We’ve been hearing a lot about the White House reception for Amy Coney Barrett on Sunday, September 26, that became a COVID-19 super-spreader event. Less is being said about the event held the very next day, which may be even more disturbing.
On September 27, Trump welcomed a selected group of Gold Star Families to the White House for a reception that was held indoors, with no social distancing, where very few attendees (including the President) wore masks. Here’s a look:
It should come as no surprise that attendees are turning up positive for COVID-19. All of our Joint Chiefs of Staff are now in quarantine thanks to either attending that reception or coming in contact with infected persons. This includes Coast Guard Vice-Commandant, Admiral Charles Ray, who attended the ceremony and is now positive.
Was the President infected with COVID-19 and contagious at this reception? Did he know he had the disease yet? We can’t verify his claims because the White House refuses to provide any information on the President’s last negative virus test. How many attendees are now sick? We don’t know. The White House is blocking CDC efforts to perform contact tracing on those who attended either the Supreme Court or the Gold Star event.
For a sense of how horrifyingly irresponsible it was for the White House to hold this event in such a reckless manner, here’s a description of the Gold Star Families from the US Army website:
The term Gold Star family is a modern reference that comes from the Service Flag. These flags/banners were first flown by families during World War I. The flag included a blue star for every immediate family member serving in the armed forces of the United States, during any period of war or hostilities in which the armed forces of the United States were engaged. If that loved one died, the blue star was replaced by a gold star. This allowed members of the community to know the price that the family had paid in the cause of freedom.
These are the people the President exposed to a lethal pandemic, not just so he could get some campaign footage, but to get campaign footage with just the right images to fit his delusions. Holding this event in the midst of a pandemic was a questionable decision. Staging it in a manner that stripped away any protections for the families or other attendees is basically murder.
Imagine you’re holding a gun. It’s loaded, but you insist against all evidence that it isn’t loaded and doesn’t work. Then you point it a Gold Star Mom and pull the trigger. If it goes off, are you a murderer? That’s what Trump did.
How many members of these Gold Star families will get sick? How many friends, wider-family and neighbors of these folks will get sick? How many of these families, who already paid the ultimate price for their patriotism, will pay with yet another loss? We don’t know yet. We may struggle to ever find out since the Administration is blocking contact tracing efforts. What we know is that Donald Trump made the decision to potentially kill them to suit his own personal needs.
It is rare that the editorial board of a nonpartisan professional healthcare organization devoted to medical practitioners and researchers would ever take a public stand in an election, but, here it is.
Our scientists and those who care about truth have literally had it.
Bravo and thank you.
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMe2029812?
And of course, Trump says he could have contracted it from Goldstar familes:
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/08/trump-gold-star-families-coronavirus-427875
Not sure that fits what little we know of the timeline.
The only thing I can say in response is that I hope you are not simply preaching to the choir, and that somehow, people in a broad enough spectrum understand the treachery of this person. He is killing us; now it is time to vote him out of office. We quite literally cannot survive four more years of this.
Death Cult Leader demands sacrifices from Death Cult Members.
Death Cult Members do not deny him his sacrifices.
I’m fond of the fun-fact that the White House superspreader event has more confirmed cases than many countries’ current case-count combined.
Honestly as much as people are taking their self-satisfied chuckles at 45 specifically getting hit with the virus, I for one am sitting back to watch how this spreads through our gerontocratic Capitol Hill. This is the flip-side of not standing up for logic and common sense because you’re too cowardly to face a person like Trump. I’m particularly interested in seeing what Senate we end up with by this time next year, from the combination of voting and infections opening up its usual glacial turnover rate.
The next few months will be best expressed by the famous Texas Chainsaw Massacre tagline: “Who will survive and what will be left of them?” Hell, we could theoretically have three new Presidents in as many months. If 45 dies Pence could take the oath, lose the election, Biden comes in, gets sworn in, gets infected and dies, and then Harris takes the oath.
If that sounds like I’m enjoying the thought, I’m not. These situations that may occur solve no problems we need to solve, but create new ones in a chaotic state that could be manipulated by who knows whom. Hopefully life remains less interesting than my imagination.
Unsurprisingly, there are more members of the extended White House who have tested positive than have been reported.
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/34-people-connected-white-house-previously-infected-coronavirus/story?
The tyrant was right when he said he could kill someone on 5th Avenue and get away with it. He just had the location wrong,
But his actions now, and in the past 3 years, are nothing compared to what the world will witness starting Nov 4th and beyond. How do madmen react when things look like they are going against them?
Don’t forget the insult added to this injury- when news of Hope Hicks’ positive test leaked, the toadies were pointing their fingers at the people who attended this event.
At the risk of stating the obvious- anyone going to any WH event is playing chicken with COVID. Don’t do it.