Unhinged

When Trump took office he average 4 lies a day for a while (the first 100 days), but apparently he was having so much fun he decided to up that ante, for what specific reason is unclear but for the most part he hasn't turned off his base. On September 7th, he made an astonishing 125 false or misleading states in 120 minutes. But his average of lies per day is now over 30 and he has broken the 5000 lies mark since taking office.

So? That's apparently what the typical Trumpette asks when reading true statements like those but it is also a question I want to see answered. Today he tweeted that Democrats have made up an elaborate lie about the deaths from Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico last summer. He says the 2900 estimated deaths attributed to the hurricane and its aftermath are completely bogus and that the researchers and statisticians from George Washington University who compiled the numbers are simply counting old people who died.

Now as I have written previously, I have been through a couple of hurricanes and my old hometown of Corpus Christi went through several in the 45 years that my parents lived there so I understand that sometimes deaths attributed to hurricanes can be a little confusing. Do you count the guy who had a heart attack when the tree fell on his house even though the tree didn't hurt him? Do you count the fellow who was electrocuted when the live power line fell in his yard and he cut it with a power saw? How about the car accidents that the slick roads and high winds contribute to? And in Maria's case, there were many people who were left without electricity and died of heat exposure, or kidney failure because the dialysis machines were inoperable or unreachable. There were premature babies who died because the hospitals could not get supplies. Whether Trump likes it or not, all those deaths are hurricane deaths even if they happen after the storm passes and even if they aren't death by high wind  or high water.

People died. People who had families, people who would have lived at least a little longer if Maria had not hit Puerto Rico. Don't let Trump diminish the impact of that.