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You are here: Home / Healthcare / COVID-19 / Trump Speaks His Ignorance

Trump Speaks His Ignorance

by Cheryl Rofer|  March 11, 20209:00 pm| 405 Comments

This post is in: COVID-19, Dolt 45

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Speech said to have been written by Jared Kushner and Stephen Miller. Theme said to be “not my fault.”

You may applaud now.

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Previous Post: « COVID-19 Coronavirus: A Few Longer Reads
Next Post: Post Oval Office Address Open Thread Dr. Anthony Fauci and Dr. Robert Redfield Congressional Testimony 11 March 2020»

Reader Interactions

405Comments

  1. 1.

    schrodingers_cat

    March 11, 2020 at 9:01 pm

    Did he hump a flag?

  2. 2.

    Baud

    March 11, 2020 at 9:01 pm

    @schrodingers_cat:

    When he’s not shitting on it.

  3. 3.

    steppy

    March 11, 2020 at 9:02 pm

    *SNIFFFFF

  4. 4.

    Dadadadadadada

    March 11, 2020 at 9:03 pm

    Glad I’m not the only one straight-up hate-watching this bullshit.

  5. 5.

    Llelldorin

    March 11, 2020 at 9:03 pm

    Han freaking Solo sounded like an immature dipshit when he broke out that line. Trump thinks it’s a winner?

    Oy.

  6. 6.

    khead

    March 11, 2020 at 9:04 pm

    I, for one, am reassured.

  7. 7.

    la caterina

    March 11, 2020 at 9:04 pm

    Oy ve.  He’s just congratulating himself. Blame it on the Europeans.

  8. 8.

    Baud

    March 11, 2020 at 9:04 pm

    @Llelldorin:

    Trump claimed he could make the Kessel Run in less than twelve parsecs?

  9. 9.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    March 11, 2020 at 9:05 pm

    low energy

  10. 10.

    Poe Larity

    March 11, 2020 at 9:05 pm

    Those damn Europeans! Except Brexit ICU empty land!

    He’s like Dr Roboto or something.

    My shorts on the market are going to be WINNING! Thx Roboto Don!

  11. 11.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:05 pm

    They’ve got him on a lot of adderall.

  12. 12.

    Dadadadadadada

    March 11, 2020 at 9:05 pm

    Oh. My. God.

  13. 13.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:06 pm

    What could go wrong with noted medical expert Jared Kushner on the case?

    https://www.politico.com/news/2020/03/10/coronavirus-trump-economy-125226

    “Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar is pushing for the designation but Vice President Mike Pence, who Trump tapped to lead the administration’s coronavirus response, doesn’t want Trump to act until Congress passes a stimulus package, according to two of the people. There’s no deadline for a decision, but one of the people familiar with the talks said the task force will not give Trump its final verdict until Jared Kushner, the president’s senior adviser and son-in-law, finishes his research and comes to a conclusion himself.”

  14. 14.

    Baud

    March 11, 2020 at 9:06 pm

    Theoretically speaking, can the Dow be a negative number?

  15. 15.

    mad citizen

    March 11, 2020 at 9:06 pm

    “Remember when I declared an end to the American carnage?  Well, we’re starting it up again.”

  16. 16.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:06 pm

    OMG.  Did he just shut down travel from Europe?  Was in the other room.

  17. 17.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    March 11, 2020 at 9:06 pm

    Dow futures have fallen 300 points in the last 6 minutes (no, joke)

  18. 18.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 9:06 pm

    @Baud: No, he claimed he was going to repay Jaba. Fake space news!

  19. 19.

    Dadadadadadada

    March 11, 2020 at 9:07 pm

    @Elizabelle: Excluding the UK, travel between the US and Europe is closed, starting Friday.

  20. 20.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:07 pm

    “Smart action today will prevent  … tomorrow.”

    Horse.  Out of the barn, jackhole.

  21. 21.

    dmsilev

    March 11, 2020 at 9:07 pm

    He sounds like he’s sedated and talking in a monotone. I guess this is the closest he can come to “serious and reassuring”.

  22. 22.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 9:07 pm

    @Elizabelle: Yes he did.

  23. 23.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:07 pm

    @Baud: I’d like to see him try to run twelve feet.

  24. 24.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:07 pm

    @Dadadadadadada:   Damn.  That is what I thought I heard.

  25. 25.

    Baud

    March 11, 2020 at 9:08 pm

    @Dadadadadadada:

    What if the virus connects through Heathrow?

  26. 26.

    Dadadadadadada

    March 11, 2020 at 9:08 pm

    “Smart action today will prevent virus spread tomorrow,” or some such.

    No shit. But smart action six weeks ago is what we really needed.

  27. 27.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    March 11, 2020 at 9:08 pm

    “better hygiene”

     

    yeah, like not have sex with porn stars or marrying escorts

  28. 28.

    la caterina

    March 11, 2020 at 9:08 pm

    Not again with the unemployment figures . . .

  29. 29.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:08 pm

    @Dadadadadadada:   UK exempted?  Mad cow land is OK?  Trump.  A friend to those with prion disease.

  30. 30.

    Dadadadadadada

    March 11, 2020 at 9:09 pm

    @Baud: He probably thinks that’s impossible. The UK is one of those good countries without diseases, doncha know.

  31. 31.

    dmsilev

    March 11, 2020 at 9:09 pm

    @Baud: Then we’re safe; no way is it making that connection anytime soon.

  32. 32.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:09 pm

    @Dadadadadadada: Because the novel Coronavirus is pro-Brexit.

  33. 33.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:09 pm

    Has he blamed Obama yet?  That’s my drinking phrase.

  34. 34.

    Ukko

    March 11, 2020 at 9:09 pm

    He is such a dipshit

  35. 35.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:10 pm

    @dmsilev: That’s because he is sedated and talking in a monotone.

  36. 36.

    ChuckInAustin

    March 11, 2020 at 9:10 pm

    US Women are up 2-0 against Japan at halftime.

  37. 37.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:10 pm

    If “strongly” was your word, you are blotto, this very minute.

  38. 38.

    dmsilev

    March 11, 2020 at 9:10 pm

    He keeps saying “corona virus”. Does he think it’s the beer brand or something?

  39. 39.

    Gin & Tonic

    March 11, 2020 at 9:10 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    the task force will not give Trump its final verdict until Jared Kushner, the president’s senior adviser and son-in-law, finishes his research and comes to a conclusion himself.”

    Must make namesake Don Jr feel like a million bucks.

  40. 40.

    SiubhanDuinne

    March 11, 2020 at 9:11 pm

    “The virus will not have a chance against us.”

     

    JFC.

  41. 41.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:11 pm

    The virus will not have a chance against us.

    I hope that goes on that fucker’s tombstone.  Soon!

  42. 42.

    Dadadadadadada

    March 11, 2020 at 9:11 pm

    I’m watching the whitehouse.gov livestream, after failing to find it on broadcast TV. Are any TV channels carrying it?

  43. 43.

    Aleta

    March 11, 2020 at 9:11 pm

    Has he mentioned the interest-fee loans and other grift for “the hotel industry” (his) (and airlines, cruise co.s etc.)?

  44. 44.

    steppy

    March 11, 2020 at 9:11 pm

    HIs right eye is about to disappear completely.

  45. 45.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:11 pm

    “Acting with compassion and love, we will heal the sick ….”

    Messiah complex there?

    Yea.  It was short.  As his di …

  46. 46.

    Baud

    March 11, 2020 at 9:11 pm

    So Biden gives his big coronavirus tomorrow, right?

  47. 47.

    Fredric Weizmann

    March 11, 2020 at 9:12 pm

    @Baud: A parsec is a unit of distance, not time.

  48. 48.

    la caterina

    March 11, 2020 at 9:12 pm

    Rachel noting his “strange affect.”

  49. 49.

    dmsilev

    March 11, 2020 at 9:12 pm

    Earth to fucknuts: Your call for politics-free unity might be better received coming from, well pretty much anybody besides you.

