Cagle World

If Donald Trump was a movie scene, he’d be the fiery train wreck in “The Fugitive,” and U.S. Marshal Tommy Lee Jones would be cruising through the carnage saying, “My my my. What. A. Mess.”

The dueling “town halls” Thursday night were enough to make one’s head spin. On ABC, where Joe Biden resided, you had decency and sanity. On NBC, had demagoguery and sociopathology. Choose the America you want, folks, because the contrast could not be starker.

For instance, here’s how Biden talked about how masks curb the spread of the deadly virus: “When a president doesn’t wear a mask, or makes fun of folks, like me, when I was wearing a mask for a long time, then people say, ‘well, it mustn’t be that important.’… It is estimated by the University of Washington that if, in fact, we wore masks, we could save, between now and the end of the year, 100,000 lives.”

But here’s what Trump said: “I’m OK with masks…But just the other day, they came out with a statement that 85 percent of the people that wear masks catch [coronavirus]. That’s what I heard, that’s what I saw.”

There’s less than zero evidence that 85 percent of mask-wearer get COVID-19. Anyone who spends five seconds parsing that fake statistic knows it’s laughable. What Trump shared with viewers – and shared with his rally saps earlier yesterday – was a blatant lie popularized by Tucker Carlson on Fox News.

What a shame that NBC, the network that saved Trump from financial ruin by airing his celebrity game show, decided this week to indulge him again, giving him free air time to dump his stinking rhetorical detritus on America’s lawn.

Hold your nose, because here we go:

– He again refused to say whether he had tested positive for Covid prior to sharing a debate stage with Biden and delusionally lauded his greatness on handling the pandemic.

– He refused to condemn the QAnon conspiracy freaks (who believe there’s an international cult of celebrities and Democrats who engage in child sex-trafficking). Even though federal law enforcement authorities are closely watching them, Trump claimed he knew nothing about them. Then he changed his mind and said they’re “very strongly against pedophilia, and I agree with that.”

– He didn’t think it was wrong to falsely tell his Twitter followers that Biden had conspired with Navy SEALS to cover up the fake death of Bin Laden. “That was a retweet. I’ll put it out there. People can decide for themselves. I don’t take a position,” Trump said.

– He confirmed he’s personally $400 million in debt, but said it was a small amount of money (“a peanut”), and he refused to name is creditors because he claims not to know who they are. When he was asked whether his creditors are foreign sources or foreign entities, he said: “Not that I know of, but I will probably, because it’s so easy to solve, and if you’d like to do, I will let you know.” Whatever that means.

– He recycled one of his pet lies about purported mail ballot fraud: “When I see thousands of ballots dumped in a garbage can, and they happen to have my name on it? I’m not happy about that.” Thanks to Trump’s non-stop blather, NBC’s viewers never heard the truth. The episode Trump was referring to involved nine trashed ballots – not “thousands” – in one Pennsylvania county, where a temporary seasonal worker screwed up and was fired after three days on the job.

– He recycled the lie that he and his servile Republicans “are always protecting people with preexisting conditions, and I can’t say that more strongly. In reality, he’s working to kill Obamacare in the U.S. Supreme Court, thereby removing all statutory protections for people with preexisting conditions, and he still has no plan to replace the 10-year-old law that’s now widely popular.

And so on. Shame on NBC for indulging a guy who fled like a coward when offered a second opportunity to debate Biden. If he wants to lie with impunity, let him buy ads. But the good news is with less than 2 weeks on the clock, he said virtually nothing that’s likely to bedazzle the independents, seniors, and college-educated suburbanites he so desperately needs.

Ultimately, the contrast boiled down to this:

On NBC, Trump attacked Biden, Pelosi, “the radical left,” Obama, Antifa, his own FBI director, and the Gold Star families who “maybe” gave him COVID-19.

On ABC, Biden said: “In politics, grudges don’t work.”

While pondering the next four years, which tone strikes you as more attractive?

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Copyright 2020 Dick Polman, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Dick Polman, a veteran national political columnist based in Philadelphia and a Writer in Residence at the University of Pennsylvania, writes at DickPolman.net. Email him at [email protected]

Maybe you remember this Trump gem from 2016: “I think (Hillary) was out there with classified information. She was giving it to anybody. And the FBI did nothing about it…The top people were scum, absolute scum.”

