Brian Kemp Says He Wants to Reopen Georgia by Friday, Immediately Gets Thrown Under the Bus By President Who Keeps Saying the Economy Needs to Reopen

I keep wondering when Trump’s allies are going to learn that Trump does not give a single, solitary fuck about any of their wellbeing.

Let us not forget that Trump has been crowing about re-opening the economy since the end of fucking March, when he said that he wanted things to be re-opened by Easter. Trump quickly backtracked and said that he didn’t say the thing he said after everyone pointed out that was mostly impossible. It hasn’t stopped Trump from insisting that the economy is ready to be re-opened, he just bitched about it slightly quieter. Ish.

Over the course of the past week, a handful of Republican governors, most of whom are Trump loyalist first, governors fifth, and decent human beings somewhere near last, said they were ready to re-open. Florida governor Ron DeSantis has allowed beaches (which had previously served as a breeding ground for the virus among spring breakers openly ignoring warnings about the disease) and parks to re-open. South Carolina is moving full speed ahead to make it easier for my immunocompromised mother to get ill, and Georgia governor and stealer-of-elections Brian Kemp has said that hair salons, movie theaters, in-person church services and massage parlors can all re-open by Monday at the latest.

I don’t need to tell you that this a horrifically bad idea for a state that has 21,102 confirmed cases and 847 deaths, who just added 972 cases as of fucking yesterday. The model designed by Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation suggests that Georgia shouldn’t open until June 19th at the latest. I also don’t need to tell you that Georgia waited too long to institute measures to slow the spread of the disease and are now sprinting to end restrictions too soon.

What I do need to tell you is that this should be a lesson for the kinds of idiots who think being buddy-buddy with Trump grants them any kind of favor that won’t immediately be thrown out when Trump decides to change his mind. In his nightly coronavirus press conference, Trump quickly took the opportunity to throw Kemp under the bus.

“It’s just too soon,” Trump said Wednesday at the daily White House news briefing on coronavirus when asked about Kemp’s timetable. “The spas and the beauty parlors and the barber shops … I love them but they can want a little bit longer, just a little bit, not much, because safety has to predominate.”

CNN.com

Trump famously hates taking responsibility for anything he says or does, and this is an example of him doing so. Trump has spent the last two weeks putting pressure on governors to re-open as quickly as possible. Trump toadies like Brian Kemp make moves to appease the President, and then the President acts like he hasn’t spent the last two weeks putting pressure on governors to re-open as quickly as possible. It makes Kemp look like a dick, and allows Trump to seem competent.

Kemp thought he was gonna get a pat on the head from the president, but all he got were tire marks across his face. In response, all Kemp could do was muster a weak series of tweets.

Donald Trump is a con artist, and an obvious one at that. It will never cease to baffle me on how people like Brian Kemp keep falling for the same old tricks over and over.

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About KC Complains A Lot 135 Articles
KC Complains A Lot is another refugee from Deadspin. He enjoys writing and not caving to pressure from herbs.

9 Comments

  1. CovidiotKemp is opening up the weirdest businesses. It’s like he looked at some “freedumb” instagrammer and just picked businesses that had to do with some of the idiots protest signs.

    I am in Georgia. I went to the grocery store two days ago. Maybe half of the people were wearing masks. Maybe a third of them were following the arrows on the floor. Let’s not even talk about the six foot distance – people seem to think that only applies to when you check out. I can’t imagine more people coming out into the mix. Thank god, I’m in the film business and studios are so worried about getting sued if people get sick that they probably won’t start back up for months.

    Also, this may be ignorance on my part, but I was thinking covid 19 was more like the flu. My sister(the ER nurse in NYC) said the big problem is the blood clotting. It’s not mucous in the lungs – it’s tiny blood clots. They also can mess up other organs. She was telling me about all of this and then it started popping up in the news. I wasn’t really that scared before – but for some reason this is terrifying me.

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/04/22/coronavirus-blood-clots/

    Some good news – I had no idea someone was thinking of doing a live action Battle of the Planets. I am here for it – hopefully.
    https://collider.com/magic-the-gathering-netflix-update-battle-of-the-planets-movie-joe-russo/?utm_campaign=collidersocial&utm_medium=twitter&utm_source=twitter

    • The thing is, if you don’t compel people to stay home whenever possible and to wear masks in public when they go out, they just won’t. Maryland had some of the first cases in the country, but Georgia still outpaced them with 6,909 more cases and 262 more deaths because they were so fucking slow to react. Maryland is just starting to flatten the curve and it’s aggressive measures probably help to make sure that Virginia and DC weren’t any worse. Georgia is still adding cases on a daily basis.

      If you don’t tell folks they can’t do the thing, they’re gonna do the thing whatever the dangers are.

    • …I know it’s not the important thing but about battle of the planets

      …I had fond memories of that from long ago but some years back I knew someone who got the box-set & the thing seemed like it cut to the same looped stock footage of the kind of roach robot thing whenever anything really cool should’ve been on screen

      …I have a feeling I remembered actual fights & stuff but unless there’s a non-english-dubbed version out there somewhere it seems like I just imagined that shit?

      • I haven’t watched it in years – but I remember different fights and stuff. I know they reuse some of the footage of the kids transforming and stuff. I haven’t watched the box set. I have my other fave Star Blazers though – those episodes actually hold up pretty well.

      • BoP was originally called Science Team Gatchaman in Japan produced in 1972-74. The North American version (I saw it too, I’m old why do you ask?) had the sexual innuendo, transvestites (Zoltar!) and the ultra violence (they weren’t knocked out, kids) taken out.

  2. Somewhere last night (I thiiink it was over on Twitter, I apologize if it was one of y’all!) I read a GREAT post, breaking down *exactly* which businesses Kemp wants to re-open, and they made an EXCELLENT point about it.

    The places he wants to open (nail salons, gyms, hair salons, etc.,etc., etc.), are *typically* the sorts of places where self-employed/contract workers work. And they often offer low pay, to–oftentimes–single moms with kids…

    Folks who typically don’t end up eligible for access to unemployment, and by allowing these folks to *technically* go back to work, he and the R’s in the state can claim they are NO LONGER eligible, should they decide that it’s safer to *not* return to their jobs.

    It’s pretty likely, that what’s REALLY going on, is an attempt to reduce expenditures, because–as always–“WHY should the state pay for poor people to live, when there are rich folks who could save & grow that money so much better!”

  3. An example:

    “Nail salon workers, massage therapists and servers don’t have a choice. If they “choose” not to go to work, they lose their jobs and livelihoods. They no longer qualify for unemployment. These people have families and children (who are not in school, by the way). Great options.”

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