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Katherine Eban
Katherine Eban published a blockbuster report Thursday in Vanity Fair, that a White House group tapped to create a national testing plan in the beginning months of the coronavirus pandemic reportedly scrapped their proposal in part because the virus was hitting “blue states” the hardest.
The team, led by White House senior adviser and presidential son-in-law Jared Kushner, reportedly bought 3.5 million Covid-19 tests for $52 million from an Abu Dhabi–based artificial intelligence company.
The tests were never used, deemed “contaminated and unusable." That alone would be a matter worth investigating: where are the congressional Republicans who all campaigned on fiscal conservatism, when the federal government sent $52 million to a foreign company for an "unusable" product?
No, what's even worse was the revelation that "because the virus had hit blue states hardest, a national plan was unnecessary and would not make sense politically."
A public health expert who had been in "frequent contact" with the White House coronavirus task force told Eban that was the view expressed by a member of Kushner's team.
“The political folks believed that because it was going to be relegated to Democratic states, that they could blame those governors, and that would be an effective political strategy,” the expert said.
Instead of rolling out a national program, Trump announced that he was shifting testing responsibilities back to individual states.
The coronavirus pandemic may have hit blue states harder at the beginning, but it's a national problem now, and we don't count the over 150,000 Americans who have died from Covid-19 as Democrats or Republicans, they're just Americans. The continued difficulty in making testing available -- not to mention reasonably quick results -- as cases have spiked continues to drag down our efforts to contain this disease.
Eban's article shined a brutally bright light on some very dark sentiments expressed by high ranking people in our government, exactly as a great journalist should. 6.5.0 |
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 | MEDIA LOSER:
Brad Parscale
It takes a special talent to get fired from a job and still get blamed for everything weeks later.
Former Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale was unceremoniously dumped from his role earlier this month, and deputy campaign manager Bill Stepien took his place. The move came after President Donald Trump's reported fury over the poor attendance at the rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma -- an event that Parscale had unwisely touted as having one million people request tickets.
The ticket requests might have been boosted by teens on TikTok pranking the campaign, and the egg was all over Parscale's face. A video ad from the anti-Trump PAC The Lincoln Project that lambasted Parscale for getting fame and fortune from the campaign coffers didn't help, reportedly getting under the skin of a president with an antipathy to sharing the spotlight with anyone, even allies.
Trump has been steadily falling behind his Democratic rival Joe Biden in polls across the country, facing a 7- to 9-point deficit in nationwide polls, and even putting states previously viewed as safe, like Georgia and Texas, at risk. The campaign also recently stopped buying television and radio ads in Michigan, a battleground state worth 16 electoral college votes.
Now, two weeks later, the Trump campaign has stopped dead in its tracks, freezing a majority of its TV spending less than 100 days before the 2020 election.
A campaign official blamed Parscale's demotion, saying it had led them to start a “review” and “fine-tuning” of their re-election strategy.
The main theme of the ads the campaign was running attempted to attack Biden as wanting to defund the police, showing melodramatic scenes of terrified people trying to call 911 and getting voicemail. Biden has raged against the ads as inaccurate, and even Fox News' Chris Wallace pushed back in a recent interview with Trump.
We hope Mr. Parscale's "gorgeous Ferrari" and "sleek Range Rover" have been paid off. He might have thought he was the G.O.A.T., but the campaign seems determined to make Parscale their scapegoat. 6.5.0 |
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| Let's delay the election? LOL JK! Trump faced a bipartisan tsunami of criticism for his Thursday morning tweet suggesting that the Nov. 3 general election should be delayed. Even Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, a graduate of the Harvard Law School, was unwilling to say it was legal. The best defense even his staunchest allies could offer for hours was to shrug it off as hyperbole and the president attempting a "joke" or "distraction" for the media.
Ultimately, that was the excuse Trump used, tweeting that afternoon that he had just wanted the "very dishonest LameStream Media to finally start talking about the RISKS to our Democracy from dangerous Universal Mail-In-Voting (not Absentee Voting, which I totally support!).”
It, uh, didn't work.