Fooled you! Trump didn’t say that in 2016. He said it on Fox News over the weekend.

Why? Because he just can’t quit her.

Last Thursday, when he was convalescing with COVID-19, he phoned into the Fox Business Network and asked, “Why isn’t Hillary Clinton being indicted?”

Perhaps the day will come when the people around this broken grifter will get him the serious help he needs. Because apparently he doesn’t even know what year it is.

I’m joking, of course. He knows very well that it’s 2020 and that he may well be electorally humiliated. His big problem is that he has failed to make Americans hate Joe Biden. Only his cultists buy the lie that Biden is a tool of the “radical left,” or the lie that Biden is allied with “anarchists,” or that “Sleepy Joe” is mentally daft. (Heck, at this point, “sleepy” sounds good. We can all use a pleasant nap after our long waking nightmare.)

Since Trump can’t slime Biden, it appears his only pathetic play is to travel back in time to the good old days. He’s like the former high-school jock, years later and gone to fat, who can’t stop reminiscing about the prank he once pulled on the smart girl in class.

Naturally, Trump has enablers. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo excitedly told Fox News that they were about to drop the hammer on Hillary: “We’ve got the emails. We’re getting them out. We’re gonna get all this information out so the American people can see it.”

Right. Because an electorate that’s reeling from a pandemic is hungry to hear about Hillary’s emails. These revelations (where are they, by the way?) are sure to hurt her 2020 electoral prospects in the Rustbelt.

But I guess this is what a craven campaign feels compelled to try when there’s nothing else left. Last month, Trump toady John Ratcliffe, the so-called Director of National Intelligence, declassified an intel assessment – a Russian intel assessment! – which claimed that the Trump-Putin 2016 election alliance never happened, that it was a fake story cooked up by Hillary.

Nice try. The bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee, which wrote five volumes about the Trump-Putin election alliance, rejected that Russian lie a long time ago.

By the way – not that anyone remembers – Trump’s own Justice Department closely scrutinized the Hillary email “scandal,” and in October 2019 it issued a report which concluded: “There was no persuasive evidence of systematic, deliberate mishandling of classified information.” (That should answer Trump’s question about why Hillary hasn’t been “indicted.”)

Here in 2020, it really doesn’t matter whether voters remember the Justice Department’s exoneration, because voters don’t have any interest in replaying anything about Hillary. There are, shall we say, far more pressing concerns.

If Trump wants to resurrect the remnants of his so-called glory days, that’s fine. It’s a sign of weakness that even Fox Business Network anchor Dagen McDowell recognized the other day.
“I am not sure it helped his campaign to talk about Hillary Clinton’s emails and going back down that rabbit hole like it was four years ago,” McDowell said. “It didn’t really focus on the very issues of what the American people want to hear.”

And why do rabbits retreat down to their holes? Because holes are great places to hide, to feel safe and secure. You get my drift.

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Copyright 2020 Dick Polman, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Dick Polman, a veteran national political columnist based in Philadelphia and a Writer in Residence at the University of Pennsylvania, writes at DickPolman.net. Email him at [email protected]

Q: Congratulations, Mr. Fly. You won the vice presidential debate Thursday night. You are America’s Insect. How do you feel today?

A: Just like the president, I feel great. I felt it was my solemn duty to participate.

Q: Why? What compelled you to go sit on the vice president’s head for so long? Have you always been interested in politics?

A: Not until Thursday night. I was always content to zip here and there, nobody telling me what to do. I did like when the vice president talked about “freedom” and against “mandates.” I wouldn’t want a mandate telling me where I can fly or not fly. But as I was listening to what the vice president was saying to that lady on stage, I decided I had to take a stand.

Q: Wow, Mr. Fly. You became politicized in the blink of your thousands of eyes?

A: Frankly, I went there to sample the vice president’s hair product. But remember, I’m a fly – so I stayed for all his s—-.

Q: Whoa, Mr. Fly. This is a family publication. How can you say such a thing?

