An item from Friday:

U.S. President Donald Trump said he had spoken to a number of world leaders in recent days, including German Chancellor Angela Merkel, and “they all view us as the world leader” when it comes to fighting coronavirus, “and they’re following us.”

Nope. No they don’t, no they aren’t, no they haven’t, no they won’t. Not even a little tiny bit.

Trump was speaking to Republican members of the U.S. Congress on Friday. Citing calls with Merkel, Japan’s Shinzō Abe and other, unnamed leaders, he said “so many of them, almost all of them, I would say all of them” believe the U.S. is leading the way when it comes to tackling the virus.

That progression is so typical of him. He tells the lie and then expands it and then expands it some more – apparently oblivious to how he’s giving away the fact that he’s making it all up. “so many of them, almost all of them, I would say all of them” – Start modestly, just say “so many,” but then feel a stab of pain at the inadequacy and move to “almost all” but then instantly feel the anguish of “almost” and make it oh what the hell all of them, “I would say all of them” because that’s just what a pinhead I am.

Then he says “not everybody wannoo admit it but they all view us as…[pause] the world leader, and they’re following us.”

Not everybody do wannoo admit it, that’s very true, and in fact none of them wants to admit it, and they don’t admit it, and they can’t “admit” it because it isn’t true. They could say it, and it would be untrue, but they can’t “admit” it. I can’t “admit” that I’m forty feet tall, because I’m not.

They are getting nervous.

The Trump administration is racing to contain an outbreak of Covid-19 inside the White House, as some senior officials believe that the disease is already spreading rapidly through the warren of cramped offices that make up the three floors of the West Wing.

…

The discovery of the two infected employees has prompted the White House to ramp up its procedures to combat the coronavirus, including daily tests for some senior staff, increased usage of masks and more rigorous screening of people entering the complex.

The concern about an outbreak of the virus at the White House — and the swift testing and contact tracing being done to contain it — underscores the broader challenge for Americans as Mr. Trump urges them to begin returning to their own workplaces despite warnings from public health officials that the virus continues to ravage communities across the country.

Well. Yes, but. People returning to their own workplaces is not the same as Trump staying in his. People are just people, while Trump is…you know. Above that level.

Mr. Trump himself continues to reject guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to wear a mask when meeting with groups of people. But a senior administration official said the president was spooked that his valet, who is among those who serve him food, had not been wearing a mask. And he was annoyed to learn that Ms. Miller tested positive and has been growing irritated with people who get too close to him, the official said.

Masks are for the little people.

Robert Reich presents some blunt truths:

With 4.25% of the world population, America has the tragic distinction of accounting for about 30% of pandemic deaths so far.

And it is the only advanced nation where the death rate is still climbing. Three thousand deaths per day are anticipated by 1 June.

No other nation has loosened lockdowns and other social-distancing measures while deaths are increasing, as the US is now doing.

Much of this is because we’re not really an advanced nation, not in all senses. Technologically we’re hot shit, but socially and politically we’re a disaster.

We now know Donald Trump and his administration were told by public health experts in mid-January that immediate action was required to stop the spread of Covid-19. But according to Dr Anthony Fauci, “there was a lot of pushback”. Trump didn’t act until 16 March.

Epidemiologists estimate 90% of the deaths in the US from the first wave of Covid-19 might have been prevented had social distancing policies been put into effect two weeks earlier, on 2 March.

That’s a lot of premature deaths that are Trump’s doing.

And they’re Trump’s doing not even for any reason. It wouldn’t have cost him anything to pay attention to what the experts were telling him and do what needed to be done. He didn’t because…what? He got it into his flatulent head that paying attention to experts is a Democratic thing? He was too busy watching Fox and tweeting? He didn’t understand what the experts were telling him? He didn’t feel like it? What? Just sheer incompetence and stupidity and not giving a fuck, apparently.

No nation other than the US has left it to subordinate units of government – states and cities – to buy ventilators and personal protective equipment. In no other nation have such sub-governments been forced to bid against each another.

We like to be special.

In no other advanced nation has Covid-19 forced so many average citizens into poverty so quickly. The Urban Institute reports that more than 30% of American adults have had to reduce their spending on food.

