How long until this Pandemic ceases?

[CriticalGaming]

February 7th, 2020:
February 27th, 2020:

Feb 7th,

That video is a little disengenious because it's clips from several days, including March, and is also him repeating what people have said. Look he is right, starting a panic helps nobody. And his information from the 7th clearly evolved by the time the March 19th clip happened. Look at the panic buying of toilet paper that happened. People are followers, they see paper being bought out then they buy paper too. It's got to be very hard to lead, because any mistake is a disaster, but the problem is any leader will ultimately make mistakes because that's being human. Information at the begining of this was very very thin. China likely downplayed it and tried to cover up as much as they could and only relented information when it was clear the shit went everywhere.

Remember people called him a racist for the Chinese travel ban. He wanted to lock this up, and should have honestly locked down all international travel period. Even for citizens trying to get back home, sucks for them, but he should have prevented any travel in or out of the states. If such a thing was even possible and if it would have mattered in the end.

Feb 27th.

Where is the wrong info here though? Covid is worse than the flu, but the disease is very much comparable. And the way you treat it at home, and prevent it at home is to do the same thing that you would do if you had the flu. Remember he is addressing the general public and the general public is fucking stupid. You have to relay information to people in ways that everybody understands and we all understand the flu and we know what it is, how it feels, how to treat it, and how to prevent it as much as we can in our homes.

What's he supposed to do go, "If you get sick, panic, rush to the hospital, call 911, scream and cry and get ready to die!"? Obviously not.

Look the number of countries that handled this correctly are very very few and the ones that ended up with little covid effects are also countries with very small populations. New Zealand gets thrown around a lot because of how Covid free they've been but NZ only has a total population of 4.8million people, spread across a country the size of Colorado. Meanwhile Los Angeles has nearly 13million people alone. Manhattan island has near 2 million residents living in a space of 22 square miles.

These "successful" countries are a very very different breed from any sort of population that exist in the U.S.

And look around the world. Nobody has exactly been perfect with this whole covid thing and every country with serious population has had big problems.

 

[SupahEwok]

This sounds like some delusional libertarian persecution fantasy.

For one, it doesn't even make any economic sense. People have to be able to buy if you hope to sell to them. Small businesses are people that take loans from you. That buy equipment from suppliers. Families mean money thrown at children for children things.

But some dude on YouTube says that the deep state is coming for your religion and patriarchal privilege, so I guess basic economics don't matter.

 

[Agema]

I think people give Trump too much shit. They blame him for not reacting fast enough, yet ignore the fact that every other polticial party possible has fought him every step of the way for everything he wanted to do. Trump wants to help people and send out more stimulus payments, they fight him because they would rather kill people than see the American people get help with Trump's name on it. It's fine to hate the guy if you want, but you can't rest the blame entirely on him, because EVERYONE has been against him for EVERYTHING he has tried to get done in office. Every media outlet paints him as a satanic dictator, yet provides no evidence on what makes him such a dastardly being.

I'm not a Trump supporter, I hate every politician equally, but I think he has tried to do his best despite everyone and everything working as hard as possible against him for no legitimate reason other than not being able to CONTROL him.

In a sense, I agree with you that Trump has done his best with covid. It's just that this is his best - and it isn't any good.

Trump's failure to work with Congress is in large part Trump's failure. He's never learnt to work with them, and often he's antagonised them and alienated them. That in large part is because Trump doesn't like resistance and disagreement, and he throws tantrums and abuse. I mean, we're pretty much all professionals. None of us think it's constructive and professional to publicly insult and outrage the people we work with and what they believe in. Trump's failure to even reliably keep his own party on board is even more damning. He has no idea how to do politics, what it takes to get things done in government. Here's the supposed "master of the deal", and he can't even cut a deal with his own party most of the time. Trump has treated government like it's everyone's job to do what they are told (by him), and raged at them when they have not. But people such as Pelosi and McConnell have real power, they need to be bargained with.

It's not that I think the current political situation isn't a bit of a shitshow even without Trump, but if Trump's not going to work with the system, and he's not going to take action to reform the systtem either, then he's nothing but a failure and deserves to be a failure. End of.

