Trump is delaying testing in the states, and for a very simple reason.

[MineralMan]

His plan to open up for business depends on numbers of cases going down, not up. More testing means identification of more active infections among the public. That would get in the way of his four step plan to "OPEN!"

Sure, he could change the parameters for the stages, but that would look a little odd.

So, he's promising more testing essential components "in the next few weeks. That's what was said yesterday. Until then, though, he is annoyed at Maryland getting its own testing supplies for 500,000 tests. He doesn't like that, because it interferes with his planned interference with widespread testing.

Trump doesn't want testing. It will make him look bad and make the situation look bad, even though the testing is very badly needed to manage the pandemic effectively.

Trump is trying to sabotage the orderly process of testing more and more people to find out exactly what is going on. He doesn't want that knowledge out there in public view.

[SheltieLover]

1. K&R

[underpants]

2. I also thinks it's past tense

If he ramped up testing now it would show how he dropped the ball at the beginning.

Of course yesterday he played dumb about rallies in March so there is that parallel universe thing.

[certainot]

79. they would also like to time it so it's going strong around election time

they were hoping to use ebola like in 2014 and this idiot probably thought covid might work instead, since it looked like they were getting ebola under control, with treatment

[SoonerPride]

3. Exactly. If he could he would outlaw all testing from now on.

"What you don't know about can't hurt you."

[OMGWTF]

40. Like a little kid thinking if they close their eyes, you can't see them.

[gibraltar72]

4. As I said here his plan was to control supply so he could use them to blackmail

hundreds of Governors to open up. Nice state you got there, too bad if something happened to it.

[Scarsdale]

93. Meanwhile, there seems to be no shortage of

test kits for the WH and the useless idiots working there. They are all safe, so who cares about the rest of us? Jared wants to control which governors get these kits, plus supplies for medical personnel. Where there is a buck, there is Jarvanka and the tRump ghouls. It is disgraceful that governors have to sneak around to get supplies, avoiding the government that is supposed to protect them. One family is controlling the entire country, during the worst epidemic to reach these shores. If only there was an intelligent member of that family. When this is finally under control I hope people remember who helped, and who obstructed the relief efforts. Thanks to J.B. Pritzker of Illinois. He is working hard for our residents.

[Gothmog]

99. trump only cares about himself

[leftieNanner]

5. This has been his stupid plan all along

The thing is, if he had been proactive (I know, LO - frickin' L) and started testing right away, he would have reduced his numbers and reduced the vast amount of dead. But he has never in his entire useless life done anything the hard way, or the right way. He would have gotten the accolades that his sick ego needs. Have you ever read Catch 22, Donnie? No. I didn't think so.

[barbtries]

62. my favorite book.

milo minderbinder: jared.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

6. I believe Minnesota is getting its own tests from the Mayo Clinic.

So eat THAT, Donnie.

[MineralMan]

19. Yes, but it's doing very little actual testing outside of hospitals.

That's why our case count is so low here. Testing will probably increase, but it will still probably be inadequate to give us a clear picture of how many people are actually infected.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

23. I don't think there's much testing outside hospitals anywhere yet.

At least Mayo is doing that much.

[MineralMan]

32. That's true, pretty much everywhere.

They're only testing people with severe symptoms. Now, once the antibody tests are widely distributed, we'll be able to see who has had it and is over the infection. In many ways that will be very helpful. However, testing for active infections would also be a very important way to see where this is going. Antibody tests show where it has been, and that's not enough information.

What shocked me were the hundreds of active infections discovered in that meat processing facility in South Dakota. Similarly, we're seeing high percentages of cases in nursing homes, prisons, jails, and, I suspect, in the military. The military has shut down all movement of personnel for the time being. There is a reason for that. But, what's happening in the military is classified.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

34. The Spanish Flu was spread to a considerable extent by soldiers in barracks

and who were deployed to various places in WWI. Then, as now, they share close quarters so it isn't surprising that it's turning up in the military, who didn't talk about it much then, either.

[MineralMan]

35. Yes. And, if they reopen the schools, they will have the same

effect. So many people in close quarters. It's a recipe for the nationwide spread of an epidemic.

[OMGWTF]

45. We already have a nationwide epidemic and it's going to hit the red states in 3, 2, 1 ...

I am sorry so many people have died because of Covitidiot-45. He is a mass murderer at this point and it's only going to get worse.

[erronis]

78. And the military has ceased reporting its cases. Even if they did, could we trust them?

Sort of like the body counts from 'nam. And "light at the end of the tunnel."

[The Blue Flower]

7. He's cannibalizing the people of this country

As if killing millions would be a great steppingstone to being re-elected.