Elsewhere around the world, governments are providing generous income support. Not in the US.

Oh but you see this is where we’re so clever. Having this massive impoverished underclass means the bosses can pay lousy wages for working in dangerous conditions. They get rich! They buy golf resorts and airplanes! It’s all worth it!

The coronavirus has been especially potent in the US because America is the only industrialized nation lacking universal healthcare. Many families have been reluctant to see doctors or check into emergency rooms for fear of racking up large bills.

That puts it too mildly though. It’s not “fear of” racking up huge bills – it’s certain knowledge that huge bills will be the result. There’s no element of chance here.

America is also the only one of 22 advanced nations failing to give all workers some form of paid sick leave. As a result, many American workers have remained on the job when they should have been home.

Adding to this is the skimpiness of unemployment benefits in America – providing less support in the first year of unemployment than those in any other advanced country.

American workplaces are also more dangerous. Even before Covid-19 ripped through meatpackers and warehouses, fatality rates were higher among American workers than European.

What I’m saying. Shit pay and protections, dangerous conditions, all so that a few people can amass more money than they know what to do with.

It turns out Obama has not been hugely impressed with Trump’s recent work. He

delivered a blistering critique of the Trump administration’s response to the coronavirus crisis, describing it as “an absolute chaotic disaster” during a private call Friday night with people who worked for him in the White House and across his administration.

…

In a 30-minute conversation with members of the Obama Alumni Association, the former president said the response to the coronavirus outbreak served as a critical reminder for why strong government leadership is needed during a global crisis. The call was intended to encourage former Obama staffers to become more engaged in Biden’s presidential campaign.

“This election that’s coming up — on every level — is so important because what we’re going to be battling is not just a particular individual or a political party,” Obama said. “What we’re fighting against is these long-term trends in which being selfish, being tribal, being divided, and seeing others as an enemy — that has become a stronger impulse in American life.”

Yes, but it is the Trump Republicans who are enabling and cheering on the trends. It is Trump who exemplifies them so thoroughly.

He also talked about the Flynn disgrace.

Weighing in on the case during the call, Obama said Attorney General William Barr’s decision to drop the criminal case against Flynn suggested “the rule of law was at risk” in the United States. Before taking office, Obama warned Trump about Flynn and raised questions about his conduct with Russia.

But Obama saved his strongest words for the Trump administration’s handling of the coronavirus crisis and its worldview.

“It’s part of the reason why the response to this global crisis has been so anemic and spotty,” Obama said. “It would have been bad even with the best of governments. It has been an absolute chaotic disaster when that mindset — of ‘what’s in it for me’ and ‘to heck with everybody else’ — when that mindset is operationalized in our government.”

To hell with everybody else – “to heck with” is not an idiom.

Anyway, here’s hoping Trump is running around with his pants on his head screaming.

Well now there’s an essential industry.

Community spread of the coronavirus in California began in a nail salon, Gov. Gavin Newsom said Thursday, as other states allow their manicurists to reopen.

Why allow nail salons of all places to open during a pandemic? Are women unable to function without long painted fingernails?

State health directors have put some “red flags” on nail salons as a high-risk business, Newsom added, likening them to gyms and hair salons. He announced Monday that the state will allow some low-risk businesses, including bookstores, warehouses, florists and more, to begin reopening with modifications and offering curbside pick up as soon as Friday.

One salon owner was shocked to hear it.

Saunders James said she employs 12 people in her business, which opened in January and has been closed since mid-March. In preparation for reopening, whenever that may be, she said she’s stocking up on personal protective equipment and disinfectants.

“I am just intuitively kind of following the rules of what a nurse would wear or a physician, or something that is more in the medical field,” she said. “Because if you’re comfortable enough to go to the dentist, or go in to see your physician, then if we’re wearing the same thing and our environment is as sterile and sanitized as a medical office, then why wouldn’t the customer feel comfortable getting a manicure in that situation?”

Because medical treatment and dental work are necessary for health. Polished fingernails are not remotely necessary for health. Why take a risk by going to a nail salon (and getting up close and personal with the person who decorates your fingernails) when doing so is far from essential?

