Virus thread, the political one.

[caleb]

Y'all, I'd love to hear a little about the state of the shutdown on the ground in your areas. I trust my selected news signal to give me facts, but I don't trust it to represent the whole country.

Here in my neighborhood of Minneapolis, the shutdown is pretty thorough. Not much movement at all. I think on my block there's one guy still going to work. I could walk down the middle of streets that are usually choked with traffic.

But, I drove through the ex-urbs the other day, and judging by the big box parking lots, life was proceeding much closer to normal. That makes me think I might be seeing this phenomenon pretty partially.

Where you are, how thorough is this shutdown?

[vertical_doug]

Actually, I read somewhere how all these Televised ministries are preaching to empty mega churches. So now that I am back in the USA, I'd turned one on today to check it out. Much to my surprise, the church was packed. (It was David Jeremiah and the church is in San Diego I think) I look at the info on my online cable guide, and it looked to me like it was recent since the Mass was discussing lent. I don't think it was a rebroadcast. I have nothing against religion but this is exactly the kind of activity that caused the virus to spread so rapidly in South Korea. My area in Westchester is in containment because of a incident at the Synagogue. I am glad the Vatican has cancelled mass in Italy and in most of the US. More religious leaders need to follow suit.

[zachateseverything]

Y'all, I'd love to hear a little about the state of the shutdown on the ground in your areas. I trust my selected news signal to give me facts, but I don't trust it to represent the whole country.

Here in my neighborhood of Minneapolis, the shutdown is pretty thorough. Not much movement at all. I think on my block there's one guy still going to work. I could walk down the middle of streets that are usually choked with traffic.

But, I drove through the ex-urbs the other day, and judging by the big box parking lots, life was proceeding much closer to normal. That makes me think I might be seeing this phenomenon pretty partially.

Where you are, how thorough is this shutdown?

I'm in NE Ohio. We have a state wide shutdown. Restaurants that can do take out and delivery are still open. Stores that sell food or hardware are open. All other retail is closed. Most businesses are either shuttered or have employees working remote.

There isn't a lot of traffic on our normal roads. It's down probably 75% or more.

The only thing I've seen an uptick in is traffic in our parks. I live next to a county metro park and a national park. The parking lots are overflowing with cars and the trails look slammed. I guess since everything else is closed people are getting outside for entertainment. Ordinarily I'd be stoked but I think it's hard to observe proper social distancing on a trail that's only 5 feet wide. We currently are allowed to leave the house for exercise but I'm expecting that to change if the curve doesn't flatten shortly.

[bironi]

Maybe things are getting better in Washington State.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/graph...ge%2Fstory-ans

Or perhaps there is less testing happening Saturday-Sunday?

[thollandpe]

Here in a western Mass college town it's very quiet. The colleges gave the students an extra week of spring break and are now in remote learning mode. Except for students who could not leave, who have no better options. So our town is basically at summer population. I do not know what will happen to staff -- housekeeping, grounds, and dining services -- that have a lot less work to do. The lowest-paid employees in the organization (and dining services may be employed by a 3rd party at some of them).

I hear that UMass is offering food to whoever needs it, I do not know details but this warms my heart.

I have a friend who just shuttered a 15-year-old business, laid off all employees so they can collect unemployment. They use personal protective equipment every day (N95 masks, nitrile gloves, tyvek suits, duct tape) and donated their entire stock to a local hospital. This chills my shit, only slightly offset by the warm gesture. Another building insulation business is reporting in that they donated their all PPE too. Also an amazing gesture, but also an acknowledgment that work has stopped.

It took more than a week, but traffic on the road I live on is noticeably down. Foot traffic on the trails is noticeably up. There are so many cars at the rail trail lots that we won't go near them. On a regular mountain bike ride or hike, we see more people in a day than I'm used to seeing in a season. It's weird, so I'm breaking out my B routes and avoiding peak hours. But it is heartening that people are voting with their feet -- outdoor recreation is very important to them. This is what's critical.

