All things political. Coronavirus Edition. (15 Viewers)

[Maxp]

I fear we are really going to be in a bad place due to the obvious cuts to the federal agencies that deal with infectious disease, but also the negative effect the Affordable Care act has had on non urban hospitals. Our front line defenses are ineffectual and our ability to treat the populous is probably at an all time low. Factor in the cost of healthcare and I can see our system crashing. What do you think about the politics of this virus?

 

[Intensesaint]

Given the rate of spread in this country, prohibiting "foreigners" from coming in yet encouraging governors and everyone else already in this country to go back to business as usual is going to accomplish what, exactly?

Keeping people from spreading from other countries. If people want to be dumb in their own states let them. But right now I dont want anyone coming into our country potentially bringing in more cases. Do you?

I think it's dumb for the president to tell people to push back against stay at home laws, but that doesn't mean I have to OMB at him for preventing immigrants at this time.

 

[not2rich]

Keeping people from spreading from other countries. If people want to be dumb in their own states let them. But right now I dont want anyone coming into our country potentially bringing in more cases. Do you?

I think it's dumb for the president to tell people to push back against stay at home laws, but that doesn't mean I have to OMB at him for preventing immigrants at this time.

I live in Colorado. What's to stop me from traveling to Wyoming or Utah to spread the virus there, if I'm infected? I might just decide it's "time to get my freedom back."

What's dumb is a President who likes to ban "immigrants" from coming into the country (although I assume American citizens and other categories are exempt?), but has no plan - other than blame-shifting and scapegoating - to prevent the spread of a virus already in the country, and can't find it within him to encourage us all to make small sacrifices for the collective good. Instead, he just encourages divisiveness as he always does.

 

[Heathen]

Wait do you want people coming into the country now from other countries?

That wasn't the point I was making. I really don't have a problem with it, but I find it ironic..

If protecting people from the coronavirus is the prerogative, why would you restrict immigration and in the same vein encourage people to go out?

That's absurd in any universe.

 

[Heathen]

Keeping people from spreading from other countries. If people want to be dumb in their own states let them. But right now I dont want anyone coming into our country potentially bringing in more cases. Do you?

I think it's dumb for the president to tell people to push back against stay at home laws, but that doesn't mean I have to OMB at him for preventing immigrants at this time.

One of these is so, so much dumber than the other. I'm not being dramatic. What the president is telling people or inferring at the very least could cause many more people to die than need to over this virus. It's criminal, in my opinion.

If we know that the more we group together, the higher propensity (and that's been proven) for this thing to spread, why on Earth would anyone want to put innocent lives in danger?

Oh right...political brownie points. It's an election year.

 

[Beach Friends]

So Trump is suspending immigration because of the Coronavirus yet encouraging Americans to rebel against local quarantine law and protest together.

I want to know if that makes any sense to a soul here.

One of these is so, so much dumber than the other. I'm not being dramatic. What the president is telling people or inferring at the very least could cause many more people to die than need to over this virus. It's criminal, in my opinion.

If we know that the more we group together, the higher propensity (and that's been proven) for this thing to spread, why on Earth would anyone want to put innocent lives in danger?

Oh right...political brownie points. It's an election year.

I think it is pretty straightforward. We don't need the labor, we don't need the extra risk of screening immigrants (or extra patients from those who tested positive).

I know it's tempting to mix the two, but being a citizen of a nation should mean something.

One of the things being a citizen should mean is that we share similar values - in the case of our great nation one of those values is that we value freedom from dictators like that crazy woman in MI.

I am glad to see that patriots are letting it be known that we will not tolerate arbitrary limits on our rights. Good for them - maybe politicians will take notice and think twice about the orders they sign.

The government is not going to be able to keep us locked down forever. I know that some people will welcome the government taking full control and responsibility for their lives. But, most will not and that is what they are saying in a relatively polite way.

Hopefully the message is being heard and we can unite to get through this together- as free citizens.

 

[Dragon]

Our national center for infectious diseases reports that multiple european studies shows that the amount of virus that you are exposed to have a big influence on how severly you will be affected by the disease.

That is why among others, medical personel are hit so hard, because not only are they getting infected, but getting infected by a high level of the virus.
Basically social distances not only help curb the spread of the virus, but more people will be asymptomatic or only have a mild illness if the level of exposure is limited.

