Thank you, David Corn, for reminding viewers that MAGA Trumpers ignoring the COVID warnings are a result of 40 years of the Republican Party and right wing media telling their sycophants, that "you can't trust the government." From Sunday's AM Joy:



JOY ANN REID: Rick, I see you nodding in there because the challenge is, is that the tough coverage that Donald Trump is getting, you know, from journalists, that is deservedly tough because he really was slow on the uptake, then reinforces for his followers that 'the media is out to get him' and that they're not saying that the coronavirus crisis is a crisis and pandemic because it's true but just because it hurts him. I've had friends emailing me things they're getting from people -- family members and friends on Facebook saying it's all a lie, they still believe it. They believe his pivot isn't real. The danger is real. This keeping away from one another and doing our social distancing only works if everybody does it. If his people don't believe it and believe the tough coverage is just out to get him rather than trying to save lives, we have a problem.

RICK WILSON: I mean, look, Joy, the Trump-adi Caucus, the small number of true believer Trumpers who will not be touched by this, I suspect they'll be going to a lot of funerals because they're going to be the people who helped spread this. We had a Florida legislator, Mike Hill, post on Facebook a bunch of guys joking they're not going to do social distancing. These people who believe everything Trump says. Trump has said, they've had seven weeks hearing this is a fake thing, it's a hoax, the media is out to get him, and this is where science and the Trump reality bubble collide. And those people that are laughing it off right now are going to be the ones who have a proximate responsibility for the fact this is going to take longer and cost more lives than it should have. I know -- let me ask -- it's true.

REID: Yeah. I mean, let me go to David and Jennifer on this question. What do you do, from your point of view, David, and then from "The Washington Post," Jennifer, the media you're coming from, just like the one I'm working with, are not going to break through to the other side. And so when you're approaching these stories, is your goal to try to break through to the other side or just to try to inform as much as possible those who are open to believing reality?

DAVID CORN: I think we've lost the other side. I think, you know, and Rick has written about this, it's become a cult. They believe what Trump says. They believe what they read in Breitbart and OANN, whatever it is. They're not persuadable. I don't think they'll be persuadable even at the funerals Rick is talking about. We're about to go through this massive societal dislocation with thousands of our fellow Americans, loved ones, neighbors, and strangers passing because of government ineptitude. I'm not sure that's going to sway anyone.

The Republicans, sorry Rick, spent four decades saying "government was terrible. You can't trust government." And saying, a lot of them saying, "the liberal media" and bashing, bashing, bashing "the liberal media". Trump was not the first guy to do this. And so this is all colliding now after decades, with Trump being the culmination on both sides of that equation. And I think we've lost 20%, 30%, 40% of the population. It's all about the rest of us, which is a majority, banding together and doing the best we can to get through this and get through the remaining years of the Trump presidency.