@ItalianPhilosophers4Monica Please stop repeating this debunked nonsense re HCQ. At the time of Trump's claims, there was initial research behind the drug which simply didn't pan out. He didn't at any point suggest prophylactic use, only as a treatment, nor did he say anything about dosage. To blame Trump for the decision of a pair of adults to self-medicate with something "close enough" (chloroquine phosphate) is ludicrous. 1/

After all, methanol and ethanol are pretty similar molecules; or water and hydrogen peroxide; to give two of countless possible examples. There is nothing to suggest that Trump gave anything like actionable advice here, let alone acted-upon advice. 2/

Furthermore, the woman in that couple (who survived) was later investigated for homicide in relation to the incident and wasn't a Trump supporter. 3/3

"that's not quite the same influence and you know it. i'd never heard of this bizarre claim, wont bother to figure out its inane logic." Really? At the time, I had a hard time avoiding mention of it on public media. But yes, people saying that whatever random thing done by Republicans is a "nazi dogwhistle" absolutely is influential and has demonstrable negative impact on people's lives. Like, say, that Jeopardy! champion who got accused of being a white supremacist for signing the number 3.

Anyway, if you won't accept bizpacreview as a source, will you accept RCP? Or the original video on MSNBC's Youtube channel? Dismissing claims because of their sourcing is only a good look when it isn't trivial to look them up properly.

Citation needed, please, for the claim that racists "use the OK symbol to identify themselves to other racists". Even the ADL, in their write-up, can't point to any more evidence than "Tarrant used it once" (which given that he was already known to post on 4chan, doesn't really tell us anything) for the white-supremacist meaning ever being unironically intended, and strongly and repeatedly cautions against over-interpretation. Anyway, pointing at Tarrant does not evidence the claim.

Not to mention: the list of people recently seen flashing an OK sign includes Joe Biden. It seems a little ridiculous to keep up the charade at this point. It is a hoax, everyone knows it's a hoax, the ADL acknowledges that it's a hoax in as many words....

aside from which, symbols "becoming" a symbol for something else does not work that way. Non-verbal communication, like verbal language, is descriptive; definitions thus come from common use. Something can only "become a white supremacist symbol" that had a previously well established meaning, through a comparable amount of meaning-establishment labour - which considering how few actual white supremacists there are around, would take a lot of dedication and a very, very long time.

@KarlKnechtel whatever. You can slice and dice your arguments all you want, truth is Trump stuck with Hydro way beyond the time it was dropped as a useful avenue of research (within about 2-4 weeks max of the original French claim it looked bad). The other thing... a POTUS is a... POTUS. Not a scientist, nor a doctor. He should have deferred to their advice. Which he didn't. So, nonsense? Yes, you are full of it.

I have flagged your reply for the personal attack. That said, science does not simply become settled "within about 2-4 weeks max", especially not when it comes to a novel pandemic virus - cf. the recent news stories about the lab leak hypothesis. The WHO continued looking at HCQ until June 2020. There are others still studying it; example.

I agree that government officials should defer to relevant experts on such topics. However: 1) such experts are often wrong anyway; 2) the correct processes followed by experts often do not and cannot produce definitive answers on timelines required for policy-setting; 3) it is also part of the role of President to calm the fears of the citizenry.

For that matter, here's CNN (via MSN.com) saying in July that HCQ might have some benefit.