[Botany]

31. I have to think that he wants to kill us

Because if you wait until the person shows symptoms then we will have had up to 14 days of the person spreading the virus asymptomaticly.

[MineralMan]

36. The idea of shutting everything down was to buy time.

Time to find out what the effective treatments are and time to work on an effective vaccine. Trump wants to end all that, long before either has been pinned down.

We're getting fairly close on the treatment side. There are a couple of antiviral drugs that are showing excellent results in compassionate trials that don't have control groups. There are other trials going on, too, some with cocktails of antiviral drugs.

The vaccine situation works more slowly, and controlled trials for effectiveness take a good deal of time and have to be used in situations where people are exposed to the virus. So, that's why it will take at least a year to find the best vaccine candidate.

[OMGWTF]

48. I swear to Goddess Trump is taking his orders from Putin. Everything he does hurts us.

[MineralMan]

50. Putin's busy right now. He has his own pandemic to worry about.

I somehow think he's not all that concerned with Trump right now.

[bdamomma]

55. hopefully

this virus takes these tyrants down too. They deserve it.

[erronis]

80. Not too busy to stop trying to destroy his arch-enemy, the one who brought down his beloved USSR.

And he has implanted all those russki operatives throughout the US. The NRA, the armed idiots calling themselves "proud boys" or tee-partiers, and the (r)epuglicons.

[bdamomma]

51. The scientists

I have great faith in, they will find something. I wish that cult minority would just STFU, but ignorance and arrogance will take them down. Their tyrant doesn't give two shits about them.

[littlemissmartypants]

66. Of course, he wants to kill us, he's a psychopath. nt

[Whiskeytide]

69. I don't think he actually WANTS to kill people, ...

... he just doesn’t CARE whether he does or not. He has the obsessive goal of restarting the economy and trying to salvage the November election. It just doesn’t matter to him if that results in the deaths of tens of thousands of Americans.

He believes he controls the podium, so he plans to just bullshit his way around the deaths, blame others, and declare victory and genius presidenting’ despite the actual facts. The sad truth is that it might work - for at least some voters.

[littlemissmartypants]

71. I disagree. He's a psychopath. Nothing would please him more than to create pain and suffering.

Has the memory of Jamal Khashoggi faded that fast?

I am perfectly fine with my assessment of his character and strong in my belief that he is amoral and dangerous.

He would delight in killing you. I'm sure of it.

That doesn't mean he can't go through all of the other machinations you mentioned. Chaos and pain keep the psychopath motivated but they're not that deep. It's simple, he wants to see us suffer and if we die, well that's icing on the cake.

[The_REAL_Ecumenist]

77. Well, that's just idiotic because the VAST MAJORITY of people who commit suicide are the same

Intellectually DISTURBED MAGAts & tea party cretins. How many trumpanzees have we read about, who claimed that CV19 was NO BIG DEAL & ended up "CASKET SHARP"? Just saying....

[LAS14]

8. K & R

[malaise]

9. In a just world Don the Con would

die from Covid -19.
That is all

[gratuitous]

10. He certainly seems to be courting death

We could see the normal and natural consequence of failing to follow the counsel of experts.

[SoonerPride]

53. We came so close when the Brazilian delegation was at his stupid Florida golf club shithole.

I was really hoping the virus had found a nice juicy host.

Alas it was not to be.

[erronis]

81. Anybody else wonder if they didn't have a vaccine ready for his trip to Walter Reed?

[warmfeet]

87. Absolutely.

We need to bring justice to this world.

[empedocles]

11. Haven't seen this anywhere. Could trump be reflexively fighting against 'flattening the curve',

- instead, trying to spike the curve, and hope to get infectious cases done and out of the way, or declining, before November?

[MineralMan]

20. I've thought about that, as well. He did mention just letting the disease

"wash over the country," in one of his pressers, but we never heard that again. However, inadequate testing and re-opening businesses that involve lots of people gathering would very likely lead to that, anyhow. The trouble with that is that it would also lead to a flooding of hospitals with critical cases, overloading them completely.

The measures taken to limit the number of infections at any given time have worked fairly well, but if they are abandoned, I'm afraid things will get bad pretty quickly again, and simply using the "stay at home" measures won't be able to stop it.

Yesterday, Trump said "Maybe there will be, you know, 50-60 thousand deaths total, and that would be horrible, of course, but..."

There will be that many deaths by the end of next week or the week after. What then, Donald?

[empedocles]

26. As policy its terrible to spike the curve - agreed. Could well backfire against trump.

However, from traitortrump's point of view, - so what. Try and get the worst out no matter what the damage, and do this 'hail mary' for November.

