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?

 

[dtc]

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-50511063

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-51403795



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_China

Dude. Maybe I'm reading you wrong, but wouldn't Trump just love to round up and imprison Muslims?

I know for a fact that there's a sizable number of his supporters who absolutely would love to rid the USA of Muslims.

 

[GMRfellowtraveller]

While you're trying to make a strong connection here between illegal immigration and coronovirus, it's really not the same topic and not directly related to the handling of the current situation. It's a side issue at best. Would you mind starting another tread and discussing it there, please?

I'm trying my best not to get involved, as I see so many weakness in your argument it's irking me. But I don't want to further hijack the thread and make this into an immigration discussion.

Thanks.

good point
i should not have taken the bait

 

[dtc]

If you were known as being right of center I guarantee you would have been called racist by now.

It's beyond ridiculous to claim building a wall promotes racist tendencies. I could understand the criticism of the cost, but when you combine it with other enforcement mechanisms it can be effective.

What are the dog whistles you are referring to?

Neither Republicans or Democrats really want the immigration system fixed. Republicans like to exploit the current system to help give businesses cheap labor. Democrats like to exploit it as well by trying to make it as easy for as many illegal immigrants to come here so when they eventually get amnesty passed they will have a whole new generation of voters they can depend on.

No, it's not ridiculous. The wall is a stupid plan. It doesn't work and whatever worth it has is economically miniscule. It's a symbol intended to fortify Trump's racists support by appealing to their most base instincts. Technology and personnel would be far better and cheaper and everyone knows it except for those who think armed machine gun turrets shooting down Mexicans is a reasonable way for the United States to handle what are often refugees.




I don't buy your premise that Democrats only want immigrants for future voters, but even if they do it's less abhorrent than profit driven slavery. I mean how freaking detestable is it that Republican politicians refuse to do anything to punish employers who provide the illegal incentive to come here while their base clamors for mass hangings of illegals?

 

[Beach Friends]

Let me get this straight.

You think China allowing their southern people to eat crazy animals like bats and civets and whatever else they eat should bring down the full weight of the world on their government, right?

Is that correct? If so, what on earth do you think about our government or parts thereof trying to outlaw abortion or seasonal deer hunting or the use of LSD or eating bacon?

Is it your argument that when there's a risk involved to the health and well being of one's self or others that government should step in and outlaw the behavior?

Guns too?

I would appreciate it if the Chinese government regulates their markets where wild animal carcasses are traded. If it only helps to prevent one pandemic it will be worth it.

I think it would also be helpful if the Chinese government did not arrest physicians for sharing information about an outbreak of an infectious disease, destroy records about the disease and force physicians to give false confessions about spreading rumors.

Yeah, that would be nice.

 

[zztop]

meanwhile on the saints forum

 

[GMRfellowtraveller]

If you were known as being right of center I guarantee you would have been called racist by now.

It's beyond ridiculous to claim building a wall promotes racist tendencies. I could understand the criticism of the cost, but when you combine it with other enforcement mechanisms it can be effective.

What are the dog whistles you are referring to?

Neither Republicans or Democrats really want the immigration system fixed. Republicans like to exploit the current system to help give businesses cheap labor. Democrats like to exploit it as well by trying to make it as easy for as many illegal immigrants to come here so when they eventually get amnesty passed they will have a whole new generation of voters they can depend on.

here follow this story
it was a Frontline from a few years ago about how Bannon/Breitbart/Sessions/Miller used immigration to take over the R party and how Trump was coached to saw "Wall" bc he didn't always remember to talk about immigration in his primary speeches

NARRATOR:

In Manhattan, Donald Trump had watched the Cantor defeat. Now he believed immigration as an issue was a dragon slayer.

MALE VOICE [reading Breitbart article]:

Trump said he thinks Cantor’s "amazing" loss can be traced to his stance on immigration policy.

NARRATOR:

While Bannon and Breitbart educated Trump from the outside, Trump adviser Sam Nunberg worked from the inside.

JOSHUA GREEN:

Nunberg had realized that this issue of immigration has real salience with Republican voters. The problem they had was, they couldn’t get Trump to stay on topic. Famously short attention span. And so Sam Nunberg came up with this idea, essentially a mnemonic device to keep Trump focused on the issue of immigration.

SAM NUNBERG:

So I said, "Well, why don’t we say you’re going to build a wall, because it’s bigger. You’re going to build a wall, and we'll make—and you’ll get Mexico to pay for it."