  50. 50.

    EmbraceYourInnerCrone

    March 11, 2020 at 9:12 pm

    @Elizabelle: yes for thirty days starting Friday including cargo  I believe. I yelled at my TV so loud I scared my dog. He is tooting his own horn and doing USA USA. And using it as a stick to tell the Dems to shut up.

  51. 51.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:12 pm

    Does that mean we can GO to Europe?  We can be our own little vectors?

  52. 52.

    Formica

    March 11, 2020 at 9:12 pm

    I would swear he’s been sedated for this. Seriously.

  53. 53.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 9:12 pm

    @Baud: As long as it has the proper visa, and didn’t come from a shithole socialist country (looking at you Finland!), then it’s all good!

  54. 54.

    Kay (not the front-pager)

    March 11, 2020 at 9:12 pm

    He sounds awfully sleepy and slurry. Not one word was really properly pronounced. Very weird speech. And that doesn’t even get into the content. Wow.

  55. 55.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:13 pm

    @Elizabelle: I lived in Scotland between 1992 and 1995. And because of that I can’t donate blood despite the fact that they actually know how the Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease cluster in semi-rural southwestern England happened, that it only has a ten year incubation period, so if I had it, we’d have known by 2005, and I obviously don’t have it.

    Also: mooo!

  56. 56.

    E.

    March 11, 2020 at 9:13 pm

    I missed it. Did he become the President tonight?

  57. 57.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    March 11, 2020 at 9:13 pm

    whoo boy, he’s got the sniffles tonight

    he’s suspending travel between the US and Europe?

  58. 58.

    zzyzx

    March 11, 2020 at 9:13 pm

    The UK thing makes sense. They’re the one country in Europe not in the Schengen Zone.

  59. 59.

    bluehill

    March 11, 2020 at 9:13 pm

    @David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch: You’d think the negative reinforcement from the market would cause him to try something else.

  60. 60.

    Baud

    March 11, 2020 at 9:13 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    Probably coronavirus.

  61. 61.

    Elie

    March 11, 2020 at 9:14 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Totally agree — man is on drugs of some sort.  Also, his makeup is off the chain — deep orange sorbet makeup.  This dude is in major crazzee and I believe he will snap in some way pretty soon.  This is just nuts — to have this insane maniac “leading” this country….  It just makes me scream and scream…..

  62. 62.

    different-church-lady

    March 11, 2020 at 9:14 pm

    It was nice of Zombie Donald Trump to show up and read that speech written for some other president.

  63. 63.

    Gin & Tonic

    March 11, 2020 at 9:14 pm

    National emergency or no? I can’t watch or listen.

  64. 64.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:14 pm

    @dmsilev:

    Dr. Anthony Fauci and Dr. Robert Redfield Congressional Testimony 11 March 2020

  65. 65.

    Avalune

    March 11, 2020 at 9:15 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: We can’t donate blood either due to living overseas too long. Also probrexit made me snort.

  66. 66.

    Brachiator

    March 11, 2020 at 9:15 pm

    @Dadadadadadada:

    Excluding the UK, travel between the US and Europe is closed, starting Friday.

    Holy Moly! I just got a news notification about this.

    Trump truly has a 19th Century brain. He believes in Fortress America, shutting itself off from the rest of the world.

    Can Americans abroad come back in?

  67. 67.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:15 pm

    @Gin & Tonic: Jr should be happy that the campaign is paying for his girlfriend to be his girlfriend.

  68. 68.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 9:15 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Awww, Bessie! Yur knut lukin’ too gud! Muh poor sweet lass!

  69. 69.

    different-church-lady

    March 11, 2020 at 9:16 pm

    @Brachiator:

    Can Americans abroad come back in?

    “With proper screening,” yes.

  70. 70.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    March 11, 2020 at 9:16 pm

    Daniel W. Drezner @dandrezner
    My thoughts on Trump’s proposed Europe ban: 1) The virus is already here. 2) It’s not obvious how halting cargo shipments helps to halt the coronavirus. 3) The markets will freak out at any attempted decoupling from Europe. So, basically, a shitshow.

  71. 71.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:16 pm

    @Dadadadadadada: I have MSNBC on. Which, according to Greenwald, means I’m the Democratic establishment.

  72. 72.

    Avalune

    March 11, 2020 at 9:17 pm

    @different-church-lady: Which means what exactly? Whoooo knows.

  73. 73.

    Gin & Tonic

    March 11, 2020 at 9:17 pm

    @Avalune: I was “permanently” deferred due to having had babesiosis, but guidelines change regularly, and now I’m OK (maybe it’s the fact that I’m O- and they need me.) You should check again – you too, Adam. Rules may have changed.

  74. 74.

    WereBear

    March 11, 2020 at 9:17 pm

    So it wasn’t a Democratic hoax? He’s admitting it?

    Prepare for all Trump fans trampling each other to wash their hands?

  75. 75.

    bluehill

    March 11, 2020 at 9:17 pm

    NBA game (Jazz – Thunder) postponed at the last minute because one of its players is sick. Sports is the one thing that brings a lot of people together. Between March Madness and stuff like this, it’s going to be hard to ignore for the folks that haven’t been paying attention.

  76. 76.

    Ken

    March 11, 2020 at 9:17 pm

    @zzyzx: The coronavirus must have missed the rules about the Schengen Zone, because it’s in the UK.

    I’d say it’s more likely because Trump owns hotels in the UK.

  77. 77.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    March 11, 2020 at 9:17 pm

    Dow futures have now dropped 500 points since he started speaking.

    So much winning!

  78. 78.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:17 pm

    @la caterina: Drugged out of his gourd.

  79. 79.

    Gin & Tonic

    March 11, 2020 at 9:18 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: There’s a name for that sort of thing, but the word escapes me right now.

  80. 80.

    MaxUtil

    March 11, 2020 at 9:18 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:  It’s called “Mad” cow. So surely it would be: MOOO!

  81. 81.

    Avalune

    March 11, 2020 at 9:18 pm

    Dear President – the call is coming from inside the house!

    The number of people I run into parroting his nonsense is alarming and going to kill us all.

  82. 82.

    Poe Larity

    March 11, 2020 at 9:18 pm

    Returning to local news anchors, they both had expressions of wtf, how are we supposed to respond to that?

  83. 83.

    TheflipPsyd

    March 11, 2020 at 9:18 pm

    I can’t  deal with his absolute craziness and narcissism. Are all threads open? I’ve lurked  for years but don’t  post much. Anyone watching The Masked Singer. Spoiler —-

     

     

     

     

    Sarah Palin was unmasked tonight. She sang Sir Mix-A-Lot’s Baby Got Back. Interestingly one of the guesses was Tina Fey.

  84. 84.

    different-church-lady

    March 11, 2020 at 9:18 pm

    @Formica: There’ll be no more [AHHHHHH-AHH-AHHHHHHH], but you may feel a little sick…

  85. 85.

    Dadadadadadada

    March 11, 2020 at 9:19 pm

    @Brachiator: Yes, at least until Friday. I suppose not after that, though that gets into a pretty serious legal question: they can’t bar US citizens from coming home under any circumstances, can they?

    Though if all flights from Europe are canceled, there might just not be any way for anyone to get back. That will almost certainly lead to some infected jackass trying to take a roundabout route (like, say, flying from Spain to Mexico to Florida), thus spreading the virus more than if he’d just flown direct, and much more than if he’d just stayed put.

  86. 86.

    Avalune

    March 11, 2020 at 9:19 pm

    @Gin & Tonic: They need me too but said no way. I try every time we have a blood drive on campus. They say come back in two years.

  87. 87.

    bluehill

    March 11, 2020 at 9:19 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Futures now down 2%. Reacting more negatively as he goes on.

  88. 88.

    EmbraceYourInnerCrone

    March 11, 2020 at 9:19 pm

    @Baud: I guess we’re gonna find out…I ‘m trying to cut down my alcohol to lose weight  but screw it for tonight

  89. 89.

    different-church-lady

    March 11, 2020 at 9:19 pm

    @TheflipPsyd: She was unmasked 12 years ago.