A: Because I’ve rubbed my hands and legs together and done some homework, which your audience may appreciate. Roughly 212,000 humans are dead from that virus, right? And 7.6 million are infected? But here’s what I heard Thursday night: “From the very first day President Donald Trump has put the health of Americans first…I couldn’t be more proud to serve as vice president to a president who stands without apology for the sanctity of human life.” He really said that.

Q: Gee. Anything else?

A: Oh yes. The buzz these days is that the president is mean to pretty much everyone who isn’t an able-bodied white person. But here’s what I heard Thursday night: “This is a president who respects and cherishes all the American people.” He really said that.

Q: We get the point.

A: There’s more. When I fly around I notice how much warmer the air is. You call it “climate change.” Here’s what I heard Thursday night: “President Trump has made it clear that we’re going to continue to listen to the science.” He really said that.

Q: Surely that’s all you got.

A: Oh no. There’s also buzz that we don’t know how sick the president is because his doctors keep hiding all kinds of information. But here’s what I heard Thursday night: “The transparency they’ve practiced all along the way will continue.” He really said that.

Q: No wonder you stayed on his head so long. Anything else bugging you?

A: Yeah. He wouldn’t answer simple questions. Like when he was asked, if you kill the law that protects people with health conditions, what’s your plan to help people who have health conditions? He changed the subject. Or when he was asked to explain why his boss won’t challenge the dictator who has put “bounties” on American soldiers? He changed the subject. Or when he was asked, are there plans to have you step in if the president gets too sick to work? He changed the subject.

Q: You are very well informed, for a fly.

A: I have a lot of free time. And there’s one other thing. I don’t presume to speak for half the human race – all the women out there – and I’ll admit that I like to land on their hair, too. But I bet they didn’t like how the vice president refused to stop talking when it wasn’t his turn. Whenever that Harris lady would start to stay something, he wouldn’t let her talk. She kept saying, “I’m speaking, Mr. Vice President! I’m speaking!” I thought that if I stayed on his head long enough, maybe he’d get distracted and shut up. But alas I failed.

Q: You seem upset, Mr. Fly. Why?

A: Just puzzled, I suppose. I buzzed past a TV today, and someone said that the president and vice president are already getting “crushed in the polls” by women – so why would the vice president want to make things even worse?

Q: I guess it was just in his nature. Speaking of nature, I understand that it’s common for flies to vomit when they land on something?

A: Yes, but only when we eat. That’s why I finally left his head. I was still hungry for substance. That fellow wasn’t worth my puke.

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Copyright 2020 Dick Polman, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Dick Polman, a veteran national political columnist based in Philadelphia and a Writer in Residence at the University of Pennsylvania, writes at DickPolman.net. Email him at [email protected]

We can probably agree that falling ill with a dire disease is the one thing that could’ve made Donald Trump a human being worthy of universal sympathy.

“Nobody should have to suffer,” “thoughts and prayers,” the whole nine yards. We teach our kids to be compassionate toward others, so the least we can do is practice what we preach.

But boy oh boy, does this guy make it tough to be nice.

Perhaps we should simply stipulate that the sympathy we extend comes with lots of caveats. Because Trump doesn’t deserve anything more – not after everything he has done, and continues to do. And if holding back on sympathy makes you feel guilty, cut yourself a break, because you have plenty of company.

In a new national poll, a landslide 63 percent of Americans – including 66 percent of the high-turnout typically Republican seniors – say that Trump, has acted irresponsibly “in handling the risk of coronavirus infection to the people who have been around him.”

And Joe Biden rightly concurs. In Miami Monday night he said: “Anybody who contracts the virus by essentially saying masks don’t matter, social distancing doesn’t matter, I think is responsible for what happens to them.”

That works for me.

I’m not saying that it’s appropriate to dance with joy at the prospect of Trump suffering or dying. That kind of behavior is low rent, and we’ve seen too much of it over the years.

When Edward Kennedy died in 2009, people posted comments like this on the ABC News website: “Hot diggity damn! Maybe we’re finally rid of him!” When Dick Cheney was hospitalized with chest pains in 2010, people posted comments like this on the Washington Post website: “I just hope they don’t desecrate Arlington National Cemetery with that piece of carrion.”

Nevertheless, it feels appropriate, and morally just, to dial back the empathy for a narcissistic madman who warrants the name Typhoid Donny.

