Republican strategist Alex Castellanos, quoted in an article in yesterday’s Washington Post, on Republican senators (finally) urging Trump and fellow Republicans to wear masks:
“Mask-wearing has become a totem, a secular religious symbol,” Castellanos said. “Christians wear crosses, Muslims wear a hijab, and members of the Church of Secular Science bow to the Gods of Data by wearing a mask as their symbol, demonstrating that they are the elite; smarter, more rational, and morally superior to everyone else.”
No, Alex, science is not opinion. Science is not political. Science is not religion. Science is fact. This virus is science, as are its effects. Wearing a mask is not about being "morally superior." It is about dealing in reality.
And this lunacy and idiocy exemplify everything that is wrong with this country and with the Republican Party, specifically. It is a celebration of ignorance and lies, aided and abetted by Trump, his administrative sycophants, GOP senators and House members, and by Hannity, Ingraham, Carlson, Fox & Friends, The Five, Pirro, Perino, Dobbs, Varney, the rest of the Fox News crew and other conservative media outlets that have told their audiences for months that:
- The coronavirus was no worse than the flu.
- Health professionals were exaggerating the threat to hurt Trump.
- Hydroxychloriquine was a miracle cure (when, in fact, it was killing people, including vets in VA hospitals).
- The most knowledgeable experts in science and medicine were not only not to be trusted, but were to be hated and threatened.
- Armed protests to “reopen America” were patriotic (when, in fact, premature reopening led to more death and our current rapidly spreading train wreck and now re-closing of what had been reopened, just as health experts predicted).
- Masks were infringements on ”freedoms and liberties” rather than a simple sacrifice to protect ourselves and our most vulnerable.
The actions of Trump, his (mal)administration and its enablers in Congress, on Fox News and other media outlets, are criminal. They lied to prop up a leader. They denied the scientific truths to promote falsehoods that needlessly killed tens of thousands of Americans and will likely kill tens of thousands more.
NEEDLESSLY.
Because they felt compelled to lie to defend a man who cannot be defended. A man who allowed a sworn enemy to place a bounty on the heads of American service members. A man who humps a flag, pretending to be a patriot when he is anything but.
And to his true believers, you should be ashamed. You phony uber-patriots with your flag frames on your Facebook selfies. Your hero is the opposite of a patriot. He is a traitor. He is a criminal. You should be ashamed.
Ashamed.
You won’t be, of course. And you will continue to refuse to wear masks because of your “freedoms and liberties.” And you will continue to defend this pus-filled abscess of a human. And, unfortunately, we will all reap what you have sown: death, destruction, racism and ignorance.
Your man is going down in November and he is taking the entire Party with him into a deep, dark hole. Enjoy the blackness because, as we know, most things Black (and Brown) scare the living hell out of you.