Coronavirus

[mcliu]

It's fairly easy to criticize the US response by comparing it to Singapore, Taiwan, South Korea, but they are very different countries compared to the US with very different populations and politics and mistrust of China.

 

Obviously, the US federal government did some appropriate things like travel ban and some inappropriate things like failing to ramping up testing, screening, PPE protection.

 

But even Deborah Birx said that when Wuhan happened she was still in Africa and based on the Chinese data and WHO guidance, scientists thought it was a much more contained epidemic like the original SARS.

 

Also, although the lockdown of Wuhan in China was effective, there are many reports on Chinese social media (obviously cannot be verified) of various rolling lock-downs and flare-ups. That's with everyone wearing masks. So it might not be the best long-term strategy.

[cubsfan]

Thanks for doing your jobs and keeping the world safe WHO - after all, you are the EXPERTS:

 

 

 

World Health Organization (WHO)

@WHO

Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission of the novel #coronavirus (2019-nCoV) identified in #Wuhan, #China.

Image

5:18 AM · Jan 14, 2020·Twitter Web App

[ERICOPOLY]

To be fair, I do think it’s reasonable for our liberal lecturers to criticize Trump for not trying to close the borders or ban international travel. It’s such an obvious and easy precaution to take. I’m actually shocked I have not heard more about this from them.

 

Of course it's not - it's the typical armchair quarterback crap. Trump was the first world leader to close the borders, The WHO criticized him, the opposition party criticized him - since they love the Chinese Communist Party. Turns out, the President was correct - and just about EVERY major country followed suit.  Any of them ROLL BACK their travel bans?  NO

 

These geniuses have all the answers.

 

Agreed. With hindsight, that decision by Trump was a good one. I wish Canada had done the same thing at that time. I also think that his recent decision to extend ‘social distancing’ for 30 days was also a good move. I also like how he is being aggressive in removing government barriers to moving quickly with medical innovations (testing, medical equipment, vaccine etc).

 

The China travel decision is a bit like congratulating the losing football team for making a first down in the first quarter.

[Pondside47]

https://moneyweek.com/economy/global-economy/601080/edward-chancellor-governments-reaction-to-the-virus-will-come-back-to

[cubsfan]

To be fair, I do think it’s reasonable for our liberal lecturers to criticize Trump for not trying to close the borders or ban international travel. It’s such an obvious and easy precaution to take. I’m actually shocked I have not heard more about this from them.

 

Of course it's not - it's the typical armchair quarterback crap. Trump was the first world leader to close the borders, The WHO criticized him, the opposition party criticized him - since they love the Chinese Communist Party. Turns out, the President was correct - and just about EVERY major country followed suit.  Any of them ROLL BACK their travel bans?  NO

 

These geniuses have all the answers.

 

Agreed. With hindsight, that decision by Trump was a good one. I wish Canada had done the same thing at that time. I also think that his recent decision to extend ‘social distancing’ for 30 days was also a good move. I also like how he is being aggressive in removing government barriers to moving quickly with medical innovations (testing, medical equipment, vaccine etc).

 

The China travel decision is a bit like congratulating the losing football team for making a first down in the first quarter.

 

Except that you will never give him credit for saving thousands of American lives because you hate him so much.

Trump had the balls to do it - and was roundly criticized.

 

Tell me ---- What world leader handled this catastrophe courageously and quickly?  Name them all for me please.

 

Italy?

WHO?

China?

UK?

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Liberty]

Thanks for doing your jobs and keeping the world safe WHO - after all, you are the EXPERTS:

 

 

 

World Health Organization (WHO)

@WHO

Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission of the novel #coronavirus (2019-nCoV) identified in #Wuhan, #China.

Image

5:18 AM · Jan 14, 2020·Twitter Web App

 

How simplistic must one's thinking be to think that because I'd like epidemiological/public health decisions to be made by people who know these fields that I automatically think that organisations like the WHO are perfect and can't be wrong or haven't been politicized (which they shouldn't be, as the US response shouldn't have been turned into a partisan thing by Trump for weeks). I also blame China's politicization of the science, just like in the US. The two can be bad at the same time. Repeating other people's mistakes isn't a good thing, it's bad, and if you held Trump to anything close to the standards that you apply to the things you attack you'd see that.

