Virus thread, the political one.

[Sbti]

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

"People grew sick of social distancing measured as they dragged into the summer of 1918. When the great war finally ended in late November, people took to the streets to celebrate their good fortune. In the following weeks, the second wave of the pandemic killed more people than the war."

Well, yeah. But those people didn't have the guns like those heroes in the photo above.

[j44ke]

The instantaneous production of protests in Michigan make a little more sense after reading this article about Gov. Whitmer. Potentially you will be able to track potential running mates for Joe Biden by the number of protestors that materialize outside their door. So if you wake up in the morning and there is a militia in your front yard, don't panic. Biden just put you on his list of potential VP's.

Gretchen Whitmer Isn’t Backing Down - The New York Times

BTW, I'm not questioning the legitimate economic anxiety - and in many cases outright panic as bill after bill comes due with no salary in sight - of people. Just that these protests' just add water" spontaneity contrasted with the similarity of talking points, messages on signs, etc.

Okay, now they make even more sense, at least in terms of origination and singularity of messaging.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/techn...tine-protests/

[caleb]

The most interesting thing I read today (as I was laying awake at 5:30 watching the sun come up) was from Barron's of all places (no idea why that magazine exists since dentists' offices are closed).

The auto industry is starting to campaign for a Cash for Clunkers 2.0 program as part of the stimulus/bailout: Get Ready for Mega Cash for Clunkers, Morgan Stanley’s Adam Jonas Says - Barron's

Here are the auto industry's goals, according to the author from Morgan Stanley:

On changes to the car business after the pandemic:

We came up with a list: less commuting, less car rental, younger cars, fewer dealers, more digital and touchless service. Restructured supply chains to reduce geographic dependence. Possibly less ride-sharing. You know, the whole concept of hygiene and who the prior rider was in a ride-sharing or pooling operation, or in a car rental operation, or even in the used car business, might take on an elevated importance for some time to come.

So, we offer a $5000 incentive (carrot) along with fear mongering about disease (stick) to cajole people who don't want to buy new cars to buy new cars. Because the alternative to a vehicle-dependent life is disease and presumably the possibility of death. Much better to play it safe by hiding inside the security of an over-gadgeted Ford Flex on a 72 month payment plan.

Lots of commentary has made the argument that shocks get us to the future faster. Apparently there are also powerful forces thinking, hoping, and lobbying that this particular shock will revive 1992.



More:

These are numbers more for discussion: a $5,000 coupon to scrap a car subject to a variety of criteria, including U.S. local content percentages, call it 60% U.S. content. So there’s an American domestic angle that will of course include Japanese and Korean cars produced in the U.S. There may be some household income limitations and then limitations on the kind of vehicle you can scrap, and then how much you can buy. It might have a $60,000 maximum price limitation. It’s going to be designed, we think, to support lower and middle income classes to get bipartisan support.

Also, there will be a fuel economy and a sustainability angle to it. The fuel economy of the car bought, we suspect, will be 50% better than the fuel economy of the car scrapped. By getting rid of those old clunkers, you’re getting rid of the least efficient cars on the road, too. And then there’s a safety element to it—some level of minimum driving assistance technology—so the car you’re scrapping versus the car you’re buying has a lifesaving element to it, which would get some support.

When we run the math on that, you get some interesting paybacks because you’re stimulating factories. You’re creating sales tax for states that are in pretty dire straits. You’re creating registration fees while saving fuel and lives and insurance. That’s kind of how the pitch will be.

Please, for the love of Dog, let's be honest: Cash for Clunkers 1.0 was awful for the environment because it scrapped a metric ton of embodied carbon that wasn't even close to offset by increased fuel economy. It was regressive, because the real costs were paid by the poor (and especially the rural poor) who now had to pay inflated prices for used vehicles. It was a boondoggle bailout when Obama did it, and it would be awful this time around, too.

[jclay]

After all, they do look well regulated to me...

They tend to forget that part of the 2nd.