  90. 90.

    zzyzx

    March 11, 2020 at 9:19 pm

    @Ken:

    I’m not saying it is good policy, just that it’s not that they pulled the UK out of a hat. The intent is to be an Italy ban but to do that, it has to be a Europe ban.

  91. 91.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    March 11, 2020 at 9:19 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Nope.  I am.

  92. 92.

    mrmoshpotato

    March 11, 2020 at 9:20 pm

    Are you guyses enjoying the rambling shitshow?

    Bob Cesca’s interview with The Furniture Guys is good listening.

  93. 93.

    SiubhanDuinne

    March 11, 2020 at 9:20 pm

    @Formica:

    I would swear he’s been sedated for this. Seriously.

    Oh, for certain. He’s drugged to the eyebrows.

    (Rachel, just now: “The President just concluded an Oval Office address. It was … a weird one.”)

  94. 94.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 9:21 pm

    @bluehill: I mentioned this in the thread below, but the US Women’s soccer team match v Japan is packed full tonight in Frisco, Texas. Someone mentioned they had a friend there who said they found corona in Frisco this week. So, you know, good stuff. I’m sure everything will be A-OK!

  95. 95.

    Dadadadadadada

    March 11, 2020 at 9:21 pm

    @TheflipPsyd: That just shows you how well Fey captured Palin’s essence on SNL all those years ago. (God, that was a really long time ago, wasn’t it?)

    Also, Sarah Palin still exists? And is on TV?

  96. 96.

    Avalune

    March 11, 2020 at 9:21 pm

    @WereBear: I wouldn’t say that. He still sounds like it isn’t really here yet and he’s kicking it’s ass – so you could argue he’s still operating on the premise that Dems are blowing it out of proportion to make him look bad.

  97. 97.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    March 11, 2020 at 9:22 pm

    Tom Hanks posts on Instagram that he and Rita Wilson have tested positive for Coronavirus. pic.twitter.com/KRvN7ETdnb
    — Lights, Camera, Pod (@LightsCameraPod) March 12, 2020

    It’s a terrible day in the neighborhood, a terrible day in the neighborhood, would be, could you be, would be my nurse.

  98. 98.

    sixthdoctor

    March 11, 2020 at 9:22 pm

    Aw, shoot, missed the speech. I wonder if there’s a succinct review…

    Chrrrrrrrrrrrrrrriiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiissssssssssssssssssssstttttttttt.
    — Kevin M. Kruse (@KevinMKruse) March 12, 2020

    Ah.

  99. 99.

    Baud

    March 11, 2020 at 9:22 pm

    Maybe Jared has figured out how to use this to short the market.

  100. 100.

    mrmoshpotato

    March 11, 2020 at 9:22 pm

    @la caterina: ?

  101. 101.

    Marcopolo

    March 11, 2020 at 9:23 pm

    Okay, I watched. He didn’t actually declare a national emergency, did he? Did I miss that. Because folks like Govs Inslee & Pritzker need a national emergency declaration to get access to FEMA funding & to get additional flexibility in how they can use other federal dollars they receive.

  102. 102.

    Juju

    March 11, 2020 at 9:23 pm

    @different-church-lady: but back then it just involved makeup remover and sandpaper.

  103. 103.

    eclare

    March 11, 2020 at 9:23 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:  I spent too much time in the UK to donate, too. Pisses me off.

  104. 104.

    Dadadadadadada

    March 11, 2020 at 9:23 pm

    @David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch: Oh my God. Are we going to have another rash of beloved-celebrity deaths like in 2016? Capped off by the worst presidential election anyone has ever seen, ditto?

  105. 105.

    Duane

    March 11, 2020 at 9:24 pm

    First time Trumpov has addressed the nation isn’t it? That was pathetic. What a mess.

  106. 106.

    bluehill

    March 11, 2020 at 9:24 pm

    Frum tweeted this. Obama showing how to do it’s done

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iFHEbYLmEuE

  107. 107.

    Steeplejack

    March 11, 2020 at 9:24 pm

    @Fredric Weizmann:

    Thank you, guy who apparently never saw Star Wars. That’s an actual line from the movie that has been ridiculed for [*checks calendar*] over 40 years.

  108. 108.

    L85NJGT

    March 11, 2020 at 9:25 pm

    Maybe he tested positive for COVID-19

  109. 109.

    WereBear

    March 11, 2020 at 9:25 pm

    @Avalune: thanks. And it’s not like I expected anything good.

  110. 110.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    March 11, 2020 at 9:25 pm

    “I will not ban travel from United Kingdom, as long as I have golf course there”

  111. 111.

    Dadadadadadada

    March 11, 2020 at 9:25 pm

    @mrmoshpotato: “Affect” means a person’s demeanor, look, how they come off. A person with “flat affect” is unexpressive, hard to read. Someone with “strange affect” comes off as weird, just like Trump did just now.

  112. 112.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 9:25 pm

    Trumpov trying to prevent a 12 Monkeys situation… Maddow listing all the people who’ve met Trumpov face-2-face who’ve been directly exposed to corona.

  113. 113.

    BobS

    March 11, 2020 at 9:25 pm

    I see they sent robot Donald Trump out to read the teleprompter again.

  114. 114.

    opiejeanne

    March 11, 2020 at 9:26 pm

    @Fredric Weizmann: Thank you. I hate HATE when that line comes up in the movies. They tried to fix the stupidity of it by manufacturing a short-cut in space in one of the more recent movies.

  115. 115.

    Avalune

    March 11, 2020 at 9:26 pm

    @Marcopolo: If I’m honest i kind of tunes him out after the first few minutes. His affect, as mentioned earlier, was making me so uncomfortable (also his face, words, the way his mouth makes those weird shapes, the sniffing, the strange way he emphasizes certain words, the lack of sense even when he’s reading teleprompter etc etc).

  116. 116.

    Chris T.

    March 11, 2020 at 9:27 pm

    @Baud: Theoretically speaking, can the Dow be a negative number?

    No … and yet, somehow Trump will find a way.

  117. 117.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    March 11, 2020 at 9:27 pm

    I didn’t watch it, the travel ban strikes me as freakin’ nuts

    Tom Nichols @RadioFreeTom
    We are in a global pandemic, we face the meltdown of our medical system, the markets are crashing, and Trump has gone bye-bye.

    I’m calling it. TOMCON 1. All bets about…well, everything… are off.

  118. 118.

    Sab

    March 11, 2020 at 9:27 pm

    Lots of pastry here that I am tempted to read. But no, not today.

  119. 119.

    Scout211

    March 11, 2020 at 9:27 pm

    I thank you all for watching because I definitely could not. So no declaration of national emergency?

  120. 120.

    schrodingers_cat

    March 11, 2020 at 9:27 pm

    Can someone paraphrase the cray cray? I can’t  bear to hear his voice.  Thanks.

  121. 121.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 9:27 pm

    @WereBear: He still gets all his intel briefings from Fox, so yeah, it’s still a shit show/blame it on the hysterical Dems.

  122. 122.

    Dadadadadadada

    March 11, 2020 at 9:27 pm

    @BobS: The Dark Knight Strikes Again, a nightmarish dystopian tale of horror, had a holographic president, controlled from just off camera by Lex Luthor.

    Whodathunk that that scenario would ever be an improvement on reality.

  123. 123.

    HeleninEire

    March 11, 2020 at 9:27 pm

    @zzyzx:  Ireland isn’t.

  124. 124.

    TheflipPsyd

    March 11, 2020 at 9:27 pm

    @different-church-lady: 

    So true. And I actually laughed out loud and woke up my husband after reading your comment

  125. 125.

    bbleh

    March 11, 2020 at 9:27 pm

    The more I reflect on this, the worse it is.

  126. 126.

    bluehill

    March 11, 2020 at 9:28 pm

    @Leto: I saw that. Hoo boy, pray for the best.

