Yes and they will take a place in History right next to the German Christians of WW II, ignoring the faults and evil deeds of their glorious Leader.
Since the start of the novel COVID-19 outbreak months ago I've been thinking about how Anne Frank and her sister Margot died from one of the infectious diseases that rapidly afflicted thousands detained at Bergen-Belsen (typhus fever) and what plans would be made to protect the children in Trump's camps. We're being told to diligently and routinely wash our hands with soap to protect ourselves during this global pandemic. It took the intervention of United States federal court for child detainees to be given access to soap. They ruled that migrant children are entitled to toothbrushes and soap, and other fundamentals of human hygiene and dignity, after the Trump administration argued they weren't necessary. Children are still in soiled clothes, not routinely bathed, traumatized in ways that will permanently harm their development. Calloused-hearted fools who've been outraged and moaned Trump has been victimized when he's criticized for his actions have literally asked "why these people didn't bring these things with them" in reference to infants and toddlers who didn't have their own supply of formula, diapers, and shampoo on them. Trump's policies haven't been cruel as a side effect but as the actual intent. Children are still separated from their families, and there's a less functional tracking system in place for reunification than what a bowling ally has to make sure people get their shoes back.
Bergen-Belsen wasn't a death camp, and it had euphemistic names that made it sound less atrocious, less brutal and dehumanizing, than we know that it was. It was a hell made on Earth by men for men, women, children. All they had in the camp for any joy or love was one another, and that's what makes infectious diseases so heartbreaking because it's indifferent about emotions and you can infect the person who has kept your spirit alive. A recurrent theme in Nazi antisemitic propaganda was that Jews spread diseases. It's the primary reason Christians at the time argued that the Jews (as well as the Soviets, Romanians, gays and others imprisoned in the camps) should remain detained. The recurrent theme in Trump's propaganda is that foreigners are exclusively at fault for the global COVID-19 pandemic, not his stupefyingly incompetent and indifferent series of actions, dating to when he eliminated the pandemic response directorate in the NSC, to his current bungling, that lead to the country he is supposed to be leading being woefully unprepared. Of course Fox News, the Russian bots, Rush Limbaugh and other proxies for Trump will immediately leap in and spread the contagion of propaganda as soon as someone tests positive in the migrant detainment camps. Jews imprisoned in the camps were blamed for the infectious diseases that afflicted people......outside of the camps. Some Nazi propaganda even depicted the camps as sanitariums that protected the rest of the population from the further spread of disease.
There is not so much as a dust of hope that COVID-19 will not race through the ICE facilities and migrant detainment camps. These camps and facilities are so overcrowded people are sleeping in toilet stalls so social distancing is most definitely not an option. There have been outbreaks of flu, mumps, chicken pox and tuberculosis, and an outbreak of COVID-19 is inevitable. It will most likely be people from outside the camps who will bring it in. A guard. Or maybe a benevolent attorney sincerely trying to help, who didn't know she was contagious since she wasn't yet symptomatic. Once the detainees are infected Trump will not have sympathy, his heart will not be weighted with grief and concern; just the opposite. It will fuel his xenophobia. He will seize upon it with gusto. In his rally just a couple of weeks ago where he called the outbreak a "hoax by the Democrats" he spouted racist rhetoric, primarily fixated on the Chinese but of course as soon as someone in an ICE facility and CBP camp tests positive for COVID-19 he'll speed over to Twitter to rouse up the "build the wall" crowd. Never mind that the wall would, of course, not have stopped coronavirus. Trump and members of his administration (including Secretary of State Mike Pompeo) have shared messages that refer to COVID19 as the “Wuhan virus” or “China virus,” both of which critics say are as racist and xenophobic, and of course that has polluted onto this forum as well.
The Miami Herald reported the Trump administration ordered immigration court staff throughout the country to take down posters that explained in English and Spanish how to prevent catching and spreading the coronavirus.
Trump was surprised that people die of the flu. Three migrant children died due to complications from the flu while in federal custody last year. That is why the CDC recommended that all migrants be given the flu shot; they're inexpensive, simple to administer, and low-risk.
Doctors volunteered to administer the vaccines. They were refused.
After arrests of protesting doctors, the border agency dug in on refusal to vaccinate migrants. There is no way a vaccine for COVID-19 will be available in the near future, but if Trump was reelected and one became available later into a second term, I have no faith all, not even a spark, that he'd ensure the least among us, the children in the migrant camps, will receive it. Doctors have pleaded with the Trump administration that the tenet to be followed by the American Medical Association is "humanity is our patient." To no avail.
I also write long posts when I'm stressed. Thanks for always reading what I write.
