by liberal japonicus
image from this Guardian link. To support the Guardian, go here or here.
From Anthony Beevor’s The battle for Spain: the Spanish Civil War, 1936-1939.
Soon after the ceremony began, Professor Francisco Maldonado launched a violent attack against Catalan and Basque nationalism, which he described as ‘the cancer of the nation’, which must be cured with the scalpel of fascism. At the back of the hall, somebody yelled the Legion battlecry of ¡Viva la muerte! (Long live death!). General Millán Astray, who looked the very spectre of war with only one arm and one eye, stood up to shout the same cry. Falangists chanted their ¡Vivas!, arms raised in the fascist salute towards the portrait of General Franco hanging above where his wife sat.
The noise died as Unamuno stood up slowly. His quiet voice was an impressive contrast. ‘All of you await my words. You know me and are aware that I am unable to remain silent. At times to be silent is to lie. For silence can be interpreted as acquiescence. I want to comment on the speech, to give it that name, of Professor Maldonado. Let us waive the personal affront implied in the sudden outburst of vituperation against the Basques and Catalans. I was myself, of course, born in Bilbao. The bishop, whether he likes it or not, is a Catalan from Barcelona. Just now I heard a necrophilous and senseless cry: “Long live Death!” And I, who have spent my life shaping paradoxes, must tell you as an expert authority that this outlandish paradox is repellent to me. General Millán Astray is a cripple. Let it be said without any undertone. He is a war invalid. So was Cervantes.
‘Unfortunately there are all too many cripples in Spain now. And soon there will be even more of them if God does not come to our aid. It pains me to think that General Millán Astray should dictate the pattern of mass psychology. A cripple who lacks the greatness of Cervantes is wont to seek ominous relief in causing mutilation around him. General Millán Astray would like to create Spain anew, a negative creation in his own image and likeness; for that reason he wishes to see Spain crippled as he unwittingly made clear.’
The general was unable to contain his almost inarticulate fury any longer. He could only scream Muera la inteligencia! Viva la Muerte! (Death to the intelligentsia! Long live Death!)’. The Falangists took up his cry and army officers took out their pistols. Apparently, the general’s bodyguard even levelled his submachine-gun at Unamuno’s head, but this did not deter Unamuno from crying defiance.
‘This is the temple of the intellect and I am its high priest. It is you who profane its sacred precincts. You will win, because you have more than enough brute force. But you will not convince. For to persuade you would need what you lack: reason and right in your struggle. I consider it futile to exhort you to think of Spain.’
He paused and his arms fell to his sides. He finished in a quiet resigned tone: ”I have done.’ It would seem that the presence of Franco’s wife saved him from being lynched on the spot, though when her husband was informed of what had happened he apparently wanted Unamuno to be shot. This course was not followed because of the philosopher’s international reputation and the reaction caused abroad by Lorca’s murder. But Unamuno died some ten weeks later, broken-hearted and cursed as a ‘red’ and a traitor by those he had thought were his friends.
Beevor’s version doesn’t have this, from Wikipedia
From somewhere in the auditorium, someone cried out the motto “¡Viva la Muerte!”. As was his habit, Millán-Astray responded with “¡España!”; the crowd replied with “¡Una!”. He repeated “¡España!”; the crowd then replied “¡Grande!”. A third time, Millán-Astray shouted “¡España!”; the crowd responded “¡Libre!”. This was a common Falangist cheer. Later, a group of uniformed Falangists entered, saluting the portrait of Franco that hung on the wall.
The medium changes, the message remains the same…
Beevor’s version doesn’t have this, from Wikipedia
From somewhere in the auditorium, someone cried out the motto “¡Viva la Muerte!”. As was his habit, Millán-Astray responded with “¡España!”; the crowd replied with “¡Una!”. He repeated “¡España!”; the crowd then replied “¡Grande!”. A third time, Millán-Astray shouted “¡España!”; the crowd responded “¡Libre!”. This was a common Falangist cheer. Later, a group of uniformed Falangists entered, saluting the portrait of Franco that hung on the wall.
The medium changes, the message remains the same…
Just a note:
A good many of the contributors and commentariat at The American Conservative, many rightwing Catholic, like their Godfather, Pat Buchanan, others of some orthodox Christian ideological complexion or another look fondly upon Generalissimo Franco and his dictatorship, just as they now fully support other rightwing dictatorships and the cessation of democratic institutions such as in Hungary under Victor Orban (Dreher just doubled down on his Orban crush last week; I would link, but why, they censor my commentary because it isn’t politically correct and respectful enough toward their fascism, so fuck em).
There’s quite a lot of Putin-love there too. Not Putin the Commie, the KGB operative, no, Putin the right wing conservative who boasts the full backing of the Russian Orthodox Church.
Their program is extraordinarily radical. Nothing short of rolling back western civilization (the New Deal is but a speed bump in their revanchist inclinations) all the way back to before the Enlightenment.
Except for THEIR creature comforts, of course.
Larison remains a bright spot, of course. He’s a Christian as well, but he doesn’t get it all over you, like the Covid.
Dreher, for his part, has taken on these Coviidian Death Cult Christians who believe the virus is a sacrament that they should be free to share with all of us, but, inevitably he steers everything back to his peculiar fixation on what he views as the scourge of LGBT political correctness.
And, one of their contributors wrote a pretty good paean to the U.S. Post Office the other day.
Just a note:
A good many of the contributors and commentariat at The American Conservative, many rightwing Catholic, like their Godfather, Pat Buchanan, others of some orthodox Christian ideological complexion or another look fondly upon Generalissimo Franco and his dictatorship, just as they now fully support other rightwing dictatorships and the cessation of democratic institutions such as in Hungary under Victor Orban (Dreher just doubled down on his Orban crush last week; I would link, but why, they censor my commentary because it isn’t politically correct and respectful enough toward their fascism, so fuck em).
There’s quite a lot of Putin-love there too. Not Putin the Commie, the KGB operative, no, Putin the right wing conservative who boasts the full backing of the Russian Orthodox Church.
Their program is extraordinarily radical. Nothing short of rolling back western civilization (the New Deal is but a speed bump in their revanchist inclinations) all the way back to before the Enlightenment.
Except for THEIR creature comforts, of course.
Larison remains a bright spot, of course. He’s a Christian as well, but he doesn’t get it all over you, like the Covid.
Dreher, for his part, has taken on these Coviidian Death Cult Christians who believe the virus is a sacrament that they should be free to share with all of us, but, inevitably he steers everything back to his peculiar fixation on what he views as the scourge of LGBT political correctness.
And, one of their contributors wrote a pretty good paean to the U.S. Post Office the other day.
And we can’t afford first-rate villains anymore since we seem to be in the repeat-as-farce phase. Not that the difference means much to those who fall victim to it.
But itching powder could be a proper reaction to these specific clowns. Sneak on the roof above them and blow a liberal (pun intended) dose down. No tear-gas or the like (too visible and also makes the targets seem victims instead of ridiculous).
And we can’t afford first-rate villains anymore since we seem to be in the repeat-as-farce phase. Not that the difference means much to those who fall victim to it.
But itching powder could be a proper reaction to these specific clowns. Sneak on the roof above them and blow a liberal (pun intended) dose down. No tear-gas or the like (too visible and also makes the targets seem victims instead of ridiculous).
A subtle and timely post, lj.
A subtle and timely post, lj.
Yes. They’re fascists.
Yes. They’re fascists.
To JDT’s point, back in my RedState days I had a number of conversations with folks arguing for the virtues of the Pinochet regime.
It was eye-opening.
They’re fascists.
TBH I don’t know what to call them.
“We need to go to the hairdresser” doesn’t really have the same fanatic militant xenophobic nationalist vigor of “Viva la muerte!”. There’s something else going on here, I think, and I’m mostly at a loss to describe it, much less explain it.
It’s like some weird form of petulance. I don’t live where all the sick people are, I personally am not sick, so why should I have to change anything about my life because those people over there are sick?
Plus, a kind of distorted understanding of what “rights” mean in a complex democratic society.
Plus, the whole if I don’t get my way I’ll shoot you thing. Always a great way to persuade others of the legitimacy of your concerns.
I understand that the virus has been enormously disruptive, to a lot of people, and that it is imposing enormous hardship on a lot of people. But it’s a freaking virus, nobody asked for it. And if you have the time and health to spend the day running around yelling at people you have it better than a lot of other people.
What I make of all forms of this stuff – the whole “You’re not the boss of me” “Come and take” bullshit parade – is that these people don’t have the skill set to negotiate complicated situations in a complicated world.
That’s tough for everyone. But most people don’t respond to that by fucking up the world for everyone else.
The folks who really worry me are the people who sponsor and bankroll all of this “I’m oppressed” theater. The folks who feed these people a daily diet of “those people are looking down on you”, “those people are trampling on your rights”, “those people aren’t real plain old honest hard-working Americans like you are”.
Those folks – the folks feeding the puke funnel – are not fascists, they’re kleptocrats. They’d be fine with fascism if it means they get to have all the cookies. And they don’t give a crap about whether the dudes running around with their AR-15’s live or die, from the virus or any other thing.
To JDT’s point, back in my RedState days I had a number of conversations with folks arguing for the virtues of the Pinochet regime.
It was eye-opening.
They’re fascists.
TBH I don’t know what to call them.
“We need to go to the hairdresser” doesn’t really have the same fanatic militant xenophobic nationalist vigor of “Viva la muerte!”. There’s something else going on here, I think, and I’m mostly at a loss to describe it, much less explain it.
It’s like some weird form of petulance. I don’t live where all the sick people are, I personally am not sick, so why should I have to change anything about my life because those people over there are sick?
Plus, a kind of distorted understanding of what “rights” mean in a complex democratic society.
Plus, the whole if I don’t get my way I’ll shoot you thing. Always a great way to persuade others of the legitimacy of your concerns.
I understand that the virus has been enormously disruptive, to a lot of people, and that it is imposing enormous hardship on a lot of people. But it’s a freaking virus, nobody asked for it. And if you have the time and health to spend the day running around yelling at people you have it better than a lot of other people.
What I make of all forms of this stuff – the whole “You’re not the boss of me” “Come and take” bullshit parade – is that these people don’t have the skill set to negotiate complicated situations in a complicated world.
That’s tough for everyone. But most people don’t respond to that by fucking up the world for everyone else.
The folks who really worry me are the people who sponsor and bankroll all of this “I’m oppressed” theater. The folks who feed these people a daily diet of “those people are looking down on you”, “those people are trampling on your rights”, “those people aren’t real plain old honest hard-working Americans like you are”.
Those folks – the folks feeding the puke funnel – are not fascists, they’re kleptocrats. They’d be fine with fascism if it means they get to have all the cookies. And they don’t give a crap about whether the dudes running around with their AR-15’s live or die, from the virus or any other thing.
the snark version.
The whole topic deserves a more serious understanding and discussion than snark, but sometimes that’s all that’s available.
Better bitter laughter than we take you up on your offer to fight it out mano a mano. For now, anyway.
the snark version.
The whole topic deserves a more serious understanding and discussion than snark, but sometimes that’s all that’s available.
Better bitter laughter than we take you up on your offer to fight it out mano a mano. For now, anyway.
“What I make of all forms of this stuff – the whole “You’re not the boss of me” “Come and take” bullshit parade – is that these people don’t have the skill set to negotiate complicated situations in a complicated world.”
It’s not that they have a point, or the right to a point of view, or they need to fucking work to survive and going broke while no one around them is sick seems ludicrous. It’s that they “dont have the skill set”.
Why would they think people look down on them?
The people who dont have the skill set seems to be everyone in charge from Trump to Cuomo to Baker to DeSantis to Pelosi.
They just sit around in a big circle jerk blaming each other while the most they can come up with is everyone stay home and watch the death toll rise. That’s not likely to increase the stress on everyone, meaning some people will react negatively to the anxiety.
Every time one of them puts out a list of”must haves” to reopen society, most people shake their heads and go we’re fucked. Because most people realize that shit ain’t happening.
We dont have anyone in this country responsible for tracking 330 million people, testing them, identifying who they might have had contact with and quarantining all those people. Nor do most of the 330 million people want to be tracked. So putting that as number one on your list is just saying we have no plan for how to open so if you dont have a job, well get used to it.
Everyone stayed home for a month in Mass, and the numbers go up every day, in NY on a good day its 7000 new cases, on a bad day its 10k. After a month. California is slower but steady.
Trump, Cuomo, Other governors all have to address an actual plan. When these six things happen, that no one can say when that would be, isnt a plan, it’s a way to say we dont know what to do or how to do it.
So people are protesting.
They should leave the guns at home, it diverts from the message.
“What I make of all forms of this stuff – the whole “You’re not the boss of me” “Come and take” bullshit parade – is that these people don’t have the skill set to negotiate complicated situations in a complicated world.”
It’s not that they have a point, or the right to a point of view, or they need to fucking work to survive and going broke while no one around them is sick seems ludicrous. It’s that they “dont have the skill set”.
Why would they think people look down on them?
The people who dont have the skill set seems to be everyone in charge from Trump to Cuomo to Baker to DeSantis to Pelosi.
They just sit around in a big circle jerk blaming each other while the most they can come up with is everyone stay home and watch the death toll rise. That’s not likely to increase the stress on everyone, meaning some people will react negatively to the anxiety.
Every time one of them puts out a list of”must haves” to reopen society, most people shake their heads and go we’re fucked. Because most people realize that shit ain’t happening.
We dont have anyone in this country responsible for tracking 330 million people, testing them, identifying who they might have had contact with and quarantining all those people. Nor do most of the 330 million people want to be tracked. So putting that as number one on your list is just saying we have no plan for how to open so if you dont have a job, well get used to it.
Everyone stayed home for a month in Mass, and the numbers go up every day, in NY on a good day its 7000 new cases, on a bad day its 10k. After a month. California is slower but steady.
Trump, Cuomo, Other governors all have to address an actual plan. When these six things happen, that no one can say when that would be, isnt a plan, it’s a way to say we dont know what to do or how to do it.
So people are protesting.
They should leave the guns at home, it diverts from the message.
they need to fucking work to survive and going broke while no one around them is sick seems ludicrous.
And that’s why they block ambulances and doctors going to work to deal with patients with CoVID-19. And Trump can’t get the checks out because he wants his name on them.
I’m sure you have a plan. Don’t keep us in the dark, do tell…
they need to fucking work to survive and going broke while no one around them is sick seems ludicrous.
And that’s why they block ambulances and doctors going to work to deal with patients with CoVID-19. And Trump can’t get the checks out because he wants his name on them.
I’m sure you have a plan. Don’t keep us in the dark, do tell…
They should leave the guns at home, it diverts from the message.
Yeah, but they don’t, do they?
And they block access to the hospital while they’re at it. Which requires hospital staff to come out and plead with them to get the fuck out of the way.
All of which is why I say they don’t have the skill set to negotiate a complicated situation. A situation that includes people fucking dying.
What do you think the situation in MA would be without Baker’s lockdown? Four people I work with have COVID. How many would have it if those folks had been coming into the office, along with everyone else, for the week or so that they were infected, but not symptomatic?
Are you out and about? Correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m guessing not. Why not, if it’s all just bullshit?
Everybody’s entitled to a point of view. And it sucks to be up against the wall with bills etc. and no income.
But there are ways to make yourself heard without being a fucking dick. Maybe they should try those.
In any case, good on them, they got their 15 minutes. I hope, sincerely, that none of them get sick. Because then they well and truly will be fucked.
They should leave the guns at home, it diverts from the message.
Yeah, but they don’t, do they?
And they block access to the hospital while they’re at it. Which requires hospital staff to come out and plead with them to get the fuck out of the way.
All of which is why I say they don’t have the skill set to negotiate a complicated situation. A situation that includes people fucking dying.
What do you think the situation in MA would be without Baker’s lockdown? Four people I work with have COVID. How many would have it if those folks had been coming into the office, along with everyone else, for the week or so that they were infected, but not symptomatic?
Are you out and about? Correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m guessing not. Why not, if it’s all just bullshit?
Everybody’s entitled to a point of view. And it sucks to be up against the wall with bills etc. and no income.
But there are ways to make yourself heard without being a fucking dick. Maybe they should try those.
In any case, good on them, they got their 15 minutes. I hope, sincerely, that none of them get sick. Because then they well and truly will be fucked.
We dont have anyone in this country responsible for tracking 330 million people
This in particular makes me SMH.
You’re on the internet, reading this, right? You’re being tracked.
You have a smart phone? You’re being tracked.
Everything you read, every place you go, every question you ask here on the great intertoobs, tracked. Unless you are going to some unusual lengths to prevent it, and then that fact is noted and tracked.
It’s not the government, it’s just a bunch of people trying to sell you shit, so that’s OK.
All of that’s an aside to the overall point of the thread, it just strikes me as ironic that we are fine with accepting people using technology to sell us J-random whatever, but not to keep us alive.
Funny world we live in.
We dont have anyone in this country responsible for tracking 330 million people
This in particular makes me SMH.
You’re on the internet, reading this, right? You’re being tracked.
You have a smart phone? You’re being tracked.
Everything you read, every place you go, every question you ask here on the great intertoobs, tracked. Unless you are going to some unusual lengths to prevent it, and then that fact is noted and tracked.
It’s not the government, it’s just a bunch of people trying to sell you shit, so that’s OK.
All of that’s an aside to the overall point of the thread, it just strikes me as ironic that we are fine with accepting people using technology to sell us J-random whatever, but not to keep us alive.
Funny world we live in.
I agree that we require new words to describe what is happening.
Fascist, Republican, Conservative, even asshole, just don’t do it justice.
I’m warming to Nazi, but Trump seems too much like Colonel Klink for it to sound menacing.
Though the actor who played Klink was Werner Klemperer, the renowned German conductor, who in turn was first cousin to Victor Klemperer, about whom I’ve written briefly here regarding the bombing of Dresden.
That history repeats as farce doesn’t make the deaths and killing the second time around the least bit farcical.
I’ve noted many times that our decent conservatives here should find a new label, because the current rampaging radicals have ruined the word for everyone, as Casey Stengel remarked about a certain New York Yankee third baseman.
That said, there was plenty of random, unfocused petulance bubbling up in Russia circa 1915-16, Germany circa 1929 and on, Cambodia circa Sihanouk, the Confederacy for years before the first shots of the Civil War, just about anywhere historically that has gone off the rails.
It took a purposeful organizing force to exploit the petulance in every instance and bring it to dreadful fruition, and I would now say that we have that.
Robespierre before the French Revolution could be described as merely petulant.
Not that the inhabitants of Versailles weren’t petulantly clueless.
It takes two or more to fuck the world.
In Denver tomorrow, there are two demonstrations to protest our Governor’s efforts to limit the spread of this killer.
Natch, the Libertarians will do their thing, maybe boil a live bat* and serve it with pangolin au jus and then shout thru bullhorns that “”Whaddaya gonna do about it, libtards?”
The other, maybe larger demonstration is organized by something called the Peace, Love, Hippie Juice Collective, which is going to cause a traffic jam on a Sunday at the Capitol, except that there is no traffic, especially on a Sunday during the shutdown, except for their cars, idling and giving off carbon dioxide I imagine against whatever other environmental druthers they harbor to come at the other end of the libertarian constitutional Overton whining window to protest their constitutional right to give me the Covid-19 while they work and bake muffins for me, I guess.
I’m thinking of heading down there on my bike, fully masked up, hooded, and so forth, and see if can break one libertarian jaw and one hippie jaw if the Covidiots want to fuck with me.
I notice this latter bunch of losers had a guy on their twitter feed calling me a snowflake. Last time a pitcher called me that from the mound while I happened to be holding a baseball bat for its rightful purposes, he ended up on the disabled list and I got a two-game suspension for chasing him around the infield.
He pulled a groin muscle, I think, running away.
Not sure I want to go to jail, which would just be getting closer to the virus, but I at least have to see this and yell rude things.
We’ll see.
I’m pretty sure, once the curve is flattened enough not to kill me (is the Lt. Gov. of Texas dead yet, because he should at least set a good example for the rest of us, money where masked mouth is, etc), which is to say, totally flattened, and some semblance of eating out returns, it would be sure wager to think that you could tempt a crowd of petulant libertarians with a bat soup themed menu.
Bat croquettes, bat tacos, bat fritter with a covid crema, bat bacon ice cream.
The special tonight is pangolin lasagna accompanied by a chloraquine infused martini.
A shuddering snowflake shall be standing by for your have it on with the libtards delectation.
Pay no attention to the ambulance parked out front.
I agree that we require new words to describe what is happening.
Fascist, Republican, Conservative, even asshole, just don’t do it justice.
I’m warming to Nazi, but Trump seems too much like Colonel Klink for it to sound menacing.
Though the actor who played Klink was Werner Klemperer, the renowned German conductor, who in turn was first cousin to Victor Klemperer, about whom I’ve written briefly here regarding the bombing of Dresden.
That history repeats as farce doesn’t make the deaths and killing the second time around the least bit farcical.
I’ve noted many times that our decent conservatives here should find a new label, because the current rampaging radicals have ruined the word for everyone, as Casey Stengel remarked about a certain New York Yankee third baseman.
That said, there was plenty of random, unfocused petulance bubbling up in Russia circa 1915-16, Germany circa 1929 and on, Cambodia circa Sihanouk, the Confederacy for years before the first shots of the Civil War, just about anywhere historically that has gone off the rails.
It took a purposeful organizing force to exploit the petulance in every instance and bring it to dreadful fruition, and I would now say that we have that.
Robespierre before the French Revolution could be described as merely petulant.
Not that the inhabitants of Versailles weren’t petulantly clueless.
It takes two or more to fuck the world.
In Denver tomorrow, there are two demonstrations to protest our Governor’s efforts to limit the spread of this killer.
Natch, the Libertarians will do their thing, maybe boil a live bat* and serve it with pangolin au jus and then shout thru bullhorns that “”Whaddaya gonna do about it, libtards?”
The other, maybe larger demonstration is organized by something called the Peace, Love, Hippie Juice Collective, which is going to cause a traffic jam on a Sunday at the Capitol, except that there is no traffic, especially on a Sunday during the shutdown, except for their cars, idling and giving off carbon dioxide I imagine against whatever other environmental druthers they harbor to come at the other end of the libertarian constitutional Overton whining window to protest their constitutional right to give me the Covid-19 while they work and bake muffins for me, I guess.
I’m thinking of heading down there on my bike, fully masked up, hooded, and so forth, and see if can break one libertarian jaw and one hippie jaw if the Covidiots want to fuck with me.
I notice this latter bunch of losers had a guy on their twitter feed calling me a snowflake. Last time a pitcher called me that from the mound while I happened to be holding a baseball bat for its rightful purposes, he ended up on the disabled list and I got a two-game suspension for chasing him around the infield.
He pulled a groin muscle, I think, running away.
Not sure I want to go to jail, which would just be getting closer to the virus, but I at least have to see this and yell rude things.
We’ll see.
I’m pretty sure, once the curve is flattened enough not to kill me (is the Lt. Gov. of Texas dead yet, because he should at least set a good example for the rest of us, money where masked mouth is, etc), which is to say, totally flattened, and some semblance of eating out returns, it would be sure wager to think that you could tempt a crowd of petulant libertarians with a bat soup themed menu.
Bat croquettes, bat tacos, bat fritter with a covid crema, bat bacon ice cream.
The special tonight is pangolin lasagna accompanied by a chloraquine infused martini.
A shuddering snowflake shall be standing by for your have it on with the libtards delectation.
Pay no attention to the ambulance parked out front.
it’s a way to say we dont know what to do or how to do it.
Because they don’t know what to do or how to do it. Because nobody does. At all. Because it’s a new virus in the human population and it’s not completely clear how to deal with it.
So the people you name are trying to figure it the hell out. And the things you claim are “impossible” are the things that, so far, have seemed to be the best available approach to keeping the virus from spreading to everybody on the damned planet, in a remarkably short amount of time.
What’s your big idea? Everybody go back to work? Open the restaurants, theaters, bars? Re-start all of the sports seasons and get everybody up close and personal with tens of thousands of their friends and neighbors? Re-open the malls so everyone can mill around with thousands of their fellow shoppers? Get those hairdressers and barbers open again, so you can sit in a chair and breath the same air as the last fifty people who just sat in the same place?
That’s what “re-opening the economy” is. Essential businesses are still open, in one form or another, and they cover a hell of a lot of ground. Here is the list in MA. It’s a really long list.
A lot of people are out of work. We should pay them to stay home, period. For months, if that’s what we need to do. I’m fine with that, you can raise my taxes to do that if that’s what we need to do.
You fine with that? Or would you rather than all of the folks running around with guns, blocking traffic, go back to work, right the hell now, even if that means a lot of them get sick.
No small number of them would probably be fine with that. Unfortunately, that choice would not be confined to them, they’d make other people sick, too.
And those other people have a voice and a point of view.
it’s a way to say we dont know what to do or how to do it.
Because they don’t know what to do or how to do it. Because nobody does. At all. Because it’s a new virus in the human population and it’s not completely clear how to deal with it.
So the people you name are trying to figure it the hell out. And the things you claim are “impossible” are the things that, so far, have seemed to be the best available approach to keeping the virus from spreading to everybody on the damned planet, in a remarkably short amount of time.
What’s your big idea? Everybody go back to work? Open the restaurants, theaters, bars? Re-start all of the sports seasons and get everybody up close and personal with tens of thousands of their friends and neighbors? Re-open the malls so everyone can mill around with thousands of their fellow shoppers? Get those hairdressers and barbers open again, so you can sit in a chair and breath the same air as the last fifty people who just sat in the same place?
That’s what “re-opening the economy” is. Essential businesses are still open, in one form or another, and they cover a hell of a lot of ground. Here is the list in MA. It’s a really long list.
A lot of people are out of work. We should pay them to stay home, period. For months, if that’s what we need to do. I’m fine with that, you can raise my taxes to do that if that’s what we need to do.
You fine with that? Or would you rather than all of the folks running around with guns, blocking traffic, go back to work, right the hell now, even if that means a lot of them get sick.
No small number of them would probably be fine with that. Unfortunately, that choice would not be confined to them, they’d make other people sick, too.
And those other people have a voice and a point of view.
It took a purposeful organizing force to exploit the petulance in every instance and bring it to dreadful fruition, and I would now say that we have that.
yes.
It took a purposeful organizing force to exploit the petulance in every instance and bring it to dreadful fruition, and I would now say that we have that.
yes.
yes, it’s a liberal plot to destroy the economy.
these fucking morons are just looking for a platform on which to perform their Fox-brand conservatism. they think they’re in some kind of fucking war, because that’s what Fox et al tell them, 24/7. and now they get to play soldier. Booo! on the liberals! yeah, the fucking liberals are behind this. no liberals own businesses, and we all love staying locked in our goddamned houses. but sponge-brained coplayers are going to kill a bunch of people because they don’t have the mental capacity to sit down and STFU until we all figure out how to deal with this virus.
the GOP is a cult.
yes, it’s a liberal plot to destroy the economy.
these fucking morons are just looking for a platform on which to perform their Fox-brand conservatism. they think they’re in some kind of fucking war, because that’s what Fox et al tell them, 24/7. and now they get to play soldier. Booo! on the liberals! yeah, the fucking liberals are behind this. no liberals own businesses, and we all love staying locked in our goddamned houses. but sponge-brained coplayers are going to kill a bunch of people because they don’t have the mental capacity to sit down and STFU until we all figure out how to deal with this virus.
the GOP is a cult.
Unfortunately, that choice would not be confined to them, they’d make other people sick, too.
— “We have a right to own enough firepower to destroy Genghis Khan’s army even if thousands of innocents die for it in schools and churches and synagogues”
and
— “We have a right to go get a can of paint and a haircut even if people die because of it”
Same message.
“Right to life” indeed.
Unfortunately, that choice would not be confined to them, they’d make other people sick, too.
— “We have a right to own enough firepower to destroy Genghis Khan’s army even if thousands of innocents die for it in schools and churches and synagogues”
and
— “We have a right to go get a can of paint and a haircut even if people die because of it”
Same message.
“Right to life” indeed.
Four people I work with have COVID. How many would have it if those folks had been coming into the office, along with everyone else, for the week or so that they were infected, but not symptomatic?
FWIW:
COVID apparently has an R factor of 2.5. So, absent some kind of isolation protocol, one infected person will infect 2.5 others.
It seems like you can be infected and contagious for about 5 days before you’re symptomatic.
That gives us 4 x 2.5^5, or 390 people. Which is basically everybody in the Cambridge location of my company.
Feel free to check my math.
The virus sucks. It sucks for everyone. It sucks that nobody has a bulletproof, ready-to-go plan for how to deal with it.
Running around with guns and blocking access to the hospital is not going to convince anyone of the virtue of your point of view. It just makes you look like a big fucking baby.
Hence, my comment.
Four people I work with have COVID. How many would have it if those folks had been coming into the office, along with everyone else, for the week or so that they were infected, but not symptomatic?
FWIW:
COVID apparently has an R factor of 2.5. So, absent some kind of isolation protocol, one infected person will infect 2.5 others.
It seems like you can be infected and contagious for about 5 days before you’re symptomatic.
That gives us 4 x 2.5^5, or 390 people. Which is basically everybody in the Cambridge location of my company.
Feel free to check my math.
The virus sucks. It sucks for everyone. It sucks that nobody has a bulletproof, ready-to-go plan for how to deal with it.
Running around with guns and blocking access to the hospital is not going to convince anyone of the virtue of your point of view. It just makes you look like a big fucking baby.
Hence, my comment.
I’m guessing opening the county for these people who are entitled to their points of view doesn’t include opening the borders. It would be funny to get a few “open the borders” signs in their hands accidentally at their astroturfed protests.
I have to wonder what the correlation is between whining about being entitled to your point of view and your point of view being f**king stupid. Seems kind of high.
I’m guessing opening the county for these people who are entitled to their points of view doesn’t include opening the borders. It would be funny to get a few “open the borders” signs in their hands accidentally at their astroturfed protests.
I have to wonder what the correlation is between whining about being entitled to your point of view and your point of view being f**king stupid. Seems kind of high.
Looking for … and finding Death.
