Monday, April 6, 2020
Trump Falsely Claims He Inherited ‘Empty’ Stockpile
Trump Falsely Claims He Inherited ‘Empty’ Stockpile
"More than once, President Donald Trump has falsely claimed that the federal stockpile of emergency medicine and supplies he inherited from his predecessor was an “empty shelf.”
While the government does not publicize all of the contents of the repository, at the time Trump took office, the Strategic National Stockpile, as it is formally known, reportedly contained vast amounts of materials that state and local health officials could use during an emergency, including vaccines, antiviral drugs, ventilators and protective gear for doctors and nurses.
“The SNS was definitely not an empty shell,” Dr. Tara O’Toole, a former homeland security official during the Obama administration who is now executive vice president at the nonprofit strategic investment firm In-Q-Tel, told us in an email.
At least three times in the past week, however, Trump has sought to blame former President Barack Obama’s administration for the current state of the stockpile, which has been unable to meet the demand for additional supplies expected to be needed to treat people with COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, or to protect the doctors and nurses caring for those patients."
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So now Billionaire Bill Gates is lying about the US not being prepared in 2015.
January 31: President Trump declares a national health emergency and imposes a ban on travel to and from China. Former Vice President Joe Biden calls Trump’s decision “hysterical xenophobia … and fear-mongering.”
skud, no matter what you write about Joe Biden, it doesn't change the fact that a majority of Americans and the world know that Donald Trump utterly failed us in preparing the US for this pandemic:
Trump, Jan. 22: The president tells CNBC that “we have it totally under control” and “it’s going to be just fine.”
Top Biden adviser, Jan. 22: Ron Klain, a Biden adviser who managed the 2014 Ebola response, co-writes a piece excoriating Trump for “brashly” dismissing coronavirus as “under control,” while calling for “expertise” to “guide critical decisions” and noting “reasons for great concern.”
Trump, Jan. 24: Trump praises and gives thanks to China for its efforts to contain the coronavirus, and adds: “It will all work out well.”
Biden, Jan. 27: Biden publishes an op-ed in USA Today hitting Trump for “shortsighted policies" that "have left us unprepared for a dangerous epidemic,” and warning that the coronavirus “will get worse before it gets better.”
Trump, Jan. 30: Trump says at a rally in Michigan: “We think we have it very well under control.”
Biden, Jan. 31: Biden tells reporters in Iowa that “science” must “lead the way,” adding: “We have, right now, a crisis with the coronavirus.”
Biden, Feb. 1: Biden tweets: “We are in the midst of a crisis with the coronavirus. We need to lead the way with science.”
Trump, Feb. 2: Trump goes on Sean Hannity’s show and claims: “We pretty much shut it down, coming in from China.” Trump extols our “tremendous relationship” with China, and adds: “We did shut it down, yes.”
(con.)
Trump, Feb. 10: Trump claims that “a lot of people” think the coronavirus “goes away in April with the heat,” adding that we only have “11 cases,” and that “we’re in great shape.”
Biden, Feb. 11: Biden goes on “Morning Joe” and excoriates Trump for claiming the coronavirus will disappear in the warm weather, crossing himself while doing so, and adding: “You couldn’t make it up.”
Trump, Feb. 26: Trump claims the media is conspiring with Democrats to hype the coronavirus to rattle the markets. Trump also says the coronavirus is “going very substantially down, not up.”
Trump, Feb. 27: Trump hails his administration’s handling of the coronavirus, and while he does reveal a hint of uncertainty, he says: “It’s going to disappear. One day — it’s like a miracle — it will disappear.”
Trump, Feb. 28: Trump shouts at a rally in South Carolina that Democrats’ criticism of his response (which proved entirely accurate) is “their new hoax.”
(con.)
Biden, Feb. 28: Biden goes on CNN and says Trump has yet to “gain control” of the coronavirus, while calling on Trump to stop downplaying it and urging him instead to “let the experts take this over” and “let the experts speak.”
Trump, March 9: Trump dismissively compares the coronavirus with flu, claiming flu kills tens of thousands annually and that “life & the economy go on.”
Trump, March 10: Trump again hails the “great job” he’s doing on the coronavirus, and declares: “It will go away. Just stay calm. It will go away.”
Biden, March 12: Biden gives a speech stressing the importance of presidential truth-telling amid crises, noting that Trump’s ongoing falsifications risk leaving Americans without reliable guidance, compounding “public fears.”
Trump, March 13: Asked about the administration’s epic failure to ramp up testing, Trump declares: “I don’t take responsibility at all.”
Biden is a leader; Trump is an ignorant clown.
Skud, you can't look at those direct quotes from Trump's own mouth and not see what a colossal idiot he's been throughout this nightmare. He is no leader. Biden is!
From the USA Today regarding the lack of N95 masks in the US Stockpile...
"We rate this claim [that Obama did not resupply the national stockpile] TRUE because it is supported by our research. There is no indication that the Obama administration took significant steps to replenish the supply of N95 masks in the Strategic National Stockpile after it was depleted from repeated crises. Calls for action came from experts at the time concerned for the country’s ability to respond to future serious pandemics. Such recommendations were, for whatever reason, not heeded."
Trump is messing this up, but on this count, he's at least partly correct.
I hope you don't really expect skud to acknowledge the truth Shaw. That is something trumpers just won't do. And skud is a trumper. If he's not, as he no doubt will claim, he sure talks like one.
Why didn't trunp pay attention to those in charge of a pandemic response and replenish what was used up in previous epidemics? At 3+ years into his administration, Trump bears responsibility for all of this. He got rid of people who would have had this information and would have told him that supplies needed to be replaced.
