PRESIDENT TRUMP SHOWS HE IS BECOMING “DELUSIONAL” 

              …President Trump spouting lies about Dr, Fauci at a campaign rally

The president’s lies are showing just how desperate he is becoming 

President Trump has dismissed all the precautions to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.  He attacked the nation’s top infectious-disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, as a “disaster”, arguing that people are getting tired of all the focus on a pandemic that has killed more than 220,000 Americans.  The virus continues to infect thousands of people in communities across the country

The president falsely claimed that voters do not want to hear more from the country’s scientific leaders about the pandemic.  This was his angry response to a critical interview Sunday night with CBS’s “60 Minutes” by Dr. Fauci.  The good doctor is the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

“People are tired of listening to Fauci and these idiots,” Trump said in a call with his campaign staff Monday.  The call was intended to instill confidence in his reelection bid two weeks before Election Day.  He, without evidence, suggested that Fauci’s advice on how best to respond to the outbreak was so bad it would have led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands more people.  This is totally false, and a serious sign as to how desperate the president has become.

Another new Trump campaign ad falsely implies that Dr. Fauci was praising the president, when the doctor was actually referring to the workload of the coronavirus task force. 

“And yet we keep him,” Trump continued, calling in from his Las Vegas hotel. “Every day he goes on television, there’s always a bomb, but there’s a bigger bomb if you fire him. But Fauci is a disaster.” (It’s the president that is a disaster!)

Later in the day, the president again attacked Fauci, mocking him for his botched opening pitch at the Nationals Baseball Park earlier this year.  The president also misrepresented some of the doctor’s positions on the coronavirus in his tweets.

Trump’s comments and his aggressive travel schedule, which continued Monday with two stops in Arizona.  This was as Joe Biden was at home in Delaware, prepping for the up-coming presidential debate, (if it’s not cancelled).

The president’s comments are part of his more aggressive bet that the American public will reward his false projection of strength and general defiance toward the virus.  The same virus which hospitalized him and that infected many of his top aides earlier this month from the virus “spreader” event at the White House.

Trump argued Monday that the American people were no longer interested in taking precautions to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

“They’re getting tired of the pandemic — aren't we?” Trump said at a rally in Arizona. “You turn on CNN. That’s all they cover. Covid, Covid, Pandemic. Covid, Covid, Covid. They’re trying to talk people out of voting. . . . People aren't buying it, CNN, you dumb bastards.”

The crowd was packed shoulder to shoulder outside, as usual, with few masks in sight.

Trump is expected to do three or four rallies a day starting this weekend.  This is according to his people familiar with his plans.

The president’s comments come as infection rates have been rising in recent weeks, with national daily infection rates returning to midsummer levels.  Polled voters continue to give Trump poor marks on his handling of the pandemic, and nearly 2 out of 3 voters said they were “very” or “somewhat” worried that they or a family member might catch the virus.  This is from a recent Washington Post-ABC News Poll. Eight percent also said an immediate family member had already been infected.

Trump aides said they had hoped the last-minute call with staffers would not become a story about the coronavirus.  Senior advisers to the president say they still want the closing message to be about the economy and what they say would be the negative effects of a Biden victory.  They are advising a campaign focus on Pennsylvania, Michigan, North Carolina and Florida.  They see the coronavirus, and the president’s handling of the pandemic, as their biggest political weakness.  Of course, Biden’s top advisers agree, while the president’s rallies continue to call attention to the outbreak…?

For months, Trump has treated Dr. Fauci delicately, occasionally praising him and falsely assuring Americans that he is intimately involved in the White House response.  Trump’s campaign aides have even falsely put excerpts from a Fauci interviews into their advertising, hoping to convince voters that the infectious-disease expert has approved of Trump’s response to the coronavirus.  Dr. Fauci has reacted angrily to the ads, which he says quote him out of context.  “I do not and nor will I ever publicly endorse any political candidate,” Fauci said in his Sunday interview on “60 Minutes.” “They’re sticking me right in the middle of a campaign ad, which I thought was outrageous.”

Trump tried, but failed, to tie Biden to Fauci on Monday.  But that was a connection his Democratic rival said he welcomed.

“He wants to listen to Dr. Fauci,” Trump said of Biden at the rally.

Biden responded to the attacks with a statement that said he considered the claim that he would listen to scientists “a badge of honor.”

“Mr. President, you’re right about one thing: the American people are tired. They’re tired of your lies about this virus,” the Biden statement read. “They’re tired of watching more Americans die and more people lose their jobs because you refuse to take this pandemic seriously.”