Zero Tolerance | FRONTLINE

Watch FRONTLINE's documentary on how President Trump turned immigration into a powerful political weapon that fueled division and violence.

www.pbs.org

 

[GMRfellowtraveller]

I would appreciate it if the Chinese government regulates their markets where wild animal carcasses are traded. If it only helps to prevent one pandemic it will be worth it.

I think it would also be helpful if the Chinese government did not arrest physicians for sharing information about an outbreak of an infectious disease, destroy records about the disease and force physicians to give false confessions about spreading rumors.

Yeah, that would be nice.

so regulations are good now?

 

[SaintForLife]

Does it make us better if we do the same thing the Chinese government is doing? You keep bringing these examples of the Chinese spreading conspiracy theories, lies and fear to compare to what conservatives in this country is doing. Nobody is saying that the Chinese government doesn't do these things, we know they do. It's not right and it's not okay. Of course they spread misinformation, they're an authoritarian government. I would just rather my government and government officials not do the same thing they're doing. Am I asking for to much?

Calling it the Chinese Coronavirus is the same thing as lying and saying it started in the US? It's a fact that it started in China. I know you don't like that term, but it's not even close to what the Chinese government is saying.

 

[Maxp]

Calling it Chinese virus is not racist, it's just blame shifting. Let's move on, I'm no longer worried if I see each Asian walk pass who "might" have traveled to China.

 

[Dadsdream]

While you're trying to make a strong connection here between illegal immigration and coronovirus, it's really not the same topic and not directly related to the handling of the current situation. It's a side issue at best. Would you mind starting another tread and discussing it there, please?

I'm trying my best not to get involved, as I see so many weakness in your argument it's irking me. But I don't want to further hijack the thread and make this into an immigration discussion.

Thanks.

C'mon, Coldseat, I was answering GMR's question and you know it.
If we're going to have to test everybody and account for everybody, we have to determine who is in the country and we have to stop the flow of people coming into the country illegally.
No, I'm not starting another thread. Accounting for everybody in the country controlling who enters and who leaves is all part of this..
There's no weakness. It's basic epidemiology.
It's not a thread hijack, it's standard procedure in a health crisis.
Stop trying to control what I post. Thanks.

 

[Dadsdream]

good point
i should not have taken the bait

Lousy point. We have to account for everybody, test them, isolate those who need to be isolated and stop the influx of new cases from abroad.
That stops illegal immigration in its tracks, regardless of how many times people cry "racist," which of course it isn't.
Epidemiology. Look it up.

 

[coldseat]

Calling it the Chinese Coronavirus is the same thing as lying and saying it started in the US? It's a fact that it started in China. I know you don't like that term, but it's not even close to what the Chinese government is saying.

Misinformation is misinformation, no matter where it comes from. Calling it the Chinese Coronavirus (or Chinese virus or Chinese flu) is blame shifting with a xenophobic tent at this point. Saying we have a million test kits when we didn't is misinformation. Saying we we had the virus contained is misinformation. Saying this isn't worse than the flu is misinformation. Telling people to go out and spend and live there lives without worry was misinformation and dangerous. Saying we had sufficient supplies like PPE when we didn't is misinformation. Saying this was another Democratic hoax is misinformation and blame shifting. Trump and his administration did all those things early on.

If you guys would just concede that and stop trying to justify it, we could just move on. Personally, I'd rather focus on what's happening right now instead of living a few months in the past. At least until we reach a point where we've stabilized the situation and can reflex back on what was done right and what was done wrong.

 

[Nebaghead]

C'mon, Coldseat, I was answering GMR's question and you know it.
If we're going to have to test everybody and account for everybody, we have to determine who is in the country and we have to stop the flow of people coming into the country illegally.
No, I'm not starting another thread. Accounting for everybody in the country controlling who enters and who leaves is all part of this..
There's no weakness. It's basic epidemiology.
It's not a thread hijack, it's standard procedure in a health crisis.
Stop trying to control what I post. Thanks.

Unemployment spiking will stop people from coming over. Samething happened during the last recession.

 

[SaintForLife]

No, it's not ridiculous. The wall is a stupid plan. It doesn't work and whatever worth it has is economically miniscule. It's a symbol intended to fortify Trump's racists support by appealing to their most base instincts. Technology and personnel would be far better and cheaper and everyone knows it except for those who think armed machine gun turrets shooting down Mexicans is a reasonable way for the United States to handle what are often refugees.

“Part of our area is covered with some fencing on our east side. That accounts for about 6 percent of our traffic,” Border Patrol chief Raul Ortiz told journalists during President Trump’s January 10 visit to Rio Grande Valley, Texas. “Where we have no fencing, over 90 percent of our traffic occurs in those areas.” A day earlier, Ortiz added, 450 people were apprehended in the unfenced sector, including 133 from such non-Latin nations as India, Pakistan, and Romania.

