All things political. Coronavirus Edition. (1 Viewer)

[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?

 

[CoolBrees]

Sweet jeebus.

Tucker Carlson lied to you. There aren’t thousands and thousands of truckers. There are a few that are driving through Calgary causing havoc. Please read articles from Reuter’s or AP about it.

This is a story funded out of the US, and they are using these few poor unwitting truckers are pawns.

 

[el caliente]

Sweet jeebus.

Tucker Carlson lied to you. There aren’t thousands and thousands of truckers. There are a few that are driving through Calgary causing havoc. Please read articles from Reuter’s or AP about it.

This is a story funded out of the US, and they are using these few poor unwitting truckers are pawns.

I don’t watch Tucker (or anyone on Fox). I watch CNN when I am at the gym, and they were tracking the story as I was working out today.

But back to the ~90% (as implied by the provided article), they are protesting mandates that impact them. They aren’t loons.

 

[superchuck500]

Then what are the other ~90% doing out there?

I’m not trying to be obtuse or confrontational. If the article reads that ~10% of the protestors are unvaccinated then that must mean that ~90% of the protesters are vaccinated, which would lead me to believe that they aren’t upset about mandates that don’t apply to them.

You think 100% of Canada's truck drivers are protesting?

The article said 90% of Canada's truck drivers are vaccinated. Not 90% of the trucker protesters.

 

[el caliente]

You think 100% of Canada's truck drivers are protesting?

The article said 90% of Canada's truck drivers are vaccinated. Not 90% of the trucker protesters.

So then we are back to not knowing how many of these protestors are vaccinated vs aren’t. We also have ranges on the number of protesters being 300-10,000. Is trying to put a number on this event like trying to catch a chicken covered in baby oil?

 

[insidejob]

So then we are back to not knowing how many of these protestors are vaccinated vs aren’t. We also have ranges on the number of protesters being 300-10,000. Is trying to put a number on this event like trying to catch a chicken covered in baby oil?

No, we're not back to anything. They know exactly who is and isn't vaccinated just like we do here since the vaccinated are registered with the Dept of Health and CDC - or whatever they call it in Canada.

This is a vocal minority causing a bunch of shirt because they are pissed at their own country's border policies. Screw them.

 

[SFIDC3]

Then what are the other ~90% doing out there?

Same as the other 10% (vaxxed or not) wasting theirs and others time.....what a crock of BS....

 

[CoolBrees]

Ok so we can agree that they are able to protest. I would encourage you re-read the article pertaining the 90% as I am about done with this.

They do know the exact number. Like exact. Because they are a union, and union collect dues from members. Hold votes with members and have a roster of who is in said union. You have to report your drive time to the union to get paid. You get the point.

So now knowing they know exactly how many members they have, we can surmise they can quite accurately state that 10% have gone against the unions’s position and are refusing the vaccine.

 

[SystemShock]

10% refused the jab (how accurate that is is up in the air). So this isn’t about “needles are ouchy.” If that was the case the number of drivers who refused the jab would be much higher. The protest is about much more than that.

As for a small fraction of a single occupation, so what? Because their numbers aren’t larger their concerns shouldn’t be considered? That’s pretty elite. They aren’t calling for anarchy, or for the disbandment of government, they are asking for a lift on mandates imposed by the government.

Now it’s starting to make sense why folks don’t want such a protest here in the US. Can you imagine the government being okay with one group protesting, and not another?

That small fraction of a single occupation is going to have a significant impact on the U.S. economy.

 

[SystemShock]

But back to the ~90% (as implied by the provided article), they are protesting mandates that impact them.

You read that wrong.

They aren’t loons.

Define loon.

BTW, many are waving CSA flags.

.

 

[Optimus Prime]

More on the truckers

Also, if you have a position and you show up to a protest in support of that position and there are fellow supporters there with confederate and Nazi flags and wearing Camp Auschwitz t-shirts you probably have some things you should think about

================
A few hundred Canadian truckers irate over their country’s strict pandemic restrictions have used their tractor-trailers to paralyze the center of the capital, Ottawa; to threaten the auto industry by blocking traffic at three major border crossings with the United States; and now to demand the resignation of the recently reelected prime minister, Justin Trudeau.

In their self-righteous embrace of an upside-down idea of “liberty,” they have spawned copycats planning convoys to incapacitate cities elsewhere, including in the United States, and prompted an outpouring of right-wing support and funding on both sides of the border and beyond.


The truckers, calling themselves the “Freedom Convoy,” have leveraged their rigs’ brute bulk to intimidate the government and inflict economic damage estimated at hundreds of millions of dollars daily.

They have flouted Canada’s laws and constitution and modeled a threat to peace and order elsewhere that goes well beyond the exercise of free expression.


Not all the truckers and their backers are ideological extremists or conspiracy fantasists —though some are, including apparent white nationalists who have borne Nazi and Confederate images into Ottawa’s staid streets.

But their means of pursuing a motley array of goals are extreme and tinged by menace. For nearly two weeks, they have upended life in a city of 1 million residents, jeering at mask-wearing passersby, jolting residents awake by blaring their earsplitting horns, and prompting Canadian security officials to relocate Mr. Trudeau and his family from their official residence to an undisclosed location……..

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/02/10/canada-truck-convoy-protest-spawns-copycats/

 

[el caliente]

So then ~90% of all drivers are vaccinated, and 100% of the protesters aren’t vaccinated?

 

[el caliente]

That small fraction of a single occupation is going to have a significant impact on the U.S. economy.