My wife talked with the Amazon delivery guy. He's scared shitless. He's got four kids, the youngest is 8 months old, and he wonders every day if the job will kill him. And them. He's got a job as a school bus driver when things return to normal. Let's hope we find "normal" pretty soon. In the meantime, I'm extremely grateful that I can order a case of canned tuna and within days, a worried professional pulls into my driveway, gets out of the van, says hello to the dogs, and puts the box inside the door.

Essential personnel.

[Greg Costello]

A 30 minute ferry ride across the Puget Sound, on Bainbridge Island, things are quiet, very quiet (although its often like that even without a pandemic). Grocery stores, pharmacies, Ace Hardware and some restaurants doing take out and delivery are all that's open. They've now yellow taped the parking lots at the parking areas for local parks, so those are now quiet too (like other places, the parks were being overcrowded). In March we only have 8 positive tests so far in a population of 25,000 or so. The most risky places are the grocery stores, not because they aren't doing a good job managing people and conditions but rather just the number of people around. Most take out restaurants have a system down that minimizes human contact even with pin pads etc. We are trying to support a few of our favorites where we have relationships with the owners, but even that seems risky. My new behavioral norm - handling the delivered food and other packages as if the exterior is coated in toxic waste, writing down recipes for homemade hand sanitizer; I hope this is only a temporary thing and not a new normal. But it does seem that, as our community has taken this pretty seriously since the first case in Kirkland, we are on a hopeful trend to keep the spread under control and the health system at least not overwhelmed by patients.

[guido]

Republican Kevin McCarthy calls for holding off on further coronavirus aid packages - Vox

god forbid we help people more...

[jclay]

Florida's Republican governor refused access to a Corona-virus briefing to a reporter known for asking tough questions. We are witnessing, living, how democratic institutions and representative governments are lost to authoritarians. How anybody who is living the benefits of the progressive social and economic arcs of human existence can still support Republicans is astonishing. It really is like having slightly less than a majority of chickens supporting Col Sanders.

Access Denied

DeSantis, shortly after election, made some nice noises about reducing pollution in Florida and restoring voting rights to felons who had finished their sentences. My sweet wife thought that maybe we had an example of a decent Republican governor; to her mild displeasure (she wants to see the best in people) I muttered that I thought he was just a cagey politician. To the best of my knowledge he hasn't done squat about addressing pollution and destruction of Florida's environment and has decided that felons must pay back what are unachievable sums of money associated with their cases before being granted the right to vote.

I sometimes hate it when I'm right. Conservative thought isn't responsible for the social and governmental improvement in the human condition, progressive thought is.

[Matthew Strongin]

Florida's Republican governor refused access to a Corona-virus briefing to a reporter known for asking tough questions. We are witnessing, living, how democratic institutions and representative governments are lost to authoritarians. How anybody who is living the benefits of the progressive social and economic arcs of human existence can still support Republicans is astonishing. It really is like having slightly less than a majority of chickens supporting Col Sanders.

Access Denied

DeSantis, shortly after election, made some nice noises about reducing pollution in Florida and restoring voting rights to felons who had finished their sentences. My sweet wife thought that maybe we had an example of a decent Republican governor; I muttered that I thought he was just a cagey politician. To the best of my knowledge he hasn't done squat about addressing pollution and destruction of Florida's environment and has decided that felons must pay back what are unachievable sums of money associated with their cases before being granted the right to vote.

I sometimes hate it when I'm right. Conservative thought isn't responsible for the social and governmental improvement in the human condition, progressive thought is.

It was a sad day in my household when DeSantis won the election.

[fastupslowdown]

It was a sad day in my household when DeSantis won the election.

I'm still amazed that the same guy who refused to close the beaches is now worried that new yorkers are going to come and spread the virus in his state. forget about the legal questions as Andrew Cuomo points out but its in his state now. any hopes of cordoning off a population should have ended weeks ago. at this point it should be about mitigation and social distancing. surprised DeSantis doesn't call it the NYVirus

[Sbti]

I'm still amazed that the same guy who refused to close the beaches is now worried that new yorkers are going to come and spread the virus in his state. forget about the legal questions as Andrew Cuomo points out but its in his state now. any hopes of cordoning off a population should have ended weeks ago. at this point it should be about mitigation and social distancing. surprised DeSantis doesn't call it the NYVirus

Have all the snow birds left Florida for points north? If not shouldn't Florida be "quarantined" and northern states banning anyone coming back? Have they been told to stay at their winter place?