Climbing into a hermetically sealed SUV for a joy ride around Walter Reed, inches away from Secret Service agents who would prefer to remain healthy, for the sole purpose of guzzling cultist adulation was – to put it as nicely as possible – insane.

Flying back to the White House with his deadly infection, and turning our building into a hot zone was – to put it as nicely as possible – the quintessence of idiocy. As one White House source tells Axios, “It’s insane that he would return to the White House and jeopardize his staff’s health when we are still learning of new cases among senior staff. This place is a cesspool. He (has) exposed thousands of his own staff and supporters to a deadly virus. He has kept us in the dark, and now our spouses and kids have to pay the price. It’s just selfish.”

And insulting our intelligence is hardly the way to engender sympathy. His tweet Monday (“Don’t be afraid of Covid. Don’t let it dominate your life.”) is the kind of advice we’ve come to expect from the leader of a death-cult party. COVID-19 already dominates the lives of the American families grieving the loss of 210,000 loved ones and those who’ve survived the worst of the illness but face a lifetime of impaired health.

But hey, folks, “don’t be afraid of Covid,” because if you’re stricken, perhaps you too can fly Marine One to a four-room hospital suite for experimental treatments and free health care.

So I can only speak for myself. I want him alive and sentient four weeks from now so that he might witness and absorb an election humiliation, the kind of cosmic reckoning he has managed to dodge his entire irresponsible life.

What say you?

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Copyright 2020 Dick Polman, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Dick Polman, a veteran national political columnist based in Philadelphia and a Writer in Residence at the University of Pennsylvania, writes at DickPolman.net. Email him at [email protected]

Karma (noun): The sum of a person’s actions decide that person’s fate…The intent and actions of an individual influence the future of that individual.

And so it has happened. Trump testing positive for the coronavirus – four weeks before the election, no less – certainly looks like the ultimate October surprise. But when we consider his long string of actions (or, more precisely, his lack of action), it doesn’t seem surprising at all.

We are the sum of the choices we make. We are condemned to consequences. Or, as Clint Eastwood said in his film Unforgiven, “We all have it coming, kid.”

Forgive me for sounding heartless about Trump’s health, but by dint of his reckless behavior, he’s long had it coming.

Earlier this week, at the debate he desecrated, Trump mocked Joe Biden’s safety regimen.

“I don’t wear masks like him. Every time you see him, he’s got a mask. He could be speaking 200 feet away from (people), and he shows up with the biggest mask I’ve ever seen,” Trump said.

Just a few weeks ago, Trump staged a maskless super-spreader rally in Pennsylvania, where all the saps joined in laughter as he mocked Biden again.

“Did you ever see a man that likes a mask as much as him? It gives him a feeling of security. If I was a psychiatrist, I’d say this guy has some big issues,” Trump said.

And so on. No need here to recap the quack’s shameless rhetorical record – about how the virus would disappear like a miracle, about how he’s smarter than the scientists, yadda yadda – because the big question is: What happens next?

How will the markets react? If Trump is in quarantine for days or weeks, does that put the kibosh on the remaining debates (or move them to Zoom)? If he becomes symptomatic or worse – if he becomes too ill even to tweet – at what point would he be compelled to temporarily relinquish power, and who makes that call? The 25th Amendment allows Trump to cede control to Mike Pence (who just tested negative), but to reclaim his crown when he’s deemed able, but who’d make that call?

Or perhaps we’re getting too far ahead of ourselves. All we know right now is that an incumbent who’s on the ballot four weeks hence – an obese 74-year-old in the highest risk category, with a history of mystery visits to Walter Reed – has been infected with a killer disease after sowing irresponsibility among his cultists and turning the White House into a Petri dish. In what remains of this unprecedented presidential, there’s no other issue now. The blood of 208,000 dead Americans is on his hands – as well as his own.

“Out, damned spot! Out, I say!” cried Lady MacBeth. Oh well, too late.

Yes, I am offering thoughts and prayers for Trump’s health. Nobody should have such a disease. But right now I’m more concerned about whether the COVID poster child’s 90-minute spittle-yelling put Joe Biden in any danger.

The future of this benighted nation may hinge on that.

