From top US President Donald Trump at a Covid-19 press briefing in the White House yesterday; Dan Boyle
At times of deep national crisis a natural instinct is to rally around the flag. To put aside usual critical tendencies. To seek not to distract. To support those in decision making positions.
Not only is this natural, it is necessary.
Diminishing criticism is not eliminating the need for evaluation. It gets put aside to reemerge when the crisis has passed.
This crisis, hopefully, will soon pass. When it does questions that have been building up will need to be answered.
Most obvious will be questions on whether interventions were effective and timely. Was preparedness appropriate? Were resources sufficient?
The spirit of this evaluation needs to be generous. It must be about whether lessons have been learned, whether those lessons can be applied if and when future crises emerge.
It can’t be about political point scoring.
Nor should it be about avoiding accountability. If poor decisions get made, and such decisions result in terrible consequences, that has to be made known. The who, the what and the why.
The default position should be is that any crisis is being dealt with by people who are acting to the best of their abilities with the best of intentions.
When this principle gets compromised, there is a need to critically intervene. It might be when a political party seeks to breach the social contract by seeking to make capital out of a crisis.
It could be when an individual within a decision making structure, overstates their importance making themselves the crisis.
Into this scenario comes the ultimate curve bender – Donald J Trump.
While in Ireland our response to the coronavirus will eventually be seen as being less than perfect, the international dimension to the crisis is being cruelly undermined by the presence of Trump in the White House at this juncture in time.
With the world dealing with one of the worst crises in history, the actions of this man child throwing his toys out of the pram, is not only negligent, it is criminal.
If the United States recognised the International Criminal Court in The Hague, Trump’s indictment there would be a slam dunk.
Something has to be done about the United States. Its empire has been more cultural and economic than it has been territorial. It is an empire that is unravelling and never more so than it has been in the person of Trump.
A latter day Nero, without even the musical ability, he has already proven himself to be a malignant, narcissistic oaf, the last person who should be in control of anything.
To be in this position now, when the planet is most in need of real leadership, is the ultimate in cruel irony.
His previous behaviour has been met with a collective global shrug of the shoulders. Sometimes we have laughed at his ignorance. We can no longer laugh or shrug.
Despite the millions of Americans who are imprisoned in their own nightmare because of him, there has to be a change in how the rest of the World interacts with the United States. However badly Trump has been treating his own citizens, his behaviour is now affecting the rest of us far worse.
We need to call out this poster boy for malevolence. We need to isolate those who enable him. Mostly we need to remind MAGA heads that USA number 1 now only applies to negative indicators.
Trump is not a virus. He’s more like bacteria. Definitely not the good kind either.
Dan Boyle is a former Green Party TD and Senator and serves as a Green Party councillor on Cork City Council. His column appears here every Thursday. Follow Dan on Twitter: @sendboyle
AP
Dan Boyle spends a whole column telling us that Donald Trump is a terrible leader but fails to provide even one example of his terrible leadership.
Peak TDS.
Worst Pandemic Ever!
Dan need not show us any examples. We see numerous samples every single day of the week for ourselves and they get crazier. Just yesterday, he had the relief cheques delayed by three days to his citizens most in need because he wanted his name printed on them.
I love kittens
https://www.google.ie/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/politics/coming-to-your-1200-relief-check-donald-j-trumps-name/2020/04/14/071016c2-7e82-11ea-8013-1b6da0e4a2b7_story.html%3foutputType=amp
I love kittens
What colour is your hair?
And let’s not forget another minor detail. Donald Trump knew dangers of COVID19 beginning of January. He should have been pushing social distancing, lockdowns, school closures, medical supply production, mask wearing all beginning of February, not late-March. He screwed up big time but he’s been too busy every day since massaging his ego. Don’t let anyone forget the facts.
Beginning of January?
That would be two weeks before the WHO said there was no coronavirus transmission to humans, yeah?
Berate the orange buffoon, but at least qualify it, if there is a qualification to be made for “beginning of January”, thanks.
https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-peter-navarro-january-memo-coronavirus-deaths-2020-4?r=US&IR=T
https://www.google.ie/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2020/04/11/us/politics/coronavirus-trump-response.amp.html
I see, not the “beginning of January” then.
But the end of January, as per the links.
Yes, apologies. However, it doesn’t change the fact that he knew long before taking any action.
‘america is not a country, it’s a business’
It’s not a business. It’s an asylum.
Enlightening Dan. In a nutshell what you’re saying is ‘Trump is wrong, but I don’t know if anyone else (WHO for instance) is wrong’
Trump is a nice easy target then.
I like this phrase though. ‘It could be when an individual within a decision making structure, overstates their importance making themselves the crisis’ – Case in point, Eamon Ryan and his leakings to the press trying to promote himself as a potential Tanaiste.
Ooooh, that’s a burn.
+1 Giggidy
…if you call Trump’s throwing the toys out of the pram criminal, what did you call the 100000 bombs Obama dropped on 7 countries killing, maiming and displacing millions?
Or the millions murdered and left homeless by the war mongering buffoon George Bush.
…imagine…Trump’s legacy is that he becomes the US President with least blood on his hands…
Trump doesn’t have a legacy yet(apart from being a racist, white supremacist supporter, homophobic, narcissistic, woman hater) but most likely will be their greatest ever president to contribute the blood of his own citizens on his hands. Your grandchildren will use his name as a curse word.
…at the end of the day, whoever is US president has been a lose:lose for the rest of the world…even the US. Bad as Trump is it could be far worse…generations of children have used the Yanks as a curse word and that number is growing.
Thanks to Putin, regime change in the Middle East has been reversed and in Syria, almost defeated…
yeah, look at all those millions of happy syrians.
Obama bad but Putin good is a demented take.
…demented in your estimation…but that’s what the evidence shows…mind you…Obama had the help of his heir apparent – crooked Hillary…
Putin’s blood-soaked imperialism is more to your taste.
Unless you count the potential illnesses, fatalities and displacements his rolling back of environmental protections and climate change measures could cause, but then again those have nothing to do with giving Assad and Putin free hands so I understand it might not register for you.
But what about the whataboutery? Don’t forget the whataboutery!
Has anyone looked at the recent comments on Bill Gates’ Instagram posts? Most interesting.
Disappointing to see politicians like Dan and Michael McDowell focusing on the United States and its President – an easy target – when they should be focusing on issues here, such as the forgotten-about human beings in Direct Provision.
Both of them – intelligent and humane men – should look beyond the Clinton-controlled US media portrayal of Trump and research more deeply the reasons for his decisions.
If they do so they will find much to admire, a man after their own hearts.
‘Clinton controlled.’ Idiocy.
The problem is that the centre left and centre right are not doing enough to control the far left and far right, respectively, so we now have an increase in polar politics. Social media has also contributed to the pot, forcing people to become more tribal, with identity politics especially driving that, it only makes matters worse for absolutely everyone. Am no fan of the man but Trump is what happens when you have an out of control radical left.
While the left has clearly fecked up disastrously and completely failed to face the challenges effectively, the only people to blame for Trump are the right.
Sure if you’re not a radicalised woke obsessed leftie, you must be a nazi, that’s the way it goes today.
Just to clarify, because this isn’t any sort of false dichotomy – people literally and actually voted for the guy. They are the people to blame.
The reasons why they voted are crucial to understanding the scenario.
White supremacy, entitlement and pwning the libs?
You honestly think that? Or are you just messing?