By Judi McLeod ——Bio and Archives--March 17, 2020
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While the world struggles to stop the ravage of the Coronavirus pandemic, Barack Obama aides—past and present—work diligently to come up with a way to blame the pandemic on President Donald Trump.
One day after his 2017 inauguration, a One Million Strong Big Women’s March signalled the world that a Hatefest was needed to remove America’s 45th from office.“In a sober briefing, Trump’s incoming team learned that the disease was an emerging pandemic — a strain of novel influenza known as H9N2 — and that health systems were crashing in Asia, overwhelmed by the demand. (Politico) “Health officials warn that this could become the worst influenza pandemic since 1918,” Trump’s aides were told. Soon, they heard cases were popping up in California and Texas.
“The briefing was intended to hammer home a new, terrifying reality facing the Trump administration, and the incoming president’s responsibility to protect Americans amid a crisis. But unlike the coronavirus pandemic currently ravaging the globe, this 2017 crisis didn’t really happen — it was among a handful of scenarios presented to Trump’s top aides as part of a legally required transition exercise with members of the outgoing administration of Barack Obama.”Nothing was ever mentioned about the 2009 Swine Flu outbreak that the Obama administration did nothing about until it was too late. “The first confirmed case in the United States was on the West Coast. The spread was faster than governments or hospitals were prepared for. The World Health Organization declared it a pandemic, and the U.S. president eventually declared a national emergency. (Daily Signal, March 16, 2020)
“Before it was over, the pandemic had hit 60.8 million Americans, hospitalized 274,304, and killed 12,469, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “This was the H1N1 virus, also known as the swine flu, which emerged in April 2009 and lasted until April 2010.” “They didn’t do anything about it,” Trump said of the Obama administration in a March 4 interview with Fox News Channel’s Sean Hannity. “Interestingly, with the swine flu, children were—in particular, they were vulnerable, sort of the opposite in that respect. But children were very vulnerable to the swine flu.”
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“POLITICO obtained documents from the meeting and spoke with more than a dozen attendees to help provide the most detailed reconstruction of the closed-door session yet. (Politico) “It was perhaps the most concrete and visible transition exercise that dealt with the possibility of pandemics, and top officials from both sides — whether they wanted to be there or not — were forced to confront a whole-of-government response to a crisis. “The Trump team was told it could face specific challenges, such as shortages of ventilators, anti-viral drugs and other medical essentials, and that having a coordinated, unified national response was “paramount” — warnings that seem eerily prescient given the ongoing coronavirus crisis.Where were the Obama-era stockpile of ventilators, anti-viral drugs and other medical essentials?
“But roughly two-thirds of the Trump representatives in that room are no longer serving in the administration. That extraordinary turnover in the months and years that followed is likely one reason his administration has struggled to handle the very real pandemic it faces now, former Obama administration officials said.” (Politico)
“The advantage we had under Obama was that during the first four years we had the same White House staff, the same Cabinet,” said former deputy labor secretary Chris Lu, who attended the gathering. “Just having the continuity makes all the difference in the world.” (Politico)But President Trump was never given the privilege of “continuity”.
“The outgoing Obama aides and incoming Trump aides gathered for roughly three hours on the afternoon of Friday, Jan. 13, 2017, in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building next to the White House. (Politico) “Obama aides, in op-eds and essays ripping the Trump administration’s handling of the coronavirus, officially called COVID-19, have pointed to the Jan. 13, 2017, session as a key example of their effort to press the importance of pandemic preparedness to their successors.
“In a Friday op-ed, Susan Rice, Obama’s national security adviser, blasted Trump for comments such as “you can never really think” that a pandemic like the coronavirus “is going to happen.” She mentioned the 2017 session as one of many instances of the Obama administration’s efforts to help its successor be ready for such a challenge. “Rather than heed the warnings, embrace the planning and preserve the structures and budgets that had been bequeathed to him, the president ignored the risk of a pandemic,” Rice wrote.This from the Obama stalwart who lied that an anti-Muslim video was the cause of the Benghazi tragedy. The truth is that outgoing Obama aides did diddly-squat to help the Trump team; that their leader had already crowned himself as “Resistance” leader, which he remains to be in the present day. The burning questions these ‘helpful’ Obama aides should be asked is when and how they had this information about pandemics. And most significantly why are they bringing it forward now?
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