THE COUCH POTATRIOT

Couch Potatriot – new term for the take out delivery economy and an apt name for my historical screed of current events. 

Let me begin with either a pandemic conspiracy theory that Trump is ignoring the pandemic for monetary gain OR that the President is so inept that he and his cronies see the pandemic thru political and economic lens, not as a medical national disaster.

Let me begin with the possibility that the President knew the potential for the virus and positioned himself and his cronies to make billions off the market economy knowing that the economy would be sunk with large numbers of unemployed.  This data ahead of time can easily be monetized.  Just look at the 2 Senators that sold millions of dollars of stocks just after being briefed about the virus and prior to the crash.  Would Trump or his cronies do such a thing? Yes!

His inaction would also create a total lockdown of the economy and a bailout would be necessary. But being a conniving grifter at his core, he fired of the watchdog Inspector General and signed a statement denying congressional oversight for the said bailout.  Why, with the obvious mutual benefits of testing, has he not instituted a Marshall plan or a Manhattan Project for testing? Perhaps he believes this entire disaster is an opportunity to sneak government funds out the back door and into his waiting wheelbarrow.

He stumbled and denied help and promised testing. Early on he stated, “anyone that wanted a test could get a test”. They couldn’t.  On March 10 he announced that 27 million tests would be available by the end of March and only 1 million were tested. Keep in mind, that’s out of 330 million people in the U.S.  When the tests were available, there was no way to test due to the lack of swabs.  On April 9^th he stated that the states were now to be responsible for tests and that he was not going to fund states testing sites.  Bush had a pandemic plan.  Korea and other countries continue to have more per capita tests than the U.S. even at this time in April. Trump must know that testing will be the only thing bringing the economy running, albeit slowly. 

Let me bring up the January 2017 plan. The same type of plan that Bush had in place and the Trump transition team was given.  The details included the dire necessity during a pandemic, for the Federal Government to provide surge resources.  A pandemic was labeled as a tier 1 risk.  This included strategic planning and the necessity for the communications to include if/then scenarios.  It also had 6 things that must be conveyed to maintain confidence they were:

1. Be first to communicate news
2. Be accurate
3. Be credible
4. Show empathy
5. Show action
6. Give everyone respect

Trump score 0 for 6

This is a crisis that impacts everyone, with un-employment numbers and an economy like the great depression.  Anything less than all-out attack on providing tests puts the suspicion on Trump.  Incompetence or conspiracy? In lieu of concentrating on the pandemic the stable genius has weaponized his narcissism and his sycophants continue to feed the bloviating barn animal.