Tag Archives: coronavirus

medical news, national news

What happened to the summer pandemic miracle?

I’m trying to recall something I thought I heard from Donald John “Miracle Man in Chief” Trump.

Back when the coronavirus was taking wing, I thought I heard Trump declare that the virus would disappear miraculously when temperatures heated up in the country. Didn’t he say that?

Well, here we are. The southern regions of the country, from Arizona to Florida, are roasting in 100-plus-degree temperatures.

Oh, wait! Where is the spike in COVID-19 infection occurring? It’s in the southern parts of the United States of America.

So, what happened to Trump’s prediction? Hey, I get it. He didn’t know what the hell he was talking about then. He doesn’t know now.

medical news, national news

Georgia governor: No. 1 knucklehead

I hereby nominate Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp as Knucklehead of the Month, maybe the year.

How did the Republican governor earn this dubious distinction? By issuing an executive order that overrides local officials in Georgia who have ordered residents to wear masks to help prevent the spread of COVID-19.

What in the name of public safety has gotten into Kemp?

Kemp issued the order because, by golly, he just doesn’t see the need to wear masks. He ignores the stern and serious advice from damn near every medical professional on Earth who tell us that masks — along with social distancing — are sure-fire preventatives against the disease that continues to sicken and kill Americans.

I am heartened that fellow Republican governors — such as Texas’ Greg Abbott — see the situation quite differently. Abbott has gone in the opposite direction, ordering masks when Texans venture into indoor settings.

Moreover, companies that are doing business in Georgia have ordered their employees and customers who enter their establishments to wear masks. That means that Gov. Kemp can issue executive orders until the cows come home, some folks in his state aren’t going to listen.

This is part and parcel of what has happened in this country. We have politicized a global pandemic that is taking no prisoners. The coronavirus has killed 138,000 Americans. It has sickened more than 3 million of us. Our nation’s rate of death and infection far exceed the percentage of the worldwide population that resides in the United States.

And yet we have Republican politicians — led by the Idiot in Chief, Donald Trump — flouting medical advice by refusing to wear masks. Their political followers walk in lockstep with them, refusing to maintain proper distance. What happens then? The rate of infection skyrockets, right along with the rate of hospitalization … and death!

Then we get my nominee for Knucklehead of the Month issuing an idiotic executive order that seeks to override local officials’ tough decisions on how to keep their constituents safe from a viral infection that could kill them.

Stupidity is alive inside the Georgia statehouse.

medical news, State news

Abbott draws fire from his fellow Rs … amazing!

Pardon me for a moment while I, um, LOL.

Yes, the reason for my guffaw has been the response from Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s fellow Republicans over the governor’s conversion to a get-tough politician waging war against the coronavirus pandemic.

Actually, Abbott is drawing heavy fire from both sides of the divide. Democrats are angry that Abbott acted too quickly to reopen the state. Now it’s Republicans who are spittin’ mad at Abbott because he realizes he erred the first time.

So, Abbott has dialed back the state’s reopening plans. He has mandated mask-wearing as a preventative measure against the virus; he also has mandated social distancing and told businesses they have to scale back their occupancy rates.

What is hilarious — in a sickening sort of way — has been the response from GOP-leaning businessmen and women. One of them is a friend of mine. He runs a small business in Amarillo. He displays a picture of President Reagan prominently where customers buy their products. My friend’s GOP credentials are real and I respect them.

But now that Abbott is acting to protect Texans’ lives and health against the killer virus, my friend has taken to calling the governor a dictator. I think he used the word “communist” in a social media post complaining about Abbott’s order to shut certain businesses down.

I happen to be upset that Abbott acted too quickly when he sought to reopen the state’s business infrastructure. We are paying the price at this moment.

However, I support the governor’s decision to dial it back and believe he is acting responsibly now. My family and I are wearing masks when we venture out. We are keeping our distance from others. We are wiping down surfaces with sanitary wipes and we keep alcohol-based sanitizer handy at all times.

Do I feel sorry for the governor? Not for a second. He gets the big bucks to make the correct decisions. He made the wrong one, then has tried to correct it. I hate to say that do-overs aren’t allowed.

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.

political news, State news

Texas becomes battleground?

The national political media continue feed my heebie-jeebies.

They talk about Joe Biden’s national polling lead over Donald Trump. They suggest there might be a Democratic “tsunami” about to sweep Trump and many of his Republican congressional sycophants out of office in Washington.

Why, many commentators are looking at a recent Dallas Morning News/University of Texas-Tyler poll that puts the former vice president up by 5 percentage points over Trump. They use that poll result as evidence that Texas is about to cast its electoral votes for the first Democrat since Jimmy Carter in 1976.

Whoa, now! Let’s hold on. Let’s catch our breath.

I am not yet ready to toss Texas into the Democrats’ sack of political goodies. This is among the reddest Republican states in the country. Every statewide elected official here is a Republican. It’s been an all-R state since 1998. The state’s transition from overwhelming Democrat to Republican has been stunning in the speed with which it occurred.

Is Joe Biden the Democratic presidential candidate to carry Texas across a new threshold? Hmm. I have trouble believing it, although my heart wishes it would happen.

As the Dallas Morning News reported: “I really do think that Biden could win Texas, and I didn’t think that as recently as even a month ago. But the landscape has shifted so much,” said Nancy Beck Young, chair of the University of Houston history department and a scholar of Texas politics.

The Morning News poll does suggest that since Texas is being stricken so cruelly by the COVID crisis that Texans at this moment are enraged by Trump’s feckless and reckless response to the emergency. That well might be reflected in the polling results.

I think it’s fair to suggest, though, that if Biden somehow manages to win more votes than Trump in Texas then we are looking at an epic political landslide that will bury Trump. Moreover, if Biden falls short by just a little bit — say, 2 or 3 percentage points — then that, too, might portend a significant political defeat for Donald Trump nationally.

Still, the media keep fueling my nervousness. I get that’s the media’s job. It is to report the news and polling statistics that suggest a staggering defeat of the self-proclaimed “smartest man in human history” — or words to that effect — most certainly should get our attention.

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

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.

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

Drop out of WHO? In the midst of a global pandemic?

Let me see if I have this straight.

Donald Trump has decided to initiate the withdrawal from the World Health Organization in the midst of a global pandemic that is killing thousands of human beings every hour.

He’s mad at WHO because of its initial response to the pandemic, which Trump says began in China and which the WHO was too slow to call the People’s Republic of China to task for withholding valuable information from the worldwide public.

Instead of staying with the WHO where the United States could bring its influence to bear to enact reform and, by the way, reap the benefit of WHO’s medical expertise, Donald Trump wants to pull the United States out of the organization altogether.

I do not get the “logic” here.

I now am willing to suggest — which I shall do at this very moment — that we have yet another reason to elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. as our next president.

You see, Joe Biden can stop this continuing self-isolation by Donald Trump that puts even more Americans in jeopardy if we no longer can can rely on the World Health Organization for expertise on how to deal with — and eradicate — this killer virus.