Losing My Father to Trump Propaganda

I saw my father four times between March 2020 and March 2021. Each time, the conversation began with some version of this.

Me: Dad, you know I’d hug you but it doesn’t seem wise given the pandemic.

Dad: Nan, they’re overblowing it. It’s not as bad as they’re saying.

Me (not wanting to ignite a political debate): Dad, we really do need to be careful.

Dad: I’m 89. I’m going to die of something. If it’s COVID, it’s COVID.

Me: But Dad, it’s an awful death. It’s a lonely death because no one can visit you. The hospitals are crowded. And it’s often scary because people who have it can’t breathe.

He never budged in his belief. The assholes had won, right up to the part where my father died alone in a hospital in the middle of the night, April 27, 2021. This was after nearly a month of agonizing after his initial diagnosis.

Donald Trump and every enabler in his administration. Rush Limbaugh, whose obituary noted that on his radio show he’d likened COVID-19 to the common cold. And Fox News, a so-called news network that lied to him night after night after night.

Outright, bald-faced lies designed to keep viewers doubting anything that in any way reflected badly on Trump, a con man of such epic proportions that he…