News at warp speed

The news continues to move along at warp speed and the President named the leadership of his Operation Warp Speed, aimed at getting a coronavirus vaccine as soon as possible, maybe as early as the end of this year in his telling.

Let’s start there:

Operation Warp Speed. Trump named the operation’s leadership including its leader, Monsef Slaovi, a former executive at GlaxoSmithKline. During the announcement Slaovi teased the crowd with news that he has seen good early reports on a vaccine, not mentioning which one. The next day we learned that vaccine was, surprise, being developed by his old company, in which he still holds millions of dollars of stock. Not surprisingly, after the company announced its progress on a vaccine, the stock market rose. Now, I hope the news about the vaccine is true, believe me, but how the sequence of events played out is curious, no?

Trump abruptly leaves press conference. Trump held a press conference in the Rose Garden which, not surprisingly, turned testy. At one point, Weijia Jiang, an Asian American reporter for CBS, asked why Trump constantly touts the statistic that the U.S. has given more coronavirus tests than any other country as if it’s the most important thing. Trump quickly became testy and said, “Why don’t you ask China that question?” Jiang asked why he chose to ask her that question. Some took his reaction as racist. He also pulled a similar move a few years ago when April Ryan, an African American reporter, asked a question about the Congressional Black Caucus and Trump responded…