Hello, people of America. I am writing to you at this critical moment to ask for your support.
Vote Trump-covid in 2020!
I know many of you think that the Republican ticket actually features Mike Pence in the V.P. slot. But, as the average housefly can tell you, old “Prayers Pence” has been dead inside for years. To give him his due, he has done remarkable work keeping science from escaping the White House and spreading into the minds and actions of everyday people who might use it for their own gains—it even surpasses the job he did requiring the good people of Indiana to share needles in 2015, when H.I.V. needed his help, or his revelation in a 2001 op-ed that “smoking doesn’t kill.” He leaves us with the daily number of new infections soaring higher than ever before—an “essential worker” delivering packages of fear and misinformation all across the country.
To be clear, I have always considered myself an Independent in matters of politics, but when I watch Fox News, it is clear to me that I am truly cut from Republican cloth—cloth that you liberals would rather use to make facial coverings. Like Jared and Ivanka, I have no soul. Like Devin Nunes and Matt Gaetz, I have no brain. Like Ted Cruz, most people wish I did not exist. And like Lindsey Graham, I don’t really care about anything as long as it is warm and moist and offers me a chance to get noticed. These are my people, and history will show that they have done everything in their power to allow me to flourish in this great country of yours. In their endless quest for diversity, the Republican Party has given a simple virus a shot at the second-highest office in the land.
They even threw a party for me in the Rose Garden, where I met the First Lady, who let me play with her young son, Barron. I know some folks still think the young people can’t get the virus, but as the ladies of Kappa Kappa Covid can tell you, our nation’s colleges are showing truly infectious spirit right now! Roll Tide, Alabama over Auburn by the score of 2,882 cases to 2,019 cases. And Clemson and Georgia are locked in a real barn burner for No. 1 in the nation, 4,082 to 4,049! I wish the class of 2021 a killer holiday season when this first trimester is over and they return home to their families. And speaking of the first trimester being over, I saw Justice Amy Coney Barrett again, who welcomed me with open arms over this past summer. Won’t be long until Handmaid Barrett will be doing her part to make the coronavirus available to even the poorest and sickest Americans by declaring their insurance unconstitutional.
I want to reach out to the undecided among you, those who are wondering why you should vote for a histrionic, anti-science, racist liar who colors his hair (please note if you live in Lindsey Graham country: you can actually vote for two histrionic, anti-science, racist liars who color their hair) and an insidious coronavirus that has killed well over 220,000 of your fellow Americans.
Like Jared and Ivanka, I have no soul. Like Devin Nunes and Matt Gaetz, I have no brain. Like Ted Cruz, most people wish I did not exist.
Because our president is fond of saying these days, “We are rounding the corner.” So true. The end is now within sight—not of me, no, no, no—the end of democracy in America. A vote for Trump-covid brings us closer to the end of so many things—the rule of law, government accountability, facts, science, justice, the separation of powers, live music, theater, dancing cheek to cheek … Yes, we are going to Make America Great Again—abso-fucking-lutely, we are—back to when it was just rivers and forests and rocks and animals doing animal things. Before it even knew its name was America.
Joe Biden likes to point out that more than eight and a half million of you have been infected, but what about the 322 million of you who remain uninfected? What does Joe Biden offer them—a mask and some health insurance? How is it fair to deprive every man and woman in America of the “powerful” feeling our commander in chief currently feels as he super-spreads his legs for the Proud Boys? Sure, Joe Biden speaks of love and empathy; well, the president knows America wants more than that, and he’s going to give it to them—he wants to kiss the men and all the pretty women. Kiss them on the mouth. Whether they want that or not. Without asking … because that’s what he does. It’s what law enforcement calls “a pattern.”
The next four years are a critical time for this country, a time of existential choices: we can continue to be a democracy, or as the great political scientist and my partner-in-pandemic Republican senator Mike Lee has said, “We’re not a democracy.” Trump-covid 2020 will work to keep America first in death and disease. The important work we have begun has only just started, but already you see the results. With the help of Mitch McConnell, in just a few short months we have already killed so many Black and brown people that we will no longer need to suppress their votes on Election Day. So you libs can stop accusing us of that!
And what has been lost in all of this are the improvements we have made in your lives: traffic is just a fraction of what it used to be, pretty much every restaurant now delivers, and the baseball season is finally a reasonable length. Even dogs, who had to wake up and dutifully bark at the person delivering the mail, can catch up on their sleep, because we have been thoughtful enough to slow down the postal service. You still want to talk about the economy? The 644 billionaires in this country have seen their net worth skyrocket by more than 30 percent since I showed up—you’re welcome, rich white people!
Yes, I know many of you have lost your jobs in recent times, but Trump-covid is generating new jobs all the time—people who once worked in hospitality can now be re-trained to dig mass graves and serve eviction notices to the unemployed who dare to vote against us. People who once worked in the arts can … well, they can … they can … sit alone in their rooms and Zoom with their therapists and talk about loneliness, fear, and loss of purpose.
Yes, I know many of you have lost your jobs in recent times, but Trump-covid is generating new jobs all the time—people who once worked in hospitality can now be re-trained to dig mass graves.
Put simply, I owe my life to Trump. He and the Republican Party couldn’t have done more to help me end or ruin the lives of countless Americans. (I say countless because he asked the C.D.C. to stop counting the dead.) The death rate here in America is second to none! It is more than double that of Canada and their silly socialized medicine. It exceeds that of Japan, a country filled with vulnerable elderly people doing strange dances in the parks every morning, by a factor of almost 50—and it’s even 2,000 times higher than that of Vietnam, a country that we bombed into the Stone Age. He has denied science for me and for you. He has silenced people who have spoken out against me in trying to protect you. He is even willing to rush a vaccine into the world that won’t really work, so that people lose faith in all vaccines—and viruses like me can once again flourish as we did in the Dark Ages. This brave man does not bother with a mask—because, as any woman will tell you, it will ruin your makeup.
So stay positive, America. And get ready for four more years of Trump-covid!
Scott Z. Burns wrote the screenplay for Contagion