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James Corden Schools Trump on HIV/AIDS

James says:

  • 1.1 million people live with HIV in the U.S.60% of whom can't afford medication
  • 36.7 million people world-wide have HIV/AIDS, including more than 2 million children under the age of 15.

Maybe Donald Trump doesn't care because he has never seen the movie "Philadelphia." Seeing that movie is what made James start caring.

Yesterday, James Corden and The Late Late Show sent 297 copies (as many as they could buy on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, etc., many on Blue-ray) to Trump at Mar-a-lago (The White House was very uncooperative when James called so he didn't send them there.)[More...]

James asks that if you have a copy, send it to Donald Trump at Mar-A-Lago, 1100 Ocean Blvd., Palm Beach, FL 33480

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  • Display: Sort:
    It's a great idea (5.00 / 1) (#2)
    by CaptHowdy on Wed Jun 21, 2017 at 04:38:03 PM EST
    But that's not why he doesn't care.  He doesn't care because because it's not part of his universe.   Expecting him to develop compassion at 71 is very optimistic.  

    The only thing that would make Trump care about HIV is contracting it.

    I am kind of confused why (5.00 / 1) (#10)
    by Peter G on Wed Jun 21, 2017 at 07:29:26 PM EST
    sending hundreds of copies is a good idea, rather than one copy. And particularly why it is a good idea to deplete the on-line market and deprive anyone who wants to buy a copy of this great film (featuring an even greater theme song) of the opportunity to do so.

    Parent
    speaking of which (none / 0) (#4)
    by Peter G on Wed Jun 21, 2017 at 05:24:23 PM EST
    Cf. Tr*mp atty and mentor, the late Roy Cohn, Esq.

    Parent
    Boy (none / 0) (#5)
    by CaptHowdy on Wed Jun 21, 2017 at 05:31:39 PM EST
    THAT is a can of worms I have no desire to peer into.

    From what I know of Cohn he would have probably been every bit as disinterested in the subject as far as helping the afflicted

    Parent

    You really need to read up on (5.00 / 1) (#7)
    by Zorba on Wed Jun 21, 2017 at 05:49:01 PM EST
    Roy Cohn, Howdy.
    And if you have never seen it, watch HBO's "Angels in America."
    But have a big drink or two available when you watch it, or your recreational herb of choice.  Because it's not easy to watch, but it is outstanding.

    Parent
    I know a good deal about Cohn (5.00 / 1) (#8)
    by CaptHowdy on Wed Jun 21, 2017 at 05:50:54 PM EST
    And I've pretty much memorized the dialog of Angels.

    Parent
    There was a POLITICO (none / 0) (#9)
    by CaptHowdy on Wed Jun 21, 2017 at 06:00:44 PM EST
    piece a couple of day ago on them.


    Week Four: The President Summons the Ghost of Roy Cohn
    His mentor's bruising style is one Trump studied well. This will be its ultimate test.
    By JACK SHAFER June 17, 2017
    Facebook Twitter Google + Email Comment Print
    Never adopt a mentor without first drafting a plan to ditch him and his influence on that day you want to become your own man--or when expediency demands abandonment. President Donald Trump, who was taught the martial arts of verbal combat by Roy Cohn, jettisoned Sen. Joe McCarthy's former attorney in the mid-1980s when he became ill from HIV. Trump wasn't so much emerging from the red-baiter's shadow as he was shunning his faithful attorney due to a sense of morbid panic about the disease. Although he dumped Cohn, Trump never ceased playing the role of the dirtbag attorney's parrot. Since inauguration, and especially since the scandal with no name has inflicted bleeding wounds all over his presidency, Trump has only become more Cohnian in his persona. He rains his fury down on his opponents, just like Cohn. He breaks rules and bullies all who get in his way. He does whatever it takes to win. When Trump's mouth forms the words, it's really Cohn speaking from the grave.

    LINK

    Parent

    Also (none / 0) (#6)
    by CaptHowdy on Wed Jun 21, 2017 at 05:39:55 PM EST
    As far as this giving Trump experience with HIV,  Cohn denied he had HIV.  He always said he had liver cancer.  And he never really admitted to being gay.

    We know what a casual relationship Trump has with inconvenient facts.  He doesn't believe GW is real.  He doesn't believe Russia hacked our election.  How difficult is it to think he has never even, in what passes for his own mind, connected HIV with Cohns death?

    Parent

    If you want to know what it looks like ... (5.00 / 1) (#12)
    by Donald from Hawaii on Thu Jun 22, 2017 at 11:59:03 AM EST
    ... when The Über-Rich devour a country, you need only refer to the United States in 2017.

    Like its GOP-run House counterpart, the GOP-run Senate's American Health Care Act essentially loots and pillages Medicaid to pay for yet another round of tax cuts for the already-disproportionately wealthy.

    Suffice to say that passage of this cruel travesty of public policy will prove positively devastating to persons with HIV and AIDS, among so many others whose personal well being is otherwise at serious risk were it not for the Affordable Care Act of 2010.

    Congressional Republicans aren't even bothering anymore with the pretense that they represent anyone else in this country besides plutocrats and oligarchs.

    While Trump's clown car of an administration is a truly disastrous distraction, let's please realize that it's Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell and their billionaire benefactors who are really driving this train.

    They're grabbing everything that isn't nailed down for the benefit of rich, and they'll let you know when they're done.

    Don't just get mad. Organize and resist.

    Donald, when you begin srudying (none / 0) (#13)
    by fishcamp on Thu Jun 22, 2017 at 01:07:18 PM EST
    for your PhD in American or early American history what will you actually be studying?  You already have a tremendous grasp of our history and politics.  My thinking is it will include W.W.I and WWll and the aftermath, including the current events.  My Oregon reforestation trips to the burned areas due to Japanese incendry bombs could be a living testimony.  Can't believe I was alive during WWll.  What will you study?

