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Here’s New Yorker Tiffany Chu describing a man who walked up to her and just started talking: “And he said, ‘Trump says all Asians have coronavirus,’ you disgusting (expletive deleted).’”

The man didn’t stop there.

“He called me a bunch of other things,” she said. “He started spitting at me. . .I looked around and of course no one wanted to acknowledge that anything was happening.”

That may be the worst thing about this. That suddenly everyone was minding their own business and didn’t want to speak up to defend Chu. Or maybe they were fearful of catching something from her?

Tell me you haven’t experienced this, or something similar, because these incidents are happening, folks.

And now we need another vaccine against this.

It’s the “Kung Flu Fallout,” America’s new micro-aggression toward Asian Americans, stoked by the ignorance of the President of the United States, Donald J. Trump.

Since his utterances of the anti-Asian slur at his recent Tulsa and Phoenix rallies, Trump has become the super-spreader of racial animus against Asian Americans, whose experiences were captured by USA Today.

It coincides with a new study from the Pew Research Center that shows that nearly 40 percent of Asian Americans and African Americans say they’ve faced a spectrum of racism from slurs to physical attacks during the pandemic.

That’s compared to 27 percent of Hispanics and 13 percent of Whites who said they had experienced anything similar.

The study shows a new pandemic basis for solidarity between African Americans and Asian Americans, where around 40 percent of both groups said there was concern about the suspicions brought out from wearing a mask in public.

If you’re feeling the sting of the “KF,” speak out.

If the stereotype is that Asian Americans don’t speak out, now is the time to break that stereotype. Most of the people on the video are under 40. Now is the time for all of us to speak out.

As we celebrate our independence, let freedom ring–from the sound of your voices. If you’ve been subject to such transgressions, call out these moments of the KF virus. (Contact me through AALDEF. Share your story.)

At this time, the proper vaccine against these transgressions is called voting.

That’s how important it is this year. Don’t forget.

It’s a bit strange in a democracy when the perpetrator of the microaggression against an entire ethnic and racial group is the president of the United States.

Trump seems to be incapable of real leadership when it comes to matters of race and coronavirus.

TRUMP MUST BE BORED
We should have known it would get this bad. After his first few days in office, Trump had already exhausted all the great clichés of political metaphor not involving baseball or sports.

He just keeps topping himself as the greatest example ever of “Emperor with no clothes,” or “Nero fiddling as Rome burns.”

Consider that after major spikes in Covid-19 cases in 28 states in 14 days, California and other states are shutting down again after opening too soon. Even Dr. Anthony Fauci warned Congress this week that he “would not be surprised if we go up to 100,000 [cases] a day if this does not turn around.”

But here’s how the president showed leadership in an interview on Fox Business on Wednesday:

“I think we’re going to be very good with the coronavirus. I think that at some point that’s going to sort of just disappear.”

Nero fiddling? How’s this for a master stroke? Trump’s not even using a bow.

Nor a mask. And he could have no clothes (though from the video he is clearly dressed by Zoom standards).

Trump’s a mixed metaphor–just like his message.

It’s like nothing we’ve never seen from a POTUS.

And that’s distressing.

Now he’s even allowing VP Mike Pence to appear with a mask, as he stays on the Trumpian non-message:

Said Pence in Phoenix this week: “I could not be more proud of our nation’s response to the coronavirus pandemic”

Proud of a single-day case record for the fifth time in a week? 50,000 new cases on Wednesday alone.

Time for all good Republicans to wear a mask and social distance from the president. Political distance will come eventually. If the case count goes up and the poll numbers drop, what else can Republicans do? And we haven’t even talked about the Russian bounty dereliction or the tell-all book from Bolton or the one to come from Trump’s niece.

Replacement fireworks abound.

So enjoy the Fourth. Stay safe and sane. Stay home. Protect yourself from all viruses, including Trump’s KF.

Consider it delayed gratification. Until November 4th.