Political Discussion In The 20s

Topic

Let’s reboot this thing. Have at thee.

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Some people really have problems with numbers. Jimmy Dore is crying that 1,5 trillion gets pumped into the stock market to stop it crashing, and says it’s stupid we can afford that, but not UBI. UBI would however cost more than twice that. And the 1,5 trillion are actually loans.

 

I love Jimmy Dore, but he says some stupid shit sometimes. He also said if we can afford bombs, we can afford universal healthcare, but the US spends twice on healthcare what it spends on the military.

 

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/03/federal-reserve-trying-stop-financial-crisis/607987/

A single payer healthcare system would save money–$450 billion per year.

https://www.newsweek.com/medicare-all-would-save-450-billion-annually-while-preventing-68000-deaths-new-study-shows-1487862

It’d also raise wages and create jobs in the healthcare industry:

https://www.newsweek.com/bernie-sanders-medicare-all-would-likely-increase-wages-create-jobs-new-economic-analysis-shows-1490800

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Christian, Andy, Todd, lorcan_nagle

A few things:

Sanders talks a good game with free this and that, and even AOC points to some European countries with their beneficial social programs. My question is ( and I ask objectively) : Why can’t some of the nice programs that work OK overseas work in the US?

There has been a small spike in anti Asian hate crimes and Twitter had a few postings that for all the labels of Asians as been “model minorities” and being so successful etc. it was always a conditional toleration that can go away at any minute like now…

Being in office means being able to juggle as it were a lot of issues and problems, damage control, and crisis management. It was never high society or entertainment. Now I say we really see who can and who can’t minimize damage. Just saying….

Al-x wrote:

Why can’t some of the nice programs that work OK overseas work in the US?

They would. But the majority of people in the US don’t care about that kind of solidarity and community; they want their systems to be capitalist.

Tragically, we’ve been following that path in Europe. Part of the problem of the Corona crisis is that we’ve in recent decades dismantled a lot of our health system, because a lot of the American small-government ideology was followed here, as well.

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Al-x

The key words there are “likely”.
Macroeconomics is speculative. Particularly in a non-fixed economy like America which sustains the western world and is based on 4-5% of the global population.

Its why the bottoming put of the AAA instruments caused the global financial crisis. One little thing amd then all those dominoes fell.

People looking at those numbers arent just thinking in terms of cash; theyre thinking of implications like debt/equity swaps and cancelled debts and the run on effects. This touches wall street, like it or not.

I like both those policies – UBI and single payer (and they would work in Australia with a population of 5% of Americas, and Denmark with a quarter of ours).

But you literally have to do a staged implementation and monitor the results. You introduce single payer first (Warrens plan is correct, sorry Will) and you have to fo a gradual increase of UBI.

Neither are likely to cause a GFC, thats not what im saying, but few people undetstand financial markets and instruments (including me, and im sure everyone here). Historically, shocking it is bad, even if its for positive transformational reasons.

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Christian

Bernie’s M4A plan is staged too, it just doesn’t split the tougher fight (actual M4A) into a separate bill delayed til after 2022.

My point wasnt really to pick a candidate – it was that transformative imoacts to the financial markets have to be implementws carefully and watched closely. And that America is difderent from many european countriws due to the size and scale of the economy and potential macroeconomoc impacts.

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Will_C

Christian wrote:

Part of the problem of the Corona crisis is that we’ve in recent decades dismantled a lot of our health system, because a lot of the American small-government ideology was followed here, as well.

I’m not sure it’s been dismantled so much as choked by labyrinthine bureaucracy.  Sure, the ideology says reduce the state, but in order to reduce the state you need a huge bureaucratic apparatus, with many parts contracted out to the private sector – because the same ideology says that’s always better. (In some cases it has been, others? Not so much.)  For all she talked of rolling back the state, Thatcher expanded central government and that direction hasn’t really changed.

Over in the US? Well, if it wasn’t for a highly bewildering mass of actual US agencies to draw from, numerous US cop procedurals would lack their standard go-to plot of another agency waltzing into fuck everything up, cue lots of juris-dick-tion punch-ups.

But even if the actual picture is different, that belief does still persist.

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Christian

Al-x wrote:

My question is ( and I ask objectively) : Why can’t some of the nice programs that work OK overseas work in the US?

Who says they can’t? Ain’t it usually vested interests (follow the money)?

All available evidence points to single payer/M4A resulting in better health outcomes at a lower cost – the losers in this scenario though are the parties currently doing very well out of private health; and they do so well that they can afford to pump out disinformation and coerce the legislators who supposedly control things.

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Will_C

Anonymous wrote:

He also said if we can afford bombs, we can afford universal healthcare, but the US spends twice on healthcare what it spends on the military.

It does but it also spends twice as much government money per person on healthcare as countries like France and Germany who provide universal healthcare, nearly 3 times what the UK spends. The current system is a big money eating machine.

So there is an argument that if you reformed it to become more efficient like those systems you could.

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Will_C, lorcan_nagle

garjones wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

He also said if we can afford bombs, we can afford universal healthcare, but the US spends twice on healthcare what it spends on the military.

It does but it also spends twice as much government money per person on healthcare as countries like France and Germany who provide universal healthcare, nearly 3 times what the UK spends. The current system is a big money eating machine.

So there is an argument that if you reformed it to become more efficient like those systems you could.

