{"id":2458729,"date":"2020-05-21T22:24:00","date_gmt":"2020-05-22T04:24:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/news\/try-leading-over-tweeting\/"},"modified":"2020-05-22T10:01:07","modified_gmt":"2020-05-22T16:01:07","slug":"try-leading-over-tweeting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/local-news\/try-leading-over-tweeting\/","title":{"rendered":"Try leading over tweeting"},"content":{"rendered":"<div readability=\"54\">\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">One day last week Donald Trump averaged a tweet every 7 1\/2 minutes. None of the tweets mentioned the nearly 80,000 Americans who died from COVID-19 or any plans for addressing the pandemic. What\u2019s with the tweeting? When will he begin leading?<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Trump\u2019s leadership plan has been to discount, ignore and reverse anything President Obama enacted. In 2017, Trump proposed cutting $277 million in pandemic preparedness funding. He gutted CDC funding and disbanded the directorate for Global Health Security and Biodefense, which Obama established after the successful control of the international ebola epidemic of 2014. Trump\u2019s administration ignored the comprehensive (69-page) plan that Obama provided on how to handle a pandemic, and lied that it didn\u2019t exist. Despite repeated dire warnings beginning as early as July, 2019, that the U.S. was precariously unprepared and underfunded to deal with a pandemic, Trump continued to cut funding and discount the scientific facts presented to him.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">As a stark and telling contrast, South Korea and the USA identified their first COVID-19 cases on the same day, Feb. 15. South Korea\u2019s leaders took the threat seriously: testing, tracking and containing the deadly virus. Trump told Americans, \u201cThe coronavirus is very much under control in the USA.\u201d (Feb. 24) \u201cIt\u2019s going to disappear\u2026like a miracle.\u201d (Feb. 28). \u201cJust stay calm. It will go away.\u201d (March 10). For precious weeks, people continued to travel, mingle, and spread the virus. We all know the horror our health-care providers have had in attempting to treat and control this rampant illness without adequate tests, protective equipment, and supplies. Today South Korea\u2019s virus death toll is 263; America\u2019s is 91,275, up nearly 11,000 in just the past week.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Trump spends his time tweeting excuses, throwing tantrums, firing his \u201cenemies,\u201d and fabricating conspiracy theories to divert attention from the fact that he was, is, and always will be an incapable leader.<\/p>\n<div class=\"row\">\n<div class=\"col\" readability=\"6\">\n<div class=\"row at-donation at-donation-mobile p-0\" readability=\"7\">\n<div class=\"col-xl-4 p-2\">\n<div data-bg=\"url(https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/03\/AT-logo-white.png)\" class=\"p-0 mt-2 mb-2 h-75 text-center rocket-lazyload\">\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/03\/AT-logo-white.png\" class=\"logo m-0 p-0 invisible\"><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><h3 class=\"d-inline mr-3\">Support Local Journalism<\/h3>\n<p><button class=\"btn d-inline\" type=\"button\" onclick=\"handleDonationButtonClickMidArticle()\">Donate<\/button><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Meanwhile, Americans have lost and are continuing to lose our livelihoods, our freedoms, and our very lives.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND Letter Name\">Annette Roberts-Gray<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND Letter Title\">Carbondale<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div readability=\"11.303082191781\">\n<div class=\"col-xl-7 pt-3 pb-4 at-4 pl-4\" readability=\"19.164371772806\">\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/03\/AT-logo-white.png\" class=\"logo\"><\/p>\n<p><strong>Readers around Aspen and Snowmass Village make the Aspen Times\u2019 work possible. Your financial contribution supports our efforts to deliver quality, locally relevant journalism.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Now more than ever, your support is critical to help us keep our community informed about the evolving coronavirus pandemic and the impact it is having locally. Every contribution, however large or small, will make a difference.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Each donation will be used exclusively for the development and creation of increased news coverage.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><button class=\"btn\" type=\"button\" onclick=\"handleDonationButtonClickBelow()\">Donate<\/button> <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/opinion\/letters-to-the-editor\/try-leading-over-tweeting\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">via:: The Aspen Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>One day last week Donald Trump averaged a tweet every 7 1\/2 minutes. None of the tweets mentioned the nearly 80,000 Americans who died from COVID-19 or any plans for addressing the pandemic. What\u2019s with the tweeting? When will he begin leading? Trump\u2019s leadership plan has been to discount, ignore and reverse anything President Obama [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2458729","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-21 21:40:36","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley&#039;s Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2458729","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2458729"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2458729\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2458747,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2458729\/revisions\/2458747"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2458729"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2458729"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2458729"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}