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MineralMan

(146,317 posts)
Wed Mar 18, 2020, 09:52 AM Mar 2020

To His Shame, Trump Is Attempting to Cast COVID-19 as "The China Virus"

In today's twitter stream from the White House, Trump refers to "The China Virus" multiple times. He is making a very lame attempt to blame this virus on China.

That attempt will fail in most circles, but will be spread far and wide by Trump's ragtag army of sycophants and ne'er-do-wells.

Why is he doing such a thing? Who knows? Probably he is trying to scapegoat China as the cause of the disease. That will surely backfire, since China is an important trade partner that supplies us with much of the materials for the pharmaceuticals we need to maintain the health of US Citizens.

Trump is so stupid that he believes he can somehow mitigate his own blame for the spread of the virus in the US by creating a false label that blames China.

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Lindsay

(3,276 posts)
4. As somebody I know has said,
Wed Mar 18, 2020, 09:58 AM
Mar 2020

"Shamelessness is their superpower."

So I'll take issue with the one word, shame, but otherwise, yeah.

If there's a stupid move available, Trump will make it. And make things exponentially worse.

marble falls

(57,112 posts)
6. If it's Chinese virus then the Afghan war is the American war, the Iraq war was the American ...
Wed Mar 18, 2020, 10:07 AM
Mar 2020

war, the Panama invasion was the American invasion ............

The Genealogist

(4,723 posts)
8. Of course he is
Wed Mar 18, 2020, 10:33 AM
Mar 2020

It sends a message to his base that people who are a different color are responsible for the current disruption to their lives. They've been trained that all the problems in their lives are because there are people who look or talk or wosrhip or love differently from exist.

Aristus

(66,397 posts)
10. We did the same thing in 1918.
Wed Mar 18, 2020, 10:37 AM
Mar 2020

The "Spanish Flu" originated in Kansas, and was carried to Europe by soldiers deploying to the battlefront in WWI. Due to the communication security blackout, the nations with infected patients didn't report on the spread of the disease. All except Spain, which was neutral during the war.

Journalists and politicians in the US jumped on the reports of infected and dying patients from Spain, and dubbed the contagion the Spanish Flu.

Tanuki

(14,919 posts)
14. With bats and pangolins, apparently. They have no nationality.
Wed Mar 18, 2020, 10:47 AM
Mar 2020

Racist misdirection to cover up our "leader's" criminal negligence is not helpful in combatting a global pandemic.

Act_of_Reparation

(9,116 posts)
13. We in the scientific community share some blame for this, I fear.
Wed Mar 18, 2020, 10:45 AM
Mar 2020

Ebola-Zaire, Ebola-Uganda, Ebola-Reston. Marburg. Lhasa. Hendra. Nipah. Naming diseases after their apparent point of origin has been something of a habit. It was simple, logical, easy to remember.

But I don't think we fully appreciated the history of naming diseases after places, or the social implications of doing so. It's a practice we should probably do away with.

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