And it’s worth pointing out that that figure is just public spending.  The US spends significantly more per capita on healthcare than any given European country and that’s just the VA, Medicare and Medicaid, it doesn’t even cover free access to hospitals for everyone.

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Will_C, Todd

Bizarro world time – Mitt Romney has essentially suggested a UBI; monthly payments of $1,000 to every USAmerican.

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Miqque, Will_C, Todd

Remember that the first ever UBI pilot was signed off by Nixon. It’s a Republican invention!

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Todd, lorcan_nagle, Andrew

Google’s COVID19 testing service, heavily promoted by Trump last week, apparently has some conditions:

In addition to being located in these places, eligible participants must also be 18 or older; a resident of the U.S.; able to speak and read English; and willing to sign a COVID-19 Public Health authorization form, according to the website. This form provides permission to Verity to collect a person’s information to be used for the screening process. Anyone looking to make use of the site must also either create a new Google account or connect their existing account in order to register.

More at this link: Google Alphabet’s Verily

To be honest Jerry, that’s probably because they haven’t translated the forms into all major languages (I accept, that should only be administrative).

In most western common law jurisdictions, if you cannot understand something you are signing it isn’t deemed to be binding.

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Andrew

garjones wrote:

Remember that the first ever UBI pilot was signed off by Nixon. It’s a Republican invention!

Between that and founding the EPA, I’m amazed the Republicans haven’t decried Nixon as a secret commie.

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Andy, Andrew, Todd

So, apparently there is a sick leave bill going through the US system. Sounds logical, right? Wrong, it’s getting gutted by Republicans on the basis it’ll make people ‘lazy’.

So fucking stupid. If nothing else, along with killing a lot of people, maybe coronavirus will take out the whole ‘work = holiest-of-holies’ mentality .

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Will_C, Todd

Anonymous wrote:

To be honest Jerry, that’s probably because they haven’t translated the forms into all major languages (I accept, that should only be administrative).

In most western common law jurisdictions, if you cannot understand something you are signing it isn’t deemed to be binding.

Couldn’t they just use Google Translate?

NO THEY CANT JERRY GAAAAWWWWWDDD

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njerry

Ben wrote:

it’s getting gutted by Republicans on the basis it’ll make people ‘lazy’.

Here’s my anecdote on this. In Malaysia you can’t take any time off sick unless you are signed off for sick days by a GP. I got talking to staff there as I was unaware and explained that in the UK you could self-certificate if it was just a few days. They were amazed and said there must be loads of sick days taken there. It piqued my interest so as I still had access to the sickness file of my UK team I did a comparison and the rate was 40% higher in Malaysia.

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Andrew, Will_C, DavidM, Christian, Ben

My workplace allows up to 5 days over 6 months.  After that, informal review.  If someone gets whacked for 2 weeks with docs note to that effect, it’s easily signed off.

But more often than not? Staff have to be shoved towards taking sick leave!  Thing is, working while unwell doesn’t work for anyone.

No it doesn’t but I think it’s interesting that ‘laziness’ is always thrown out there as a danger and it probably does count for a small percentage but overall I don’t think people operate like that, we or the press project it onto ‘those people’. Everyone in my UK office could have cadged a couple of days off every few weeks and gotten away with it but they didn’t. You could get in 8 or 9 days staying at home playing computer games without the review but I’m sure you don’t.

It’s similar with unemployment, laziness is always thrown around as a primary reason but it stands up to zero scrutiny. Employment rates are almost always intrinsically connected to the state of the economy. During boom times we always post full employment rates (which isn’t literally full employment because there are always some in transit between jobs but below a small percentage), none of those people became lazy overnight when a crash came. Being long term unemployed is deeply depressing so nobody wants it as a lifestyle choice.

 

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Christian, Andrew, Ben, Will_C, lorcan_nagle

garjones wrote:

Being long term unemployed is deeply depressing so nobody wants it as a lifestyle choice.

Some people do. it’s probably a small part of the unemployed population though.

So after yesterday it’s pretty clear that Sanders is done. Just like 2016 I expect him to stay in the race long passed the point where he can’t viably win, stirring up his followers and allowing angry and conspiracy theories to build.

I hope he does stay in the race. During a worsening pandemic we need him running and contrasting his platform against Biden’s limp half-measures. Plus it helps down-ballot progressives.

Yesterday the Biden campaign and Tom Perez were lying about the science and encouraging people to put their lives at risk and vote because Biden’s approval is falling. Today of course the narrative has become that Bernie staying in the race is dangerous, but I think sensible people are looking at that and wondering why establishment Dems’ position on the safety of voting has suddenly changed. Dem leadership is failing us–they’re currently to the right of Republicans like Mitt Romney on temporary UBI–so any chance, however small, is worth taking to get an actual progressive into the White House during a crisis that could last well into 2021.

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lorcan_nagle

I haven’t given up on Tulsi.

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Christian, Will_C

Anonymous wrote:

garjones wrote:

Being long term unemployed is deeply depressing so nobody wants it as a lifestyle choice.

Some people do. it’s probably a small part of the unemployed population though.

I did caveat that a little with  ‘it probably does count for a small percentage’ but in the great scheme of things it’s also an irrelevant percentage. Especially because, as the UK found during austerity, if you cut them off they end up usually costing you more. They end up homeless and then they end up in hospital with a cost of 100 quid a night instead of per week. 

