The Trump Presidency: Part 20

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BobTheCoward said:
The ad is incorrectly implying that his use of the word hoax applies to the virus when multiple, legitimate fact checkers said it clearly referred to democrat accusations.
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The democrat accusation that the virus is not a hoax?

Anyway, the claim is definitely beyond legal recourse, since it is not unreasonable to get the message from what Trump has said that the danger of the virus is a hoax: he has repeatedly claimed that it is no danger and that he has everything under control.

But by all means, let's have some Discovery!
 
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The Great Zaganza said:
The democrat accusation that the virus is not a hoax?
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From snopes

What's True
During a Feb. 28, 2020, campaign rally in South Carolina, President Donald Trump likened the Democrats' criticism of his administration's response to the new coronavirus outbreak to their efforts to impeach him, saying "this is their new hoax." During the speech he also seemed to downplay the severity of the outbreak, comparing it to the common flu.

What's False
Despite creating some confusion with his remarks, Trump did not call the coronavirus itself a hoax.
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I've already heard the answer to these

sts60 said:
Did you ask him why we’re paying for the “wall” instead of Mexico?
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They are, indirectly. "He never said they would write a check." (actually, he did say they would write a check)

Or why Trump has spent nearly a third of his presidency golfing, at his own properties at our expense? After saying he’d be “too busy” to golf?
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Fake news. He hasn't actually golfed as much as Obama. And when he is golfing, he is actually working so it doesn't count.

(I'm not making this up, these are apologetics I have heard)


Or… Oh, never mind. Just tell him he’s an idiot and be done with it.
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Trumpets have a very different reality. How do you communicate with people who insist that white christian men are the most discriminated against group in the US? (and they said it at a time when the administration was trying to ban muslims from entering the US)

Also ask: Hillary Clinton - locked up yet? Shoot, even AG Barr said there's nothing there.

Healthcare: everyone covered, and it's cheap?

Who knew it could be so complicated, right?
 
BobTheCoward said:
From snopes
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It's rather clear that Trump believes the Coronavirus is a real thing. It's also rather clear that Trump's critics recognize that Trump believes it can infect people and make them ill. The "hoax" is that the Coronavirus is a meaningful threat.

If it only killed two people outside of China, and made a dozen Americans mildly ill, then Trump's claim that it's a "hoax" would be vindicated. As it stands, he was mistaken.
 
Cain said:
It's rather clear that Trump believes the Coronavirus is a real thing. It's also rather clear that Trump's critics recognize that Trump believes it can infect people and make them ill. The "hoax" is that the Coronavirus is a meaningful threat.

If it only killed two people outside of China, and made a dozen Americans mildly ill, then Trump's claim that it's a "hoax" would be vindicated. As it stands, he was mistaken.
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Snopes, and multiple fact checkers disagree with your claim here

The "hoax" is that the Coronavirus is a meaningful threat.
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BobTheCoward said:
Snopes, and multiple fact checkers disagree with your claim here
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And yet: "During the speech he also seemed to downplay the severity of the outbreak, comparing it to the common flu."

Instead of just invoking fact-checkers try to, you know, bring actual evidence to bear. If you can. Here are Trump's remarks:

One of my people came up to me and said, ‘Mr. President, they tried to beat you on Russia, Russia, Russia. That didn’t work out too well. They couldn’t do it. They tried the impeachment hoax. That was on a perfect conversation. They tried anything, they tried it over and over, they’ve been doing it since you got in. It’s all turning, they lost, it’s all turning. Think of it. Think of it. And this is their new hoax. But you know, we did something that’s been pretty amazing. We’re 15 people [cases of coronavirus infection] in this massive country. And because of the fact that we went early, we went early, we could have had a lot more than that.
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Let's take for example the "impeachment hoax." It wasn't a hoax; it actually happened. Democrats didn't merely threaten to impeach him -- they DID impeach him. If pressed, Trump would have to acknowledge that, yes, he was impeached. What he's saying is that the impeachment was based on non-credible grounds. Now that we have our stupid-to-English translators out, it's perfectly reasonable to infer that Trump here means that the Coronavirus is all blown out of proportion -- just like the "perfect" phone call was blown all out of proportion. He later says the press is in "hysteria mode," but Coronavirus nothing to worry about because he has it under control and is doing such a good job.

Separately worth noting: All of this occurred well before Coronavirus mutated into the Chinese virus.
 
From Snopes:

What's True
During a Feb. 28, 2020, campaign rally in South Carolina, President Donald Trump likened the Democrats' criticism of his administration's response to the new coronavirus outbreak to their efforts to impeach him, saying "this is their new hoax." During the speech he also seemed to downplay the severity of the outbreak, comparing it to the common flu.

