As Americans die, Trump cronies cut in line for treatments

Rudy Giuliani is a horrible human being.

I’m not talking about his hair- dye malfunction, his cruelty about Hunter Biden’s drug problems or his outing to the landscaping business hard by the porn shop.

I’m talking about this: Somebody may very well be dying right now because of his recklessness.

He roamed the country, often mask-free, spouting lies about election fraud. Then when he (inevitably) got COVID-19, the White House secured for him rare treatments, including a lifesaving antibody cocktail available to few on the planet outside of President Donald Trump and his cronies, such as Chris Christie and Ben Carson. Doctors ration the scarce drug, so Giuliani’s good fortune is the misfortune of somebody else who desperately needed it.

“The president told me if I took this Regeneron I’d be 10 years younger,” Giuliani said in one interview boasting about his rapid recovery. “The White House physician helped a lot,” he said at another point. “The president helped a lot. They got me better in two days.” This led Giuliani, like Trump, to pronounce the disease curable, saying, “you can’t let it stop your life.”

Tell that to the families of the some 300,000 dead.

Now comes the latest move by Trump to protect the lives of the politically powerful and well- connected. The White House said Sunday that it would let officials in the administration, Congress and the courts jump the queue to receive the just-authorized vaccine — regardless of actual vulnerability. A National Security Council spokesman said in a statement Sunday that “senior officials across all three branches of government will receive vaccinations pursuant to continuity of government protocols.”

Now the White House is worried about continuity of government? After eschewing maskwearing and hosting a rolling, nine-month superspreader event?

Even Trump apparently felt some rare shame. He tweeted Sunday night that White House officials “should receive the vaccine somewhat later.” If Trump is (for once) telling the truth, this still would apparently mean others in the administration could still cut the line. Perhaps that includes Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who invited 900 people for indoor holiday receptions.

Though details are fuzzy, the line- cutting scheme would also appear to allow members of Congress to get their vaccines before their constituents do — even though Congress (thanks to Senate Majority Leader

Mitch McConnell) hasn’t passed a COVID relief bill that would send states the billions of dollars they need to administer the vaccine. Not one member of Congress should jump the queue before Congress sends states the funds to vaccinate the rest of us.

The White House plan, as originally described, would let the likes of Justice Samuel Alito cut in line, too. A month ago, Alito bemoaned the “previously unimaginable restrictions on individual liberty” during the pandemic. Two weeks later, Alito and Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett struck down New York’s attempts to limit crowd size at religious gatherings in places where the virus is rampant. Such gatherings fuel the spread.

So now these justices get first dibs at the vaccine while their ruling makes the rest of us more likely to get sick.

This is how it works when a president doles out life- or- death medical technology like presidential M& Ms — or clemency to aides who broke the law.

This comes on top of the flagrant disparities throughout the pandemic based on race and wealth. Those with lower incomes have been hit harder, in part because they can’t work from home. While the stock market roars, low-wage jobs have been the slowest to recover.

But don’t worry — Giuliani is fine. “If it wasn’t me, I wouldn’t have been put in a hospital frankly,” he boasted. “Sometimes when you’re a celebrity

... they’re going to examine it more carefully and do everything right.”

When you’re a star, they let you do it.

Giuliani, a horrible human being, roamed the country, often mask-free, spouting lies. After getting COVID-19, he got top treatment, saying you “can’t let COVID stop your life.” Tell that to the 300,000 dead.