[Colinmclelland]

I don't know what it is, but something we don't yet know must be happening to justify the Fed firing quite such a big bazooka on Sunday

Seems a bit like "yeh, but it would be a shame to die with one bullet left..."

OK, so I’m a muppet. Nothing we didn’t know just turns out the stuff we did know was all set to be a bigger global shitfight than I expected...

[BBB]

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

"People grew sick of social distancing measured as they dragged into the summer of 1918. When the great war finally ended in late November, people took to the streets to celebrate their good fortune. In the following weeks, the second wave of the pandemic killed more people than the war."

This is true and governments of all stripes need to guard against complacency and the problems associated with a second wave of infection, but a parallel with conditions at the end of WW1 is not entirely on point. There had just been four years of particularly bloodthirsty war and various European countries were traumatised as a result. And while the fighting ended in November 1918, it didn't for many with civil war (Russia for example) or general unrest. Medicine, science and mass communication were a fraction of what they were back then. Ditto living conditions.

I do think we have to be careful that we don't become complacent (infection rates after Easter went up for example), but we are a way away from 1918.

[guido]

Opinion | Protesting for the Right to Catch the Coronavirus - The New York Times

"At a string of small “reopen America” protests across the country this week, mask-less citizens proudly flouted social distancing guidance while openly carrying semiautomatic rifles and waving American flags and signs with “ironic” swastikas. They organized chants to lock up female Democrat governors and to fire the country’s top infectious disease experts. At one point during protests at the Michigan Capitol, the group’s orchestrated gridlock blocked an ambulance en route to a nearby hospital.

For those who’ve chosen to put their trust in science during the pandemic it’s hard to fathom the decision to gather to protest while a deadly viral pathogen — transmitted easily by close contact and spread by symptomatic and asymptomatic people alike — ravages the country. But it shouldn’t come as a surprise. This week’s public displays of defiance — a march for the freedom to be infected — are the logical conclusion of the modern far-right’s donor-funded, shock jock-led liberty movement. It was always headed here.

Few demonstrate this movement better than Alex Jones of Infowars — one of the key figures of Saturday’s “You Can’t Close America” rally on the steps of the Capitol building in Austin, Tex. For decades, Mr. Jones has built a thriving media empire harnessing (real and understandable) fear, paranoia and rage, which in turn drive sales of vitamin supplements and prepper gear in his personal store. The Infowars strategy is simple: Instill a deep distrust in all authority, while promoting a seductive, conspiratorial alternate reality in which Mr. Jones, via his outlandish conspiracies, has all the answers. He’s earned the trust of a non-trivial number of Americans, and used it to stoke his ego and his bank account. And he never lets reality get in the way (case in point, holding a stay-at-home order protest in Texas the day after the state announced it would begin efforts to carefully reopen in coming weeks)."

[bcm119]

Opinion | Protesting for the Right to Catch the Coronavirus - The New York Times

"At a string of small “reopen America” protests across the country this week, mask-less citizens proudly flouted social distancing guidance while openly carrying semiautomatic rifles and waving American flags and signs with “ironic” swastikas. They organized chants to lock up female Democrat governors and to fire the country’s top infectious disease experts. At one point during protests at the Michigan Capitol, the group’s orchestrated gridlock blocked an ambulance en route to a nearby hospital.

For those who’ve chosen to put their trust in science during the pandemic it’s hard to fathom the decision to gather to protest while a deadly viral pathogen — transmitted easily by close contact and spread by symptomatic and asymptomatic people alike — ravages the country. But it shouldn’t come as a surprise. This week’s public displays of defiance — a march for the freedom to be infected — are the logical conclusion of the modern far-right’s donor-funded, shock jock-led liberty movement. It was always headed here.