They have cut and cut benefits and services and the bill never goes down. Cut social care locally and you end up with hospital bed blocking, the deficit has never stopped growing.

We spend an incredible amount of time worked up about this tiny percentage when in the end they don’t really matter. If 0.5% of the population wants to live a shitty life on dole money then let them, it really doesn’t matter. The media sets us up to be jealous of loafers but nobody actually wants to be one, I’ve been there, it’s crap.

This keeps getting proven again and again, every UBI pilot has ended with people doing more work, not less because our traditional benefits system creates a trap where everything gets removed if you work for one hour.

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Andrew, lorcan_nagle, DavidM, Todd, Ben, Will_C

Anonymous wrote:

I haven’t given up on Tulsi.

garjones wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

garjones wrote:

Being long term unemployed is deeply depressing so nobody wants it as a lifestyle choice.

Some people do. it’s probably a small part of the unemployed population though.

I did caveat that a little with  ‘it probably does count for a small percentage’ but in the great scheme of things it’s also an irrelevant percentage. Especially because, as the UK found during austerity, if you cut them off they end up usually costing you more. They end up homeless and then they end up in hospital with a cost of 100 quid a night instead of per week. 

They have cut and cut benefits and services and the bill never goes down. Cut social care locally and you end up with hospital bed blocking, the deficit has never stopped growing.

We spend an incredible amount of time worked up about this tiny percentage when in the end they don’t really matter. If 0.5% of the population wants to live a shitty life on dole money then let them, it really doesn’t matter. The media sets us up to be jealous of loafers but nobody actually wants to be one, I’ve been there, it’s crap.

This keeps getting proven again and again, every UBI pilot has ended with people doing more work, not less because our traditional benefits system creates a trap where everything gets removed if you work for one hour.

Yeah I am not necessarily against UBI. The system as it is now is weird, you guys know I am unemployed and I tried to work part time a couple of times, however it didn’t make me one extra cent in the end. Everything I earned working was subtracted from my welfare.

 

I am not quite sure how jobs people usually hate will be filled, though. Maybe by paying them a lot more money. One of the benefits of UBi could be that employers need to do more to make jobs attractive, leading to improvement in overall happiness and health.

 

Here in my country an alternative to UBI that was suggested recently was a “universal basic job.” Basically the government would guarantee everyone a job instead of just paying them.

Russian media ‘spreading Covid-19 disinformation’

This does not surprise me.

Anonymous wrote:

Here in my country an alternative to UBI that was suggested recently was a “universal basic job.” Basically the government would guarantee everyone a job instead of just paying them.

A Job Guarantee is a widely canvased idea. It’s looking to become more and more necessary in a lot of places right now. ~10% of employment here is in tourism; the COVID19 crisis has crushed air travel and mass gatherings of strangers – one of our biggest travel agencies closed 100 branches. Those jobs won’t be back too soon.

I’ve mentioned this before – during the last mass economic downturn the then Labor government deployed a series of measures that are surely the world standard for economic stimulus. The most meaningful was the BER program which was derisively called “School Halls” – money given to every school in the country to build or renovate facilities – this kept tradespeople employed for years across practically every postcode in the nation, and provided much needed upgrades. Even if your firm didn’t get a contract, there’d be more non-school related work left for your firm to tend to. And if you’re not in a trade, their doing well flows through to the rest of the economy – they need supplies, they need food, they take holidays, the use banks.

For the 2010 election I went to vote at the polling booth at my primary school – I hadn’t been there since I was 11, some 20 years prior. The only major change was the small BER project, a shelter covering the outdoor gathering area.

Australia did not suffer a recession during the 2008-10 downturn.

It goes against our current government’s beliefs, but I’d recommend a similar approach this time; a major public works initiative through every council. They’d all have wishlists of  parks, libraries, pools, plazas that they’ve needed for years – the federal government should provide funds for that now.

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DavidM, Dave, Will_C, lorcan_nagle

Will_C wrote:

I hope he does stay in the race. During a worsening pandemic we need him running and contrasting his platform against Biden’s limp half-measures. Plus it helps down-ballot progressives.

Yesterday the Biden campaign and Tom Perez were lying about the science and encouraging people to put their lives at risk and vote because Biden’s approval is falling. Today of course the narrative has become that Bernie staying in the race is dangerous, but I think sensible people are looking at that and wondering why establishment Dems’ position on the safety of voting has suddenly changed. Dem leadership is failing us–they’re currently to the right of Republicans like Mitt Romney on temporary UBI–so any chance, however small, is worth taking to get an actual progressive into the White House during a crisis that could last well into 2021.

except that he doesn’t have a chance and he’s not helping down ballot progressives. His supporters aren’t showing up and most down ballot candidates have been distancing themselves from him for months now. I’m not sure who you’re referring to as leadership dems since it’s been Pelosi pushing them UBI and is the one who got it through the house. Where is Biden’s support dropping? He’s trouncing Sanders at this point. Meanwhile Sanders supporters are going all in on conspiracy theories for why he’s losing instead of recognizing that it because they’re not showing up at the polls. I’m all for an actual progressive winning but Sanders isn’t going to win, he’s not even going to get a contested convention at this rate.

Bernie’s cut Biden’s approval with Dem voters down to single digits: https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/488091-poll-sanders-cuts-biden-lead-to-single-digits-among-democratic-voters

In the same poll last week he was trailing by 21 points. The worse this crisis gets the worse Biden looks.