[bdamomma]

57. that

"but" sounds like I don't care.

[dpibel]

59. Not in a presser

WaPo unnamed source report is where "wash over the country" came from.

See, e.g., https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/trump-ask-why-government-let-coronavirus-wash-over-country

He's never said it out loud in public.

[Locrian]

29. or - even worse....

he thinks it's a win-win:

If the dems fight him (and he can keep the numbers down) then he blames the economy on the dems refusal to "let people get back to work"

If they give in, ff the numbers go UP (if enough people demand it) - there's a real possibility that he claims some sort of emergency powers. I wound not put ANYTHING past him to stay in power

I think the recent rallys of his brownshirts are a sign of things to come. I do NOT like where this is going.


It's always ANYTHING to blame someone else, and it's sliding into ANYTHING to stay in power.

[kentuck]

12. Yep!

Nailed it!

[IronLionZion]

13. If a parachute is working, a skydiver can remove it during a jump

[Roy Rolling]

14. Bingo

You can’t have a confirmed case without a test. The best way for cases to go to zero is stop testing completely.

In a perverse way, that’s how Trump’s twisted brain works. He’s reducing the spread of the disease by not testing for it. And then going on Fox News to declare the country virus free.

[FarPoint]

15. Send this as an email opinion to CNN

I would like to see this raise to the level of truth...

Heck...send it to the Biden campaign team..

[MineralMan]

21. It's not uniquely my idea. Others have thought of it, as well.

That theory is already out there.

[FarPoint]

24. You said it with clarity..

I believe you are spot on target...

[MineralMan]

28. My thinking about this is based on his actions.

I can't think of any reason he would act as he is acting other than that conclusion.

He is scared to death of the public discovering how many people are actually infected by COVID-19. What he doesn't realize is that people are going to find out at some point. They're also going to find out that opening things back up will lead to a huge spike in deaths and people on life support in hospitals.

His ignorance and stupidity know no bounds.

[Iliyah]

16. Wouldn't it be more feesible in a business point of view . . .

to allow the testing, try to control the infection rate and have less deaths in view to a "long term" heathy , more profitable opening?

What t-rump and cronies are doing is somewhat backwards and would subject the country to become less profitable, with more deaths and uncontrollable and widespread infections.

As Mr. Spock would say . . . . illogical.

[MineralMan]

30. Yes, it would, but Donald Trump thinks in the very short term only.

[aggiesal]

41. t-rump and cronies are doing something backwards? ...

No way that would happen.

What kind of American are you?

Do I need the sarcasm thingee?

[Wounded Bear]

17. Trump has been blocking widespread testing from the beginning...

[Captain Zero]

33. ever since the cruise ship was kept in the Pacific

He was worried ",his numbers" would go up. So it's like his income if he is figuring his taxes, he keeps his numbers low. If he needs a loan he reports more assets than he really has to the loan officer. It's not about the objective reality of any situation to him. It is about his "needs". So, he is always manipulating, any AND EVERY situation, to his "needs". It is part of his disordered personality. It won't change.

[ProfessorGAC]

46. HIS Numbers

Not american people. Not american lives. His numbers.

[BBG]

18. Not delaying but denying

I think he is averse to testing because no good has ever come of testing for him. From school tests that showed him not be the best and brightest to paternity tests that showed him legally responsible for progeny he has never experienced any good (for himself) in testing. He is traumatized at what testing can and will reveal about himself.

[Gothmog]

22. trump wants to pretend that the number of cases are going down

[MineralMan]

25. Exactly. He thinks in 24-hour increments. He cannot think ahead

farther than a week or so. He has advisors, but he doesn't listen to them. If they contradict his ideas, we don't see them any more in his daily "briefings." When did you see Dr. Fauci last in one of those?

Trump has no long game, because he has no foresight. He can't remember stuff from the recent past, and can't think clearly about the future.

Yesterday, he said he "hadn't been out of the White House for months," despite having held big rallies in February and one in March. He has also been golfing a few times, as well.

Trump's mind is gone.

[empedocles]

27. trump lives in 'the moment'. The 'trump moment'

[bdamomma]

58. he

lives in a delusional state of his own bubble, hope it pops soon.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

37. He's been compared to a goldfish.

He lives in a confined little bubble, can't remember what happened yesterday or even a few hours ago, and has a negligible attention span.

[MineralMan]

38. A very good comparison.

[aggiesal]

47. He also said that ...

he's been talking to 100's of governors.

[MineralMan]

52. And he has saved "billions of lives" in this country...

of 320 million people. Idiot!