Other states haven’t been as cautions when it comes to reopening personal care locations like nail salons. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott announced earlier this week hair and nail salons, barber shops and tanning salons will be allowed to reopen with modifications on Friday. 

Again: stupid. Why take that risk for optional fripperies?

Remind you of anything?

It reminds me of all those cartoons and advertisements featuring cute animals, in which the one female animal is shown to be such by…a hair bow.

Poor Don. He was this close to getting away with it.

A day after breaking his White House self-isolation for a cross-country trip meant to signal the country’s readiness to restart, Trump received word that one of his Oval Office valets tested positive for the virus.

Two days later, Vice President Mike Pence’s press secretary also tested positive, setting off another round of tests, delaying the vice president’s trip to Iowa and causing more hand-wringing inside the White House about who might be infected.

Which didn’t prevent Wee Donnie from going out to say howdy to some WW2 veterans without a mask.

Even the nightly deep cleanings, regular testing and a lot of wishful thinking couldn’t prevent the virus from arriving on Trump’s doorstep.

On account of how that’s not how any of this works. Deep cleanings are fine but they don’t prevent person to person infection.

Mark Meadows, the President’s chief of staff, indicated Friday the new cases had triggered a change in procedures — even though federal guidelines on social distancing were issued months ago and new, more specific recommendations on how to reopen businesses have been held up by the White House.

“I don’t want to get into all the procedures that we have embarked upon,” he said. “But I can tell you this is probably the safest place that you can come to.”

Sure, you can tell us that, but it isn’t true. Obviously it isn’t true. It’s easy to think of places that are far safer than the White House.

A poignant detail:

The military valets responsible for the President’s personal needs are a rare group with access to the food he eats and the Diet Cokes he summons with the push of a red button.

Aw. That red button will never seem so innocent again.

Oh goody, a new stupid word to show off with.

Not to be confused with the cishet greeting: “Allo cishet!”

Oops.

Meanwhile, press secretary Kayleigh McEnany sought to reassure the news media that the White House testing procedures are sound. I wanted to draw attention to this quote from McEnany:

“We have put in place the guidelines that our experts have put forward to keep this building safe, which means contact tracing,” McEnany told reporters during Friday’s news briefing. “All of the recommended guidelines we have for businesses that have essential workers, we are now putting them in place here in the White House. So as America reopens safely, the White House is continuing to operate safely.”

Oh contact tracing. That’s important, is it? Then…

Greg Sargent underlines it:

The careful reader will note a jarring juxtaposition here. McEnany claims both that the United States is reopening safely and that the White House is operating safely. But only one of these two — the White House — actually has the sort of testing regime the White House itself is now implicitly acknowledging is a prerequisite to safety.

And it’s not us! It’s Trump and his stooges and it’s not us.

The rest of the country largely lacks this level of testing — because Trump doesn’t want to take the steps necessary to stand up a robust federal testing regime.

Because it would benefit us and not him.

It’s true that the fact that Miller tested positive — as one of Trump’s valets did earlier this week — shows that having robust testing isn’t absolutely foolproof. The coronavirus can still get in. But as Philip Bump notes, having that intensity of testing is exactly what prevented it from spreading.

That’s the whole point behind the idea that you need far more robust testing and tracing to reopen the economy safely. Experts have noted that you need not just dramatically ramped-up testing resources, but also a robust effort at contact tracing — which entails tracking and testing those who have had contact with infected people — to make this possible.

Yes but all that costs money, and it’s money Trump would rather put in his own pocket.

It is of course to be expected that they have access to these protections, because Trump is the president. But Trump is making a choice not to meaningfully take the steps necessary to extend this to the rest of us.

And no one in the world is surprised.

She tested positive, out of the blue – this is why the whole concept of tests aren’t necessarily great. The tests are perfect, but something can happen between a test where it’s good and then something happens [gesture of hand up and over and then down on the table] and all of a sudden. She was tested very recently and tested negative, and then today I guess for some reason she tested positive.

