Corvid-19 and its impact (name edit)
- Thread starter Saint of M
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I agree.Silvanus said:
He's not saying that's what he thought. He's saying that's what he would have said... if he wasn't informed. The whole bit there was saying that the number of deaths from the flu is surprising if you haven't been told it already. Trying to make a "would" statement, a counterfactual statement, into a factual statement of ignorance is disingenuous nonsense.
Maybe not as bad as saying Trump halted tests to try and pretend there weren't any cases.
Maybe not as bad as saying Trump tried to work with a German company on a vaccine because he wanted exclusive rights to it.
Maybe not as bad as saying Trump fired the pandemic response team.
Maybe not as bad as saying Trump spread the virus because HHS helped arrange quarantine for people returning from China.
Maybe not as bad as saying Trump told the states that they had to fend for themselves.
But all of these things are lies.
But he apparently he wasn't informed, again according to his own words:tstorm823 said:
"Over the last long period of time, you have an average of 36,000 people dying (per year). I never heard those numbers. I would've been shocked. I would've said, 'Does anybody die from the flu? I didn't know people died from the 'flu.'"
The implication of that statement is that only recently someone popped up and told him people died of 'flu.
But what aren't lies are that the Trump administration flubbed the testing regime in the early days and left them well behind the game. That it did scrap the dedicated pandemic response team. That it spent weeks telling everyone there wasn't much of a problem and nothing much to worry about when they could have been better preparing a response. That many of the measures to assist the states were slow in coming and only released under pressure.
The administration has has done a lot of the right sorts of things, just some of those things have been been cocked up or not done in a timely manner. It's been more reactive than proactive. Don't feel too bad: the USA isn't the only country that's delivered an underwhelming response.
We are now at the point where the government is putting together stimulus plans to help the American people.
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/03/18/refusal-pelosi-consider-universal-cash-payments-response-coronavirus-pandemic
Somehow the Democrat leadership are bungling it and are to the right of Republicans.
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/03/18/refusal-pelosi-consider-universal-cash-payments-response-coronavirus-pandemic
Somehow the Democrat leadership are bungling it and are to the right of Republicans.
You can see Pelosi's point - to avoid government money being handed to people who don't need it - but it sure doesn't make her look good. And if takes more time and administrative effort that leaves people in the lurch, it's just a bad idea and may as well just send the cheques and worry about the rest later.crimson5pheonix said:
I think it's really interesting to watch how Trump's supporters essentially take his weird old-man ramblings and try to project their own thoughts into the demented void.
Trump very openly said he did not know people die of flu. The fact that it was a conditional statement doesn't change its meaning, because he's not describing what some hypothetical ignorant person would have said but rather what he would have said at a previous point in time before being convinced of the validity of this information.
It is actually not unreasonable that an extremely rich person with access to expensive medical care and no history of disability (beyond just being quite old) would be surprised that people die of flu. I don't think that's actually a huge problem or something we can necessarily expect. US presidents are not elected on the basis of any kind of competence or scientific expertise. What is stupid here, and very indicative of a general theme or style of Trump presidency, was the questionable decision to convey this anecdote at all.
Trump very openly said he did not know people die of flu. The fact that it was a conditional statement doesn't change its meaning, because he's not describing what some hypothetical ignorant person would have said but rather what he would have said at a previous point in time before being convinced of the validity of this information.
It is actually not unreasonable that an extremely rich person with access to expensive medical care and no history of disability (beyond just being quite old) would be surprised that people die of flu. I don't think that's actually a huge problem or something we can necessarily expect. US presidents are not elected on the basis of any kind of competence or scientific expertise. What is stupid here, and very indicative of a general theme or style of Trump presidency, was the questionable decision to convey this anecdote at all.