[cubsfan]

Thanks for doing your jobs and keeping the world safe WHO - after all, you are the EXPERTS:

 

 

 

World Health Organization (WHO)

@WHO

Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission of the novel #coronavirus (2019-nCoV) identified in #Wuhan, #China.

Image

5:18 AM · Jan 14, 2020·Twitter Web App

 

How simplistic must one's thinking be to think that because I'd like epidemiological/public health decisions to be made by people who know these fields that I automatically think that organisations like the WHO are perfect and can't be wrong or haven't been politicized (which they shouldn't be, as the US response shouldn't have been turned into a partisan thing by Trump for weeks). I also blame China's politicization of the science, just like in the US. The two can be bad at the same time. Repeating other people's mistakes isn't a good thing, it's bad, and if you held Trump to anything close to the standards that you apply to the things you attack you'd see that.

 

That's about the dumbest thing I've heard you say here. "WHO is not perfect?" - seriously? well why do the hell do they even exist?

 

But I TOTALLY get your point Liberty:  IT'S Trump's fault!

 

LOL

 

And don't give the President ANY credit for savings thousands of lives when the cat got out of the bag and he slapped the ban on.

 

Talk about disingenuous !

[Gregmal]

Thanks for doing your jobs and keeping the world safe WHO - after all, you are the EXPERTS:

 

 

 

World Health Organization (WHO)

@WHO

Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission of the novel #coronavirus (2019-nCoV) identified in #Wuhan, #China.

Image

5:18 AM · Jan 14, 2020·Twitter Web App

 

How simplistic must one's thinking be to think that because I'd like epidemiological/public health decisions to be made by people who know these fields that I automatically think that organisations like the WHO are perfect and can't be wrong or haven't been politicized (which they shouldn't be, as the US response shouldn't have been turned into a partisan thing by Trump for weeks). I also blame China's politicization of the science, just like in the US. The two can be bad at the same time. Repeating other people's mistakes isn't a good thing, it's bad, and if you held Trump to anything close to the standards that you apply to the things you attack you'd see that.

 

That's about the dumbest thing I've heard you say here. "WHO is not perfect?" - seriously? well why do the hell do they even exist?

 

But I TOTALLY get your point Liberty:  IT'S Trump's fault!

 

LOL

 

And don't give the President ANY credit for savings thousands of lives when the cat got out of the bag and he slapped the ban on.

 

Talk about disingenuous !

 

First, WHO has a remarkably flawed track record with quite a few major crisis responses. Anyone claiming otherwise is not informed.

 

Second, its not about praising or criticizing a president. The entire thing should be about doing what one can to handle a bad situation and preparing the best we could as a country. The President has a hand in that, but there's plenty of other players as well. The issue here at least, is all the jackass lefties who completely ignore anything positive, deliberately cast blame in one self serving area when its never really that simple, and then run their mouths promoting things negative and counter productive. In many aspects, these clowns are no different the The Donald himself. Now isn't exactly the time for media misinformation and spin jobs. This should hold true for Trump and it should also hold true for the mouth breathing left. Unfortunately, there are two sets of rules they play by.

 

Examples have been brought up before.... Trump does positive... "oh it doesnt count because he dropped the ball with xyz"/ ok then, name someone who's done a better job?...response? crickets... slants and lies. Its like the folks who think our cases exploded at EXACTLY THE SAME TIME we started testing! LOL, no dipshit. No tests = fewer confirmed #s. More tests = more confirmed cases.... But then these same folks who say, Trump is responsible for the delayed response, can't really seem to mesh the idea of "delayed" if there supposedly weren't any cases prior to March.... its all quite amusing.

[Gregmal]

Here was one of the great left actions taken!

 

https://in.news.yahoo.com/italy-launched-hug-chinese-campaign-065339340.html

 

But yea, no credit for the travel ban.... why? Well because at the time we cried about it and tried to claim it was a bad/racist/polarizing move, and now we just move on to whining about other shit.

[ERICOPOLY]

Except that you will never give him credit for saving thousands of American lives because you hate him so much.

 

It is childish to provide a narrative for the thinking of others who are in disagreement with you.

[cubsfan]

Except that you will never give him credit for saving thousands of American lives because you hate him so much.

 

It is childish to provide a narrative for the thinking of others who are in disagreement with you.

 

Sure buddy, take a look in the mirror Mr. Know-it-all!