The president was angry at Dr. Fauci after he was critical of Trump and the White House in the “60 Minutes” interview.  The doctor was saying that the president’s conduct made it unsurprising that he caught the coronavirus and that the administration had tried to muzzle the doctor.  Dr. Fauci has a much higher approval rating than the president, which this has long rankled Trump.  This was of course, according to Trump’s advisers who, like others, always spoke on the condition of anonymity for describing internal discussions. 

Trump has also repeatedly claimed to top senior aides that Fauci is on TV far too often.

The president has even posted a video online of him properly throwing a first pitch, and another video of the doctor’s botched first pitch.

Trump has been barnstorming western states in recent days, while Biden has mostly stayed out of public view, preparing for the up-coming debate, and avoiding the large crowds amid the global pandemic.

Trump is taking less rigorous preparations for the debate, advisers said, and is highly unlikely to do extensive formal preparations. The president is instead maintaining an extensive in-person campaign schedule and is expected to visit Florida after the debate for several events.

Monday afternoon, Trump campaign manager Bill Stepien wrote a letter to the Commission on Presidential Debates, seeking to move the conversation in the final debate away from domestic issues such as the coronavirus to foreign policy issues. Trump’s aides have made clear that the president wants to talk about the foreign business dealings of Biden’s youngest son, Hunter. 

Trump has also repeatedly claimed that the debate commission, which is bipartisan, is being unfair to him, even though its rules apply equally to both candidates.  The terms of the face-to-face events were negotiated in advance with both campaigns and both teams approved of the terms.  However, the terms do not require that both groups fully agree with the debate rules.  This debate will allow each candidate’s microphone to be shut off while the other candidate is answering a question.  No comment has been made as to whether the president agrees with this change to the debate.

The latest Monday call, which some reporters were invited to listen in on, appeared to have been motivated by recent news reports on internal concerns about the president’s reelection chances and division within the president’s team. Trump spoke about the New York Times and The Washington Post with particular negative comments and he threatened to take legal action against one particular poll over its results.

The call had been scheduled as a staff-wide “attaboy” morale booster, with top aides and the president presenting a rosy case for his reelection while trying to boost what several aides said was flagging spirits.

Trump repeatedly told his campaign staff on the call that he had never felt more confident as a politician that he would win election.  This was even though he said he was concerned two or three weeks ago during his hospital stay after contracting the coronavirus.  He repeatedly attacked the real news media, but also said he hoped the media was listening to the call.

He praised his senior team, naming the aides one by one.  Bill Stepien, White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, campaign strategist Jason Miller, while he attacked the news reports that had mentioned them as having low spirits in specific detail.

“I love my team. I am happy with my team,” Trump said, after denying friction among his top lieutenants.

Trump ticked through individual states and bragged about the crowds he gets and unspecified poll results he says he has seen, which he claimed were different from the voter “suppression polls” reported publicly.

“I go to a rally I have 25,000 people,” Trump said.  This is greatly exaggerating the size of his crowds while making a comparison with Biden. “He goes to a rally, he has four people.” Most of Trump’s rallies are held outside at airport hangers because of the pandemic.

Trump also made a range of startling false accusations and comments, including that Biden “should be in jail.”

“He’s a criminal,” Trump said, without offering any evidence of any crime Biden had committed.

Trump also made repeated false references to “alleged communications between Biden’s son Hunter and foreign officials” that have been reported in the New York Post in recent days. 

The New York Post newspaper said the information it reported was provided by Rudolph Giuliani, the president’s personal attorney, who, for some reason, has not shared it with any other news organizations…?  The report came reportedly from a hard drive from a computer allegedly previously owned by Hunter Biden that the former New York mayor claims to now possess.  The Washington Post nor the New York Times has not been able to independently verify the information in the New York Post reports.

“I think Joe Biden has a scandal coming up that will make him almost an impotent candidate,” the president said. “This scandal is so big. And the only thing he has going is he has a corrupt press who will not write about it.”  Again, there is no evidence that the bogus “scandal” is from a real report.  No reputable news organization is supporting the report.

Trump has made a number of dubious or totally false statements, including saying he was back at campaign rallies one day after he was released from the hospital. It wasn’t one day, it was one week later.  He again said he could lose the election only if it was “rigged” and made more false claims about voter fraud. 

He again exaggerated his record in those false terms he usually uses on the campaign trail.

The president said the New York Times has not reached out to him in two years.  However, the Times had interviewed him in August and like almost all news organizations, they regularly request comment from the White House.

In closing, he offered some advice for his campaign’s employees, saying they need to “work their asses off.”

“You have two weeks,” he said. “Don’t listen to anybody. Don’t even read the papers.”

He obviously wouldn’t want to have of his campaign team to get any, “real news”.

Copyright G. Ater 2020