Democrats are fond of blaming Donald Trump for downplaying the seriousness of the COVID-19, pandemic and their charges are not without merit. He almost never wore a face mask, thereby setting a bad example for Americans — and especially those with the wrong-headed notion that the pandemic was all some sort of hoax to deprive them of their civil rights.
But Joe Biden is hardly guiltless when it comes to messaging about COVID and protecting oneself and one’s family. As I observed back in 2021:
For all his preaching about COVID-19, what Joe Biden doesn’t know about proper protocol for wearing and handling a face mask can hurt him. You, too, if you come into contact with him.
Videos of him since the pandemic began are riddled with instances of him fiddling and futzing with the mask he is wearing, plainly touching the exterior, which is a no-no. CDC guidelines advise: “Do NOT touch the mask when wearing it. If you have to often touch/adjust your mask, it doesn’t fit you properly, and you may need to find a different mask or make adjustments.” Elsewhere the agency admonishes, “Handle only by the earloops or ties.”
But it’s not only Biden’s deeds that have sent a wrong message to the American people. Far more problematic have been his verbal directives, which early on included talk of a “mask mandate” to be imposed on all Americans. Rather than explain — or better still have a health official explain — how to safeguard against the virus, he spoke repeatedly of a “patriotic responsibility” to wear a face mask and, later, of getting vaccinated.
Will this presidential election be the most important in American history?
Now his rhetoric has reached a new level of invasiveness. He now speaks of his door-to-door vaccination campaign in terms borrowed from the gestapo hand book. On Tuesday, his administration announced they had launched “strike forces” to go into local communities. Is it any wonder an Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich advised residents to put up “no trespassing” signs to deter the canvasing.