The conservative, crypto-religious, nationalist Death Cult is a worldwide scourge:
https://washingtonmonthly.com/2020/04/18/hindu-nationalists-are-using-covid-19-to-fuel-a-humanitarian-disaster-in-india/
Trump and Pompeo love them some Modi, but mass murderers communicate with each other even in solitary confinement in maximum security prisons.
I’m warming to bringing the death penalty back, especially at the Hague.
Looking for … and finding Death.
The conservative, crypto-religious, nationalist Death Cult is a worldwide scourge:
https://washingtonmonthly.com/2020/04/18/hindu-nationalists-are-using-covid-19-to-fuel-a-humanitarian-disaster-in-india/
Trump and Pompeo love them some Modi, but mass murderers communicate with each other even in solitary confinement in maximum security prisons.
I’m warming to bringing the death penalty back, especially at the Hague.
russell: “We need to go to the hairdresser” doesn’t really have the same fanatic militant xenophobic nationalist vigor of “Viva la muerte!”. There’s something else going on here, I think, and I’m mostly at a loss to describe it, much less explain it.
It’s like some weird form of petulance.
It’s not quite petulance, but it’s definitely not xenophobia (regardless of her views otherwise). It’s a reflection of simply not seeing those others, who may suffer or die, as really human. Are you willing to be inconvenienced, even slightly, because something might happen to a weed?
Of course, that requires either being willfully blind to the very real threat to you and yours.
Or sufficiently credulous as to believe your supposed leaders who say you’re not at risk. (Even though their personal, off camera, actions say otherwise.)
russell: “We need to go to the hairdresser” doesn’t really have the same fanatic militant xenophobic nationalist vigor of “Viva la muerte!”. There’s something else going on here, I think, and I’m mostly at a loss to describe it, much less explain it.
It’s like some weird form of petulance.
It’s not quite petulance, but it’s definitely not xenophobia (regardless of her views otherwise). It’s a reflection of simply not seeing those others, who may suffer or die, as really human. Are you willing to be inconvenienced, even slightly, because something might happen to a weed?
Of course, that requires either being willfully blind to the very real threat to you and yours.
Or sufficiently credulous as to believe your supposed leaders who say you’re not at risk. (Even though their personal, off camera, actions say otherwise.)
because most prominent conservatives™ are telling them it’s something on the spectrum between a Democratic hoax and a Chinese bio-weapon, they think it’s liberals making them stay at home for no good reason.
so, they’re gonna go strut their conservatism in defiance.
they have no idea how anything works because they live in a fairy tale world.
because most prominent conservatives™ are telling them it’s something on the spectrum between a Democratic hoax and a Chinese bio-weapon, they think it’s liberals making them stay at home for no good reason.
so, they’re gonna go strut their conservatism in defiance.
they have no idea how anything works because they live in a fairy tale world.
The jackasses in Michigan blocked a hospital emergency room entrance, preventing a patient in an ambulance from being offloaded.
I can find nothing about whether the criminals were removed and/or punished.
This raises a question for decent armed conservatives here: If you were the patient being transported in the ambulance and you were prevented by these goons from receiving care, and if you carry your weapon with you, would you have been justified in discharging that weapon with deadly force at the goons in self-defense?
See, these guys are going to be like the Malheur Wildlife Refuge federal property invaders, arsonists, and property vandals. The latter weren’t set upon by law enforcement with armed force, like say a black kid minding his own business on a city street routinely is, instead they were negotiated with and treated with kid gloves and given mere slaps on the wrist as punishment, not to mention that Bundy senior is still a tax cheat, who should be executed.
And now THEY are back threatening armed force.
Just as Trump did not have the bones in his face re-arranged early in life when he bullied the first or second time (look where he is now), so these Michigan thugs will be back in the Fall to disrupt legal elections and if Biden wins, they will become even more lethally dangerous to the Republic.
The patient in the ambulance can kill them now or we can face them later when are even more intent on killing us.
This lecture is one I’ve memorized over the years from numerous big swinging dick conservatives who thought they knew how to fuck back at being fucked with by armed jackals stealing their record collections, instead of all this pussy-footing, shilly-shallying, limp-wristed cowardice we witness now.
The jackasses in Michigan blocked a hospital emergency room entrance, preventing a patient in an ambulance from being offloaded.
I can find nothing about whether the criminals were removed and/or punished.
This raises a question for decent armed conservatives here: If you were the patient being transported in the ambulance and you were prevented by these goons from receiving care, and if you carry your weapon with you, would you have been justified in discharging that weapon with deadly force at the goons in self-defense?
See, these guys are going to be like the Malheur Wildlife Refuge federal property invaders, arsonists, and property vandals. The latter weren’t set upon by law enforcement with armed force, like say a black kid minding his own business on a city street routinely is, instead they were negotiated with and treated with kid gloves and given mere slaps on the wrist as punishment, not to mention that Bundy senior is still a tax cheat, who should be executed.
And now THEY are back threatening armed force.
Just as Trump did not have the bones in his face re-arranged early in life when he bullied the first or second time (look where he is now), so these Michigan thugs will be back in the Fall to disrupt legal elections and if Biden wins, they will become even more lethally dangerous to the Republic.
The patient in the ambulance can kill them now or we can face them later when are even more intent on killing us.
This lecture is one I’ve memorized over the years from numerous big swinging dick conservatives who thought they knew how to fuck back at being fucked with by armed jackals stealing their record collections, instead of all this pussy-footing, shilly-shallying, limp-wristed cowardice we witness now.
“I’m warming to bringing the death penalty back, especially at the Hague.”
Yeah, me too, for some time now.
Because Dubya showed me the error of my ways. The death penalty for penny-ante crooks isn’t worth it, but when a national leader kills thousands of his people, tens of thousands of innocents, whose responsibility for the carnage is absolutely beyond doubt? SCRAG ‘EM.
Saddam, also, too.
National leaders need to have some “skin in the game”, methinks. Like in ye olde days.
“I’m warming to bringing the death penalty back, especially at the Hague.”
Yeah, me too, for some time now.
Because Dubya showed me the error of my ways. The death penalty for penny-ante crooks isn’t worth it, but when a national leader kills thousands of his people, tens of thousands of innocents, whose responsibility for the carnage is absolutely beyond doubt? SCRAG ‘EM.
Saddam, also, too.
National leaders need to have some “skin in the game”, methinks. Like in ye olde days.
“That Michigan is one of the first places seeing substantial pushback against state stay-at-home orders is no random occurrence. Whitmer has instituted one of the nation’s most severe stay-at-home policies, banning everything from the sale of paint to the use of motor-powered boats (but not canoes) while the state-run lottery remains “essential.” The whole mess highlights the sadly symbiotic relationship between authorities taking things too far and people (some reasonably and strategically, some carelessly and imprudently) reacting in ways that provoke more draconian policies.
Americans have proven quite willing to play along with social-distancing directives when these directives are narrowly tailored to stopping the spread of COVID-19. If there’s a lesson from Michigan for other states, it’s that imposing overly-strict rules or trying to sneak pet policy transformations into precautionary measures will provoke a backlash that makes public health goals even more difficult to reach. If state and local leaders want their people to consent to COVID-19 emergency measures and be partners in public health, rather than antagonists, they should look to Whitmer’s examples as what not to do.”
It Figures That Michigan Is Among the First States To See Protests Against Social Distancing: Plus: Puerto Rico criminalizes fake news about COVID-19, wide geographic disparity in U.S. income growth, and more…
“That Michigan is one of the first places seeing substantial pushback against state stay-at-home orders is no random occurrence. Whitmer has instituted one of the nation’s most severe stay-at-home policies, banning everything from the sale of paint to the use of motor-powered boats (but not canoes) while the state-run lottery remains “essential.” The whole mess highlights the sadly symbiotic relationship between authorities taking things too far and people (some reasonably and strategically, some carelessly and imprudently) reacting in ways that provoke more draconian policies.
Americans have proven quite willing to play along with social-distancing directives when these directives are narrowly tailored to stopping the spread of COVID-19. If there’s a lesson from Michigan for other states, it’s that imposing overly-strict rules or trying to sneak pet policy transformations into precautionary measures will provoke a backlash that makes public health goals even more difficult to reach. If state and local leaders want their people to consent to COVID-19 emergency measures and be partners in public health, rather than antagonists, they should look to Whitmer’s examples as what not to do.”
It Figures That Michigan Is Among the First States To See Protests Against Social Distancing: Plus: Puerto Rico criminalizes fake news about COVID-19, wide geographic disparity in U.S. income growth, and more…
I can’t wait to visit Puerto Rico and yell “Fire” in a crowded non-burning theater so I can secure more constitutional leg room.
I’ll take Whitmer over any number of red-state Governors who have deliberately given free reign to a virus, as if viruses are protected species or maybe very small automatic weapons.
How bout I come down to Texas, find your local hospital emergency room entrance, and block the entrance into it should that time come.
No doubt you’ll be arriving in a private ambulance, so I’ll keep a look-out.
I can’t wait to visit Puerto Rico and yell “Fire” in a crowded non-burning theater so I can secure more constitutional leg room.
I’ll take Whitmer over any number of red-state Governors who have deliberately given free reign to a virus, as if viruses are protected species or maybe very small automatic weapons.
How bout I come down to Texas, find your local hospital emergency room entrance, and block the entrance into it should that time come.
No doubt you’ll be arriving in a private ambulance, so I’ll keep a look-out.
I’ll see your Reason cite and raise you a Bridge MI. Whoever they are. I make no claims for their objectivity, the article provides what seems to be a reasonable synopsis of the MI lockdown order. Use it as your launching pad for actually, you know, getting some factual information.
MI has the third highest number of COVID cases in the country. NY, NJ, then MI.
If people object to whatever their state or local government is doing about the virus, they should by all means state their case. Just freaking do it in a way that doesn’t put everybody else at risk of getting sick.
And don’t block the damned hospital entrance. And leave the fucking guns and Red Dawn cosplay BS the hell at home, it just makes you look like an idiot.
I’ll see your Reason cite and raise you a Bridge MI. Whoever they are. I make no claims for their objectivity, the article provides what seems to be a reasonable synopsis of the MI lockdown order. Use it as your launching pad for actually, you know, getting some factual information.
MI has the third highest number of COVID cases in the country. NY, NJ, then MI.
If people object to whatever their state or local government is doing about the virus, they should by all means state their case. Just freaking do it in a way that doesn’t put everybody else at risk of getting sick.
And don’t block the damned hospital entrance. And leave the fucking guns and Red Dawn cosplay BS the hell at home, it just makes you look like an idiot.
It seems to me that the ways people choose to express their points of view are actually part of their points of view. It’s not just “I disagree with A, B, and C” and then a separate matter of how that gets expressed. The mentality is generally one of “You can’t tell me what to do.” So they not only say that, they go out and demonstrate it through their actions. You can’t tell them not to block hospital entrances or carry their guns around threateningly in public any more than you can tell them to stay home during a public-health emergency. It’s all knotted up in one big mess.
It seems to me that the ways people choose to express their points of view are actually part of their points of view. It’s not just “I disagree with A, B, and C” and then a separate matter of how that gets expressed. The mentality is generally one of “You can’t tell me what to do.” So they not only say that, they go out and demonstrate it through their actions. You can’t tell them not to block hospital entrances or carry their guns around threateningly in public any more than you can tell them to stay home during a public-health emergency. It’s all knotted up in one big mess.
mos people grow out of that stage
mos people grow out of that stage
[Microsoft Office Specialists, that is]
[Microsoft Office Specialists, that is]
The more I read about Governor Whitmers, the more I am impressed.
Those idiots who beshat our public space in several states recently need to be subjected to extreme political isolation measures and drowned beneath the power of tens of millions of votes this coming November to convey in no uncertain terms, YOU LOSE, MOTHERFUCKERS.
The more I read about Governor Whitmers, the more I am impressed.
Those idiots who beshat our public space in several states recently need to be subjected to extreme political isolation measures and drowned beneath the power of tens of millions of votes this coming November to convey in no uncertain terms, YOU LOSE, MOTHERFUCKERS.
The more I read about Governor Whitmers, the more I am impressed.
Ya gotta love someone who won the governor’s office on a slogan of “Fix the damn roads!”
And you can understand the upset of those who lost it, because they insisted on strangling the government, so the had ignored the roads. Maybe rabid libertarianism just ain’t gonna fly. Oh, who’d a guessed? .
The more I read about Governor Whitmers, the more I am impressed.
Ya gotta love someone who won the governor’s office on a slogan of “Fix the damn roads!”
And you can understand the upset of those who lost it, because they insisted on strangling the government, so the had ignored the roads. Maybe rabid libertarianism just ain’t gonna fly. Oh, who’d a guessed? .
isn’t it strange how every “conservative” protest ends up being a bunch of overweight white guys waddling around in their camo pants and gear vests, brandishing their expensive fetish objects for everyone to fear?
isn’t it strange how every “conservative” protest ends up being a bunch of overweight white guys waddling around in their camo pants and gear vests, brandishing their expensive fetish objects for everyone to fear?
to be fair, most left-ish protests end up with somebody with bright pink hair and a lot of piercings pounding on a drum while shouting “THIS IS WHAT DEMOCRACY LOOKS LIKE” through a megaphone.
what they all have in common is that somebody is always Hitler.
I don’t really have much hair anymore, so the bright pink thing is above my pay grade. I do have a drum, though, several in fact. Conversely, no gun, nor much interest in having one. No camo, either.
Looks like it’s the lefties for me.
Everybody’s got their own brand of silliness. I just like the kind without the threats of violence better.
to be fair, most left-ish protests end up with somebody with bright pink hair and a lot of piercings pounding on a drum while shouting “THIS IS WHAT DEMOCRACY LOOKS LIKE” through a megaphone.
what they all have in common is that somebody is always Hitler.
I don’t really have much hair anymore, so the bright pink thing is above my pay grade. I do have a drum, though, several in fact. Conversely, no gun, nor much interest in having one. No camo, either.
Looks like it’s the lefties for me.
Everybody’s got their own brand of silliness. I just like the kind without the threats of violence better.
what they all have in common is that somebody is always Hitler.
What’s true is that they are Hitler. Or maybe Mussolini. Or at least Franco. Please see the OP.
what they all have in common is that somebody is always Hitler.
What’s true is that they are Hitler. Or maybe Mussolini. Or at least Franco. Please see the OP.
“Everybody’s got their own brand of silliness. I just like the kind without the threats of violence better”
I agree with this, and I am firmly in the camp that protests shouldnt block streets much less emergency vehicles.
But somehow every protest seems to be designed to inconvenience someone.So complaining about anything except the guns seems to be saying they got the attention they wanted.
I just got back to this so I will just add that certain things set me off, some of what was in the original comment I referenced made lots of sense.
People dont like to feel they are dependent on the government to get their Bill’s paid, not because it’s the government but because it takes the control away from them. They like to feel like they have some control of their destiny.
I would prefer a clearer staged plan that says which companies can reopen if they follow certain guidelines. That doesn’t mean we shouldnt continue to push testing out , but we have more lab capacity than is being used today, both at Quest and Labcorp.
It is a long road to having testing, identification and tracking. Even if we think we can sustain it, the first thing I would like to see is a plan for who is going to do it. It will necessarily be a local activity, perhaps managed by the state and paid for by fed, state and local. That’s how emergency response is structured
in our country.
More realistic seems to be to create guidelines for a business to open. Masks, testing, and response guidelines. You need an office? Make sure it’s as safe as possible. Then buildings can put in screening the way they secured elevators after 9/11, it becomes a selling point for your leases.
Want to open your small business, implement distancing guidelines.
Even if there is a reason that whatever I think of cant work, there should be some set of criteria for opening before there is universal testing.
There needs to be a plan, not just a list of things we hope will happen. Someday there will be a treatment, adequate testing and then a vaccine, then we can start opening. That’s not a plan. If all those things suddenly happened we wouldnt need a plan.
“Everybody’s got their own brand of silliness. I just like the kind without the threats of violence better”
I agree with this, and I am firmly in the camp that protests shouldnt block streets much less emergency vehicles.
But somehow every protest seems to be designed to inconvenience someone.So complaining about anything except the guns seems to be saying they got the attention they wanted.
I just got back to this so I will just add that certain things set me off, some of what was in the original comment I referenced made lots of sense.
People dont like to feel they are dependent on the government to get their Bill’s paid, not because it’s the government but because it takes the control away from them. They like to feel like they have some control of their destiny.
I would prefer a clearer staged plan that says which companies can reopen if they follow certain guidelines. That doesn’t mean we shouldnt continue to push testing out , but we have more lab capacity than is being used today, both at Quest and Labcorp.
It is a long road to having testing, identification and tracking. Even if we think we can sustain it, the first thing I would like to see is a plan for who is going to do it. It will necessarily be a local activity, perhaps managed by the state and paid for by fed, state and local. That’s how emergency response is structured
in our country.
More realistic seems to be to create guidelines for a business to open. Masks, testing, and response guidelines. You need an office? Make sure it’s as safe as possible. Then buildings can put in screening the way they secured elevators after 9/11, it becomes a selling point for your leases.
Want to open your small business, implement distancing guidelines.
Even if there is a reason that whatever I think of cant work, there should be some set of criteria for opening before there is universal testing.
There needs to be a plan, not just a list of things we hope will happen. Someday there will be a treatment, adequate testing and then a vaccine, then we can start opening. That’s not a plan. If all those things suddenly happened we wouldnt need a plan.
Stephen Moore compares the armed louts to Rosa Parks.
Wasn’t she shot in the head by cracker cops for carrying a loaded AR-15 on to a city bus, or am I getting her mixed up with Trayvon Martin? They all look alike, especially dead.
Moore is looking a little more like Pol Pot every day to me. I dread digging up all of the mass graves he has filled when this thing is over.
Silly of me, I know.
I feel for decent conservatives, the half dozen or so that still exist across this great land of ours, not counting Joe the Tiger King.
They must feel like Ronald McDonald after asshat clown John Wayne Gacy’s crawl space was dug up to reveal the latter’s night job.
Stephen Moore compares the armed louts to Rosa Parks.
Wasn’t she shot in the head by cracker cops for carrying a loaded AR-15 on to a city bus, or am I getting her mixed up with Trayvon Martin? They all look alike, especially dead.
Moore is looking a little more like Pol Pot every day to me. I dread digging up all of the mass graves he has filled when this thing is over.
Silly of me, I know.
I feel for decent conservatives, the half dozen or so that still exist across this great land of ours, not counting Joe the Tiger King.
They must feel like Ronald McDonald after asshat clown John Wayne Gacy’s crawl space was dug up to reveal the latter’s night job.
Pro-plague has a certain ring to it, like pro-rat during the Black Death or pro-cholera during all those years the miasma theory persisted.
https://digbysblog.net/2020/04/the-pro-plague-confederacy/
Many Americans were pro-polio when it really counted as a team sport.
Pro-plague has a certain ring to it, like pro-rat during the Black Death or pro-cholera during all those years the miasma theory persisted.
https://digbysblog.net/2020/04/the-pro-plague-confederacy/
Many Americans were pro-polio when it really counted as a team sport.
It would be nice to see a plan. My guess is that the plan was thrown out with the pandemic response guidelines that Trump inherited from the Obama administration.
But, yeah, state governments, local governments, families – all of us should have a plan. But the plan depends on what is available, and some of those things are PPE, testing (both of which should be available, and shouldn’t be a “plan”), then later treatment and/or vaccine. Let’s remember that vaccines aren’t a given. Not all diseases have vaccines available. There is no vaccine for the common cold (coronaviruses). Flu vaccines are extremely helpful, but not foolproof. There is no vaccine for HIV. Antivirals seem promising, but are not a panacea.
Yes, I do think there should be more definitive discussion about how we open up what and when, but I’m not going to violate social distancing guidelines anytime soon.
If we had a reasonable federal government, it could help people in need. Of course, no one WANTS to be dependent on government. But a choice between resuming a stupid meaningless job in an office, meanwhile killing people, or taking some cash from the government? No brainer. (Sure, some jobs aren’t meaningless. In fact, some are “essential.” Lots of people are still working.)
It would be nice to see a plan. My guess is that the plan was thrown out with the pandemic response guidelines that Trump inherited from the Obama administration.
But, yeah, state governments, local governments, families – all of us should have a plan. But the plan depends on what is available, and some of those things are PPE, testing (both of which should be available, and shouldn’t be a “plan”), then later treatment and/or vaccine. Let’s remember that vaccines aren’t a given. Not all diseases have vaccines available. There is no vaccine for the common cold (coronaviruses). Flu vaccines are extremely helpful, but not foolproof. There is no vaccine for HIV. Antivirals seem promising, but are not a panacea.
Yes, I do think there should be more definitive discussion about how we open up what and when, but I’m not going to violate social distancing guidelines anytime soon.
If we had a reasonable federal government, it could help people in need. Of course, no one WANTS to be dependent on government. But a choice between resuming a stupid meaningless job in an office, meanwhile killing people, or taking some cash from the government? No brainer. (Sure, some jobs aren’t meaningless. In fact, some are “essential.” Lots of people are still working.)
“They like to feel they have some control over their destiny.”
When their destiny is asymptomatic, control is an illusion, a Bronx cheer from the Gods.
It’s more Fate than Destiny.
Ask the ancient Greeks and Romans.
I love that the word Covid includes Ovid.
The first is mutating as we speak for some fresh Hell in the future, and the second wrote Metamorphoses.
“They like to feel they have some control over their destiny.”
When their destiny is asymptomatic, control is an illusion, a Bronx cheer from the Gods.
It’s more Fate than Destiny.
Ask the ancient Greeks and Romans.
I love that the word Covid includes Ovid.
The first is mutating as we speak for some fresh Hell in the future, and the second wrote Metamorphoses.
Steak-umm: https://twitter.com/steak_umm/status/1251193468451520520
Worth thinking about.
I recently learned that the Steak-umm twitter feed was worth watching. Clearly we need to know more.
Steak-umm: https://twitter.com/steak_umm/status/1251193468451520520
Worth thinking about.
I recently learned that the Steak-umm twitter feed was worth watching. Clearly we need to know more.
“What they all have in common is that somebody is always Hitler.”
The lack of respect for Genghis Khan is appalling.
“What they all have in common is that somebody is always Hitler.”
The lack of respect for Genghis Khan is appalling.
This piece reminded me of another about the Spanish Civil War: Orwell’s “Looking Back on the Spanish War.” Here’s part iv:
The struggle for power between the Spanish Republican parties is an unhappy, far-off thing which I have no wish to revive at this date. I only mention it in order to say: believe nothing, or next to nothing, of what you read about internal affairs on the Government side. It is all, from whatever source, party propaganda – that is to say, lies. The broad truth about the war is simple enough. The Spanish bourgeoisie saw their chance of crushing the labour movement, and took it, aided by the Nazis and by the forces of reaction all over the world. It is doubtful whether more than that will ever be established.
I remember saying once to Arthur Koestler, ‘History stopped in 1936’, at which he nodded in immediate understanding. We were both thinking of totalitarianism in general, but more particularly of the Spanish Civil War. Early in life I had noticed that no event is ever correctly reported in a newspaper, but in Spain, for the first time, I saw newspaper reports which did not bear any relation to the facts, not even the relationship which is implied in an ordinary lie. I saw great battles reported where there had been no fighting, and complete silence where hundreds of men had been killed. I saw troops who had fought bravely denounced as cowards and traitors, and others who had never seen a shot fired hailed as the heroes of imaginary victories, and I saw newspapers in London retailing these lies and eager intellectuals building emotional superstructures over events that had never happened. I saw, in fact, history being written not in terms of what happened but of what ought to have happened according to various ‘party lines’. Yet in a way, horrible as all this was, it was unimportant. It concerned secondary issues – namely, the struggle for power between the Comintern and the Spanish left-wing parties, and the efforts of the Russian Government to prevent revolution in Spain. But the broad picture of the war which the Spanish Government presented to the world was not untruthful. The main issues were what it said they were. But as for the Fascists and their backers, how could they come even as near to the truth as that? How could they possibly mention their real aims? Their version of the war was pure fantasy, and in the circumstances it could not have been otherwise.
The only propaganda line open to the Nazis and Fascists was to represent themselves as Christian patriots saving Spain from a Russian dictatorship. This involved pretending that life in Government Spain was just one long massacre (vide the Catholic Herald or the Daily Mail – but these were child’s play compared with the continental Fascist press), and it involved immensely exaggerating the scale of Russian intervention. Out of the huge pyramid of lies which the Catholic and reactionary press all over the world built up, let me take just one point – the presence in Spain of a Russian army. Devout Franco partisans all believed in this; estimates of its strength went as high as half a million. Now, there was no Russian army in Spain. There may have been a handful of airmen and other technicians, a few hundred at the most, but an army there was not. Some thousands of foreigners who fought in Spain, not to mention millions of Spaniards, were witnesses of this. Well, their testimony made no impression at all upon the Franco propagandists, not one of whom had set foot in Government Spain. Simultaneously these people refused utterly to admit the fact of German or Italian intervention, at the same time as the Germany and Italian press were openly boasting about the exploits of their ‘legionaries’. I have chosen to mention only one point, but in fact the whole of Fascist propaganda about the war was on this level.
This kind of thing is frightening to me, because it often gives me the feeling that the very concept of objective truth is fading out of the world. After all, the chances are that those lies, or at any rate similar lies, will pass into history. How will the history of the Spanish war be written? If Franco remains in power his nominees will write the history books, and (to stick to my chosen point) that Russian army which never existed will become historical fact, and schoolchildren will learn about it generations hence. But suppose Fascism is finally defeated and some kind of democratic government restored in Spain in the fairly near future; even then, how is the history of the war to be written? What kind of records will Franco have left behind him? Suppose even that the records kept on the Government side are recoverable – even so, how is a true history of the war to be written? For, as I have pointed out already, the Government also dealt extensively in lies. From the anti-Fascist angle one could write a broadly truthful history of the war, but it would be a partisan history, unreliable on every minor point. Yet, after all, some kind of history will be written, and after those who actually remember the war are dead, it will be universally accepted. So for all practical purposes the lie will have become truth.
I know it is the fashion to say that most of recorded history is lies anyway. I am willing to believe that history is for the most part inaccurate and biased, but what is peculiar to our own age is the abandonment of the idea that history could be truthfully written. In the past people deliberately lied, or they unconsciously coloured what they wrote, or they struggled after the truth, well knowing that they must make many mistakes; but in each case they believed that ‘the facts’ existed and were more or less discoverable. And in practice there was always a considerable body of fact which would have been agreed to by almost everyone. If you look up the history of the last war in, for instance, the Encyclopaedia Britannica, you will find that a respectable amount of the material is drawn from German sources. A British and a German historian would disagree deeply on many things, even on fundamentals, but there would still be that body of, as it were, neutral fact on which neither would seriously challenge the other. It is just this common basis of agreement, with its implication that human beings are all one species of animal, that totalitarianism destroys. Nazi theory indeed specifically denies that such a thing as ‘the truth’ exists. There is, for instance, no such thing as ‘science’. There is only ‘German science’, ‘Jewish science’ etc. The implied objective of this line of thought is a nightmare world in which the Leader, or some ruling clique, controls not only the future but the past. If the Leader says of such and such an event, ‘It never happened’ – well, it never happened. If he says that two and two are five – well, two and two are five. This prospect frightens me much more than bombs – and after our experiences of the last few years that is not a frivolous statement.
But is it perhaps childish or morbid to terrify oneself with visions of a totalitarian future? Before writing off the totalitarian world as a nightmare that can’t come true, just remember that in 1925 the world of today would have seemed a nightmare that couldn’t come true. Against that shifting phantasmagoric world in which black may be white tomorrow and yesterday’s weather can be changed by decree, there are in reality only two safeguards. One is that however much you deny the truth, the truth goes on existing, as it were, behind your back, and you consequently can’t violate it in ways that impair military efficiency. The other is that so long as some parts of the earth remain unconquered, the liberal tradition can be kept alive. Let Fascism, or possibly even a combination of several Fascisms, conquer the whole world, and those two conditions no longer exist. We in England underrate the danger of this kind of thing, because our traditions and our past security have given us a sentimental belief that it all comes right in the end and the thing you most fear never really happens. Nourished for hundreds of years on a literature in which Right invariably triumphs in the last chapter, we believe half-instinctively that evil always defeats itself in the long run. Pacifism, for instance, is founded largely on this belief. Don’t resist evil, and it will somehow destroy itself. But why should it? What evidence is there that it does? And what instance is there of a modern industrialized state collapsing unless conquered from the outside by military force?
Consider for instance the re-institution of slavery. Who could have imagined twenty years ago that slavery would return to Europe? Well, slavery has been restored under our noses. The forced-labour camps all over Europe and North Africa where Poles, Russians, Jews and political prisoners of every race toil at road-making or swamp-draining for their bare rations, are simple chattle slavery. The most one can say is that the buying and selling of slaves by individuals is not yet permitted. In other ways – the breaking-up of families, for instance – the conditions are probably worse than they were on the American cotton plantations. There is no reason for thinking that this state of affairs will change while any totalitarian domination endures. We don’t grasp its full implications, because in our mystical way we feel that a régime founded on slavery must collapse. But it is worth comparing the duration of the slave empires of antiquity with that of any modern state. Civilizations founded on slavery have lasted for such periods as four thousand years.
When I think of antiquity, the detail that frightens me is that those hundreds of millions of slaves on whose backs civilization rested generation after generation have left behind them no record whatever. We do not even know their names. In the whole of Greek and Roman history, how many slaves’ names are known to you? I can think of two, or possibly three. One is Spartacus and the other is Epictetus. Also, in the Roman room at the British Museum there is a glass jar with the maker’s name inscribed on the bottom, ‘Felix fecit’. I have a vivid mental picture of poor Felix (a Gaul with red hair and a metal collar round his neck), but in fact he may not have been a slave; so there are only two slaves whose names I definitely know, and probably few people can remember more. The rest have gone down into utter silence.
History is always with us – these days more than most.
This piece reminded me of another about the Spanish Civil War: Orwell’s “Looking Back on the Spanish War.” Here’s part iv:
The struggle for power between the Spanish Republican parties is an unhappy, far-off thing which I have no wish to revive at this date. I only mention it in order to say: believe nothing, or next to nothing, of what you read about internal affairs on the Government side. It is all, from whatever source, party propaganda – that is to say, lies. The broad truth about the war is simple enough. The Spanish bourgeoisie saw their chance of crushing the labour movement, and took it, aided by the Nazis and by the forces of reaction all over the world. It is doubtful whether more than that will ever be established.
