Originally Posted By: Wonder Boy
 Originally Posted By: Matter-eater Man
Trump failed to heed intelligence on coronavirus

“Donald Trump may not have been expecting this, but a lot of other people in the government were — they just couldn’t get him to do anything about it.”


I know he doesn’t take any responsibility for anything and you might view his various attacks on Obama, the media and democrats inspiring but the virus doesn’t care what the pos says.



The Hill is a pretty dead-center publication that I've sourced in the past. But this is not a The Hill article, it is one re-posted from The Washington Post, a rabidly anti-Trump newspaper that has made no secret of its hostility toward the president, and has run with a long stream of unconfirmed stories that have been proven untrue a few days later, or at best used "anonymous sources" that could be completely made up and not actually exist.

This short Washington Post piece fits into the latter category, using anonymous sources, and not really saying anything specific about what Trump allegedly did wrong.

Here I deconstructed it piece by piece:

 Quote:
INTEL REPORTS GOING BACK TO JANUARY WARNED OF CORONAVIRUS THREAT

By Tal Axelrod, 03/20/2020


The intelligence community was warning of the danger posed by the novel coronavirus throughout January and February as the White House downplayed [HOW?] the threat and was slow to roll out [HOW?] nationwide measures, reports show [WHAT REPORTS?].

U.S. officials [ANONYMOUS SOURCE] familiar with spy agency reporting told The Washington Post that the reports [UNSPECIFIED] did not clarify when the virus might spread in the U.S. or recommend specific steps to prevent an outbreak [SO THEY DIDN'T GIVE SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS TO TRUMP FOR HIM TO NOT ACT ON AND BE BLAMED FOR], but they did track the international spread of the coronavirus and warn that China was initially dismissing the seriousness of what is now a pandemic. [WHICH IS WHY TRUMP SUSPENDED ALL CHINA FLIGHTS ON JAN 31st, DESPITE ADVICE AGAINST IT AND DESPITE NO SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS BY THESE ANONYMOUS SOURCES].

While President Trump did take early action to close the border to any travelers from China, where the coronavirus first appeared, the White House was slow to make test kits available and ceded much of the response to state governments. [AGAIN, THE CDC'S FAULT NOT TRUMP'S, AS DR. FAUCI AND OTHERS HAVE SPECIFICALLY EXPLAINED, DESPITE THAT THIS PIECE LYINGLY BLAMES IT ON TRUMP.}

Intelligence agencies “have been warning on this since January,” a U.S. official who had access to intelligence reporting told the Post[ANONYMOUS SOURCE]. “Donald Trump may not have been expecting this, but a lot of other people [/i][ANONYMOUS SOURCE, WEASEL WORDS][/i] in the government were — they just couldn’t get him to do anything about it.” [ALLEGATION, NO SPECIFIC EXAMPLE]

The White House has defended the president’s response, dismissing claims that the administration was caught flat-footed and insisting that Trump took early and significant action.

“President Trump has taken historic, aggressive measures to protect the health, wealth and safety of the American people — and did so while the media and Democrats chose to only focus on the stupid politics of a sham illegitimate impeachment,” Hogan Gidley said in a statement to the Post. “It’s more than disgusting, despicable and disgraceful for cowardly unnamed sources to attempt to rewrite history — it’s a clear threat to this great country.” [DAMNED GOOD POINT, THAT EVEN AMID THE WORST PART OF A BASELESS AND PURELY POLITICAL IMPEACHMENT TRIAL, TRUMP HAD AN AWARENESS OF THE THREAT AND MADE AN EXCELLENT JUDGEMENT CALL TO SUSPEND CHINESE TRAVEL THAT DEMOCRATS AND THE LIBERAL MEDIA PORTRAYED AS "EXTREME", "OVER-REACTION" AND "RACIST". WHAT DR ANTHONY FAUCI OF NIH SAID WAS THE SINGLE GREATEST ACTION TO DELAY A SPIKE IN CASES AND BUY THE NATION TIME TO PREPARE.]






I think you provide an excellent example of how state ran media would handle Trump. Thankfully we have a free an independent press. As for Trump not acting on intelligence that was warning him of this, it’s more than believable. He’s been clear about wanting to keep the coronavirus numbers down in the US so much that he didn’t even want stranded cruise people to be able to get off their boat. I watched the Fox Sunday show where they asked munchkin point blank if our intelligence agencies warned them and he wouldn’t answer it. I would point out that the WP article was taken as credible by the host of the Sunday show.

Fair play!