Social media erupts in mockery after Matt Gaetz brags about Trump’s COVID-19 infection
One of the more disgusting talking points to emerge from the shared fever dream that is the Republican Party’s collective psyche in the wake of President Trump’s contraction of COVID-19 is the idea that recovering from the virus is simply a matter of strength and “toughness.”
Conservatives are obsessed with this idea that Trump is some kind of hyper-masculine ubermensch who excels in all physical and mental categories because they can’t get themselves to admit the simple and obvious fact that he’s an elderly, obese man with poor fitness habits and an aversion to wearing masks.
Beyond the pathetic nature of this absurd hero worship, such commentary is deeply insulting to the hundreds of thousands of Americans who have died from COVID-19 or found themselves inflicted with chronic health problems or disabilities due to the virus. These people didn’t suffer and in some cases die because they’re somehow weaker than Trump. They died because their government, led by Trump, misled them about the risks of the coronavirus. They died because Republicans are working around the clock to gut our healthcare system and they didn’t have access to the kind of doctors and healthcare that Trump has access to.
How many of these people would have survived if they too had a private suite at Walter Reed Hospital, the world’s best doctors doting on them around the clock, and a steady stream of expensive medications pumped into them without concern for the cost? Trump’s recklessness and flagrant irresponsibility landed him in the hospital. Receiving medical care that most people could only dream of is what will get him out.
On Twitter today, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL), one of Trump’s most reliably obsequious little minions, took the right-wing’s stomach-churning rhetoric about Trump’s physical prowess to a pathetic new low. He blasted out what he presumably thought was a flattering joke about the president and said that Trump “won’t have to recover from COVID” and that “COVID will have to recover from President Trump,” tossing in a #MAGA for a little extra brown-nosing oomph.
The tweet is nonsensical in addition to being embarrassingly fawning. It’s obviously hyperbolic but it trades on a presumption that Gaetz’s audience genuinely thinks Trump has an underlying, unique strength in the face of the virus. It’s as childish as it is deluded and just the latest tweet from Gaetz showing how desperate he is for the president’s attention and approval. This is a man who has devoted himself to a corrupt, cruel, cryptofascist in his mercenary pursuit of power. The sooner the Congressman is voted out of office, the safer all of us will be.
President Trump won't have to recover from COVID.
COVID will have to recover from President Trump. #MAGA
— Rep. Matt Gaetz (@RepMattGaetz) October 5, 2020
Twitter users, many of whom are by now well aware of Gaetz and his frequently odious messaging, swarmed him with mockery. Check out some of the best dunks below.
New GOP message: The 210,000 Americans who died from this virus were insufficiently masculine and strong. – @maxasteele
— Justin Satzman (@jsatz23) October 5, 2020
dude. this is pathetic.
— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm) October 5, 2020
I believe Covid has moved on at this point in the relationship
— david cross✍ (@davidcrosss) October 5, 2020
That’s just stupid.
— Wanda Sykes (@iamwandasykes) October 5, 2020
tell me this is the alcohol talking
— Jeff Tiedrich (@itsJeffTiedrich) October 5, 2020
https://twitter.com/redheadb3/status/1313128178974625793?s=20
COVID has been *thriving* under President Trump with 210,000 *confirmed* dead already, and infection & hospitalizations increasing into a likely 3rd wave of suffering & death.
— David Rothschild (@DavMicRot) October 5, 2020
So, Trump is more sickening than COVID.
Refreshing honesty, Matt.
— The Hoarse Whisperer (@TheRealHoarse) October 5, 2020
https://twitter.com/JaimePrimak/status/1313153777457934336?s=20
https://twitter.com/murray_nyc/status/1313150288526823427?s=20
Joe Biden won't have to recover from COVID.
Because Joe Biden took the necessary steps to avoid becoming infected.
— James Buchanan (@POTUS_15) October 5, 2020
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