I remember saying once to Arthur Koestler, ‘History stopped in 1936’, at which he nodded in immediate understanding. We were both thinking of totalitarianism in general, but more particularly of the Spanish Civil War. Early in life I had noticed that no event is ever correctly reported in a newspaper, but in Spain, for the first time, I saw newspaper reports which did not bear any relation to the facts, not even the relationship which is implied in an ordinary lie. I saw great battles reported where there had been no fighting, and complete silence where hundreds of men had been killed. I saw troops who had fought bravely denounced as cowards and traitors, and others who had never seen a shot fired hailed as the heroes of imaginary victories, and I saw newspapers in London retailing these lies and eager intellectuals building emotional superstructures over events that had never happened. I saw, in fact, history being written not in terms of what happened but of what ought to have happened according to various ‘party lines’. Yet in a way, horrible as all this was, it was unimportant. It concerned secondary issues – namely, the struggle for power between the Comintern and the Spanish left-wing parties, and the efforts of the Russian Government to prevent revolution in Spain. But the broad picture of the war which the Spanish Government presented to the world was not untruthful. The main issues were what it said they were. But as for the Fascists and their backers, how could they come even as near to the truth as that? How could they possibly mention their real aims? Their version of the war was pure fantasy, and in the circumstances it could not have been otherwise.
The only propaganda line open to the Nazis and Fascists was to represent themselves as Christian patriots saving Spain from a Russian dictatorship. This involved pretending that life in Government Spain was just one long massacre (vide the Catholic Herald or the Daily Mail – but these were child’s play compared with the continental Fascist press), and it involved immensely exaggerating the scale of Russian intervention. Out of the huge pyramid of lies which the Catholic and reactionary press all over the world built up, let me take just one point – the presence in Spain of a Russian army. Devout Franco partisans all believed in this; estimates of its strength went as high as half a million. Now, there was no Russian army in Spain. There may have been a handful of airmen and other technicians, a few hundred at the most, but an army there was not. Some thousands of foreigners who fought in Spain, not to mention millions of Spaniards, were witnesses of this. Well, their testimony made no impression at all upon the Franco propagandists, not one of whom had set foot in Government Spain. Simultaneously these people refused utterly to admit the fact of German or Italian intervention, at the same time as the Germany and Italian press were openly boasting about the exploits of their ‘legionaries’. I have chosen to mention only one point, but in fact the whole of Fascist propaganda about the war was on this level.
This kind of thing is frightening to me, because it often gives me the feeling that the very concept of objective truth is fading out of the world. After all, the chances are that those lies, or at any rate similar lies, will pass into history. How will the history of the Spanish war be written? If Franco remains in power his nominees will write the history books, and (to stick to my chosen point) that Russian army which never existed will become historical fact, and schoolchildren will learn about it generations hence. But suppose Fascism is finally defeated and some kind of democratic government restored in Spain in the fairly near future; even then, how is the history of the war to be written? What kind of records will Franco have left behind him? Suppose even that the records kept on the Government side are recoverable – even so, how is a true history of the war to be written? For, as I have pointed out already, the Government also dealt extensively in lies. From the anti-Fascist angle one could write a broadly truthful history of the war, but it would be a partisan history, unreliable on every minor point. Yet, after all, some kind of history will be written, and after those who actually remember the war are dead, it will be universally accepted. So for all practical purposes the lie will have become truth.
I know it is the fashion to say that most of recorded history is lies anyway. I am willing to believe that history is for the most part inaccurate and biased, but what is peculiar to our own age is the abandonment of the idea that history could be truthfully written. In the past people deliberately lied, or they unconsciously coloured what they wrote, or they struggled after the truth, well knowing that they must make many mistakes; but in each case they believed that ‘the facts’ existed and were more or less discoverable. And in practice there was always a considerable body of fact which would have been agreed to by almost everyone. If you look up the history of the last war in, for instance, the Encyclopaedia Britannica, you will find that a respectable amount of the material is drawn from German sources. A British and a German historian would disagree deeply on many things, even on fundamentals, but there would still be that body of, as it were, neutral fact on which neither would seriously challenge the other. It is just this common basis of agreement, with its implication that human beings are all one species of animal, that totalitarianism destroys. Nazi theory indeed specifically denies that such a thing as ‘the truth’ exists. There is, for instance, no such thing as ‘science’. There is only ‘German science’, ‘Jewish science’ etc. The implied objective of this line of thought is a nightmare world in which the Leader, or some ruling clique, controls not only the future but the past. If the Leader says of such and such an event, ‘It never happened’ – well, it never happened. If he says that two and two are five – well, two and two are five. This prospect frightens me much more than bombs – and after our experiences of the last few years that is not a frivolous statement.
But is it perhaps childish or morbid to terrify oneself with visions of a totalitarian future? Before writing off the totalitarian world as a nightmare that can’t come true, just remember that in 1925 the world of today would have seemed a nightmare that couldn’t come true. Against that shifting phantasmagoric world in which black may be white tomorrow and yesterday’s weather can be changed by decree, there are in reality only two safeguards. One is that however much you deny the truth, the truth goes on existing, as it were, behind your back, and you consequently can’t violate it in ways that impair military efficiency. The other is that so long as some parts of the earth remain unconquered, the liberal tradition can be kept alive. Let Fascism, or possibly even a combination of several Fascisms, conquer the whole world, and those two conditions no longer exist. We in England underrate the danger of this kind of thing, because our traditions and our past security have given us a sentimental belief that it all comes right in the end and the thing you most fear never really happens. Nourished for hundreds of years on a literature in which Right invariably triumphs in the last chapter, we believe half-instinctively that evil always defeats itself in the long run. Pacifism, for instance, is founded largely on this belief. Don’t resist evil, and it will somehow destroy itself. But why should it? What evidence is there that it does? And what instance is there of a modern industrialized state collapsing unless conquered from the outside by military force?
Consider for instance the re-institution of slavery. Who could have imagined twenty years ago that slavery would return to Europe? Well, slavery has been restored under our noses. The forced-labour camps all over Europe and North Africa where Poles, Russians, Jews and political prisoners of every race toil at road-making or swamp-draining for their bare rations, are simple chattle slavery. The most one can say is that the buying and selling of slaves by individuals is not yet permitted. In other ways – the breaking-up of families, for instance – the conditions are probably worse than they were on the American cotton plantations. There is no reason for thinking that this state of affairs will change while any totalitarian domination endures. We don’t grasp its full implications, because in our mystical way we feel that a régime founded on slavery must collapse. But it is worth comparing the duration of the slave empires of antiquity with that of any modern state. Civilizations founded on slavery have lasted for such periods as four thousand years.
When I think of antiquity, the detail that frightens me is that those hundreds of millions of slaves on whose backs civilization rested generation after generation have left behind them no record whatever. We do not even know their names. In the whole of Greek and Roman history, how many slaves’ names are known to you? I can think of two, or possibly three. One is Spartacus and the other is Epictetus. Also, in the Roman room at the British Museum there is a glass jar with the maker’s name inscribed on the bottom, ‘Felix fecit’. I have a vivid mental picture of poor Felix (a Gaul with red hair and a metal collar round his neck), but in fact he may not have been a slave; so there are only two slaves whose names I definitely know, and probably few people can remember more. The rest have gone down into utter silence.
History is always with us – these days more than most.
I will just add that certain things set me off
no worries, we all have our own personal list of those.
There needs to be a plan, not just a list of things we hope will happen.
In general I agree. And, I think folks – by which I mean governors and local leadership – are trying to understand what a good plan looks like. Your suggestions are reasonable, but not necessarily the best idea in all places. And, in places where it’s feasible to do so, lots of places are re-opening, with the kinds of safety precautions that you refer to.
I completely agree that everything about the virus is frustrating. At a. bare minimum. And, I agree that people like to feel competent and able to take care of themselves, so being told they need to stand down from work is, for a lot of people, also frustrating.
It may even be that Whitmer’s latest round of lockdown regulations goes further than they need to go. I don’t know the answer to that, because I don’t know the details of what the lockdown regulations require.
All of that said, the protests in MI put people at risk of infection from a highly contagious virus that is making a lot of people seriously ill, and killing a lot of them. The people involved in the protest appear to be well aware of that, many of them wore masks. And, when they leave the protest site, they will bring whatever they came in contact with there back home with them, to their own families and communities.
Risk your own life, fine. Risk other people’s, much less so.
I have no patience with the gun business. I don’t care about guns per se one way or the other, some people enjoy them, that’s fine, they’re just not interesting to me.
But they have no place whatsoever in any gathering that claims to be a “peaceable assembly”, as protected by the 1st A. There is nothing whatsoever “peaceable” about brandishing semi-automatic rifles at a public gathering. It’s intended to signal some kind of threat about insurrectionist violence if they don’t get their way. Don’t take my word for it, just ask any of them.
The threat itself is actually kind of risible, the dudes on the front steps in Lansing are highly unlikely to actually kill anybody. And it damned well better stay that way, because if and when that ever changes, it will not by god be tolerated, and the camo boys will have some surprises coming to them. But laughable or not, it’s an offense to me, to everyone who doesn’t agree with these dudes, and in fact to the fundamental Lockean concept of liberty that makes it possible for the variety of kinds of people that live together in this country to do so peaceably.
That, and not “you’re not the boss of me”, is the concept of liberty that is what this country was founded on.
Wear camo if that floats your boat, leave the fucking guns at home. You – rhetorical you, not you, Marty – aren’t the boss of us, either, camo boy. Learn to get along with the rest of us and maybe we’ll get somewhere. Threaten the rest of us with violence, however clownishly, and your petitions will fall on deaf ears.
I hope none of those folks get sick, but if they don’t it’ll just be their own dumb luck. If they do get sick, the rest of us will nonetheless do what we can to help them get better.
I will just add that certain things set me off
no worries, we all have our own personal list of those.
There needs to be a plan, not just a list of things we hope will happen.
In general I agree. And, I think folks – by which I mean governors and local leadership – are trying to understand what a good plan looks like. Your suggestions are reasonable, but not necessarily the best idea in all places. And, in places where it’s feasible to do so, lots of places are re-opening, with the kinds of safety precautions that you refer to.
I completely agree that everything about the virus is frustrating. At a. bare minimum. And, I agree that people like to feel competent and able to take care of themselves, so being told they need to stand down from work is, for a lot of people, also frustrating.
It may even be that Whitmer’s latest round of lockdown regulations goes further than they need to go. I don’t know the answer to that, because I don’t know the details of what the lockdown regulations require.
All of that said, the protests in MI put people at risk of infection from a highly contagious virus that is making a lot of people seriously ill, and killing a lot of them. The people involved in the protest appear to be well aware of that, many of them wore masks. And, when they leave the protest site, they will bring whatever they came in contact with there back home with them, to their own families and communities.
Risk your own life, fine. Risk other people’s, much less so.
I have no patience with the gun business. I don’t care about guns per se one way or the other, some people enjoy them, that’s fine, they’re just not interesting to me.
But they have no place whatsoever in any gathering that claims to be a “peaceable assembly”, as protected by the 1st A. There is nothing whatsoever “peaceable” about brandishing semi-automatic rifles at a public gathering. It’s intended to signal some kind of threat about insurrectionist violence if they don’t get their way. Don’t take my word for it, just ask any of them.
The threat itself is actually kind of risible, the dudes on the front steps in Lansing are highly unlikely to actually kill anybody. And it damned well better stay that way, because if and when that ever changes, it will not by god be tolerated, and the camo boys will have some surprises coming to them. But laughable or not, it’s an offense to me, to everyone who doesn’t agree with these dudes, and in fact to the fundamental Lockean concept of liberty that makes it possible for the variety of kinds of people that live together in this country to do so peaceably.
That, and not “you’re not the boss of me”, is the concept of liberty that is what this country was founded on.
Wear camo if that floats your boat, leave the fucking guns at home. You – rhetorical you, not you, Marty – aren’t the boss of us, either, camo boy. Learn to get along with the rest of us and maybe we’ll get somewhere. Threaten the rest of us with violence, however clownishly, and your petitions will fall on deaf ears.
I hope none of those folks get sick, but if they don’t it’ll just be their own dumb luck. If they do get sick, the rest of us will nonetheless do what we can to help them get better.
a correction:
And, in places where it’s feasible to do so, lots of places are re-opening
For “lots of places”, kindly read “a very small number of places”.
It’s gonna be a while before it’s actually safe for all sectors of the economy to ramp back up to pre-COVID levels. It just is. That sucks, but it’s a freaking highly contagious and dangerous disease.
Nobody asked for it, it’s just here, and we’re all just trying to deal with it.
Work with us, camo boys! And maybe we’ll all, or mostly all, get through it.
a correction:
And, in places where it’s feasible to do so, lots of places are re-opening
For “lots of places”, kindly read “a very small number of places”.
It’s gonna be a while before it’s actually safe for all sectors of the economy to ramp back up to pre-COVID levels. It just is. That sucks, but it’s a freaking highly contagious and dangerous disease.
Nobody asked for it, it’s just here, and we’re all just trying to deal with it.
Work with us, camo boys! And maybe we’ll all, or mostly all, get through it.
nous, thank you for the Orwell.
nous, thank you for the Orwell.
I would prefer a clearer staged plan that says which companies can reopen if they follow certain guidelines.
The federal government has (or used to have) the broad and deep expertise at hand to make such plans and provide guidelines to state and local governments. Meanwhile, our so-called president wants to look into the case of Joe Exotic. The executive branch, at the top, as an organization, is a clusterf**k – a revolving door of unqualified sycophants.
I know you don’t like paragraphs about El Naranja, Marty, but he happens to be an enormous problem right now. So it’s a topic.
I would prefer a clearer staged plan that says which companies can reopen if they follow certain guidelines.
The federal government has (or used to have) the broad and deep expertise at hand to make such plans and provide guidelines to state and local governments. Meanwhile, our so-called president wants to look into the case of Joe Exotic. The executive branch, at the top, as an organization, is a clusterf**k – a revolving door of unqualified sycophants.
I know you don’t like paragraphs about El Naranja, Marty, but he happens to be an enormous problem right now. So it’s a topic.
here’s my plan: i’m not going back to work until there’s much less chance of me getting this than of getting the flu. because this is potentially much worse the the flu.
here’s musician Thomas Dolby announcing that the bassist for The Soft Boys died of COVID19:
nothing about that sounds like anything i’m willing to go through, or would wish anyone else would go through, just because some loudmouth assholes with delusions of “tyranny” wants to go buy some fertilizer for their lawn.
here’s my plan: i’m not going back to work until there’s much less chance of me getting this than of getting the flu. because this is potentially much worse the the flu.
here’s musician Thomas Dolby announcing that the bassist for The Soft Boys died of COVID19:
nothing about that sounds like anything i’m willing to go through, or would wish anyone else would go through, just because some loudmouth assholes with delusions of “tyranny” wants to go buy some fertilizer for their lawn.
It may even be that Whitmer’s latest round of lockdown regulations goes further than they need to go.
I hear she’s setting up a new governmental department. The Department of Constitutional Overreach…
It may even be that Whitmer’s latest round of lockdown regulations goes further than they need to go.
I hear she’s setting up a new governmental department. The Department of Constitutional Overreach…
haha! good one, Charles.
Unfortunately, you heard wrong.
haha! good one, Charles.
Unfortunately, you heard wrong.
But somehow every protest seems to be designed to inconvenience someone.
Earlier, you claimed that the protests were just the natural reaction of people who had just had too much and were going out to vent. So which is it? Venting or inconveniencing people?
Though it is great that you added ‘seems to be’. Baby steps.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/17/far-right-coronavirus-protests-restrictions
Placards identified the Michigan Proud Boys as participants in the vehicle convoy. Near the state house, local radio interviewed a man who identified himself as “Phil Odinson”.
In fact the man is Phil Robinson, the prime mover in a group called the Michigan Liberty Militia, whose Facebook page features pictures of firearms, warnings of civil war, celebrations of Norse paganism and memes ultimately sourced from white nationalist groups like Patriot Front.
The pattern of rightwing not-for-profits promoting public protests while still more radical groups use lockdown resistance as a platform for extreme rightwing causes looks set to continue in events advertised in other states over coming days.
In Idaho on Friday, protesters plan to gather at the capitol building in Boise to protest anti-virus restrictions put in place by the Republican governor, Brad Little.
The protest has been heavily promoted by the Idaho Freedom Foundation (IFF), which counts among its donors “dark money” funds linked to the Koch brothers such as Donors Capital Fund, and Castle Rock, a foundation seeded with part of the fortune of Adolph Coors, the rightwing beer magnate.
If these protests are being ginned up by right-wing groups, that ‘seems to’ sounds pretty fucking ominous.
So complaining about anything except the guns seems to be saying they got the attention they wanted.
see above
nous pulled a great section of Orwell and this was amazing
I remember saying once to Arthur Koestler, ‘History stopped in 1936’, at which he nodded in immediate understanding. We were both thinking of totalitarianism in general, but more particularly of the Spanish Civil War. Early in life I had noticed that no event is ever correctly reported in a newspaper, but in Spain, for the first time, I saw newspaper reports which did not bear any relation to the facts, not even the relationship which is implied in an ordinary lie.
The only difference was that this time, the stopping of history was trumpeted as a triumph.
But somehow every protest seems to be designed to inconvenience someone.
Earlier, you claimed that the protests were just the natural reaction of people who had just had too much and were going out to vent. So which is it? Venting or inconveniencing people?
Though it is great that you added ‘seems to be’. Baby steps.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/17/far-right-coronavirus-protests-restrictions
Placards identified the Michigan Proud Boys as participants in the vehicle convoy. Near the state house, local radio interviewed a man who identified himself as “Phil Odinson”.
In fact the man is Phil Robinson, the prime mover in a group called the Michigan Liberty Militia, whose Facebook page features pictures of firearms, warnings of civil war, celebrations of Norse paganism and memes ultimately sourced from white nationalist groups like Patriot Front.
The pattern of rightwing not-for-profits promoting public protests while still more radical groups use lockdown resistance as a platform for extreme rightwing causes looks set to continue in events advertised in other states over coming days.
In Idaho on Friday, protesters plan to gather at the capitol building in Boise to protest anti-virus restrictions put in place by the Republican governor, Brad Little.
The protest has been heavily promoted by the Idaho Freedom Foundation (IFF), which counts among its donors “dark money” funds linked to the Koch brothers such as Donors Capital Fund, and Castle Rock, a foundation seeded with part of the fortune of Adolph Coors, the rightwing beer magnate.
If these protests are being ginned up by right-wing groups, that ‘seems to’ sounds pretty fucking ominous.
So complaining about anything except the guns seems to be saying they got the attention they wanted.
see above
nous pulled a great section of Orwell and this was amazing
I remember saying once to Arthur Koestler, ‘History stopped in 1936’, at which he nodded in immediate understanding. We were both thinking of totalitarianism in general, but more particularly of the Spanish Civil War. Early in life I had noticed that no event is ever correctly reported in a newspaper, but in Spain, for the first time, I saw newspaper reports which did not bear any relation to the facts, not even the relationship which is implied in an ordinary lie.
The only difference was that this time, the stopping of history was trumpeted as a triumph.
haha! good one, Charles.
But not mine.
haha! good one, Charles.
But not mine.
“looking for death…in all the right places”, it seems.
Sounds, almost familiar. And yet SO apropos.
“looking for death…in all the right places”, it seems.
Sounds, almost familiar. And yet SO apropos.
Government coercion in response to health crises — nothing new. I may have seen this link here in the first place, but it’s worth another mention. TL;DNR: just check the section headings, in bold, to see what a dumb joke Charles’s 6:35 is, right along with the “you’re not the boss of me” cosplayers in Michigan and elsewhere.
Two things that, if they turn out to be common (#1), and true in the end (#2), make for a situation almost too dire to imagine:
1. The virus seems to have the potential to attack the body in a lot of ways (the brain, blood vessels, the lungs).
2. If a vaccine can’t be developed…imagine, just for comparison, HIV — but spread by breathing in the same space as someone carrying the virus.
But hey, a bunch of toddlers with automatic weapons can’t be patient until we find out, apparently because us big bad liberals hurt their little fee-fees.
*****
I saw newspaper reports which did not bear any relation to the facts, not even the relationship which is implied in an ordinary lie.
Sounds famliar.
Government coercion in response to health crises — nothing new. I may have seen this link here in the first place, but it’s worth another mention. TL;DNR: just check the section headings, in bold, to see what a dumb joke Charles’s 6:35 is, right along with the “you’re not the boss of me” cosplayers in Michigan and elsewhere.
Two things that, if they turn out to be common (#1), and true in the end (#2), make for a situation almost too dire to imagine:
1. The virus seems to have the potential to attack the body in a lot of ways (the brain, blood vessels, the lungs).
2. If a vaccine can’t be developed…imagine, just for comparison, HIV — but spread by breathing in the same space as someone carrying the virus.
But hey, a bunch of toddlers with automatic weapons can’t be patient until we find out, apparently because us big bad liberals hurt their little fee-fees.
*****
I saw newspaper reports which did not bear any relation to the facts, not even the relationship which is implied in an ordinary lie.
Sounds famliar.
The lack of respect for Genghis Khan is appalling.
For his day, Genghis Kahn was a very forewardthinking monarch. And provided good, competent governance to his people.** Which would leave the far right (and the libertarians) right out.
** A bit rough on the neighbors, admittedly. But none of the current schmucks care about anyone else either.
The lack of respect for Genghis Khan is appalling.
For his day, Genghis Kahn was a very forewardthinking monarch. And provided good, competent governance to his people.** Which would leave the far right (and the libertarians) right out.
** A bit rough on the neighbors, admittedly. But none of the current schmucks care about anyone else either.
The racist Asatruar contingent really get me. They are the most reprehensible possible combination of naziism, romantic nationalism, pseudoscience, occultism, and religion – equal parts Sgt. Rock, Thor, and Mein Kampf with a twist of Golden Dawn for garnish.
Worst LARP ever.
The racist Asatruar contingent really get me. They are the most reprehensible possible combination of naziism, romantic nationalism, pseudoscience, occultism, and religion – equal parts Sgt. Rock, Thor, and Mein Kampf with a twist of Golden Dawn for garnish.
Worst LARP ever.
“But somehow every protest seems to be designed to inconvenience someone.
Earlier, you claimed that the protests were just the natural reaction of people who had just had too much and were going out to vent. So which is it? ”
Both
“But somehow every protest seems to be designed to inconvenience someone.
Earlier, you claimed that the protests were just the natural reaction of people who had just had too much and were going out to vent. So which is it? ”
Both
Interview of a Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital professor and emergency room doctor.
“Faust stresses that attempts to reopen businesses, schools, and other parts of everyday life will need to based on local conditions and that effective containment has to rely on the voluntary participation of people who are given reliable information rather than bullied by political and medical authorities. “It’s not a weather system that we can track beginning, middle, and end,” says Faust. ‘We make the weather. If people believe in what their participation is, it’s a hell of a lot easier to achieve [containment] than through some sort of draconian enforcement.'”
‘We Make the Weather’: Why Voluntary Cooperation Is Key To Battling Coronavirus: Dr. Jeremy S. Faust talks about battling COVID-19 in the emergency room and how to safely reopen American society.
Interview of a Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital professor and emergency room doctor.
“Faust stresses that attempts to reopen businesses, schools, and other parts of everyday life will need to based on local conditions and that effective containment has to rely on the voluntary participation of people who are given reliable information rather than bullied by political and medical authorities. “It’s not a weather system that we can track beginning, middle, and end,” says Faust. ‘We make the weather. If people believe in what their participation is, it’s a hell of a lot easier to achieve [containment] than through some sort of draconian enforcement.'”
‘We Make the Weather’: Why Voluntary Cooperation Is Key To Battling Coronavirus: Dr. Jeremy S. Faust talks about battling COVID-19 in the emergency room and how to safely reopen American society.
CharlesWT thanks for pointing to Ramirez. While what is on his site is not his body of work, it is.. interesting
This one is striking when you realize that he must not have any empathy for anyone else in the world.
https://www.michaelpramirez.com/here-there-and-everywhere-04-13-20.html
He’s also got this thing about stupidity
https://www.michaelpramirez.com/san-francisco-bans-reusable-bags-04-06-20.html
And a not a small bit of yellow peril fever
https://www.michaelpramirez.com/chinas-wet-markets-reopen-04-04-20.html
https://www.michaelpramirez.com/world-health-organization-defends-china-04-18-20.html
https://www.michaelpramirez.com/in-the-pocket-04-03-20.html
https://www.michaelpramirez.com/coronavirus-ground-zero-04-01-20.html
Whatta fucking prat…
CharlesWT thanks for pointing to Ramirez. While what is on his site is not his body of work, it is.. interesting
This one is striking when you realize that he must not have any empathy for anyone else in the world.
https://www.michaelpramirez.com/here-there-and-everywhere-04-13-20.html
He’s also got this thing about stupidity
https://www.michaelpramirez.com/san-francisco-bans-reusable-bags-04-06-20.html
And a not a small bit of yellow peril fever
https://www.michaelpramirez.com/chinas-wet-markets-reopen-04-04-20.html
https://www.michaelpramirez.com/world-health-organization-defends-china-04-18-20.html
https://www.michaelpramirez.com/in-the-pocket-04-03-20.html
https://www.michaelpramirez.com/coronavirus-ground-zero-04-01-20.html
Whatta fucking prat…
slightly out of order
it’s a hell of a lot easier to achieve [containment] than through some sort of draconian enforcement.
I didn’t see anyone getting arrested in these protests. I would think that blocking emergency vehicles is against the law. Of course, putting them all in a holding cell together would guarantee spread, I suppose. It’s like the baseball commisioner saying that pitchers who throw at cheating Astro players are going to get tossed. Hey, dig in, the comissh says it’s cool!
containment has to rely on the voluntary participation of people who are given reliable information
thus ruling out the Fox New demographic.
Marty opines
Both
Maybe you missed it from above, but I was curious about your proposed plan. What should we do? I’m all ears.
slightly out of order
it’s a hell of a lot easier to achieve [containment] than through some sort of draconian enforcement.
I didn’t see anyone getting arrested in these protests. I would think that blocking emergency vehicles is against the law. Of course, putting them all in a holding cell together would guarantee spread, I suppose. It’s like the baseball commisioner saying that pitchers who throw at cheating Astro players are going to get tossed. Hey, dig in, the comissh says it’s cool!
containment has to rely on the voluntary participation of people who are given reliable information
thus ruling out the Fox New demographic.
Marty opines
Both
Maybe you missed it from above, but I was curious about your proposed plan. What should we do? I’m all ears.
I didnt miss it
I didnt miss it
nous, thank you for the Orwell.
Seconded, with feeling. That piece is magnificent. When I first read Milan Kundera’s The Book of Laughter and Forgetting I thought the following was good enough to copy out and put in my commonplace book, but the Orwell (unsurprisingly) is in an entirely different league.
Mirek rewrote history just like the Communist Party, like all political parties, like all peoples, like mankind. They shout that they want to shape a better future, but it’s not true. The future is only an indifferent void no one cares about,but the past is filled with life, and its countenance is irritating, repellent, wounding, to the point that we want to destroy it or repaint it. We want to be the masters of the future only for the power to change the past. We fight for access to the labs where we can retouch photos and rewrite biographies and history.
nous, thank you for the Orwell.
Seconded, with feeling. That piece is magnificent. When I first read Milan Kundera’s The Book of Laughter and Forgetting I thought the following was good enough to copy out and put in my commonplace book, but the Orwell (unsurprisingly) is in an entirely different league.
Mirek rewrote history just like the Communist Party, like all political parties, like all peoples, like mankind. They shout that they want to shape a better future, but it’s not true. The future is only an indifferent void no one cares about,but the past is filled with life, and its countenance is irritating, repellent, wounding, to the point that we want to destroy it or repaint it. We want to be the masters of the future only for the power to change the past. We fight for access to the labs where we can retouch photos and rewrite biographies and history.
That Kundera is pretty good.
I’m always a bit ambivalent about Orwell. I think he’s got some complex contradictions and knots in his thinking that land him a bit further into alliance with colonialism and conservatism than I’m comfortable with. But then when I look at his lived experience, I think that he must have been conflicted about all that himself, and not seen any way of avoiding that.
The sewer man can’t be squeamish about getting into shit or nothing gets fixed.
Which was how I recently ended up registering as a Democrat after years of grumpy independence. They’re the only US party left that owns a pipe wrench and a set of waders.
That Kundera is pretty good.
I’m always a bit ambivalent about Orwell. I think he’s got some complex contradictions and knots in his thinking that land him a bit further into alliance with colonialism and conservatism than I’m comfortable with. But then when I look at his lived experience, I think that he must have been conflicted about all that himself, and not seen any way of avoiding that.
The sewer man can’t be squeamish about getting into shit or nothing gets fixed.
Which was how I recently ended up registering as a Democrat after years of grumpy independence. They’re the only US party left that owns a pipe wrench and a set of waders.
So, just to be clear, you like to ask me questions, but you don’t feel like you should answer any that are asked of you? Noted.
If that’s the case, I’d prefer that you didn’t ask me any questions, which I think is fair. Though I’ve got no idea what you think is fair or not. And I don’t really care…
So, just to be clear, you like to ask me questions, but you don’t feel like you should answer any that are asked of you? Noted.
If that’s the case, I’d prefer that you didn’t ask me any questions, which I think is fair. Though I’ve got no idea what you think is fair or not. And I don’t really care…
lj, good good.
I didnt miss it, I did talk a little about a plan in my 5:04. But if you feel it wasnt responsive I’m ok with not asking you any questions.
Actually, I will go back to avoiding that either way.
lj, good good.
I didnt miss it, I did talk a little about a plan in my 5:04. But if you feel it wasnt responsive I’m ok with not asking you any questions.
Actually, I will go back to avoiding that either way.
I didn’t see anyone getting arrested in these protests. I would think that blocking emergency vehicles is against the law. Of course, putting them all in a holding cell together would guarantee spread, I suppose.
The good news is, since they all don’t believe in distancing, at least they couldn’t complain about being unable to do so.
And it would be focusing the spread among those who are similarly minded. Karma!