This apparently is not a 0/1 but a sliding scale where the objective should be to minimize the amount of vira everyone is exposed to.

With a disease which spreads so easily through asymptomatic infected persons, it is really important to keep that exposure down. That is why facemasks works - not as much to protect yourself but to keep the amount of vira in the "public spaces" down. That is also one of the goals of social distancing.

Gatherings like those seen over the last few day and a few weeks ago in florida (spring break) is the perfect way to create a hot spot and in a few weeks we will probably see those - just as we did with those kids in Florida

 

[N.O.Bronco]

California has one of (I believe 2nd?) largest Republican voting blocks in the nation. Just because they're outweighed by more Democrat voters, doesn't mean a very big percentage of them aren't Republican. Just because that district voted Clinton, doesn't mean anything as far as who is actually protesting.

I cant tell you how many conservatives I come across that cant seem to grasp that states that go a certain color aren’t 100% made up of that party. California has more conservative voters in that state than Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Alabama combined. Has nearly as many as Texas. In fact, only Texas and Florida have more people that voted for Trump compared to any other state. And barely.

Furthermore, California Conservatism has long been a stalking horse for the rest of the party due to its permanent minority status and ability to basically test tube extremist strategies without much danger of losing what districts they have or having to actually face governing consequences. A good chunk of Trump’s inner circle early in his campaign/presidency came from that sect of the country.

 

[N.O.Bronco]

Viewed in the context where the response is judged against a set of unreasonable criteria, it is probably a fair statement.

Viewed in the context of other responses to infectious disease outbreaks and within the scope of what would be deemed as appropriate and legal actions to be taken based upon the threat, I would say it is unfair, especially the repeated attempts to twist responses to gotcha type questions into fodder for what can only be termed as consumers of all things Trump negative.

The virus itself can be spread by carriers who are asymptomatic so suggestions that we should have been taking the temperature of every airline passenger seem a bit silly. Even if we had, finding a symptomatic passenger would require quarantine of the entire crew and passenger list as well as taking the aircraft out of service until it could be properly sanitized. That sort of response would be properly deemed an over reaction to the threat.

I live in a place with a massive community from China and know of no cases in that community, which speaks to the effectiveness of Trump's initial response. It is likely that every case in the US will be traced to a US citizen returning from travel carrying the virus.

The Chinese community here is large and wealthy, with new arrivals daily and much travel back and forth.

If Covid 19 is only makes its presence known in testing, why do we care?

The flu killed an estimated 35,000 of all ages in the US last season with approximately 35,000,000 symptomatic patients.

I haven't seen anything that indicates this virus is going to get anywhere near that level of infection and the likely mortality rate is probably similar to the flu here.

It seems like calls for widespread testing are mostly just an attempt to find more confirmed cases and confirmed deaths for political points.

I am not opposed to testing for solid medical reasons.

And just as a reminder to the people telling us to ease up now, that they know better than the libs, you are the same people that helped spread the ignorance and overconfidence that got us to the point we are.

So kindly, spare us your wisdom until you can demonstrate your capacity for acknowdeing the dangerous ignorance you helped spread and explaining how it is you adjusted your thinking in any meaningful capacity that we should actually take your rants or musings any more seriously than the president you bend over backwards behind facts and reason to rationalize and defend at every turn.

Honestly, it’s amazing some of you all can show your face and carry on the ways in which you do when it is so easy to how non-credible most of you are by just going back to the beginning of this thread.

 

[Dragon]

I think it is pretty straightforward. We don't need the labor, we don't need the extra risk of screening immigrants (or extra patients from those who tested positive).

I know it's tempting to mix the two, but being a citizen of a nation should mean something.

One of the things being a citizen should mean is that we share similar values - in the case of our great nation one of those values is that we value freedom from dictators like that crazy woman in MI.

I am glad to see that patriots are letting it be known that we will not tolerate arbitrary limits on our rights. Good for them - maybe politicians will take notice and think twice about the orders they sign.

The government is not going to be able to keep us locked down forever. I know that some people will welcome the government taking full control and responsibility for their lives. But, most will not and that is what they are saying in a relatively polite way.

Hopefully the message is being heard and we can unite to get through this together- as free citizens.