Well…yes…that would be how it works. Things happen over time. One day you don’t have the virus, and the next day you do. One day the test is negative, and the next day it’s positive.

Hey did you ever stop to think, how do we know when somebody stops being short and starts being tall?

Trump and his goons really do want to kill us. AP has more details on how top officials buried the CDC report:

The decision to shelve detailed advice from the nation’s top disease control experts for reopening communities during the coronavirus pandemic came from the highest levels of the White House, according to internal government emails obtained by The Associated Press.

The files also show that after the AP reported Thursday that the guidance document had been buried, the Trump administration ordered key parts of it to be fast-tracked for approval.

“They’re onto us, quick, get some of it out there so that we can say oh no we didn’t.”

The trove of emails show the nation’s top public health experts at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention spending weeks working on guidance to help the country deal with a public health emergency, only to see their work quashed by political appointees with little explanation.

On the one hand you have medical expertise during a raging pandemic, and on the other hand you have people who care only about getting elected or appointed. Bit of a conflict of motives.

White House spokeswoman Kayleigh McEnany said Friday that the documents had not been approved by CDC Director Robert Redfield. The new emails, however, show that Redfield cleared the guidance.

In other words former Fox mouthpiece McEnany lied to us. Last week she told the press she would never lie to them…and then lied to them about 60 seconds later.

According to the documents, CDC continued inquiring for days about the guidance that officials had hoped to post by Friday, May 1, the day Trump had targeted for reopening some businesses, according to a source who was granted anonymity because they were not permitted to speak to the press.

On April 30 the CDC’s documents were killed for good.

“Soz, we don’t want your guidance, we want people to get out there and ride the buses, work the jobs, spend the money, pick up the economy.”

The administration had already released its Opening Up America Again Plan, and the clock was ticking. Staff at CDC thought if they could get their reopening advice out there, it would help communities do so with detailed expert help.

But hours later on April 30, CDC’s Chief of Staff McGowan told CDC staff that neither the guidance documents nor the decision trees “would ever see the light of day,” according to three officials who declined to be named because they were not authorized to speak to reporters.

“Sucks to be you.”

Then yesterday the AP ran the story and the goons scrambled to get some of the guidance out there.

They’re actively trying to kill us.

Pence’s spokesperson, who is also Stephen Miller’s marriageperson, has tested positive for the virus.

Katie Miller, a spokesperson for Vice President Mike Pence, has tested positive for coronavirus, according to two people with knowledge of Miller’s diagnosis.

Miller’s positive diagnosis for Covid-19 puts the potential threat of the infection squarely into the president’s inner circle. Miller serves as the vice president’s top spokesperson, traveling with him frequently and attending meetings by his side. She is also married to another top White House aide and senior adviser, Stephen Miller, who writes the majority of Trump’s speeches and spends copious amounts of time around the president, Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump.

Do we dare to hope that the princess and prince will get it? And the secretary of racism?

I know it’s not admirable to hope that, but I do, all the same.

Trump offered words of wisdom:

“She’s a wonderful young woman, Katie, she tested very good for a long period of time,” President Donald Trump said on Friday during a meeting with congressional Republicans at the White House. “And then all of the sudden today she tested positive. She hasn’t come into contact with me. She’s spent some time with the vice president.”

Did he expect it to be gradual? First she sort of tests a little bit positive? Then a little more daily for a week or two?

“This is why the whole concept of tests aren’t necessarily great,” the president continued. “The tests are perfect, but something can happen between a test where it’s good and then something happens and all of the sudden. She was tested very recently and tested negative, and then today I guess for some reason she tested positive. So Mike knows about it and Mike has done what he has to do. I think he is on an airplane, going to some far away place, but you’ll be able to ask him later on. But they’ve taken all of the necessary precautions. I understand Mike has been tested, vice president, and he tested negative.”

He’s lost in the clouds. Mike has gone away…gone away to some far place…far far away, beyond the rainbow…on an airplane, or a bird, or something…he’s the vice president…Mike…far way…

The vice president’s trip to Iowa on Friday was delayed by more than an hour as six other Pence staffers who had been in contact with Miller were removed from Air Force Two.