I didn’t see anyone getting arrested in these protests. I would think that blocking emergency vehicles is against the law. Of course, putting them all in a holding cell together would guarantee spread, I suppose.
The good news is, since they all don’t believe in distancing, at least they couldn’t complain about being unable to do so.
And it would be focusing the spread among those who are similarly minded. Karma!
They’re [the Democrats are] the only US party left that owns a pipe wrench and a set of waders.
Never mind a pipe wrench and waders. Could we get back to a second party with at least a pair of pliers and sandals?
They’re [the Democrats are] the only US party left that owns a pipe wrench and a set of waders.
Never mind a pipe wrench and waders. Could we get back to a second party with at least a pair of pliers and sandals?
If people believe in what their participation is, it’s a hell of a lot easier to achieve [containment] than through some sort of draconian enforcement.
What if what people “believe” about their participation is based on bad information? What if people don’t have the background or context to make good choices with whatever information they do have?
What if people are motivated by pure self-interest to the point that they don’t really give a crap what effect their actions and decisions have on other people?
Here, on planet earth, people do stupid things. People do selfish things. People do rash and impulsive things. All of those things may harm other people.
With all due respect, libertarians are unbelievably naive.
If people believe in what their participation is, it’s a hell of a lot easier to achieve [containment] than through some sort of draconian enforcement.
What if what people “believe” about their participation is based on bad information? What if people don’t have the background or context to make good choices with whatever information they do have?
What if people are motivated by pure self-interest to the point that they don’t really give a crap what effect their actions and decisions have on other people?
Here, on planet earth, people do stupid things. People do selfish things. People do rash and impulsive things. All of those things may harm other people.
With all due respect, libertarians are unbelievably naive.
The quote is from Dr. Faust who, as far as I can tell, hasn’t identified as libertarian.
The quote is from Dr. Faust who, as far as I can tell, hasn’t identified as libertarian.
For his day, Genghis Kahn was a very forewardthinking monarch.
Contra the impression left by phrases like “Mongol hordes’ we should recognize that the Mongol armies were, in most respects, superior to European forces.
They had better weapons, better communications, better tactics, more mobility, better officers.
For his day, Genghis Kahn was a very forewardthinking monarch.
Contra the impression left by phrases like “Mongol hordes’ we should recognize that the Mongol armies were, in most respects, superior to European forces.
They had better weapons, better communications, better tactics, more mobility, better officers.
And it’s quoted in….?
I doubt that anyone disagrees with the idea that people are more likely to go along with things they believe in.
Unfortunately, that fails to account for a lot of real life.
And it’s quoted in….?
I doubt that anyone disagrees with the idea that people are more likely to go along with things they believe in.
Unfortunately, that fails to account for a lot of real life.
Which was how I recently ended up registering as a Democrat after years of grumpy independence.
It’s never easy.
Nor should it be, I guess.
Which was how I recently ended up registering as a Democrat after years of grumpy independence.
It’s never easy.
Nor should it be, I guess.
One his last point Orwell is a bit mistaken though (and doubly so). The names of numerous slaves of antiquity are indeed on the records. The upper levels of imperial bureaucracy ran on ex-slaves (liberti) and there are discussions whether or not at least one emperor was one himself. Actors and gladiators were majority slave and many of them are known by name.
But the names we know are usually not their birth names but those given to them when they became slaves (if born free). Spartacus was not born under that name. And how could Orwell forget Tiro, Cicero’s secretary and literary executor? When Cicero first mentions him, he still is a slave and we learn about his manumission only later. Btw, ‘Tiro’ simply means ‘recruit’ or ‘apprentice’. When slaves got manumissioned they usually took their master’s name and added their slave name as family name, so Tiro became Marcus Tullius Tiro.
I’d say we could possibly know more names of slaves and ex-slaves than of free commoners* as far as Rome is concerned, if we exclude veteran lists.
*i.e.lower class, not nobility or rich businesspeople
One his last point Orwell is a bit mistaken though (and doubly so). The names of numerous slaves of antiquity are indeed on the records. The upper levels of imperial bureaucracy ran on ex-slaves (liberti) and there are discussions whether or not at least one emperor was one himself. Actors and gladiators were majority slave and many of them are known by name.
But the names we know are usually not their birth names but those given to them when they became slaves (if born free). Spartacus was not born under that name. And how could Orwell forget Tiro, Cicero’s secretary and literary executor? When Cicero first mentions him, he still is a slave and we learn about his manumission only later. Btw, ‘Tiro’ simply means ‘recruit’ or ‘apprentice’. When slaves got manumissioned they usually took their master’s name and added their slave name as family name, so Tiro became Marcus Tullius Tiro.
I’d say we could possibly know more names of slaves and ex-slaves than of free commoners* as far as Rome is concerned, if we exclude veteran lists.
*i.e.lower class, not nobility or rich businesspeople
What if what people “believe” about their participation is based on bad information?
what if it’s all a coordinated astroturf ?
What if what people “believe” about their participation is based on bad information?
what if it’s all a coordinated astroturf ?
George Orwell.
The writer who is useful fodder for every ideological way station along the political continuum from, say, Ayn Rand Hitler way over there, to the Love, Peace, and Hippie Juice Stalinist Collective way over to the other end, all of whom love them some Covid on a windy libertarian day, and then around the back where radical, off-the-charts right and left join up to exchange clubby clever secret handshakes for a friendly pot-luck among fellow assholes.
Utopia … Dystopia … WTFtopia .. he’s your man.
I’ll have to go back and read him again.
I like his “down and out” musings.
He was great on Dickens.
It would be fun if Dickens could reappear just to write a novel with a spot-on supporting emblematic character among the cast of thousands named Orwell U. Topia.
George Orwell.
The writer who is useful fodder for every ideological way station along the political continuum from, say, Ayn Rand Hitler way over there, to the Love, Peace, and Hippie Juice Stalinist Collective way over to the other end, all of whom love them some Covid on a windy libertarian day, and then around the back where radical, off-the-charts right and left join up to exchange clubby clever secret handshakes for a friendly pot-luck among fellow assholes.
Utopia … Dystopia … WTFtopia .. he’s your man.
I’ll have to go back and read him again.
I like his “down and out” musings.
He was great on Dickens.
It would be fun if Dickens could reappear just to write a novel with a spot-on supporting emblematic character among the cast of thousands named Orwell U. Topia.
My only first-hand knowledge of Orwell is having read “1984” in high-school (I think it might have actually been the year 1984) and not being terribly impressed – way too unsubtle for my liking.
Oddly enough I remember liking the film though but that might have been due Hurt, Burton, and having a bit of a crush on Suzanna Hamilton – also the cinematography (Deakins!) and production design was amazing.
Nowadays, Orwell seems to have been co-opted by a particularly annoying type of middle-aged, pseudo-liberal, pseudo-intellectual macho chauvinist, e.g. Hitchens, Packer, Aaronovitch.
My only first-hand knowledge of Orwell is having read “1984” in high-school (I think it might have actually been the year 1984) and not being terribly impressed – way too unsubtle for my liking.
Oddly enough I remember liking the film though but that might have been due Hurt, Burton, and having a bit of a crush on Suzanna Hamilton – also the cinematography (Deakins!) and production design was amazing.
Nowadays, Orwell seems to have been co-opted by a particularly annoying type of middle-aged, pseudo-liberal, pseudo-intellectual macho chauvinist, e.g. Hitchens, Packer, Aaronovitch.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/americans-at-world-health-organization-transmitted-real-time-information-about-coronavirus-to-trump-administration/2020/04/19/951c77fa-818c-11ea-9040-68981f488eed_story.html?outputType=amp
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/americans-at-world-health-organization-transmitted-real-time-information-about-coronavirus-to-trump-administration/2020/04/19/951c77fa-818c-11ea-9040-68981f488eed_story.html?outputType=amp
Speaking of Orwell, I wonder what former commenter double-plus-ungood is up to these days.
Speaking of Orwell, I wonder what former commenter double-plus-ungood is up to these days.
hsh, this can hardly be a surprise. Absent any other (i.e. hard) information, if Trump says something, pretty much anything, the smart bet is that reality is not just different but 180 degrees. (And thus, those who claim he is lost to reality are, technically, incorrect.) See, for example, his habit of accusing his opponents of whatever offensive thing he has done.
So of course WHO had told us. Just as our own intelligence organizations had, independently, told Trump. The only question ever was how long would it take for that to be demonstrated.
hsh, this can hardly be a surprise. Absent any other (i.e. hard) information, if Trump says something, pretty much anything, the smart bet is that reality is not just different but 180 degrees. (And thus, those who claim he is lost to reality are, technically, incorrect.) See, for example, his habit of accusing his opponents of whatever offensive thing he has done.
So of course WHO had told us. Just as our own intelligence organizations had, independently, told Trump. The only question ever was how long would it take for that to be demonstrated.
“That’s why it’s important for those criticizing misguided protesting efforts—including media figures who increasingly appear to be taking the view that you would have to be a deranged rightwinger to want social distancing to end—not to resort to sneering at the less fortunate. (For example: A guest on MSNBC recently called the protesters, “the Fox News Nazi confederate death cult rump of the Republican Party.) These are terrifying times, and the prospect of hundreds of thousands of deaths means there is very good reason for policymakers to proceed cautiously with reopening. But both federal and state governments must consider the long-term practicality of their coronavirus prevention plans, including whether people will be willing to obey stay-at-home orders for much longer.”
Celebrities and the Media Shouldn’t Sneer at Coronavirus Lockdown Protesters: The gatherings are ill-advised but understandable given the harms of government-enforced shutdowns.
“That’s why it’s important for those criticizing misguided protesting efforts—including media figures who increasingly appear to be taking the view that you would have to be a deranged rightwinger to want social distancing to end—not to resort to sneering at the less fortunate. (For example: A guest on MSNBC recently called the protesters, “the Fox News Nazi confederate death cult rump of the Republican Party.) These are terrifying times, and the prospect of hundreds of thousands of deaths means there is very good reason for policymakers to proceed cautiously with reopening. But both federal and state governments must consider the long-term practicality of their coronavirus prevention plans, including whether people will be willing to obey stay-at-home orders for much longer.”
Celebrities and the Media Shouldn’t Sneer at Coronavirus Lockdown Protesters: The gatherings are ill-advised but understandable given the harms of government-enforced shutdowns.
Still laughing at the idea of Christopher Hitchens being any kind of liberal, even a pseudo one (although I do know that, for example, he was called a liberal by that authoritative source, Forbes Magazine).
He described himself as being a socialist, or a Marxist, during most of his adult life (his brother Peter called himm a Stalinist in 2001, which led to an estrangement between them), and even his extraordinary metamorphosis in late life starting with the fatwa against his friend Salman Rushdie, ending with his support for the Iraq war, was so mixed up with other attitudes as to be (unless you were simpleminded) unclassifiable. Just like Bob Dylan says (justifiably) of himself in the song he dropped a couple of days ago, Hitchens contained multitudes. The world is rather poorer for being without his extremely complicated but always stimulating presence in it.
Still laughing at the idea of Christopher Hitchens being any kind of liberal, even a pseudo one (although I do know that, for example, he was called a liberal by that authoritative source, Forbes Magazine).
He described himself as being a socialist, or a Marxist, during most of his adult life (his brother Peter called himm a Stalinist in 2001, which led to an estrangement between them), and even his extraordinary metamorphosis in late life starting with the fatwa against his friend Salman Rushdie, ending with his support for the Iraq war, was so mixed up with other attitudes as to be (unless you were simpleminded) unclassifiable. Just like Bob Dylan says (justifiably) of himself in the song he dropped a couple of days ago, Hitchens contained multitudes. The world is rather poorer for being without his extremely complicated but always stimulating presence in it.
Robby Soave knows not WTF he’s talking about.
Robby Soave knows not WTF he’s talking about.
At the American Conservative, nearly in the same Covid-laced breath, one guy will praise Franco to the sky, ostensibly consigning Orwell to jail or death during the time the latter served leftist militias in Spain, and the next person will condemn the 1984 Orwellian goals of the transgender movement, which is roughly 12 people, if you count KellyAnne Conway.
Orwell is the WD-40 of intellectual argumentation thesea days … when his name comes up, almost any rusty bit of discourse can be set loose.
It’s a wonder Godwin didn’t come up with a cleekism for the guy.
Hitchens was a pip, alcohol infused. As you say GfnNC, he became unclassifiable, but his irreconcilable multitudes were contained in gorgeous sentences, particularly when speaking off the cuff, and whirling like knives against whatever poor soul thought debating him in public might be a good idea.
I would have given anything to have been a fly on the wall when Hitchens, Amis, Rushide, and was it Ian McEwan got together for a pint.
At the American Conservative, nearly in the same Covid-laced breath, one guy will praise Franco to the sky, ostensibly consigning Orwell to jail or death during the time the latter served leftist militias in Spain, and the next person will condemn the 1984 Orwellian goals of the transgender movement, which is roughly 12 people, if you count KellyAnne Conway.
Orwell is the WD-40 of intellectual argumentation thesea days … when his name comes up, almost any rusty bit of discourse can be set loose.
It’s a wonder Godwin didn’t come up with a cleekism for the guy.
Hitchens was a pip, alcohol infused. As you say GfnNC, he became unclassifiable, but his irreconcilable multitudes were contained in gorgeous sentences, particularly when speaking off the cuff, and whirling like knives against whatever poor soul thought debating him in public might be a good idea.
I would have given anything to have been a fly on the wall when Hitchens, Amis, Rushide, and was it Ian McEwan got together for a pint.
Marty and Charles,
You do realize that these protests are pure astroturf, funded by right-wing pro-Trump groups?
It’s not a spontaneous assembly of newly unemployed factory workers, or anything like that. It’s a sponsored Trump campaign rally. Complete with assholes.
Marty and Charles,
You do realize that these protests are pure astroturf, funded by right-wing pro-Trump groups?
It’s not a spontaneous assembly of newly unemployed factory workers, or anything like that. It’s a sponsored Trump campaign rally. Complete with assholes.
Astroturf or not, real people showed up, misguided or not.
Astroturf or not, real people showed up, misguided or not.
these protests are pure astroturf, funded by right-wing pro-Trump groups?
Hence the Confederate flags. Getting to wave them is more important for staffing (I think that’s a justifiable term) these events than pay. That’s the kind of people involved.
these protests are pure astroturf, funded by right-wing pro-Trump groups?
Hence the Confederate flags. Getting to wave them is more important for staffing (I think that’s a justifiable term) these events than pay. That’s the kind of people involved.
I’ll provide my review of the real people who showed up at the Denver Covid wet market exchange demonstration some time tomorrow.
I’m showering at the moment as I have been for the past two hours.
I’m a real person, and I am fucking really pissed off.
I’ll provide my review of the real people who showed up at the Denver Covid wet market exchange demonstration some time tomorrow.
I’m showering at the moment as I have been for the past two hours.
I’m a real person, and I am fucking really pissed off.
Astroturf or not, real people showed up,
right. they had to be real, unless Westworld is already reality.
Astroturf or not, real people showed up,
right. they had to be real, unless Westworld is already reality.
Astroturf or not, real people showed up, misguided or not.
Real people, me among them, have showed up again and again over the past three years to protest, among other things, brutal and vicious policies toward immigrants. No one gave us the megaphone of incessant media attention, magnifying our reach a millionfold. Is it the guns that make the media drool over these people?
Astroturf or not, real people showed up, misguided or not.
Real people, me among them, have showed up again and again over the past three years to protest, among other things, brutal and vicious policies toward immigrants. No one gave us the megaphone of incessant media attention, magnifying our reach a millionfold. Is it the guns that make the media drool over these people?
Astroturf or not, real people showed up, misguided or not.
The militia types are always going to show up for Trump rallies. Covid or not, if someone announced an anti-Whitmer, pro-Trump rally in Lansing these guys were going to be there, waving their effing guns around.
Astroturf or not, real people showed up, misguided or not.
The militia types are always going to show up for Trump rallies. Covid or not, if someone announced an anti-Whitmer, pro-Trump rally in Lansing these guys were going to be there, waving their effing guns around.
Is it the guns that make the media drool over these people?
Well, the potential for widespread violence (however low their apologists argue, in contradiction to their own words, it is) certainly gets media attention. Doing the backgrounder before, instead of after, the news event, if you will.
But possibly the advertising dollars of the protest sponsors don’t hurt either. At the editorial, if not the reporting, level.
Is it the guns that make the media drool over these people?
Well, the potential for widespread violence (however low their apologists argue, in contradiction to their own words, it is) certainly gets media attention. Doing the backgrounder before, instead of after, the news event, if you will.
But possibly the advertising dollars of the protest sponsors don’t hurt either. At the editorial, if not the reporting, level.
I am “real people,” along with all the other “real people” here with whom I mostly agree about COVID-19 and social distancing, about immigration policy, about policy in general.
You might almost start to think that some “real people” count more than others, given the way some people wallow in begrudgery on their behalf.
I am “real people,” along with all the other “real people” here with whom I mostly agree about COVID-19 and social distancing, about immigration policy, about policy in general.
You might almost start to think that some “real people” count more than others, given the way some people wallow in begrudgery on their behalf.
JDT: Yes, everyone who knew him said he was the most brilliant conversationalist in the world, bar none. Better by far in conversation than in writing, and he was no slouch in writing. I wish I could find a long piece Martin Amis wrote about him in the Observer just before he died – it was fantastic, and by no means hagiography.
I don’t know what a pip is, but I’m hoping it’s something good. As for “alcohol infused”, it was so much part of him that it’s hard to regret it, the only really bad thing being that when, fairly late in his life he debated George Galloway (a scoundrel, but no mean orator himself) the booze impaired his brilliance and he did not perform the devastating demolition of which he would have been capable at his best. Ah well.
JDT: Yes, everyone who knew him said he was the most brilliant conversationalist in the world, bar none. Better by far in conversation than in writing, and he was no slouch in writing. I wish I could find a long piece Martin Amis wrote about him in the Observer just before he died – it was fantastic, and by no means hagiography.
I don’t know what a pip is, but I’m hoping it’s something good. As for “alcohol infused”, it was so much part of him that it’s hard to regret it, the only really bad thing being that when, fairly late in his life he debated George Galloway (a scoundrel, but no mean orator himself) the booze impaired his brilliance and he did not perform the devastating demolition of which he would have been capable at his best. Ah well.
Astroturf or not, real people showed up, misguided or not.
All kinds of people showed up. All of them were “real”, some of them were motivated by their own, personal, experience of some level of hardship caused by Whitmer’s regulations.
There were also the Proud Boys, who are basically fascists.
There were, in NH, these farging iceholes, who are not showing up because they were furloughed or are upset about not being able to buy housepaint.
The skeleton mask is a nice touch.
The “however misguided” people need to wake the fuck up and think about whose interests they are furthering.
Astroturf or not, real people showed up, misguided or not.
All kinds of people showed up. All of them were “real”, some of them were motivated by their own, personal, experience of some level of hardship caused by Whitmer’s regulations.
There were also the Proud Boys, who are basically fascists.
There were, in NH, these farging iceholes, who are not showing up because they were furloughed or are upset about not being able to buy housepaint.
The skeleton mask is a nice touch.
The “however misguided” people need to wake the fuck up and think about whose interests they are furthering.
This is for Janie:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xEqSOst1dg8
This is for Orwell and 1984:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aarB12YaAgE
This is for Janie:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xEqSOst1dg8
This is for Orwell and 1984:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aarB12YaAgE
I am so glad I found this! It wasn’t easy.
It is for JDT and for anyone else who is interested, and is the piece Amis wrote about Hitchens as Hitchens was dying. It has much in it that is wonderful, if these are people you are interested in, but what I particularly remembered was this, which I think gets to the heart of one of the very complicated things about Hitchens, and which may have spurred the audacious (to put it kindly), like novakant, to doubt that he was a “real” intellectual:
most literary types, probably, would hope for inclusion somewhere or other on Nabokov’s sliding scale: “I think like a genius, I write like a distinguished author, and I speak like a child.”
Mr Hitchens isn’t like that. Christopher and His Kind runs the title of one of Isherwood’s famous memoirs. And yet this Christopher doesn’t have a kind. Everyone is unique – but Christopher is preternatural. And it may even be that he exactly inverts the Nabokovian paradigm. He thinks like a child (that is to say, his judgments are far more instinctive and moral-visceral than they seem, and are animated by a child’s eager apprehension of what feels just and true); he writes like a distinguished author; and he speaks like a genius.
I am so glad I found this! It wasn’t easy.
It is for JDT and for anyone else who is interested, and is the piece Amis wrote about Hitchens as Hitchens was dying. It has much in it that is wonderful, if these are people you are interested in, but what I particularly remembered was this, which I think gets to the heart of one of the very complicated things about Hitchens, and which may have spurred the audacious (to put it kindly), like novakant, to doubt that he was a “real” intellectual:
most literary types, probably, would hope for inclusion somewhere or other on Nabokov’s sliding scale: “I think like a genius, I write like a distinguished author, and I speak like a child.”
Mr Hitchens isn’t like that. Christopher and His Kind runs the title of one of Isherwood’s famous memoirs. And yet this Christopher doesn’t have a kind. Everyone is unique – but Christopher is preternatural. And it may even be that he exactly inverts the Nabokovian paradigm. He thinks like a child (that is to say, his judgments are far more instinctive and moral-visceral than they seem, and are animated by a child’s eager apprehension of what feels just and true); he writes like a distinguished author; and he speaks like a genius.
“The militia types are always going to show up for Trump rallies.”
Nah, I keep trying to invite them to the Bowling Green Massacre Zeroth Anniversary celebration, but they just wimp out.
“The militia types are always going to show up for Trump rallies.”
Nah, I keep trying to invite them to the Bowling Green Massacre Zeroth Anniversary celebration, but they just wimp out.
but they just wimp out.
Naturally. They prefer their opponents unarmed. Preferably women (because they’ve never encountered a trained woman, presumably) and children. You let them think they would actually have to face someone who could and would fight back. So that’s the last place they would consider going. Their enthusiasm for something that might actually hurt them is on a par with a pro wrestler, at best.
but they just wimp out.
Naturally. They prefer their opponents unarmed. Preferably women (because they’ve never encountered a trained woman, presumably) and children. You let them think they would actually have to face someone who could and would fight back. So that’s the last place they would consider going. Their enthusiasm for something that might actually hurt them is on a par with a pro wrestler, at best.
In short, they are definitely NOT looking for death. At least for themselves.
In short, they are definitely NOT looking for death. At least for themselves.
I actually know a pro wrestler and he’s a really sweet guy. Quite amazing skills, the ability to take the falls etc really requires a high level of training. I’ve done a lot of martial arts and I find that the people who are trained are more often than not quite gentle and do what they can to avoid confrontation.
About these rallies, this from TPM
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/seeing-the-open-the-economy-protests-in-their-proper-light
Look closely and a lot of the turnout is heavily stocked with militia types and the kinds of groups who turned out for the Charlottesville protests a couple years ago. But the bigger thing is that for now they appear highly orchestrated. In Michigan, they appear to be in part in reaction polling showing severe declines in public support for President Trump. They’re organized by groups funded in large part by the DeVos family. These are basically Trump loyalists supporting Trump at his request and mobilized by key rightist groups. The key question, as TPM Reader TS explains, is whether what starts here as orchestrated and largely inorganic takes on a life of its own and gains political traction. They now have Fox and an incumbent President cheering them on as a demonstration of political identity.
Of course, the writers from Reason, who have never met a stray observation that they can’t turn into foundational evidence, won’t bother to peer under that rock.
I actually know a pro wrestler and he’s a really sweet guy. Quite amazing skills, the ability to take the falls etc really requires a high level of training. I’ve done a lot of martial arts and I find that the people who are trained are more often than not quite gentle and do what they can to avoid confrontation.
About these rallies, this from TPM
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/seeing-the-open-the-economy-protests-in-their-proper-light
Look closely and a lot of the turnout is heavily stocked with militia types and the kinds of groups who turned out for the Charlottesville protests a couple years ago. But the bigger thing is that for now they appear highly orchestrated. In Michigan, they appear to be in part in reaction polling showing severe declines in public support for President Trump. They’re organized by groups funded in large part by the DeVos family. These are basically Trump loyalists supporting Trump at his request and mobilized by key rightist groups. The key question, as TPM Reader TS explains, is whether what starts here as orchestrated and largely inorganic takes on a life of its own and gains political traction. They now have Fox and an incumbent President cheering them on as a demonstration of political identity.
Of course, the writers from Reason, who have never met a stray observation that they can’t turn into foundational evidence, won’t bother to peer under that rock.
The Washington Post is now stepping up in reporting on the goons.
The Washington Post is now stepping up in reporting on the goons.
Well, they are wearing camo.
You can’t see them to even shoot at.
Even the big fat guys who blend in to the background Vietnamese gook jungle they so miss, and probably did miss, having Limbaugh and Cheney anal cysts or Trump’s ingrown toenails at that very time, are probably closer to fatal coronaries (in the coal mine) than Rapture via the Covid Godsend.
Well, they are wearing camo.
You can’t see them to even shoot at.
Even the big fat guys who blend in to the background Vietnamese gook jungle they so miss, and probably did miss, having Limbaugh and Cheney anal cysts or Trump’s ingrown toenails at that very time, are probably closer to fatal coronaries (in the coal mine) than Rapture via the Covid Godsend.
I ran across a couple of Orwell’s essay collections in college and was amazed by them. He was incredibly good at writing thoughtful essays. Thanks for the excerpt, nous.
I ran across a couple of Orwell’s essay collections in college and was amazed by them. He was incredibly good at writing thoughtful essays. Thanks for the excerpt, nous.
My favorite—
http://www.george-orwell.org/Notes_on_Nationalism/0.html
You have to read it remembering that it applies in varying degrees to every part of the political spectrum, especially including one’s own. Though of course the fun is in thinking how it applies to all those other idiots who think differently from your own group. The part about atrocities is dead on.
“Nationalism” wasn’t the best label. One could just say “ ideologue” or “ political partisan”.
My favorite—
http://www.george-orwell.org/Notes_on_Nationalism/0.html
You have to read it remembering that it applies in varying degrees to every part of the political spectrum, especially including one’s own. Though of course the fun is in thinking how it applies to all those other idiots who think differently from your own group. The part about atrocities is dead on.
“Nationalism” wasn’t the best label. One could just say “ ideologue” or “ political partisan”.
I actually know a pro wrestler and he’s a really sweet guy. Quite amazing skills, the ability to take the falls etc really requires a high level of training. I’ve done a lot of martial arts and I find that the people who are trained are more often than not quite gentle and do what they can to avoid confrontation
lj, my point was that, off stage, they generally don’t even pretend to go looking for fights. Like, in that way, the militia types. Except that, unlike the militia types, they don’t go looking for no-risk massacres either.
I actually know a pro wrestler and he’s a really sweet guy. Quite amazing skills, the ability to take the falls etc really requires a high level of training. I’ve done a lot of martial arts and I find that the people who are trained are more often than not quite gentle and do what they can to avoid confrontation
lj, my point was that, off stage, they generally don’t even pretend to go looking for fights. Like, in that way, the militia types. Except that, unlike the militia types, they don’t go looking for no-risk massacres either.
Frum considers them Trump’s plan B.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/04/trump-trading-lives-poor-economic-growth/610264/
Frum considers them Trump’s plan B.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/04/trump-trading-lives-poor-economic-growth/610264/
The 1919 San Francisco Anti Mask League….
https://twitter.com/timkmak/status/1251936242834563073
The 1919 San Francisco Anti Mask League….
https://twitter.com/timkmak/status/1251936242834563073
Thanks wj. not sure precisely what I was reacting to. Maybe something along the lines of ‘if they are ostentatiously carrying firearms, they have automatically ruled themselves out in terms of from representing those that some here are so concerned need representing’, and because they are so concerned with engaging in a pissing contest, you can’t really take what they are doing at face value.
Thanks wj. not sure precisely what I was reacting to. Maybe something along the lines of ‘if they are ostentatiously carrying firearms, they have automatically ruled themselves out in terms of from representing those that some here are so concerned need representing’, and because they are so concerned with engaging in a pissing contest, you can’t really take what they are doing at face value.
As I said, sneak attack with itching powder seems to me the most appropriate for this kind of guys. Just keep out of (gun) sight.
As I said, sneak attack with itching powder seems to me the most appropriate for this kind of guys. Just keep out of (gun) sight.
Hartmut,
for a truly effective itching powder sneak attack, you should enlist the help of the Underwear Gnomes, because that’s the best target.
Hartmut,
for a truly effective itching powder sneak attack, you should enlist the help of the Underwear Gnomes, because that’s the best target.
Where’s the profit in that?
Where’s the profit in that?
Read Nigel’s Frum piece, please:
I’ve been remiss the last couple of days by not recapping the murderer’s campaign whistle stops from the safety of his protective fascist republican bubble wrap.
Here is the lout fuck killer gazing from on high, the same view favored by Charles Whitman and Stephen Paddock, peering down at the Marty, McKinney, bc, Orwell, Thullen, Russell, Donald, Slart, Sebastian and Janie little specks, the inconsequential monads, skittering about below.
He’s musing about which ones will die. All are inconsequential to him, but some may be temporarily useful to him … until they are not.
I don’t know how he, the vermin fuck elected by real people fucks, can tell the difference from that view regarding which one is which. Even the real people dots who elected him to murder their “other” real people enemies are difficult to distinguish from ……… their enemies.
All are inconsequential specks.
The dots APPEAR identical and equal from that imperious, sociopathic, penthouse view. It appears he can’t tell one from another which except by polling data compiled by neutral, humane observers KellyAnne Conway, Stephen Miller, Mitch McConnell, and Lindsay Graham, so the choosing of who lives and who dies IS happening via method, as are the blessings fake Christian murderer Mike Pence is malignly and non-randomly bestowing upon His chosen dots.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21h0G_gU9Tw
It is interesting that the dots far below could bring their killer far above into clearer focus via mounted precision scopes and lenses, but the “real people” among the dots who carry such equipment in public instead are viewing the “other” real people dots next to them, now targets, through those instruments.
Read Nigel’s Frum piece, please:
I’ve been remiss the last couple of days by not recapping the murderer’s campaign whistle stops from the safety of his protective fascist republican bubble wrap.
