Death of a salesman

     “We are coming around, we’re rounding the turn, we have the vaccines, we have everything. Even without the vaccines, we’re rounding the turn. It’s going to be over.”
          Donald Trump, selling.

     "He's a man way out there in the blue, riding on a smile and a shoeshine. And when they start not smiling back — that's an earthquake. And then you get yourself a couple of spots on your hat, and you're finished."

     Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman


Trump isn't finished. He is still selling.

Trump is an optimist who loves selling the sizzle, not the steak, and it has worked for him. He and his campaign have a new position. "We're not going to control the pandemic," his Chief of Staff said. COVID got away from us, and millions of us will get it, but it's all right because it really isn't that bad. Go live your life. 

We do not yet know whether voters in the swing states will buy a second time from this guy. They have a choice between the shopworn candidate with the dreary message, or the salesman with spots on his hat.

I refer to Biden as shopworn and his message dreary, but mean no disrespect. I voted for him. He is old and familiar. Democrats chose him because they could not settle on a New and Improved version of him, so they took the old tried-and-true. Biden reflects the emotions I feel when taking some generally reliable medicine for a common malady: Tums for heartburn, Benadryl for the pollen allergies. I don't expect a miracle. There is nothing fun or surprising about the product, and I won't feel great afterwards, just relief at best, and back to however I felt before. 

I have an entirely different feeling when buying a new car. A car purchase combines the feeling of getting rid of some old problem car and then the anticipation of new and improved.  It is fun to buy a new car. A back up camera! Lumbar support! The new car smell! Sizzle.

Trump has more sizzle than ever for some Americans. He is even more feisty than many had hoped. He is a fighter, their fighter. Men in pickup trucks with flags and banners are shouting a big "F--- You" to the weenies in their masks and Priuses and their brainwashed belief in the mainstream media. 

Trump is telling them what they want to hear about COVID--and what they believe. They agree with Trump that COVID isn't all that dangerous, except to people who were about to die anyway, and that the numbers of COVID deaths are phony. Trump told Laura Ingraham "Only 6% of the people died from COVID" because the rest "died from other reasons." That sounds about right to many people, including some people who comment on this blog. Even if Twitter takes down Trump's tweet that repeated that statistic because it spread mis-information--and Twitter did just that-- what Trump said and tweeted seems true in spirit. Few people personally know someone who had died from COVID. How bad could it be?

Meanwhile Biden, with his supporters in their masks and fuel efficient cars and grandmothers to worry about, says to listen to Dr. Fauci. Fauci says the virus is getting away from us, and the number of new cases grew from 50,000 to 65,000, and now 85,000 and hospitals are filling up, and that we need to be way better about masks and social distancing. Biden isn't sizzle. He is buzzkill. Biden is talking about car repairs. It is sensible but dreary.

Even the good news for the Biden campaign is no fun. Apparently hell has frozen over. The Manchester, New Hampshire Union Leader, the famously very conservative newspaper that makes Democrats furious and made Ed Muskie cry, just endorsed Joe Biden. He isn't the candidate we want, they said, but "he is the candidate we need." Faint praise, but praise. They don't believe the salesman with a mud-specked hat anymore.

Trump has a message on COVID: to power through it, take our hits, and make America great again. We are rounding the turn. Hope and change. Happy days are here again.

Trump has mud on his hat. The infections are ramping up at exactly the wrong time. People have noticed, and it's an earthquake. But his story is the better one, if only it were true.