That’s why I don’t argue with the waiter at the restaurant before they bring me my food. We can be flippant about these trucker’s demands, but I believe this protest is causing about $300M a day.

Hear these truckers out, it’s not like there is a deep bench to pull from for these jobs. Fewer truckers means a logistical nightmare.

 

[insidejob]

That’s why I don’t argue with the waiter at the restaurant before they bring me my food. We can be flippant about these trucker’s demands, but I believe this protest is causing about $300M a day.

Hear these truckers out, it’s not like there is a deep bench to pull from for these jobs. Fewer truckers means a logistical nightmare.

They've already been heard. They want special treatment that every single person who goes to Canada doesn't receive because they are long haul truckers. Honestly, can you blame Canada for forcing people coming from the US to quarantine for 7 days before being released into the public if unvaccinated when 90% of Canadians over age 5 are vaccinated and that number is only about 70% in the US? The main truckers' union in Canada doesn't even support them.

 

[el caliente]

They've already been heard. They want special treatment that every single person who goes to Canada doesn't receive because they are long haul truckers. Honestly, can you blame Canada for forcing people coming from the US to quarantine for 7 days before being released into the public if unvaccinated when 90% of Canadians over age 5 are vaccinated and that number is only about 70% in the US? The main truckers' union in Canada doesn't even support them.

These are new mandates though, right?

Their protest is over an overreaching government. Quite frankly I support them in their quest to get government off their back. In a country that is so heavily vaccinated, and with so few of these drivers being unvaccinated, seems like the government is trying to see just how much freedom they can take before the levees break.

 

[SaulGoodmanEsq]

BTW, many are waving CSA flags.

Indeed.



American flags are bizarre enough, but Confederate flags, too?

 

[insidejob]

More on the truckers

Also, if you have a position and you show up to a protest in support of that position and there are fellow supporters there with confederate and Nazi flags and wearing Camp Auschwitz t-shirts you probably have some things you should think about

================
A few hundred Canadian truckers irate over their country’s strict pandemic restrictions have used their tractor-trailers to paralyze the center of the capital, Ottawa; to threaten the auto industry by blocking traffic at three major border crossings with the United States; and now to demand the resignation of the recently reelected prime minister, Justin Trudeau.

In their self-righteous embrace of an upside-down idea of “liberty,” they have spawned copycats planning convoys to incapacitate cities elsewhere, including in the United States, and prompted an outpouring of right-wing support and funding on both sides of the border and beyond.


The truckers, calling themselves the “Freedom Convoy,” have leveraged their rigs’ brute bulk to intimidate the government and inflict economic damage estimated at hundreds of millions of dollars daily.

They have flouted Canada’s laws and constitution and modeled a threat to peace and order elsewhere that goes well beyond the exercise of free expression.


Not all the truckers and their backers are ideological extremists or conspiracy fantasists —though some are, including apparent white nationalists who have borne Nazi and Confederate images into Ottawa’s staid streets.

But their means of pursuing a motley array of goals are extreme and tinged by menace. For nearly two weeks, they have upended life in a city of 1 million residents, jeering at mask-wearing passersby, jolting residents awake by blaring their earsplitting horns, and prompting Canadian security officials to relocate Mr. Trudeau and his family from their official residence to an undisclosed location……..

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/02/10/canada-truck-convoy-protest-spawns-copycats/

I liked the conclusion:

Still, the lawless impulse is clearly inspired by the Jan. 6 insurrection. Former president Donald Trump has cheered on the truckers. So have other right-wing U.S. politicians and media figures whose stock in trade is inflammatory rhetoric and tribal division. Millions of dollars in donations — much of it from U.S. sources, according to Canadian police — have poured into social media sites ostensibly established on the truckers’ behalf.

The protests’ triggering event was the Canadian government’s imposition last month of a vaccine mandate for truckers crossing into the country from the United States, a requirement already in effect for other Canadian citizens and international travelers entering the country, as well as for federal government employees and airline and railway workers.

In fact, roughly 90 percent of Canadian truckers are vaccinated, and the Freedom Convoy has been spurned by the country’s main association representing truckers. Given those facts, the protests seem an amorphous uprising against pandemic restrictions generally and the Trudeau government specifically, along with a hodgepodge of other grievances.

The irony is that Canada’s tough pandemic restrictions have contributed to a covid-19 death rate that is among the lowest in the developed world, roughly a third of that in the United States. The truckers are sick of restrictions — fine; who isn’t? But by crippling a major capital, subverting commerce and jobs, and advocating the overthrow of a fairly elected government, they have surged beyond legitimate protest into the realm of thuggery.

 

[insidejob]

Indeed.



American flags are bizarre enough, but Confederate flags, too?

But it's those radical leftists being paid by George Soros to attend Biden rallies. And it was ANTIFA (not Trumpist agitators) who turned peaceful BLM protests into violent riots.

 

[MT15]

It seems pretty hypocritical for the same people who went insane because a BLM march clogged up traffic for a few hours (to the point where two or more states, I forget how many, passed laws that it was okay to hit protestors with your car if they impeded traffic) now say it’s totally fine for these guys to completely shut down the main bridge from Canada to the US for 2 freaking weeks.

I would presume this is illegal, yet nothing is being done. When BLM protestors ignored a curfew they brought out the tear gas and rubber bullets.

Now, I am not advocating for tear gas for these guys, but the hypocrisy is overwhelming.

If these guys are breaking the law, they should be arrested.