It is probably impossible to tally all of the Covid deaths in the US stemming from Trump rallies, superspreader events at the White House and the millions of cult members who spread the disease by following Trump rather than the health guidelines, but that number is undoubtedly far greater that the 900 who perished on Guyana in November of 1978. For four decades now, Jim Jones has been considered the gold standard for murderous cult leaders who by strength of personality, perverse psychological ploys, violence and threats, was able to lure people into his cult, to Guyana and ultimately into his murderous plans. Tragically, it is now apparent that compared to the current occupant of the White House, Jim Jones was a piker.

San Francisco was a different town thirty years ago. It still had not become the city that Harvey Milk helped build, but never saw. San Francisco in 1978 was a city in transition; and Dan White, the man who had assassinated the Mayor and Harvey Milk was fighting against that transition and that progress. Dan White represented the reactionary and hateful elements that feared Harvey Milk who, in turn, feared nobody. Thirty years later, it is hard to imagine that San Francisco of the late 1970s was a city that was in some real ways was still divided. While the City Hall demonstrations against Dan White remain important images from that period, it is occasionally forgotten that strong reservoirs of support remained in several parts of San Francisco for the policeman turned city supervisor turned cold-blooded killer.

Donald Trump's Covid Cult

Thanksgiving San Francisco 1978

Lincoln Mitchell