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

Trump has treated government like it's everyone's job to do what they are told (by him), and raged at them when they have not.

That's because, from Day 1, Trump has considered himself to be "CEO of America Inc.", and he expected the same kind of top-down power structure where he called all the shots and everyone else's job was to enact his wishes. That is not how democracy works, and that has been Trump's number-one problem with democracy.

 

[Fieldy409]

Trump's idea of a ban on travel from China was pointless since the virus was already out of China and into Europe by then. It should have been a ban on travel from the world, like Australia did.

And the USA does not have the worlds biggest cities or biggest population. It's only over 300 million people with a huge amount of space.

 

[Mister Mumbler]

You asked what was so great about capitalism, I assumed you didn't feel capitalism is the "answer" and you were implying lets try a different system like socialism or whatever. All I said was to take the best aspects all of the systems instead of just going with one system.

(Sorry for the late reply)
I figured, and agree mostly too, it's just tiring to have any little criticism of capitalism seen as commie talk (plus, this is one of the first hurdles to get over to fix it).

 

[Mister Mumbler]

Snip

My point between the two videos is mainly the first audio clip in the Woodward video from the 7th versus him on the 27th. The very next bit in it (from March I believe) I think was in response to his February 27th briefing. As far as the second clip goes, take it in context of his private conversation with Woodward. It starts with a question from a reporter asking if he agrees with the CDC's assessment that covid would eventually show up here...and he disagrees. And this is my problem with this whole mess in a nutshell: this should have been easy. This is baby's first pandemic; wash your hands regularly and sanitize, don't go out unnecessarily if you can and if you must go out, social distance and wear a mask. Like you said earlier, masks are super easy to deal with rather than straight up lockdowns, but do you know why masks became such a big issue?

This is a man reading from a script, and he literally cannot go two minutes without fucking everything up. What's worse? This isn't new.

Spoiler: Newspaper clipping from Phoenix AZ, 11/30/1918

102 years almost to the exact date, and what have we learned?

 

[Phoenixmgs]

(Sorry for the late reply)
I figured, and agree mostly too, it's just tiring to have any little criticism of capitalism seen as commie talk (plus, this is one of the first hurdles to get over to fix it).

Everyone is so extreme in America. A whiff of socialistic policy and people on the right say they're a socialist or communist. How are you still afraid of communists in this day and age? Even back during the Cold War, it was really stupid; it's hard to believe in the 20th century that there was a form of basically "witch trials" going on. The whole "domino theory" was beyond stupid. At the pub 2 Fridays back, a friend of a friend claimed Biden is a communist for example, there's just no discussion to be had at that point.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Everyone is so extreme in America. A whiff of socialistic policy and people on the right say they're a socialist or communist. How are you still afraid of communists in this day and age? Even back during the Cold War, it was really stupid; it's hard to believe in the 20th century that there was a form of basically "witch trials" going on. The whole "domino theory" was beyond stupid. At the pub 2 Fridays back, a friend of a friend claimed Biden is a communist for example, there's just no discussion to be had at that point.

As mentioned recently in some other thread, the communist manifesto starts out with Marx complaining about this very point.

Oh, new right wing nickname for Biden, "the frightful spectre". "The hobbiden"?

 

[Eacaraxe]

Everyone is so extreme in America. A whiff of socialistic policy and people on the right say they're a socialist or communist. How are you still afraid of communists in this day and age? Even back during the Cold War, it was really stupid; it's hard to believe in the 20th century that there was a form of basically "witch trials" going on. The whole "domino theory" was beyond stupid. At the pub 2 Fridays back, a friend of a friend claimed Biden is a communist for example, there's just no discussion to be had at that point.

It makes very few people with very many political and social connections very much money, ergo the collective delusion must continue. Basically everyone at or below the age of a center-line gen-X'er knows exactly how much bullshit it is, even those who keep touting the "anti-commernisms!" propaganda for political gain; the problem is the boomers who fuck everything up for everyone else due to being the most credulous and buffoonish generation in the country's living history. I fully expect once the boomers die off to the point the gen-X, millennial, and zoomer vote actually means something, the country will move much further left to join the rest of the civilized world -- assuming there's a country left at that point.

