Politics - News Analysis

Fauci Unleashed: Reveals to New York Times What Working for Trump Was Really Like

One of the single most dangerous things about Trump was the fact that he always thought he was the smartest person in the room who need not listen to anyone. That is Trump, to a “t.” It really hurts knowing that quite often he was literally the dumbest and most unstable.

Meanwhile, Dr. Fauci, at 80 years old, could walk onto any university campus in the world, head to the medical school, and be welcomed like a rock star or a short god. He is revered all over the planet and has taught internationally. This nation is lucky to have him.

One would think that if there was ever a situation where a president would lean hard on an expert like Fauci it would be when there is a life-threatening situation and it involved something completely foreign to that president, like a viral outbreak and pandemic. But not Trump.

Trump is always the smartest guy in the room who knows better than anyone. He trusts himself despite the fact that literally no one else would trust his judgment on anything, never mind a pandemic. From the beginning, Trump knew more than Fauci. According to the New York Times:

I would try to express the gravity of the situation, and the response of the president was always leaning toward, “Well, it’s not that bad, right?” And I would say, “Yes, it is that bad.” It was almost a reflex response, trying to coax you to minimize it. Not saying, “I want you to minimize it,” but, “Oh, really, was it that bad?”

Can you imagine walking into the Oval Office with bad news like that: “Mr. President, North Korea just nuked Seattle, it looks bad, perhaps millions of deaths. “Well, it’s not that bad, right?” One just knows Trump would say such a thing, while also wailing about why this was happening to him.

 “Hey, I heard about this drug, isn’t it great?” or, “Boy, this convalescent plasma is really phenomenal.” And I would try to, you know, calmly explain that you find out if something works by doing an appropriate clinical trial; you get the information, you give it a peer review. And he’d say, “Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, this stuff really works.

Now, here we are forced to wonder if Trump was just late-night surfing some whacked right-wing conspiracy sites as we learned he liked to do, especially in that last year. The other possibility is that Trump talked to his buddies from the club and they’d tell him what they heard. Trump only liked good news. We suspect that the people that spoke to him knew he only liked good news and thus they only passed along “good news” whether it was true or not. Fauci wasn’t that kind of guy and here’s where Trump would know better. “This stuff really works,” like he was talking about new golf club grips.

“Hey, why aren’t you more positive? You’ve got to take a positive attitude. Why are you so negativistic? Be more positive.”

“Negativistic?” If that’s a thing we’ve never heard of it, but perhaps that’s why Fauci used it instead of “negative.” But we wonder if Trump ever got it, Fauci was “negative” because most people consider a half-million deaths and god knows how many walking wounded rather negative.

Fauci eventually just gave up trying to talk some sense into Trump:

His attitude was that he intensively reviews the literature, we may have differences, but he thinks he’s correct. I thought, “OK, fine, I’m not going to invest a lot of time trying to convert this person,” and I just went my own way. But Debbie Birx had to live with this person in the White House every day, so it was much more of a painful situation for her.

“This person.” The POTUS becomes “this person.” And why not? Any layman who thinks he can review the literature and know more than a guy with 55 years of experience deserves to become “this person,” no matter who it is.

“This person” was dangerous in so many ways.

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Peace, y’all
Jason
[email protected] and on Twitter @JasonMiciak

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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