Mussolini Moment

Leaving Joseph Behind:  Halloween is on the horizon which might explain why Trump, ever the showman, is trying out dead dictator looks, that or under the influence of the mood altering steroid dexamethasone and whatever else he generally takes, his personality disorder has exploded into full on insanity. Yesterday, Sean Conley, the White House physician, still another Trump toady who has allowed his reputation to be flushed down the toilet under the influence of  “Benito” Trump, delivered another bizarre and purposely deceptive medical update during which he announced that following another dose of the IV administered anti-viral Remdesivir and some quality time with his cosmetician Trump would be ready to leave for the White House where he would remain under medical supervision as if anyone will be able to supervise Trump in his own environs. Though Conley said that Trump wasn’t out of the woods yet, he provided only the most upbeat news about his condition and then citing HIPAA health disclosure rules refused to answer any questions about the condition of Trump’s obviously impaired lungs.  As planned, later in the day a fully orange Trump marched out of Walter Reed, down a lit for the occasion staircase for his return to the White House, leaving a trail of germs on every handrail within his reach.  Upon arrival at the White House,  he marched up an even more brightly lit staircase, dramatically removed his mask, gasped for air, delivered a proof of life statement and then dissatisfied with his first “take” repeated much of his performance for the cameras so that a better version of his arrival could be quickly turned into a cinematic video that was set to symphonic music and immediately tweeted out to his ardent followers.  Before leaving Walter Reed, Trump tweeted that we shouldn’t be afraid of COVID and shouldn’t let it “dominate” our lives as, those 210,000 dead people aside, it is such a nothing burger, adding that he felt better than he had in twenty years, thanks to the wonderful drugs developed under his regime.  Upon arrival at the White House he repeated those words about domination, bragged about all the wonderful things he’s done, how only he could beat COVID so quickly and once again took credit for every drug ever developed while also insisting that a vaccine was right around the corner. He also said he’d be back on the campaign trail shortly, though that might be a reach.  The performance was beyond weird for us but extraordinarily dangerous for the White House staff, none of whom ever thought that their daily activities would subject them to viral overload. The usually dutiful and fearless Secret Service isn’t all that pleased either.  As to that vaccine, yesterday the ever slippery Chief of Staff Mark Meadows refused to sign off on the FDA’s plans to impose stricter rules about the hoops it would have to go through before its release because if there’s any chance they can get a shot out before election day they plan to make it happen.

Collateral Damage:  Add Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany and two of her aides to the list of Trumpkins testing positive for the virus.  In addition, at least two unnamed individuals in the White House housekeeping department are also COVID positive as are at least three members of the White House press corps, including Michael Shear of the NY Times who reported that the White House has no plans to follow up with any contact tracing and why would they, as testing would just uncover more of the afflicted, making the White House, where that oft bragged about daily testing probably wasn’t really happening, look even worse.  The list doesn’t stop there, Pastor Greg Laurie, of the Harvest Christian Fellowship of Riverside California who attended a prayer march with both VP Pence and evangelist Franklin Graham as well as the Judge Amy super spreader event is also positive.  And then there’s Rudy Giuliani, last night he coughed his way through a Fox interview, while admitting that he was awaiting the results of one of those “all the way in the back of the nose” COVID tests.  During that interview, he insisted that Trump whose recovery has been nothing but remarkable would be up and about and ready for his next scheduled debate with Biden, as if Jill will ever let her Joe get close to Trump again.  As to debates, the Vice President debate between Kamala Harris and Mike Pence is still scheduled to take place tomorrow night despite all of Pence’s close encounters with the nefarious bug.  Harris’ team has requested and the debate commission has agreed that the two will be separated by a plexiglass divider, something that Pence’s team immediately mocked. That’s Pence, the head of the coronavirus task force, the group that together with the CDC recommends things like plexiglass dividers in lots of settings.

The Usual Suspects:  As planned Eric Trump was “interviewed” by the NY State Attorney General’s office yesterday though we don’t know if he said anything other than “I plead the Fifth,” “I don’t remember” and “Can I have my fidget spinner now?”  The State Department revoked the visa of the former Ukrainian diplomat who worked with Republicans including Senator Ron Johnson and Rudy Giuliani on spreading false conspiracy theories about the Biden family and foreign meddling in the 2016 election.  By the way, that’s the COVID positive Senator Johnson who insists that quarantine or not he’ll be ready to vote for Judge Amy’s confirmation even if that means that he has to arrive at the Senate in full hazmat gear.  At last report Attorney General Barr is still COVID negative though it’s not clear that he would tell anyone if he was positive.  However, he did suffer a small hit yesterday as John Bash, the US Attorney for the Western District of Texas, who he assigned to investigate all that not really “improper” unmasking of US citizens caught up on questionable calls with Russian officials that went on during the last days of the Obama administration, has resigned.  Maybe, just maybe, there was no improper unmasking and he decided to leave rather than say so?   As to masks in general, Trump’s team insists that they’re overrated and continues to mock Joe Biden for wearing his.  For his part Joe, who was not hiding in his basement yesterday, participated in a socially distanced townhall in Miami with NBC’s Lester Holt yesterday.  Among other things, he said that given Trump’s downplaying of the coronavirus and his disregard for virus protection protocols he wasn’t all that surprised about Trump’s illness but that even though no one from the White House ever reached out to alert him about Trump’s COVID status and his possible exposure he was happy to see that he was doing okay. Can you imagine what Trump would say if the shoe was on the other foot?  May we never find out.