Donald Trump and Mike Pence: Echo coronavirus truth suppressed for political intentions

How many more Trumpzi failures will Republicans intentionally ignore now that coronavirus is peaking and at risk to even exceed pandemic status? COVID-19 is the plague of the 21st century, but the pro-life Republican party is putting hundreds of thousands of lives at risk for the sake of forcing political leverage. 

This opinion echo was published in the Idaho State Journal

At his June 26, press conference, the oleaginous (aka, greasy!) VP Pence strove to avoid any thoughtful and intelligent answers to questions regarding the wearing of masks by falling back to the phrase “freedom of speech”. 

What he is really arguing for is “freedom to infect others”.

It is conclusively proven that social distancing and wearing a mask helps to insulate the wearer from infection and protects those around him or her from whatever virus the wearer might spread. Just as you cannot drive drunk or blow cigarette smoke on others because you might injure or kill them, it is obvious that wearing a mask and social distancing should be observed without raising the “loss of freedom” alarm. Rather than demonstrating how macho you are by refusing to wear a mask, why not demonstrate that you are a decent human being and have a modicum of concern for others. Whatever speech you utter will certainly penetrate the mask.

Unfortunately, the Pence compounded his foolishness by following the boss’ lead with several obvious lies. While standing in front of charts showing that the USA rates of infection continue to increase at the rate of thousands per day, Pence argued that the Trump team had “flattened the curve”. Not true.

Then, Pence announced that “all 50 states were reopening”. In fact, more than ten states have stopped their moves toward reopening and several have moved to tighten restrictions. Several Governors and Mayors have acknowledged their mistake in reopening too quickly.

Those countries and states which benefited from competent leadership and took the necessary steps to battle the virus are now enjoying low infection rates. While the US is reporting over 40,000 new cases per day, the EU is reporting fewer than 5,000 and many countries almost none.

The paucity of leadership in America has, once again, demonstrated to the world that we have become incapable of world leadership. We have, by working together, overcome greater challenges and we certainly can again, but that will require that we ignore the lies and incompetence oozing from Washington and govern ourselves responsibly.

From Roy Miller,  Pocatello Idaho