    Apparently, the Jazz player that’s sick joked a couple of days ago about the coronavirus and then touched all the mics and tape recorders/phones on the table. Don’t know if he tested positive, but wow don’t know what to say.

  127. 127.

    different-church-lady

    March 11, 2020 at 9:29 pm

    “Mr. President, tonight you are GOING TO READ THE WORDS ON THE GODDAMNED TELEPROMPTER AND ONLY THE WORDS ON THE GODDAMNED TELEPROMPTER!!”

  128. 128.

    HalfAssedHomesteader

    March 11, 2020 at 9:29 pm

    Pretty sure when Joe said Trump’s best option was to be quiet he knew what he was doing.

  129. 129.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    March 11, 2020 at 9:29 pm

    @Marcopolo: Apparently Trump’s waiting for Jared to finish his homework.

  130. 130.

    mrmoshpotato

    March 11, 2020 at 9:29 pm

    @Dadadadadadada: I was actually asking who ‘Rachel’ is since the first Rachel that comes to mind for me is Dr. Maddow.

  131. 131.

    hells littlest angel

    March 11, 2020 at 9:30 pm

    It’s a good thing all those dirty Europeans have no way to get to the UK. It’s an island!

  132. 132.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    March 11, 2020 at 9:30 pm

    @Dadadadadadada: Only if the Cubs win the serries.

  133. 133.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:30 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:   I know.  Think about that when I give blood, that so many good service people can no longer do so, and that seems way beyond an excess of caution.

  134. 134.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    March 11, 2020 at 9:30 pm

    Carl Quintanilla @carlquintanilla
    Confirmed cases: * UK: 459 * Austria: 246 * Greece: 99 * Iceland: 85 * Finland: 59 * Portugal: 59 * Ireland: 43 * Poland: 31 * Hungary: 13

    Did no one tell him this would crash the markets?

  135. 135.

    MuckJagger

    March 11, 2020 at 9:30 pm

    Does anyone know where I can find that chart that had the timeline of the coronavirus spread which featured quotes from the administration players?  For example, one quote had Kudlow saying “we have it contained,” another quote had Trump saying “it’s just the flu.”

    I thought it was here, but I can’t seem to find it in the half-dozen or so blogs I read.

  136. 136.

    mali muso

    March 11, 2020 at 9:30 pm

    WTF??? Hubby was set to visit family in Africa literally tomorrow flying via France. So, um, guess that’s not viable now if he wants to come home. So angry.

  137. 137.

    Ken

    March 11, 2020 at 9:30 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Trump has gone bye-bye

    Is that a possible outcome of narcissistic personality disorder?  That is, when finally confronted with undeniable evidence of failure, the personality just… disintegrates?

  138. 138.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 9:30 pm

    @opiejeanne: Who thought it was time? Who has ever thought it was time?

  139. 139.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    March 11, 2020 at 9:31 pm

    Dow futures CRASHING —  750 points dropped since speech started

  140. 140.

    different-church-lady

    March 11, 2020 at 9:31 pm

    @David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch: Fuck, they’re not even Italian!

  141. 141.

    Avalune

    March 11, 2020 at 9:31 pm

    @mrmoshpotato: Yes Maddow thought he seemed very weird and commented on his affect.

  142. 142.

    Gin & Tonic

    March 11, 2020 at 9:32 pm

    So, no travel to “Europe”? Is that just Schengen zone? Can I go to Ukraine? Can I travel via Istanbul?

  143. 143.

    Sab

    March 11, 2020 at 9:32 pm

    @Elizabelle: So Brexit seems prescient. My dog could run a country better.

  144. 144.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:32 pm

    @Gin & Tonic: It is unclear if he has activated a national emergency under the Stafford Act. He needs to as without it he’s hamstringing the states in their responses.

  145. 145.

    mrmoshpotato

    March 11, 2020 at 9:32 pm

    @different-church-lady: “Telebrompers are total losers!  Sad!”

  146. 146.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:33 pm

    Breaking news:  Tom Hanks and his wife Rita (Wilson?) have tested positive for coronavirus.  Top of WaPost.

  147. 147.

    trnc

    March 11, 2020 at 9:33 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    “The virus will not have a chance against us.”

    As my STEM kid pointed out, viruses are literally the most resilient things in the world.

  148. 148.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:33 pm

    @Leto: I’m fine. And I told you not to call me Bessie in public…//

  149. 149.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:33 pm

    WaPost:  “Actor Tom Hanks announced on social media that he and his wife, the actress Rita Wilson, have tested positive for coronavirus.

    The couple are in Australia and started to feel “a bit tired, like we had colds, and some body aches,” Hanks wrote on Instagram. “Rita had some chills that came and went. Slight fevers too. To play things right, as is needed in the world right now, we were tested for the Coronavirus, and were found to be positive.”

    They will be tested, observed and isolated for as long as public health and safety requires, Hanks said.”

  150. 150.

    EmbraceYourInnerCrone

    March 11, 2020 at 9:33 pm

    @TheflipPsyd: no really!!?? Sarah Palin!Bwahahahah! Thank you

    Sorry to hear about Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson

  151. 151.

    mrmoshpotato

    March 11, 2020 at 9:33 pm

    @hells littlest angel: Surrounded by water – ocean water!

  152. 152.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    March 11, 2020 at 9:34 pm

    @different-church-lady: Life is like a box of chocolates, you never know which one has the plague.

  153. 153.

    Fair Economist

    March 11, 2020 at 9:34 pm

    @EmbraceYourInnerCrone: I have 2 friends in Spain now. Yes, I told them not to go. They may be stranded now, along with tens of thousands more on both sides of the Atlantic.

  154. 154.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:34 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Item 3 is the point. He has been looking for an excuse to decouple the US from the EU since he came into office. Because he doesn’t understand how trade works. This was his excuse.

  155. 155.

    la caterina

    March 11, 2020 at 9:34 pm

    @Dadadadadadada: Thank you.

  156. 156.

    opiejeanne

    March 11, 2020 at 9:34 pm

    @TheflipPsyd: You’re joking, right?

  157. 157.

    geg6

    March 11, 2020 at 9:34 pm

    So apparently, Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson have tested positive.  Freak out in Hollywood.

  158. 158.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:34 pm

    I hope that Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Betty White are on strict home confinement.

    Also Queen Elizabeth.  Wonder what kind of pin she can wear for this.

  159. 159.

    Baud

    March 11, 2020 at 9:35 pm

    @Elizabelle:

    Sounds like they’ll be ok.

  160. 160.

    Mnemosyne

    March 11, 2020 at 9:35 pm

    Now I’m wondering if our date night activity needs to be buying canned goods and toilet paper at the grocery store, because I think a whole lot of panic buying is about to happen.

  161. 161.

    mrmoshpotato

    March 11, 2020 at 9:35 pm

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: Stop blaming this shit on them.

  162. 162.

    Amir Khalid

    March 11, 2020 at 9:35 pm

    @Fredric Weizmann:

    Blame that mistake on George Lucas.

  163. 163.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:35 pm

    @Gin & Tonic: I have checked. Every so often I have to have a pint drawn for therapeutic purposes, which they then have to dispose of. And I have a bunch of special antigens and antibodies they always need. Despite that, the rules have never been revised. I’m forbidden to donate.

  164. 164.

    Juju

    March 11, 2020 at 9:36 pm

    @different-church-lady: President: Yesh.

  165. 165.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:36 pm

    @Baud:   As long as they did not try to sneak lapdogs into the country.

  166. 166.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    March 11, 2020 at 9:36 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Would Shirley work?

  167. 167.

    Mnemosyne

    March 11, 2020 at 9:36 pm

    @L85NJGT:

    Don’t make my mouth water.

  168. 168.

    Calouste

    March 11, 2020 at 9:36 pm

    @zzyzx: There are no border controls between Ireland and the UK. Although I guess what’s going to happen is that no one with a European passport is let on board a plane to the US. Stock markets are going to plunge.