Here is the lout fuck killer gazing from on high, the same view favored by Charles Whitman and Stephen Paddock, peering down at the Marty, McKinney, bc, Orwell, Thullen, Russell, Donald, Slart, Sebastian and Janie little specks, the inconsequential monads, skittering about below.
He’s musing about which ones will die. All are inconsequential to him, but some may be temporarily useful to him … until they are not.
I don’t know how he, the vermin fuck elected by real people fucks, can tell the difference from that view regarding which one is which. Even the real people dots who elected him to murder their “other” real people enemies are difficult to distinguish from ……… their enemies.
All are inconsequential specks.
The dots APPEAR identical and equal from that imperious, sociopathic, penthouse view. It appears he can’t tell one from another which except by polling data compiled by neutral, humane observers KellyAnne Conway, Stephen Miller, Mitch McConnell, and Lindsay Graham, so the choosing of who lives and who dies IS happening via method, as are the blessings fake Christian murderer Mike Pence is malignly and non-randomly bestowing upon His chosen dots.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21h0G_gU9Tw
It is interesting that the dots far below could bring their killer far above into clearer focus via mounted precision scopes and lenses, but the “real people” among the dots who carry such equipment in public instead are viewing the “other” real people dots next to them, now targets, through those instruments.
and in Ohio, these guys showed up.
and in Ohio, these guys showed up.
Thanks Donald, for the Orwell essay.
I value your presence here, regretting only its intermittent frequency.
I agree with everything Orwell wrote in the essay, including those bits and categories that apply to me, but I am self-aware enough to see that they apply.
We live in a binary time, so one must get thee self into one category or another, for fear of getting caught in the crossfire.
Orwell also agrees with everything he himself wrote, including those sections that apply to him while he was fighting in the service of the pro-Republic militias.
Here’s some Orwellian commentary applied to Orwell, who of course is indispensable, not in spite of, but because is all too human.
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/may/06/george-orwell-homage-to-catalonia-account-spanish-civil-war-wrong
By the way, corporations are real people too, but with bigger budgets, offshore financial hidey holes, and tax loopholes not available to me.
They don’t appear as dots like I do from Mitt Romney’s point of view.
Thanks Donald, for the Orwell essay.
I value your presence here, regretting only its intermittent frequency.
I agree with everything Orwell wrote in the essay, including those bits and categories that apply to me, but I am self-aware enough to see that they apply.
We live in a binary time, so one must get thee self into one category or another, for fear of getting caught in the crossfire.
Orwell also agrees with everything he himself wrote, including those sections that apply to him while he was fighting in the service of the pro-Republic militias.
Here’s some Orwellian commentary applied to Orwell, who of course is indispensable, not in spite of, but because is all too human.
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/may/06/george-orwell-homage-to-catalonia-account-spanish-civil-war-wrong
By the way, corporations are real people too, but with bigger budgets, offshore financial hidey holes, and tax loopholes not available to me.
They don’t appear as dots like I do from Mitt Romney’s point of view.
From cleek’s link:
The harm to the economy from the shut-downs is nothing compared to what the harm, both economic and otherwise, would be from the virus if allowed to have its way with us. In that light, the shut-downs are a net benefit, economic and otherwise, because you can’t pretend the virus isn’t now part of the baseline against which you’re measuring the results of various courses of action. The harm is from the virus.
From cleek’s link:
The harm to the economy from the shut-downs is nothing compared to what the harm, both economic and otherwise, would be from the virus if allowed to have its way with us. In that light, the shut-downs are a net benefit, economic and otherwise, because you can’t pretend the virus isn’t now part of the baseline against which you’re measuring the results of various courses of action. The harm is from the virus.
Astroturf:
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2020/04/jacinda-ardern-new-zealand-leadership-coronavirus/610237/
As the professional games of baseball and football found out, Astroturf leads to career-ending injuries.
Conservative liars, are there any other kind, want you belief that this bowel movement, shat from the colons of anonymous fascist plutocrats and operatives, has grass roots.
The whole point of Astroturf is to avoid grass roots, while looking like the real thing.
Like Trump’s hair plugs and KellyAnne’s dark roots, all of it is fake, except for the dog shit, because republican dogs will shit on any surface.
Astroturf:
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2020/04/jacinda-ardern-new-zealand-leadership-coronavirus/610237/
As the professional games of baseball and football found out, Astroturf leads to career-ending injuries.
Conservative liars, are there any other kind, want you belief that this bowel movement, shat from the colons of anonymous fascist plutocrats and operatives, has grass roots.
The whole point of Astroturf is to avoid grass roots, while looking like the real thing.
Like Trump’s hair plugs and KellyAnne’s dark roots, all of it is fake, except for the dog shit, because republican dogs will shit on any surface.
Wrong link there, although the New Zealand article should be read too.
Here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_turf
I’m always twenty cites ahead of my opportunity to use them.
Wrong link there, although the New Zealand article should be read too.
Here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_turf
I’m always twenty cites ahead of my opportunity to use them.
Gohmert needs to be put through a different sort of misting therapy:
https://juanitajean.com/louie-gohmert-he-can-even-make-germans-laugh/
Red States elect mass murderers.
Gohmert needs to be put through a different sort of misting therapy:
https://juanitajean.com/louie-gohmert-he-can-even-make-germans-laugh/
Red States elect mass murderers.
How large is the largest protest and exactly how many protests have there been?
The two pics I’ve seen–LJ’s and Cleek’s–show classroom sized crowds of patent losers.
What is the big deal? These clowns don’t even qualify as pikers compared to OWS and Antifa.
Talk about pearl-clutching.
Anyone with half a brain is sheltering in place, and wearing masks and gloves when forced to go out. Exploding heads over this small crowd of yahoos doesn’t make any sense. The very worst case is that they make each other sick. They are no threat to anyone who stays home.
How large is the largest protest and exactly how many protests have there been?
The two pics I’ve seen–LJ’s and Cleek’s–show classroom sized crowds of patent losers.
What is the big deal? These clowns don’t even qualify as pikers compared to OWS and Antifa.
Talk about pearl-clutching.
Anyone with half a brain is sheltering in place, and wearing masks and gloves when forced to go out. Exploding heads over this small crowd of yahoos doesn’t make any sense. The very worst case is that they make each other sick. They are no threat to anyone who stays home.
They are no threat to anyone who stays home.
Not true. They are a threat to the people in the ambulances they block. And they are a threat to everyone if they spread the virus further. Sheltering in place and wearing masks and gloves is no perfect solution. It’s as perfect as can be when everyone does it. It’s becomes less and less perfect as more people don’t do it.
They are no threat to anyone who stays home.
Not true. They are a threat to the people in the ambulances they block. And they are a threat to everyone if they spread the virus further. Sheltering in place and wearing masks and gloves is no perfect solution. It’s as perfect as can be when everyone does it. It’s becomes less and less perfect as more people don’t do it.
Regime cleavage…Mckinney looks at the protests and sees OWS; I look and I see OKC.
Regime cleavage…Mckinney looks at the protests and sees OWS; I look and I see OKC.
I should add that everyone can’t simply stay home. They’ll starve eventually. Someone has to go get the food, even if it’s a delivery service.
I should add that everyone can’t simply stay home. They’ll starve eventually. Someone has to go get the food, even if it’s a delivery service.
You don’t need as many bodies on the front lines when the bodies are carrying semi-automatic military grade weaponry as opposed to say, as in OWS’ case, holstering loaded cans of pinto beans for those potential gas attacks.
And where is Antifa?
They’ve got the masks, so what’s up?
You don’t need as many bodies on the front lines when the bodies are carrying semi-automatic military grade weaponry as opposed to say, as in OWS’ case, holstering loaded cans of pinto beans for those potential gas attacks.
And where is Antifa?
They’ve got the masks, so what’s up?
What have OWS and Antifa been doing during the pandemic? It’s not just about the numbers of people. It’s about the context.
Besides that, heads exploding = writing stuff on a blog.
What have OWS and Antifa been doing during the pandemic? It’s not just about the numbers of people. It’s about the context.
Besides that, heads exploding = writing stuff on a blog.
Speaking of masks, in the first photographs of the Michigan clowns, several were wearing medical masks with their camo and popguns.
In the photos since, those particular guys are either missing or have removed their masks.
Was this a decision made by the militias, fearing they were sending a mixed message (I’ll shoot ya, but I’m not gonna breath on ya, seems a trifle touchy in the wrong direction) or did the media photographers counsel the militias that they would be more scarily in-character photogenic if they got rid of the masks.
I’m working on my post regarding my visit to the Denver hoopdeedo yesterday.
It will be impressionistic mostly, for the impressionable.
Also, a much longer one on Wet Markets the world over, including not so long ago on Fulton Street in NYC, since moved way up town.
Don’t say I didn’t warn ya.
Speaking of masks, in the first photographs of the Michigan clowns, several were wearing medical masks with their camo and popguns.
In the photos since, those particular guys are either missing or have removed their masks.
Was this a decision made by the militias, fearing they were sending a mixed message (I’ll shoot ya, but I’m not gonna breath on ya, seems a trifle touchy in the wrong direction) or did the media photographers counsel the militias that they would be more scarily in-character photogenic if they got rid of the masks.
I’m working on my post regarding my visit to the Denver hoopdeedo yesterday.
It will be impressionistic mostly, for the impressionable.
Also, a much longer one on Wet Markets the world over, including not so long ago on Fulton Street in NYC, since moved way up town.
Don’t say I didn’t warn ya.
“COVID-19 lockdown protests are spreading and so is misinformation about them. As a series of demonstrations against COVID-19 lockdown orders sweep the U.S., protesters have shown wildly varying degrees of responsibility and realism. Some have been staying 6 feet from others or even protesting from within cars, while simply asking for some shutdown leeway for local businesses and entrepreneurs who are willing to take extra steps to keep pandemic-times customers safe. Alas, others have been crowding up against each other in large numbers—without masks or any other precautions—while suggesting that the entire coronavirus outbreak might be a hoax.
…
After last week’s protest around the Michigan Capitol, a picture of someone holding a large swastika flag that said “TRUMP PENCE” began circulating on social media as a sign of the supposed Nazi leanings of Trump supporters and the people protesting. But after some viral outrage about the kind of people the conservative organizers of these protests were in cahoots with, it turns out that the picture in question actually came from a March 2 Bernie Sanders rally in Boise, Idaho.”
Don’t Get Fooled by Fake Photos of Coronavirus Lockdown Protests: Plus: Drudge challenges Trump on traffic claims, France taxes links, COVID-19 in Ohio prisons, and more…
“COVID-19 lockdown protests are spreading and so is misinformation about them. As a series of demonstrations against COVID-19 lockdown orders sweep the U.S., protesters have shown wildly varying degrees of responsibility and realism. Some have been staying 6 feet from others or even protesting from within cars, while simply asking for some shutdown leeway for local businesses and entrepreneurs who are willing to take extra steps to keep pandemic-times customers safe. Alas, others have been crowding up against each other in large numbers—without masks or any other precautions—while suggesting that the entire coronavirus outbreak might be a hoax.
…
After last week’s protest around the Michigan Capitol, a picture of someone holding a large swastika flag that said “TRUMP PENCE” began circulating on social media as a sign of the supposed Nazi leanings of Trump supporters and the people protesting. But after some viral outrage about the kind of people the conservative organizers of these protests were in cahoots with, it turns out that the picture in question actually came from a March 2 Bernie Sanders rally in Boise, Idaho.”
Don’t Get Fooled by Fake Photos of Coronavirus Lockdown Protests: Plus: Drudge challenges Trump on traffic claims, France taxes links, COVID-19 in Ohio prisons, and more…
The two pics I’ve seen–LJ’s and Cleek’s–show classroom sized crowds of patent losers.
My picture was a link to a video report that began
Thousands of protesters in cars and on foot have flouted Michigan’s stay-at-home orders to demand the state reopened.
But you know how these liberal newspapers lie.
Charles writes
Alas, others have been crowding up against each other in large numbers—without masks or any other precautions—while suggesting that the entire coronavirus outbreak might be a hoax.
Alas, you lie down with dogs, you are going to get fleas.
The two pics I’ve seen–LJ’s and Cleek’s–show classroom sized crowds of patent losers.
My picture was a link to a video report that began
Thousands of protesters in cars and on foot have flouted Michigan’s stay-at-home orders to demand the state reopened.
But you know how these liberal newspapers lie.
Charles writes
Alas, others have been crowding up against each other in large numbers—without masks or any other precautions—while suggesting that the entire coronavirus outbreak might be a hoax.
Alas, you lie down with dogs, you are going to get fleas.
OWS?
Other Way, Sucka?
One World Socks?
I try to keep up but there’s a lot to keep up with.
Also, show of hands – who has actually ever seen an Antifa person in real life, i.e. not on TV or YouTube?
My hand’s up FWIW. Anybody else?
classroom sized crowds of patent losers.
In MI, not people. Cars.
They are no threat to anyone who stays home.
Except the people who stay home with them. And the people who can’t stay home, that they encounter.
Watch for COVID spikes in MI, OH, and elsewhere over the next two weeks. KY is already seeing it.
OWS?
Other Way, Sucka?
One World Socks?
I try to keep up but there’s a lot to keep up with.
Also, show of hands – who has actually ever seen an Antifa person in real life, i.e. not on TV or YouTube?
My hand’s up FWIW. Anybody else?
classroom sized crowds of patent losers.
In MI, not people. Cars.
They are no threat to anyone who stays home.
Except the people who stay home with them. And the people who can’t stay home, that they encounter.
Watch for COVID spikes in MI, OH, and elsewhere over the next two weeks. KY is already seeing it.
To McKinney’s point about the small numbers of fringy knuckleheads, from Nigel’s Atlantic link:
To McKinney’s point about the small numbers of fringy knuckleheads, from Nigel’s Atlantic link:
Kentucky.
Is the increase of cases related to the protests? I.e., do protestors, or people who have been in contact with protestors, figure disproportionately among those getting sick?
I don’t know.
Is it asinine to gather publicly in unsafe ways to protest measures against the spread of the virus *while the number of cases in your community are spiking*?
I know my answer to that question.
Look at who is sponsoring this stuff and ask yourself if you think they are interested in helping working folks get through this in one piece, healthy and without financial hardship.
People need to wise the hell up.
Kentucky.
Is the increase of cases related to the protests? I.e., do protestors, or people who have been in contact with protestors, figure disproportionately among those getting sick?
I don’t know.
Is it asinine to gather publicly in unsafe ways to protest measures against the spread of the virus *while the number of cases in your community are spiking*?
I know my answer to that question.
Look at who is sponsoring this stuff and ask yourself if you think they are interested in helping working folks get through this in one piece, healthy and without financial hardship.
People need to wise the hell up.
OWS = Occupy Wall Street
OWS = Occupy Wall Street
Just as here in soon-to-be-extinct America, you have fascist leaders in power leading the protests in favor of Covid-19, their demagoguery interrupted only by their incessant coughing.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-brazil/brazils-bolsonaro-attacks-coronavirus-lockdowns-as-supporters-take-to-streets-idUSKBN2210V1
It’s a well-organized murderous world wide movement, no different there than it is here.
It’s not how many humans Bolsonaro, not only a Covid-19 victim, but a pro-virus partisan, will kill with the Covid droplets in his coughing, it’s how many Brazilians will it take to kill Bolsonaro?
One … to pull the trigger.
The rest have their thumbs up their asses.
Just as here in soon-to-be-extinct America, you have fascist leaders in power leading the protests in favor of Covid-19, their demagoguery interrupted only by their incessant coughing.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-brazil/brazils-bolsonaro-attacks-coronavirus-lockdowns-as-supporters-take-to-streets-idUSKBN2210V1
It’s a well-organized murderous world wide movement, no different there than it is here.
It’s not how many humans Bolsonaro, not only a Covid-19 victim, but a pro-virus partisan, will kill with the Covid droplets in his coughing, it’s how many Brazilians will it take to kill Bolsonaro?
One … to pull the trigger.
The rest have their thumbs up their asses.
Really chaps my ass that these media outlets aren’t covering Occupy Wall Street and Antifa’s running rampant (cause I know they have to be, McT said they were and he wouldn’t fib) while just showing these losers.
Here’s a Texas classroom, but I guess things are always bigger in Texas…
https://twitter.com/mannyNYT/status/1251564861257113602?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1251564861257113602&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Ftwitter.com%2FmannyNYT%2Fstatus%2F1251564861257113602
Really chaps my ass that these media outlets aren’t covering Occupy Wall Street and Antifa’s running rampant (cause I know they have to be, McT said they were and he wouldn’t fib) while just showing these losers.
Here’s a Texas classroom, but I guess things are always bigger in Texas…
https://twitter.com/mannyNYT/status/1251564861257113602?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1251564861257113602&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Ftwitter.com%2FmannyNYT%2Fstatus%2F1251564861257113602
OWS = Occupy Wall Street
ok, thanks. the relevance is unclear, but I appreciate the 411.
Also, Ohio.
Nice guys.
OWS = Occupy Wall Street
ok, thanks. the relevance is unclear, but I appreciate the 411.
Also, Ohio.
Nice guys.
And I’m wondering if McT caught Alex Jones’ visit.
https://twitter.com/mannyNYT/status/1251562213774692353
Harass a Sandy Hook parent, do an anti lockdown protest, hawk some colloidal silver. busy busy busy. Give him Obwi’s best McT…
And I’m wondering if McT caught Alex Jones’ visit.
https://twitter.com/mannyNYT/status/1251562213774692353
Harass a Sandy Hook parent, do an anti lockdown protest, hawk some colloidal silver. busy busy busy. Give him Obwi’s best McT…
Note in the Bolsonaro link:
The same pro-viral Bolsonaro protesters demanding freedom from social distancing and the stay-at-home strategies call for a return to murderous authoritarian military rule called AI-5, and please confuse it with AR-15.
The deadly incoherence of the worldwide murderous conservative movement never fails.
Note in the Bolsonaro link:
The same pro-viral Bolsonaro protesters demanding freedom from social distancing and the stay-at-home strategies call for a return to murderous authoritarian military rule called AI-5, and please confuse it with AR-15.
The deadly incoherence of the worldwide murderous conservative movement never fails.
Drudge?
Now feuding with trump and limbaugh and company.
Fuck him too .. hard.
Swiftboater, trafficker in Russian/Eastern European astroturfing against Hillary, including fucking lies repeated here regarding her health during the 2016 campaign, which she did NOT fucking lie about (yeah, Clinton’s flu was a brain tumor, long cancer, terminal syphilis, but Covid-19? .. nothin to see here) race baiting against the Muslim witch doctor in the White House, on and on.
Puke.
Drudge will be hung by the neck alongside the rest of them when things go twist. Do I need to add “literally”?
His little Trotsky act now does not convince.
To misquote Joe Cocker: “He can leave his dumb hat on.”
Drudge?
Now feuding with trump and limbaugh and company.
Fuck him too .. hard.
Swiftboater, trafficker in Russian/Eastern European astroturfing against Hillary, including fucking lies repeated here regarding her health during the 2016 campaign, which she did NOT fucking lie about (yeah, Clinton’s flu was a brain tumor, long cancer, terminal syphilis, but Covid-19? .. nothin to see here) race baiting against the Muslim witch doctor in the White House, on and on.
Puke.
Drudge will be hung by the neck alongside the rest of them when things go twist. Do I need to add “literally”?
His little Trotsky act now does not convince.
To misquote Joe Cocker: “He can leave his dumb hat on.”
I can’t tell. Is everything getting funnier, or is everything going the opposite way?:
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/russia-coronavirus-protest
I can’t tell. Is everything getting funnier, or is everything going the opposite way?:
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/russia-coronavirus-protest
Ok, I found this funny, but I apologize if you do not. Via Hank Smith. I think it captures, for lack of a better word, the absurdity of the situation. Models predicting nothing, yet real reports from real health care workers to be concerned, arrests for playing in the park but you can purchase lottery tickets, etc.:
Coronavirus guidelines (maybe rules). You may be prosecuted for breaking these rules depending on the county and state in which you live. However, always remember that the federal government is in charge.
1. You cannot & should not leave the house for any reason, but if you have to, then you can. You are free to stay home, you are not free to leave home. So STAY HOME. But it’s important to go out sometimes.
2. Masks are not useful if you are sick, but maybe you should wear one, it can save you, but it is mandatory as well. You will definitely not get sick with a mask, but you may still die. When you do go out, which you shouldn’t, keep a social distance of 6 to 100 feet. You must be 6 feet behind the next person in a line, however, you can be right next to the person in the line right next to your line. The virus does not travel side to side.
3. Stores are closed, except those that are open. Essential employees must work, even in stores that should be closed, but have chosen to remain open. Do not lay off any employees. The federal government will pay your employees so you don’t have to lay anyone off. However, if you do or do not lay them off, you may qualify for a federal grant which you may or may not need to pay back. See Rule 1.
4. You should not go to a hospital unless you have to go there. Same applies to a doctor’s office, you should only go there in case of an emergency, provided you are not too sick. Do not leave the house if you are sick. See Rule 1.
5. This virus is deadly, but not too scary, except that it will lead to a global disaster. We can contain it unless we can’t, then we will no longer try to contain it. If you want to be tested, breathe on a celebrity or professional athlete, and then wait for them to get tested and announce the results on Twitter.
6. Gloves won’t help, but they can still help. You don’t need to wear gloves unless you want to live.
7. There is no reason for shortages in the supermarkets, but there are many things missing when you go there in the evening, but not in the morning. Sometimes. Also, only at risk people should go in the morning. Lastly, do not hoard toilet paper. However, even if you aren’t a toilet paper hoarder, you may want to hoard it because other hoarders are hoarding it.
8. All borders are closed unless you need to come back into the country from a foreign country or unless you need to travel to a foreign country. After returning to your home country, quarantine for 14 days with your family. Your family can still go out, but they should choose to not go out once a day if possible.
9. The virus has no effect on children except those children it affects. Schools should be closed until the end of March, no, end of April, no, end of May, no, schools should only soft-close. Schools will offer free breakfast and lunch, except the schools which charge. Your children must be with you to get a free meal from the school, but remember to not take children with you when you go.
10. Animals are not affected, but there was a cat which tested positive in Belgium in February when no human had been tested, plus a few tigers here and there. Dogs are immune so the World Health Organization (or WHO) let the dogs out. When you choose to go for a walk, all animals must be on a leash. Pets may go outside, but you should not.
11. You will have many symptoms when you are sick, but you can also get sick without symptoms, have symptoms without being sick, or be contagious without having symptoms. Those who are not sick are spreading the virus more than those who are sick. If you are sick, quarantine yourself for 14 days. If you lose your sense of taste, you have probably had the virus before it was known to be in your country.
12. In order not to get sick, you have to eat well and exercise, but eat whatever you have at home because it’s better not to go out. Remember, heart disease is still killing more people per day than the virus, but there are days it does not. Lastly, please support restaurants by eating out three times per week.
13. It’s better to get some fresh air, but you get glared at when you do so, and most importantly, don’t go to playgrounds. Don’t sit down outside, except you can do that if you are old or pregnant, but not for too long. Do not travel the opposite direction on a one way sidewalk. If you walk passed your house, go all the way around the block. See Rule 1.
14 You can walk around with a friend but not with your family if they don’t live under the same roof. You may drive with your family, but not with your friends. Lastly, do not leave your county. If you travel across state lines, you may be stopped and questioned by the state you are leaving and the state you are entering. Truck drivers are exempted from rule 14, provided they have proper documentation, unless they are in the county of their residence, then no documentation is needed. See Rule 1.
15 The virus remains active on surfaces for 2 hours, no, 6, no, 14 days. It thrives in humidity, but not necessarily. It may die in warm weather, but it may also flourish in warm weather. We will definitely see a decrease in cases during the summer, but an increase in the winter, then a possible decrease next summer. This summer we will likely not see a slowdown in the number of deaths.
16 Stay quarantined until the virus disappears and then we can achieve collective immunity which, in order to occur, we must not be quarantined. The economy should be running fully by the end of May or Fall of 2041.
Got it?
Good.
Stay healthy everyone.
And God bless America. See Rule 1.
Ok, I found this funny, but I apologize if you do not. Via Hank Smith. I think it captures, for lack of a better word, the absurdity of the situation. Models predicting nothing, yet real reports from real health care workers to be concerned, arrests for playing in the park but you can purchase lottery tickets, etc.:
Coronavirus guidelines (maybe rules). You may be prosecuted for breaking these rules depending on the county and state in which you live. However, always remember that the federal government is in charge.
1. You cannot & should not leave the house for any reason, but if you have to, then you can. You are free to stay home, you are not free to leave home. So STAY HOME. But it’s important to go out sometimes.
2. Masks are not useful if you are sick, but maybe you should wear one, it can save you, but it is mandatory as well. You will definitely not get sick with a mask, but you may still die. When you do go out, which you shouldn’t, keep a social distance of 6 to 100 feet. You must be 6 feet behind the next person in a line, however, you can be right next to the person in the line right next to your line. The virus does not travel side to side.
3. Stores are closed, except those that are open. Essential employees must work, even in stores that should be closed, but have chosen to remain open. Do not lay off any employees. The federal government will pay your employees so you don’t have to lay anyone off. However, if you do or do not lay them off, you may qualify for a federal grant which you may or may not need to pay back. See Rule 1.
4. You should not go to a hospital unless you have to go there. Same applies to a doctor’s office, you should only go there in case of an emergency, provided you are not too sick. Do not leave the house if you are sick. See Rule 1.
5. This virus is deadly, but not too scary, except that it will lead to a global disaster. We can contain it unless we can’t, then we will no longer try to contain it. If you want to be tested, breathe on a celebrity or professional athlete, and then wait for them to get tested and announce the results on Twitter.
6. Gloves won’t help, but they can still help. You don’t need to wear gloves unless you want to live.
7. There is no reason for shortages in the supermarkets, but there are many things missing when you go there in the evening, but not in the morning. Sometimes. Also, only at risk people should go in the morning. Lastly, do not hoard toilet paper. However, even if you aren’t a toilet paper hoarder, you may want to hoard it because other hoarders are hoarding it.
8. All borders are closed unless you need to come back into the country from a foreign country or unless you need to travel to a foreign country. After returning to your home country, quarantine for 14 days with your family. Your family can still go out, but they should choose to not go out once a day if possible.
9. The virus has no effect on children except those children it affects. Schools should be closed until the end of March, no, end of April, no, end of May, no, schools should only soft-close. Schools will offer free breakfast and lunch, except the schools which charge. Your children must be with you to get a free meal from the school, but remember to not take children with you when you go.
10. Animals are not affected, but there was a cat which tested positive in Belgium in February when no human had been tested, plus a few tigers here and there. Dogs are immune so the World Health Organization (or WHO) let the dogs out. When you choose to go for a walk, all animals must be on a leash. Pets may go outside, but you should not.
11. You will have many symptoms when you are sick, but you can also get sick without symptoms, have symptoms without being sick, or be contagious without having symptoms. Those who are not sick are spreading the virus more than those who are sick. If you are sick, quarantine yourself for 14 days. If you lose your sense of taste, you have probably had the virus before it was known to be in your country.
12. In order not to get sick, you have to eat well and exercise, but eat whatever you have at home because it’s better not to go out. Remember, heart disease is still killing more people per day than the virus, but there are days it does not. Lastly, please support restaurants by eating out three times per week.
13. It’s better to get some fresh air, but you get glared at when you do so, and most importantly, don’t go to playgrounds. Don’t sit down outside, except you can do that if you are old or pregnant, but not for too long. Do not travel the opposite direction on a one way sidewalk. If you walk passed your house, go all the way around the block. See Rule 1.
14 You can walk around with a friend but not with your family if they don’t live under the same roof. You may drive with your family, but not with your friends. Lastly, do not leave your county. If you travel across state lines, you may be stopped and questioned by the state you are leaving and the state you are entering. Truck drivers are exempted from rule 14, provided they have proper documentation, unless they are in the county of their residence, then no documentation is needed. See Rule 1.
15 The virus remains active on surfaces for 2 hours, no, 6, no, 14 days. It thrives in humidity, but not necessarily. It may die in warm weather, but it may also flourish in warm weather. We will definitely see a decrease in cases during the summer, but an increase in the winter, then a possible decrease next summer. This summer we will likely not see a slowdown in the number of deaths.
16 Stay quarantined until the virus disappears and then we can achieve collective immunity which, in order to occur, we must not be quarantined. The economy should be running fully by the end of May or Fall of 2041.
Got it?
Good.
Stay healthy everyone.
And God bless America. See Rule 1.
this is going to end up one of those discussions where we have to ignore Trump’s actual words, pretend they have no effect, pretend actual people aren’t responding to them, etc, because … well, there’s just so much chaffe in the air, who can really know what’s happening?!
this is going to end up one of those discussions where we have to ignore Trump’s actual words, pretend they have no effect, pretend actual people aren’t responding to them, etc, because … well, there’s just so much chaffe in the air, who can really know what’s happening?!
What’s to worry? They were never heard from again. It was peace in our … wait, not yet, tens of millions needed to die first:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0gU9op16rjQ
Nothing to see here, as the virus transmits so subtly:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AvUbqY1S-QQ
What’s to worry? They were never heard from again. It was peace in our … wait, not yet, tens of millions needed to die first:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0gU9op16rjQ
Nothing to see here, as the virus transmits so subtly:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AvUbqY1S-QQ
It would kinda be funny if people weren’t being such utter asses.
The thing is, the actual rules in force in most places aren’t that hard to grok. “Stay home unless you need to go out” sounds like a joke, right?
But it’s actually a pretty obvious rule of thumb. Use your head and you should be able to figure it out.
The rules aren’t the problem.
It would kinda be funny if people weren’t being such utter asses.
The thing is, the actual rules in force in most places aren’t that hard to grok. “Stay home unless you need to go out” sounds like a joke, right?
But it’s actually a pretty obvious rule of thumb. Use your head and you should be able to figure it out.
The rules aren’t the problem.
bc asks: “Got it?”
Yup, all of that appeals to my dark whimsy.
I would think a conservative would find the lack of one-size-fits-all, based on all of these made-up, contrived borders and jurisdictions in this crisis, proof of all things good and American.
Here’s what else I find funny. I can drive 85 mph in Montana on their interstates. But I can cross a fake line in the dirt and get pulled over and fined for driving over 70 mph.
