Americans losing faith in what Trump says about the coronavirus: Reuters/Ipsos

No one was saying to inject bleach. And Trump was probably just crudely restating some experimental treatment he had heard about in one of his many briefings. Speculative disinfectant treatments have been mentioned.

It's a very minor issue and clearly grasping for a smear by the President's opponents.

Anyone who tried to drink bleach because of Trump's offhand comments that in no way endorsed doing so is beyond help or hope.

Interestingly, Scott Alexander puts "Lizardman's constant" - the rate at which you can get people in a poll to agree to even patently absurd things like "Lizardmen control the Earth" - at 4%: https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/04/12/noisy-poll-results-and...

So in a sense 98% seems suspiciously high for poll responses even assuming that the true rate of bleach-drinkers is something like 0.0001%.

It's because he's so open about what does and thinks. He doesn't act like a typical politician and hide it.

He'll say things like "We are in Iraq for the oil".

Everyone knew that, but no president would admit it.

He's also incredibly self-centered, and he acts only in order to get re-elected, and/or praised. But that means he does what the people want, rather than what is best.

There are a lot of people who believe a politician should represent the will of the voters, rather than act in the best way they know.

Obviously you can argue which is better course of action, but at least you can understand why people vote for him.

Also: You would do well to ignore what he says, and pay attention only to what he does. He says everything and anything, just to gauge reactions. His actions are then based on what reaction he got. (Remember he's very self centered and wants praise.)

I've found that people who really hate him pay way too much attention to what he says, thinking that what he says has some bearing on what he's actually going to do.

One problem with polling is that people answer contrary to their own actual beliefs. They didn’t hear the question right, or they misspoke and are too embarrassed to correct it, or they’re trolling the pollster.

It's worth pointing out that it is this article itself that is equating "injecting bleach" with "idea that Trump floated". He did not actually say to inject bleach. So did the 2% hear the question wrong, answer on expected party lines, would approve of a doctor doing it, partisan trolling, or who knows?

FWIW I think what Trump actually did say demonstrates a gross misunderstanding of basic physical knowledge and common sense, typical of empty headed business types. And while another mentally incompetent person could take his words as inspiration to inject themselves with disinfectants, he didn't literally promote this. It doesn't serve truth to exaggerate that he did.

(The terrifying thought is that this kerfuffle was actually a product of him trying to operate in an open minded brainstorming mode. It's not actually a result of him acting stupidly, but rather a product of him trying to be the smartest he can be)

> eliminated by evolution

You mean natural selection, and it doesn't select towards perfection

https://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/evo_32

Great news: it means you're part of the select 2% by some other measure! Good job.

What's interesting to me is that a whole 2% of Democrats are willing to inject themselves with household cleaners, too. I.E. that the number of people who think "this just might work!" is consistent across party lines.

These are probably somewhere holed up with the mysterious black David Duke supporters in polls.