I think there's a self-sustaining cycle of people who consider Trump to be incoherent rambling, so they don't bother to consider what he says with logic or reason, which you have to do for anyone to not seem like incoherent rambling.evilthecat said:
Hey all,
Hope everyone is doing (relatively) well during this stressful time. Not sure where everyone is currently, or how they're dealing with it but I wanted to chime in quickly with a couple things.
First, I hope everyone is taking this seriously and doing their best to heed the advice of medical experts and scientists. If you had any doubts about the seriousness of novel coronavirus, I hope those have notions have been dispelled. The situation where I am currently has escalated pretty goddamn quickly, as it has in other parts of the U.S. So please be smart, and don't be an asshole.
Second, since online communications will represent the bulk of interaction for many of us for the foreseeable future...I'm obviously not a moderator here, but I implore everyone to stay positive as best the can, provide helpful and accurate updates and information sources, and try to avoid getting bogged down in negativity and misinformation.
And third....I wanted to say that however bored or frustrated you may get in the coming weeks and months, I guarantee you have better uses of your time than trolling or responding to known and obvious trolls. In the case of the latter, I strongly suggest you practice social distancing from the trolls and starve them of the attention and interaction they require. I know that's easier said than done, but I think we'll all be happier in the end.
Stay safe!
Hope everyone is doing (relatively) well during this stressful time. Not sure where everyone is currently, or how they're dealing with it but I wanted to chime in quickly with a couple things.
First, I hope everyone is taking this seriously and doing their best to heed the advice of medical experts and scientists. If you had any doubts about the seriousness of novel coronavirus, I hope those have notions have been dispelled. The situation where I am currently has escalated pretty goddamn quickly, as it has in other parts of the U.S. So please be smart, and don't be an asshole.
Second, since online communications will represent the bulk of interaction for many of us for the foreseeable future...I'm obviously not a moderator here, but I implore everyone to stay positive as best the can, provide helpful and accurate updates and information sources, and try to avoid getting bogged down in negativity and misinformation.
And third....I wanted to say that however bored or frustrated you may get in the coming weeks and months, I guarantee you have better uses of your time than trolling or responding to known and obvious trolls. In the case of the latter, I strongly suggest you practice social distancing from the trolls and starve them of the attention and interaction they require. I know that's easier said than done, but I think we'll all be happier in the end.
Stay safe!
To expand on this, I think there's a sort of favourable assumption people have towards the rich and successful that they know lots of things. The reality is that they are frequently very ignorant about lots of things, despite (probably) knowing a very great deal about whatever it is that they have excelled in. As Feynman put it about scientists, outside their area of expertise they're as dumb as the next guy. I don't see much about Trump that gives me the impression he's widely read or interested in very much outside his business (except golf and pestering pretty women) such that I'd expect him to be a reliable source of general knowledge: suggestions of his short attention span and disinterest in detail would reinforce that notion.evilthecat said:
Frankly, I wouldn't be surprised if most of us here in this forum have better general knowledge than Trump: the very fact we're here is indicative that we take an active interest in the stuff going on round us in the world.
It's like tarot or horoscopes, isn't it? If you have the faith, you'll read what you want into it.
Ah, now I think I understand the particular approach you've taken with this: are you positing that the hypothetical answer he gave about not knowing is something he "would" have said a long time ago? That he's been informed for a long time, and the hypothetical ignorant Trump to which he refers only exists a long time ago?tstorm823 said:
Fuller context of the quote;
That "last long period" is... the last instance of seasonal flu, a year ago. So, the numbers he explicitly says he never heard-- the numbers he himself said shocked him and made him realise people died from the flu-- were numbers he heard at most 1 year ago.
Now, are you going to try to argue (with a straight face) that he knew the flu killed people the whole time, even before the last seasonal flu outbreak, despite him linking that outbreak with his realisation? That he's just describing fantasy scenarios about his own ignorance with no basis in reality at all?
At this point, I think it's clear that if Trump signed a sworn document stating that he didn't know, with no qualifications or caveats or "stacked quotations", you'd find a way of arguing that he obviously knew the whole time and we're all just madmen.
