Opinion
After Donald Trump's deranged balcony address,
we're all gasping together
Marina Hyde
The
president tells us he beat coronavirus like a man: the kind who takes all the
best drugs and leaves everyone else exposed
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/oct/06/donald-trump-coronavirus-balcony-drugs
A rare
moment of unity in the US election, as Donald Trump marked his return to the
White House by gasping along with his detractors. On Monday night, the
president puffed up the front staircase of his residence, his face coated in
several more gallons of paint than the front elevation of the building. “Don’t
let it dominate your lives,” he panted of the virus, a bad case of which tends
to dominate your death.
Yet there
he was, this hideous kink in the arc of history, giving the most dangerous
balcony performance since Michael Jackson had his baby crowdsurf off one. The
American people are all Blanket now.
As for the
optics, “deranged balcony address” is certainly a look – but not one that tends
to end well. How might this version turn out? Unfortunately, it’s not a
question Trump’s attention span equips him to answer. His reference points for
the form are the occasional three minutes of historical documentaries he’s
forced to watch while searching his stomach-folds for the TV remote. It feels
like he switches over to Fox News before discovering how a whole series of
20th-century balcony stories ended.
Still:
don’t call him Wussolini. He beat this illness – which he still very much has –
like a man. One of the really manly ones, who takes all the best drugs and
leaves everyone else exposed and misled and unprotected. Even so, early
reactions to the gasping spectacle suggest the move could only have backfired
more if Trump had ascended the front steps via a hastily installed stairlift
carrying a pack of adult diapers.
Once he’d
wheezed through the unpleasantries, all that remained was to remove his mask
and set about infecting any remaining staff yet to be exposed to his droplets.
Think of Trump as the 83rd Airborne, parachuting his deadly particles deep into
butlers’ respiratory systems. He won’t give you a Purple Heart, but he might
give you purple lungs.
Alas, it’s
disappointing to find potential victims failing to feel grateful for the
opportunity. One current secret service agent assigned to the first family’s
detail expressed frustration, telling CNN: “We’re not disposable.” Two
housekeeping staff have already tested positive for the virus. As the events of
the past week show, the president’s respect for human life is so low that he is
willing to send an entire army of servants into 14-day isolation or worse in
order to keep up a steady stream of trans-fats being fed to him. Dying in the
line of duty used to mean taking a bullet for the president; it could now
involve taking him a Diet Coke. Thank you for your drinks service.
As for how
Trump spent the rest of his evening, I assume it was straight on to the
monstrous leaders’ WhatsApp to josh with the other bros about how they kill
their underlings. RocketmanKim loves a firing squad, Vlad69’s a huge chemicals
guy, but Trump just clears his throat while being brought his fourth burger of
the day. Boom! “I cough on them like a bitch! When you’re famous you can do
that.”
Face it,
he’s absolutely bossing the likes of Kim and Xi and MBS in the fantasy evildoer
leagues. It’s not that the other guys don’t have lethal motorcades and abysmal
interiors taste and balcony addresses and death cults and doctors who mislead
the world. But doing them in a democracy – well, that makes it triple points.
Speaking of
physicians who really need to heal themselves, what a striking misinformation
campaign it’s been from presidential medic Sean Conley, who has been
continually obfuscating about Trump’s condition since calling his symptoms
“mild”, only for even the White House to contradict him. For me, that’s the new
low. Of course, we now expect the president of the United States to lie as
default – to tell us black is white, or up is down, or to claim he never said
something he’s on camera saying. But for a professional and senior doctor to
mislead apparently without remorse shows how necrotic the body politic has
become, from the very top down. The lying, the reality-denying is not a one-off
case – it’s the other epidemic.
In fact,
it’s kind of amazing that conspiracy theorists have lined up so supportively
behind Trump, when he’s really the most convincing proof yet of all their worst
fears. The Man really is lying to them, he really is wicked, and he really does
want to kill them. The damning evidence is right there in front of everyone.
Only, instead of begging Oliver Stone to make a film about it, they want to
give Trump a second term.
Like me,
you probably hate to see a conspiracist wimp out of their beliefs just when
it’s coming up roses for them. It’s as if the moon landing hoaxers were signing
over their life savings to Nasa, or the flat Earthers booking a round-the-world
ticket. So come on, guys – back yourselves! After all, if not now, then when?
• Marina
Hyde is a Guardian columnist
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