Few demonstrate this movement better than Alex Jones of Infowars — one of the key figures of Saturday’s “You Can’t Close America” rally on the steps of the Capitol building in Austin, Tex. For decades, Mr. Jones has built a thriving media empire harnessing (real and understandable) fear, paranoia and rage, which in turn drive sales of vitamin supplements and prepper gear in his personal store. The Infowars strategy is simple: Instill a deep distrust in all authority, while promoting a seductive, conspiratorial alternate reality in which Mr. Jones, via his outlandish conspiracies, has all the answers. He’s earned the trust of a non-trivial number of Americans, and used it to stoke his ego and his bank account. And he never lets reality get in the way (case in point, holding a stay-at-home order protest in Texas the day after the state announced it would begin efforts to carefully reopen in coming weeks)."

Who are the "illegals" now?

[davids]

Opinion | Protesting for the Right to Catch the Coronavirus - The New York Times

"At a string of small “reopen America” protests across the country this week, mask-less citizens proudly flouted social distancing guidance while openly carrying semiautomatic rifles and waving American flags and signs with “ironic” swastikas. They organized chants to lock up female Democrat governors and to fire the country’s top infectious disease experts. At one point during protests at the Michigan Capitol, the group’s orchestrated gridlock blocked an ambulance en route to a nearby hospital.

"Ironic" swastikas? Hey you Fox anchor motherfucker (and who in hell is that ranting idiot?), there is never, ever, ever anything ironic about marching with a swastika. Those motherfuckers are fascists. You are, at best, an apologist for fascists.

I wonder if that asshole has a similar explanation for this sign, from the capital of the state I was born in?

[monadnocky]

"Ironic" swastikas? Hey you Fox anchor motherfucker (and who in hell is that ranting idiot?), there is never, ever, ever anything ironic about marching with a swastika. Those motherfuckers are fascists. You are, at best, an apologist for fascists.

I wonder if that asshole has a similar explanation for this sign, from the capital of the state I was born in?

what the hell has happened to us.

[guido]

Seeing The “Open the Economy” Protests In Their Proper Light | Talking Points Memo

"The protests we’ve seen in a handful of locations around the country have bamboozled a lot of the national press. Look closely and a lot of the turnout is heavily stocked with militia types and the kinds of groups who turned out for the Charlottesville protests a couple years ago. But the bigger thing is that for now they appear highly orchestrated. In Michigan, they appear to be in part in reaction polling showing severe declines in public support for President Trump. They’re organized by groups funded in large part by the DeVos family. These are basically Trump loyalists supporting Trump at his request and mobilized by key rightist groups. The key question, as TPM Reader TS explains, is whether what starts here as orchestrated and largely inorganic takes on a life of its own and gains political traction. They now have Fox and an incumbent President cheering them on as a demonstration of political identity. "

[theflashunc]

what the hell has happened to us.

Fascism happened. Again.

[rydesteel]

what the hell has happened to us.

Yesterday was the 25th Anniversary of the OKC Bombing. White Supremesist, Sovereign Citizens, Facist, and a short damn memory.

[gregl]

And what do the protests against shelter-at-home orders in multiple states have in common? That’s right (no pun intended), gun advocacy conspiracists. In this case, four brothers with an agenda: Conservative activist family behind '''grassroots''' anti-quarantine Facebook events. Cashing in on second amendment supporters while purporting to protect their freedoms. Pathetic but predictable.

Greg

[guido]

Opinion | The Right Sends In the Quacks - The New York Times

"Over the past few days there have been noisy, threatening demonstrations at various statehouses demanding an end to Covid-19 lockdowns.

The demonstrations haven’t been very big, with at most a few thousand people, and involve a strong element of astroturfing — that is, while they supposedly represent a surge of grass-roots anger, some of them have been organized by institutions with links to Republican politicians, including the family of Betsy DeVos, the secretary of education.

And polls show that an overwhelming majority of Americans — including half of Republicans — are more worried that restrictions will be lifted too soon than that they will be kept in place too long.

But the demonstrators have received huge favorable coverage from right-wing media; Donald Trump called them “very responsible people”; and they were praised by White House economic adviser Stephen Moore, who compared them to Rosa Parks.

