№ 842: Thank You, Donnie

GOPLAND (April 23) —

Why can't FAILING FAKE MEDIA say

that Donnie was right all along;

that coronavirus was nothing to fret over —

well, not really, for long;

that Donnie restored American greatness —

that everyone envies us, everywhere;

that chloroquine (though it doesn't work),

is better, by far, than Obamacare;

that, as Donnie asserted, with warmer weather,

the virus deserted — problem averted;

that despite what they say, despite what you hear,

that these are the BEST times America's seen;

that Donnie’s the GREATEST president — EV-ER! —
well, anyway, in his dreams

№ 841: Past, Present, And Future Tense

HERE AND NOW (April 22) —

THERE'S A NON-ZERO CHANCE our future is past;

that Donnie the First is Donnie the Last;

that he ends voting (and the Constitution);
that he restores football (and also pollution);

that bills of attainder will be back in fashion 

(if they don’t interfere with the passion to cash in

of his flocking parvenu oligarchs,

his Gospel-trumpeting moral loan sharks,

or his Ayn Randy Darwinian “winners” —

atheists unwelcome at Wednesday church dinners);

that the first shall be first; that the last remain last

(as they have been forever — present and past);

that the U.S. experiment will come to be seen

as a flop; that we regress toward the mean.

№ 840.1: EXTRA! He'll Do

Health Chief’s Early Missteps Set Back Coronavirus Response (Curiously, NOT Paywalled, thank Rupert?)

HHS Secretary Alex Azar waited for weeks to brief the president and oversold his agency’s progress

WASHINGTON—On Jan. 29, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar told President Trump the coronavirus epidemic was under control.

The U.S. government had never mounted a better interagency response to a crisis, Mr. Azar told the president in a meeting held eight days after the U.S. announced its first case, according to administration officials. At the time, the administration’s focus was on containing the virus.

When other officials asked about diagnostic testing, Dr. Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, began to answer. Mr. Azar cut him off, telling the president it was “the fastest we’ve ever created a test,” the officials recalled, and that more than one million tests would be available within weeks.

That didn’t happen. The CDC began shipping tests the following week, only to discover a flaw that forced it to recall the test from state public-health laboratories. When White House advisers later in February criticized Mr. Azar for the delays caused by the recall, he lashed out at Dr. Redfield, accusing the CDC director of misleading him on the timing of a fix. “Did you lie to me?” one of the officials recalled him yelling.

Six weeks after that Jan. 29 meeting, the federal government declared a national emergency and issued guidelines that effectively closed down the country. Mr. Azar, who had been at the center of the decision-making from the outset, was eventually sidelined.

Mr. Azar’s defenders say he is being unfairly blamed by White House officials eager to cover up their own missteps.

Email subscribers click here.

(with apologies to Will D. Cobb and Gus Edwards)

THE HIGH CASTLE (April 22) —

Fall guy, fall guy,

hang ’im out to dry guy

Let ’im twist very slow in the wind

Do not blame Donnie, it's never him

Looks like Azar ’iz gotta go

’cuz he made Trump look like a schmo

I can’t help thinking I told you so

Let us sing, “Bring out your dead”

№ 840: Keep 'Em Out, Immigration Man

DETACHED DOTARD AND DISTRACTION (April 21) —

In light of the attack from the Invisible Enemy, as well as the need to protect the jobs of our GREAT American Citizens, I will be signing an Executive Order to temporarily suspend immigration into the United States!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 21, 2020

I sign whatever I find on my desk.

(Unless, of course, it's a check.)

Proclamations, orders — whatever — decrees

promulgating the end of disease.

For my GREAT July Fourth Celebration,

I'll add my name to the Declaration

of Independence. (Larger than Lincoln’s.)

As ink sinks into cracks and crevasses,

my supporters applaud and laugh off their asses.

This, all agree, is my GREAT attraction:

I screw things up, then I make a distraction.

Trevor Dodd

№ 839.1: EXTRA! Oil Wells Do Trend Well

Oil-Price Crash Deepens, Weighs on Global Markets (Paywall)

U.S. crude benchmark plunges a day after oil prices fell below zero

Email subscribers click here.

(with apologies to Lionel Bart)

QUEL DOMMAGE (April 21) —

We can’t sell this barrel of crude oil

Nowhere to store it, we’re giving it free

Good old Donnie will hand us a bail out

Three cheers for de-mock-ro-cy

It is our oil-o-garchy’s pleasure

whenever things go wrong

we raid the nation’s treasure(y)

same old dance and song

We admit our profligate dealing

destroys the country from sea to sea

still we see no reason to change things

there’s nothing we won’t do

no one we won’t screw

for our prof't-ab-il-it-y

Bonus track

№ 839: Homo Suspectus

Protesting for the Freedom to Catch the Coronavirus (Paywall)
For those who’ve chosen to put their trust in science during the pandemic it’s hard to fathom the decision to gather to protest while a deadly viral pathogen — transmitted easily by close contact and spread by symptomatic and asymptomatic people alike — ravages the country. But it shouldn’t come as a surprise.

Click

(with apologies to Carmine Appice, Tim Bogert, and Vincent Martell)

BELOW AND BEYOND (April 20) —

PEOPLE,

futile, stupid people

How did we ever beat

Ne-an-der-thals

We’re flimsy,

ignorant and clumsy

yet we were on the “winning” side

on a too speedy downhill ride

I blame daddy

and mumsy

Lovers

are extra stupid people

they’re the stupidest people in the world

With each other

in parallel or series

they mate and make more of themselves,

create ever unhealthier hells

full of hunger and thirst but firstly

too many people,

futile, stupid people

how in hell did we beat

Ne-an-der-thals

With each other

in parallel or series

they mate and make more of themselves,

create ever unhealthier hells

full of hunger and thirst but firstly

too many people,

futile, stupid people

how in hell did we beat

Ne-an-der-thals

№ 838: WHO's Sorry Now

Email subscribers click here.

(with apologies to Bert Kalmar, Harry Ruby, and Ted Snyder)

MY WAY (April 19)

WHO's sorry now,

WHO's sorry now?

Who guts your funding

when you don't kowtow?

I need respect

“Best — evah! — sex”

(whatever)

or I say, “NEXT!”

Listen up, chump,

I, Trump, am TRUMP,

with great ideas

from my rump

That's how it is

That's what I give

That’s how that

WHO’s sorry now

I said, “Not to worry,

there's nothing to fear,

I'll keep the virus away

No virus can hurt us,

not while I am here

and it's not my fault anyway.”

WHO's sorry now,

WHO's sorry now?

Who guts your funding

when you don't kowtow?

I need respect

“Best — evah! — sex”

(whatever)

or I say, “NEXT!”

Listen up, chump,

I, Trump, am TRUMP,

with great ideas

from my rump

That's how it is

That's what I give

That’s how that

WHO’s sorry now

WHO's sorry now,

WHO's sorry now?

Who guts your funding

when you don't kowtow?

I need respect

“Best — evah! — sex”

(whatever)

or I say, “NEXT!”

Listen up, chump,

I, Trump, am TRUMP,

with great ideas

from my rump

That's how it is

That's what I give

That’s how that

WHO’s sorry now

WHO's sorry now,

WHO's sorry now?

Who guts your funding

when you don't kowtow?

I need respect

“Best — evah! — sex”

(whatever)

or I say, “NEXT!”

Listen up, chump,

I, Trump, am TRUMP,

with great ideas

from my rump

That's how it is

That's what I give

That’s how that

WHO’s sorry now