According to the USAToday article:
Again according to NIH, the stockpile's resources were also used during hurricanes Alex, Irene, Isaac and Sandy. Flooding in 2010 in North Dakota also called for stockpile funds to be deployed. The 2014 outbreaks of the ebola virus and botulism, as well as the 2016 outbreak of the zika virus, continued to significantly tax the stockpile with no serious effort from the Obama administration to replenish the fund.
ProPublica reported on April 3 that congressional budget battles in the early years of the Obama administration contributed to stockpile shortages. But the article notes available funds were used not to replenish masks: "With limited resources, officials in charge of the stockpile tend to focus on buying lifesaving drugs from small biotechnology firms that would, in the absence of a government buyer, have no other market for their products, experts said. Masks and other protective equipment are in normal times widely available and thus may not have been prioritized for purchase, they said."
During the presidency of Donald Trump, analysts have warned the United States is not prepared for a serious pandemic.
'Gross misjudment':Experts say Trump's decision to disband pandemic team hindered coronavirus response
“We assess that the United States and the world will remain vulnerable to the next flu pandemic or large scale outbreak of a contagious disease that could lead to massive rates of death and disability, severely affect the world economy, strain international resources, and increase calls on the United States for support,” the 2019 World Threat Assessment from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence states.
The Obama administration did not replenish the supplies, and the above explains why. But the new administration had the opportunity and ability to do so. Why this wasn't done is a question only the Trump administration can answer.
There is no excuse for his behavior except he placed faith in the WHO which it turns out was not correct.
Not sure how he lost months when the first diagnosed case was January 21st and the president convened a task force January 27th and declared a national health emergency January 31 which is the same time Biden said he was a racist and fear mongering. On February 4th he made mention of the virus and the speaker of the house paid so much attention she tore it up.
No matter he screwed up by not paying as much attention to the virus rumor as he did to the partisan impeachment so for that he is a scoundrel, liar, and a horrible politician.
Granted he did not listen to his advisors but there is plenty of blame to go around on both sides.
Fun facts:
Trump is the first president in US history to be impeached in his first term
and to simultaneously hold records for the biggest stock market drop,
the highest national debt, the most convicted people in a POTUS's administration
and the most Americans to die of a pandemic.
MAGA!
No, skud, THERE IS NO BLAME FOR BOTH SIDES on this Trump failure.
He's been president for 3 years. This is all his.
PS. Trump was holding dozens of rallies and golfing AFTER he was briefed on this pandemic, and during his impeachment. So don't parrot the excuse Trump and FAUX NOOZ is selling. It doesn't work here.
Trump is the POTUS; the Covid-19 catastrophe is all his.
Trump's own words: "Only I can fix it."
Much easier to blame someone especially someone you despise. Some people need to be told to get out of the rain while others look around and say I need to do something. Granted there are far to many people who need the government to tell them what to do and how to act. For the rest of us we choose to take responsibility for our lives.
At least he didn't wait six months to declare a national emergency like another unnamed president.
DECLARATION OF A NATIONAL EMERGENCY WITH RESPECT TO THE 2009 H1N1 INFLUENZA PANDEMIC
"I have hereunto set my hand this twenty-third day of October, in the year of our Lord two thousand nine, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and thirty-fourth"
“In particular, on behalf of the American People, I want to thank President Xi!”
Quote Tweet
Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump
· Jan 24
China has been working very hard to contain the Coronavirus. The United States greatly appreciates their efforts and transparency. It will all work out well. In particular, on behalf of the American People, I want to thank President Xi!
The Trump administration had cut U.S. public-health staff operating inside China by two-thirds, from 47 in January 2017 to 14 by 2019, an important reason it found itself dependent on less-accurate information from the World Health Organization. In July 2019, the Trump administration defunded the position that embedded an epidemiologist inside China’s own disease-control administration, again obstructing the flow of information to the United States.
Yet even if Trump did not know what was happening, other Americans did. On January 27, former Vice President Joe Biden sounded the alarm about a global pandemic in an op-ed in USA Today. By the end of January, eight cases of the virus had been confirmed in the United States. Hundreds more must have been incubating undetected. --David Frum, Conservative
David Frum: "That the pandemic occurred is not Trump’s fault. The utter unpreparedness of the United States for a pandemic is Trump’s fault. The loss of stockpiled respirators to breakage because the federal government let maintenance contracts lapse in 2018 is Trump’s fault. The failure to store sufficient protective medical gear in the national arsenal is Trump’s fault. That states are bidding against other states for equipment, paying many multiples of the precrisis price for ventilators, is Trump’s fault. Air travelers summoned home and forced to stand for hours in dense airport crowds alongside infected people? That was Trump’s fault too. Ten weeks of insisting that the coronavirus is a harmless flu that would miraculously go away on its own? Trump’s fault again. The refusal of red-state governors to act promptly, the failure to close Florida and Gulf Coast beaches until late March? That fault is more widely shared, but again, responsibility rests with Trump: He could have stopped it, and he did not."
You keep bringing up what Barack Obama did during his presidency. That doesn't matter here, skud, because RIGHT NOW, Americans are suffering and dying because of THE PRESENT POTUS, NOT OBAMA, NOT HILLARY, NOT JOE BIDEN! Americans are suffering and dying because of an inept, incompetent, lying s.o.b. who shifts blame for every failure during his administration onto other people. He's never taken responsibility for any of his failings. EVER.
That is a horrible trait in a human being, and a fatal one for a POTUS. He is a failure. A MISERABLE FAILURE.
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