[ides1056]

I started riding across the country from Jacksonville on March 10. St Augustine was overrun with bikers from Daytona Bike Week. Tourists were everywhere: I could not get a spot at Anastasia State Beach. Flagler College was not closed. The next day in Gainesville I found the University closed, but students everywhere. By Tallahassee people were beginning to show signs of concern, but then heading down to the Gulf that changed back to little concern. In Panama City Beach it was party on. The State Park would not admit me, so I stayed in an RV park where they had gotten the message and were doing all they could to keep the place disinfected, but the amusement park next door went late into the night tossing people into the air on the Hammer and some other nausea-inducing ride. I wore earplugs to drown out the screaming.

So Florida can blame itself.

[Mark Kelly]

Trump has apparently calimed the death rate will peak in two weeks.

As my wife said "Well we know he's no good with maths, look at the number of companies he has bankrupted"

[guido]

[caleb]

Thanks for all of your reports on the shutdown in your neighborhoods.

I was digging around last night to try to find some data on regional variation, and I came across this interactive mapping tool that uses cell phone data to approximate reductions in travel. I can't paste anything here's so you're going to need to click through to see it: Covid-19 Social Distancing Scoreboard — Unacast

It's not too tough to see that reduction in movement is far greater on the coasts and in urban counties (you can get county-level data by clicking on a state) than it is in most rural states and counties. For example, lots of plains and mountain west states are unchanged or up in their travel. It certainly looks like this shutdown is primarily an urban and coastal-state phenomenon for now.

Outliers in the interior seem to be those with Democratic governors (i.e. Michigan, Nevada).

For much of the country, it appears this is still primarily a spectator event.

[mzilliox]

i wanted to share some words from a guy who watched the coronavirus address last night. i didnt watch it. here is his summary. its pretty hilarious, but also pretty terrifying, because its real.
written by Jim Wright:

"If you're not watching Trump's nightly Coronavirus shitfest, here's the summary:

He started out by accusing nurses of hoarding or stealing face masks.

Trump: "There is something going on. I don't know if it is hoarding. It is maybe worse than hoarding ... for years, 10 to 20,000 masks. Okay. It's a New York City hospital. It's packed all the time. How do you go from 10 to 20 to 300,000? 10 to 20,000 masks, to 300,000 ... even though this is different. Something is going on. And you ought to look into it as reporters. Where are the masks going? Are they going out the back door? How do you go from 10,000 to 300,000? Uh, and we have that in a lot of different places. So ... somebody should probably look into that, 'cause I just don't see from a practical standpoint how that's possible to go from that to that, and we have that happening in numerous places..."

He then accused hospitals of "hoarding" ventilators.

He does this several times throughout the briefing, Suggesting New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, and medical personnel, specifically nurses, are conspiring to overinflate the number of ventilators and masks needed.

Again, he does this more than once.

Trump then admits there actually ARE shortages, but blames Obama. Saying that it's like how the military was out of bullets when he took over. None of this has any basis in reality whatsoever, but the toadies in the background are all nodding like this is fact.

This is beyond gaslighting.

This is a radioactive gas cloud.

This is like watching the Soviet government press briefings about Chernobyl, when the reactor was still burning and the Russians didn't realize we could actually SEE it from orbit and that radiation meters were sounding the alarm over half the planet.

Trump then talks about immigrants and how keeping them out of America probably prevented us from getting the plague and everybody behind him has this carefully practiced expressionless Soviet face on, and then bizarrely Trump randomly pivots to explaining how he didn't know until TODAY that 2.2 MILLION AMERICANS will likely die if we don't maintain social distancing -- even though that number was specifically briefed IN FRONT of him two weeks ago on national TV.

Naturally, now that Trump is suddenly aware of the probability of 2.2 MILLION DEATHS, he never said he was going to order America back to work by Easter. That was, uh, um, well, you see, um, just "aspirational."

The man who always speaks bluntly, is suddenly talking in metaphor and parable.

