Since the President's diagnosis last week, I have watched people on social media talking about how his sickness is karma for not taking the coronavirus (COVID-19) seriously. I urge these people to reevaluate their rhetoric online because Trump's diagnosis is so much more than karma. It's a real and direct result of his actions. It's a consequence of his negligence and lies.

By saying that his illness is karma, you reduce the diagnosis to a supernatural act, an outside force. This is a false analysis of how and why Trump is still sick and apparently struggling to breathe. Trump has COVID-19 because he has declined — and will always decline — to take seriously scientists and experts. It is unknown exactly when and where Trump contracted COVID-19, but possibilities include a largely maskless White House Rose Garden event or traveling with close advisor Hope Hicks.

Trump told the country back in April,

"The C.D.C. is advising the use of nonmedical cloth face covering as an additional voluntary public health measure. So it's voluntary. You don't have to do it. They suggested for a period of time, but this is voluntary. I don't think I'm going to be doing it"

Trump repeatedly equated wearing a mask with being a Democrat, being "politically correct," and being irrationally scared in the early months of the pandemic. It took the president until July to wear a mask publicly. In doing this, Trump established not only to the nation but also to himself that following the rules set by his own administration was something that was below him. The rules do not apply to Trump nor do they apply to his family who were also maskless during last Tuesday's debate unnecessarily exposing everyone in the convention hall to a deadly virus.

This is not normal presidential behavior.

This is not acceptable presidential behavior.

This is the kind of behavior that leads directly to the kinds of consequences that the president is facing now.

No matter how many times Trump tells the country we are "rounding the corner" on COVID or how often he tries to convince us that "it affects virtually nobody," we all will know now for certain that he was and is lying not only to Americans but also to himself.

His diagnosis is not karma but is instead a reasonable consequence of Trump convincing himself that his lies about coronavirus are true.

I think of it this way: Trump and his supporters are like fish in a tank with an old broken filter. Every time Trump says some bullshit about the coronavirus, it circulates around getting spread and reinforced in the minds of those who support him just like dirty water being blown around in a fish tank with a broken filter. But Trump lives in the fish tank, too. He is not immune to his own rhetoric. He lives in the same constant cloud of bullshit that his supporters live in — and that is one of the most dangerous truths that Trump's diagnosis has revealed to the public.

I think some people maintained the thought process that Trump was somehow immune to the contents of the fish tank. Maybe Trump in their eyes lived in a separate tank with clean water and only his supporters were clouded by his constant bullshitting and lying.

After this week and Trump's COVID diagnosis, we know that this is false.

This analogy of the fish tank helps us to better understand why Trump supporters will never leave his side. It isn't just that they have been fooled by him. It's that he has also fooled himself. Trump has created an alternate version of reality that he resides in along with his supporters and enablers. This reality is one where the rules do not apply to Trump and the consequences for poor decisions and foolish actions are nonexistent. This reality is one where supporters get to complain about government restrictions on the opening of schools and businesses and place blame on the "libtards" even though many of the restrictions have been put in place by the Trump administration. This is a fantasy world where Trump can do no wrong and where his supporters are not bound by rational thought or logic or facts or truth.

But this week, the fabric of this reality began to fray. Trump's COVID diagnosis may serve as a catalyst to begin the process of unwinding the web of fabrications and lies that Trump has woven so tightly.

The glass of the fish tank has begun to crack, and some little Trump-supporting fish may finally be able to slip through the cracks to escape the false reality they have been living in for four years. Those who remain, however, are doomed.

After all, fish who live in their own filth will eventually succumb to the toxicity.

Nobody is immune to it, not even Trump himself.