Category Archives: medical news

medical news

Trump allies undercut POTUS’s positive COVID spin

For the life of me I do not know how you can possibly put a positive spin on more than 136,000 deaths from a worldwide pandemic in this country alone … but Donald John Trump is seeking to do precisely that.

It’s not working. Indeed, he now is getting pushback from his most loyal political allies, such as some of the Republican governors who opened their states up too quickly and now are paying a terrible political price for their rush to reopening.

You hear now from GOP Govs. Ron DeSantis in Florida, Greg Abbott here in Texas, even from Doug Ducey in Arizona. They are sounding downright alarmed at what’s happening in their states. Surgeon General Jerome Adams is pleading with Americans to “please, please, please” wear face masks while in public. Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina acknowledges a “testing shortage” in his state.

Then comes word that some senior GOP politicians are forgoing attendance at the Republican National Convention. Why? They don’t want to get sick. And yet Donald Trump insists that it’s OK to stage an event — now planned for Jacksonville, Fla. — that includes jam-packed arena space full of partisans yelling in favor of the guy they intend to nominate for a second term as president.

Were I in the GOP pols’ shoes, I’d stay away, too. As for Trump, he continues to claim stupidly the notion that the COVID-19 virus is “under control” and that more testing necessarily means more positive cases.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention officials have set some guidelines down for reopening of schools. Trump wants to ignore the CDC. Yet former CDC heads now proclaim that no president in history has politicized a pandemic the way Trump has done.

I am going to circle back to a point I made some time ago. I no longer am going to listen to, let alone heed, a single word that flies out of Trump’s mouth. His political ambition is standing directly in the way of anything resembling wisdom on how to respond to this crisis.

I am going to rely on the medical experts. If they tell me I should worry … I am going to worry. Now it appears that other politicians are listening to them as well and are turning away from the Bloviator in Chief.

medical news, national news

Open warfare over pandemic response?

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I can’t believe what I see unfolding before us.

It looks as though some members of Donald Trump’s administrative team are declaring open warfare against Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert over the tone of Fauci’s remarks describing the state of the battle under way against the COVID-19 pandemic.

They dislike Fauci’s brutal tone, which contrasts the happy talk that Trump is delivering. So, they want to sideline Fauci. They are keeping him away from the Oval Office, away from Donald Trump.

The president keeps insisting that public schools need to reopen fully this fall, despite the spiraling infection rate from the pandemic. Medical experts join Fauci in trying to tell Trump that school classrooms pose a serious threat to the health of students, their teachers and the family members of them all. Donald Trump is ignoring them, listening instead to the “sage advice” offered by talk show gasbags like Sean Hannity and game show hosts like Chuck Woolery, who proclaims that the COVID scare is a “lie.”

Meanwhile, the Trumpkin Corps is putting out opposition research on Anthony Fauci, the Ivy League-educated physician who has served six presidents of both political parties. Indeed, it was on President George W. Bush’s watch that Fauci led the effort to deliver HIV/AIDS research to Third World countries afflicted by that disease.

Now he’s being vilified as one who “makes mistakes”? He is not to be trusted? Dr. Fauci doesn’t “know what he’s talking about,” according to Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick?

Give me a break!

This internecine battle is one more startling example of the incompetence being demonstrated by Donald Trump’s administration as it wages what looks to many of us like a losing fight against a killer disease.

And … Trump wants to get rid of the nation’s leading expert on how to win that fight? Incredible!

education news, medical news, national news

Trump shows his ignorance yet again

Donald John “Ignoramus in Chief” Trump threatens to pull federal funds from public schools if they don’t reopen this fall, per his edict.

Sigh …

No, he is not going to do that. He has no authority to do anything of the sort. Donald Trump once again is showing us what he doesn’t know about the job to which he was elected … and from which I hope he gets booted out in about 120 days.

Fox News’ Chris Wallace challenged an assertion delivered by Education Secretary Betsy DeVos on Sunday. DeVos repeated Trump’s threat, to which Wallace told her that Congress appropriates federal funds for public schools. Wallace asked “Under what authority are you and the president going to unilaterally cut off funding, funding that’s been approved from Congress and most of the money goes to disadvantaged students or students with disabilities?” “You can’t do that,” he continued.

That means that Trump is out of the game.

DeVos didn’t answer the question directly. She couldn’t answer. Because she is as ignorant about government as Donald Trump. She did say, “Look, American investment in education is a promise to students and their families. If schools aren’t going to reopen and not fulfill that promise, they shouldn’t get the funds, and give it to the families to decide to go to a school that is going to meet that promise.”

Americans are getting sick from the COVID-19 pandemic in increasing numbers. That poses threats to students, teachers and their loved ones. Donald Trump’s demand that schools reopen this fall runs directly counter to the medical advice he is getting from the infectious disease experts with whom he has surrounded himself.

Oh, wait! He knows more than they do. Isn’t that what he has inferred … about anything?

medical news

White House going after Fauci

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It appears that the White House operatives have unsheathed the long knives and are sharpening them as they prepare to plunge them into Dr. Anthony Fauci’s back.

