So last night the IDINC, looking and sounding like a hostage video, woodenly read a speech from the teleprompter in which he portrayed the current public health crisis as a foreign invasion, falsely announced that insurance companies had agreed to waive co-pays for treatment, and bizarrely announced a travel ban from all European countries except that one where he owns resorts. Other than that, he contributed nothing to our currently fraught and painful public discourse.
The travel ban is ridiculous. The virus is already here. The ban will however have severe economic consequences, which has driven the stock market to give up 100% of its gains since the IDINC took office. Fortunately, the IDINC's statement that he had banned all trade with Europe was later withdrawn. Only humans are barred, unless they happen to be U.S. citizens or legal residents, which presumably means they can't possibly be infected because, as the IDINC said from the start, this is a "foreign" virus.
In the absence of any meaningful national leadership, it is left to state and local authorities, and private institutions, to decide how to respond. My university has now joined its sister institutions in sending the students away and setting up remote instruction. I'm not sure I approve of this decision on several grounds, not the least of which is equity. This is a real hardship, indeed it may interrupt the education of those with the least resources. I have an advisee who is from Lesotho. I doubt she has broadband Internet access back home and of course her classes will be scheduled in the middle of the night. Others from low income families in the U.S. will also have a very hard time keeping up with their courses. For seniors, it's a terrible social disappointment. Their college career is over, without a chance to say goodbye to their friends. No yearbook photos either and for that matter, I have to assume, no yearbook since there will be nobody here to produce it. Quite possibly no commencement ceremony.
No NBA. What about baseball? Broadway? The symphony? Nightclubs? We could be much more conservative about these decisions if we had the resources to test everybody, but we don't. So now lots of restaurants will go broke, possibly airlines and bus companies, boutique hotels and resorts, maybe even some large companies. Certainly shale oil producers, not that I shed any tears for them but they have large debts that won't be paid and that will hurt pension funds, widows and orphans. Amtrak is laying people off. Economic catastrophe is now inevitable. And in charge of it all is a psychopathic moron.
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There are two, possibly three confirmed cases of coronavirus infection in my home town of Rome, Ga. In two of the cases, someone went to the emergency room with fairly mild symptoms. They did not meet all the criteria for testing, so they were sent home without being tested. In both cases, their symptoms got worse and they came back several days later. When they were finally tested, the results came back positive. It sounds like a shortage of testing capability is allowing infected people to go back out into public.
Yep. That's why South Korea got control over it and we didn't. It's too late now, but we still don't have enough tests.
I was talking with a colleague where I teach today, and she was saying basically that it's a travesty that, while doctors have to go to medical school, and teachers need certification, and almost everybody needs some verifiable credential to show his capability at a job, we elect a president without any proven abilities whatsoever--as in Shitler's case, a human who is a complete failure in every way, especially in the ways he's supposed to be a "success"--which he isn't, having had a "career" littered with bankruptcies, fraud, sexual abusing, affairs, and sordid activities with big-time creeps like Epstein.
A total fraud, a Russian puppet, a blackmailed, totally corrupted, morally depraved, demented, narcissistically disturbed individual. As president.
Wow, that White Fragility shit really works on angry, ignorant Caucasian voters. And why not? They buy/eat/drink/watch shit in every other area of their lives. It's just shocking that there is such a sea of ignorance here.
One other comment: While Shitler and his supporters (McConnell, etc.) have only been able to destroy the government and the country at a moderate speed--e.g., defunding medical programs and the CDC, etc.--Shitler's ability to "respond" to the COVID-19 crisis with demented vindictiveness must be truncated, and fast. Whether it's ideologically motivated travel bans or his continued panic-driven inability to know what to do about any situation without hurting and killing innocent people and the world, he must be removed from office because he is and always has been unfit to serve.
Whatever it takes--a decision by cabinet members, or other methods. One insane man cannot be allowed to wreak havoc with everyone else's life. I assume this will be done, whatever it takes, on the part of those who are in a position to do so. Immense public pressure should be brought to bear to begin his removal, and of course, Pence cannot be allowed to take the reigns. These are not normal times.
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