You talk a lot about your rights - but what about your responsibilities?

As a citizent of a free democratic nation you do have both.

You do have a responsibility to not endanger your fellow citizents. They too have rights. If you by your action help spread disease which kills other fellow cititizents, what makes your right to "freedom" more valuable than their right to life?

 

[UncleTrvlingJim]

I am glad to see that patriots are letting it be known that we will not tolerate arbitrary limits on our rights. Good for them - maybe politicians will take notice and think twice about the orders they sign.

Or, people start to think conservatives are reactionary antagonists with little perspective and a selfish perspective on everything. Since you like to give advice to liberals about how their actions can backfire on them, I thought I'd return the favor (balance restored, ).

I think the below shows how some people will view it.

You talk a lot about your rights - but what about your responsibilities?

As a citizent of a free democratic nation you do have both.

You do have a responsibility to not endanger your fellow citizents. They too have rights. If you by your action help spread disease which kills other fellow cititizents, what makes your right to "freedom" more valuable than their right to life?

Most Americans, thankfully, aren't all that political or partisan. I think social media and 24 hour "news" stations are changing that, but for the most part, I think most people are healthier than we are on this board in that regard. They don't spend hours reading blog posts in order to figure out what to be outraged about today. They don't spend every day griping about how terrible those other people are. There's a fair amount of fluidity in how they'll vote every year, and I hope that never changes.

I think a very large number of Americans look to see who they believe is most responsible and will work in their best interests.

I think most Americans will try to figure out who was the best at weighing their lives verse their livelihoods.

 

[Beach Friends]

You talk a lot about your rights - but what about your responsibilities?

As a citizent of a free democratic nation you do have both.

You do have a responsibility to not endanger your fellow citizents. They too have rights. If you by your action help spread disease which kills other fellow cititizents, what makes your right to "freedom" more valuable than their right to life?

I think we have a responsibility to stand up for liberty.

For those state governors who thought we lost that spirit, they seriously miscalculated.

Any encroachments on our rights should only be those that are necessary and should be in the least restrictive manner possible.

When governors sign orders that are arbitrary and capricious that's a tell tale sign that they have not made any attempt to strike the right balance between public health and individual freedom. The latter was never even considered and that is a mistake.

There is room for debate as to whether restrictions like many of our states have invoked or much looser restrictions like you see in Sweeden is the right approach. Only time will tell whether there was any real benefit to killing our economy.

But, what some of these states have done does not even fall within the parameters of what may be reasonable. There is no excuse for that and people are rightfully letting it be known that we have not yet reached the point where it will be blindly accepted.

 

[Dragon]

I think we have a responsibility to stand up for liberty.

For those state governors who thought we lost that spirit, they seriously miscalculated.

Any encroachments on our rights should only be those that are necessary and should be in the least restrictive manner possible.

When governors sign orders that are arbitrary and capricious that's a tell tale sign that they have not made any attempt to strike the right balance between public health and individual freedom. The latter was never even considered and that is a mistake.

There is room for debate as to whether restrictions like many of our states have invoked or much looser restrictions like you see in Sweeden is the right approach. Only time will tell whether there was any real benefit to killing our economy.

But, what some of these states have done does not even fall within the parameters of what may be reasonable. There is no excuse for that and people are rightfully letting it be known that we have not yet reached the point where it will be blindly accepted.

Well Sweden is about 8 miles from my house and half my husbands family is swedish. Sweden also have 1.580 dead so far. Denmark has 364 with a little more than half the same population. The demographics are equal, the hospital system and welfare systems are the same and etnically the two countries are very alike. The only difference is that Denmark were very quick to shut down everything and Sweden kept everything open.

That cost 1K more people their lifes so far...

Also Denmark do have a stimulus package for the companies, but they are employment based. Basically they cover the salaries of employess who are at home during the lock down and unable to work from home. So the companies are rewarded for not laying people off while the lock down goes on but it is closely tied to the costs of labor. There is another "aid package" designed to help business with rent and other expenses, but no "bag of money with no strings attached"

Yes the economy will be affected, but the way the stimulus packages work is far more important when it comes to economy, than whether to lock down or not

 

[surada]

I live in Colorado. What's to stop me from traveling to Wyoming or Utah to spread the virus there, if I'm infected? I might just decide it's "time to get my freedom back."