A QANN "reporter" asks Trump why his approval ratings are so high, is it because he's so awesome? Trump admits that he is.

Someone else asks about Americans facing eviction on April 1st. Trump says "I think landlords will take it easy."

Trump goes after reporter Yacmiche Alcindor for daring to ask about his repeated attacks on various governors. Trump angrily says, "We sent thousands of generators to New York ... the people in New York never distribute it the generators."

It takes a minute to figure out that when Trump says "generators" he probably means "ventilators." He does this repeatedly.

A reporter asks why Florida has 100% of their requests for supplies from the national strategic stockpile filled, but Massachusetts has not? Instead of answering, Trump says: "I was on the call yesterday with the governors and they were happy with the job we are doing."

The governors, who he noted the day before, he refuses to call. He was on the phone with them. They're happy he says, despite the fact that he was just this morning talking about how they're not happy and they should be.

Trump then segues into: "The biggest problem was the test didn't work. That was not from us. That has been there a long time" and suggests that the fault lies with Obama.

The tests in question were developed by the CDC, WITHIN THE LAST 3 MONTHS. Literally since the beginning of THIS year. Obama has been out of office for nearly 4 years now.

Then, bizarrely -- or not, given that this the new normal -- Trump says: "You will see drugs being used like nobody has ever used them before, and people are going to be dying all over the place."

I thought at first he was talking about his repeated claims about untested drugs as a cure for the coronavirus. You know, aquarium cleaner. But, instead, he was talking about drug ABUSE. Not sure by who, but you can probably guess. You know what happens when "those" people stay home with nothing to do.

A CNN reporter tries to get Trump back to his comments about the governors of blue states having to be more "appreciative." Trump screams at him, "YOUR STATEMENT IS A LIE!"

The reporter was LITERALLY quoting Trump's own statement.

Literally quoting Trump.

Trump called those words a lie. I mean, he's not wrong, but still...

As proof of this, Trump starts bragging about how his press briefings are getting better ratings than The Bachelor and Monday Night Football.

"The enemy is death," declares Trump.

And we're done. Thanks for coming everybody. Hope to see you all tomorrow for another exciting episode of "Reality TV President!"

[theflashunc]

i wanted to share some words from a guy who watched the coronavirus address last night. i didnt watch it. here is his summary. its pretty hilarious, but also pretty terrifying, because its real.
written by Jim Wright:

"If you're not watching Trump's nightly Coronavirus shitfest, here's the summary:

He started out by accusing nurses of hoarding or stealing face masks.

Trump: "There is something going on. I don't know if it is hoarding. It is maybe worse than hoarding ... for years, 10 to 20,000 masks. Okay. It's a New York City hospital. It's packed all the time. How do you go from 10 to 20 to 300,000? 10 to 20,000 masks, to 300,000 ... even though this is different. Something is going on. And you ought to look into it as reporters. Where are the masks going? Are they going out the back door? How do you go from 10,000 to 300,000? Uh, and we have that in a lot of different places. So ... somebody should probably look into that, 'cause I just don't see from a practical standpoint how that's possible to go from that to that, and we have that happening in numerous places..."

He then accused hospitals of "hoarding" ventilators.

He does this several times throughout the briefing, Suggesting New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, and medical personnel, specifically nurses, are conspiring to overinflate the number of ventilators and masks needed.

Again, he does this more than once.

Trump then admits there actually ARE shortages, but blames Obama. Saying that it's like how the military was out of bullets when he took over. None of this has any basis in reality whatsoever, but the toadies in the background are all nodding like this is fact.

This is beyond gaslighting.

This is a radioactive gas cloud.

This is like watching the Soviet government press briefings about Chernobyl, when the reactor was still burning and the Russians didn't realize we could actually SEE it from orbit and that radiation meters were sounding the alarm over half the planet.

Trump then talks about immigrants and how keeping them out of America probably prevented us from getting the plague and everybody behind him has this carefully practiced expressionless Soviet face on, and then bizarrely Trump randomly pivots to explaining how he didn't know until TODAY that 2.2 MILLION AMERICANS will likely die if we don't maintain social distancing -- even though that number was specifically briefed IN FRONT of him two weeks ago on national TV.

