. Trump and Republicans want to “re-open” the economy despite having done nothing yet to stop the pandemic. But, we do have millions of doses of smallpox and anthrax vaccines!
The U.S. leads the world in both the numbers of infected and those killed by the COVID-19 pandemic. Trump HAS to blame China for the COVID-19 pandemic. Otherwise, it will come out that Trump, Kadlec, Republicans and the chemical and biological war profiteering industries completely abandoned the 329,000,000 plus citizens of America to millions of COVID-19 infections, and possibly millions of COVID-19 related deaths.
Trump, Kadlec, Republicans and the chemical and biological war profiteering industries placed their bet of OUR lives on Kadlec’s corrupt ego, and WE lost.
Folks, it’s time for the torches and pitchforks!