Or, I can have a heart attack on one side of a fake state line and not qualify for health insurance, or I can think a few minutes ahead, move my domicile a few feet across the fake line into another state and keel over from the same coronary and not immediately advance to go and have every internist on the staff collect $200 from me for my trouble.
It was reported that Franz Kafka would invite his friends over to his bedroom to listen to the first public reading of his fiction.
Kafka would sit in a chair that was positioned inside his open clothes closet, but so that his head and torso were concealed by the hanging garments. But they could see the chair and his legs and shoes.
And he would read the stories in a monotone that mocked his own stories’ monstrous absurdity.
His friends would howl with side-splitting laughter.
If that much is not true, it shoulda been.
But the really hilarious part is that his fiction in retrospect, like no other, and I would include Orwell’s, foreshadowed the tragic absurdities of the most murderous century on the books, World War I, World War II, the Holocaust, the Stalinist genocides.
It still cracks me up.
It’s kinda like those early Brownshirt street rallies that Hitler would arrange from afar but not attend.
A few Jewish onlookers would gather early on, before they learned better, and one would nudge his neighbor and ask “These guys are kidding .. right?”
bc asks: “Got it?”
Yup, all of that appeals to my dark whimsy.
I would think a conservative would find the lack of one-size-fits-all, based on all of these made-up, contrived borders and jurisdictions in this crisis, proof of all things good and American.
Here’s what else I find funny. I can drive 85 mph in Montana on their interstates. But I can cross a fake line in the dirt and get pulled over and fined for driving over 70 mph.
Or, I can have a heart attack on one side of a fake state line and not qualify for health insurance, or I can think a few minutes ahead, move my domicile a few feet across the fake line into another state and keel over from the same coronary and not immediately advance to go and have every internist on the staff collect $200 from me for my trouble.
It was reported that Franz Kafka would invite his friends over to his bedroom to listen to the first public reading of his fiction.
Kafka would sit in a chair that was positioned inside his open clothes closet, but so that his head and torso were concealed by the hanging garments. But they could see the chair and his legs and shoes.
And he would read the stories in a monotone that mocked his own stories’ monstrous absurdity.
His friends would howl with side-splitting laughter.
If that much is not true, it shoulda been.
But the really hilarious part is that his fiction in retrospect, like no other, and I would include Orwell’s, foreshadowed the tragic absurdities of the most murderous century on the books, World War I, World War II, the Holocaust, the Stalinist genocides.
It still cracks me up.
It’s kinda like those early Brownshirt street rallies that Hitler would arrange from afar but not attend.
A few Jewish onlookers would gather early on, before they learned better, and one would nudge his neighbor and ask “These guys are kidding .. right?”
cleek wrote:
“this is going to end up one of those discussions where we have to ignore Trump’s actual words, pretend they have no effect, pretend actual people aren’t responding to them, etc, because … well, there’s just so much chaffe in the air, who can really know what’s happening?!”
Flood the zone with shit! Love, Steve Bannon.
This morning, I was reading a stock market strategist lamenting that money managers are lost in the wilderness because the market’s pricing mechanism has ceased functioning in any rational perceptible manner.
All the better than for Mnuchin and Kudlow to secretly and illegally funnel taxpayer dollars into the stock market, the better to own the means of production and support paper stock portfolios, while actual labor seems no longer required.
cleek wrote:
“this is going to end up one of those discussions where we have to ignore Trump’s actual words, pretend they have no effect, pretend actual people aren’t responding to them, etc, because … well, there’s just so much chaffe in the air, who can really know what’s happening?!”
Flood the zone with shit! Love, Steve Bannon.
This morning, I was reading a stock market strategist lamenting that money managers are lost in the wilderness because the market’s pricing mechanism has ceased functioning in any rational perceptible manner.
All the better than for Mnuchin and Kudlow to secretly and illegally funnel taxpayer dollars into the stock market, the better to own the means of production and support paper stock portfolios, while actual labor seems no longer required.
then not than
“Than” is a hoax.
then not than
“Than” is a hoax.
However few or many, however risible or dangerous, however sincere or brainwashed the Covidiot demonstrators may be, they have managed to demonstrate at least one thing for sure: that certain of our fellow commenters can always be counted on to display some degree of sympathy, and provide some degree of justification, for any instance of Right-Wing Nut-Jobbery that comes down the pike.
–TP
However few or many, however risible or dangerous, however sincere or brainwashed the Covidiot demonstrators may be, they have managed to demonstrate at least one thing for sure: that certain of our fellow commenters can always be counted on to display some degree of sympathy, and provide some degree of justification, for any instance of Right-Wing Nut-Jobbery that comes down the pike.
–TP
poor Hank Smith. imagine living in a world where people learning as new information comes in is actually a plot to deprive of your freedom.
a philosophy that doesn’t allow for adapting to new knowledge is a pretty fucking useless philosophy.
but here we are.
poor Hank Smith. imagine living in a world where people learning as new information comes in is actually a plot to deprive of your freedom.
a philosophy that doesn’t allow for adapting to new knowledge is a pretty fucking useless philosophy.
but here we are.
Regime cleavage…Mckinney looks at the protests and sees OWS; I look and I see OKC.
Nope, I’m comparing much larger, but lefty’ish, groups that actually did or do something with groups that are ineffectual, and in the former case, not equating either with impending communist revolution while laughing my ass off at the ridiculous notion that the clowns in MI and elsewhere are even in the same universe as Franco, or that our situation is even remotely similar to Spain in 1936.
OKC was pretty much a one-off. Timothy McVeigh is not 100% unique, but he is in a very, very small league. The only one who comes close–that I can recall off-hand–is Anders Breivik, the Norwegian mass murderer. Those kinds of atrocities–the result of psychopathy, fairly high IQ, intense focus and long term planning–are not in the skill set we see on display in this pissant rallies.
If you equate the RW pissants with the Antifa + the OWS crowd and just consider them to be the “muscle” behind the Right and Left Wing extremes, I’m not sure who has who outnumbered. I’m reasonably confident that if you added both sides together, you still have a very, very small minority.
As for “exploding heads”, look at the overwrought title of this thread. Jesus.
this is going to end up one of those discussions where we have to ignore Trump’s actual words, pretend they have no effect, pretend actual people aren’t responding to them, etc, because … well, there’s just so much chaffe in the air, who can really know what’s happening?!
DT’s words, and Fox’s, have an effect, but I’m not sure the effect goes as far as some here seem to think. As I’ve said before, we are self-quarantining in the heart of Trump country and everyone–EVERYONE–is social distancing, staying at home, etc.
We drove from our present location to Houston this weekend to check on the office and our home (lawyers are an essential business in Texas and are exempted from the lock down and we do need to get to the office in person to handle payroll and insurance issues), and the traffic is pretty much nonexistent. The country between Austin and Houston is Trump country. Folks are staying home.
So, it is unclear to me that DT’s stupidity is having as widespread an impact as some here imply. His early stupidity no doubt played a role; however, Pelosi, De Blasio and Cuomo were pretty nonchalant in January and February, IIRC. That’s when the shit hit the fan, so if there was a failure of leadership, it isn’t wholly one-sided.
If you go to a store and see people not distancing with no gloves and no masks, they are most likely non-English speaking people from Mexico or Central America. If you look at the high case counts in Houston, these same neighborhoods are among those at the top. People who come from a culture that instinctively either ignore or disbelieve everyone in authority don’t suddenly see the light when they cross the Rio Grande. This too is problematic. You get the same outcome, but for completely different and, in this case, perfectly rational reasons.
that certain of our fellow commenters can always be counted on to display some degree of sympathy, and provide some degree of justification, for any instance of Right-Wing Nut-Jobbery that comes down the pike.
Yep, I’m seeing a lot of that here.
Regime cleavage…Mckinney looks at the protests and sees OWS; I look and I see OKC.
Nope, I’m comparing much larger, but lefty’ish, groups that actually did or do something with groups that are ineffectual, and in the former case, not equating either with impending communist revolution while laughing my ass off at the ridiculous notion that the clowns in MI and elsewhere are even in the same universe as Franco, or that our situation is even remotely similar to Spain in 1936.
OKC was pretty much a one-off. Timothy McVeigh is not 100% unique, but he is in a very, very small league. The only one who comes close–that I can recall off-hand–is Anders Breivik, the Norwegian mass murderer. Those kinds of atrocities–the result of psychopathy, fairly high IQ, intense focus and long term planning–are not in the skill set we see on display in this pissant rallies.
If you equate the RW pissants with the Antifa + the OWS crowd and just consider them to be the “muscle” behind the Right and Left Wing extremes, I’m not sure who has who outnumbered. I’m reasonably confident that if you added both sides together, you still have a very, very small minority.
As for “exploding heads”, look at the overwrought title of this thread. Jesus.
this is going to end up one of those discussions where we have to ignore Trump’s actual words, pretend they have no effect, pretend actual people aren’t responding to them, etc, because … well, there’s just so much chaffe in the air, who can really know what’s happening?!
DT’s words, and Fox’s, have an effect, but I’m not sure the effect goes as far as some here seem to think. As I’ve said before, we are self-quarantining in the heart of Trump country and everyone–EVERYONE–is social distancing, staying at home, etc.
We drove from our present location to Houston this weekend to check on the office and our home (lawyers are an essential business in Texas and are exempted from the lock down and we do need to get to the office in person to handle payroll and insurance issues), and the traffic is pretty much nonexistent. The country between Austin and Houston is Trump country. Folks are staying home.
So, it is unclear to me that DT’s stupidity is having as widespread an impact as some here imply. His early stupidity no doubt played a role; however, Pelosi, De Blasio and Cuomo were pretty nonchalant in January and February, IIRC. That’s when the shit hit the fan, so if there was a failure of leadership, it isn’t wholly one-sided.
If you go to a store and see people not distancing with no gloves and no masks, they are most likely non-English speaking people from Mexico or Central America. If you look at the high case counts in Houston, these same neighborhoods are among those at the top. People who come from a culture that instinctively either ignore or disbelieve everyone in authority don’t suddenly see the light when they cross the Rio Grande. This too is problematic. You get the same outcome, but for completely different and, in this case, perfectly rational reasons.
that certain of our fellow commenters can always be counted on to display some degree of sympathy, and provide some degree of justification, for any instance of Right-Wing Nut-Jobbery that comes down the pike.
Yep, I’m seeing a lot of that here.
not here in suburban NC.
i went grocery shopping yesterday. about half of everybody was wearing a mask, all demographics – white, black, hispanic, asian, old, young, yoga-pants moms and redneck guys. no children were wearing masks, and none of the workers either.
not here in suburban NC.
i went grocery shopping yesterday. about half of everybody was wearing a mask, all demographics – white, black, hispanic, asian, old, young, yoga-pants moms and redneck guys. no children were wearing masks, and none of the workers either.
a philosophy that doesn’t allow for adapting to new knowledge . . .
. . that certain of our fellow commenters can always be counted on to display some degree of sympathy . . .
If that was aimed at what I posted, I simply respond that a philosophy that doesn’t allow for humor and satire . . .
And no, I do not sympathize with the protesters coming with weapons, blocking access to hospitals, etc. My feelings are quite the opposite.
I can have those feelings and at the same time be frustrated myself at inconsistent messaging (not all, IMHO, in response to increasing knowledge over time), the lack of clear, empirical evidence that sheltering long-term will outweigh the detriment, Trump bloviating and the media bloviators boloviating back, etc.
a philosophy that doesn’t allow for adapting to new knowledge . . .
. . that certain of our fellow commenters can always be counted on to display some degree of sympathy . . .
If that was aimed at what I posted, I simply respond that a philosophy that doesn’t allow for humor and satire . . .
And no, I do not sympathize with the protesters coming with weapons, blocking access to hospitals, etc. My feelings are quite the opposite.
I can have those feelings and at the same time be frustrated myself at inconsistent messaging (not all, IMHO, in response to increasing knowledge over time), the lack of clear, empirical evidence that sheltering long-term will outweigh the detriment, Trump bloviating and the media bloviators boloviating back, etc.
Masks are not useful if you are sick, but maybe you should wear one, it can save you, but it is mandatory as well.
If you’re sick, it will cut the amount of aerosol you spray out.
Masks are not useful if you are sick, but maybe you should wear one, it can save you, but it is mandatory as well.
If you’re sick, it will cut the amount of aerosol you spray out.
Everyone here in NJ is wearing masks. They won’t let you into the store without one. Many, including myself and all the workers, are wearing gloves, too. They strictly control how many people are in the store at one time, only letting a number of people in as the same number of people leave. The aisles are all one-way, with big arrows on the floor, to minimize people passing each other while shopping.
On another note: One difference I see between OWS and Antifa on one hand and the Covidiots on the other is that the first two are far more youth oriented. If you were going to characterize them negatively, you might say there are a lot of dumb kids involved, doing stuff dumb kids tend to do. The Covidiots are mostly middle aged, though not necessarily “grown up” in their thinking.
Everyone here in NJ is wearing masks. They won’t let you into the store without one. Many, including myself and all the workers, are wearing gloves, too. They strictly control how many people are in the store at one time, only letting a number of people in as the same number of people leave. The aisles are all one-way, with big arrows on the floor, to minimize people passing each other while shopping.
On another note: One difference I see between OWS and Antifa on one hand and the Covidiots on the other is that the first two are far more youth oriented. If you were going to characterize them negatively, you might say there are a lot of dumb kids involved, doing stuff dumb kids tend to do. The Covidiots are mostly middle aged, though not necessarily “grown up” in their thinking.
Except the people who stay home with them. And the people who can’t stay home, that they encounter.
Watch for COVID spikes in MI, OH, and elsewhere over the next two weeks. KY is already seeing it.
Spike is a relative concept and can and likely does have a variety of causes. Many people don’t follow rules, not because of some political agenda, but because they are lazy, stupid, apathetic or what have you.
That said, ISTM that the single largest drivers of the Covid spread are dense population centers and mass transit. People who have no choice but to ride an elevator to come and go to and from home or to get on a train or a bus are the most exposed. The more spread out people are, the less disease. We are seeing that in Houston–apartment-heavy districts have the highest rates of infection, single family areas the lowest.
I’m pretty sure I’m right about this, and I’m pretty sure this ‘crowding’ phenomena is going to have to be factored in to long term climate change planning. If there is a plus side, one thing we are learning from this crisis is that many of us do not have to leave an urban foot print or get in their car everyday to live and work. On average, I’m in my car 3 times every two weeks for about an hour each time. Previously, I put 30,000 miles a year, 2,500 a month, every year, every month. Now, less than 300 a month.
I’m thinking my experience isn’t unique and I’m wondering what tweaks we can make as a country to promote more–a lot more–telecommuting.
Except the people who stay home with them. And the people who can’t stay home, that they encounter.
Watch for COVID spikes in MI, OH, and elsewhere over the next two weeks. KY is already seeing it.
Spike is a relative concept and can and likely does have a variety of causes. Many people don’t follow rules, not because of some political agenda, but because they are lazy, stupid, apathetic or what have you.
That said, ISTM that the single largest drivers of the Covid spread are dense population centers and mass transit. People who have no choice but to ride an elevator to come and go to and from home or to get on a train or a bus are the most exposed. The more spread out people are, the less disease. We are seeing that in Houston–apartment-heavy districts have the highest rates of infection, single family areas the lowest.
I’m pretty sure I’m right about this, and I’m pretty sure this ‘crowding’ phenomena is going to have to be factored in to long term climate change planning. If there is a plus side, one thing we are learning from this crisis is that many of us do not have to leave an urban foot print or get in their car everyday to live and work. On average, I’m in my car 3 times every two weeks for about an hour each time. Previously, I put 30,000 miles a year, 2,500 a month, every year, every month. Now, less than 300 a month.
I’m thinking my experience isn’t unique and I’m wondering what tweaks we can make as a country to promote more–a lot more–telecommuting.
some of our supermarkets have those arrows on the floor. that helps. they all have workers wiping down carts for people to use.
(state-run) liquor stores only allow one person in at a time – line up outside, place your order with the guy when he let the person in front of you in, then he’ll fetch your order and bring it up to the counter. then he lets you in so you can pay. restaurants are all take-out only. smart.
i don’t know why people aren’t wearing masks. and i don’t see how anything Trump says or the protests he’s encouraging are going to help make adoption more widespread.
and say what you will about Cuomo’s slow start, but he’s infinitely better now than Trump and the idiots who took Trump’s lead.
and, AFAIK, Cuomo isn’t literally hijacking trucks full of supplies from places that need it.
some of our supermarkets have those arrows on the floor. that helps. they all have workers wiping down carts for people to use.
(state-run) liquor stores only allow one person in at a time – line up outside, place your order with the guy when he let the person in front of you in, then he’ll fetch your order and bring it up to the counter. then he lets you in so you can pay. restaurants are all take-out only. smart.
i don’t know why people aren’t wearing masks. and i don’t see how anything Trump says or the protests he’s encouraging are going to help make adoption more widespread.
and say what you will about Cuomo’s slow start, but he’s infinitely better now than Trump and the idiots who took Trump’s lead.
and, AFAIK, Cuomo isn’t literally hijacking trucks full of supplies from places that need it.
i went grocery shopping yesterday. about half of everybody was wearing a mask, all demographics – white, black, hispanic, asian, old, young, yoga-pants moms and redneck guys. no children were wearing masks, and none of the workers either.
I get to the store once a week or so. I rarely see kids and the vast majority of people I see use both masks and gloves. Interesting that your neck of the woods is different. People are very interesting.
The Covidiots are mostly middle aged, though not necessarily “grown up” in their thinking.
If one is gifted at birth with minimal intelligence, age isn’t going to make things better. Try to imagine the lack of self- and situational awareness that goes into dressing up like that and then going out in public wanting to be seen.
It’s like a Skinhead white supremacist with a deaths head tat on his forehead: if “you”–“you” being the white supremacist–want to make the case that “you” are the superior race, wouldn’t “you” want to, you know, pick a better example?
i went grocery shopping yesterday. about half of everybody was wearing a mask, all demographics – white, black, hispanic, asian, old, young, yoga-pants moms and redneck guys. no children were wearing masks, and none of the workers either.
I get to the store once a week or so. I rarely see kids and the vast majority of people I see use both masks and gloves. Interesting that your neck of the woods is different. People are very interesting.
The Covidiots are mostly middle aged, though not necessarily “grown up” in their thinking.
If one is gifted at birth with minimal intelligence, age isn’t going to make things better. Try to imagine the lack of self- and situational awareness that goes into dressing up like that and then going out in public wanting to be seen.
It’s like a Skinhead white supremacist with a deaths head tat on his forehead: if “you”–“you” being the white supremacist–want to make the case that “you” are the superior race, wouldn’t “you” want to, you know, pick a better example?
and say what you will about Cuomo’s slow start, but he’s infinitely better now than Trump and the idiots who took Trump’s lead.
I agree 100%. I haven’t gotten into the weeds on the supplies allocation controversy, and I probably won’t. DT is so many things that are wrong, it is exhausting and, at some point, redundant and pointless to continue making that inventory. That said, his entirely transactional approach to pretty much everything leaves me open to believing the worst in that regard.
But, we are talking about two different things. Perhaps someday there will be an objective and valid analysis of how much of the current crisis is attributable to an early, bipartisan slow start and how much was due downstream to the administration’s acts and omissions. In the meantime, as I wrote on a thread a week or so back, I saw one DT press evening briefing and was nauseated. How effectual or ineffectual he actually is will be hard to measure in the here and now. It can only be done in hindsight, when and if the dust ever settles and the actual numbers can be reliably aggregated.
and say what you will about Cuomo’s slow start, but he’s infinitely better now than Trump and the idiots who took Trump’s lead.
I agree 100%. I haven’t gotten into the weeds on the supplies allocation controversy, and I probably won’t. DT is so many things that are wrong, it is exhausting and, at some point, redundant and pointless to continue making that inventory. That said, his entirely transactional approach to pretty much everything leaves me open to believing the worst in that regard.
But, we are talking about two different things. Perhaps someday there will be an objective and valid analysis of how much of the current crisis is attributable to an early, bipartisan slow start and how much was due downstream to the administration’s acts and omissions. In the meantime, as I wrote on a thread a week or so back, I saw one DT press evening briefing and was nauseated. How effectual or ineffectual he actually is will be hard to measure in the here and now. It can only be done in hindsight, when and if the dust ever settles and the actual numbers can be reliably aggregated.
McKinneyTexas, that is.
McKinneyTexas, that is.
Oil prices are negative. I don’t mean down. I mean they’ll pay you to take oil. (I don’t know if that actually would happen or if it’s some weird market-pricing anomaly that doesn’t depict reality.)
Oil prices are negative. I don’t mean down. I mean they’ll pay you to take oil. (I don’t know if that actually would happen or if it’s some weird market-pricing anomaly that doesn’t depict reality.)
Ya gotta admit, Trump definitely knows how to pick ’em.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/brett-giroir-trumps-testing-czar-was-forced-out-of-a-job-developing-vaccine-projects-now-hes-on-the-hot-seat/2020/04/19/b061b968-7e89-11ea-8de7-9fdff6d5d83e_story.html
Ya gotta admit, Trump definitely knows how to pick ’em.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/brett-giroir-trumps-testing-czar-was-forced-out-of-a-job-developing-vaccine-projects-now-hes-on-the-hot-seat/2020/04/19/b061b968-7e89-11ea-8de7-9fdff6d5d83e_story.html
Trump is thoroughly exhausting, you got that right.
i’d be much happier with a Pres Pence, who at least seems like he’s within a std-devs or so of just … normality.
maybe more of this will get people to take it seriously.
Trump is thoroughly exhausting, you got that right.
i’d be much happier with a Pres Pence, who at least seems like he’s within a std-devs or so of just … normality.
maybe more of this will get people to take it seriously.
McKinney’s comment only reinforces my impression that we are well into regime cleavage.
Too many of my GOP relatives and acquaintances believe and spread the crap that motivates these threeper loons to cosplay revolution. They (the non-Red Dawn LARPers) think that the underlying paranoia and disinformation accurately describes the world we live in. They consume bad information and they don’t have the critical perspective or the media literacy skills to see why or where they are wrong. And their confirmation biases are built on the non-falsifiable bedrock of religious conviction. They are closer in their sympathies to the threepers than they are to me anymore.
McKinney’s comment only reinforces my impression that we are well into regime cleavage.
Too many of my GOP relatives and acquaintances believe and spread the crap that motivates these threeper loons to cosplay revolution. They (the non-Red Dawn LARPers) think that the underlying paranoia and disinformation accurately describes the world we live in. They consume bad information and they don’t have the critical perspective or the media literacy skills to see why or where they are wrong. And their confirmation biases are built on the non-falsifiable bedrock of religious conviction. They are closer in their sympathies to the threepers than they are to me anymore.
Perhaps someday there will be an objective and valid analysis of how much of the current crisis is attributable to an early, bipartisan slow start and how much was due downstream to the administration’s acts and omissions.
In that analysis (I actually hope it’s a criminal investigation), I’m thinking that the Trump administration’s disdain for science and institutional preparation that had existed for dealing with a pandemic, advice his administration received from his predecessor, etc., might be quite relevant. These are all things that would never have happened under that she-devil Hillary Clinton.
Perhaps someday there will be an objective and valid analysis of how much of the current crisis is attributable to an early, bipartisan slow start and how much was due downstream to the administration’s acts and omissions.
In that analysis (I actually hope it’s a criminal investigation), I’m thinking that the Trump administration’s disdain for science and institutional preparation that had existed for dealing with a pandemic, advice his administration received from his predecessor, etc., might be quite relevant. These are all things that would never have happened under that she-devil Hillary Clinton.
Too many of my GOP relatives and acquaintances believe and spread the crap that motivates these threeper loons to cosplay revolution. They (the non-Red Dawn LARPers) think that the underlying paranoia and disinformation accurately describes the world we live in.
Threeper? Non Red Dawn LARPer?
What the hey? What are you talking about?
Too many of my GOP relatives and acquaintances believe and spread the crap that motivates these threeper loons to cosplay revolution. They (the non-Red Dawn LARPers) think that the underlying paranoia and disinformation accurately describes the world we live in.
Threeper? Non Red Dawn LARPer?
What the hey? What are you talking about?
Oil prices are negative. I don’t mean down. I mean they’ll pay you to take oil. (I don’t know if that actually would happen or if it’s some weird market-pricing anomaly that doesn’t depict reality.)
Yeah, less there than meets the eye, I think. It’s a bunch of expiring contracts. June contracts are at $22, per my money manager. So, not really giving it away. I think. I hope.
Oil prices are negative. I don’t mean down. I mean they’ll pay you to take oil. (I don’t know if that actually would happen or if it’s some weird market-pricing anomaly that doesn’t depict reality.)
Yeah, less there than meets the eye, I think. It’s a bunch of expiring contracts. June contracts are at $22, per my money manager. So, not really giving it away. I think. I hope.
These are all things that would never have happened under that she-devil Hillary Clinton.
It’s hard to imagine how much differently this would have been handled under Clinton. I’m not sure I can accurately remember what a competent administration looks like.
The other side of it is that the morons running around with their guns would be even more paranoid and irrational if guidelines were coming from a Clinton administration, and Trump would be cheering them on from his nightly Fox News talk show and on Twitter with a thousand times the vigor his is now.
These are all things that would never have happened under that she-devil Hillary Clinton.
It’s hard to imagine how much differently this would have been handled under Clinton. I’m not sure I can accurately remember what a competent administration looks like.
The other side of it is that the morons running around with their guns would be even more paranoid and irrational if guidelines were coming from a Clinton administration, and Trump would be cheering them on from his nightly Fox News talk show and on Twitter with a thousand times the vigor his is now.
WTF?
WTF?
Militia types, McKinney. Three-percenters. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Percenters
Also the Atomwaffen and TWP and Identity Evropa (or whatever they are calling themselves these days) neo-nazis and ghost skins. They have run thick in many of the places I have lived – WI, CO, Orange County.
Anyone who live action role-plays (LARP) their white supremacist revolutionary fantasy with actual firearms.
Militia types, McKinney. Three-percenters. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Percenters
Also the Atomwaffen and TWP and Identity Evropa (or whatever they are calling themselves these days) neo-nazis and ghost skins. They have run thick in many of the places I have lived – WI, CO, Orange County.
Anyone who live action role-plays (LARP) their white supremacist revolutionary fantasy with actual firearms.
You kids with your funny slang.
You kids with your funny slang.
My patois is on fleek.
My patois is on fleek.
https://www.balloon-juice.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/monday-afternoon-update.jpg
https://www.balloon-juice.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/monday-afternoon-update.jpg
In the parlance of our times.
Regardless of what would happen if I were to try to buy oil today (assuming I were in a position to do that sort of thing), it’s an historic low. I have to think it’s still kind of a big deal.
In the parlance of our times.
Regardless of what would happen if I were to try to buy oil today (assuming I were in a position to do that sort of thing), it’s an historic low. I have to think it’s still kind of a big deal.
So, not really giving it away. I think. I hope.
LOL. Looks like some investors are eager to pay the government for the privilege of loaning it their money.
So, not really giving it away. I think. I hope.
LOL. Looks like some investors are eager to pay the government for the privilege of loaning it their money.
De-lurking to make a couple of observations w/r/t negative oil prices … a few things can cause that to happen (a) it’s cheaper than shutting down the well and doing long term damage (b) there is contracted pipeline space that has a penalty (c) you can lose lease rights for not continuously pumping.
I’m not saying that’s what’s happening here, but in theory you can come up with a plausible scenario that would lead to paying someone to take your oil off your hands, especially in the current conditions where most of the available storage is already full.
De-lurking to make a couple of observations w/r/t negative oil prices … a few things can cause that to happen (a) it’s cheaper than shutting down the well and doing long term damage (b) there is contracted pipeline space that has a penalty (c) you can lose lease rights for not continuously pumping.
I’m not saying that’s what’s happening here, but in theory you can come up with a plausible scenario that would lead to paying someone to take your oil off your hands, especially in the current conditions where most of the available storage is already full.
it’s an historic low. I have to think it’s still kind of a big deal.
wasn’t too long ago that Trump was taking credit for personally fixing* the oil market.
* = raising prices for American consumers
it’s an historic low. I have to think it’s still kind of a big deal.
wasn’t too long ago that Trump was taking credit for personally fixing* the oil market.
* = raising prices for American consumers
“Drill, baby, drill!” is so 2008.
“Drill, baby, drill!” is so 2008.
In my immediate area, the average risk of being infected appears to be relatively low. Not necessarily so to the south in Dallas County. The risk is a bit hard to judge since they’re only giving out the age, sex, and city/zip code of those infected.
In any case, I occasionally go to the local convenience store for a non-essential fountain drink. I can get in and out of the store without getting near anyone, touching anything I don’t take with me or leaving behind anything I took in the store with me.
In my immediate area, the average risk of being infected appears to be relatively low. Not necessarily so to the south in Dallas County. The risk is a bit hard to judge since they’re only giving out the age, sex, and city/zip code of those infected.
In any case, I occasionally go to the local convenience store for a non-essential fountain drink. I can get in and out of the store without getting near anyone, touching anything I don’t take with me or leaving behind anything I took in the store with me.
If you’re an oil storage facility, with a contract to take more oil, and that contract comes with penalty clauses, you might well be willing to pay someone to clear some capacity for you. No idea if oil contracts feature such a thing. But it would get you to a negative real price.
If you’re an oil storage facility, with a contract to take more oil, and that contract comes with penalty clauses, you might well be willing to pay someone to clear some capacity for you. No idea if oil contracts feature such a thing. But it would get you to a negative real price.
We joined OPEC, to try and save Harold Hamm’s bacon after trying to break the thing for 50 years.
Just like we are doing the largest QE, the what?, forth in a row, after listening to the Kudlows of the world insult, disparage, and spit on all of the previous QEs as market distorting new fangled lefty bushwah all those Obama years.
WE are witnessing as well the largest dispensation of socialist, subsidizing, gummint owning the means of production scheme in the history of history.
And yet we can’t seem to elect a Democratic government, who could do this stuff in their sleep and also not lecture us endlessly about their holier than thou principles that doing nothing and letting the market settle everyone’s hash and starve a third of the population without “interference” would be somehow more “American”.
america = bullshit.
