Politics - News Analysis

Trump Press Conferences Become Baghdad Bob Briefings, Except More Demoralizing

We all know that things are worse, much worse. We can all see the video coming out of New York. We know New York was one of the first areas hit hardest, and is the most densely populated. We know what is coming.

We know what got fkt up before – and we even know what went right. It turns out Trump was right to shut down flights and entry from China, we can admit it. It’s called being an adult, and adults can handle admitting when their opponents are right. We can handle it in part because there’s no other choice and history shows that people have handled much worse. I would rather be quarantined at home with my family, my dog, net, food, and AC, over Valley Forge wishing I had shoes. We are ready to do what is asked, most of us, anyway.

The press conferences are utterly insulting. Not only are they insulting, but they’re now getting dangerous. Today we saw some of the most horrific scenes coming out of New York City. Wouldn’t it have been powerful to see a president begin the briefing with a moment of silence and a moment of prayer to keep our medical personnel safe? Followed by a sober admission that things will get worse before they get better? It might help us get over the divide, and rally a bit more as Americans.

Instead we’re treated like children, by a child, who thinks he needs to fool the grown-ups.

We are not like Trump. We can deal with the truth and adversity. Whatever the hell else goes on in his mind, we don’t have to tell ourselves little lies like he does to get through the day, we can do better, much better. We are ready to put our disdain for him aside if asked to do the right thing if asked to put aside partisanship by someone who has put it aside himself – instead of the guy calling people together while also using “Sleep Joe” in the press conference itself for god sake.

If only.

The lies at the press conference go deeper. Just like we see everything he does as false bravado mendacious bullshit, some see his statements ordained by God. Thus it is that I find myself sitting in the only fcking state in the Union where the governor overrode local officials’ decisions as to their communities rules, to LIGHTEN the restrictions! In Mississippi, Tate Reeves did the opposite of what the law normally allows. Normally, the federal or state sets “minimum standards” – like air quality, and yet states or local communities can pass stricter ordinances. The bigger sets the bar for the lower, which can take it higher. Not here. We went the other way. Tate took the strict “shelter in place” order that my closest relatively sophisticated town (maybe 30 miles away) had, and Tate said, “No, you can only …” and lowered it statewide.

It is not a coincidence that the most irresponsible move occurred in the most Trump worshipping state that exists. It all starts at the podium.

Bush got a shoe thrown at him in an effort to unleash anger. We would be throwing a shoe in an attempt to wake someone up. But no one can wake Trump from this – this is his waking life, his life has always breathed upon lies. To him, this is no different, and it’s no different for his acolytes to blindly follow.

We are used to political lies from both sides, but when it comes to a national emergency that threatens our integrity as a nation, we rallied around George W Bush in the week after 9-11, and we’re ready to do it now. But not if we’re lied to, and not when our local pols are only to be shot down by a Trumper following the lead and insulting us … while putting us at increased danger.

Now we hear the lies daily, the same damned ones – even as this day proved to be the worst so far, we got the same press conference and same lies. I already wrote a short column on the repetitiveness of the press conferences, but I think it’s got to go deeper. Here’s a great summary, though:

WE have accepted that, just like 9-11 ushered in a new reality, we’re still in the first weeks of our “post-C” reality. Unlike 9-11, where the most horrific scenes came in the first hours, we know we’re a long way from even the peak. Also unlike 9-11, we’re still divided, by a guy that knows no other way to live. I have said it before, he doesn’t believe he can win without there being a loser.

Want to hear something sobering? Many of us reading this column will end up in the ICU, some won’t make it. It could be me, or anyone else, we just don’t know.

What do we know is this. We are ready to help each other, already have been. We are ready to set aside normal political differences. We know we must make sacrifices, hugely significant ones, and we want to. The one thing we are not ready to do is to be lied to anymore. If he needs to lie – and he does – then keep his lies in his own head or to his staff.

People laughed at Baghdad Bob, he wouldn’t tell the truth at a point in time when the truth mattered and sung out the most absurd lies. Trump is doing the exact same thing, telling glowing lies when the truth couldn’t matter more. The only difference is that no one is laughing about Trump.

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Peace, y’all

Jason

[email protected] and Twitter @MiciakZoom

meet the author

Jason Miciak is a political writer, features writer, author, and attorney. He is originally from Canada but grew up in the Pacific Northwest. He now enjoys life as a single dad raising a ridiculously-loved young girl on the beaches of the Gulf Coast. He is very much the dreamy mystic, a day without learning is a day not lived. He is passionate about his flower pots and studies philosophical science, religion, and non-mathematical principles of theoretical physics. Dogs, pizza, and love are proof that God exists. "Above all else, love one another."

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