• Some 560,000 illegals were caught astride San Diego and Tijuana in Fiscal Year 1992, when a border wall was installed there. By FY 2017, the Border Patrol says it snared 26,086 — down 95.3 percent.

• A barrier between the Tucson, Ariz., sector and Nogales, Mexico, was erected in 2000. That year’s 616,346 arrests plunged to 38,657 in FY 2017 — down 93.7 percent.

• A fence installed at the border between Yuma, Arizona, and Los Algondones, Mexico brought apprehensions from 138,438 in FY 2005 to 12,847 in FY 2017 — down 90.7 percent.

“Crime has significantly decreased in the Yuma area,” then–acting homeland security secretary Elaine Duke wrote in USA Today in August 2017, “and smugglers now look for other less difficult areas of the border to cross — often areas without fencing.”

• A 150-mile barrier between Israel and southern Egypt cut the number of illegal-alien entrants from 17,000 in 2011 to 43 in 2013, after the fence’s completion, Israel’s Ministry of the Interior states — down 99.7 percent.

• Bulgaria erected a barrier on its Turkish perimeter in 2013. That year’s 11,000 illegal crossings dropped to 4,000 in 2014 — down 63.6 percent.

• Just as British Gibraltar dangles from Spain’s underside, Spanish Ceuta and Melilla surf atop Morocco. Multiple fences and barriers there sliced 2014’s 2,100 arrests at the Spanish-territorial/Moroccan frontier to 2015’s 100 — down 95.2 percent.

The strongest proof that walls work is that Democrats once loved them.

Former and current senators Joe Biden, Tom Carper, Hillary Clinton, Dianne Feinstein, Barack Obama, Chuck Schumer, Debbie Stabenow, and Ron Wyden were among the 26 Democrats who voted for the Secure Fence Act of 2006. It authorized 700 miles of double fence. All 54 Senate Democrats voted unanimously in June 2013 for $46 billion in border security, including 350 miles of new steel fence.

“Between 2005 and 2015, polls show that nearly half of Democrats continued to support building a border barrier of some kind,” Cato Institute scholar Emily Ekins wrote in The Federalist. “However, things changed in 2015 when Donald Trump announced his bid for the presidency,” she continued. “Democratic support shifted more swiftly starting in the fall of 2015 onward. Now only about 12 percent of Democrats support a border wall or fence.”

Walls Work | National Review

Democrats know it, but they want President Trump to fail.

www.nationalreview.com

I don't buy your premise that Democrats only want immigrants for future voters, but even if they do it's less abhorrent than profit driven slavery. I mean how freaking detestable is it that Republican politicians refuse to do anything to punish employers who provide the illegal incentive to come here while their base clamors for mass hangings of illegals?

Could you not tell I was criticizing Republicans and Democrats on immigration?

 

[RobF]

Unemployment spiking will stop people from coming over. Samething happened during the last recession.

Most likely, yes. And the argument about needing to know people's immigration status, or (somehow) have no illegal immigrants, to manage an epidemic is false anyway. That would only apply if you had an authoritarian surveillance state that knew where every legal citizen was to start off with. Since that's not the case - and I assume no-one is calling for one? - it's already a situation where people need to be identified first regardless of status.

And ironically, making their citizenship an issue harms the ability to fight an epidemic. If it's not an issue, then those with worries about their status, or the status of those close to them, have no reason not to cooperate with measures necessary to fight the epidemic.

Have we run out of dead cats for the table yet?

 

[Beach Friends]

so regulations are good now?

I guess you can't tear down that strawman if you don't build it first.

 

[GMRfellowtraveller]

I guess you can't tear down that strawman if you don't build it first.

hai. sensei

 

[GMRfellowtraveller]

Most likely, yes. And the argument about needing to know people's immigration status, or (somehow) have no illegal immigrants, to manage an epidemic is false anyway. That would only apply if you had an authoritarian surveillance state that knew where every legal citizen was to start off with. Since that's not the case - and I assume no-one is calling for one? - it's already a situation where people need to be identified first regardless of status.

And ironically, making their citizenship an issue harms the ability to fight an epidemic. If it's not an issue, then those with worries about their status, or the status of those close to them, have no reason not to cooperate with measures necessary to fight the epidemic.

Have we run out of dead cats for the table yet?

epidemiologically, it makes way more sense to cancel mardi gras than to check for green cards
but i haven't read OAN's take on how to fight yellow fever or whatever, so *shrug*