{"id":175759,"date":"2020-12-06T19:07:00","date_gmt":"2020-12-07T00:07:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2020\/12\/06\/today-in-evil\/"},"modified":"2020-12-06T19:07:00","modified_gmt":"2020-12-07T00:07:00","slug":"today-in-evil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2020\/12\/06\/today-in-evil\/","title":{"rendered":"Today in Evil"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>  Memos have been released showing that   <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sun-sentinel.com\/coronavirus\/fl-ne-coronavirus-florida-desantis-spin-ss-prem-20201203-tyjmgkos6bd7vo7vnripqliany-htmlstory.html\">Florida Governor Ron DeSantis actively deceived the public about the spread     of Covid for political gain<\/a>. <\/p>\n<p>  We already knew that he was a miserable excuse for a human being, but now we   have proof: <\/p>\n<blockquote><p>  <span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\"><span>Throughout the COVID-19 crisis in Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis\u2019     administration engaged in a pattern of spin and concealment that misled the     public on the gravest health threat the state has ever faced, a South     Florida Sun Sentinel investigation has found. <\/span><span><\/p>\n<p>    DeSantis, who owes his job to early support from President Donald Trump,     imposed an approach in line with the views of the president and his powerful     base of supporters. The administration suppressed unfavorable facts,     dispensed dangerous misinformation, dismissed public health professionals,     and promoted the views of scientific dissenters who supported the governor\u2019s     approach to the disease. <\/span><span><\/p>\n<p>    The DeSantis administration\u2019s approach to managing COVID-19 information     carries costs. It supports a climate in which people proudly disdain masks,     engage in dangerous group activities that could spread the disease, and     brush aside information that conflicts with their political views. With     <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sun-sentinel.com\/news\/fl-ne-wharf-reopens-with-crowd-20201121-tbn5prnf2rbulkl7lopo4la2iu-story.html\">partygoers packing Florida bars<\/a>    and holiday travelers filling hotels and guest rooms, the state faces a few     difficult months before the possible relief of vaccines. <\/span><span><\/p>\n<p>    These findings are based on interviews with more than 50 people, including     scientists, doctors, political leaders, employees of the state health     department, and other state officials, as well as more than 4,000 pages of     documents: <\/span><span><br \/><\/span>  <\/span><\/p>\n<ul style=\"text-align: left;\">\n<li>      <span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\"><span>        The Florida Department of Health\u2019s county-level spokespeople were         ordered in September to stop issuing public statements about COVID-19         until after the Nov. 3 election.<\/span><\/span>    <\/li>\n<li>      <span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\"><span>        The DeSantis administration refused to reveal details about the first         suspected cases in Florida, then denied the virus was spreading from         person to person \u2014 despite mounting evidence that it was.<\/span><\/span>    <\/li>\n<li>      <span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\"><span>        State officials withheld information about infections in schools,         prisons, hospitals and nursing homes, relenting only         <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sun-sentinel.com\/coronavirus\/fl-ne-coronavirus-florida-nursing-home-names-20200418-cn6zgq3hvjeppgnzhozxret5la-story.html\">under pressure or legal action<\/a>        from family members, advocacy groups and journalists.<\/span><\/span>    <\/li>\n<li>      <span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\"><span>        The DeSantis administration brushed aside scientists and doctors who         advocated conventional approaches to fighting the virus, preferring         scientists on the fringes who backed the governor\u2019s positions.<\/span><\/span>    <\/li>\n<li>      <span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\"><span>        The governor\u2019s spokesman regularly takes to Twitter to spread         misinformation about the disease, including the false claim that COVID         was less deadly than the flu.<\/span><\/span>    <\/li>\n<li>      <span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\"><span>        The governor highlighted statistics that would paint the rosiest picture         possible and attempted to cast doubt on the validity of Florida\u2019s rising         death toll.       <\/span><\/span>    <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">  <span>    \u201cThe governor is a smart, educated guy,\u201d said Thomas Unnasch, co-director of     the Center for Global Health and Infectious Disease Research at the     University of South Florida in Tampa. \u201cBut he also is a politically savvy     guy. He is encouraging people who are of the opinion that the virus is not     as severe and profound as others say it is and putting politics before     science.\u201d<\/span>  <\/span><\/p>\n<p>    <span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\"><span>\u2026\u2026\u2026<\/p>\n<p>Don\u2019t issue news releases or write social media posts       about COVID, they were told, according to three health department county       spokespeople who asked not to be identified. Instead, talk about flu       shots, hearing-loss screenings \u2014 anything but the virus.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt is       all part of the top-down control of messaging from the governor\u2019s office,\u201d       said a senior official in the health department.   <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\"><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">The order came from Alberto Moscoso, communications director for   the state health department. It\u2019s unclear who told Moscoso to issue the order.   He left the department on Nov. 6 and declined comment for this report.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>This is ineluctably evil.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>In a just world, he&#8217;d be facing impeachment right now, but we are talking about Florida. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Memos have been released showing that Florida Governor Ron DeSantis actively deceived the public about the spread of Covid for political gain. We already knew that he was a miserable excuse for a human being, but now we have proof: Throughout the COVID-19 crisis in Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis\u2019 administration engaged in a pattern of &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[368,375,364,572,374],"class_list":["post-175759","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-corruption","tag-elections","tag-evil","tag-pandemic","tag-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175759"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=175759"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175759\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=175759"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=175759"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=175759"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}