Oh, Iowa. That’s not so far away. He seemed to be talking about Nepal or something.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends anyone who has been exposed to a person with the coronavirus should “stay home until 14 days after last exposure and maintain social distance (at least 6 feet) from others at all times.”

Well we know Trump isn’t going to let anyone do that.

Aaron Rupar watched the Fox News segment where they talked to Trump on the phone so that we won’t have to.

Americans on Friday awoke to the worst jobs report in recorded history, one that showed the unemployment rate surging up to 14.7 percent. The main driver of that, of course, is the coronavirus pandemic, which resulted in more than 2,500 Americans dying in a 24-hour period ending late Thursday, pushing the death toll above 76,000, with no end in sight.

2500. Normal is 8000 so yes, that’s massive for a single new disease.

Those are huge, interrelated problems that are causing people a lot of pain and anxiety. But President Donald Trump’s nearly hour-long call into Fox & Friends Friday morning was a window into an alternate world where the biggest story going is the Obama-era FBI’s purported bias against Trump, and the interrelated public health and economic crises are minor inconveniences.

…

“Comey, who is a sick man,” Trump said, referring to former FBI Director James Comey. “He’s just a stupid guy. He’s dumb as a stick. And he’s a sick guy — there’s something wrong with him.”

No you’re the one who’s stupid and fucked up, you are, I’m not, you are.

Trump had been talking for more than 20 minutes before the word “coronavirus” was even mentioned. And while the pandemic is at the forefront of consciousness for most Americans, it was a topic the president and Fox & Friends hosts discussed in passing. Trump used it as an opportunity to attack blue state governors for not moving quicker to reopen their economies, and described the Americans he wants to get back to work in the teeth of a pandemic as “warriors.”

…

About halfway through the interview, the US Department of Labor released a jobs report that showed the country shedding 20.5 million jobs in April. The optics of Trump’s real-time response weren’t great.

Alongside a graphic of the 14.7 unemployment rate, Trump boasted about how strong the economy was as recently as three months ago, and proclaimed, “those jobs will all be back, and they’ll be back very soon” — contradicting forecasts from his own government that foresee double-digit unemployment lingering into next year.

MAGA!

Zing

More on the Georgia lynching: from the Guardian Wednesday:

According to a police report obtained by the New York Times, Gregory McMichael, a former police officer and district attorney’s investigator, told investigators the incident began when he spotted Arbery from his front yard “hauling ass” down the street.

I.e. running, aka jogging. Running is a thing that people do. It’s a popular form of exercise. Furthermore, it seems to me, that kind of running looks quite different from running to escape a threat or the cops. Exercise running is systematic in a way that fleeing danger is not. You’d think it would be recognizable as such even to a former DA’s investigator.

But then it’s widely known that there’s a whole separate category of “while black” activities that automatically come under suspicion. Driving while black, walking while black, shopping while black, playing in a park while black – all draw special fear and suspicion from white people.

According to a letter obtained by the Times, the prosecutor in Brunswick argued there was not probable cause to arrest the McMichaels because they were legally carrying firearms, had a right to pursue a burglary suspect and use deadly force to protect themselves.

Wait just a fucking minute there. In what sense was Arbery a burglary suspect? Only in the nonsensical sense that McMichael “suspected” him – apparently because he saw him hauling ass jogging down the street. Arbery wasn’t a genuine burglary suspect, he was a suspect only in the jumping-to-conclusions mind of the ex-cop who got him killed. Outside the moss-infested mind of Gregory McMichael, Arbery was simply a young guy out running.

If it’s legal in Georgia to murder someone as long as you then explain that you “suspected” that someone of burglary, Georgia needs to fix that law yesterday.

ABC reports:

Two men have been arrested and charged with murder and aggravated assault for the February shooting of 25-year-old Ahmaud Arbery, according to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.

Gregory McMichael, 64, and his son, Travis McMichael, 34, were arrested on Thursday and will be booked into the Glynn County Jail.

Cellphone video showing the moment Arbery was killed has prompted national outrage since surfacing online this week, but his mother said she can’t bring herself to watch it.