What's False
Despite creating some confusion with his remarks, Trump did not call the coronavirus itself a hoax.


So it's a mixture. He called it the Democrats' new hoax to downplay the severity of it and thus, justify his pathetic "response" to it.
 
Hyper-literalness and reality aren't generally compatible. Especially when the speaker speaks a language generally know as Weasel Giberish.
 
Cain said:
And yet: "During the speech he also seemed to downplay the severity of the outbreak, comparing it to the common flu."

Instead of just invoking fact-checkers try to, you know, bring actual evidence to bear. If you can. Here are Trump's remarks:



Let's take for example the "impeachment hoax." It wasn't a hoax; it actually happened. Democrats didn't merely threaten to impeach him -- they DID impeach him. If pressed, Trump would have to acknowledge that, yes, he was impeached. What he's saying is that the impeachment was based on non-credible grounds. Now that we have our stupid-to-English translators out, it's perfectly reasonable to infer that Trump here means that the Coronavirus is all blown out of proportion -- just like the "perfect" phone call was blown all out of proportion. He later says the press is in "hysteria mode," but Coronavirus nothing to worry about because he has it under control and is doing such a good job.

Separately worth noting: All of this occurred well before Coronavirus mutated into the Chinese virus.
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Is the ad implying that the quote reflects a general downplaying as you argued, or is the ad implying that he called the existence of the virus a hoax?

I don't disagree with your argument about what he said and implied. But the question is what does the ad say about what he said.
 
BobTheCoward said:
From snopes
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The main real issue is that Trump was, and generally still is (though less so now), downplaying things immensely all around, in part to justify why he's taken very little actually decisive action, especially during the time when COVID-19's spread likely could have been contained (or technically, had its spread immensely restricted) in the US. The "hoax" comment is just one part out of many when it comes to that and fits perfectly well in that context. No need to claim that he said that COVID-19 was a hoax - he didn't, after all, and that ad didn't claim that he did.

To quote the originators -

Trump refused to take the threat of the coronavirus seriously, now he won’t take responsibility as his administration has been totally unprepared for this crisis.
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Aridas said:
The main real issue is that Trump was, and generally still is (though less so now), downplaying things immensely all around, in part to justify why he's taken very little actually decisive action, especially during the time when COVID-19's spread likely could have been contained in the US.
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That is the main issue about life in general, but the issue presented by the cease and desist letter is narrow.
 
SuburbanTurkey said:
Trump campaign attempting to suppress this negative ad about his Covid-19 response. They have issued a cease and desist order, which I can't imagine being successful.

https://twitter.com/briantylercohen/status/1242974655293435907
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Cease and desist orders, according to my sister who ia practicing attorney, are something of a joke in the legal profession. Just sending one has no real force of law;you have to get a court order. And judges are notoriously skeptical to give such an order.
This one is particualry usless;would be thrown out of court immedietely as a clear violation of the First Amendment.
BTW all through his career Trump has used cease and desists and threats of legal action to bully people.
 
BobTheCoward said:
That is the main issue about life in general, but the issue presented by the cease and desist letter is narrow.
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Narrow, yes, and misses the mark. It's little more than the usual nonsensical BS that Trump and his lawyers make up to try to kill things that Trump thinks are not good for him.
 
I think Trump's gut feeling is that his current standing inthe polls will vanish the longer the crisis lasts, and he is scared it might be beyond his control.
 
Aridas said:
Narrow, yes, and misses the mark. It's little more than the usual nonsensical BS that Trump and his lawyers make up to try to kill things that Trump thinks are not good for him.
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Which is why I asked a narrow question. I didn't ask the obvious how much the themes with the piece fits into Trump's oeuvre.
 
BobTheCoward said:
Of course not. However wrong Trump's accusation was, it is separate from the question if the ad misrepresented it.
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In news somewhat relevant to the validity of what the ad actually implied...

Here’s one of the worst sentences I have read even during this terrible time for our nation: “At the Department of Veterans Affairs, workers are scrambling to order medical supplies on Amazon after its leaders, lacking experience in disaster responses, failed to prepare for the onslaught of patients at its medical centers.”

They were unprepared for a pandemic even with months of warnings, so they’re trying to shop on Amazon, which is swamped with orders and notoriously running low on key supplies for the pandemic. And it’s the Department of Veterans Affairs, which runs its own major health care system. That right there tells you so much of what you need to know about this administration when it comes to basic competence and preparedness.
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Incidentally, that's referring to the Times article found here.
 
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