[Liberty]

Except that you will never give him credit for saving thousands of American lives because you hate him so much.

 

It is childish to provide a narrative for the thinking of others who are in disagreement with you.

 

I’ll credit him with saving thousands AND with likely killing hundreds of thousands by convincing half the country who listens to him in the early days that it was no big deal, at exactly the time when small actions could’ve alerted the course of things majorly.

[Liberty]

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/04/02/us/coronavirus-social-distancing.html

[Gregmal]

Except that you will never give him credit for saving thousands of American lives because you hate him so much.

 

It is childish to provide a narrative for the thinking of others who are in disagreement with you.

 

I’ll credit him with saving thousands AND with likely killing hundreds of thousands.

 

Except for the fact that we as individuals have known about this since when? January? If other people didn't take precautions that some of us did, regarding their health and distancing, its kind of a silly move to blame the president, no? Donny didn't come to my house and give me good/bad advice... The issue again likely comes down to people either not wanting to take individual responsibility or much more likely, just use a tragic world wide situation to push political bullshit. Whatever. There were folks pushing their agendas during 9/11 as well.  I just dont see what good it does anyone, especially with these fools who pretend to be "gravely concerned" yet use the veil of "concern" to promote a political agenda...

[cubsfan]

Except that you will never give him credit for saving thousands of American lives because you hate him so much.

 

It is childish to provide a narrative for the thinking of others who are in disagreement with you.

 

I’ll credit him with saving thousands AND with likely killing hundreds of thousands by convincing half the country who listens to him in the early days that it was no big deal, at exactly the time when small actions could’ve alerted the course of things majorly.

 

Good thing Americans DIDN'T listen to Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders - you'd be talking millions of deaths now!

 

How is that "open borders" and "globalization" strategy going these days?  NOT A PEEP - that's what I thought

[Casey]

well Gregmal, I guess you call it like you see it. I thought Trump's response had a lot to be desired and can understand why many "jack assed" lefties and Americans in general were extremely pissed and complaining. Especially if you live in a major city, which many of them do. In the end, the slowness and un-seriousness while the virus played out in front of our eyes in other countries is going to cost a lot of American lives.

 

Personally I find it really, really sad and tragic, both because strong competence would have made a huge difference, and because it seems like enough of us are dumb enough to buy Trump's "I did great, I closed the border with China" shtick that the guy might actually get elected again despite killing off what he predicts will be 100ks of Americans w/ our slow and cavalier response.

 

If there is a silver lining perhaps some apolitical Americans will shift attitudes about politics and whether it "matters" who is the leader.

[cubsfan]

well Gregmal, I guess you call it like you see it. I thought Trump's response had a lot to be desired and can understand why many "jack assed" lefties and Americans in general were extremely pissed and complaining. Especially if you live in a major city, which many of them do. In the end, the slowness and un-seriousness while the virus played out in front of our eyes in other countries is going to cost a lot of American lives.

 

Personally I find it really, really sad and tragic, both because strong competence would have made a huge difference, and because it seems like enough of us are dumb enough to buy Trump's "I did great, I closed the border with China" shtick that the guy might actually get elected again despite killing off what he predicts will be 100ks of Americans w/ our slow and cavalier response.

 

If there is a silver lining perhaps some apolitical Americans will shift attitudes about politics and whether it "matters" who is the leader.

 

Yea, Greg - Trump should have taken that Bill DeBlasio approach - keep Chinatown open and tell everyone to ride the subway

WEEKS AFTER January 31st.

 

Now THAT is real leadership saving thousands of lives in NYC!

 

“The Facts Are Reassuring,” De Blasio Says on March 2

“The facts are reassuring,” the New York mayor said during a March 2 press conference alongside New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo.

 

De Blasio added: “We have a lot of information now, information that is actually showing us things that should give us more reason to stay calm and go about our lives” normally.

 

“Since I’m encouraging New Yorkers to go on with your lives + get out on the town despite Coronavirus,” de Blasio told his Twitter followers on March 3, no more than two weeks before likening the outbreak to a type of world war that required nationalizing industries.