Edit: "Quoting a hypothetical version of himself that doesn't know" has to take the prize, actually, for the most satire-worthy defence I've ever heard; I'm gonna have to recount that to someone. It's too good to stay on this board.
Weird anecdote, I went out for Chinese a couple of days after my first date with my now-wife, was texting with her planning our second date. The fortune in my fortune cookie read "You are about to embark on the great love of your life." Only time in my life a fortune cookie has been accurate.Agema said:
We're up to 2 confirmed cases in my state (one on the southern edge of the state, the other in the eastern panhandle). The expected shortages from panic buying continue. Wife is having panic issues at work today, and even if the state closes most offices she'll still have to work which doesn't help. My employer isn't going to close unless either too many people get sick at once to keep running or the government mandates we close to ride it out.Exley97 said:
Honestly, the worst part is listening to people say crazy BS about it - so far the most amusing being that COVID-19 is a hoax perpetuated by the Democrats. Or that there's going to be a nationwide 2-week lockdown and quarantine announced before the weekend under the Stafford Act (hint: that's not what the Stafford Act does, and it's already been invoked), followed by encouraging more panic buying by saying you'd best rush to get everything you need to ride out two weeks before the weekend.
Throw enough darts at a board blindfolded, one of them will eventually hit the bullseye.Schadrach said:
Honestly, I'm not sure religion generally is that much different from tarot with respect to individuals believing what suits them. You only need to take one look at how different people manage to interpret holy writ differently to see there's a lot of wiggle room to pick what suits their fancy. In fact, I wonder if the most successful religions aren't deliberately vague or contradictory about a lot of things.
I've worked from home for the last five years, but with large portions of the government essentially trying to hermetically seal them off, large portions of my practice are now essentially non-functioning.Agema said:
Well it's either that or she doesn't want Trump being credited with what is a good idea and salvaging a reputation going into the election.Agema said:
Bingo!Silvanus said:
He's not trying to give a report card of his historical knowledge, he's trying to express that more people die of the flu each year than some people may be aware of. This did happen a day or so after people accused him of downplaying covid-19 by comparing it to the flu, so this time he was emphasizing the seriousness of the flu. But because a big part of Trump's schtick is about not being talked down to by elites, rather than say the ignorant masses don't know how deadly the flu is, he presented it in a self-deprecating sense that people can relate to.
That's exactly the problem. Americans have been through the means-testing rigamarole so many times to know its inevitable outcome: overly complex, bureaucratic, unresponsive, insufficient, tailored in such a way it actually denies aid to the most at-risk Americans, and generally based on 400-year-old Puritanical notions of the worthiness of the poor. We've all seen the statistics, 80% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck and over half can't even afford a $400 emergency let alone a month's worth of rent, and this is in a situation where the country has spiked to 20% unemployment practically overnight.Agema said:
I mean, this is exactly how atrociously (as in, should be sent to the Hague atrocious) incompetent Pelosi's "plan" is: she wants a tax credit. We're in the middle of tax season right now, in the middle of a global pandemic. That means, on next year's taxes, or people are going to have to either file for an extension or potentially re-file. There's already an imminent national foreclosure/eviction crisis coming, the last thing we need is the bureaucracy and complexity of a goddamn tax credit.
For most people, rent's due on the 1st which means Congress' deadline to act, even with direct stimulus, was...two weeks ago. To give people the time to receive checks in the mail and deposit them. Which would mean people would be having to go to banks en masse...and there just might be a problem with that.
And all this boils down to one thing: Pelosi's trying to play election-year politics in all this. She doesn't want to give Trump a "win" and let him take credit for cleaning up this mess.
[tweet t="https://twitter.com/RobertFaturechi/status/1240746141236359168"]
This is just a great big coincidence, I'm sure.
This is just a great big coincidence, I'm sure.