“I don’t think I’ll ever be in a mental state where I can actually watch the video. I had others that watched it that shared what they saw and that just was enough,” Wanda Cooper-Jones told ABC News in an interview that aired Thursday on “Good Morning America.”

She shouldn’t watch it.

“I’m managing, it’s really hard,” Arbery’s mother told ABC News Thursday. “It’s really been hard.”

Updating to add: the two white men have been arrested.

Then there’s the murder of Ahmaud Arbery.

Georgia prosecutor has called for a grand jury investigation into the shooting death of Ahmaud Arbery, a 25-year-old black man who was killed after being chased by two white men in February while out running in a residential neighborhood outside Brunswick, a city on the state’s southeast coast.

It’s unclear why those two white men have not been arrested to this point, unless it’s just as simple as “Well they are white men you see.”

Advocates have likewise expressed alarm over the way the shooting has been handled by police, and the lack of criminal charges thus far brought against his attackers. Anger erupted after a disturbing video emerged Tuesday on social media, appearing to show the violent, and seemingly unprovoked, circumstances surrounding Arbery’s death.

I haven’t watched the video. Can’t do it.

The police have had the video since February 23, the day of the murder, and have kept it to themselves.

Video footage captured by an unidentified witness in a vehicle being driven behind Arbery shows him as he jogs along a two-lane road on Feb. 23. Ahead, a white pickup truck is parked, with one man standing in the truck bed and another standing by the driver’s side.

Arbery is seen running toward the truck’s right side and he then veers in and out of the camera’s frame. A gunshot rings out. Arbery is then seen entering into a struggle with one man, who appears to hold a long gun. Another shot then rings out; Arbery was shot at least twice before he fell to the pavement.

An incident report from the Glynn County Police Department obtained by the New York Times identifies Gregory McMichael, 64, and his son, Travis McMichael, 34, as two men who pursued Arbery, though they are not immediately identifiable in the video footage. The report includes a series of quotes from Gregory McMichael, who is identified as a witness.

And this is where the ears start to ring from sheer rage.

Gregory McMichael said he saw Arbery run by his front yard and alerted his son, according to the police report — he says they thought he resembled a suspect behind recent break-ins in the neighborhood. Both men then grabbed weapons and attempted to follow Arbery in their pickup truck.

STOP RIGHT THERE.

What.the.fuck.

People don’t get to grab their guns and go out to chase down people they “think” looks like somebody they “think” has been behind some local break-ins. End of story. This isn’t a movie from the 50s, this isn’t a tv show, this isn’t the OK Corral; random people are not deputized to chase people down and shoot them.

After a chase, the men pulled up beside Arbery and shouted at him to stop, McMichael claimed, and Travis McMichael got out of the vehicle with a shotgun. Gregory McMichael alleged that Arbery then attacked Travis and that the men began fighting over the weapon before any shots were fired— an assertion which appears to contradict the footage appearing to show Arbery only began grappling with a man after the first shot.

What the hell were they doing pulling up beside him (while carrying great big guns) and shouting at him to stop??? They’re not his bosses and they’re not the cops. We don’t need vigilante policing thank you very much.

According to a New York Times report, one of the prosecutors, George E. Barnhill, who had formerly been assigned to examine the case told police the men who chased Arbery were acting in accordance with Georgia’s self-defense and citizen arrest statutes.

So amateur policing is legal in Georgia? That’s insane. Stark raving mad.

Andrea Young, the executive director for the A.C.L.U. of Georgia, noted similarities between the circumstances of Arbery’s killing and the 2012 shooting of Trayvon Martin.

“The vigilante behavior that we saw in Brunswick is unacceptable in a civilized society,” Young said in a statement. “Ahmaud was killed three days before the anniversary of the 2012 killing of Trayvon Martin. Both incidents are a reminder that white supremacy has been a foundation for our country and leads repeatedly to the targeting and harming people of color, particularly African Americans.”

Indeed. It’s horrendous.

A dark day.

What’s the problem.

We’re toast.

And now filthy Barr’s filthy Justice Department has dropped the charges against filthy Michael Flynn, who confessed to them twice.