Dr. Irwin Redlener, director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at Columbia University, joined MSNBC anchor Yasmin Vossoughian yesterday to discuss the Trump administration’s handling of the COVID-19 crisis.
Vossoughian asked Redlener whether the U.S. was adequately prepared for the outbreak, especially considering we’ve known about the virus for more than two months.
Needless to say, Redlener doesn’t think Donald Trump’s glowing orange visage was warning enough:
VOSSOUGHIAN: “Do you think the United States, the federal government, was adequately prepared to deal with an outbreak of the coronavirus?”
REDLENER: “That’s the last way I would think about describing it. This is the most egregious level of incompetence in an administration that I think we’ve witnessed, at least in my memory. We have problems with how the government responded to Katrina. That was minor league compared to this. It’s extraordinary when you contrast the level of what we’re dealing with as a public health challenge and the absolute gross amateur-hour incompetence coming out of the White House. It’s actually stunning. It has nothing to do with politics. It has to do with a kind of an objective assessment of what we’ve been doing, when we got started, why we haven’t involved the private sector a long time ago, the fact that we’ve done maybe a thousand, maybe a little bit more tests, when South Korea has done 75,000, 100,000 tests. This whole thing is out of control. … Preparedness is not just about developing a vaccine and giving it to people and the appropriate drugs. It’s also about, are we prepared for a major national, international emergency in terms of preserving our economic stability and confidence of the public and so on?”
Hmm. Tell us what you really think, Dr. Redlener.
Of course, I could have told Dr. Redlener and anyone else who wanted to listen that Trump would be a disaster in a crisis. I literally would not hire the guy for any job. I wouldn’t even ask him to smuggle drugs in his rectum, because Pence would immediately narc to the feds about the pound of hash and the condom he found in his living room.
Maybe I’d let him change out the urinal cakes in a roadhouse bathroom if he promised only to eat the used ones.
But keeping the nation calm and handling a crisis? Bwahahahahahahaha! This guy is a reality show host! What did those fools who voted for him expect?
Let’s just hope we can get through this without too much death and suffering. I’m not holding my breath, though — except for all the times I am. Like, you know, whenever I’m at Target.
Here’s the entire MSNBC interview in case you weren’t already frightened enough.
Is Trump still chafing your arse-cheeks? Then Dear F*cking Lunatic: 101 Obscenely Rude Letters to Donald Trump and its boffo sequels Dear Pr*sident A**clown: 101 More Rude Letters to Donald Trump and Dear F*cking Moron: 101 More Letters to Donald Trump by Aldous J. Pennyfarthing are the pick-me-up you need! Reviewers have called these books “hysterically funny,” “cathartic,” and “laugh-out-loud” comic relief. And they’re way, way cheaper than therapy.