  169. 169.

    Poe Larity

    March 11, 2020 at 9:37 pm

    Prediction: Even QAnon will be talking about 25th Amendment options after the market opens

  170. 170.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:37 pm

    @Gin & Tonic: She also seems to have the same kidney problem as the First Lady.

  171. 171.

    Sab

    March 11, 2020 at 9:37 pm

    @Elizabelle:Are we now jackholes? I hope that’s only BJ After Dark when the west coast guys kick in. ( Mnem the troll tormentor.)

  172. 172.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:37 pm

    Everytime I see an image of Trump in the Oval Office I think “you fucker.  You are sitting in Hillary’s chair. You stole it.”

  173. 173.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    March 11, 2020 at 9:38 pm

    Life is really unfair.

    Tom Hanks has the plague and Adam Sandler doesn’t even have the sniffles.

  174. 174.

    mrmoshpotato

    March 11, 2020 at 9:38 pm

    @trnc: What the fuck is he going to do – nuke the planet from orbit?

  175. 175.

    Gin & Tonic

    March 11, 2020 at 9:38 pm

    @Calouste: Good thing we didn’t elect that damn woman President. You know how they are in a crisis.

  176. 176.

    The Dangerman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:38 pm

    I swear, I decided to take a nap around 5:15p (local, PDST, speech at 6p). I figured 30 to 40 minutes (typical) and I’d wake up well in time to see Trump be presidential for the first time in his term…

    …and I woke up and it was already over. Hannity tells me it was the best speech ever. He’s not lying to me, is he?

  177. 177.

    TheflipPsyd

    March 11, 2020 at 9:38 pm

     

    @opiejeanne: I kind of wish I were. The panel really didn’t  know what to say.  Definitely was awkward when she was unmasked. And if you watch the show, the panel  is usually over the top complimentary of the unmasked singer. There was just stunned silence from the panel

  178. 178.

    lgerard

    March 11, 2020 at 9:39 pm

    He did ask for a 50 billion dollar slush fund to be given to the SBA so he can bail out his supporters

  179. 179.

    hells littlest angel

    March 11, 2020 at 9:39 pm

    @mrmoshpotato: Surrounded by water – ocean water!

     

    Nothing can live in that! The salt makes it sterile!

  180. 180.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:39 pm

    @Sab:   That’s funny.  It is a play on jackal.  Not going for that, but good on you for picking it up.

    OK.  Trump is officially a dipshit.  He cannot be anything approaching a jackal.  For one thing, no sense of humor.

  181. 181.

    Formica

    March 11, 2020 at 9:39 pm

    @different-church-lady: it lays bare the absurd double standard that we’ve somehow adopted. Trump can literally piss his pants, slur his words, make no sense to the media, and then be shot full of diazepam so he can make it through a ten minute speech without going full MAGA… but if Joe Biden has a senior moment, well, obviously it’s dementia. (Does that make me a neoliberal shill?)

  182. 182.

    Ksmiami

    March 11, 2020 at 9:39 pm

    Republicans need to pay for foisting this monster on us.

  183. 183.

    mrmoshpotato

    March 11, 2020 at 9:39 pm

    @Elizabelle: In hazmat suits too.

  184. 184.

    Ken

    March 11, 2020 at 9:40 pm

    @The Dangerman: Hannity tells me it was the best speech ever. He’s not lying to me, is he?

    No.  He’s lying to Trump, who is his only viewer that matters.

  185. 185.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 9:40 pm

    @Amir Khalid: How is it wrong? Using the original quote, how is it wrong?

  186. 186.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:40 pm

    @mrmoshpotato:   And scuba gear.  Anything to keep them safe.

  187. 187.

    Baud

    March 11, 2020 at 9:41 pm

    @Formica: Yes. Not even kidding.

  188. 188.

    Mnemosyne

    March 11, 2020 at 9:41 pm

    @Elizabelle:

    Good thing QE 2 always wears gloves and no one is allowed to touch her in public. Maybe RBG and Betty White need to do the same.

  189. 189.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:42 pm

    @Leto: This is how the US Soccer Federation resolves its lawsuit with the women’s team. By killing them off with COVID-19.

  190. 190.

    Gin & Tonic

    March 11, 2020 at 9:42 pm

    The NBA has just cancelled the remainder of the season.

  191. 191.

    Baud

    March 11, 2020 at 9:42 pm

    @Gin & Tonic: Wow.

  192. 192.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:43 pm

    LA Times:  Colonel Parker, hmmm?

    In a statement relayed through their representative, Hanks said the two contracted the illness in Australia, where the actor is currently filming Baz Luhrmann’s untitled Elvis Presley biopic, in which Hanks is playing Presley’s manager, Colonel Tom Parker. Hanks and Wilson are both 63 years old.

  193. 193.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:43 pm

    @Marcopolo: As far as I can tell he did not invoke the Stafford Act.

  194. 194.

    different-church-lady

    March 11, 2020 at 9:43 pm

    @BobS: Scram pal, I’m working this side of the street!

  195. 195.

    Mnemosyne

    March 11, 2020 at 9:44 pm

    @Sab:

    You rang? ?

    I was home with a migraine today, so I was able to take the anti-troll day shift.

  196. 196.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    March 11, 2020 at 9:44 pm

    @Formica: No, it makes you a member of the Democratic Establishment, congratulations!

  197. 197.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:44 pm

    @Dadadadadadada: We need the Cubs to win the World Series again though to reset the timeline.

  198. 198.

    Fair Economist

    March 11, 2020 at 9:44 pm

    @zzyzx:Pointless to ban Italy now as they are under lockdown.

    No passengers or cargo to Europe means economic catastrophe. No wonder the market is freaking out

  199. 199.

    hells littlest angel

    March 11, 2020 at 9:44 pm

    Something I’m really not looking forward to: celebrity coronavirus news.

  200. 200.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 9:44 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: I’m not going to say that I didn’t think the timing of these two incidents was… most circumspect. Same day they argue that the men have “more responsibility”, they decide to let the game go on with a packed audience after the NBA/NCAA/some MLB teams close shop to the public. Did Trumpov install his people there too? Did another caddie get to run the US Soccer Federation? Ugh

  201. 201.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 9:45 pm

    @Gin & Tonic:   Shit just got real.  The NBA?  Wow.

  202. 202.

    piratedan

    March 11, 2020 at 9:45 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: feature… not bug… besides its only blue state people…

  203. 203.

    Patricia Kayden

    March 11, 2020 at 9:45 pm

    This is pretty similar to how Italy got into its mess.A lot of officials spent a lot of time loudly closing the borders, while COVID spread inside the country.It's one thing the first time a country makes this mistake. For the Trump admin to repeat it is rank incompetence.— Dr Sarah Taber (@SarahTaber_bww) March 12, 2020

  204. 204.

    Gin & Tonic

    March 11, 2020 at 9:46 pm

    @Baud: Well, in the words of former Presidential candidate Miguel Bloombito: “Chillingo outo maximo y relaxo mas coolo y shooto los b-ballo outsidero el never mindo el ÑBÀ estan cancelledo para coñorona.”

  205. 205.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    March 11, 2020 at 9:47 pm

    eff Greenfield @greenfield64
    I’ve been watching Presidential speeches for decades. have never seen a President look more nervous, more unsure of what he was saying, than tonight.

    Tom Nichols @ RadioFreeTom
    This is why my Spidey-sense is tingling. It makes no sense and neither did the President in announcing it. It’s scapegoating and I’d bet someone in the White House is thinking about emergency powers but can’t figure out how to use them effectively yet.

    helluva combination, a zonked-out, halfwit megalomaniac with Bill Barr whispering in one ear and Stephen Miller in the other

  206. 206.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:47 pm

    @schrodingers_cat:

    via GIPHY

  207. 207.

    The Dangerman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:48 pm

    @Gin & Tonic:

    The NBA has just cancelled the remainder of the season.

    Fuck me.

