A Canadian View On The US: The Rose Garden Ramblings of Donald Trump

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By Jo-Ann “Jo D NL” Duke

Hi, it’s me again, your friendly Canadian observer, back again with a look at the many varied ramblings in the Rose Garden of your president, Donald Trump on July 14, 2020; as they were made during his speech about the executive orders for Hong Kong and China. However the purpose of the briefing quickly went off the rails, after he quickly mentioned his executive orders.

For about an hour, he began to rant, vent, and ramble. He flipped back and forth between topics that had nothing to do with the reason given for the briefing including the Coronavirus, China, Joe Biden, school reopening, etc. After he announced the executive orders, he just rambled. as he just went from one topic to another, and then back again multiple times.

The way the information was presented by Trump at the time was unusual and at times strange. It appeared that he was either just speaking off the cuff or free associating; or he was ticking items off a list of his supposed accomplishments during his first term. It was like seeing a student standing before the class, trying to make sense of a project that they’d forgotten to do, and had thrown together in a few moments before class, thinking if they kept talking that something would finally make sense to the people listening; but knowing that it was hopeless. I cannot believe what we heard was put together by a professional speechwriter. The speech jumped from one topic to another repeatedly, it didn’t have any cohesion, and was not clear and concise. The quality was like something a child writing a report for the first time. I felt like I had a case of whiplash while trying to follow the topics presented during this almost hour long “speech”; it was so disjointed, and at times it was painful to hear. Everything below is from a transcript of the speech released by the White House. https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/remarks-president-trump-press-conference-071420/

First up, the two executive orders regarding Hong Kong and China. The first executive order concerned Hong Kong, he said, “Today, I signed legislation and an executive order to hold China accountable for its oppressive actions against the people of Hong Kong. The Hong Kong Autonomy Act, which I signed today, passed unanimously through Congress. This law gives my administration powerful new tools to hold responsible the individuals and the entities involved in extinguishing Hong Kong’s freedom.” Then his second executive order, “Today, I also signed an executive order ending U.S. preferential treatment for Hong Kong. Hong Kong will now be treated the same as mainland China: no special privileges, no special economic treatment, and no export of sensitive technologies.” Huh, the two EOs seem to contradict each other. And he talks about WHO, and how he withdrew the US from membership in the organization. He says that they have been very tough on the World Trade Organization before he says, “World trade is terrible. The deal is terrible.” I wonder if he knows that the World Health Organization and the World Trade Organization are two completely separate organizations.

We know it was supposed to be about the executive orders regarding Hong Kong and China; That didn’t last past reciting the two Executive Orders (EO). He was talking about the stock market and said, “So we’ve had a big day in the stock market. Things are coming back very rapidly – a lot sooner than people thought.” He said a little later, “But then they — then the virus came in, and the world is a different place. But we’re now getting back, and one of the reasons the market is doing so — it’s almost at the point that it was at prior to the plague. Almost. We’re getting very close. It’s a great thing. It’s an amazing thing, what our people have done and what they’ve endured.” This seems greatly exaggerated, from economic news reports.

New topic, he said, “High-speed broadband. We want high-speed…” Well why didn’t he get it? Three years ago — it’s not a long time.” Correct me if I’m wrong, but three years ago, wasn’t Mike Pence his Vice President, not Joe Biden. Did he forget this? Then he suddenly started talking about both China’s and the US’s population numbers. He said, “China has 1.4 billion people; we have 325- — probably 325 million, approximately. Nobody can give the exact count. We’re trying to get an exact count. But you have, over the years, many illegals who have come into the country, so it depends on how you want to count it. But you could say 325- to 350 million people, as opposed to 1.4 billion people.” Okay, connection, please!

Next up, his broken record, you know the one, where he blames China for the coronavirus, we all must have it memorized by now. “And make no mistake: We hold China fully responsible for concealing the virus and unleashing it upon the world. They could’ve stopped it. They should’ve stopped it. It would’ve been very easy to do at the source when it happened.” Please notice the man saying this has continually refused to take any responsibility in his handling of the pandemic. He seems fixated on both Joe Biden and China, “In contrast, Joe Biden’s entire career has been a gift to the Chinese Communist Party and to the calamity of — of errors that they’ve made. They made so many errors. And it’s been devastating for the American worker.”, and he said, “There’s no company and no country in the world — no country in the world has ever ripped off the United States like the incredible job that they did on this country and the people that ran it.” Americans bought more products from China than Chinese people bought from America, were they supposed to stop selling to the US? Surely a successful businessman would understand this?

