Donald Trump on the Spanish flu epidemic – How does Trump spend his spare time? – Trump and the Republican Party – Russian vaccine – Election in Belarus – Evening statistics
Jane Austen was in the habit of occasionally recording odd remarks from her acquaintances and one occurred when she asked a certain Mrs. Digweed her opinion of a collection of parodies that had recently appeared (the “Rejected Addresses” by James and Horace Smith). The response was rather cryptic: “Oh! dear, yes – very droll indeed – the opening of the House! – and the striking up of the Fiddles!” After Austen puzzled over it for a while she commented, “What she meant, poor woman, who can say?”
Observers today might have a similar reaction to a remark made by Donald Trump to the effect that the Spanish flu epidemic of 1918 “probably ended” World War II. World War II began nearly twenty years after the epidemic ended. Presumably he meant to say World War I. There was some overlap between the last months of the war and the first several months into the epidemic. The epidemic began in February, 1918 and the war ended in November, 1918. The first wave of the epidemic was relatively mild, however, and the second wave did not begin until August, 1918. October, 1918 was the deadliest month of the entire epidemic. Some historians have argued that it tipped the balance in favor of the Allies, since the morbidity rates among Germany and Austria were considerably higher, and that it might have prodded the German belligerents into declaring the armistice. Did Donald Trump really mean to imply all of this? Who can say?
It wouldn’t be worth making such a song and dance about, I suppose, were it not for the fact that Trump’s paternal grandfather was a casualty of the epidemic; and one would expect him, for that reason alone, to be a little more knowledgeable about it.
One wonders what Donald Trump does for amusement during his spare time. Clearly he does not read. Politics did not play a major role in his life until the last decade. One can say with a certain amount of assurance that he has no interest whatever in philosophy. He does not go to the theatre; at least, I have not heard of his attending any performance since he came to Washington. Despite the recent photo showing him posed with Bible in hand in front of a church, he has no interest in religion. It is indeed difficult to imagine a man more diametrically opposed in outlook to Christ in every respect. He probably doesn’t listen to music. It is doubtful that he has glanced at works of painting or sculpture, and it is an open question whether he can distinguish a picture from a table. In all probability he does not even notice trees, flowers, bushes, shrubs, grasses, and other flora; to him they most likely appear as blurs in the background.
The only pursuits that seem to awaken his interest are golf and, to a lesser degree, amorous dalliance with women. These latter pleasures, possibly, have palled on him to some extent as a result of too much repetition. Now that he is in his seventies he does appear to have sown his wild oats of the past fifty years or so, and has so far subsided in his relations with Melania as to become mere man and wife, without the polygynous sidelines that characterized his first two ventures into marriage. Although he has been so magnanimous as to praise the sexual attributes of his daughters in public he has not, as far as I know, personally availed himself of their charms. There remains one other activity that animates his features, causes his eyes to brighten with ardor, infuses something approaching genuine fervor in his voice and mien, and makes him, for the moment, a better, stronger, finer man; and that activity is – golf. There is nothing wrong with the game itself, of course. I have no doubt it can inspire the same sort of enthusiasm in some men and women that hiking inspires for me. Nonetheless even here Trump’s motives are mixed: he owns several golf courses, and it is unclear whether he cares more for the game for its own sake or whether he looks upon it primarily as a money-making concern.
His political opponents will say that he is a typical man of the Republican Party, but that is not so. He bears the same relation to the Republican Party that the adelgid bears to the hemlock and the emerald ash borer bears to the ash tree. He has infiltrated what was once a vigorous and flourishing growth from within, and has caused it in the space of a few years to droop and wither and fall into premature decrepitude. There is nothing to be done now except to uproot the entire trunk, branches and all, and discard it as one disregards rotted wood; and, possibly, in future, to plant seedlings here and there that can restore the species in a manner that will enable it to resist such invasive parasites more effectively.
To be sure, Trump is not the only national leader who thinks only of his self-aggrandizement at the expense of every other consideration. Today Vladimir Putin announced that Russia has developed a coronavirus vaccine and will begin mass inoculation, possibly as early as October. Even the scientists in Russia are skeptical about its effectiveness, and those in other nations are nearly unanimous in expressing their doubts. At this point only a few dozen people have tested it out. In the U.S. vaccines entering final-stage testing require studies of at least 30,000 people apiece. Issuing a vaccine that has not been sufficiently tested, like this one in Russia, can cause potential harm in a number of ways. It can give people a false sense of immunity, allowing them to become infected unawares and spreading the disease still further, and it can even make them ill in its own right. This vaccine is not the first one that Russia has produced without controversy. It claimed also to have developed two Ebola vaccines during the 2014 epidemic in West Africa. The African nations, however, eyed them with distrust and said in effect, “We are needy – not desperate,” and waited for vaccines developed along more orthodox methods before inoculating their citizens. One wonders whether Russian medical science has advanced much since the days of Dr. Lysenko.
And then there is Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus, who recently ran an electoral race against the dissident Svetlana Tikhanovskaya. In his defense it must be said that, officially, he received the majority of the votes, but it has been whispered that the methods of tabulating them have not been altogether free from coercion. In any case, spirited sort that he is, he will not allow a mere election to interfere with his prerogative. He used the simple but effective method of threatening his rival’s children, who were spirited out of the country to Lithuania for their safety; and their mother at length followed them in order not to be separated from them for the rest of her life. Lukashenko had already thrown her husband into jail.
Generally I include some aspects of personal life to counter-balance the fairly gloomy view of the world that the headlines have been encouraging for months on end, but I’m a bit out of sorts today. The hike scheduled for the Vigorous Hikers was Leading Ridge, the steepest climb in Shenandoah National Park, ascending 1700 feet in 0.9 miles. I like the hike very much under certain conditions, but I was not up to doing it in 90-degree heat. The weather is supposed to cool down a bit later in the week, so I will venture somewhere or other then and in that way attempt to restore myself to a more equitable state of mind.
Today’s statistics as of 8:00 PM – # of cases worldwide: 20,500,383; # of deaths worldwide: 744,367; # of cases U.S.: 5,304,062; # of deaths U.S.: 167,563. Our downward trend has been reversed. Today we saw over 50,000 new cases and over 1,300 new deaths. The mortality rate is now about 3.1%, so there is a slight improvement in that respect. About 500 of deaths occurred in Florida and Texas. Virginia’s case count is now over 100,000.