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

Oh you know what. Let's add a second rule.

If you sick. STAY THE FUCK HOME!

Simple.

Can't. Need to pay rent or be homeless.

 

[Generals]

Oh you know what. Let's add a second rule.

If you sick. STAY THE FUCK HOME!

Simple.

It's a very sensible rule but only partly useful when the desease can be transmitted while asymptomatic... I am fairly certain many infected others not knowing they were "sick".

 

[Thaluikhain]

It's a very sensible rule but only partly useful when the desease can be transmitted while asymptomatic... I am fairly certain many infected others not knowing they were "sick".

Not perfect, but it'd still be a big step forwards if people got behind that.

(Oh, and if people weren't risking starving or being evicted...might be a good idea to help people with that sort of thing even when there isn't a plague)

 

[Generals]

Not perfect, but it'd still be a big step forwards if people got behind that.

(Oh, and if people weren't risking starving or being evicted...might be a good idea to help people with that sort of thing even when there isn't a plague)

Don't get me wrong, I'm all in favor of it. But I guess what I poorly expressed is that it wouldn't be sufficient due to Covid's nature. In the end to prevent lockdowns you'd need massive testing, tracking & tracing and full compliance to basic rules like: not going out when ill, wearing masks, keeping distances, washing hands regularly, etc.

Unfortunately complying with basic rules is extremely hard for many and the many conspiracy theories don't help encourage compliance.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Don't get me wrong, I'm all in favor of it. But I guess what I poorly expressed is that it wouldn't be sufficient due to Covid's nature. In the end to prevent lockdowns you'd need massive testing, tracking & tracing and full compliance to basic rules like: not going out when ill, wearing masks, keeping distances, washing hands regularly, etc.

Unfortunately complying with basic rules is extremely hard for many and the many conspiracy theories don't help encourage compliance.

Agreed with that.

As an aside, is anyone else annoyed that when movies do that "the real threat isn't the zombie plague, it's the other survivors" thing, we can't call it a tired cliche anymore?

 

[Agema]

As an aside, is anyone else annoyed that when movies do that "the real threat isn't the zombie plague, it's the other survivors" thing, we can't call it a tired cliche anymore?

Maybe. The key is perhaps that a lot of people realise that their risk of serious ill-effects from covid-19 approximates to zero and this affects their attitude. Neither they nor the vast majority of people they know are likely to be at risk. It's obvious to me, for instance, that over-60s are vastly more assiduous about wearing masks than under-30s. Of course they are. They're looking at a chance of death around 1 in 100, not 1 in 100,000.

I'll grant you most of these under 30s are probably much more thoughtful about their own grandparents and try not to visit or take care when they do, but everyone else, well, that just doesn't really seem to occur to them.

 

[Thaluikhain]

The key is perhaps that a lot of people realise that their risk of serious ill-effects from covid-19 approximates to zero and this affects their attitude. Neither they nor the vast majority of people they know are likely to be at risk. It's obvious to me, for instance, that over-60s are vastly more assiduous about wearing masks than under-30s. Of course they are. They're looking at a chance of death around 1 in 100, not 1 in 100,000.

Is that really true, though? I mean, maybe for actually dying, but there's a lot that a bug can do to a person without killing them that I'd consider to be a risk. Even if you are somehow guaranteed a full recovery, being useless for a few weeks doesn't seem like a great thing.

Though, perhaps I'm working with a different definition of "serious".

 

[stroopwafel]

Is that really true, though? I mean, maybe for actually dying, but there's a lot that a bug can do to a person without killing them that I'd consider to be a risk. Even if you are somehow guaranteed a full recovery, being useless for a few weeks doesn't seem like a great thing.

Though, perhaps I'm working with a different definition of "serious".

'Serious' in my opinion is death or permanent damage. The average covid death is as high as the average age of death. I wholeheartedly support common sense measures like social distancing and avoiding busy places but in other respects the lockdowns in particular have become a 'cure' way worse than the disease. We are sacrificing our freedom of movement with the same ease as we sacrificed our right for privacy. Governments shout 'national security' and suddenly every civil right is overruled and the same is happening now with covid. They now see how easy it is to scare people into submission and render the institutions powerless. This sets a dangerous precedent, similarly as 'national security' led to government death camps in judicial grey areas, assassination teams, outsourcing of torture, snatch & grab, drone strikes with mass casualties swept under the rug etc.

