All things political. Coronavirus Edition. (18 Viewers)

Some good news.

insidejob said:

When every cabinet head (for the positions that even got filled) is carrying his water it really matters not what the lower level WH employees are doing or thinking. And I'm sorry, but caring about the work you do and working for THIS administration are mutually exclusive. I don't care who you are or what your career ambitions are.

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We'll just have to agree to disagree then.

DaveXA said:

We'll just have to agree to disagree then.

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That's totally cool. No hard feelings whatsoever.

Since there really isn't anything about COVID-19 that isn't that isn't political at this point, I guess I'll just drop this here.

The link on reddit doesn't work but the explanation of how the test works is in the comments. Sounds pretty awesome to me.

I've been meaning to early vote since last Friday but have been sleeping like shirt and haven't made it yet. Gonna be there for six today so I didn't bother googling to find the article. I'm sure someone will be so inclined.

insidejob said:

Since there really isn't anything about COVID-19 that isn't that isn't political at this point, I guess I'll just drop this here.

The link on reddit doesn't work but the explanation of how the test works is in the comments. Sounds pretty awesome to me.

I've been meaning to early vote since last Friday but have been sleeping like shirt and haven't made it yet. Gonna be there for six today so I didn't bother googling to find the article. I'm sure someone will be so inclined.

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Their site appears to be down, hence why the link doesn't work. But here's an article reporting on it: https://www.todayonline.com/singapore/nus-start-develops-60-second-breathalyser-test-covid-19

I'd say the key things to note are, yes, it's a promising approach that could be extremely useful, however, what they're reporting is based on a clinical trial of just 180 people, 93% specificity and 95% sensitivity sounds good but at scale that's quite a lot of false results, and it sounds like it's a release from the startup involved, so take with a healthy dose of salt (a lot of things like this sound promising initially, and then seem to quietly disappear).

That said, there's also other breathalyser approaches out there, e.g. this Dutch one: https://www.dutchnews.nl/news/2020/...up-latest-gives-result-in-less-than-a-minute/ . A larger scale test (1800) people, sounds like it has a lower sensitivity, but could be used to quickly clear around three-quarters of people who are negative, reducing the demand for more time-consuming tests.

So even if these tests can't match the sensitivity of the more time-consuming tests, they could be useful in combination for some situations for speeding up the process and making it a bit more scalable, as long as they're not producing higher numbers of false negatives.

So it's being reported that the CDC will hold their first on-camera briefing outside of the task force this afternoon.

GrandAdmiral said:

So it's being reported that the CDC will hold their first on-camera briefing outside of the task force this afternoon.

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Interesting. Wonder if that's about the vaccine progress.

So, this is probably why McConnell is balking at anything the president is doing on stimulus negotiations.... because he sees the political writing on the wall. The only way to swing the election in his favor is to give even more aid than the democrats are asking for. Maybe he sees the public sentiment there. However, McConnell wouldn't be pushing against this so hard if he thought Trump had a political future. That, and he may not actually care about record unemployment, if he can blame a democrat the next 4 years.

On Tuesday, Trump doubled down, making another appeal for Republican lawmakers to support an economic relief package higher than the $2.2 trillion proposed by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. "It’s very simple. I want to do it even bigger than the Democrats,” Trump said on “Fox & Friends.”

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So, it looks like we have another outbreak in the White House. If I'm a low level staffer, bro, eff that, eff my career arc, I would have shot out months ago.


At least five people in Vice President Mike Pence's orbit have tested positive for coronavirus in recent days, including chief of staff Marc Short and outside adviser Marty Obst, a source familiar with the situation told CNN.

There are concerns that more people within Pence's inner circle will test positive in the coming days, the source said. "They're scared," the source said of staffers in the vice president's office.

And, of course, none of that is stopping the VP from traveling.

Vice President Pence and Mrs. Pence both tested negative for COVID-19 today, and remain in good health.

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While Vice President Pence is considered a close contact with Mr. Short, in consultation with the White House Medical Unit, the Vice President will maintain his schedule in accordance with the CDC guidelines for essential personnel.

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Even Chris Christie is openly questioning that decision.


Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a top GOP ally of President Trump, said he's surprised that Vice President Mike Pence is hitting the campaign trail after the vice president's chief of staff and other aides tested positive for the coronavirus.

"I think everybody's got to put the health of he people they're going to be in touch with first," Christie, who tested positive himself for the coronavirus and was hospitalized earlier this month.

"You got to keep yourself away from everybody and I'm a little bit surprised," he said on ABC's "This Week" in response to a question from host Martha Raddatz on the news from Pence's office.

"The whole getting of COVID to begin with and the not wearing of masks has been a problem," Christie said at the beginning of his remarks.

Okay, okay. So maybe I am being alarmist and overreacting. Let's see what the White House has to say about this and give them a chance to lead. Chief of Staff Meadows, help me out:


“We’re not going to control the pandemic," White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows told CNN's "State of the Union."

When CNN host Jake Tapper asked, "why aren’t we going to get control of the pandemic?” Meadows responded: “Because it is a contagious virus."

Annnnnd...we're forked. Good lord, get these clowns out of office.

I am pretty sure that the president gaslighting about “turning the corner” and “it affects virtually nobody” is the worst, most damaging thing I have ever seen a president say or do in my lifetime. It shows a monstrous lack of caring about human lives.

I read that over 1700 health care workers have died. Doctors, nurses, respiratory therapists, aides, people who have to clean the rooms after a patient leaves the hospital. I’m sure at least 20x that have contracted the virus.

We haven’t mentioned day care workers, teachers, meat plant workers, waiters, everyone who is considered an essential worker and has to be among the public to do their job. My own son contracted it as soon as school reopened. In his thirties with no pre-existing conditions, so didn’t have to go to the hospital thank goodness. We are hopeful that he won’t develop complications later.

Anecdotally, in the hospital where I work, a surprisingly large percentage of people hospitalized are in their forties. And we have had a few patients in the hospital in their twenties, even.

He also basically accused Doctors of exaggerating COVID deaths because they get more money for it. It's a long-standing completely debunked conspiracy theory, but that doesn't matter one bit. It's all part of the way he's politicized this in a way that has caused 40% of the country to not take it seriously and killed a heck of a lot of people.

My sister had to go back to part time in person teaching last Wednesday at Ben Franklin. By Friday, they already had two confirmed cases but not in her class. She only has to do in person teaching on Wednesday and Friday but, really, if it only took two days for two kids to test positive how many did they infect before they were even symptomatic?

Yuck. This is getting a lot worse. We are going to need more stimulus and places may need to lock down.

wardorican said:

Yuck. This is getting a lot worse. We are going to need more stimulus and places may need to lock down.

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Can't tell this administration and Senate leadership that...

GrandAdmiral said:

Can't tell this administration and Senate leadership that...

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People aren't gonna wait until February for a stimulus package. There will be unrest rivaling anything we've seen so far if Congress doesn't do anything between now and then. It's not gonna be pretty imo.

wardorican said:

Yuck. This is getting a lot worse. We are going to need more stimulus and places may need to lock down.

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Now take that map and superimpose over 2016 voting map.

efil4 said:

Now take that map and superimpose over 2016 voting map.

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Would it be ironic that the pandemic actually suppresses the Republican vote? Kinda seems that way when you look at the map. Interesting, no?

GrandAdmiral said:

Can't tell this administration and Senate leadership that...

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They couldn't care less, their goal is herd immunity but they are too cowardly to admit that because they are basing that tactic of off trump's big brain.