    I figure MLB might be next. This is payback for the Dodgers stealing Mookie Betts, huh?

  208. 208.

    Sab

    March 11, 2020 at 9:48 pm

    @Mnemosyne: Good for you resting today. Best of health. My spouse gets cluster headaches so we wish you well and good health.

  209. 209.

    PenAndKey

    March 11, 2020 at 9:48 pm

    You know, every time he does something new these days I have to reign in my first impulse. It’s not to scream or throw something at the screen. It’s you immediately ask, “how in the ever loving fuck does the president have the power to do THAT?”. Seriously, without even declaring a national emergency he can just ban travel to an entire continent?

    Well, shit. By the time November comes around he’s going to have citizens storming the gates of DC at this rate. The GOP does know that if they completely tank the economy their financial backers are going to be out for blood, and that it’ll be theirs people are aiming for, right?

  210. 210.

    Marcopolo

    March 11, 2020 at 9:48 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: That’s what I thought.  Still not taking it seriously.

  211. 211.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:48 pm

    @HeleninEire: Do you really he thinks he knows that the Republic of Ireland is 1) different than Northern Ireland and 2) not in the UK/Britain?

  212. 212.

    rk

    March 11, 2020 at 9:49 pm

    A”foreign virus”.

    Why not just call it the chinki slit eyes yellow monster and be done with it.

  213. 213.

    Mnemosyne

    March 11, 2020 at 9:49 pm

    @hells littlest angel:

    You say that now, but just wait until it hits the Kardashians and you’ll be singing a different tune.

  214. 214.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:49 pm

    @different-church-lady: Or no ice cream, Sean Hannity, or Twitter time for you!

  215. 215.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    March 11, 2020 at 9:49 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Doesn’t he have a golf course there?

  216. 216.

    BobS

    March 11, 2020 at 9:50 pm

    @different-church-lady:

    Nope.

    Zombies are horror, robots science-fiction.

    On second thought, you’re right- Trump belongs in the horror aisle.

  217. 217.

    Ksmiami

    March 11, 2020 at 9:50 pm

    Ps I hope this entire administration contracts the virus. They are all worthless pustules

  218. 218.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:50 pm

    @Elizabelle: It is what it is. Before they put the ban in place I donated regularly. I’d still do so if they let me.

  219. 219.

    Dadadadadadada

    March 11, 2020 at 9:50 pm

    @The Dangerman: Hannity? Lie? NEVER! How dare you suggest such a thing!

  220. 220.

    Marcopolo

    March 11, 2020 at 9:50 pm

    @PenAndKey: But everyone will be standing 6 feet apart.

  221. 221.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    March 11, 2020 at 9:50 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: helluva combination, a zonked-out, halfwit megalomaniac with Bill Barr whispering in one ear and Stephen Miller in the other

    ah, I was being overly optimistic

    Jim Acosta @Acosta
    Jared Kushner becoming more involved in Coronavirus response, as Mulvaney heads for the exits, sources @DanaBashCNN @JDiamond1 and me. Jared is “in total control,” source tells us.

  222. 222.

    trnc

    March 11, 2020 at 9:50 pm

    @Calouste: I started to wonder if a 15K dow is what would motivate Mitch to be first in line to go all Orient Express on DT.

  223. 223.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:51 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: It isn’t that they didn’t tell him, it’s that he doesn’t understand what they tell him.

  224. 224.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    March 11, 2020 at 9:51 pm

    I can’t see how they go forward with the Olympics.

  225. 225.

    Mike in NC

    March 11, 2020 at 9:51 pm

    Well, beginning to look like Great Depression v2.0 is in the cards, thanks to the cluelessness of Fat Bastard. Putin must be popping Champagne corks.

  226. 226.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    March 11, 2020 at 9:51 pm

    So let’s see so far how Donny Dumb Ass is going

    * Declared the virus response meetings top secret, so the doctors needed to do the planning can’t attend.

    * Banned travel from Europe,  because of a virus that started in China.

    What’s next, nuking Wyoming?

    To think, somewhere in a Trump resort there is a boot full of piss in it that need to be emptied.

  227. 227.

    Sab

    March 11, 2020 at 9:51 pm

    @The Dangerman: Good for them. Don’t want folks dying for my entertainment.

  228. 228.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:51 pm

    @Gin & Tonic: No and no!

  229. 229.

    Avalune

    March 11, 2020 at 9:52 pm

    @rk: I thought something very similar when I heard him say that.

  230. 230.

    jonas

    March 11, 2020 at 9:52 pm

    @Elie: Whenever they have to trot Trump out to make a “serious” speech that has to read off a teleprompter or whatnot, he always seems in this low-level daze — yeah, like he’s been drugged or something. Very strange.

  231. 231.

    Gin & Tonic

    March 11, 2020 at 9:52 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Donating is one thing that makes me feel good. I was just annoyed that they don’t have any more coffee mugs to give out after the 10-gallon one.

  232. 232.

    Narya

    March 11, 2020 at 9:52 pm

    Fever and cough for me here…trying not to freak out.

  233. 233.

    hells littlest angel

    March 11, 2020 at 9:52 pm

    @Mnemosyne: If it leads to a new reality show, Celebrity Survivor: Covid 19, I might be okay with it.

  234. 234.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:53 pm

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: No.

  235. 235.

    Avalune

    March 11, 2020 at 9:53 pm

    @Mnemosyne: Leto has been sick a few days and I stayed home because of headaches and dizziness myself. ??

  236. 236.

    randy khan

    March 11, 2020 at 9:54 pm

    @Fredric Weizmann:

    They actually retconned that in Solo, so that it (theoretically) made sense.

  237. 237.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:54 pm

    @mrmoshpotato: Don’t give him any ideas.

  238. 238.

    Duane

    March 11, 2020 at 9:54 pm

    @Mnemosyne: All the Trumpsters are going to freak out now that Dear Leader has given this approval. Let the hoarding begin.

  239. 239.

    The Dangerman

    March 11, 2020 at 9:54 pm

    @David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch:

    I can’t see how they go forward with the Olympics.

    I figured games without fans (NBA, NCAA, Olympics, et al).

    Shutting down the games entirely is …. unexpected and still unanticipated for the Olympics.

    So much money at stake (not for the players, for the hotels, restaurants, etc).

    Unbelievable.

  240. 240.

    Baud

    March 11, 2020 at 9:55 pm

    @Narya: Have you called your doctor?

  241. 241.

    different-church-lady

    March 11, 2020 at 9:55 pm

    @Duane: Yeah, like they weren’t hoarders already.

  242. 242.

    BobS

    March 11, 2020 at 9:56 pm

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques: Nuking Wyoming isn’t necessarily the worst idea, assuming they make everything north of Jackson Hole part of Montana first.

  243. 243.

    bluehill

    March 11, 2020 at 9:56 pm

    I can guess Trump wasn’t joking

    https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2020/03/10/16/25789234-8096221-image-a-1_1583856405520.jpg

  244. 244.

    joel hanes

    March 11, 2020 at 9:57 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    he doesn’t understand what they tell him

    He REFUSES to understand, because it’s not what he wants.

    He crosses his arms in that little-boy-opposition posture and makes his pouty/bored/annoyed face, and none of the words in the air around him are the boss of him.

  245. 245.

    opiejeanne

    March 11, 2020 at 9:57 pm

    @Dadadadadadada: Palin is drawn to cameras.

  246. 246.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    March 11, 2020 at 9:57 pm

    @Dadadadadadada: he Dark Knight Strikes Again, a nightmarish dystopian tale of horror, had a holographic president, controlled from just off camera by Lex Luthor.

    Would we be living in that universe. There is no evil master mind behind the curtain on this one.

  247. 247.

    Formica

    March 11, 2020 at 9:58 pm

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: Sweet! When do those sweet, sweet DNC checks start showing up? Do they do direct deposit? ?

  248. 248.

    Jacel

    March 11, 2020 at 9:58 pm

    @David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch: Will Tom and Rita self-quarantine on a deserted island with a vollyball?

