I am beginning to suspect that our national media suffers from a variant of Stockholm Syndrome. Not precisely the same, but somewhat. Perhaps we should call it What-If-Obama-Had-Said-Or-Done-This-Itis. The media has reacted to constant abuse from a certain stable genius by refusing to acknowledge the obvious, and pretending that his insanity is just Trump being Trump. For example, his constant lying and misleading is just Trump drawing conclusions that aren’t necessarily supported by the facts.
Yesterday the President of the United States (so-called) suggested that we could inject people with sunshine and/or that we should inject or consume disinfectants in order to cure or ward off the corona virus.
Here’s the reaction at the Palmer Report, which I would say puts the matter mildly:
Donald Trump wants you to know that there’s a way to inject sunlight into the body so it’ll kill coronavirus. That was his overriding message during his press briefing today. Unfortunately for Trump, even his own experts weren’t willing to side with him on this bizarre nonsense.
…
Trump also suggested ingesting disinfectant directly into the body as a coronavirus miracle cure. To be clear, not only will this not help you, it could kill you. Disinfectants such as hand sanitizer and isopropyl alcohol are poisonous if ingested. In fact, 99% isopropyl alcohol is so dangerous, you can burn your skin just by touching it. Trump continues to offer phony medical advice that can prove fatal if you listen to him.
It goes on in this vein, leaving no doubt that the man is a nutjob.
Let’s step back a bit. The sunlight injection thing is so absurd even a six year old would reject it. As to the disinfectant injection, again, six is about the age when you can be pretty sure your kid won’t think to swig some Clorox. Yet here is a grown man, who holds the world’s most powerful position, suggesting that such things are not just feasible, but promising as treatments for the plague that his incompetence has amplified in this country. Such things should set off alarm bells in the media, for isn’t it the media’s job to keep us informed of looming dangers?
The Boston Globe ran a Bloomberg article, which quotes experts advising against following the recommendations of the prescriber in chief. That’s okay, so far as it goes. The Times also informs us that the genius’s prescription may not work, even passing along the information that disinfectant manufacturers felt called upon to issue a warning to other people who may still be in an infantile mental stage:
The maker of the disinfectants Lysol and Dettol also issued a statement on Friday warning against the improper use of their products. “As a global leader in health and hygiene products, we must be clear that under no circumstance should our disinfectant products be administered into the human body (through injection, ingestion or any other route),” the company said.
What these stories both share is the underlying assumption that it is simply normal for the President of the United States to make suggestions that have no logical, scientific, or rational basis, and which are so ludicrous that a kid in grammar school would flunk a science test if he or she suggested any such thing. There is no attempt to convey the fact that the President of the United States is a seriously mentally ill individual who is a clear and present danger to this nation and this world on multiple levels. Would it be so difficult to say something like: “Trump embraces another bizarre corona virus cure”, just as a lead in? Getting back to my original sentence, one must wonder if this media reluctance is a result of the fact that the genius constantly attacks them, and has effectively browbeaten them into a complicit silence.
Postscript: I know I’m a little late to the game commenting on this insanity when so many non-media folks (twitter is good for something, after all) have done so. Hopefully, I’m making a different point than most.
UPDATE: I didn’t even catch this in the Times article.
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