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Copyright 2020 Dick Polman, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Dick Polman, a veteran national political columnist based in Philadelphia and a Writer in Residence at the University of Pennsylvania, writes at DickPolman.net. Email him at [email protected]

When I was a kid, I went to the zoo and saw a gorilla eat his own feces. I didn’t see that again until Tuesday night.

In truth, this “presidential” “debate” was worse than the zoo. Donald Trump came not to debate, but to desecrate. Whether his behavior will save his job and keep him out of jail is highly debatable.

It’s arguably impossible to pinpoint his lowest moment. Perhaps it was when he refused multiple opportunities to exude a scintilla of empathy for the 200,000 Americans who’ve died from COVID-19. Or perhaps it was when he refused to condemn white supremacists and right-wing militias, which his own FBI director has called the biggest threat to domestic peace.

Maybe it was his refusal to say he will accept the results of the election, and instead called mail ballots “a disaster.” In truth (a concept alien to Trump), during the last 20 years there have been a grand total of 143 criminal convictions for mail ballot fraud – which is .00006 percent of all the votes cast.

It could have been when Trump followed up Biden’s comments about his late son, Beau, with a blizzard of lies about Biden’s other son, Hunter, none of which are worth repeating here.

Actually, Trump’s worst moment was every moment that he rampaged through the proceedings, fuming, bullying, interrupting, crapping on civility. That’s what tinpot authoritarians do. They flood the zone with falsehoods and create so much chaos that citizens tune out for the sake of their sanity.

Trump can’t defend his dystopia – much less offer any kind of affirmative agenda for another four years – so his only play is to ruin the night for everyone else. When Biden surrendered to exasperation and said, “Will you shut up, man?” he spoke for the America that yearns to turn the page.

It’s hard to fathom what Trump hoped to accomplish. He’s losing badly in the polls – even red states like Texas and Georgia are virtually tied – largely because women detest him. In pivotal Pennsylvania, he’s currently losing women to Biden by 23 points. Yet there he was last night doing everything possible to alienate women further. He’s the quintessential guy who bulldozes women, nonsensically man-splaining when they try to talk. He’s the classic abusing ex-husband that they managed to get away from.

Suburban women, in particular, are turned off to Trump – who thinks he can win them over by scaring them with demagoguery about “radical left” minorities bringing in crime. He floated that con again Tuesday night, but Biden retorted at his best: “I was raised in the suburbs. This is not 1950. All these dog whistles and racism don’t work anymore. Suburbs are by and large integrated… What really is a threat to the suburbs and their safety is his failure to deal with COVID. They’re dying in the suburbs.”

Trump can’t win unless he expands his appeal beyond his suckered cult. Ask yourself whether he did anything Tuesday night to accomplish that. Ask yourself whether you want to spend a second or third “debate” night – much less another four years – listening to this broken grifter.

At one point, amidst all the cacophonous cross-talk, Biden addressed the audience cringing at home: “Folks, do you have any idea what this clown is doing?”

I suspect they do.

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Copyright 2020 Dick Polman, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Dick Polman, a veteran national political columnist based in Philadelphia and a Writer in Residence at the University of Pennsylvania, writes at DickPolman.net. Email him at [email protected]

In case you feared that the looming Supreme Court fight would distract everyone from Donald Trump’s culpability in the deaths of 200,000 Americans, fear not. Trump can’t resist making a fool of himself.

Monday in Ohio, addressing another sea of credulous saps, he actually babbled this about the virus: “It affects elderly people, elderly people with heart problems and other problems. That’s what it really affects. In some states, thousands of people – nobody young. Below the age of 18, like, nobody. They have a strong immune system, who knows? Take your hat off to the young, because they have a hell of an immune system. But it affects virtually nobody. It’s an amazing thing.”

Actually, what’s amazing is that he told Bob Woodward precisely the opposite. He said, on tape, that the virus affected “plenty of young people.” He said, “Now it’s turning out it’s not just old people, Bob. Just today, and yesterday, some startling facts came out. It’s not just old, older.”

True that, Sherlock! Last month, his own beleaguered CDC released a study that charted hospitalizations of youngsters under the age of 18, found that one in three infected children requires treatment in an Intensive Care Unit, and concluded that “Children are at risk for severe COVID-19.”