The media spent the day chasing down Republican elected officials to get their comments about delaying the election, citing people with actual law degrees who pointed to the very plain language in federal law that has set Election Days since 1845 and in the Constitution that sets the date for presidents and Congressional members to be sworn into office, and chatting with a seemingly endless parade of talking heads who all but universally agreed that Trump had no power to unilaterally change the election date.
Trump was even soundly criticized by at least one Fox News commentator and Steven Calabresi, co-founder of the Federalist Society who has publicly defended Trump in the past.
Why don't you just take your ball and go home?
The Wall Street Journal joined Trump's chorus of critics over the election delay "ploy," dropping a scathing missive from their editorial board.
“Mr. Trump’s defenders are correct that he was merely raising the issue,” the board wrote. “But delaying the Nov. 3 elections is a dreadful idea. Only an act of Congress can change the date, established in 1845, and there is no chance it will do so now. Lincoln ran for re-election amid the destruction and displacement of the Civil War.”
The editorial board went on to dismiss Trump’s notion that the election will be “rigged” because of widespread mail-in voting, writing, “If he believes that, he should reconsider his participation and let someone run who isn’t looking for an excuse to blame for defeat."
Toxic environment
"Be kind" is the mantra for Ellen DeGeneres' eponymous show Ellen, but the program has been plagued by a string of troubling reports in conflict with that, including allegations of racism and other toxic and discriminatory actions taking place behind the scenes.
DeGeneres penned an apology letter to her staff, saying that the show had "grown exponentially" and as a result she had "not been able to stay on top of everything and relied on others to do their jobs as they knew I’d want them done."
“Clearly some didn’t. That will now change and I’m committed to ensuring this does not happen again.”
Read the full letter here.
Not funny!
Comedian John Oliver has been taking some swings at Sean Hannity on his show, Last Week Tonight, and the Fox News host does not appreciate it.
Hannity complained about Oliver's criticism on his radio show, mentioning that he had seen the headline on Mediaite -- thanks for reading, Sean! -- and dismissed Oliver as being "not funny."
“I don’t spend a lot of time watching comments that people make about me because I actually have a life and have better things to do," said Hannity, "If I want to feel bad I could always Google my name and then find out that I’m the second coming of the devil. I don’t live my life too concerned about what John Oliver thinks. His big problem is he’s not funny. If you’re funny, I don’t care what you say. Be funny about it.”
Listen to the segment here.
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Too political?
Former congressman and civil rights icon John Lewis was laid to rest Thursday, and three former presidents were there to eulogize him: Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama.
Obama had moving words of tribute for his friend, who had passed away after a battle with cancer, but also had some pointed words of criticism for Trump. He did not mention Trump by name but the meaning was clear.
Dr. Alveda King, the niece of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and a Fox News contributor, criticized Obama for "grab[ing] at the opportunity" to make political statements, saying his words "took us back to the 1960s" and unfairly characterized Trump's use of National Guard members and state troopers against protesters.
Tucker Carlson was more scathing, attacking Obama's remarks as "desecrating" Lewis' funeral.
Weird time for a pizza promo
Trump raised eyebrows with a Thursday morning tweet promoting a Long Island pizza shop operated by a supporter, especially since he posted it within minutes of news breaking of the death of former Godfather Pizza CEO Herman Cain. Cain, a Trump supporter who had attended the Tulsa rally, died from complications due to Covid-19.
Over four hours later, Trump posted two tweets offering condolences to the Cain family for their loss, minutes after the television coverage of the Lewis funeral wrapped. 6.5.0 |
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| "You're putting words in my mouth!" Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) and Dr. Anthony Fauci clashed during a congressional hearing Friday morning when Jordan asked a series of badgering questions about whether the coronavirus could be transmitted during the political protests that have occurred across the country over the past few months.
Fauci responded by explaining that he believes all large gatherings should be limited throughout the pandemic, especially if masks are not being worn, but would not definitively object to protests.
The two went back-and-forth for a few minutes, with Jordan repeatedly asking if Fauci thought the government should ban protests, and Fauci saying that as a health expert, he was not going to opine on who the government should arrest, etc.
“So the protests don’t increase the spread of the virus?” asked Jordan.
“I didn’t say that,” Fauci shot back. “You’re putting words in my mouth.”
Watch the exchange here. |
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