So, Trump is holding another press conference today (maybe sell now?), and also the spreading virus is foreigners’ fault and Trump appointee Jay Powell is to blame for the economy:
Trump will find many people to blame this afternoon, and President Obama, Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer will likely get name-checked. But Trump-adjacent entertainers and elected officials have been debuting other possible scapegoats this week:
On Fox & Friends, Jerry Falwell Jr claims people are "overreacting" to coronavirus, the national response is "their next attempt to get Trump," and the virus itself is a North Korean bioweapon. pic.twitter.com/2JPuNBW7C3
— Bobby Lewis (@revrrlewis) March 13, 2020
There’s no internal logic there since a bioweapon is by definition a big fucking deal. But that’ll sail right over the Fox News audience’s heads. Sparkling pool enthusiast Falwell Jr. and the network’s sofa squatting assholes’ reckless blather is probably going to get more than just the stupid people killed.
The Bobble-Throated Slap-Dick from Arkansas* is also pushing the bioweapon conspiracy theory:
I don’t think Trump has endorsed the conspiracy theory yet, but that could change this afternoon. Sure would put a crimp in trade negotiations! But these people don’t think long term. They don’t think at all.
The animating principle of the Trump administration is to pin the blame on someone else for the consequences of Trump’s towering incompetence. That applies to every result of each of the many incidences of Trump’s bungling. It’s just that the scale of this incident is so massive that it might take World War III to obscure it.
Open thread.
[H/T: Charles P. Pierce]