Despite Dr. Trump’s quack pronouncements, it’s well established by now that maskless, asymptomatic young people potentially infect others in their vicinity. Last month, a World Health Organization official reminded us that “people in their 20s, 30s and 40s are increasingly driving the spread.” Another new study, this one at Mass General, said that even little kids can “have high levels of virus in their airways during the first three days of infection despite having mild symptoms or none at all – suggesting their role in community spread may be larger than previously believed.”

Last month, even more ominously, Dr. Anthony Fauci, our top infectious disease expert (remember him?), voiced this warning: “In individuals who are young and otherwise healthy, who don’t require hospitalization but do get sick and symptomatic enough to be in bed for a week or two or three and then get better, they have residual symptoms for weeks and sometimes months.”

“These are people that supposedly recovered from COVID-19,” Fauci said. “I’ll guarantee you if we have this conversation again, six months to a year from now, we’ll be reviewing the literature about talking about the long-term deleterious effects of non-hospitalized patients.”

Translation: Contrary to the demagogue’s latest fake assurances that the virus affects “virtually nobody” who’s young, the reality is that affected young people may wind up with infirmities for the rest of their lives. Or as we call them, preexisting conditions.

So let’s connect all the dots:

Trump and his death-cult party members continue to drag their feet on a second stimulus bill, refusing to help the millions laid off in the midst of Trump’s pandemic…while they’re rushing to install a new Supreme Court justice who will cast a pivotal vote to abolish Obamacare in the midst of Trump’s pandemic…thus screwing the COVID-19 survivors, young as well as old people, who will have preexisting conditions for the rest of their lives thanks to Trump’s pandemic…because Obamacare is the law that best protects coverage for people with preexisting conditions.

I’ll simply pose a rhetorical question:

If any president, through sheer ignorance and negligence, had allowed terrorists to kill 200,000 Americans – the equivalent of 67 9/11s and 50,000 Benghazis – with the prospect of killing many more, and wounding still more for life, would that manifestly failed individual even have a prayer of getting re-elected?

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Copyright 2020 Dick Polman, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Dick Polman, a veteran national political columnist based in Philadelphia and a Writer in Residence at the University of Pennsylvania, writes at DickPolman.net. Email him at [email protected]

Did anyone watch Don the Con’s Comedy Hour on Tuesday night?

Granted, it wasn’t fun being soaked to the bone by his fire hose of falsehoods, but the pleasure President Trump’s Philadelphia “town hall” was seeing him rebuked by a real citizen. A black woman with a serious health condition.

“Mr. President,” said a Philadelphian named Alycee Block, “I was born with a disease called sarcoidosis, and from the day I was born, I was considerable uninsurable. That disease started in my skin, moved to my eyes, into my optic nerves, and when I went to graduate school, into my brain… I’m still paying almost $7,000 a year in addition to the co-pay.”

She then pointed out that Obamacare protects the coverage of people with preexisting health conditions. She started to ask whether that protection should be removed when Trump tried to jump in:

“No – “

But Block quickly cut him off:

“Please stop and let me finish my question, sir.”

Trump being upbraided by a black woman…That must’ve sent the bees in his head abuzzing. He was a long way from his rallies with unmasked saps.

Anyway, Block kept going: “Should that (protection) be removed? Within a 36 to 72-hour period, without my medication, I will be dead. And I want to know what it is that you’re going to do to assure that people like me who work hard, we do everything we’re supposed to do, can stay insured. It’s not my fault that I was born with this disease. It’s not my fault that I’m a black woman, and in the medical community I’m minimized and not taken seriously. I want to know what you are going to do about that.”

Then came his lies, gushing by the gallon, almost too numerous to count

“We are not going to hurt anything having to do with preexisting conditions. We’re not going to hurt preexisting conditions,” Trump said. “We’re going to be doing a healthcare plan very strongly and protect people with preexisting conditions.”

“We are not going to hurt anything having to do with preexisting conditions,” Trump claimed. “In fact, just the opposite. If you look at what they [Biden and the Democrats] want to do, where they have socialized medicine, they will get rid of preexisting conditions, if they go into Medicare for All, which is socialized medicine.

