Inaction and Failure : How Trump Failed the Biggest Test of his Presidency

There is no other way to put what we are seeing with the supposed leader of the free world. I would like to put it lightly but sadly there is no nice or politically correct way to say this, so I will just come out and say it like it needs to be said.

Donald Trump failed the biggest moment of his presidency.

He not only failed but he failed miserably and now the American people are paying the price for his inaction and his failure and for his weak and in fact negligent response to this crisis, the worst crisis that our country has had in decades, perhaps in our lifetimes.

This quote from Trump says it all about where he stands, “I don’t like testing because when you test you found out something is wrong with that person being tested.”

This says it all.

He does not want testing because he wants low numbers, it is all about his image and his precious economy. He does not want people to see things as bad as they are because then they will stay home and his baby, his economy, will not flourish like he needs it to for re-election and this is the truth of why he does not want mass testing and contact tracing.

This is the same reason why is against masks and other ways to slow the spread and contain the virus. He is against these things for two very simple reasons and these reasons are proof of where his priorities lie and what he is all about.

1. Higher numbers show the epic failure of his response.
2. When people wear masks and testing is done, less people will be going out and the slower the country will reopen, which is bad for his economy and thus his re-election.

Trump is against masks, testing, and tracing.

He is against all of this because he failed from the very start and he wants people to just pretend this is all going to go away like he told us that it would and he wants people to praise him, that he was right and the medical experts were wrong.

He is against testing and tracing because he is afraid if more cases are found, his failed response to the virus will be exposed even more and perhaps exposed to his supporters and they will finally (hopefully) wake up to the fact that it is there guy that let the virus spread within the United States and not China or the Democrats who are to blame.

He is against testing and tracing because testing and tracing goes against what he is telling everyone and that is that everything is all good and that we don’t have a big problem and as he said himself, when you test, then you know that there is a problem and he does not want that.

He is against masks because he views masks as a culture war.

He views it as a way he can rile up his supporters to view things from his lens and that is that those who want them to wear masks are controlling them and their lives. As we know, Republicans view everything from the lens of their freedoms being taken away and the Trump side views when they are told to test, stay at home, and wear a mask then they are being controlled and that their freedoms are being restricted.

Also, he and so many who refuse to wear masks view it as being a sign of being weak and taking away from their self image that they so desperately cherish. It is a sign that they are needy and afraid to them and that they do not have that fearlessness and strength that they perceive that they need to be powerful.

It is also something that they feel makes them a “sheep” or weak, as I have heard those who support Trump often say. They think that wearing a mask makes them a follower and not a leader and they do not realize that they are the followers and sheep who are following Trump and doing as he says and does.

Trump does not wear a mask and by not wearing one himself, he is sending the message to not only his supporters, but to the country as a whole that wearing a mask is not necessary and that they do not need to wear one because look at him, he does not wear one and he is fine and healthy and this is the wrong message to send to people. This is a message that goes against what the medical and scientific experts are telling people, that wearing a mask prevents further spread of the virus.

Trump believes that masks, tests, and so on make our country look bad and that it slows the reopening of the country and this is because for him, it is not about us, but it is and always has been about HIM and what is important for him and the agendas and plans that he has for himself. It is not about the health of our nation and doing what is right and it never has been, even before this crisis began.

If he cared about the country and slowing this virus down then he would suck it up and wear a mask, he would give the country what he gives his staff and his own family and that is consistent access to testing and tracing, and he would make sure everyone has access to the financial help that they need to survive during the pandemic.

The sad truth is that he does not care about you or me and never has and this crisis proves that. In fact, he does not even care about his own staff and is only testing them because he wants to protect himself from getting the virus and that is why he makes sure that everyone around him gets tested and that tracing is done. The same can be said about how everyone in the West Wing of the White House is required to wear a mask yet he does not wear one himself, he cares about him not getting sick, and could care less about if others get sick with the virus.

Wearing a mask is about protecting others, not yourself so much and the reason that Trump and his supporters do not wear a mask is because they do not care about you, they only care about themselves and that right there says it all about where their priorities are. It says it all about who Trump and those who support him are and tells us all we need to know.

The resistance to masks, tracing , and testing is an element of the failed response by this president but there is so much more to the worst failure to respond to a crisis that we have ever seen in the history of this country, there is so much more.