He says, “Possibly, it’s one of the reasons — certainly, it’s one of the very big reasons — trade and things related to trade — that I got elected in the first place. I’ve been talking about it for a long time, along with many other subjects, frankly.” No, not really, you got elected because not enough people voted in 2016, because no one considered that enough people would vote for you; and that was what helped you win, remember, you lost the popular vote to Hilary Clinton, didn’t you? If it hadn’t been for the Electoral College, you would not now be president. He said, “I’ve been given a lot of credit for what I did there. It took a certain amount of courage, I guess, because it sounds so nice — the Paris Climate Accord — but it wasn’t good for us at all.” This deserves praise, because every country needs to be involved in helping the climate issues be repaired if possible, as they helped make them.

He jumps back to Joe Biden, “So Biden was here for 47 years. Eight years — the last eight years, not long ago — as Vice President, he said, “One in five miles of our highways are still in poor condition.” Well, we’re doing a good job in highways, but why didn’t he fix them three years ago? Why didn’t he fix them?” Might it have been that the Republicans would block everything the former administration did? He said, “And it wasn’t easy, because you talk about a certain power of the telephone and the calls, where they would call and say, “No, we don’t want to do that.” He sounds like he is trying to convince everyone that he is the only one who can get anything done, that none of the foreign leaders are as competent as him, so not true. “We’ve — we’ve got now, soon — as it — all this equipment comes in, all made in the USA — we’ve got the newest, most incredible weapons anywhere in the world. We have the best tanks, the best ships, the best missiles, rockets. We have the best of everything. We have the best fighter jets — the F-35, the F-18. All of these assets are being built. Tankers — incredible tankers. Bombers. Hope we don’t have to use them, but we have the most incredible military.” What is his issue with being the best and the biggest, hmm? Boys and their toys, I guess.

“We would’ve had thousands of people additionally die if we let people come in from heavily-infected China. But we stopped it; we did a travel ban in January.” He also says, “We would have lost — in fact, Dr. Fauci said you would’ve lost thousands of additional people if President Trump had to do that.” If he is quoting that Dr. Fauci was behind him in his actions, why isn’t Dr. Fauci a part of the revived Corona Task Force Briefings now going on daily with only Trump speaking. What is his reason for pushing so hard to reopen schools, as he has threatened to cut funding to schools that aren’t fully open and operational? He said, “But we did what we had to do, and now we’ll put out the flames as it — as it happens. We have to get the schools open. We have to get everything open. A lot of people don’t want to do that for political reasons, not for other reasons.” If he is so eager to get the schools reopened, why is he disregarding the recommendations made by the CDC? He said, “And, frankly, if we didn’t test, you wouldn’t have all the headlines because we’re showing cases. And we have just about the lowest mortality rate. But if we did — think of this: If we didn’t do testing — instead of testing over 40 million people, if we did half the testing, we would have half the cases. If we did another — you cut that in half, we would have, yet again, half of that.” None of this is true, look up sites that deal with testing for viruses, especially Covid-19.

He says, “Well, we all wish well to China, but what China has unleashed on the world, it’s — it’s hard to even fathom. I see people now, friends of mine — they walk up, they want to say hello, and they have to keep their distance, and they’re all covered up, like you’re all covered up, with facemasks. It’s a different world, but we’re coming out on top.” So which is it, does Trump wish them well or blame them? He has refused to make a federally mandated requirement on mask wearing, he has grudgingly started saying people should wear one, he does not, he carries it around in his coat pocket. “And the cases are created because of the fact that we do tremendous testing. We have the best testing in the world.” There is no way that being tested for a virus can give someone the virus and create a case.

I was intrigued when he refers to the formation of the European Union being set up so that they could take advantage of the US. His exact words were, “We’re in tremendous economic competition, including Europe, which has never treated us well. The European Union was formed in order to take advantage of the United States. They formed, and they take advantage of the United States. They formed, and they take advantage of the United States. And I know that, and they know I know that, but other Presidents had no idea.”

Even though there is more I could take from this rant or rally speech, whatever it really was; I will stop here. I have to ask; Is it just me, or does anyone else see that the man who is supposed to be the leader of the free world does not seem to be able to concentrate on one subject at a time as seen in this speech? It would be much easier on everyone who listens to one of these briefings, if he could present the information in a coherent, concise and clear manner; one topic at a time. Something that has been pointed out by those who viewed this speech is that this seemed more like a miniaturized version of one of his former election rallies that he so loves to hold. Unfortunately, though for the president, his crowd of supporters were not there to give him the applause, attention, acceptance and blind admiration that he has come to believe to be his due. I am sure that he is feeling deprived of this, but thanks to the Covid-19 crisis, he has to settle for his new telephonic rallies that he is doing with supporters in each state now, trying to rally the voters for November.

Well, once again I am signing off here from Canada, sincerely wishing all of my American friends the best, those both old and new, and much love to all of you.

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