“We’re going to be doing a healthcare plan very strongly and protect people with preexisting conditions. I will say this, they will not do that,” Trump added.

A couple of things worth pointing out:

1. Trump is currently in the Supreme Court, agitating anew for the total repeal of Obamacare – which, for the last 10 years, has protected the coverage of people with preexisting conditions.

2. Medicare for All would not “get rid of” people with preexisting conditions. Quite the opposite.

3. Biden doesn’t even support Medicare for All. He campaigned against it during the primaries. He would add a public option to Obamacare – an option to get government care – and thus continue to protect preexisting conditions.

4. Trump has promising to unveil his own health care plan “very strongly” for virtually the entirety of his regime. He said in June 2019 that it was merely weeks away – nothing happened. He said in July 2020 that it was merely weeks away – nothing has happened.

Town hall host George Stephanopoulos asked a very simple question: So where’s this health care plan you keep talking about?

There’s no such plan, of course. There never was. But whenever Trump is cornered, he just floors the accelerator on his B.S. bulldozer.

The Philadelphia event was festooned with whoppers – like when he praised the stock market and said that “stocks are owned by everybody” and lied that Biden “wants to raise everybody’s taxes” (the Biden plan raises taxes only on those who make more than $400,000). He also said “a lot of people think that masks are not good,” putting him at odds with his own CDC director, and bizarrely claimed Biden – who is not president – has failed to institute a national mask mandate.

If you’re wondering how Trump will “debate” Biden in less than two weeks, look no further than Tuesday night’s transcript. We’ll all join Alcyee Block in saying, “Please stop, sir.”

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Copyright 2020 Dick Polman, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Dick Polman, a veteran national political columnist based in Philadelphia and a Writer in Residence at the University of Pennsylvania, writes at DickPolman.net. Email him at [email protected]

In American law, criminal negligence is conduct in which a person ignores a known or obvious risk, or disregards the lives and safety of others.

We now have the perfect defendant.

It turns out – not that we’re surprised – that the failed casino owner knew all along that he was gambling recklessly with the lives and safety of the citizens he’d sworn to protect. As you undoubtedly know by now, Bob Woodward got it all on tape.

The first smoking gun was fired way back on Feb. 7, when Trump told Woodward that he was already well aware of COVID-19’s potential to wreak havoc: “You just breathe the air, and that’s how it passed…It’s also more deadly than even your strenuous flu…So, this is deadly stuff.”

So what did he do next? He staged five maskless rallies in confined spaces, exposing his MAGA suckers to the deadly disease that he knew was airborne. On Feb. 10, he wowed rally-goers in New Hampshire. On Feb. 19, he did it again in Arizona. On Feb. 21, he did it again in Nevada. On Feb. 28, he did it again in South Carolina. On March 2, he did it again in North Carolina.

And all that time, he kept comparing it to the common flu – in essence, giving people a false sense of security. He did that on Feb. 26, Feb. 27, Feb. 28, March 2, March 4, March 6, March 9, and March 10. Everything was fine and dandy, he said on Feb. 26: “When you have 15 (infected) people, and the 15 within a couple days is going to be down close to zero, that’s a pretty good job we’ve done.”

Also on Feb. 26, he didn’t share his knowledge that coronavirus was far more deadly than the flu. On the contrary, he kept equating the two: “This will end. This will end. You look at flu season. [COVID-19] is a little bit different, but in some ways it’s easier and in some ways it’s a little bit tougher. But that’s a little bit like the flu. It’s a little like the regular flu that we have flu shots for.”

And at his maskless mass rally on March 2, as his trusting fans shared their airborne droplets without him issuing a word of warning, he peddled this fake sense of security: “They’re going to have vaccines, I think, relatively soon. And they’re going to have something that makes you feel better and that’s going to actually take place, we think, even sooner.”

He knew exactly what he was doing, as evidenced by the smoking gun he fired on March 19, telling Woodward on tape: “Really, to be honest with you…I wanted to always play it down. I still like playing it down, because I don’t want to create a panic.”

He’s fine with trying to create a panic in suburbia with his racist warnings about black people invading paradise. But leveling with the American people at the earliest opportunity? Helping them prepare for a deadly threat? Taking every conceivable transparent step to minimize the death toll? That’s not how this guy rolls.