Trump supporters get their information (lies) from Trump, they get it from the source and they are getting wrong information. It was him who failed us with this virus, not China and not the World Health Organization, and for sure not Democrats, but it was Trump who dropped the ball and continues to fail on the response to this crisis.

Trump and his supporters say that he banned travel from China and that is only partially true and in fact, not a difference maker and here is why I say that. He “banned” travel from China “very early” and that his China travel ban “saved thousands of lives” and this talking point has been debunked by a number of sources and is not true. There is a very good reason why I say that it is not true and that is that there were thousands who flew in from China to the United States after that ban was put into effect and none of them were placed in quarantine.

Trump supporters say that the 40,000 who came in on flights after the ban took effect were American citizens and that is also not entirely true, some non Americans were on those flights and even the citizens of the U.S. could have been exposed to the virus and they were not placed in quarantine after they arrived back here, which was a major mistake.

Plus, the travel ban was too late and thus it made zero difference in stopping the spread of this virus.

There is now evidence that a Santa Clara, California woman was the first American to be positive for COVID-19 and she had the virus before the ban was put into place, which debunks the notion that the virus was not kept out by his travel ban as it was here before the ban was put into place and it also debunks the notion that it was travel related to China, she never had even traveled to the region.

The virus was already here by the time Trump put this so-called travel ban into place so the ban made no difference. It was completely ineffective and did not save any lives. This is their number one go-to argument when they are faced with the reality that their president failed and when Trump himself is confronted with the facts that he failed the biggest test of his presidency and one neither he or his supporters can accept.

What else do they have other than this China ban to show that he acted and did so in time?

Nothing. The failed travel ban is all they have!

Trump has shown complete inaction. He cannot deflect blame like he so often likes to do and his supporters cannot use whataboutisms to talk about what others are or are not doing when their president is the one who has failed us and failed to act and they know it, if they did not know it then they would not get so angry as they attempt to defend him.

For ten weeks he did nothing but call this virus a “hoax” and a “harmless flu” and downplay the severity of this and he did all of this as Americans were dying and becoming very ill from the virus that he did not and still to this day does not take seriously. It was his inaction both in word and in action that got us into this situation and it was his lack of leadership that encouraged his supporters to ignore the threat as well.

If he led like a real leader does then we would be in much better shape than we are today, but he did not and thus, here we are with approaching 95,000 deaths and more than 1.6 million Americans infected with the virus and that number growing daily, with no end in sight. If he had been presidential and acted like a real leader does during a crisis, then that number would be much lower and we would be in much better shape.

Here are the facts of his inaction.

• He ignored the threat that was in the playbook of the previous administration and his own advisors warned him of for weeks and weeks.
• He dismantled the Pandemic Response Team set up by President Obama
• He failed to replenish the national stockpile of PPE (He had three years to do so)
• He has lied about the virus and who is to blame
• He promotes wacko cures and treatments that are dangerous and don’t work.
• He promotes opening up the country with no regard for public health and others.
• He blames everyone else and takes no responsibility for his own actions.
• He divides as the virus rages through our country. He attacks everyone under the sun who ask simple questions.
• He failed to act when we had a dozen cases by not enacting guidelines of social distancing, lockdowns, and other health orders and because of that the virus has spread and continues to spread.

These are the facts. Trump failed the American people. He continues to do just that and allow this virus to spread and continues to lie and blame everyone else for his own inaction and failures on this virus and the crisis that he and his administration allowed to get to this point.

This is what we know.

Trump failed the biggest test of not only his presidency, but of our country and our history.

He continues to show a lack of leadership and he continues to deflect, blame, and lie daily on this virus and his response to it, while claiming that he has done more than enough and has no responsibility for any of it and that alone shows us how this man is unfit to lead.

The bottom line is this, this president has dropped the ball in regard to this virus and has allowed it to get out of control when he and his people had multiple opportunities to get it under control and contain the spread back in January and February but instead did nothing for months and this is why we currently have the most deaths and the most cases of any nation on earth and that certainly does not make America great.

Trump let us down and abandoned his oath of office to protect the 300+ million Americans under his care. Trump failed the biggest test of his presidency and of his life and continues to dig a deeper hole by lying and deflecting the blame to others while more and more of our people die from the virus.

Come November, remember this.

Donald Trump is not to blame for the virus, but he is to blame for our response or lack of a response to it and the thousands of deaths are on his watch and he owns them — all of them. I say this because if he had shut us down early on and took social distancing and masks seriously and enacted those policies then we would be better off — much better off.