Pelosi’s leadership has been disappointing to say the least: https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/03/16/pelosis-coronavirus-compromise-has-left-even-tom-cotton-saying-bill-doesnt-go-far

https://thehill.com/policy/finance/487902-congress-hit-for-not-doing-more-on-paid-leave

Walmart, McDonald’s, Whole Foods, Target, any company with 500+ employees is exempt from providing paid sick leave. And companies with fewer than 50 have a path to exemption. So 80% (that’s the actual number) of workers won’t be covered. WTF is that?

On Pelosi and UBI specifically:

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/03/18/refusal-pelosi-consider-universal-cash-payments-response-coronavirus-pandemic?amp&__twitter_impression=true

Progressives erupted with frustration and anger Wednesday over days of reporting that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi would not consider cash payments for Americans without means-testing despite the ongoing coronavirus outbreak that has ground the U.S. economy almost to a standstill.

[…]

Pelosi’s deputy chief of staff Drew Hammill on Twitter Tuesday emphasized that any aid “MUST be targeted” for the Speaker to approve it, drawing further anger from the left.

“Why?” asked New York Times columnist Jamelle Bouie. “If we agree that the crisis is stark and immediate, and we know that precise targeting takes time and administrative effort, why make that a requirement when you can simply disburse the funds *now* and collect from high-income recipients *later*?”

New Consensus president Saikat Chakrabarti was flabbergasted at Pelosi’s resistance to payments for all Americans.

“This crazy obsession in Dem leadership with looking ‘reasonable’ by not ‘doing too much’ is about as impractical and insane as you can get in the face of a pandemic,” Chakrabarti tweeted.

One poll is meaningless especially when Sanders went on to lose every single primary the day after that article and now trails by an almost insurmountable margin. Cherry picking your information doesn’t help you.

Unfortunately for Sanders, Biden’s base seems to take the coronavirus about as seriously as Biden does.

The point is that with a worsening pandemic and Biden being Biden, there’s nothing to gain from Sanders dropping out.

 

Sanders base wasn’t showing up before the virus either, don’t pretend that’s what cost Sanders a win. He was never going to win those states but I’m not saying he should drop out now. I said I expect him to stay in the race long past the point where he can no longer win, just like he did in 2016. He’s not going to win but until he can no longer mathematically win then he has every right to stay in.

Fuck sake lads: both candidates suck, the world is on fire and were on the verge the worst recession since 1987.

You should be making shoulder pads out of car tyres and hammering nails into the ends of your baseball bats! Not squabbling over 2 old white guys will be the first to go when the Apocalypse hits!

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Andy, Will_C, DavidM

Know who would’ve been great in a health and economic crisis like this?

Elizabeth Warren would’ve been.

Sigh.

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Andrew

Andrew wrote:

It goes against our current government’s beliefs, but I’d recommend a similar approach this time; a major public works initiative through every council. They’d all have wishlists of  parks, libraries, pools, plazas that they’ve needed for years – the federal government should provide funds for that now

Public works initiatives were a big part of how the United States, Germany and Italy responded to the Great Depression. It’s hard to evaluate how successful they really were since the disruption of a World War obviously had the greatest impact. Too bad we invented all those nuclear weapons making a global conflict impractical. Nothing like a good world war to redistribute wealth and stimulate the economy.

Since a crisis puts people into the mind of being willing to do anything to avoid the worst, it also often ends up giving some politicians the opportunity to grab power. It really doesn’t matter what the current government thinks, they will quickly be replaced by a completely new group of people riding the wave of a promise to provide relief and prosperity. They’ll come in and institute all these “voluntary” programs, but you’ll find there will be no toleration for anyone who doesn’t volunteer.

Often, national crises pass of their own accord – the worst happens or people find their own individual solutions – but the caution is that governments who came to power on the wave of a crisis often need there to continue to be a crisis to justify their power.

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Tulsi Gabbard ends Democratic presidential campaign and endorses Joe Biden

So much for her anti-imperialist stance.

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Todd wrote:

Tulsi Gabbard ends Democratic presidential campaign and endorses Joe Biden

Nothing matters anymore.

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Christian, Will_C

When Trump was on the Apprentice show, people thought that his bottom line results approach and authoritatively telling people “You’re fired!” … that it would work well in office.

Trump thought that anything Obama could do, he could do better and that there was nothing much to do but sign papers, make deals , and fire people.

But Obama did warn that this is not entertainment. Now, Trump is showing that he is in over his head
and out of his league. I don’t wish the virus on anyone or the subsequent recession because lives are lost. Does Trump deserve it? I say he deserves to be exposed but even all this is severe.

Just saying.

I would say it’s what the people of the US deserve for electing an obvious con man, but… the majority of them didn’t. So, I don’t know man. You’ve got a system that allows backwards states like Texas* to fuck you over. That’s just how it is.

 

 

—

*Sorry, Todd.

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Todd, Ben

Some of the comments by the GOP people like it will only kill 3.7 percent of the population, it is a Chinese virus, it will pass etc. make me wonder how they got into office in the first place.

Al-x wrote:

Some of the comments by the GOP people like it will only kill 3.7 percent of the population, it is a Chinese virus, it will pass etc. make me wonder how they got into office in the first place.