Trump has been one of the few who is actually strongest against lockdowns. Similarly he disassembled a lot of the precursors that make 'national security' such a necessity like restrictive borders, protracted military occupations and espionage from the rival superpower. Sure, he made a ton of mistakes doing so but in actual policy intent he is(or was) probably one of the most pro-democratic presidents. What Trump doesn't have, and what other governments only have, is tunnel vision. They modeled these lockdowns after China without ever really re-assessing if they work or not(they don't). So governments get frustrated and start implementing more restriction and increase the amount of lockdowns, often for months on end. Again, for a disease most people get no more than a runny nose from. Just with 'national security' there is no sense of proportionality anymore. The populace similarly have internalized this narrative that a plague is on the loose that must be stopped with any means necessary and which no one must be infected by and for which every death is one death too many. When in fact, you don't employ this metric for any disease.

So you have governments passing legislation for infringing on freedom of movement and robbing low margin/small businesses of their livelihoods while devaluing the currency by lending hundreds of billions on the capital markets through the central banks so corporations can 'borrow' more billions at negative interest rates while the small timer see their savings evaporate. And property prices balloon with inflation. The only factor uninterrupted is the global supply chain and it's aggregate service industry like tax, legal, insurance etc. The one who suffers the most under the lockdowns is not the industrial economy or vital commercial industries(espescially ecommerce) but the small business owner or self-employed person or any of the other numerous people who are dependent on low margin business(restaurants, coffeeshops etc).

Then finally there is also the psychosocial cost for many people. People who live alone and now might live in complete isolation for months on end. The amount of domestic abuse that have miraculously dropped in reported incidents by huge margins. Young people who are denied an important period of their formative years. Or even old people who are cut off from close contact with their children and grandchildren. There are heartbreaking reports about seniors having depersonalized because of protracted isolation that they no longer recognize their children or even who they themselves are. Worse than risking covid? Really?

There is also the 'hidden' grief of delayed medical care because of covid. People who were too late with their cancer diagnosis which have now metastasized. Delayed surgeries leading to death or much more severe outcomes. Cancelled appointments in which important diagnosis are missed. The cost is enormous.

If you add all this up does it really stand in proportion to the health risks of covid? Risks that can also be, idk, mitigated with a healthy lifestyle and exercise given that the biggest risk group is obese with underlying comorbidities like high blood pressure, diabetes, hypertension etc. In my opinion it absolutely doesn't.

 

[tstorm823]

How are you still afraid of communists in this day and age?

To be fair, there's a lot more to communism than just the economics, and there are people out in the streets roleplaying as 1930s German communists actively hoping to recreate the destruction of liberal democracy that took place there.

 

[Agema]

Is that really true, though? I mean, maybe for actually dying, but there's a lot that a bug can do to a person without killing them that I'd consider to be a risk. Even if you are somehow guaranteed a full recovery, being useless for a few weeks doesn't seem like a great thing.

Though, perhaps I'm working with a different definition of "serious".

"Long covid" is - tentatively - estimated at 1 in 10, and unsurprisingly much higher in hospitalised patients. The other issue is how serious - for some, it will probably be a drain over several months and they can still get by, rather than debilitating.

One of the interesting things might be long term effects, particularly from my perspective neurological. Some context here is the long-standing evidence of a potential link between peripheral infection and the central nervous system: there's evidence that Parkinson's Disease, for instance, may be triggered by gastrointestinal infections. If that sounds alarming, it maybe should be. We already know (the smell / taste deficit symptoms of covid-19) that covid-19 causes dysfunction of some peripheral neuronal activity. We simply don't know what long-term effects could be and whilst I think it very low probability a large number of people will be seriously affected, the possibility exists that down the line we could have a significant uptick in other pathologies.

That's the danger with new infections - you never really know what they do, and it may take years before much of it is revealed. And again why a casual 'flu comparisons are potentially a cause of complacency.