  249. 249.

    Shana

    March 11, 2020 at 9:59 pm

    @Avalune: He seemed to be about to start crying a couple of times during that speech.

  250. 250.

    joel hanes

    March 11, 2020 at 9:59 pm

    @BobS:

    The canyon of Ten Sleeps is spectacularly wonderful, and Thermopolis is a fun tourist trap with a family that can swim.

    I have a soft spot for Wyoming because they put signs in the roadcuts to show you the horizon strata that demark the various geological eras.

  251. 251.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 10:00 pm

    The FTF NYTimes was shamed into making its coronavirus coverage free.  Have at it!

  252. 252.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    March 11, 2020 at 10:00 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne: Seriously, Trump smack talked a disease?

  253. 253.

    Sab

    March 11, 2020 at 10:00 pm

    @Duane: At least they sort of let us know so we could hoard first.

  254. 254.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 10:00 pm

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: He has golf resorts and courses in Scotland and Ireland. They are leveraged to the hilt and losing a lot of money.

  255. 255.

    Citizen Alan

    March 11, 2020 at 10:01 pm

    @TheflipPsyd:  Jesus Christ I thought you were joking!!! Wow! She’s fallen further than I ever imagined!

  256. 256.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    March 11, 2020 at 10:01 pm

    When do Jamie Dimon and the Remaining Koch Brother and whoever else decide enough is enough?

  257. 257.

    joel hanes

    March 11, 2020 at 10:01 pm

    @trnc:

    I started to wonder if a 15K dow is what would motivate Mitch

    The Trump crime family has quietly taken control of the Republican national party fundraising apparatus.

  258. 258.

    BobS

    March 11, 2020 at 10:01 pm

    @joel hanes: One word- Cheney.

  259. 259.

    Patricia Kayden

    March 11, 2020 at 10:01 pm

    Nothing about testingNothing about hospital bedsNothing about health care workersNothing about vaccinesNothing about the health care infrastructureNothing about schoolsNothing about public transportationNothing about home working#trumpaddress #CornonaVirus #EuropeToUS— Alex Menendez (@InstinctFilms) March 12, 2020

  260. 260.

    Amir Khalid

    March 11, 2020 at 10:01 pm

    @Leto:

    The Google gives this definition:

    One parsec corresponds to the distance at which the mean radius of the earth’s orbit subtends an angle of one second of arc.

    I.e. it’s a unit not of time but of distance (about 3 x10e16 metres, or 3.26 light years). Apparently George did not know that, so the line has Han nonsensically claiming he traversed the Kessel Run in less than the actual distance.

  261. 261.

    Anya

    March 11, 2020 at 10:02 pm

    My friend asked her wingnut mom about Trump’s weird affect tonight and the wingnut mom said: “he is very concerned. He is carrying the weight of the nation’s problems.” I hate these people. We will never see the calamity of this lunatic’s presidency.

  262. 262.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 10:02 pm

    @Sab:   No hand sanitizer, isopropyl alcohol of any strength, or even hydrogen peroxide at Kroger today.

    I bought four bars of Dove soap because all this handwashing is going to turn me into an iguana by April.

  263. 263.

    Steeplejack

    March 11, 2020 at 10:02 pm

    @Gin & Tonic:

    “Suspended,” I thought I heard.

  264. 264.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 10:02 pm

    @David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch: At best, they’ll have no spectators, just competitors. But I expect that Japan wouldn’t take that risk.

  265. 265.

    Sab

    March 11, 2020 at 10:02 pm

    @Elizabelle: Will it suck? Anybody got a book coming out months too late to be helpful? Just asking for nobody in particular.

  266. 266.

    Ksmiami

    March 11, 2020 at 10:03 pm

    @Narya: please drink a fuck ton of juice, smoothies,  tea, Gatorade keep your throat moist so Ilness particles move to the stomach and acid can dissolve them. Also the extra vitamin c is good for immunity

  267. 267.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 10:03 pm

    @Narya: We’ll keep good thoughts!

  268. 268.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 10:03 pm

    @randy khan: It was in the 1977 notes for the sequels that Lucas was writing. Also the original quote is still correct. If someone can explain how the original line is incorrect, even when you take into account that a parsec is distance (and the Kessel Run is a measure of… distance) I’d love to see it. Why no freak out over the fact that it can go .5 past light speed? Figured people would’ve freaked out over that.

  269. 269.

    Amir Khalid

    March 11, 2020 at 10:03 pm

    @randy khan:

    What was the retcon?

  270. 270.

    L85NJGT

    March 11, 2020 at 10:04 pm

    The idea behind quarantine and social isolation is that it keeps the rate of spread down enough so that the medical infrastructure isn’t overwhelmed.

  271. 271.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 10:04 pm

    @Sab:   I say get in there and comment away.  Ask that very question.  They deserve it.

    I wonder if the remaining states with primaries will go to mail in absentee ballots.  Can they print those in time?  Or maybe folks pull one down off teh intertubes?

  272. 272.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 10:05 pm

    @joel hanes: They haven’t posted it yet, but that is the subject of my most recent paid column. Once it posts, I’ll link to it here.

  273. 273.

    Avalune

    March 11, 2020 at 10:05 pm

    @Anya: Well that is one way to look at it I guess. ?

  274. 274.

    different-church-lady

    March 11, 2020 at 10:05 pm

    @Gin & Tonic: Not cancelled: suspended.

  275. 275.

    Poe Larity

    March 11, 2020 at 10:05 pm

    Rudy Gobert is the infected player – he made a point of joking about the virus at a press meeting while smearing their mics with his hands.

  276. 276.

    bluehill

    March 11, 2020 at 10:07 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: I wonder this myself. Whatever money they got from the tax breaks and relaxed regulations is all gone and then some. The repub appear to have tied themselves to the mast, but have to believe that not everyone in the business community is that stupid.

  277. 277.

    Duane

    March 11, 2020 at 10:07 pm

    @lgerard: No Republican should say another word about economic stimulus or deficits. Or healthcare or really anything else. They’re not just worthless they make things worse. How much more does it take to understand that.

  278. 278.

    Mary G

    March 11, 2020 at 10:08 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: OK, that scares me more than almost anything I’ve. Nichols is always poo-pooing panic.

  279. 279.

    Sab

    March 11, 2020 at 10:08 pm

    @Elizabelle: Soap actually works better than hand sanitizer.

    I’ve been using rubbing alcohol, and definitely heading into iguana territory  on my hands (winking lizards around here. Not in the wild, but always in bars.)

  280. 280.

    Amir Khalid

    March 11, 2020 at 10:09 pm

    @Leto:

    The Kessel run is presumably a more or less fixed distance between two defined points. It doesn’t really make sense to have a fixed route with variable distance.

  281. 281.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    March 11, 2020 at 10:09 pm

    Philip Wegmann@PhilipWegman· 33m
    Trump is now a “war time” president per @JasonMillerinDC: “This is a war unlike anything we’ve faced in US history & it’s going to take an unconventional president who isn’t trapped by preconceived notions of doing things the way they’ve always been done to lead us through this.”

  282. 282.

    Jeffro

    March 11, 2020 at 10:09 pm

    @David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch: win (assuming there’s anyone left to laugh a month from now)

  283. 283.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 10:09 pm

    @Amir Khalid: Except the Kessel Run was never establish any further than that, so why are you taking it as time instead of distance? This is comparable to me telling you that I traveled from NYC to LA in X miles but then you saying, loudly, NO MILES IS THE INCORRECT UNIT! No, miles is correct.

     

    Here let me ask this: using just A New Hope, tell me what a proper distance for Kessel Run is? Or how long should it take? Why does both Luke and Ben scoff at what he said?

  284. 284.

    VOR

    March 11, 2020 at 10:10 pm

    @Leto: The Kessel Run issue was addressed in the prequel “Solo”. The Kessel Run is in an odd area of space and is x parsecs long. Solo and the Falcon found a shortcut, a very dangerous shortcut.