What's dumb is a President who likes to ban "immigrants" from coming into the country (although I assume American citizens and other categories are exempt?), but has no plan - other than blame-shifting and scapegoating - to prevent the spread of a virus already in the country, and can't find it within him to encourage us all to make small sacrifices for the collective good. Instead, he just encourages divisiveness as he always does.

Good post. Trump is always avoiding accountability by blaming others while taking credit. He's always blamed others .. Normal people can't relate to Trump.. Its like talking to a drunk.


People love me. And you know what, I have been very successful. Everybody loves me.

Donald Trump

 

[brandon]

You don't actually understand Darwin.

I suspect you also don't understand anything about this virus.

It is going to kill who it is going to kill, eventually.

The only lives saved by slowing it down were those which can be saved by the presence of modern medical technology that may have otherwise not been present.

We are now past the point, in this country, of the possibility of creating such a shortage in any large scale.

Huddling in the basement isn't going to change that reality.

You display a fevered hopefulness that Americans protesting unnecessary restrictions on their freedom in order to give a false sense of comfort will result in deaths of Trump voters.

I cannot express, for many reasons, how disgusting that is.

This is simply untrue. If you aren’t exposed to the virus, you won’t get sick. There’s almost a zero chance that if you and your family are able to stay home and do so that you will get sick.

It’s not going to “kill who it’s going to kill” if there aren’t hosts out spreading it.

And yes, at some point we have to reopen, and when we do, more people will get sick. But there’s a very specific set of criteria necessary to be met to allow the downward trend to continue even when we do reopen.
Those criteria have not yet been met, no matter how many rednecks swing their maga flags.

And gathering this early will likely guarantee that we have to stay locked down longer. If we spike 2 weeks from now, you’ll know who to blame.

I think we have a responsibility to stand up for liberty.

Your liberty to swing your fist ends just where my nose begins.

 

[Optimus Prime]

 

[Lapaz]

Trump has a very limited toolbox and logic isn't one of the tools.

I'm pro imigration, but it probably makes sense to halt imigration for the time being. I don't think Trump used logic, but his xenophobic instincts led to a good decision. I do think it protects everyone, including the immigrant's nation, if they return to their country. It reduces additional testing requirements. Also, these people don't get benefits, so they are in more danger. It is a diversion, but alas, probably the right decision. It won't make much of a difference, but I'm not going to dwell on this. I'm going to continue to worry about what matters most now, which is focusing on testing or continued social distancing.

 

[Heathen]

I think we have a responsibility to stand up for liberty.

For those state governors who thought we lost that spirit, they seriously miscalculated.

Any encroachments on our rights should only be those that are necessary and should be in the least restrictive manner possible.

When governors sign orders that are arbitrary and capricious that's a tell tale sign that they have not made any attempt to strike the right balance between public health and individual freedom. The latter was never even considered and that is a mistake.

One question...Are you on the side of the protesters that are endangering countless lives by gathering together against local law?

It seems like if one understands the science behind the epidemiological nature of what we're dealing with here, they'd be against these angry people potentially creating clusters of disease.

If these were liberals gathering in your community, potentially creating a much larger chance that you and your family could potentially get sick/die, would you be against it, or for it?

 

[Beach Friends]

Well Sweden is about 8 miles from my house and half my husbands family is swedish. Sweden also have 1.580 dead so far. Denmark has 364 with a little more than half the same population. The demographics are equal, the hospital system and welfare systems are the same and etnically the two countries are very alike. The only difference is that Denmark were very quick to shut down everything and Sweden kept everything open.

That cost 1K more people their lifes so far...

Also Denmark do have a stimulus package for the companies, but they are employment based. Basically they cover the salaries of employess who are at home during the lock down and unable to work from home. So the companies are rewarded for not laying people off while the lock down goes on but it is closely tied to the costs of labor. There is another "aid package" designed to help business with rent and other expenses, but no "bag of money with no strings attached"

Yes the economy will be affected, but the way the stimulus packages work is far more important when it comes to economy, than whether to lock down or not

That doesn't answer the question of how the mortality rates will compare in a year's time. Also, despite similarities I think there are difference between the two countries aren't there?