Shockingly, racism isn’t a turn off for roughly a quarter of Americans, and they vote with far more frequency and loyalty than the other 75%

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Andy, Will_C, Ben

lorcan_nagle wrote:

Al-x wrote:

Some of the comments by the GOP people like it will only kill 3.7 percent of the population, it is a Chinese virus, it will pass etc. make me wonder how they got into office in the first place.

Shockingly, racism isn’t a turn off for roughly a quarter of Americans, and they vote with far more frequency and loyalty than the other 75%

This has been even more true in the years since the Voting Rights Act was gutted.

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lorcan_nagle

Al-x wrote:

Some of the comments by the GOP people like it will only kill 3.7 percent of the population, it is a Chinese virus, it will pass etc. make me wonder how they got into office in the first place.

Technically I think all those are probably true. It will probably be less than 3.7 % though. Maybe o.5 to 1 % (which is stll a lot of people, making it insensitive to say it is “just” 3.7 %. But the statement is not necessarily untrue.)

 

As for the “Chinese virus” thing, it is probably true in that the virus started in China. But the designated name for the virus is SARS-CoV-2, or colloquially the novel coronavirus. The racism accusation is the press reaching for a story, and trying to do some Trump bashing. Lots of diseases have a geographical name in it.

The problem is there has already been documented cases of hate attacks on Asians due to coronavirus so having someone like Trump, in the position he occupies, going around deliberately choosing to call it the Chinese flu is massively irresponsible.

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Andy, Will_C, Martin Smith, lorcan_nagle

It is – probably – literally a virus from China though. And it has been called “Chinese virus” in lots of places. Singling out Trump over something like this is silly.

 

This is typically how some of the more egregious p.c. nonsense works. You take someone you don’t like, search in their words for anything that can be deemed offensive, and attack them over it to gain an advantage for your own side.

 

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DavidM

It was bad when those places did it too.

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Andy, Todd

Anonymous wrote:

Lots of diseases have a geographical name in it.

Not recently. They stopped doing that because of stigma and misnomers like Spanish Flu that didn’t start in Spain.

Whether it’s considered racist or not there’s no doubt that he can’t help and try to make political points out of it all. The same with his weird short lived travel ban that allowed the UK in, even though they had more cases than most EU countries and were behind on containment measures, the only reason that existed was to stick it to the EU.

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Andy, Todd, Ben, DavidM, Christian

Anonymous wrote:

This is typically how some of the more egregious p.c. nonsense works. You take someone you don’t like, search in their words for anything that can be deemed offensive, and attack them over it to gain an advantage for your own side.

Oh, come on now, it’s not just calling it “Chinese virus” (which those news sources may have done at the very start because China is where it was, but I haven’t seen that in ages). Trump emphasised that this is a “foreign virus” in a way I haven’t seen anywhere else; he’s clearly playing to racism. I mean…

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Todd, Ben

Yeah in pretty anti these sorts of terms.

Its less about location and more about ethnic connotations.

It is the Covid-19 virus. Just call it that.

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JRCarter, Todd, Ben

Arjan, there are currently lots of fucking idiots in the world.   You’re smart enough to not be one so stop trying to be with this kind of game playing online.

It may be a form of fun for you, it’s not for me.

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Al-x, Andy, lorcan_nagle, Todd

Anonymous wrote:

Yeah in pretty anti these sorts of terms. Its less about location and more about ethnic connotations. It is the Covid-19 virus. Just call it that.

Still, a big part of the backlash is the Chinese Communist Party’s push to avoid responsibility for not doing more to prevent these outbreaks. I agree that calling it the Chinese Virus has a risk of stigmatizing Chinese citizens around the world, so stop doing that. However, at the same time, people should be very clear where and how this pandemic started and went out of control, and that the Chinese government should be held accountable for its actions – and its current propaganda push to avoid any responsibility.

Otherwise, we’re going to be going through this again in a few years. The virus can’t necessarily be blamed on anyone, but the pandemic lies in the failures of governments to take measures to control it. That started in China where the government used its much greater authority to conceal rather than deal with the outbreak.

 

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/03/china-trolling-world-and-avoiding-blame/608332/

Some American commentators and Democratic politicians are aghast at Donald Trump and Republicans for referring to the pandemic as the “Wuhan virus” and repeatedly pointing to China as the source of the pandemic. In naming the disease COVID-19, the World Health Organization specifically avoided mentioning Wuhan. Yet in de-emphasizing where the epidemic began (something China has been aggressively pushing for), we run the risk of obscuring Beijing’s role in letting the disease spread beyond its borders.

China has a history of mishandling outbreaks, including SARS in 2002 and 2003. But Chinese leaders’ negligence in December and January—for well over a month after the first outbreak in Wuhan—far surpasses those bungled responses. The end of last year was the time for authorities to act, and, as Nicholas D. Kristof of The New York Timeshas noted, “act decisively they did—not against the virus, but against whistle-blowers who were trying to call attention to the public health threat.”

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garjones wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Lots of diseases have a geographical name in it.

Not recently. They stopped doing that because of stigma and misnomers like Spanish Flu that didn’t start in Spain.

Whether it’s considered racist or not there’s no doubt that he can’t help and try to make political points out of it all. The same with his weird short lived travel ban that allowed the UK in, even though they had more cases than most EU countries and were behind on containment measures, the only reason that existed was to stick it to the EU.

