Saturday, June 20, 2020

Trump's Killing Field

It is just past midnight. Juneteenth, when Trump passed 119,000 is in the books.

119,112 Cumulative Total Killed by Trump. I would be very surprised if he hits 120,000 today, the 20th.

I am providing just a snippet of Chief WaPo's Deaths seven-day average line and daily bar graph to point something out. First, the best news, the line continues to go down.

We have a new pattern, one we have never seen previously in WaPo's graph, four consecutive days, each of which looks like the same cookie cutter was used to make them. Chronologically those four bars represent 732 Deaths June 16, 748 June 17, 718 June 18, 688 June 19. As you can see by comparison with just the previous two stacks, June 16-19 looks nothing like June 2-6 and June 9-13, both of which swing dramatically from day-to-day. Maybe that spooks me a little because I don't understand anything. Or maybe a brand new pattern of death emerging three months into an epidemic furrows the brows of those who do understand. Or maybe, and probably more likely, they don't keep themselves awake at night with that when the seven-day line continues to head in the right direction.