An Alternate World: Trump's Only Pandemic Plan Is To Distort Reality
In January of 2017, as Donald Trump transitioned into the presidency of the United States of America, his press secretary Sean Spicer began his tenure by lashing out at the assembled press in his first briefing, declaring that “This was the largest audience ever to watch an inauguration. Period.”
Spicer’s lie was notable for its blatancy. Photos from the event showed large stretches of unoccupied space. I was there covering the event, and was shocked myself by how few people had actually shown up. The ones who had made up for the dismal attendance with bad behavior, but it was a stark reminder that Trump was wildly, wildly unpopular.
It was necessary, of course, for Donald Trump to believe his inauguration was the largest ever because Trump himself is wholly dependent on an alternate worldview that he is the curator of himself. The White House was lined with pictures that distorted the size of the inaugural crowd. Even recently he has continued to repeat the lie over and over again.
Continuing this trend, reports have now surfaced that Trump is pushing the Center For Disease Control to change its coronavirus death numbers in order to lessen the impact of the pandemic. This comes from Trump’s gut feeling that the numbers can’t possibly be as bad as 80,000+ having died. After all, he’s done a wonderful job of fighting the virus. A perfect job, if you will.
For anyone paying even the most modest amount of attention, this falls in line with Trump’s continued denial of the pandemic’s destruction, which is his only strategy. Lost in a reality of his own making, wherein he is the most competent and talented and popular leader in American, no, world history, Trump cannot face the truth that he has not only failed, but failed in a historic way to protect the American people.
This is because Trump, as a “businessman”, has relied on his ability to distort his own reality and live within his distortions. He has failed at every endeavor he has ever undertaken, and yet he believes he has never so much as faltered. He has never been worth the amount of money he claims - he has been forced to admit on several occasions his sense of worth “fluctuates” based on how he feels that day - and has never been the actual person he portrays in any meaningful way.
Trump’s reality distorting tendencies were learned, in a sense, from his association with Norman Vincent Peale, the founder of the gospel of Positive Thinking, an offshoot of the Cult of the Shining City that has coopted white evangelicalism and American politics, and part of the ongoing prosperity gospel that ordains that God rewards those people who believe in him and are most positive in their philosophy with riches and political power. Trump followed Peale’s teachings by developing his reality distortion field, the same that many successful businessmen adopted in the 1970’s/1980’s/1990’s as the gap between the wealthy and poor continued to grow by the day.
This twisted philosophy positions men like Trump in the center of their own universes and the poor and downtrodden as wicked and unworthy of assistance. That has been unbelievably destructive in the economic and political world, but to think now that it is going to enable a generational pandemic and distort the reality of it is just beyond disgusting.
Make no mistake, Trump will “fight” the pandemic by pretending it isn’t as bad as it is. He will push false numbers, especially if it means getting reelected, avoiding prosecution, and continuing to protect and embolden his distorted reality. He’ll save himself even if it means damning the rest of us.
Jared Yates Sexton is the author of American Rule: How A Nation Conquered The World But Failed Its People, available for pre-order from Dutton/Penguin-Random House. His work has appeared in The New York Times, The New Republic, The Daily Beast, Politico, and elsewhere. Currently he serves as an associate professor of writing at Georgia Southern University and is the co-host of The Muckrake Podcast.
