I often wonder, as I'm sure many of us do, how Trump thinks, or perhaps more accurately, how he chooses what to say or do.
Take Bob Woodward's revelations today that Trump knew and understood in February that covid-19 was many times more deadly than the flu and was more easily transmitted. Yet he repeatedly told the public that is was no more of a problem than the regular flu.
What was the calculation behind his lies - we know they are lies because he made public statements that from his on the record interview with Woodward, we now know he knew were not true?
His explanation is that he didn't want to cause a panic; yet in "not causing a panic" he advocated attitudes and actions that have significantly prolonged and exacerbated the seriousness of the pandemic in the US. Could it be that he was unable to foresee how his statements would alter the public's response (not wearing masks, not social distancing, gathering in large indoor settings) in ways that increased the spread?
Or as Aaron Blake posits, it was that his only goal each day was (is) to manage the next 24 hours in the news cycle? That has a ring of plausibility; his only preoccupation is his ratings and the coverage he gets in the media. That he manages day to day to the exclusion of pretty much everything else, matters that require engagement, concentration and study, things to which he appears complete allergic.
It has been suggested that he is completely incompetent; perhaps another spin is that he's good at one thing only - image management (his own); but unfortunately being president is about more than just that.
No comments:
Post a Comment