    Parent
    please take this to an open thread (none / 0) (#14)
    by Jeralyn on Thu Jun 22, 2017 at 01:34:03 PM EST
    Thanks!

    Parent
    I subscribe to the philosophy of ... (none / 0) (#16)
    by Donald from Hawaii on Thu Jun 22, 2017 at 03:41:45 PM EST
    ... George Santayana, who admonished us that those who fail to learn from history are condemned to repeat the mistakes of the past. As a student of history (where my focus has primarily been on America's westward movement), my particular perspective on public policy development differs from most others in politics, in that I tend to take a longer range view of such matters, and I don't dwell excessively on the short-term effects of such decision making.

    My fear right now is that those decisions presently being made with regards to healthcare in this country are rooted in pure conservative fantasy about the way things ought to be from their view, rather than the way things actually are.

    Sound public policy is often based upon the sum totals of our collective historical experiences. But sometimes those historical experiences can warp our perspective beyond all reason, and actually hinder our efforts to adapt to present-day and ever-changing circumstances. We ought to be able to respect our history and heed its lessons, without also being forever beholden to its ghosts.

    U.S. healthcare policy is one such area where we've been hindered if not hamstrung. Per Victor Fuchs, PhD, one of the nation's foremost health economists, there are three fundamental characteristics in our U.S. political system -- driven by our country's own history -- that are making it very difficult for the U.S. to adopt a less costly government-financed health care system, such as exists in other developed nations.

    First, there is our inherent distrust of large government, which first began when the original thirteen colonies broke away from an overbearing British Empire by force of arms. But while public skepticism is warranted and healthy to a point, it ceases being productive whenever it gives way to the paranoid delusions of a vocal and bullying minority.

    Second, there is a reluctance to redistribute wealth across all citizens, in part because of the country's cultural diversity. I would go even further then Fuchs, and offer that this reluctance is based in substantial part on white American resistance to the idea that such diversity can define us without also dividing us.

    White Americans need to accept the fact that policies to promote, protect and ensure the continued racial homogeneity and political predominance of the white race are the very antithesis of good governmental practices, and further represent a profound betrayal of our country's ideals and promise. We're not going to turn the clock back.

    Finally, there are choke points in the U.S. political system -- such as the cost of election campaigns and the Senate filibuster -- that give deep-pocketed special interest groups an inordinate amount of influence in the crafting of federal policy, and gives those interests the upper hand in the prevention of the sort of sweeping reforms that our healthcare system needs.

    And on that note, there's really no better example of that than the one offered today by the Senate's GOP majority leadership, which drafted their version of the AHCA entirely behind closed doors without any public input whatsoever, and is preparing to place it on the Senate floor for a vote as early as next week.

    To bring this full circle back to Jeralyn's topic in this thread, which is our evolving views in HIV and AIDS in this country over the last three decades, I will close with a most appropriate quote from November 1977 by the late Sen. Hubert Humphrey, then facing the sunset of his own life due to advanced cancer, who nevertheless challenged us to strive always in our efforts to become a good and just society:

    "The moral test of government is how that government treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the elderly; and those who are in the shadows of life, the sick, the needy and the handicapped."

    40 years later, Humphrey's challenge remains before us still.

    Parent

    Wish I had a copy to send (none / 0) (#1)
    by ruffian on Wed Jun 21, 2017 at 04:11:47 PM EST
    That movie was how I learned more about HIV too - I think it personalized it for those of us that did not know anyone directly affected at the time.

    In my opinion, a better film was ... (none / 0) (#11)
    by Donald from Hawaii on Wed Jun 21, 2017 at 09:11:35 PM EST
    ... the 1993 HBO movie "And the Band Played On," which is based upon the 1987 bestselling book by the late Randy Shilts, staff writer for the San Francisco Chronicle and a gay man who himself would succumb to AIDS in 1994. The book covers the outbreak in the early '80s as it was just beginning to rear its ugly head, and the story's definitely not a pretty one.

    Again, my opinion only, but while I think "Philadelphia" is good, I found it to also be also pretty melodramatic and at times a little too emotionally manipulative for my tastes. But that's also an entirely subjective take on my part. It wouldn't have been so critically acclaimed if it wasn't any good.

    Aloha.

    Aloha.

    Parent

    Maybe true, but I did not have HBO at the time (none / 0) (#15)
    by ruffian on Thu Jun 22, 2017 at 01:42:08 PM EST
    Movies in wide release reached a lot more people. I've hear 'And the Band Played On' is great, but still have not seen it.

    Parent
    The movie is very good. (none / 0) (#17)
    by Donald from Hawaii on Thu Jun 22, 2017 at 03:57:02 PM EST
    But as in most cases, Randy Shilts' book itself is actually better. I urge anyone who's interested in healthcare policy to read "And the Band Played On," because it shows what can happen when we allow our own prejudices and petty foibles to unduly influence our collective actions. In the case of HIV and AIDS, homophobia and ignorance first hindered and then crippled our prompt and dispassionate response to the active presence of a deadly virus that held rich potential to trigger a pandemic. And that's a lesson which I fear that we've yet to learn.

    Parent
    Mar-a-Lago closes its main club for (none / 0) (#3)
    by Anne on Wed Jun 21, 2017 at 04:50:31 PM EST
    the summer (I believe it's been closed since May 14th), so Corden should probably have sent the copies to either the Bedminster, NJ club, or the Washington DC club.

    This is why Trump hasn't been there lately.