Liar Liar, Nation On Fire

"I wanted to always play it down. I still like playing it down, because I don't want create a Panic." These words were spoken by the Liar Liar, Pants on Fire in Chief last March during an interview with journalist Bob Woodward. Even tough it's a politician's job to tell untruths, and even though this occurs on both sides of the political spectrum, never before during my lifetime have we experienced a political leader who lies so frequently, so boldly and so unashamedly as Donald Trump.

As recently as yesterday someone responded to me, and I quote: "Actually Trump has been 100% right on COVID-19. He said it was no worse than a bad flu and that lockdowns were a bad idea." Now, I'll leave in the middle if the Corona virus is as bad as most politicians and scientists claim, because in my opinion it's simply too early to tell. With 9/11 it was clear very early on that something else than the official narrative must have had happened, and it's a black page in our collective history books that we still haven't apprehended and punished the real perpetrators. But with this pandemic It's very hard to determine if the officially sanctioned narrative is justified. But, starting with the assumption that we simply can't know for sure, it's my conviction that we all need to do whatever we can to minimize risk of infection, not for ourselves but mainly for the vulnerable among us. America is rather unique in the sense that many people see the request of wearing a face mask as an attack on their freedom; the ideology behind this highly individualistic behavior, bordering on pure selfishness from my perspective, free market capitalism, is most developed in America. And America now has a leader who advocates for this idea of individual freedom very loudly and has refused to call for a national effort to combat the virus. That's no surprise in a country where anything that has even a hint of collectivism or solidarity is immediately shoved aside as communist or socialist authoritarianism. I will probably never understand that, because for me the very notion of "freedom" can never be understood as "individual", there's no such thing as "individual freedom", there's only the freedom granted by the society you're part of, it's a mutually gained or mutually lost aspect of the inescapable spectrum of human interactions.

Let's leave that at a side for now and concentrate on the Liar in Chief. He has many of his most fervent followers convinced that Covid-19 is "no worse than a bad flu" and, more importantly, has them convinced that he actually believes that himself... They applaud him for honoring the Constitution and giving the individual states the freedom to handle the pandemic to their liking. To those people especially I say: watch the below linked video. It has fragments of the interviews Bob Woodward conducted with Trump for his new book in February and March this year. Trump was perfectly aware that this virus is exponentially more deadly than the common flu, and that it is highly contagious. As a result of his lies America now is number two, only bested by Brazil, another country with a fascist in chief, on the list of most infected people. During the interview Trump admits that compared to the regular flu, "this is more deadly. This is five per, you know, this is five percent versus one percent and less than one percent. You know? So, this is deadly stuff." Now compare that with what Trump said and tweeted publicly in the period between early February until even now. The many times he claimed that "we're handling it very well" and "it'll disappear" just like that. He never believed that, regardless what you personally believe, HE always believed it to be a serious and deadly threat. This man is a disgrace, and I'm being kind here. Even among professional liars he stands out as a particularly nasty one. But hey, when in all of history has a fascist ever cared about his (it's never "her") people?

Trump is a crazy president born in crazy times, and I can only imagine how completely disillusioned one must be if your adult life started around the year 2000. I was born in 1968, became politically aware and active around 1987 / 1988, when the "communist" Eastern Block was about to fall. The quotes around "communist" are there for a reason. Regardless, my political awareness began when, here in Europe at least, there were still some truly leftist parties and politicians; I've seen them all fall for the neoliberal ideology, one by one, to the point that right now there are no more true leftist parties left. Trump is the epitome of the world-wide shift to the political right and has crossed the line into fascist regions. I wish my American brothers and sisters well, even those who still think Trump is the best thing that ever happened to them, but I fear for you. And the rest of us. If you have some time left over, also watch the above linked video from someone who's adult life began just before the year 2000, someone who only saw democracy fail and politicians lie, starting with George W. Bush stealing the elections from Al Gore. The narrator doesn't emphasize this in the video, but what I remember most from that defeat is the ease with which the Democrats conceded; I fear something similar will happen in 2020, as now it seems Democrats do everything in their power to loose to Trump. It must be so disheartening to be politically aware in America in 2020...

Thanks so much for visiting my blog and reading my posts dear reader, I appreciate that a lot :-) If you like my content, please consider leaving a comment, upvote or resteem. I'll be back here tomorrow and sincerely hope you'll join me. Until then, keep safe, keep healthy!