On the Spanish flu, there is a debate on wiki going on now where it’s claimed it was never the commonly used name at all, and to change the name of the article.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Spanish_flu#Requested_move_15_March_2020

 

edit: Looking at it now, I don’t see anyone making the argument it wasn’t the commonly used name at the time. The argument by most seems to be it’s not the correct name according the WHO standards. Which is fair enough. I could see the argument by both sides makes sense.

 

This is not an intellectual exercise…

It is still throwing the Chinese and Asians collectively under the bus…

Hate crimes against Asians are on the rise since the virus hit the US.

All this just shows that for all this “admiration” of the Asian hard work and study ethic, being “model minority” status,

Asians were never considered equals but were only tolerated so long as they “did their thing” and “stayed in their place”.

Just saying…

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lorcan_nagle, Will_C, DavidM, njerry

Ben wrote:

Arjan, there are currently lots of fucking idiots in the world.   You’re smart enough to not be one so stop trying to be with this kind of game playing online.

It may be a form of fun for you, it’s not for me.

It’s not fun for me, it’s deadly serious. Maybe in a few weeks it will be considered racist to say you think this disease started in China.

Then why come out or be supportive of shit that doesn’t help? Because that’s what Trump’s doing.

Right now? It doesn’t matter where the virus came from, its gone too far! That does nothing at all to actually even try to deal with the situation.  But it does encourage the shitbags to go out doing shitty antics.  Sure, they likely would do that without it but the point remains that language matters, especially that used by those in positions of leadership.

Later? Much later, “there will be words” at the international level – that’s what you have diplomats for – about China’s role in this as a government.  For now? It’s practically irrelevant.

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Andy, lorcan_nagle, Will_C

Ben Carson’s getting dragged on Twitter for apparently falling asleep during Trump’s coronavirus briefing:

@SecretaryCarson is literally falling asleep standing behind @realDonaldTrump during the Coronavirus press briefing. This response is a pathetic joke.

— James Duke Mason (@JamesDukeMason) March 21, 2020

Trump is telling bedtime stories, Ben Carson is falling asleep

— John G (@johngar75) March 21, 2020

Ben Carson is sleep or heavily medicated… this is insane. Eyes closed!

— LesliBroadway (@leslibroadway) March 21, 2020

Why is Ben Carson taking a nap during this press conference?

— King (@spinnersmedia) March 21, 2020

LMFAOOOOOOO Ben Carson is falling ASLEEP standing up there.

— Shea Butter Hot Girl (@_Baetriot_) March 21, 2020

I really wanna know what drugs Ben Carson is on. That’s one heavily sedated looking man & he should share with the rest of us

— Turing Pest (@Krikalitika) March 21, 2020

Someone wake up Ben Carson!

— Stefanie Hammond (@stef3404) March 21, 2020

Ben Carson is falling asleep behind Trump…hope he falls over and takes Trump down with him.

— VitaBeez (@VitaBeez) March 21, 2020

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Todd

To be fair I can’t really blame him. These endless press conferences are just Trump rambling incoherently about whatever comes into his head. They are pretty boring.

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Christian

Al-x wrote:

This is not an intellectual exercise… It is still throwing the Chinese and Asians collectively under the bus… Hate crimes against Asians are on the rise since the virus hit the US. All this just shows that for all this “admiration” of the Asian hard work and study ethic, being “model minority” status, Asians were never considered equals but were only tolerated so long as they “did their thing” and “stayed in their place”. Just saying…

However, it is a separate point. There is a big difference between the Chinese in general and the Communist Chinese government specifically. Much of the media push to condemn calling in the Chinese Virus or the Wuhan Virus is promoted by state sponsored PRC media. The Chinese government would much rather this be about racism than focus on the factor their response played in failing to respond to the outbreak while they spent a month trying to silence physicians dealing with the virus and then failed to contain it after they could no longer hide it. Nor did they put into place any preemptive measures even after dealing with SARS.

While we’re condemning calling it the Chinese virus, and seeing plenty of stories about it, there is still little mainstream coverage of actual racist policies from the government of China in Xinjiang where a million Chinese Muslims have been detained in camps. The government has completely clamped down on any information from the area so even if there was an outbreak, we’d probably never hear about it until it spread to some neighboring region.

That’s why it is important to keep pressure on China now. Not wait until later, because if there is another outbreak – or even an outbreak of some completely new and worse disease right on top of this one – the Chinese government will simply behave in the same way.

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Johnny, youve done that thing you sometimes do which is were all discusding one discrete topic and your discussing something else.

Yes, China should have better health and safety standards. It is one of the reasons why their production is so cheap – they literally have workers handling dangerous plastics without any protection – but thats not what we were talking about.

After March 2020, I would expect every Government would be reviewing their risks of outbreak for all viruses.

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Andy, Christian, Al-x, lorcan_nagle, Will_C, Todd, Ben

Rand Paul becomes first known senator to test positive for coronavirus

Considering what a hindrance he is in the Senate, I have zero sympathy for him.

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Hank Cannon, Will_C

There are a lot of politicians I disagree with but I don’t think I’d wish serious illness on any of them.

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Now there are reports of neo Nazi and other white supremacy groups using the Chinese origin of the virus as a recruiting point and even trying to make the coronavirus a weapon: should any of them get it, they will try to infect minorities.