Think of this for just a moment.

The nation was struck by a global pandemic. The White House formed a response task force. It selected Dr. Fauci, one of the world’s premier infectious disease experts to be a leading source of research for the task force. Donald Trump chose Mike Pence to lead the task force. Trump and Pence then began a series of happy-talk riffs about the “fantastic” job they were doing to fight the pandemic. Fauci didn’t buy into it.

Fauci is concerned about the outbreak that is not subsiding. He has said so publicly and with considerable emphasis.

The White House is having none of it.

Admiral Brett Giroir, a physician and a member of the pandemic task force, appeared today on “Meet the Press” and said Fauci has been wrong in his assessment. He is the latest White House official to pile onto Fauci.

Excuse me for chiming in, but I am far more wiling to accept Dr. Fauci’s brutal honesty than listen to the politically driven propaganda being spouted by the White House.

Anthony Fauci is the expert in the room. The politicians who run the task force need to put the long knives away and let the good doctor continue to tell us the truth.

medical news

What took so long, Mr. POTUS?

Donald J. Trump finally saw fit to wear a mask in public, to do the very thing his team of infectious disease experts has been imploring the public to do while the nation fights a so-far losing battle against the coronavirus pandemic.

He donned the mask while touring Walter Reed Medical Center.

If only Donald Trump had decided, oh, about three months ago to do the right thing. What might have been the result? Here’s a thought: Given the cult of personality that has developed around this clown, there well might have been less political resistance from the Trumpkin Corps against wearing the mask. As a result, there could have been thousands fewer infections and thousands fewer deaths as a result.

But oh, no! Trump wasn’t going to wear a mask. It didn’t look, um, “presidential,” or so he inferred. I guess he’s changed his mind? Is that possible? Who the hell knows?

The surgeon general pleads with us to wear a mask in public; so does the head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; same for the secretary of health and human services; the top medical experts on the White House pandemic response team say the same thing.

Closer to home, we’re hearing from governors, county officials, mayors, school leaders, hospital officials, emergency responders, firefighters and cops to do the same thing.

The president? Until just this weekend he has thought differently and has brought that vocal but shrinking base of supporters along with him.

Donald Trump should be ashamed. So should those who resist the mask-wearing and the mandates to take other precautions to avoid getting swept up in the pandemic crisis.

D’oh! I almost forgot! Donald Trump has no shame.

medical news

Lo and behold, Trump dons a mask!

Well now, that wasn’t so bad, was it Mr. President?

Donald Trump had infamously avoided wearing a surgical mask in public, despite pleas from his coronavirus pandemic response team that masks are an essential preventive measure against the killer virus.

Trump said he thought the masks looked bad for the president of the United States. How utterly, completely ridiculous!

He went to Walter Reed National Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., today to visit with some of our wounded warriors. He wore the mask and allowed pictures of him to be snapped and distributed around the world.

Did anyone on Earth laugh out loud at the sight of Donald Trump wearing a mask? I don’t think so, even though there might have been some giggling at the idiocy expressed by Trump about his reluctance to wear a mask.

Masks serve a dual purpose. They protect the health of those who wear them. They also protect those who stand near the person wearing the mask.

So, it’s not about whether someone looks good wearing a mask. It’s about protecting people’s health and possibly saving their lives.

The president needs to lead in that effort and ditch that moronic notion that we have this virus “under control.” We don’t. Donald Trump needs to wear a mask whenever he ventures into public view.

education news, local news, medical news, national news

Knock off threats to schools, Mr. POTUS

Donald J. Trump is now putting heat on governors to reopen public school systems, much like he tried to browbeat houses of worship leaders into packing pews in time for Easter and threatened governors to reopen their states … or else.

There is no “or else” for the president, given that he has no singular authority to tell governors how to run their states as they cope with the COVID-19 pandemic.

Now he’s going after them on school reopening.

I found this quote from a former member of Congress, a guy I know, but who I haven’t spoken to in more than two decades. Former Rep. Nick Lampson writes: School re-openings must be based on science not the ineptitude of Donald Trump. We have a collective responsibility to protect the interests of America’s youth. Expecting kids to spend 8 hours a day in close quarters during a pandemic and threatening to defund public schools like some sort of authoritarian is not the sort of leadership we need in the White House.

Here in Texas, and specifically in Collin County, our school leaders are giving parents the option of sending their children back to the classroom or keep them at home in a sort of hybrid learning environment. Texas’s infection rate is soaring. We do not want our children exposed needlessly just because Donald Trump wants schools to reopen their classrooms.

While I am on the subject, Donald and Melania Trump have a son in school. Are they sending Barron back to class? I am not going to make the youngster an issue; I merely am asking the question to ascertain what kind of parental decisions the first couple are making with regard to their own son.

As for the rest of us, Donald Trump ought to let governors and the public educators who deserve praise and not threats decide how to handle their unique situations.

medical news

Dr. Fauci offers grim prognosis

“I don’t think you can say we’re doing great. We’re just not.”

