So a little while ago I started reading Preventable: The Inside Story of How Leadership Failures, Politics, and Selfishness Doomed the U.S. Coronavirus Response by Andy Slavitt. If you are a more visual type here ya go. The title tells you what it is all about. Out national level response to Covid-19 was utterly horrendous. When does it go from simple bad policy to criminal negligence at best, mass murder at worse? Our US justice system has two levels, one for the wealthy and one for the rest of us. Our two level justice system may have another tiny level on the wealthy end, one for politicians. George W. launched an entire war based on lies and... crickets. Obama expanded drone warfare in Afghanistan killing far more innocents than so called "bad guys." Again... crickets. And then along came The Donald.
Former President Trump managed to survive his one term without starting any new wars. He eased tensions on the Korean peninsula and treated the Russians with respect. His admiration for Vladi and Kim was cringeworthy to put it mildly. He looked good on camera roasting the media and may have coasted into a second term on a decent economy except for one thing- Coronavirus (Covid-19). A self-absorbed guy calling himself a billionaire may not be the best leadership choice when the shit gets real.
We had the tools in place already set up by previous presidents, both Republican and Democrat, to deal with a pandemic. The Donald saw no need for such a thing Obama had left in place, it had to go (Because Obama thought it was a good idea? Who knows...). It does not take Covid-19 very long to set up shop and establish itself here in the US. Viruses could give two shits about travel bands, visas and borders. The war was on! Instead of making it us versus the virus, Donnie did his best to make it us VS each other. He down played it, called it a hoax and called for less testing to reduce our covid numbers (an absurdity), all-the-while knowing full well how dangerous it was. It started off in so-called blue states. Donnie (or someone in his inner circle of brilliance) had the bright idea to make this a Democrat problem. Covid could care less about party affiliation. When in a short time it became obvious this would not work, they had a new great idea, kick it to the states! Blame the states when it goes to shit. Hint- no state was ready or able to deal with something of this magnitude. The death toll piled up (along with the medical bills, businesses closing and disinformation). The economy tanked as a reasonable person would expect and Trump continued down the ole sad river of denial. "It will go away this summer," "Like a miracle, it will be gone," "It's a hoax by the Democrats" blah, blah, blah. Remember, he told us (Via Bob Woodward) he damn well knew otherwise. Yup, bring on the crickets. He lost decisively to Joe Biden (and a whole new CON started-THE BIG LIE). So... is Trump criminally responsible for a good chunk of the covid deaths? I'd say YES! He's not the first politician to get a lot of people killed through catastrophically bad policy and he will not be the last.
President George W. Bush sold us a shit-ton of lies to justify our illegal and unjust invasion of Iraq. Yes, the Iraqis had had WMD's before and even used them on their own citizens. But the program had died in the '90's. We allowed Saddam to survive Gulf War I and go on a murderous rampage afterward. Dick Chaney, of all people, was right to say marching on Bagdad would be a very bad idea back in '91. Let Saddam be and check Iran. We never ended our war on Iraq via sanctions and no-fly zones. Saddam and his goons could care less as thousands of everyday Iraqis died. And then...9/11.
Why let such an opportunity go to waste? OBL was in Afghanistan so tie him to Saddam and get two wars for the price of one! The lies got bigger and bolder taking advantage of an enraged public demanding action. There was too little to blow up in Afghanistan that would look good on TV. Meanwhile, Iraq had it all- bridges, bases, tanks, an air force, power grids and lots of bunkers! It was the perfect location for a 24/7 news cycle war. I'm not a conspiracy theory person, but we would do well to remember some people got (and continue to get) filthy, filthy rich. American war crimes were glossed over or covered up completely (almost). Sooner or later, sunshine finds the truth. Where was justice? Punishing whistleblowers, where else? The politicians? Crickets...
In school they teach us about this thing called Impeachment. It turns out one can be impeached for simply getting a blow job, sad. Later, when there were good reasons to use it, we found out what justice looks like in the hands of politicians. Party-line vote no matter the evidence. It is not even as good as a show trial or kangaroo court. There is no way to justice through Impeachment. There has to be a way to hold political types accountable to the law.
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