Apparently there is a “vision” of the future in society of a major breakdown of civilization and it will be every man for himself. This gives rise not just for sensational zombie apocalypse TV shows, but more seriously, a lot of gun buying to protect what is theirs. White supremacists have a future race war in mind and that accounts for their stockpiling of arms, and other people have a future breakdown of society as I just mentioned. It all adds up to panic and knee jerk reactions on the part of many.

Just saying…

Al-x wrote:

Apparently there is a “vision” of the future in society of a major breakdown of civilization and it will be every man for himself.

Yet what’s actually happening in this crisis so far is the opposite. Governments are launching massive social programs, that were being laughed at as economically impossible 4 weeks ago.

In the early 90s I visited friends in the Netherlands and they told us about an unemployment scheme that meant you had 80% of your salary for 12 months when laid off. It seemed crazy and people back home barely believed it, that’s now UK official policy, overnight. Corbyn’s proposal of free broadband looks pretty mild now.

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lorcan_nagle, Todd, Dave

They say they want society to collapse but they think it’s the end of the world if their internet connection is down, if they can’t their essential medication, or if their hair salon closes.

 

I believe most of the people saying these kinds of things are so-called LARpers. There are undoubtedly some who have serious plans for mayhem, but I don’t think there are that many.

Al-x wrote:

Now there are reports of neo Nazi and other white supremacy groups using the Chinese origin of the virus as a recruiting point and even trying to make the coronavirus a weapon: should any of them get it, they will try to infect minorities.

I bet they’ll be embarrassed when they discover that the virus was actually created in a Level 4 Bio Lab in Galveston, Texas. Ask the Iranians. 

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Todd

njerry wrote:

I bet they’ll be embarrassed when they discover that the virus was actually created in a Level 4 Bio Lab in Galveston, Texas. Ask the Iranians.

I wouldn’t mind the conspiracy theories so much if they weren’t so cliched. Some secret lab somewhere? I heard that about HIV/AIDS back in the 80’s.

Come on, people! There are geneticists creating new strains of DNA and RNA in their garages today. Let’s think of something better than some secret government lab somewhere. Heck, Frank Herbert’s The White Plague had a more creative origin and that came out in ’82.

Jonny made the virus.

Stop making viruses Jonny. Youre making people upset.

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JRCarter, DavidM, Todd

Anonymous wrote:

Stop making viruses Jonny. Youre making people upset.

But I’m so good at it!

Seriously, though, these conspiracy theories have some really terrible results and give governments opportunities to demonstrate how bad they are. Iran’s Ayotollah refuses foreign aid because he believes the virus is a US weapon. China accuses the US of bringing the virus to Wuhan and some idiot politician in Arkansas claims it is a Chinese bio-weapon.

 

Even if it’s not a bio weapon, politicians are using it like it is one. Never let a good crisis go to waste.

garjones wrote:

In the early 90s I visited friends in the Netherlands and they told us about an unemployment scheme that meant you had 80% of your salary for 12 months when laid off.

It could be different now than it was in the 90s but I think the rule is for every year that you worked, you get a month of WW which is 80 % of your salary.

Ben wrote:

Then why come out or be supportive of shit that doesn’t help? Because that’s what Trump’s doing.

Right now? It doesn’t matter where the virus came from, its gone too far! That does nothing at all to actually even try to deal with the situation.  But it does encourage the shitbags to go out doing shitty antics.  Sure, they likely would do that without it but the point remains that language matters, especially that used by those in positions of leadership.

Later? Much later, “there will be words” at the international level – that’s what you have diplomats for – about China’s role in this as a government.  For now? It’s practically irrelevant.

I could see Trump “making sure” that people don’t forget that the Chinese Government is “Responsible” so he could use it as leverage post-pandemic in his “Trade War”

That’s not going to happen.

He ain’t going to be able to afford a trade war.

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DavidM

At this point I honestly think there’s a good chance the elections will be cancelled. How the hell can you do a campaign when people are supposed to be quarantined?

Anonymous wrote:

I could see Trump “making sure” that people don’t forget that the Chinese Government is “Responsible” so he could use it as leverage post-pandemic in his “Trade War”

I’m fairly convinced that Trump doesn’t think Covid 19 is a problem. I can’t read his mind, but his actions imply that he thinks this is a personal political attack against him. His statements seem to imply or talk around the idea that it is no worse than the flu and the conspiracy is that his opponents (or their shadowy supporters behind the scenes in the media) are overblowing the response and using panic to turn it into a catastrophe so he’ll lose the election. And right after he loses, suddenly, it will all fade away.

I don’t have any strong evidence for that viewpoint, but I really think that is what he believes. Now, maybe he thinks the PRC is a co-conspirator in that, but it’s obvious that he personally hates the democrats and just doesn’t care for the Chinese government.

Anonymous wrote:

his actions imply that he thinks this is a personal political attack against him.

That is one of the conspiracy theories around it. There are a lot of them. One that I’ve seen is that Trump is causing the pandemic it but it is actually a good thing, because he did it to taint the elite’s baby blood supply with coronavirus to poison them. In this “theory” Tom Hanks and Elle DeGeneres are now being held prisoner by the military rather than quarantined and they are sending cryptic messages to other cabal members in instagram videos.

 

I like a good conspiracy theory, but this is not one of those.