That clearly is not the view expressed repeatedly by Donald John “Prevaricator in Chief” Trump. It is instead an opinion offered by the nation’s — if not the world’s — leading infectious disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci.

Dr. Fauci is seriously concerned about the terrible spike in infection, hospitalization and death caused by the worldwide coronavirus pandemic.

The doc is contradicting directly the man for whom he works, the president of the United States. I am going to stand with the doctor’s view on where we stand in this fight against the pandemic.

Trump, meanwhile, is fighting for his political life and the pandemic — namely the federal response to it — isn’t providing Trump much ammo to use in his re-election campaign. Indeed, Donald Trump’s arsenal is spent; he is out of ammunition.

How in the world does the nation fight its way back from the medical brink? There is increasing talk about states returning to their shelter in place policies, shutting down businesses they had reopened, ordering Americans to do certain things to prevent the spread of the virus.

In Texas, where officials sought to restart the economy, GOP Gov. Greg Abbott has issued a mandatory mask-wearing order, told businesses to scale back their service to 50 percent of capacity. Yes, he has drawn fire for his order, namely from Republicans — if you can fathom that — who continue to insist that we reopen the business community despite the threat to people’s health and their very lives.

As for Dr. Fauci, he well might be writing his exit from the White House pandemic response team, where he has played a once-significant role that has been diminished of late because of Fauci’s disagreement with Donald Trump. Indeed, Trump has been critical openly of the good doctor, saying he has committed many “mistakes.” I haven’t heard a single example of what Trump considers to be a Fauci mistake.

Still, I am going to listen to the doctor. I am going to ignore the blathering of the politicians … especially the nation’s top pol, the guy who couldn’t tell us the unvarnished truth if his political career depended on it.

Oh, wait … !

medical news

Time is ticking away for Dr. Fauci

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I want to offer a suggestion: Sit in as quiet a room as you can find and you might start hearing the tick-tock sound of a clock.

That well might be the sound of Dr. Anthony Fauci’s time as part of Donald Trump’s coronavirus response team winding down. You see, Fauci had the temerity to publicly and quit forthrightly contradict Donald Trump’s happy talk about the status of the global pandemic that has killed more than 130,000 Americans.

Trump says it’s under control. Dr. Fauci says we’re nowhere close to getting it under control.

Trump now says Fauci “made a lot of mistakes.” Fauci says he hasn’t briefed Trump in more than two months.

The end of Fauci’s time at the right hand of Donald Trump might be coming. If so, the nation will lose the up-close insight of its leading infectious disease expert, a man who’s worked side by side with medical geniuses in seven presidential administrations, dating back to Ronald Reagan’s time in the White House.

That’s all part of the bad news that well might be coming. There is some good news to report about all of this.

Anthony Fauci will remain a top-flight infectious disease expert, even if he’s no longer “advising” Donald Trump; I use the word “advising” with caution because Trump doesn’t appear to take the advice of the “best people” with whom he surrounded himself during this pandemic.

As for his status as a member of the White House coronavirus response team, a part of me actually hopes Trump cuts Dr. Fauci loose.

Moreover, I hope Dr. Fauci refuses to sign a “no disparagement” document if he is let go. Why? Because then he could tell the world that Donald Trump has been leading a clusterfu** response effort that has resulted in untold — and more than likely unnecessary — death and misery in this country.

medical news

Doubt creeps into thinking about resumption of sporting events

Oh, I do hate being a Negative Ned … but plenty of doubt is creeping into my noggin about whether we ought to resume sporting activities that occur in front of crowds.

Let’s consider a couple of things.

First, Tulsa, Okla., has reported a significant spike in the cases of COVID-19 after a political rally attended by about 6,500 spectators. Donald Trump went to Tulsa to restart his re-election campaign and now we hear about a surge in infection in that city and surrounding area.

Second, the Ivy League has just announced it is canceling all fall sports. No intercollegiate sports will occur in that conference. Why? Sports and school officials are concerned about infection coming from the pandemic.

The Texas State Fair canceled its 2020 event. The Big 12, though, plans to play the Texas-Oklahoma college football game anyway. They won’t pack the Cotton Bowl, but still the place will have plenty of fans.

Major League Baseball is going to restart its season soon, along with the NBA, the NHL and the pro football will start training camps soon. Some players are boycotting the season out of fear of getting sick. Others might follow.

I am just at the point now of worrying whether the risk is worth the reward.

We are hearing too many reports of “hot spots” springing up all over the country. Arizona is the latest place to receive the dubious designation of “epicenter” of the pandemic. Texas isn’t that far behind.

I express these doubts and concerns as someone who wants a return to collegiate football. My beloved Oregon Ducks are supposed to play a big non-conference game in Eugene on Sept. 12 against Ohio State. There is no way they can pack Autzen Stadium full of fans to cheer on the Ducks. I now am doubting whether it’s wise to even play the game.

I am now officially beginning to wonder whether the Ivy League has blazed a trail down which other athletic conferences should travel.