He infamously bragged that he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and not lose a vote. But while fully armed with foreknowledge about COVID-19, he has now shot and killed 190,000. Will that cost him votes? Are we so benumbed at this point that even the most flagrant smoking guns shoot only blanks?

Richard Nixon flew away in his helicopter for far less.

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Copyright 2020 Dick Polman, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Dick Polman, a veteran national political columnist based in Philadelphia and a Writer in Residence at the University of Pennsylvania, writes at DickPolman.net. Email him at [email protected]

Here’s a pop quiz. Which of these rash acts is the stupidest?

a) Frying your hand in cooking oil

b) Breaking your thumb with a hammer

c) Swimming laps in a polluted river

d) Volunteering to be Donald Trump’s guinea pig

If you were nuts enough to do a, b, or c, at least you’d know what kinds of treatment would nurse you back to health. But signing up for a COVID-19 vaccine that’s been rushed to market because the Leader needs an electoral Hail Mary? Taking his word (of all people) that it’s safe and effective?

I’d sooner eat a defunct Trump Steak, get drunk on defunct Trump Vodka, or belt myself onto the defunct Trump Shuttle.

Trump is like the Pigpen character in the Peanuts strip, kicking up clouds of dirt wherever he goes. First he catastrophically botches the pandemic response – the latest models say that by the end of the year, 2,000 Americans will die each day – and now he’s meddling with the vaccine response every time he flaps his big yap.

The last thing we need, at this juncture, is to hear this grifter play politics with vaccine development. The last thing we need is for the public to lose faith in the science. But did we ever expect anything different?

The scientific consensus is that no safe, effective vaccine will be widely available until early next year or beyond. The crucial Phase III human trials are barely underway – for only three vaccine candidates – and there’s no guarantee that they’ll pass muster. (Stuff like this happens.) Even the guy who heads Trump’s grandly titled Operation Warp Speed told NPR the other day that the odds of a miracle cure by November is “very, very low…extremely unlikely.”

But Trump, who’s desperate to stay in office and elude prosecution, is laser-focused on a certain day in November. He just can’t help himself, because his sole objective is to save himself.

Last week he said there could be a vaccine “before the end of the year and maybe even before November 1. I think we can probably have it some time in October.” On Monday he again said, “It could be during the month of October, actually could be before November…We’ll have the vaccine soon, maybe before a special date. You know what date I’m talking about…The vaccine will be very safe and very effective, and it’ll be delivered very soon. You could have a very big surprise coming up.”

He assailed Joe Biden and Kamala Harris for questioning the rush to market, claiming that they were “politicizing” vaccines. He said that while ballyhooing the dream of a vaccine by Election Day.

So, serious question: Would you inject a rushed vaccine into your veins on his say-so? Would you take the word of a guy who pressured the FDA to OK the emergency use of hydroxychloroquine for COVID-19 patients? (The FDA later revoked it because the treatment didn’t work.) Would you take the word of a guy who has suggested that people treat themselves with disinfectant? Who used to tweet anti-vaxxer propaganda, claiming without a shred of valid evidence that childhood vaccinations cause autism?

Fortunately, the public is wise to this particular con. According to a new national poll, only 21 percent of voters say they’re willing to take a vaccine that’s brought to market in 2020. Which means that not even the MAGA cultists are anxious to be lab rats.

Indeed, the quack president is so egregious that he makes Big Pharma look like good guys. On Tuesday, nine companies currently in the hunt for a vaccine felt compelled to reassure the public that they will not tolerate any political meddling: “We believe this pledge will help ensure public confidence in the rigorous scientific and regulatory process by which COVID-19 vaccines are evaluated and may ultimately be approved.”

But how’s this for a solution:

If a vaccine suddenly appears before Election Day, the first person to inject it and demonstrate its safety should be Donald Trump. In a public ceremony. Let’s see if he’s willing to put his body on the line.

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Copyright 2020 Dick Polman, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Dick Polman, a veteran national political columnist based in Philadelphia and a Writer in Residence at the University of Pennsylvania, writes at DickPolman.net. Email him at [email protected]