Anonymous wrote:

At this point I honestly think there’s a good chance the elections will be cancelled. How the hell can you do a campaign when people are supposed to be quarantined?

elections can’t be canceled. They can be delayed but if there hasn’t been one by 1/20 then the president and VP are out of office and the leader of the house takes over until the election takes place.

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Todd, DavidM, garjones

Anonymous wrote:

That is one of the conspiracy theories around it.

My conspiracy theory is that Congress is taking so long passing a Covid-19 stimulus package because they want to give all their members time to get their stock picks in order before they agree on it.

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Todd

Im pretty sure Bezos made it so we have to use his silly drones

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You’re not silly. You’re just learning to adapt.

Fetch me a cappuccino, Pip.

Yes dearest

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Anonymous wrote:

Yes dearest

Oh Tim, it is you.

At least I have one constant.

If you look closely at some news reports, a lot of the GOP in office are saying stupid things and making decisions that go against what the medical experts are saying and so on.

They are being exposed, but will that be enough to be voted out of office?

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Todd

It’ll be interesting what happens to his approval rating. Latest (March 2nd) was pretty high, relative to Trump’s average approval rating (44% to 40% average).

Anonymous wrote:

Im pretty sure Bezos made it so we have to use his silly drones

Nah, he’s soliciting public donations instead.  Yes, seriously, the richest guy on the planet can’t put his hand in his pocket and supply some cash.

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lorcan_nagle, Will_C

rory wrote:

elections can’t be canceled. They can be delayed but if there hasn’t been one by 1/20 then the president and VP are out of office and the leader of the house takes over until the election takes place.

I wonder what would happen if any of the candidates actually get Covid 19. I’m actually astonished Trump hasn’t gotten it yet considering how little he appears to consider it. Still, there is a rumor he’s very germaphobic in any case.

Yeah he is supposedly that way, from multiple accounts. The interesting thing is we have 3 guys left in the race who are of pretty advanced years. Trump as the youngest one is obese (however well his height and clothes try and hide it). There were questions about that even before a virus that targets them came along.

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World to Fitch – no one gives a goddamn about this.

Fitch cuts UK credit rating to AA-

The ratings agency Fitch has cut Britain’s sovereign debt rating to AA-, saying debt levels will jump as the government ramps up its spending to offset the near shutdown of the economy in the face of coronavirus.

Fitch downgraded the country by one notch to the same level as its rating for Belgium and the Czech Republic. It said a further cut could follow as it kept the rating on negative outlook.

“The downgrade reflects a significant weakening of the UK’s public finances caused by the impact of the Covid-19 outbreak and a fiscal loosening stance that was instigated before the scale of the crisis became apparent,” Fitch said. “The downgrade also reflects the deep near-term damage to the UK economy caused by the coronavirus outbreak and the lingering uncertainty regarding the post-Brexit UK-EU trade relationship.”

Fitch said the coronavirus shutdown was likely to shrink Britain’s economy by nearly 4% in 2020, assuming the drastic containment measures could be relaxed in the second half of the year, leading to a 3% bounce in growth in 2021. But doubts about Britain’s future trading ties with the European Union posed a further risk, Fitch said.

The thing is too it’s all relative. Every other country is doing the same and will downgraded the same so in truth nothing really changes. It’s bit like if suddenly everyone’s school grades went down one level, A becomes a B but as everyone’s has then B is the new standard.

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DavidM, Ben

I needed this. Please share with anyone who still needs this!

 

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njerry

A commentator said once that it would take a crisis like a recession where
practically everyone is losing their job and hiring is slow to have people
turn on the President and other GOPers in office.

Well, with this Covid-19 and the subsequent recession, the commentator got
what he said and then some…. I said before that some in office are being
exposed and it is separating those who can lead and manage is crisis and
those who can’t.

Just saying…

[njerry]

Al-x wrote:

I said before that some in office are being
exposed and it is separating those who can lead and manage is crisis and
those who can’t.

This is only my opinion from watching his recent press conferences, and listening to the differences between what he reads from his script versus his off-the-cuff remarks, but I get the feeling that President Trump less concerned about the (now) thousands of Americans dying from this virus and more concerned about getting the economy jump-started, as boasting about being solely responsible for a strong economy is the only plank in his re-election platform.

The problem is, many Americans are drinking his Kool-Aid, forgetting the fact that his administration ignored warnings from the intelligence community about this threat and just focusing on the promise that he’s giving them a check for $1,200. And some polls (which I know can be skewed and misleading, but still…) are giving him a bigger-than-usual approval rating for his handling of the crisis, so your comment about some politicians’ flaws being exposed apparently does not apply to the political office that matters the most.

• This reply was modified 4 years, 8 months ago by njerry.

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Ben, lorcan_nagle

Al-x wrote:

I said before that some in office are being exposed and it is separating those who can lead and manage is crisis and those who can’t.

This effect is happening but it is not following through to people’s political decisions.

Thus Trump and Johnson can fuck up entirely and still have good poll numbers because of that strange disconnection or unwillingness of people to follow through.

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Todd, lorcan_nagle

Ben wrote:

Thus Trump and Johnson can fuck up entirely and still have good poll numbers because of that strange disconnection or unwillingness of people to follow through.

I watched a news piece this morning talking about how state governors approval ratings are blowing Trump’s out of the water. People see there state and local officials doing more about Coronavirus than Trump and the federal government. The federal response is lagging behind local and state actions.

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Ben