 

Nothing to worry about in NYC - but if it changes, we can blame it on the President

[cobafdek]

Looks like thousands of American citizens are going to be crucified at the alter of one persons narcissism. A "war time" president who should be facing war criminal charges of epic incompetence.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2020/03/31/coronavirus-latest-news/

 

The White House coronavirus task force on Tuesday presented a grim picture of where the U.S. could be heading over the next couple of months, even with interventions like physical distancing. The task force projects 100,000 to 240,000 deaths from the virus, with mitigation.

 

Deborah Birx and Anthony S. Fauci, the leaders of the task force, emphasized that although the projections were likely based on the data that they have seen from the hardest hit locations so far, they were hopeful that they could prevent such a high number of deaths.

 

“Whenever you’re having an effect, it’s not time to take your foot off the accelerator, and on the brake, but to just press it down on the accelerator,” Fauci said of the mitigation efforts. “And that’s what I hope. And I know that we can that do over the next 30 days.”

 

Spot on. The lack of basic understanding shown in early stages of this is beyond belief. I still believe they are downplaying the true possible numbers here. Two more weeks and we will know, by tomorrow US will likely have 200K+ infections.

 

Question for the Hindsight Geniuses on this thread:

 

Which one(s) of the anti-pandemic measures in the following article should the President have done in January?  Which ones should he do now?

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/30/world/europe/coronavirus-governments-power.html

 

I'm not interested in argument.  I asked a serious question to get people on record.  So far responses from those I'm addressing have been non-existent and have shown the expected cognitive dissonance.

 

I'll go first.  I'm in favor of this:

 

"Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has authorized his country’s internal security agency to track citizens using a secret trove of cellphone data developed for counterterrorism. By tracing people’s movements, the government can punish those who defy isolation orders with up to six months in prison."

[John Hjorth]

Please let it go, gents, - at least for now,

 

To me, right now, it's all about damage control [forward looking].

 

- - - o 0 o - - -

 

Perhaps a day will come, when to discuss who's to blame for this or that [including errors of omission].

[Gregmal]

well Gregmal, I guess you call it like you see it. I thought Trump's response had a lot to be desired and can understand why many "jack assed" lefties and Americans in general were extremely pissed and complaining. Especially if you live in a major city, which many of them do. In the end, the slowness and un-seriousness while the virus played out in front of our eyes in other countries is going to cost a lot of American lives.

 

Personally I find it really, really sad and tragic, both because strong competence would have made a huge difference, and because it seems like enough of us are dumb enough to buy Trump's "I did great, I closed the border with China" shtick that the guy might actually get elected again despite killing off what he predicts will be 100ks of Americans w/ our slow and cavalier response.

 

If there is a silver lining perhaps some apolitical Americans will shift attitudes about politics and whether it "matters" who is the leader.

 

I dont disagree he's gotten thing wrong. But who's gotten this perfect? Maybe, maybe you can make the case for some of the SARS countries who have been practicing for these things like school kids do fire drills? OK, but thats not us, not under any president. All in all, theres good and bad and always will be during unexpected times of crisis/panic. The least productive thing anyone can do is bitch and moan and be a negative. Ive stated plenty how I dont like Trumps credit grabs and he deserves the flack that comes with that. Like signing the stock chart a day before the 3,000 point drop. I just dont see how anyone wins playing games with political narratives in this situation, its really no different than 9/11. People pushing agendas during times like this are no different than the scumbags selling N95 masks for $50 on eBay...

[Liberty]

You partisans’ answer to any stupid thing done by your guy is you find something stupid done by someone else, as if it cancels out. The buck always stops somewhere else. The CDC and FDA screw thinks up royally, Trump defunds pandemic readiness, has his totally unqualified son-in-law run point on pandemic response, promises things that never happen (five million tests at CVS, etc), gets into fights with governors for petty personal reasons at a time when every hour counts, threatens them with witholding federal help if they criticize him... well, it’s not like he’s in charge of the federal government, right?

[Dalal.Holdings]

Looks like thousands of American citizens are going to be crucified at the alter of one persons narcissism. A "war time" president who should be facing war criminal charges of epic incompetence.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2020/03/31/coronavirus-latest-news/

 

The White House coronavirus task force on Tuesday presented a grim picture of where the U.S. could be heading over the next couple of months, even with interventions like physical distancing. The task force projects 100,000 to 240,000 deaths from the virus, with mitigation.

 

Deborah Birx and Anthony S. Fauci, the leaders of the task force, emphasized that although the projections were likely based on the data that they have seen from the hardest hit locations so far, they were hopeful that they could prevent such a high number of deaths.