We joined OPEC, to try and save Harold Hamm’s bacon after trying to break the thing for 50 years.
Just like we are doing the largest QE, the what?, forth in a row, after listening to the Kudlows of the world insult, disparage, and spit on all of the previous QEs as market distorting new fangled lefty bushwah all those Obama years.
WE are witnessing as well the largest dispensation of socialist, subsidizing, gummint owning the means of production scheme in the history of history.
And yet we can’t seem to elect a Democratic government, who could do this stuff in their sleep and also not lecture us endlessly about their holier than thou principles that doing nothing and letting the market settle everyone’s hash and starve a third of the population without “interference” would be somehow more “American”.
america = bullshit.
I have to think it’s still kind of a big deal.
It isn’t nothing, that’s for sure. PDM and WJ make sense. Even if June contracts are at $22, that’s a loser for most oil companies, with bankruptcies and widespread havoc in oil-sensitive economies. Live by the petrodollar, die by the petrodollar. We had our first oil bust in 1980 and several since then. As alternate fuels become more and more affordable and preferable, things will get worse/better depending on optics. My gut is that this is a temporary reverse spike aided and abetted by the Saudis and the Russkies. We’ll get past it, but there will be a lot of pain in the process.
I have to think it’s still kind of a big deal.
It isn’t nothing, that’s for sure. PDM and WJ make sense. Even if June contracts are at $22, that’s a loser for most oil companies, with bankruptcies and widespread havoc in oil-sensitive economies. Live by the petrodollar, die by the petrodollar. We had our first oil bust in 1980 and several since then. As alternate fuels become more and more affordable and preferable, things will get worse/better depending on optics. My gut is that this is a temporary reverse spike aided and abetted by the Saudis and the Russkies. We’ll get past it, but there will be a lot of pain in the process.
I havent read all of the comments but: negative wti futures are occurring today because they expire tomorrow and there are some holders that literally cant take delivery. There are two kind of people who cant,but mostly futures speculators that dont have the capability to receive or store oil, at all.
After the May futures expire tomorrow the price you see everyday will be the June futures, they were at $21 today.
These speculators usually can dump any amount because someone wants free oil, but storage is getting very expensive so in a very few cases they were paying some of the storage to get someone to take it.
There were very few contracts traded today so the price wasnt universal for oil.
This may very well happen for a few months until Europe and the US open up. But then the price is likely to go up pretty quickly as pumps are being shut down in Texas pretty much as fast as they can shut them down,and they take little time to bring back on line.
I havent read all of the comments but: negative wti futures are occurring today because they expire tomorrow and there are some holders that literally cant take delivery. There are two kind of people who cant,but mostly futures speculators that dont have the capability to receive or store oil, at all.
After the May futures expire tomorrow the price you see everyday will be the June futures, they were at $21 today.
These speculators usually can dump any amount because someone wants free oil, but storage is getting very expensive so in a very few cases they were paying some of the storage to get someone to take it.
There were very few contracts traded today so the price wasnt universal for oil.
This may very well happen for a few months until Europe and the US open up. But then the price is likely to go up pretty quickly as pumps are being shut down in Texas pretty much as fast as they can shut them down,and they take little time to bring back on line.
They take “a” little time to start up. Most wont startup before $45 just because they need $35 to break even at best.
They take “a” little time to start up. Most wont startup before $45 just because they need $35 to break even at best.
So if you mix the excess milk dairy farmers are pouring down the drain with the excess oil the drillers don’t have a place to store, can you both drink it and fuel the car with the combination?
Weren’t we just talking about the sure threat of inflation around here not two weeks ago?
Supply-side economics has certainly increased supply while making commodity prices disappear altogether.
So if you mix the excess milk dairy farmers are pouring down the drain with the excess oil the drillers don’t have a place to store, can you both drink it and fuel the car with the combination?
Weren’t we just talking about the sure threat of inflation around here not two weeks ago?
Supply-side economics has certainly increased supply while making commodity prices disappear altogether.
“But then the price is likely to go up pretty quickly as pumps are being shut down in Texas pretty much as fast as they can shut them down,and they take little time to bring back on line.”
So, OPEC Junior.
“But then the price is likely to go up pretty quickly as pumps are being shut down in Texas pretty much as fast as they can shut them down,and they take little time to bring back on line.”
So, OPEC Junior.
We taught opec how to do it, they created opec to copy the texas railroad commission.
We taught opec how to do it, they created opec to copy the texas railroad commission.
Some practical advice.
https://www.balloon-juice.com/2020/04/20/covid-19-and-me/
Tamara apparently lives in Denver. Too close.
See ya tomorrow.
Some practical advice.
https://www.balloon-juice.com/2020/04/20/covid-19-and-me/
Tamara apparently lives in Denver. Too close.
See ya tomorrow.
More:
https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2020/04/notes-on-prevalence
If the White House press conferences were given over to solely advising us on this stuff, lives would be saved, particularly with those high ratings.
Instead, we get madness.
More:
https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2020/04/notes-on-prevalence
If the White House press conferences were given over to solely advising us on this stuff, lives would be saved, particularly with those high ratings.
Instead, we get madness.
McT: Perhaps someday there will be an objective and valid analysis of how much of the current crisis is attributable to an early, bipartisan slow start and how much was due downstream to the administration’s acts and omissions
It is really DEPLORABLE how Pelosi, Shumer and Biden slow-walked the official emergency declarations. Awful.
Why, it’s as if they weren’t in charge of the federal bureaucracy or something, sheesh!
McT: Perhaps someday there will be an objective and valid analysis of how much of the current crisis is attributable to an early, bipartisan slow start and how much was due downstream to the administration’s acts and omissions
It is really DEPLORABLE how Pelosi, Shumer and Biden slow-walked the official emergency declarations. Awful.
Why, it’s as if they weren’t in charge of the federal bureaucracy or something, sheesh!
Spike is a relative concept and can and likely does have a variety of causes.
No doubt.
Most likely, some of the people running around protesting the lockdowns are gonna get sick. And some of them are going to pass it along to somebody else, whether they get sick or not.
So they seem like selfish idiots, to me.
I’ll also say that I’m fine with people having a range of points of view, but I insist on a few bright lines. Nazis and other forms of fascist fall outside of those bright lines.
Proud Boys are coked up fascist punks who like to beat people up for fun. People carrying signs calling Jews “the real plague” are racist scum.
And I don’t really care how many boyos are showing up with AR-15’s and tactical vests to “protest” stay at home orders. If it’s more than zero, it’s too many.
Threatening violence in order to intimidate or coerce a civilian population, which is to say people, or intimidate or coerce a government, is terrorism. Not in my opinion, not in the fevered imagination of hysterical lefties, but by definition, per the US Code.
Black letter law.
We tolerate this stuff because these guys are such a bunch of clowns that nobody is really afraid of them. But whether they are effective terrorists or not hardly seems on point, to me.
The virus is making a lot of people sick. People I know, probably people you know. Close friends of mine and my wife’s, at the moment.
I have no patience with people who want to run around and act like idiots because they want to buy a can of paint or some shrubs.
None.
And I have less than no patience with people who take any opportunity to wave their guns around like they’re some kind of brave patriot. Or cause traffic jams in front of hospitals during a national health emergency.
They’re idiotic children, and they’re gonna make people profoundly ill, and kill some of them.
I’d have a great deal more respect for the “conservative movement” if so many of its spokespeople and representatives weren’t flaming assholes. And I’m not just talking about the folks in MI and OH and wherever else.
I’m hard pressed to think of a single notable conservative who isn’t either an utter bonehead, or simply reprehensible as a human being. I can’t really come up with any. Maybe some of the more polite folks at TAC, but then again, their spiritual grandpa is Buchanan, who is basically a Proud Boy without the coke habit.
OWS was a flash in the pan. Antifa, with rare exceptions, are kids who run around at protests organized by other people and make a nuisance of themselves. In a handful of places, notably Portland OR, they are much more violent, but then again so are their counter-parties. In Charlottesville, antifa saved some lives, and I can introduce you to people who can attest to that from first-hand experience.
In any case, unless you’re a fascist engaging in public display of your more violent tendencies, you’re unlikely to ever meet a member of Antifa, at least as such.
There is nothing on “the left”, such as it is, that is comparable to the literally fascist cohort that is ever-present at events like MI and OH, and which is encouraged and abetted by, not fringe conservatives, but institutional conservatism, going straight up to the POTUS and his WH staff.
So, Spain in 1936 may not be a particularly apt analogy, but the OP has a point to make. It should be attended to.
Personally, I have to say that current-day conservatism, in this country, seems more like a pathology than anything else. Sorry to say it, but it is what it is.
Get the freaking Nazis and Randian greedheads out of your community, commit yourselves to the well-being of the people of this nation, and perhaps there is a conversation to be had.
Keep pretending the violent racist weirdos that, somehow, keep popping up are just an “aberration” and I’m not sure what there is to talk about.
Spike is a relative concept and can and likely does have a variety of causes.
No doubt.
Most likely, some of the people running around protesting the lockdowns are gonna get sick. And some of them are going to pass it along to somebody else, whether they get sick or not.
So they seem like selfish idiots, to me.
I’ll also say that I’m fine with people having a range of points of view, but I insist on a few bright lines. Nazis and other forms of fascist fall outside of those bright lines.
Proud Boys are coked up fascist punks who like to beat people up for fun. People carrying signs calling Jews “the real plague” are racist scum.
And I don’t really care how many boyos are showing up with AR-15’s and tactical vests to “protest” stay at home orders. If it’s more than zero, it’s too many.
Threatening violence in order to intimidate or coerce a civilian population, which is to say people, or intimidate or coerce a government, is terrorism. Not in my opinion, not in the fevered imagination of hysterical lefties, but by definition, per the US Code.
Black letter law.
We tolerate this stuff because these guys are such a bunch of clowns that nobody is really afraid of them. But whether they are effective terrorists or not hardly seems on point, to me.
The virus is making a lot of people sick. People I know, probably people you know. Close friends of mine and my wife’s, at the moment.
I have no patience with people who want to run around and act like idiots because they want to buy a can of paint or some shrubs.
None.
And I have less than no patience with people who take any opportunity to wave their guns around like they’re some kind of brave patriot. Or cause traffic jams in front of hospitals during a national health emergency.
They’re idiotic children, and they’re gonna make people profoundly ill, and kill some of them.
I’d have a great deal more respect for the “conservative movement” if so many of its spokespeople and representatives weren’t flaming assholes. And I’m not just talking about the folks in MI and OH and wherever else.
I’m hard pressed to think of a single notable conservative who isn’t either an utter bonehead, or simply reprehensible as a human being. I can’t really come up with any. Maybe some of the more polite folks at TAC, but then again, their spiritual grandpa is Buchanan, who is basically a Proud Boy without the coke habit.
OWS was a flash in the pan. Antifa, with rare exceptions, are kids who run around at protests organized by other people and make a nuisance of themselves. In a handful of places, notably Portland OR, they are much more violent, but then again so are their counter-parties. In Charlottesville, antifa saved some lives, and I can introduce you to people who can attest to that from first-hand experience.
In any case, unless you’re a fascist engaging in public display of your more violent tendencies, you’re unlikely to ever meet a member of Antifa, at least as such.
There is nothing on “the left”, such as it is, that is comparable to the literally fascist cohort that is ever-present at events like MI and OH, and which is encouraged and abetted by, not fringe conservatives, but institutional conservatism, going straight up to the POTUS and his WH staff.
So, Spain in 1936 may not be a particularly apt analogy, but the OP has a point to make. It should be attended to.
Personally, I have to say that current-day conservatism, in this country, seems more like a pathology than anything else. Sorry to say it, but it is what it is.
Get the freaking Nazis and Randian greedheads out of your community, commit yourselves to the well-being of the people of this nation, and perhaps there is a conversation to be had.
Keep pretending the violent racist weirdos that, somehow, keep popping up are just an “aberration” and I’m not sure what there is to talk about.
Democrats were asking for action already in early February:
https://twitter.com/ChrisMurphyCT/status/1225073987639705600
He’s on the Appropriations Committee and the Foreign Relations Committee.
And a lovely little graph in this one about tweets by Members of Congress concerning COVID:
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/04/02/tweets-by-members-of-congress-tell-the-story-of-an-escalating-covid-19-crisis/
In case you want to compare the slowness of the responses.
Yes, it’s only Twitter, but it definitely shows what’s occupying their attention.
Democrats were asking for action already in early February:
https://twitter.com/ChrisMurphyCT/status/1225073987639705600
He’s on the Appropriations Committee and the Foreign Relations Committee.
And a lovely little graph in this one about tweets by Members of Congress concerning COVID:
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/04/02/tweets-by-members-of-congress-tell-the-story-of-an-escalating-covid-19-crisis/
In case you want to compare the slowness of the responses.
Yes, it’s only Twitter, but it definitely shows what’s occupying their attention.
wrs
wrs
these ‘protests’ are having an effect.
via LGM:
yes. let’s go to the gym! squeeze in a pilates class before bowling!
apparently, the GOP wants to die.
who am i to blow against the wind?
these ‘protests’ are having an effect.
via LGM:
yes. let’s go to the gym! squeeze in a pilates class before bowling!
apparently, the GOP wants to die.
who am i to blow against the wind?
If you live in GA, stay the hell out of my state.
This is no anti-red-state or anti-southern bigotry, my father was born and raised in GA, I have family there, some of my best memories growing up are of time I spent there.
But the governor of GA is apparently a bonehead, see also “I didn’t know you could be asymptomatic and still carry the virus”.
So if you’re from GA please stay the hell out of my state. Our hands are full dealing with the virus already, we don’t need your crazy BS making things worse.
If you live in GA, stay the hell out of my state.
This is no anti-red-state or anti-southern bigotry, my father was born and raised in GA, I have family there, some of my best memories growing up are of time I spent there.
But the governor of GA is apparently a bonehead, see also “I didn’t know you could be asymptomatic and still carry the virus”.
So if you’re from GA please stay the hell out of my state. Our hands are full dealing with the virus already, we don’t need your crazy BS making things worse.
A lot of people will make a personal assessment of what their risks are and will continue to self-quarantine regardless of what businesses are open.
“Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee (R) and Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R) announced Monday afternoon that they are taking the initial steps of allowing ‘non-essential’ businesses to reopen.
The ‘vast majority’ of businesses in Tennessee will be allowed to restart their engines on May 1. ‘Social distancing must continue, but our economic shutdown cannot,’ Lee said in a statement. ‘While I am not extending the ‘Safer at Home’ order past the end of April, we are working directly with our major metropolitan areas to ensure they are in a position to reopen as soon and safely as possible. Social distancing works, and as we open up our economy, it will be more important than ever that we keep social distancing as lives and livelihoods depend on it.'”
Tennessee Will Allow ‘Vast Majority’ of Businesses To Reopen on May 1: And Georgia will reopen select businesses beginning April 24.
A lot of people will make a personal assessment of what their risks are and will continue to self-quarantine regardless of what businesses are open.
“Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee (R) and Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R) announced Monday afternoon that they are taking the initial steps of allowing ‘non-essential’ businesses to reopen.
The ‘vast majority’ of businesses in Tennessee will be allowed to restart their engines on May 1. ‘Social distancing must continue, but our economic shutdown cannot,’ Lee said in a statement. ‘While I am not extending the ‘Safer at Home’ order past the end of April, we are working directly with our major metropolitan areas to ensure they are in a position to reopen as soon and safely as possible. Social distancing works, and as we open up our economy, it will be more important than ever that we keep social distancing as lives and livelihoods depend on it.'”
Tennessee Will Allow ‘Vast Majority’ of Businesses To Reopen on May 1: And Georgia will reopen select businesses beginning April 24.
Oh ffs
If you go to a store and see people not distancing with no gloves and no masks, they are most likely non-English speaking people from Mexico or Central America. If you look at the high case counts in Houston, these same neighborhoods are among those at the top.
McT, I’m sure you are going out all the time and making careful scientific observations. I mean, what if they can’t afford masks and gloves? Pack them in a ghetto and then say they are not like us because they get sick.
People who come from a culture that instinctively either ignore or disbelieve everyone in authority don’t suddenly see the light when they cross the Rio Grande. This too is problematic.
Right, if they are brown and like this, that’s a problem. If they are white, well, not so much…
Yep, I’m seeing a lot of that here.
Insert a comment about a mirror here
That said, ISTM that the single largest drivers of the Covid spread are dense population centers and mass transit. People who have no choice but to ride an elevator to come and go to and from home or to get on a train or a bus are the most exposed.
Self-parody much?
As someone pointed out, why do the rich take this more seriously than they do people getting cancer and dying indigent? Because the help couldn’t give you cancer…
Oh ffs
If you go to a store and see people not distancing with no gloves and no masks, they are most likely non-English speaking people from Mexico or Central America. If you look at the high case counts in Houston, these same neighborhoods are among those at the top.
McT, I’m sure you are going out all the time and making careful scientific observations. I mean, what if they can’t afford masks and gloves? Pack them in a ghetto and then say they are not like us because they get sick.
People who come from a culture that instinctively either ignore or disbelieve everyone in authority don’t suddenly see the light when they cross the Rio Grande. This too is problematic.
Right, if they are brown and like this, that’s a problem. If they are white, well, not so much…
Yep, I’m seeing a lot of that here.
Insert a comment about a mirror here
That said, ISTM that the single largest drivers of the Covid spread are dense population centers and mass transit. People who have no choice but to ride an elevator to come and go to and from home or to get on a train or a bus are the most exposed.
Self-parody much?
As someone pointed out, why do the rich take this more seriously than they do people getting cancer and dying indigent? Because the help couldn’t give you cancer…
A problem is that the seasonal flu numbers are not actual counts, but inflated estimates.
“Preliminary results from antibody tests in Los Angeles County indicate that the true number of COVID-19 infections is much higher than the number of confirmed cases there, which implies that the fatality rate is much lower than the official tallies suggest. “The mortality rate now has dropped a lot,” Barbara Ferrer, director of the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, said at a press briefing today. In contrast with the current crude case fatality rate of about 4.5 percent, she said, the study suggests that 0.1 percent to 0.2 percent of people infected by the virus will die, which would make COVID-19 only somewhat more deadly than the seasonal flu.”
L.A. County Antibody Tests Suggest the Fatality Rate for COVID-19 Is Much Lower Than People Feared: The tests indicate that the number of infections in the county is around 40 times as high as the number of confirmed cases.
A problem is that the seasonal flu numbers are not actual counts, but inflated estimates.
“Preliminary results from antibody tests in Los Angeles County indicate that the true number of COVID-19 infections is much higher than the number of confirmed cases there, which implies that the fatality rate is much lower than the official tallies suggest. “The mortality rate now has dropped a lot,” Barbara Ferrer, director of the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, said at a press briefing today. In contrast with the current crude case fatality rate of about 4.5 percent, she said, the study suggests that 0.1 percent to 0.2 percent of people infected by the virus will die, which would make COVID-19 only somewhat more deadly than the seasonal flu.”
L.A. County Antibody Tests Suggest the Fatality Rate for COVID-19 Is Much Lower Than People Feared: The tests indicate that the number of infections in the county is around 40 times as high as the number of confirmed cases.
It goes both ways, though. If it’s spreading more rapidly and stealthily, more people are going to infected over a given time frame. So the same number of people might end up dying, despite a bigger denominator.
It goes both ways, though. If it’s spreading more rapidly and stealthily, more people are going to infected over a given time frame. So the same number of people might end up dying, despite a bigger denominator.
And, given the nature of CoVID, the health system will continue to be wrecked.
Freedom!!
And, given the nature of CoVID, the health system will continue to be wrecked.
Freedom!!
Yup, wrs @06.21.
Yup, wrs @06.21.
People who come from a culture that instinctively either ignore or disbelieve everyone in authority don’t suddenly see the light when they cross the Rio Grande. This too is problematic.
Right, if they are brown and like this, that’s a problem. If they are white, well, not so much…
Oh, lj, you mean libertarian culture! Definitely a whole different deal.
People who come from a culture that instinctively either ignore or disbelieve everyone in authority don’t suddenly see the light when they cross the Rio Grande. This too is problematic.
Right, if they are brown and like this, that’s a problem. If they are white, well, not so much…
Oh, lj, you mean libertarian culture! Definitely a whole different deal.
I don’t think these numbers pass the smell test. A mortality rate of 0.1% implies that everyone in NY city (death toll is ~10k) has been infected. If the mortality rate is 0.2% then about half of NY city has been infected. There was a similar study from Stanford with similar numbers however it seems like their rate of positive tests can be explained soley by the false positive rate associated with the test.
I don’t think these numbers pass the smell test. A mortality rate of 0.1% implies that everyone in NY city (death toll is ~10k) has been infected. If the mortality rate is 0.2% then about half of NY city has been infected. There was a similar study from Stanford with similar numbers however it seems like their rate of positive tests can be explained soley by the false positive rate associated with the test.
All that means Charles is that neither you nor I are dead yet.
McKinney wrote: “look at the overwrought title of this thread. Jesus.”
No, look at this and feel your underwroughtness:
https://digbysblog.net/2020/04/as-ye-sow-so-shall-ye-reap/
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/18/nyregion/coronavirus-jjbubbles-joe-joyce.html
I’d say the title of this post is on the money in its evocation of the anti government conservative fake Christian death cult that is looking for death ………. theirs, yours, and mine, and they are reaching pay dirt. So much winning.
I sense in their black hearts that they are becoming disappointed at the recent stats pointing to the fact that Covid-19’s per capita death toll is not going to reach the dire levels predicted, even though the ease of transmission and the asymptomatic carriers goofing on us are outrageously unpredicable and it seems uncountable by republicans, who like the Chinese government early in the going are resisting the counting ….. and the testing required.
I am overwrought. It is a matter of public record.
But you are a consistent minimizer of serious crap that always, always, turns out to be much worse than your pooh poohing of how bad it gets.
And somehow you always determine that both sides do it, and if it wasn’t for government fucking up, nobody would do it.
We could review if you like.
Both sides don’t influence people to goddamned die of this killer virus.
Only one side does.
Trump is not stupid. He’s doing his best, McKinney to kill you and he’s pretty smart about it, I’d say, despite the best intentions of the decent folks remaining in the deep state attempting to save your life.
Both sides is bullshit.
Trump is smarter than both of us. He has to be, as a killer, to keep one step ahead of us like he does.
Feel free to rip me.
I am immune to that at least.
One interesting item regarding the death toll in Italy that relates to your density and minority observations. It turns out that Italians, like many ethnic minorities in this country practice very close multi-generation family values and their first human impulse as the virus swept trouble the population was to gather together as family asymptomatically and pass the virus on to their loved ones, killing many of the elder generation.
I would continue regarding your observations about who is spreading this thing by relating how difficult is for me the white guy to finally get my hands on masks and gloves and disinfectant, despite my ability to pay, and the horrendous practices at grocery stores, mostly serving white folks, until very late in the going, related to me by close friends who work in the industry who work on the front line.
But I need a shower to rinse the both sides cooties off my person.
All that means Charles is that neither you nor I are dead yet.
McKinney wrote: “look at the overwrought title of this thread. Jesus.”
No, look at this and feel your underwroughtness:
https://digbysblog.net/2020/04/as-ye-sow-so-shall-ye-reap/
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/18/nyregion/coronavirus-jjbubbles-joe-joyce.html
I’d say the title of this post is on the money in its evocation of the anti government conservative fake Christian death cult that is looking for death ………. theirs, yours, and mine, and they are reaching pay dirt. So much winning.
I sense in their black hearts that they are becoming disappointed at the recent stats pointing to the fact that Covid-19’s per capita death toll is not going to reach the dire levels predicted, even though the ease of transmission and the asymptomatic carriers goofing on us are outrageously unpredicable and it seems uncountable by republicans, who like the Chinese government early in the going are resisting the counting ….. and the testing required.
I am overwrought. It is a matter of public record.
But you are a consistent minimizer of serious crap that always, always, turns out to be much worse than your pooh poohing of how bad it gets.
And somehow you always determine that both sides do it, and if it wasn’t for government fucking up, nobody would do it.
We could review if you like.
Both sides don’t influence people to goddamned die of this killer virus.
Only one side does.
Trump is not stupid. He’s doing his best, McKinney to kill you and he’s pretty smart about it, I’d say, despite the best intentions of the decent folks remaining in the deep state attempting to save your life.
Both sides is bullshit.
Trump is smarter than both of us. He has to be, as a killer, to keep one step ahead of us like he does.
Feel free to rip me.
I am immune to that at least.
One interesting item regarding the death toll in Italy that relates to your density and minority observations. It turns out that Italians, like many ethnic minorities in this country practice very close multi-generation family values and their first human impulse as the virus swept trouble the population was to gather together as family asymptomatically and pass the virus on to their loved ones, killing many of the elder generation.
I would continue regarding your observations about who is spreading this thing by relating how difficult is for me the white guy to finally get my hands on masks and gloves and disinfectant, despite my ability to pay, and the horrendous practices at grocery stores, mostly serving white folks, until very late in the going, related to me by close friends who work in the industry who work on the front line.
But I need a shower to rinse the both sides cooties off my person.
(death toll is ~10k)
For the record, the current tally on Johns Hopkins side for NYC is 14,604.
(death toll is ~10k)
For the record, the current tally on Johns Hopkins side for NYC is 14,604.
For the record, the current tally on Johns Hopkins side for NYC is 14,604.
10k is a nice round number, but 14k makes those results for deathrates even less believable. When was the last time there were mass burials in NY for the seasonal flu?
For the record, the current tally on Johns Hopkins side for NYC is 14,604.
10k is a nice round number, but 14k makes those results for deathrates even less believable. When was the last time there were mass burials in NY for the seasonal flu?
I look forward to all of those densely packed folks going without protection losing their health insurance when the packed court declares Obamacare illegal, along with Medicaid, and trump de-funds both programs down to a pittance.
I wish both sides did it equally. In fact I wish my side was ten times more ruthlessly better at it.
bc wrote: trump bloviations and the media bloviatiors bloviatots back
Man, your underestimation of trump’s achievements in breaking the tie is impressive. Even Genghis Khan gives him more credit.
Both sides bullshit.
I look forward to all of those densely packed folks going without protection losing their health insurance when the packed court declares Obamacare illegal, along with Medicaid, and trump de-funds both programs down to a pittance.
I wish both sides did it equally. In fact I wish my side was ten times more ruthlessly better at it.
bc wrote: trump bloviations and the media bloviatiors bloviatots back
Man, your underestimation of trump’s achievements in breaking the tie is impressive. Even Genghis Khan gives him more credit.
Both sides bullshit.
I’m starting a group to push for the end of social distancing and the mainstreaming of libertarian lepers. Those people have suffered enough.
They’ll be coming to your door soon so you can succor their scabs personally.
There is nothing in the Constitution …..full stop.
I’m also instituting in my chain of libertarian bat soup covidterias, to enlarge my clientele, the concept of pangolin-free lunches every Wednesday for the discerning diners who may be scared shitless of coming out of their homes and experiencing freedom.
The bat buffet will feature copper surfaces and sneeze guards to minimize viral contamination and charging stations for portable ventilators for those suffocating on the premises, but are nevertheless bellying up to the bar.
We welcome all dining ideologies.
Hand washing is optional. As long as you wash mine by paying your bill, I could give a shit whether you wash yours.
What am I, your mother?
I’m starting a group to push for the end of social distancing and the mainstreaming of libertarian lepers. Those people have suffered enough.
They’ll be coming to your door soon so you can succor their scabs personally.
There is nothing in the Constitution …..full stop.
I’m also instituting in my chain of libertarian bat soup covidterias, to enlarge my clientele, the concept of pangolin-free lunches every Wednesday for the discerning diners who may be scared shitless of coming out of their homes and experiencing freedom.
The bat buffet will feature copper surfaces and sneeze guards to minimize viral contamination and charging stations for portable ventilators for those suffocating on the premises, but are nevertheless bellying up to the bar.
We welcome all dining ideologies.
Hand washing is optional. As long as you wash mine by paying your bill, I could give a shit whether you wash yours.
What am I, your mother?
When was the last time there were mass burials in NYC for the seasonal flu?
Giuliani was Mayor, and al Qaeda claims there were mass burials for the 3000 who passed on simultaneously from the flu in the Twin Towers while coincidentally the buildings fell down because of architectural irregularities.
When was the last time there were mass burials in NYC for the seasonal flu?
Giuliani was Mayor, and al Qaeda claims there were mass burials for the 3000 who passed on simultaneously from the flu in the Twin Towers while coincidentally the buildings fell down because of architectural irregularities.
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/white-house-memo-federal-workers-return-office
Mick Mulvaney told the Conservative Group called Predatory Jackals On The Hunt that what better way to reduce the federal employee headcount without going thru regular channels.
His mother, we know her, agreed.
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/white-house-memo-federal-workers-return-office
Mick Mulvaney told the Conservative Group called Predatory Jackals On The Hunt that what better way to reduce the federal employee headcount without going thru regular channels.
His mother, we know her, agreed.
Here’s a link to the actual press release from LA County Public Health so that you can read the info without all of the artificial flavors and colors that Reason routinely adds to their commentary in order to please libertarian palates.
http://publichealth.lacounty.gov/phcommon/public/media/mediapubhpdetail.cfm?prid=2328
You can see the experts’ recommendations there, absent the napkin doodles of the amateurs.
Here’s a link to the actual press release from LA County Public Health so that you can read the info without all of the artificial flavors and colors that Reason routinely adds to their commentary in order to please libertarian palates.
http://publichealth.lacounty.gov/phcommon/public/media/mediapubhpdetail.cfm?prid=2328
You can see the experts’ recommendations there, absent the napkin doodles of the amateurs.
such a heartfelt outpouring of true grievance.
we need to respect their deep true feelings of loss and their manly dignity and TYRANNY !!!
STFU.
such a heartfelt outpouring of true grievance.
we need to respect their deep true feelings of loss and their manly dignity and TYRANNY !!!
STFU.
A lot of people will make a personal assessment of what their risks are and will continue to self-quarantine regardless of what businesses are open.
This is the fatal flaw in the libertarian ethos. It assumes that people making a “personal assessment of what their risks are” have the information and context to actually make a reasonable assessment of what their risks are. It assumes that, regardless of what information and context they have, their assessment will be rational, dispassionate, and accurate. It assumes that we are all purely rational actors, armed with complete and accurate information.
