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Donald Trump’s press conference on Wednesday did nothing to calm the fear that many Americans have about the coronavirus outbreak that has now reached U.S. shores.

As PoliticusUSA’s Sarah Jones noted earlier on Thursday, the stock market is having its worst week since the financial crisis – a sign that just about nobody is confident in Trump’s ability to manage this global health crisis.

On Thursday, the president threw a fit that his made-for-TV coronavirus press conference wasn’t viewed favorably by the public, blaming the media for not raving about how “calming” it was.

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“It would be really nice if we could be recognized by the press fairly,” Trump whined. “I gave a press conference yesterday that was really a very good press conference, and some people thought it was great.”

He added, “Basically it was a calming press conference. It was a conference to say we’re doing well.”

Video:

Trump is furious that people didn’t like his coronavirus press conference as much as he did. #ctl #p2 pic.twitter.com/JdAs0ijLbW — PoliticusUSA (@politicususa) February 28, 2020

Trump said:

We’re almost all better now, but we do things and it would be really nice if we could be recognized by the press fairly. And you know what, it would be really nice – if we do something wrong, we get criticized by the press. But I gave a press conference yesterday that was really a very good press conference, and some people thought it was great and most of you people saw it. It was covered live. One of the advantages is that I get covered live all the time. And I like that better because they can’t chop it up … I’d rather be live. But it was a very good press conference and basically it was a calming press conference. It was a conference to say we’re doing well.

Trump’s reality TV presidency is crumbling under the coronavirus crisis

There’s a mantra that if someone has to explain a joke after the fact, then it really wasn’t that funny in the first place.

In the same way, if Trump has to explain a day later that his press conference was calming, chances are it actually wasn’t calming at all.

Like the rest of his presidency, Trump was hoping that he could rely on reality TV stunts to make it look like he’s doing his job. But as the disease spreads and the stock market crashes, the American people are seeing right through it.

Donald Trump’s reality television presidency is crumbling under the weight of a global health crisis.

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