Yes, I had to break into my queue.   (This time it’s been a real pain, since Labor Day is Monday and a special day is Wednesday and I have a bunch of posts that need to appear consecutively.  But, this is an important message.)

TheDonald is simply out of control.  No, that doesn’t make it clear.  It’s that he is putting all of us at risk.

Now, many of you didn’t get my eMail yesterday (because you are not my clients- unfortunately) where I warned that TheDonald- who cannot convince businesses to put their employees at risk- will at least screw over federal employees.  (And, in so doing will put almost all Americans at risk.)

“How?”, you ask?  TheDonald wants folks to have more money right now.  To force the economy to turn around. That’s actually a good thing- but the way to do that is to provide another $ 1200 stimulus, to re-enact the $ 600 unemployment payments.   But, those require cooperation with the Democratic party.  Nope.  Not going there.

Instead, TheDonald implored American businesses to stop collecting the Social Security payments on folks’ paychecks.  But, he can’t make that obligation go away- so, he just will have us ‘loan’ you the money.  Which will come due by 30 April 2021.    Oh, yeah- he wants employers to be the collectors of those loans, too.    Business said “No, thank you.”

So, now all Federal employees (anyone whose income is $104K or less per year) will the recipients of this loan.  And, they will have to pay the loan back in 2021.  Please, folks- put the money in the bank and don’t spend it, so you won’t come short in January.  Because if you don’t, you owe the money with penalties and interest on top of that.

But, that’s really only part of TheDonald’s big plan.  To terminate Social Security.  First- if most folks don’t have the funds to pay back this loan (and they won’t)- then Social Security’s trust fund comes up short.  And, then, TheDonald will say the US will pick up the tab.  Putting Social Security in the general budget.

Which means it is just a short hop to change Social Security, with a defined funding, to the whim of Congress.  And, there goes the  benefits, since there are so many other places the general fund needs to go.

Let us also not forget that TheDonald is now advising his acolytes to break the law.  To vote twice.  Once by mail and once in person.  (I don’t think he plans to pardon all of you for committing this felony, either.)  Again, his only goal is to destroy our confidence in the integrity of American institutions- voting, the Postal Service, the media, the FDA and CDC… (I could go on, but I have one more warning for us today.)

But, that’s only PART of the way TheDonald is planning to hurt US Citizens.

He has abandoned the scientific basis behind the Coronavirus response.  (OK.  He really has done little- but now, it’s so much worse.)

Instead of relying on Deborah Birx (formerly the global AIDS coordinator) or  the estimable Tony Fauci, one of the foremost infectious disease specialists in the world, who were providing thoughtful, cogent advice on how to deal with the pandemic, he found a flak.

Scott Atlas- a radiologist, with no background in infectious diseases or microbiology- is his new go-to guy.  Of course,  Atlas’ major qualification is that he is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution- and that he pontificates on Fox (where only folks who know nothing get to be on TV).  You know, the wrong-wing group that comes up with the craziest ideas about improving America.

Scott wants us to stop wearing masks.  He wants us to believe that children don’t infect a soul as they carry the coronavirus.  But, worse of all, he wants us to get infected so we can rapidly approach “herd immunity’– by the end of the year.   And he and TheDonald leaned on the CDC to remove the need for testing- so we won’t know if we are infected and can inflict the disease on anyone we meet.

Now, no one has a clue what it will take for us to attain herd immunity.  Whether that’s 65% or 80%- or even 90%.

But, let’s follow this folly for a little bit.  And, we’ll look at the 65% number (because I have no PeptoBismol in the house to deal with the vomiting that will come from the 80% value).   65% means 25 million of us will have to develop COVID-19.  God knows where we will find hospitals to treat that population.

Yet, that’s not the big issue.  Our COVID-19 statistics have been pretty consistent.  The number of deaths per number of infected, that is.  Right now, we are reporting about 6.1 million cases- and 186000 deaths.  If we are going to up the number of cases by a factor of 4, that means we are going to murder 560,000 Americans over the next four months.

Hope you have a happy Labor Day holiday.