Trump's "embers of coronavirus" nonsense.

[MineralMan]

Yesterday, Donald Trump started using the phrase "embers of coronavirus" when referring to the disease in the Fall of 2020. In doing so, he is projecting the idea that there will just be a few cases of COVID-19 by that time. There is no evidence to support that. It is just his way of minimizing the disease. It's a framing technique, and he did not think it up, I'm sure. Someone fed him that phrase to use to try to damp down people's fears.

There is zero reason to suppose that this pandemic is going to slack off seriously during the Summer months. There is no sign of that happening, and we have only 2020 to look at, so we have no idea what the pandemic will look like in the future.

Trump is incapable of thinking of the use of such a phrase, frankly. No doubt, he hopes the disease will just stop or slow down. We all do. The phrase he is using, however, "embers of coronavirus" is a very clever psychological use of language. He did not invent the phrase. Someone gave it to him, and he used it multiple times in yesterday's presser.

I'm curious to learn who fed him that phrase. It is propaganda language. Stephen Miller? It wasn't one of the doctors. They carefully avoided using that phrase and tried to counter the idea that the pandemic won't be a problem in the Fall.

It's a subtle language cue, and I'm interesting in how Trump was fed the phrase and by whom.

[Walleye]

1. Sounds like Pence to me

[lark]

4. Don't think he's that smart.

He's white bread soaked in milk, just there for his whiteness and his pretense of religion.

[Chainfire]

2. May Trump

walk upon the embers.

[Thomas Hurt]

3. Newspeak, two, three word catch phrases, fake news, invisible enemy, alternative facts, etc.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jan/25/george-orwell-donald-trump-kellyanne-conway-1984

[5X]

5. He was probably told "remnants of coronavirus" by some right wing fox host

and he got it wrong.

[MineralMan]

7. I don't think so. "Embers" is a very specific word, with

clear connotations of something that is going away soon. It was chosen specifically for use, I'm certain. Remnants is also a good word, but it doesn't evoke the same response as "embers." Almost everyone thinks of the phrase "dying embers" when they hear the word, since that is its most common use in English.

No, it was chosen for effect.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

12. And embers, of course

can be reignited at any time, given the proper circumstances. Given that Trump literally poured Oxygen on the COVID-19 fires for 2-3 months and the fire is still spreading and continuing to burn and he is still basically using a garden hose, reluctantly at that, to try to contain it, I have no reasonable confidence that it will just vanish anytime soon.

[The Magistrate]

6. The New 'It'll Be Gone In April, Like A Miracle', Sir

Hoping and believing this will go away is really all he has....


"Defeat of a hated enemy is something to be for."

[MineralMan]

8. It is Newspeak, I believe, Sir.

Very deliberate and specifically planned. I just don't know who is doing it.

[crickets]

9. How about Stephen Miller?

It wouldn't be his first turn at putting words in trump's mouth.

[MineralMan]

13. Yes. I mentioned him upthread.

He could easily be the source of the phrase. I know he writes a lot of what Trump reads at the podium. Perhaps he is a propagandist with very good language skills. I don't know much about him, really.

[crickets]

16. Whoops, brain not working up to speed this morning!

Stephen Miller has been credited with some of the more ghoulish passages in speeches trump has made, so it wouldn't surprise me if he gives trump little verbal nuggets from day to day.

[uponit7771]

10. Isn't it the embers that either keep fires going or could start new fires?

[MineralMan]

15. They certainly can do that.

However, the goal here is to imply a fire dying out. They aren't using that phrase to make people think. It's aimed at the unconscious mind, not the rational mind.

[spanone]

11. It'll go right over the heads of the magats....subtlety is not their gift

[MineralMan]

14. Actually, the intent of such phrases is not to make people think.

It is to evoke an unconscious response.