Same deal with the free market ideologues.
None of those assumptions are sound. Ponder this for, perhaps, a minute and a half, and I think you might grasp this.
There are actually people out there in the world who have made a lifetime study of communicable diseases and how they spread in human populations.
All of those people say “stay the hell home”.
I will listen to those people, and I will avoid, literally like the plague, the people who decide on the basis of their “personal assessment of their risk” whether it’s safe for them to mingle with other folks in public places.
Frankly, I wish that all readers of Reason magazine, specifically, would wear a great big badge indicating that, so I can know to stay the hell away from them if I should encounter them on the rare occasions when I have to go into some public place.
Republicans, too, for that matter. No offense. The virus is a game of odds, I prefer to keep mine in my own favor.
A lot of people will make a personal assessment of what their risks are and will continue to self-quarantine regardless of what businesses are open.
This is the fatal flaw in the libertarian ethos. It assumes that people making a “personal assessment of what their risks are” have the information and context to actually make a reasonable assessment of what their risks are. It assumes that, regardless of what information and context they have, their assessment will be rational, dispassionate, and accurate. It assumes that we are all purely rational actors, armed with complete and accurate information.
Same deal with the free market ideologues.
None of those assumptions are sound. Ponder this for, perhaps, a minute and a half, and I think you might grasp this.
There are actually people out there in the world who have made a lifetime study of communicable diseases and how they spread in human populations.
All of those people say “stay the hell home”.
I will listen to those people, and I will avoid, literally like the plague, the people who decide on the basis of their “personal assessment of their risk” whether it’s safe for them to mingle with other folks in public places.
Frankly, I wish that all readers of Reason magazine, specifically, would wear a great big badge indicating that, so I can know to stay the hell away from them if I should encounter them on the rare occasions when I have to go into some public place.
Republicans, too, for that matter. No offense. The virus is a game of odds, I prefer to keep mine in my own favor.
I’ll extend my first paragraph above:
And it assumes that nobody else is affected by any individual’s “personal assessment”, nor does anyone else have any say or claim on what the person making the “personal assessment” does.
Do what you like, when and if it doesn’t affect anybody else.
I’ll extend my first paragraph above:
And it assumes that nobody else is affected by any individual’s “personal assessment”, nor does anyone else have any say or claim on what the person making the “personal assessment” does.
Do what you like, when and if it doesn’t affect anybody else.
Stanford put out a study similar to USC’s about a week ago that conjectured 50 times as many total cases as confirmed cases in Santa Clara county. Among other issues they assumed specificity of greater than 99% in the antibody tests, which seems unlikely.
None of USC’s press release, LA County’s press release or the LA Times article link to the actual report. I gave up after the first page of Google results, so I can’t compare on that front.
South Korea’s response to Covid has basically been to identify every damned case. They’re reporting a fatality rate of above 2%. Other countries with high rates of testing and non-overwhelmed health systems have similar death rates. That along with the NYC numbers mentioned above make the .1% death rate impossible to believe, sadly.
Stanford put out a study similar to USC’s about a week ago that conjectured 50 times as many total cases as confirmed cases in Santa Clara county. Among other issues they assumed specificity of greater than 99% in the antibody tests, which seems unlikely.
None of USC’s press release, LA County’s press release or the LA Times article link to the actual report. I gave up after the first page of Google results, so I can’t compare on that front.
South Korea’s response to Covid has basically been to identify every damned case. They’re reporting a fatality rate of above 2%. Other countries with high rates of testing and non-overwhelmed health systems have similar death rates. That along with the NYC numbers mentioned above make the .1% death rate impossible to believe, sadly.
It’s hard to give a convincing death rate number when you aren’t in a position to do serious testing. Because that means you are doing division by a flat guess. I don’t understand why Stanford or USC even bother to publish stuff that’s this poorly based.
It’s hard to give a convincing death rate number when you aren’t in a position to do serious testing. Because that means you are doing division by a flat guess. I don’t understand why Stanford or USC even bother to publish stuff that’s this poorly based.
Trump halts all immigration to America.
Like funding for WHO, food and meat inspection, and environmental regulation, immigration will never be resumed under subhuman republican nativist fascism.
We have a binary choice.
The Statue of Liberty should be blown up.
And then take down the rest of pigfucker America.
Fuck you, conservatives.
The only role for the federal government starting tomorrow is protecting your sorry asses from what is coming as you put into place the entire corrupt vermin conservative program you have yearned for these many decades.
Call your government. You are going to need it’s help to remain among the .
living. Swallow your conservative pride and suck trump’s cock. It’s all that’s left you as the fury descends upon your heads.
If you have relatives and friends or you yourselves don’t have your papers in order, kiss their and your asses goodbye.
Trump halts all immigration to America.
Like funding for WHO, food and meat inspection, and environmental regulation, immigration will never be resumed under subhuman republican nativist fascism.
We have a binary choice.
The Statue of Liberty should be blown up.
And then take down the rest of pigfucker America.
Fuck you, conservatives.
The only role for the federal government starting tomorrow is protecting your sorry asses from what is coming as you put into place the entire corrupt vermin conservative program you have yearned for these many decades.
Call your government. You are going to need it’s help to remain among the .
living. Swallow your conservative pride and suck trump’s cock. It’s all that’s left you as the fury descends upon your heads.
If you have relatives and friends or you yourselves don’t have your papers in order, kiss their and your asses goodbye.
South Korea’s response to Covid has basically been to identify every damned case. They’re reporting a fatality rate of above 2%. Other countries with high rates of testing and non-overwhelmed health systems have similar death rates.
In the US, 2% of the population is six and a half million people.
Yup, just like the flu. Which is what an old friend said to a family member of mind yesterday as his reason for going about his life as usual.
South Korea’s response to Covid has basically been to identify every damned case. They’re reporting a fatality rate of above 2%. Other countries with high rates of testing and non-overwhelmed health systems have similar death rates.
In the US, 2% of the population is six and a half million people.
Yup, just like the flu. Which is what an old friend said to a family member of mind yesterday as his reason for going about his life as usual.
Natch:
https://digbysblog.net/2020/04/only-the-best/
Joe Exotic will be pardoned and placed in charge of murdering liberals.
One side bends over. The other side does it.
Your country is garbage.
Trump is smarter than all of the conservatives combined who have posted and commented here since Moe Lane thought he was smarter than Pat Buchanan and Tacitus stifled a yawn at Gary Farber’s fact finding.
You made this world.
And now you will eat it.
I have an interesting post on my experience with wet markets in the hopper.
Fuck it. Delete button activated.
Why cast pearls before conservative swine.
Natch:
https://digbysblog.net/2020/04/only-the-best/
Joe Exotic will be pardoned and placed in charge of murdering liberals.
One side bends over. The other side does it.
Your country is garbage.
Trump is smarter than all of the conservatives combined who have posted and commented here since Moe Lane thought he was smarter than Pat Buchanan and Tacitus stifled a yawn at Gary Farber’s fact finding.
You made this world.
And now you will eat it.
I have an interesting post on my experience with wet markets in the hopper.
Fuck it. Delete button activated.
Why cast pearls before conservative swine.
classroom sized crowds of patent losers.
2500 in Olympia. all crowded together.
classroom sized crowds of patent losers.
2500 in Olympia. all crowded together.
Also these studies need to account for the fact that it’s not just COVID cases, but COVID deaths that are being significantly undercounted:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/04/21/world/coronavirus-missing-deaths.html?
Also these studies need to account for the fact that it’s not just COVID cases, but COVID deaths that are being significantly undercounted:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/04/21/world/coronavirus-missing-deaths.html?
According to current numbers at https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/, the world’s leader in per-capita testing is Iceland. They’ve tested over 12% of their population.
They currently have 1778 total cases, with 351 still active. Their deaths total 10, with 5 of their active cases listed as serious/critical.
If you assume the 5 serious/critical cases will result in death, you get a death rate of 0.8% of total cases.
UAE is the next best, not considering the Faeroe Islands and the Falkland Islands because of their extremely small populations.
UAE has tested 8% of their population, has total cases of 7755, 46 deaths, and 6266 active cases, one of which is serious/critical. Those are some odd numbers, given the high number of active cases relative to total cases and the single serious/critical case.
But adding that one serious/critical case to the number of deaths, you get a death rate of 0.6%.
South Korea is surprisingly (to me, anyway) low on the list sorted by per-capita testing – behind the US, in fact. I don’t know if it’s a reporting issue or what. At any rate, following suit with the previous calculations, you get a death rate of 2.7% for South Korea.
What all that means, I leave to people who know more than I do.
According to current numbers at https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/, the world’s leader in per-capita testing is Iceland. They’ve tested over 12% of their population.
They currently have 1778 total cases, with 351 still active. Their deaths total 10, with 5 of their active cases listed as serious/critical.
If you assume the 5 serious/critical cases will result in death, you get a death rate of 0.8% of total cases.
UAE is the next best, not considering the Faeroe Islands and the Falkland Islands because of their extremely small populations.
UAE has tested 8% of their population, has total cases of 7755, 46 deaths, and 6266 active cases, one of which is serious/critical. Those are some odd numbers, given the high number of active cases relative to total cases and the single serious/critical case.
But adding that one serious/critical case to the number of deaths, you get a death rate of 0.6%.
South Korea is surprisingly (to me, anyway) low on the list sorted by per-capita testing – behind the US, in fact. I don’t know if it’s a reporting issue or what. At any rate, following suit with the previous calculations, you get a death rate of 2.7% for South Korea.
What all that means, I leave to people who know more than I do.
I think I’m in the spam bucket. That or I screwed up when attempting to hit the “post” button.
Released. — ed.
I think I’m in the spam bucket. That or I screwed up when attempting to hit the “post” button.
Released. — ed.
maybe the protestors should try kneeling, silently.
that seems to get people’s attention. and has no negative repercussions.
maybe the protestors should try kneeling, silently.
that seems to get people’s attention. and has no negative repercussions.
Thank you, whoever got me out of jail.
I had the same thought, cleek. White guys with guns gathering during a contagion and blocking ambulances are just expressing their point of view.
Black guys kneeling silently during the national anthem before a football game are sons of bitches (or whatever fearless leader called them at the time).
Thank you, whoever got me out of jail.
I had the same thought, cleek. White guys with guns gathering during a contagion and blocking ambulances are just expressing their point of view.
Black guys kneeling silently during the national anthem before a football game are sons of bitches (or whatever fearless leader called them at the time).
The protests in Colorado on Sunday were apparently small and mild compared to other places. I watched the video feed from the news helicopter for a while. I’d guess 300 people or so on the Capitol’s west lawn. I’ve seen much bigger demonstrations there. Two categories of people: one wearing masks and maintaining spacing, one crowding together on the sidewalks. Reports are that two people were openly carrying firearms, but left to put them away (in cars?) when Denver PD told them to (Denver does not allow open carry). The planned traffic blockages didn’t really occur; Denver PD was shunting vehicles off onto one-way streets that left the Capitol vicinity.
That it was a very nice day after last week’s nasty weather probably hurt the turnout a lot.
The protests in Colorado on Sunday were apparently small and mild compared to other places. I watched the video feed from the news helicopter for a while. I’d guess 300 people or so on the Capitol’s west lawn. I’ve seen much bigger demonstrations there. Two categories of people: one wearing masks and maintaining spacing, one crowding together on the sidewalks. Reports are that two people were openly carrying firearms, but left to put them away (in cars?) when Denver PD told them to (Denver does not allow open carry). The planned traffic blockages didn’t really occur; Denver PD was shunting vehicles off onto one-way streets that left the Capitol vicinity.
That it was a very nice day after last week’s nasty weather probably hurt the turnout a lot.
To Ufficio’s point about the Stanford tests and the USC tests being reported by LA County, they can’t link to the actual reports because those reports are not yet published and likely have not yet been through review. All we really have at this point is initial results – and possibly just a first impression of those results.
I spent a couple hours looking for info from the Stanford studies back when the right wing news sites were pasting Victor Davis Hanson’s yawp over the top of the data. Even with a deep dive into the UC library databases with access to institutional-subscription-only journals, I turned up nothing about the research under any of the names associated with the study.
I’m betting it is all still at the draft-being-shared-around-on-email stage. Which is what you’d expect.
To Ufficio’s point about the Stanford tests and the USC tests being reported by LA County, they can’t link to the actual reports because those reports are not yet published and likely have not yet been through review. All we really have at this point is initial results – and possibly just a first impression of those results.
I spent a couple hours looking for info from the Stanford studies back when the right wing news sites were pasting Victor Davis Hanson’s yawp over the top of the data. Even with a deep dive into the UC library databases with access to institutional-subscription-only journals, I turned up nothing about the research under any of the names associated with the study.
I’m betting it is all still at the draft-being-shared-around-on-email stage. Which is what you’d expect.
Maybe I’m just being overwrought, but I wonder if McT is working forSmithfield…
Was there any way to prevent the Smithfield Foods pork processing plant in South Dakota from becoming one of the country’s largest known coronavirus clusters, with more than 700 workers infected? It’s hard to know “what could have been done differently,” a Smithfield spokesperson said, given what she referred to as the plant’s “large immigrant population.”
“Living circumstances in certain cultures are different than they are with your traditional American family,” she explained. The spokesperson and a second corporate representative pointed to an April 13 Fox News interview in which the governor of South Dakota, Kristi Noem, said that “99%” of the spread of infections “wasn’t happening inside the facility” but inside workers’ homes, “because a lot of these folks who work at this plant live in the same community, the same buildings, sometimes in the same apartments.”
via LGM
Maybe I’m just being overwrought, but I wonder if McT is working forSmithfield…
Was there any way to prevent the Smithfield Foods pork processing plant in South Dakota from becoming one of the country’s largest known coronavirus clusters, with more than 700 workers infected? It’s hard to know “what could have been done differently,” a Smithfield spokesperson said, given what she referred to as the plant’s “large immigrant population.”
“Living circumstances in certain cultures are different than they are with your traditional American family,” she explained. The spokesperson and a second corporate representative pointed to an April 13 Fox News interview in which the governor of South Dakota, Kristi Noem, said that “99%” of the spread of infections “wasn’t happening inside the facility” but inside workers’ homes, “because a lot of these folks who work at this plant live in the same community, the same buildings, sometimes in the same apartments.”
via LGM
Per Ufficio and nous’s mention of “Stanford” and LA county reports, here is what Cheryl Rofer at BJ said tonight in a comment on Tom Levenson’s post about Niall Ferguson:
If it’s only at the “draft being shared around by email” stage…who chose to give it to the media in the first place? Or was it a Twitter blockbuster?
I doubt I really want to know.
Per Ufficio and nous’s mention of “Stanford” and LA county reports, here is what Cheryl Rofer at BJ said tonight in a comment on Tom Levenson’s post about Niall Ferguson:
If it’s only at the “draft being shared around by email” stage…who chose to give it to the media in the first place? Or was it a Twitter blockbuster?
I doubt I really want to know.
JanieM – Both studies are real. What happened with the Stanford Medical test was that a right wing media site took one piece of initial data mentioned in a press release and used that as an excuse to trot out Victor Davis Hanson’s old speculation about “herd immunity” to amplify Limbaugh’s disinformation. Not sure where the stuff about venture capitalists is coming from. And the LA County study is, IIRC, being done by USC and the higher rate of infection was being reported as a warning that relaxing public gathering restrictions would be disastrous given how much more quickly it would spread. But again, Reason leaped upon that to try to argue for a lower case fatality rate. True, perhaps, but cold comfort when you start to pay attention and realize that it all points to more deaths on the horizon rather than fewer, despite a somewhat less deadly virus.
The studies are legit, it’s the right wing disinformation industry that’s the problem.
JanieM – Both studies are real. What happened with the Stanford Medical test was that a right wing media site took one piece of initial data mentioned in a press release and used that as an excuse to trot out Victor Davis Hanson’s old speculation about “herd immunity” to amplify Limbaugh’s disinformation. Not sure where the stuff about venture capitalists is coming from. And the LA County study is, IIRC, being done by USC and the higher rate of infection was being reported as a warning that relaxing public gathering restrictions would be disastrous given how much more quickly it would spread. But again, Reason leaped upon that to try to argue for a lower case fatality rate. True, perhaps, but cold comfort when you start to pay attention and realize that it all points to more deaths on the horizon rather than fewer, despite a somewhat less deadly virus.
The studies are legit, it’s the right wing disinformation industry that’s the problem.
“To sum up each side in the language of their angriest opponents: The “Closers” want to demolish nearly all Americans’ ability to live and destroy nearly all the wealth our society has built up over decades, by halting the wheels of most commerce for the foreseeable future. And the “Openers” are so dedicated to keeping GDP growing and so ignorant of science they want to see hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, of Americans die of a hideous disease because they don’t understand how contagion works.
Both Closers and Openers, though, have a combination of reasons, theories, guesses, and value judgments of a sort many sane people have always made, that make their respective positions make sense to them. Neither side should be blithely written off as either idiotic or sinister or not thinking, in their own way, of human well-being.”
What Each Side of the COVID-19 Debate Should Understand About the Other: The war between Openers and Closers shouldn’t be seen as a fight between idiot death-worshippers and unnecessarily frightened tyrants.
“To sum up each side in the language of their angriest opponents: The “Closers” want to demolish nearly all Americans’ ability to live and destroy nearly all the wealth our society has built up over decades, by halting the wheels of most commerce for the foreseeable future. And the “Openers” are so dedicated to keeping GDP growing and so ignorant of science they want to see hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, of Americans die of a hideous disease because they don’t understand how contagion works.
Both Closers and Openers, though, have a combination of reasons, theories, guesses, and value judgments of a sort many sane people have always made, that make their respective positions make sense to them. Neither side should be blithely written off as either idiotic or sinister or not thinking, in their own way, of human well-being.”
What Each Side of the COVID-19 Debate Should Understand About the Other: The war between Openers and Closers shouldn’t be seen as a fight between idiot death-worshippers and unnecessarily frightened tyrants.
The “Closers” want to demolish nearly all Americans’ ability to live and destroy nearly all the wealth our society has built up over decades
Who the hell wants to demolish anything?
The “Closers” want to demolish nearly all Americans’ ability to live and destroy nearly all the wealth our society has built up over decades
Who the hell wants to demolish anything?
And the “Openers” are so dedicated to keeping GDP growing and so ignorant of science they want to see hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, of Americans die of a hideous disease because they don’t understand how contagion works.
this would be a better caricature if not for the existence of, for example, GA Gov Brian Kemp.
And the “Openers” are so dedicated to keeping GDP growing and so ignorant of science they want to see hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, of Americans die of a hideous disease because they don’t understand how contagion works.
this would be a better caricature if not for the existence of, for example, GA Gov Brian Kemp.
There is a qualitative difference between “want to” and “is willing to”. Of course, there is no middle ground to find. We are a completely binary nation.
There is a qualitative difference between “want to” and “is willing to”. Of course, there is no middle ground to find. We are a completely binary nation.
The evidence from past pandemics is that letting them run uncontrolled ends up being worse economically than the alternative. So the choice between economy and lives is in all likelihood illusory.
It is not an easy problem to manage, and whatever government decides (or doesn’t decide) to do, we will all be poorer in a year’s time.
Crushing the pandemic via lockdown, and then managing it with track and trace testing until vaccines are available is probably our least worst option.
The best would have been South Korea/Germany style management, but that it not open to us without going through the harsh economic pain of lockdown.
I’m not happy about it – it’s conceivable I could lose my business if this carries on too long – but I don’t see the alternative.
The evidence from past pandemics is that letting them run uncontrolled ends up being worse economically than the alternative. So the choice between economy and lives is in all likelihood illusory.
It is not an easy problem to manage, and whatever government decides (or doesn’t decide) to do, we will all be poorer in a year’s time.
Crushing the pandemic via lockdown, and then managing it with track and trace testing until vaccines are available is probably our least worst option.
The best would have been South Korea/Germany style management, but that it not open to us without going through the harsh economic pain of lockdown.
I’m not happy about it – it’s conceivable I could lose my business if this carries on too long – but I don’t see the alternative.
There is a qualitative difference between “want to” and “is willing to”
the subtle difference in the state of mind whose actions cause a thousand deaths will be of precious little concern to those who mourn those newly dead.
There is a qualitative difference between “want to” and “is willing to”
the subtle difference in the state of mind whose actions cause a thousand deaths will be of precious little concern to those who mourn those newly dead.
Q to Trump: A man said his entire family got sick because they listened to you and didn’t stay home. Are you concerned that downplaying the virus got people sick?
A from Trump: A lot of people love Trump.
but maybe he’s doesn’t want people to die. he just doesn’t care if they do and his actions ensure that more will die.
let the magats worry about the distinction.
Q to Trump: A man said his entire family got sick because they listened to you and didn’t stay home. Are you concerned that downplaying the virus got people sick?
A from Trump: A lot of people love Trump.
but maybe he’s doesn’t want people to die. he just doesn’t care if they do and his actions ensure that more will die.
let the magats worry about the distinction.
… in the state of mind of a person whose…
… in the state of mind of a person whose…
“What do you have to lose? Take it”
– Trump on hydroxychloroquine
he doesn’t know. he doesn’t care. he doesn’t care to know. his words and inactions are killing people.
but it’s important to defend him against mean people like me.
“What do you have to lose? Take it”
– Trump on hydroxychloroquine
he doesn’t know. he doesn’t care. he doesn’t care to know. his words and inactions are killing people.
but it’s important to defend him against mean people like me.
The evidence from past pandemics is that letting them run uncontrolled ends up being worse economically than the alternative. So the choice between economy and lives is in all likelihood illusory.
But it’s an easy illusion for those whose “planning” horizon is measured in hours, or days at most. Short-termism at its finest.
The evidence from past pandemics is that letting them run uncontrolled ends up being worse economically than the alternative. So the choice between economy and lives is in all likelihood illusory.
But it’s an easy illusion for those whose “planning” horizon is measured in hours, or days at most. Short-termism at its finest.
nous | April 22, 2020 at 03:05 AM
— Thanks, nous. I don’t know what Cheryl meant, then; she’s usually pretty careful. On the other hand, I should have just stayed out of it, since I had completely ignored earlier references to those studies, since what was being reported seemed so full of holes.
nous | April 22, 2020 at 03:05 AM
— Thanks, nous. I don’t know what Cheryl meant, then; she’s usually pretty careful. On the other hand, I should have just stayed out of it, since I had completely ignored earlier references to those studies, since what was being reported seemed so full of holes.
but it’s important to defend him against mean people like me.
Yeah, cleek, and furthermore you’re contributing to how divided the country is. It’s all your fault!
but it’s important to defend him against mean people like me.
Yeah, cleek, and furthermore you’re contributing to how divided the country is. It’s all your fault!
Trump republican conservatives and their “media” will turn around and blame the VA for prescribing hydroxycholoraquine in the first place, and Lindsay Graham will call hearings, I expect by next Tuesday, to push for privatizing the entire kit and kaboodle so that the pirate (inadvertent misspelling, but I find it felicitous) sector, that isn’t required to be transparent like the long lunch takers at the VA are asked to be, can flip the numbers and send them to the White House, so they can say “lookee here, the man is a genius!”
Predicting what these filth will do is like shooting fish in a bucket.
Trump republican conservatives and their “media” will turn around and blame the VA for prescribing hydroxycholoraquine in the first place, and Lindsay Graham will call hearings, I expect by next Tuesday, to push for privatizing the entire kit and kaboodle so that the pirate (inadvertent misspelling, but I find it felicitous) sector, that isn’t required to be transparent like the long lunch takers at the VA are asked to be, can flip the numbers and send them to the White House, so they can say “lookee here, the man is a genius!”
Predicting what these filth will do is like shooting fish in a bucket.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/06/underlying-conditions/610261/
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/06/underlying-conditions/610261/
Too many money quotes, but this near the end:
It turns out that scientific experts and other civil servants are not traitorous members of a “deep state”—they’re essential workers, and marginalizing them in favor of ideologues and sycophants is a threat to the nation’s health. It turns out that “nimble” companies can’t prepare for a catastrophe or distribute lifesaving goods—only a competent federal government can do that. It turns out that everything has a cost, and years of attacking government, squeezing it dry and draining its morale, inflict a heavy cost that the public has to pay in lives.
Too many money quotes, but this near the end:
It turns out that scientific experts and other civil servants are not traitorous members of a “deep state”—they’re essential workers, and marginalizing them in favor of ideologues and sycophants is a threat to the nation’s health. It turns out that “nimble” companies can’t prepare for a catastrophe or distribute lifesaving goods—only a competent federal government can do that. It turns out that everything has a cost, and years of attacking government, squeezing it dry and draining its morale, inflict a heavy cost that the public has to pay in lives.
It’s really challenging to keep track of all of the different studies being done by all of the different universities without tracking the names of the lead researchers. Stanford Med has a lot of studied going on. They also have a lot of other academics not in the medical school who are doing their thing on stuff related to COVID. Victor Davis Hanson is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institute there. I’m sure that there are others doing quant stuff, too, that are doing other things with tech backing. Unless one is careful, those different studies can get conflated.
And a large chunk of the RW fringe media makes a cottage industry of getting clicks and narratives out of making collages of it all and using the “Stanford” label to get buy-in.
It all takes time to disentangle, even with good research skills.
It’s really challenging to keep track of all of the different studies being done by all of the different universities without tracking the names of the lead researchers. Stanford Med has a lot of studied going on. They also have a lot of other academics not in the medical school who are doing their thing on stuff related to COVID. Victor Davis Hanson is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institute there. I’m sure that there are others doing quant stuff, too, that are doing other things with tech backing. Unless one is careful, those different studies can get conflated.
And a large chunk of the RW fringe media makes a cottage industry of getting clicks and narratives out of making collages of it all and using the “Stanford” label to get buy-in.
It all takes time to disentangle, even with good research skills.
It appears that Robert Mercer and Ken Cuccinelli are two names behind the death rallies.
Please read the article. These people are monsters, and the Trump administration is crawling with them.
It appears that Robert Mercer and Ken Cuccinelli are two names behind the death rallies.
Please read the article. These people are monsters, and the Trump administration is crawling with them.
It appears that Robert Mercer and Ken Cuccinelli are two names behind the death rallies.
Now if they would only attend these (or the other RWNJ) rallies that they foment….
It appears that Robert Mercer and Ken Cuccinelli are two names behind the death rallies.
Now if they would only attend these (or the other RWNJ) rallies that they foment….
Ben Carson M.D., too.
He was known at Johns Hopkins for not washing his hands before brain surgery, and when asked why, he said, well, it’s not exactly brain surgery.
Ben Carson M.D., too.
He was known at Johns Hopkins for not washing his hands before brain surgery, and when asked why, he said, well, it’s not exactly brain surgery.
True, perhaps, but cold comfort when you start to pay attention and realize that it all points to more deaths on the horizon rather than fewer, despite a somewhat less deadly virus.
I don’t know why this isn’t obvious to (more) people. I’m going to make up pseudo-scientific factors for simplicity’s sake to illustrate what seems to me to be the basic concept, and putting it in very broad terms at a level 3rd-graders can understand.
Let’s say there’s C, which represents “contagiousness.” Then there’s D, which represents “deadliness.” Finally, there’s N, representing the number of people who will die in a given amount of time. You get N = C x D.
So maybe D is only one tenth what we thought it was, but C is twenty times what we thought it was. That means N is going to be twice what we thought it was going to be.
Running around telling people how great it is that D is only one tenth what we thought it was while ignoring the rest of the story wouldn’t be appropriate, now would it? (And I would prefer that more people would immediately see through it when someone tried to do it.)
True, perhaps, but cold comfort when you start to pay attention and realize that it all points to more deaths on the horizon rather than fewer, despite a somewhat less deadly virus.
I don’t know why this isn’t obvious to (more) people. I’m going to make up pseudo-scientific factors for simplicity’s sake to illustrate what seems to me to be the basic concept, and putting it in very broad terms at a level 3rd-graders can understand.
Let’s say there’s C, which represents “contagiousness.” Then there’s D, which represents “deadliness.” Finally, there’s N, representing the number of people who will die in a given amount of time. You get N = C x D.
So maybe D is only one tenth what we thought it was, but C is twenty times what we thought it was. That means N is going to be twice what we thought it was going to be.
Running around telling people how great it is that D is only one tenth what we thought it was while ignoring the rest of the story wouldn’t be appropriate, now would it? (And I would prefer that more people would immediately see through it when someone tried to do it.)
For many, multiplying “more” times “less” results in “whatever I wanted to believe in the first place.” Actual numbers need not apply.
For many, multiplying “more” times “less” results in “whatever I wanted to believe in the first place.” Actual numbers need not apply.
Yes, I should have been more specific. The “Stanford” study I meant was this one:
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.14.20062463v1.full.pdf
It’s a non-peer-reviewed preprint and seems to have myriad methodological issues. It does contain this helpful caveat, though:
We consider our estimate to represent the best available current evidence, but recognize that new information, especially about the test kit performance, could result in updated estimates. For example, if new estimates indicate test specificity to be less than 97.9%, our SARS-CoV-2 prevalence estimate would change from 2.8% to less than 1%, and the lower uncertainty bound of our estimate would include zero.
Yes, I should have been more specific. The “Stanford” study I meant was this one:
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.14.20062463v1.full.pdf
It’s a non-peer-reviewed preprint and seems to have myriad methodological issues. It does contain this helpful caveat, though:
We consider our estimate to represent the best available current evidence, but recognize that new information, especially about the test kit performance, could result in updated estimates. For example, if new estimates indicate test specificity to be less than 97.9%, our SARS-CoV-2 prevalence estimate would change from 2.8% to less than 1%, and the lower uncertainty bound of our estimate would include zero.
I don’t know why this isn’t obvious to (more) people.
I think people who are making this argument are pushing the “let’s get to herd immunity” line.
Order of magnitude more infections implies somewhat higher R0 value, which implies slightly higher number of cases to get to herd immunity, which is more than balanced out by lower death rate.
Not endorsing this line of thinking at all.
I don’t know why this isn’t obvious to (more) people.
I think people who are making this argument are pushing the “let’s get to herd immunity” line.
Order of magnitude more infections implies somewhat higher R0 value, which implies slightly higher number of cases to get to herd immunity, which is more than balanced out by lower death rate.
Not endorsing this line of thinking at all.