That last bit caught my eye, and not just because some of the demonstrators were waving Confederate flags. The grotesqueness of the comparison aside, why are we still hearing from Stephen Moore?

After all, Moore — whom Trump tried but failed to install as a member of the Federal Reserve Board — isn’t just a bad economist with a history of misogynistic outbursts. More to the point, he’s a quack, with a long history of misrepresenting or inventing facts to support his ideological agenda."

[j44ke]

To me, there just seem to be too many men in positions of power whose propelling anxiety is that they must always be ascending. Like an addiction to upward mobility. And what they most abhor is the feeling that rather than ascending they might actually be falling, and so they will do absolutely anything to assuage that anxiety. Collectively they become a squadron of pilots in planes on a pitch dark night with no instrumentation and no stars above and no lights below and no way of knowing whether they are going up or down or upside down or right side up. So they just hit the gas.....

[caleb]

To me, there just seem to be too many men in positions of power whose propelling anxiety is that they must always be ascending. Like an addiction to upward mobility. And what they most abhor is the feeling that rather than ascending they might actually be falling, and so they will do absolutely anything to assuage that anxiety. Collectively they become a squadron of pilots in planes on a pitch dark night with no instrumentation and no stars above and no lights below and no way of knowing whether they are going up or down or upside down or right side up. So they just hit the gas.....

There's a book to be written under the heading of, "The Ethics of Downward Mobility." We, as a society, are bad at downward mobility. But if we're going to live in a world that is both slow-ish growth and somewhat meritocratic, we're going to need to learn how to move up and down gracefully.

[King Of Dirk]

And what do the protests against shelter-at-home orders in multiple states have in common? That’s right (no pun intended), gun advocacy conspiracists. In this case, four brothers with an agenda: Conservative activist family behind '''grassroots''' anti-quarantine Facebook events. Cashing in on second amendment supporters while purporting to protect their freedoms. Pathetic but predictable.

Greg

There are many, many stupid people on the right (none at all on the left, obviously), but it's not an intrinsically stupid position to seek to limit government power. After all, a really smart person once said our Constitution is a charter of negative liberties, setting forth what the state and federal governments can't do to you.

[bcm119]

There are many, many stupid people on the right (none at all on the left, obviously), but it's not an intrinsically stupid position to seek to limit government power. After all, a really smart person once said our Constitution is a charter of negative liberties, setting forth what the state and federal governments can't do to you.

You're right that in general, seeking to limit government power is not an intrinsically stupid position. It's just that in this specific case, during this specific period of time, it's very stupid.

[mzilliox]

You're right that in general, seeking to limit government power is not an intrinsically stupid position. It's just that in this specific case, during this specific period of time, it's very stupid.

i think seeking to limit power as an end goal is not that useful. I think rather defining what power the government does and doesnt have, then designing better systems to enhance the powers it does have, and support the powers it doesnt. I htink blindly saying small government is better than big government is as dangerous as blindly voting for donald trump because your parents said they were republicans so you think thats something you are too... whats weird is when you speak about issues, theres even less actual republicans, they just identify that way anyway. but when you get down to issues, most people simply arent republicans. the values really dont actually match up. its even been tested here in these threads, start to get to the essense of a value, discuss which party would better serve those values, realize the truth, deflect and dodge and take a new position back to comfy home zone.

i get the small gov position, or at least i did at some point, but i think there's simply too many selfish idiots. so unless you want to break up into smaller tribes again, small government has its problems too. weighing the positives and negatives of both is an act very worthy of partaking in. these days i would think of one were to honestly partake in this, small government would not be a solution for the majority of societies current problems. things are changing too fast, power is far too concentrated, the world is too interconnected, the idea of small government seems like a fairy tale as far as i can tell. it requires so much of citizens that i have no faith in their ability to handle. at some point less government also leads to less freedom in so much as its defined in our society.

the overreaching government is scary to be sure, but so is the castrated useless one, as we are seeing in this fiasco.