Naturally, now that Trump is suddenly aware of the probability of 2.2 MILLION DEATHS, he never said he was going to order America back to work by Easter. That was, uh, um, well, you see, um, just "aspirational."

The man who always speaks bluntly, is suddenly talking in metaphor and parable.

A QANN "reporter" asks Trump why his approval ratings are so high, is it because he's so awesome? Trump admits that he is.

Someone else asks about Americans facing eviction on April 1st. Trump says "I think landlords will take it easy."

Trump goes after reporter Yacmiche Alcindor for daring to ask about his repeated attacks on various governors. Trump angrily says, "We sent thousands of generators to New York ... the people in New York never distribute it the generators."

It takes a minute to figure out that when Trump says "generators" he probably means "ventilators." He does this repeatedly.

A reporter asks why Florida has 100% of their requests for supplies from the national strategic stockpile filled, but Massachusetts has not? Instead of answering, Trump says: "I was on the call yesterday with the governors and they were happy with the job we are doing."

The governors, who he noted the day before, he refuses to call. He was on the phone with them. They're happy he says, despite the fact that he was just this morning talking about how they're not happy and they should be.

Trump then segues into: "The biggest problem was the test didn't work. That was not from us. That has been there a long time" and suggests that the fault lies with Obama.

The tests in question were developed by the CDC, WITHIN THE LAST 3 MONTHS. Literally since the beginning of THIS year. Obama has been out of office for nearly 4 years now.

Then, bizarrely -- or not, given that this the new normal -- Trump says: "You will see drugs being used like nobody has ever used them before, and people are going to be dying all over the place."

I thought at first he was talking about his repeated claims about untested drugs as a cure for the coronavirus. You know, aquarium cleaner. But, instead, he was talking about drug ABUSE. Not sure by who, but you can probably guess. You know what happens when "those" people stay home with nothing to do.

A CNN reporter tries to get Trump back to his comments about the governors of blue states having to be more "appreciative." Trump screams at him, "YOUR STATEMENT IS A LIE!"

The reporter was LITERALLY quoting Trump's own statement.

Literally quoting Trump.

Trump called those words a lie. I mean, he's not wrong, but still...

As proof of this, Trump starts bragging about how his press briefings are getting better ratings than The Bachelor and Monday Night Football.

"The enemy is death," declares Trump.

And we're done. Thanks for coming everybody. Hope to see you all tomorrow for another exciting episode of "Reality TV President!"

The networks have to stop airing the briefings asap. Report out from them, run clips that are verifiable facts, but they have to stop running this echo chamber insanity.

[caleb]

The networks have to stop airing the briefings asap. Report out from them, run clips that are verifiable facts, but they have to stop running this echo chamber insanity.

The problem is that without the reality TV Commander in Chief dynamic, he's going to get tired of dealing with this quick. May as well have an Easter parade then.

[mzilliox]

the dude is comparing his rating to the superbowl. we are in emergency mode and dude thinks the ratings are important or significant. like the ratings are his to be proud of? he does realize the nation would tune into to see fozzy bear or kermit the frog or godzilla or even sleepy joe give the updates on the virus right? no, he doesnt, hes delusional and totally unfit for this. what a nutbag. just like he doesnt realize there are less masks than last year because people fucking use them. the dude has simply no idea what being a human is like. its baffling. and folks like this? see this as desirable? also baffling.

[King Of Dirk]

The briefings go on far too long, and President Trump loves it - it's free air time, and there's an election in November.

For better or worse* I see Trump all day every day. When the briefings aren't running the press is talking about nothing but the briefings - and his campaign staff probably likes that. In the meantime, Biden is relatively out of sight and out of mind, and his campaign staff probably likes that, as his chances decrease with every syllable he utters.

In spring of 2016 I swore up and down that the more people saw of Trump the sooner his campaign would end. Clearly I was wrong. Somehow the more that dude rambles the more his base loves him. Sadly for Biden, his base is a little more grounded in reality, so exposure probably isn't great for him.

Never underestimate how talking loudly bolsters the illusion of leadership.

*it's worse.