With just days to go before am American presidential election, Donald Trump has publicly derided Anthony Fauci, his nations top infectious disease expert. Fauci has served with both Republican and Democrat administrations since the Reagan years and has never been associated with either political party.
A September poll by the Kaiser Foundation showed that sixty-eight percent of the American public trust Fauci to provide reliable information on the coronavirus, and yet Trump referred to him as a " disaster ", " along with all the other idiots that are getting it wrong."
Trump is the president that sacked both his Chief of staff and Secretary of State, along with numerous other " advisers " when they failed to support his maverick views. He is on very dangerous ground because this attack on Fauci will remind the voters of his own performance at the start of this pandemic.
Trump told the country to " ignore " the virus and it " would go away ". He refused to wear a mask or implement a lockdown and now the virus is responsible for over two hundred thousand deaths in his country.
Opinion polls show his competitor, Joe Biden edging ahead, provoking Trump to claim the election is being rigged and threatening to refuse to leave office if he loses. This is a serious attack on the American Constitution that could bring his redneck followers into the streets armed with guns.
Today will bring another debate between Trump and Biden and new rules will be in place to prevent the chaos of that first debate,. Trump tried to shout down both his opponent and the moderator and completely refused to abide by the rules of civilized conduct.
This time the moderator will have the ability to mute the microphone of either contender if they continue to break public decorum. No doubt there will be countless warnings before that ultimate threat is exercised but it does open the door for Trump to simply walk out and claim he was " victimized ", and that would go down well with his one eyed supporters.
How this American presidential elections is resolved may be decisive in the battle to hold the world temperature from over heating. Trump took America out of the Paris Accord and he is basing his country's economy on oil at a time when the rest of the world is moving to reign in global warming.
China has taken a bold step in announcing a date when its economy will be carbon neutral and for many years it was China which claimed the right to pollute because it was still a " developing " country. With that bogey eliminated, there is a real chance of the progress that has been elusive as we encounter hotter summers and increasing droughts.
Unfortunately, who gets to sit in the oval office will have a lot to do with what sort of world we live in a few decades from now. Perhaps we may need to follow that debate today with more than passing interest !
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