 

“Whenever you’re having an effect, it’s not time to take your foot off the accelerator, and on the brake, but to just press it down on the accelerator,” Fauci said of the mitigation efforts. “And that’s what I hope. And I know that we can that do over the next 30 days.”

 

Spot on. The lack of basic understanding shown in early stages of this is beyond belief. I still believe they are downplaying the true possible numbers here. Two more weeks and we will know, by tomorrow US will likely have 200K+ infections.

 

Question for the Hindsight Geniuses on this thread:

 

Which one(s) of the anti-pandemic measures in the following article should the President have done in January?  Which ones should he do now?

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/30/world/europe/coronavirus-governments-power.html

 

So we are now at the stage of "nobody else could have done anything anyway" and "look at all the things he is doing now". Expect this to persist till November.

 

Some of us work hard to develop foresight (which you can verify by looking back on this thread: worrying about virus/testing in late Feb when your boy was calling it "a hoax" and "like the Flu" or your congressmen who had foresight to dump stocks, and when we don't achieve foresight, we ought to then use hindsight (acknowledging & learning from our mistakes), but some people instead choose no sight (willful blindness).

 

We know this guy and his supporters' MO. Nothing is his fault (it was Sessions, Flynn, Bolton, etc etc a.k.a. the buck never stops at me) and "I can shoot a man on 5th ave and I wouldn't lose voters". I much prefer the "you can fool some of the people all of the time" quip which is credited to a much greater President (though doubtful he said it).

[LC]

Medical staff levels in NYC is strained and cracking. All available personnel are asked to come to work. COVID positive medical staff are ordered to continue working as long as they are asymptomatic, with PPE, sanitizing standards, temp checks, and away from high-risk patients. Symptomatic staff are sent home and furloughed.

[cubsfan]

And none of you can name the world leaders that have handled this disaster well. So many of them followed Trump's

extreme actions while the opposition party criticized his moves.

 

It's all so easy in hindsight. Put your boy DeBlasio, Biden, Schiff, Sanders, Pelosi, etc, etc in the game.

 

Oh, wait - you might not have to do that: Schiff is gonna take another run at impeaching Trump for the Coronavirus.

 

Now that is a party of leadership.

[Casey]

well Gregmal, I guess you call it like you see it. I thought Trump's response had a lot to be desired and can understand why many "jack assed" lefties and Americans in general were extremely pissed and complaining. Especially if you live in a major city, which many of them do. In the end, the slowness and un-seriousness while the virus played out in front of our eyes in other countries is going to cost a lot of American lives.

 

Personally I find it really, really sad and tragic, both because strong competence would have made a huge difference, and because it seems like enough of us are dumb enough to buy Trump's "I did great, I closed the border with China" shtick that the guy might actually get elected again despite killing off what he predicts will be 100ks of Americans w/ our slow and cavalier response.

 

If there is a silver lining perhaps some apolitical Americans will shift attitudes about politics and whether it "matters" who is the leader.

 

I dont disagree he's gotten thing wrong. But who's gotten this perfect? Maybe, maybe you can make the case for some of the SARS countries who have been practicing for these things like school kids do fire drills? OK, but thats not us, not under any president. All in all, theres good and bad and always will be during unexpected times of crisis/panic. The least productive thing anyone can do is bitch and moan and be a negative. Ive stated plenty how I dont like Trumps credit grabs and he deserves the flack that comes with that. Like signing the stock chart a day before the 3,000 point drop. I just dont see how anyone wins playing games with political narratives in this situation, its really no different than 9/11. People pushing agendas during times like this are no different than the scumbags selling N95 masks for $50 on eBay...

 

Noone's gotten this perfect. And both dems, republicans, every country have gotten things wrong.

 

I guess I do have a political opinion and narrative. Its basically "Trump is a mediocre-to-poor-at-best president, bad for long term health (& now also short term health) of the country, and we should get someone better." And TBF plenty of other leaders across the aisle have also shown their great skills at "leading from behind", "inability to adapt" and "not understanding whats in front of their face" during this crisis. Maybe that's easy to say watching from the outside. I dunno.

 

It's a crisis, sure, and you have to buckle down and deal with it. So just complaining is unhelpful. For me it's been extremely frustrating who we've had in the room.