[aggiesal]

75. That's why my nickname for him is Pendejo45 ...

Pendejo means IDIOT in Spanish.

He truly is Supreme IDIOT of the land.

[rocktivity]

63. The number of cases most likely WILL go down as dramatically as they went up.

The problem is that without knowing exactly who is asymptomatic or infected, there's no way to stop a "second wave" if the U.S. were to reopen prematurely. That's why cost-effective national mass testing is needed -- thankfully, it is now possible:
https://yourhhrsnews.com/mass-coronavirus-testing-debuts-in-edison-the-rest-of-the-us-next/


rocktivity

[bucolic_frolic]

39. One very big difference between now and 2016

In 2016 everyone blamed the MSM and the Faux News, and rightfully so. But no one knew what was really going on. This year Trump's motives and actions are transparently readable for thinking voters able to tease them out.

[cornball 24]

42. AGREE!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Blue Owl]

43. He is a sick, sick man

And Joe Biden needs to turn this into another campaign ad highlighting tRump's lust for money and power over safety and human lives...

[Demovictory9]

92. sick sick SICK sick

[barbtries]

44. it's fucking murderous.

if his calculations are correct and this helps him in november i just don't know what.

[MineralMan]

49. It's a long time until November.

What Trump is doing is very likely to result in disaster. That won't help him at all. There's a pretty good chance, I think, that he will become infected with COVID-19. He's likely to resume doing stupid things like rallies and parties at Mar-a-Lago. He'll be exposed, no doubt, if he does those things. The virus doesn't know he's the POTUS. Nope.

He has no idea what he's doing.

[barbtries]

61. it doesn't seem possible he could win.

but i was blindsided in 2016.

it's the level of the propaganda and seeing, in real time, how effective it is, that really sets my hair on fire. it gets worse and worse by the day, but media still broadcasts it. trump cultists are brainwashed to the extent they have given up their souls for this man. some are family members.

i agree he has little idea of what he's doing. evil people are whispering in his ear, giving him bad advice and lying to him no doubt about his popularity. how can this man be president? how did my country sink this low this fast?

i agree that his plan will end in disaster. dead people can't work. even with social distancing, thanks to his slow and terrible response, bodies are piling up already. it's bound to get worse before it gets better and trump and his cabal know that but act as if it's not so. trump is a magical thinker, a delusional, demented narcissist who couldn't lead a dog on a leash, and he's president. WTF

[abakan]

54. I don't understand what he thinks will happen if we don't test.

If we don't test it won't keep people from dying. Would he prefer a butchers bill of his victims?
How does he think dead people will vote? I just can't wrap my head around it.

[rocktivity]

56. DING DING DING! MineralMan, you're our grand prize winner!

More testing means identification of more active infections among the public.

And what's even worse for Trump, a saliva-based mass testing protocol has been approved by the FDA: it's cost-effective enough to roll out quickly, and so easy to administer that non-medical personnel can do it. And it must be done, because without a vaccine, antidote, or cure available, the only way to "flatten the curve" now is to detect and quarantine the asymptomatic and the newly infected.
https://yourhhrsnews.com/mass-coronavirus-testing-debuts-in-edison-the-rest-of-the-us-next/

Trump's real problem is that EVERYONE in the U.S. could be tested with the protocol within 60 - 90 days, and with only the uninfected allowed back on the streets, the U.S. could be re-opened safely. But by dragging it through the summer, it could have a negative effect on actually having another election, especially if he can also succeed at not bailing out the post office.


rocktivity

[beachbumbob]

60. trump don;t get it, more testing will reveal mortality rate is on par with seasonal flu and can be

better dealt with

[Hekate]

64. KnR

[Marrah_Goodman]

67. The man is evil n/t

[oldsoftie]

68. But MORE cases revealed would actually be a GOOD thing in a way. Look at LA county.

They're finding several times more cases than expected. But that also means that the death rate is actually lower than expected; and that even MORE people who get it dont need hospitalization

The BIGGEST thing to find out is if having the antibodies actually means you have conferred some immunity. Or even can pass immunity to others by donating your blood plasma. If that is the case, thats a HUGE deal. But finding that out will take time

[Hassler]

70. Vintage Chump: over estimate the possible deaths, then underreport the deaths.

[Chakaconcarne]

73. He doesn't want testing and he wants to drag this out so it affects the election.....

He probably underestimated the extremes states were willing to go to keep this under control.

[DallasNE]

82. But Trump Already Looks Bad

USA is 800,000 total while 2nd place Spain is 200,000. And over 42,000 dead. That number is the yardstick and limited testing will boost that very substantially. He's screwed both ways. And it is a trap of his own making.

