David Dayen writes a daily report for The American Prospect on the pandemic called “Unsanitized.” In this entry, he comments on Trump’s selfishness in spreading the coronavirus.

He writes:

The President Is a Sick Man 
What happens when one of the worst people America has produced contracts the coronavirus? Well, he tries to hide it, first of all. He attends a series of fundraisers and rallies without disclosure, potentially exposing hundreds if not thousands of people. When he has to roll to the hospital because his condition is deteriorating, he shows fake photos of himself “at work,” even as most of the public knows he doesn’t work even in normal times. His physician, it is leaked, withholds details of his medical condition to lift his spirits and “convey confidence.” But it’s also noted that he’s taking a cocktail of medications that are really only reserved for very sick people. To top this off, he demands to be taken on a car parade around the Walter Reed Medical Center to wave at well-wishers, while Secret Service agents are forced to sit in the car with his contagious personage.

So whether he’s leaving the hospital today or not, I think we can say that Donald Trump is handling this disease almost exactly as you would expect it. All presidents lie, and most of them lie about their health: here’s a rundown, but I note that Gover Cleveland, known in his day for the slogan “Tell the truth,” snuck out of Washington onto a boat and had half of his cancerous jaw removed, in secret, in the 1890s when removing half your jaw was, you know, a treacherous thing, and when a reporter found out about it and leaked the information Cleveland’s White House ruined his life. There’s a great little book about this called The President Is a Sick Man by Matthew Algeo. Point being, the default setting in White Houses is obfuscation about a president’s medical condition. 

Even when accounting for that, however, Trump’s… Trumpiness is exhausting and sad. The selfishness, the lies, the moral blindness is fully on display. “The President is a sick man” takes on new meaning.