[LanternWaste]

83. After this, therefor because of this, eh?

[tclambert]

84. Is one of those steps in the middle: And then a miracle occurs?

I'm sure the last step is: PROFIT!

Wait, the very last step could be: EVERYBODY PRAISES TRUMP!

My theme as you can see is I expect the plan to be based entirely on wishful thinking, grounded in stupendous stupidity.

[spanone]

85. Precisely. trump told us early on he wanted to keep the numbers low....

and his administration has slow walked the tests at every opportunity.

[scarytomcat]

86. everything is to serve the great master

all hail the great ...ah fuck it

[PatrickforO]

88. Just a quick question for you, and the others on this thread:

I would normally say this was negligent homicide - at least the minute the first 'second wave' person dies, it would be.

But negligent homicide presupposes an absence of malice, and I think Trump has malice. We won't be able to call the deaths manslaughter, either, because that also presupposes a lack of malice.

So, my question is this, a twofold one:

1. Will the second wave of deaths be murder? Murder is usually defined as a homicide committed with “malice aforethought.” It isn't necessarily a malicious killing, but the term 'malice aforethought' merely says it is an unjustified killing. For a killing to be a murder, there has to be either intent to kill, or, at minimum, conduct so reckless that it is punishable as murder. This is what I'm thinking Trump will be guilty of. Now, we can say second degree, but we all know that the reason Trump is doing this is to win the election, so to my mind, it becomes FIRST DEGREE MURDER.

2. And here's the meat of my twofold question: Will we prosecute Trump for his crimes or will we simply mouth the same old platitude that advanced nations don't prosecute past presidents? Because to my mind, we should have prosecuted Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Rice for war crimes. But we didn't. And, since I don't want to leave anyone in doubt as to where I stand, I think we should prosecute the whole disgusting bunch with each death constituting one 'count' of first-degree murder, with sentences to be served consecutively, NOT concurrently.

So, MineralMan, you've been in Democratic circles much longer than me. You're not THAT much older, but I didn't get active until '08 when I felt absolutely compelled to volunteer for Obama's campaign. Those were heady days and we truly made history!

But..............back to Trump. Prosecute or no?

[MineralMan]

96. He won't be prosecuted while in office. He can only be impeached.

After he leaves office, he could be prosecuted, but that's not something that usually happens, as you pointed out.

[Cha]

89. Of course he is.. TY for spelling it out so

well, MM!

[Quixote1818]

90. It will backfire because once the hospitals start overflowing

Everyone will know what is really going on.

[MerryBlooms]

91. reelection year, trading American lives for poll numbers

[Raster]

94. The main reason tRump* is delaying testing...

... because the DATA will show just what a failure and an incompetent #tRump* truly is.

[orangecrush]

95. Excellent post

You've outdone yourself!

[hkp11]

97. so true...

He doesn't want the #s of those infected to go up
He doesn't want the #s of deaths associated with this virus to go up
If less testing, then ongoing deaths will not be counted towards this virus and #s won't go up
Saying testing is being done over and over again to his zombies and coverage of that on RW radio/Faux News...
gives him a chance for him to win re-election go up (in his mind of course & RW minds)

[Gothmog]

98. Manipulative Trump is terrified of widespread coronavirus testing

Link to tweet

The conclusion here is simple, and has been right on the surface all along: Trump doesn’t particularly want Americans to be tested for the coronavirus. Some pundits and politicians seem unwilling to draw this conclusion, at least in public, in no small part because it doesn’t seem to make sense.

No one is under any illusions that Trump cares about the American public, of course. But mass testing seems like it would clearly be in the president’s self-interest. His best chance at winning re-election is for the economy to be safely reopened, and at least partly recover, before November. But that simply can’t be done without mass testing. Trying to reopen the economy without doing that, as states like Georgia and South Carolina are planning to do, is just likely to cause the virus to spread more rapidly, which will only worsen the economic downturn.

So why is Trump doing whatever he can to prevent the very thing that would give him the best chance of saving the economy and boosting his re-election chances? Why is a notorious narcissist whose only plausible motivation is his own self-interest not doing the
one thing that would benefit him in this crisis?

Because Trump isn’t capable of seeing widespread testing — and more accurate information about the spread of the virus — as being in his self-interest. He sees it this way: The more tests that are done, the more confirmed cases are counted, and his impulse is to conceal that larger number if he possibly can. So he’s trying to keep the official case count as low as possible through the only method he understands: Lying and cheating. In this case, by preventing testing such that no accurate count is possible.
It’s not like he’s hidden Trump hasn’t hidden this desire from the public.

[MineralMan]

100. Exactly!