  285. 285.

    joel hanes

    March 11, 2020 at 10:10 pm

    @Elizabelle:

    Soap and water work better to disinfect hands than sanitizer, if you wash for 20 seconds and do it right.

    Sanitizer is for when soap and water are impractical.

    sung to the tune of “Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer” :

    novel coronavirus

    has a lipid outer shell

    washing your hands correctly

    sends it back to virus hell

    (“lipid” is basically grease, and soap and water do actually break up the virus’s outer shell, killing much of it)

  286. 286.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    March 11, 2020 at 10:10 pm

    @Leto: The science for the Kessel Run is simple; It’s was the 70’s, the Millennium Falcon was powered by Cocaine.

  287. 287.

    Gin & Tonic

    March 11, 2020 at 10:10 pm

    @different-church-lady: OK, “indefinitely suspended.” Care to put a wager on when the suspension is lifted?

  288. 288.

    Dan B

    March 11, 2020 at 10:10 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Shoulda been looking at this earlier but:

    Geshundeit….. in unison!

     

    All run screaming.

  289. 289.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    March 11, 2020 at 10:11 pm

    Jeebus. I just walked in the door from my writer group where we aren’t even allowed to have our phones on. No travel. NBA. Tom Hanks. Market futures. If he wanted to create panic and uncertainty, he couldn’t have done it better.

  290. 290.

    japa21

    March 11, 2020 at 10:11 pm

    Just learned a fun fact while watching the Black Hawks game. The Stanley Cup has only been cancelled once. That was due to the Spanish Flu.

    ETA: More empty seats than I am used to seeing at the United Center.

  291. 291.

    SiubhanDuinne

    March 11, 2020 at 10:12 pm

    @Elizabelle:

    No hand sanitizer, isopropyl alcohol of any strength, or even hydrogen peroxide at Kroger today.

    I’ve looked nearly every day for a week — Kroger and Publix, Walgreen’s, Target, even Staples for hand sanitizer. Everyone’s out, and none of them knows when they may be getting more stock.

  292. 292.

    Sab

    March 11, 2020 at 10:12 pm

    @Elizabelle: My sister went out to California and missed Ohio primary. What was she thinking?  She is often an idiot. Can’t plan her way out of a tin can.

  293. 293.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    March 11, 2020 at 10:12 pm

    @The Dangerman: They shut down the NBA cause a player tested positive.

  294. 294.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 10:12 pm

    @Amir Khalid: Is LA to NYC a fixed distance? Also now you’re “presuming”, so if you’re doing that you’ve already accepted the fact that the Maw is a vast series of black holes which affect both distance and… time.  So again, how is the original quote wrong?

  295. 295.

    Mary G

    March 11, 2020 at 10:13 pm

    Urk:

    Statement from DHS Sec. Chad Wolf says the proclamation only applies to the Schengen Area; so that indicates this proclamation does not bar travelers from Ukraine, Serbia, Bulgaria, Russia, Turkey, Croatia, Belarus, Moldova, etc— Betsy Woodruff Swan (@woodruffbets) March 12, 2020

    6h

  296. 296.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 10:13 pm

    Oopsie!

    Former Italian Prime Minister @matteorenzi has a plea for the nation's partners in Europe and the United States on the coronavirus:

    "Please to my friends of the other European countries, and let me be very clear, all the American guys, please don't make the same mistakes." pic.twitter.com/cYsFERa8Iz

    — Christiane Amanpour (@camanpour) March 11, 2020

  297. 297.

    Redshift

    March 11, 2020 at 10:14 pm

     

    @Mnemosyne:

    Now I’m wondering if our date night activity needs to be buying canned goods and toilet paper at the grocery store, because I think a whole lot of panic buying is about to happen.

    Lol. I needed to get a couple of things at the grocery store tonight, and Ms. Redshift said “you should get going before he speaks, because there’s probably going to be panic buying afterward!”

  298. 298.

    Anya

    March 11, 2020 at 10:14 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Dimon was too quick to criticize President Obama for criticizing Wall Street pay but Trump blows up the world economy and any semblance of global cooperation and he’s nowhere to be found. Fuck that guy.

  299. 299.

    Ken

    March 11, 2020 at 10:14 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: I’ll give him this, crashing the economy as the first step to addressing a public health catastrophe is unconventional, and something no other president would have ever thought of.

  300. 300.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 10:14 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Is that the creepy guy with no chin and a kid out of wedlock?

  301. 301.

    Sab

    March 11, 2020 at 10:15 pm

    @joel hanes: Also to Skye Boat Song for Outlander TV fans.

  302. 302.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    March 11, 2020 at 10:15 pm

    @Formica: Oh, you thought there was cash money, they pay in Soros bucks.

  303. 303.

    opiejeanne

    March 11, 2020 at 10:15 pm

    @Leto: The guy who wrote the script thought it was time. Lucas. He tried to defend it after the criticism 40 years ago, unsuccessfully. They laughed at his ridiculous explanation

    Also, my dad. He was not a dumb guy but he didn’t know what a parsec was until I explained it to him, and even then he wanted it to be time-based because what did his daughter with a college degree and an A in an astronomy class know, anyway. .

  304. 304.

    sdhays

    March 11, 2020 at 10:15 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Apparently, he can’t absorb bad news unless it comes from Sean Hannity through the boob tube or during Congressional testimony (also viewed through the boob tube, during “Executive Time”). So, maybe someone did tell him, but since it wasn’t delivered in one of those two ways, he didn’t hear it.

  305. 305.

    joel hanes

    March 11, 2020 at 10:15 pm

    @BobS:

    Cheney is from Texas.  He moved to Wyoming at the last minute because the Constitution says that the President and VP cannot be from the same state.

    I think of Cheney like an embassy: a little island of the worst aspects of Texas surrounded by Wyoming.

  306. 306.

    Amir Khalid

    March 11, 2020 at 10:16 pm

    During the Liverpool-Atletico Madrid match a few hours ago, the BBS live-blogged that a player at Italian Serie A football club Juventus has tested positive for coronavirus.

  307. 307.

    Mnemosyne

    March 11, 2020 at 10:16 pm

    @Narya:

    If your healthcare provider has telemedicine or an advice nurse you can call, you should do that. And if you start to have trouble breathing, go to the ER (call ahead if you can).

  308. 308.

    Mary G

    March 11, 2020 at 10:16 pm

    The answers to tonight’s two top #CopyeditingProTip questions are: • for fuck’s sake• Hanks’s— Benjamin Dreyer (@BCDreyer) March 12, 2020

  309. 309.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    March 11, 2020 at 10:16 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    They are leveraged to the hilt and losing a lot of money.

    Of course, why should they be any different than any of his other “properties”.

  310. 310.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 10:17 pm

    @VOR: The Kessel Run was addressed in 1977 in his notes for the sequels:

    Similar info can be found in the notes Lucas recorded together with Carol Titelman in July/August 1977 to start a knowledge database for the planned sequels:
    “It’s a very simple ship, very economical ship, although the modifications he made to it are rather extensive – mostly to the navigation system to get through hyperspace in the shortest possible distance (parsecs).”

    (Wookipedia)

    And it was already explained in more detail in the Expanded Universe, which Disney shitcanned when they bought the franchise.

    Wired has a funny write up on the real life physics of the a Kessel Run: https://www.wired.com/2013/02/kessel-run-12-parsecs/

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques: Also an acceptable answer.

  311. 311.

    Jeffro

    March 11, 2020 at 10:17 pm

    @Dadadadadadada: Lex would NEVER have let it all come to this.

    See also: “Jeffro’s biggest problem with trumpov is that he’s such. a. fucking. moron.”

  312. 312.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    March 11, 2020 at 10:18 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: never seen him but I believe it’s the one who fellow ex-trump staffer and long time right wing whack job  AJ Delgado had a kid with and is currently suing– google confirms

  313. 313.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 10:18 pm

    @Mary G: Yep, this is the EU travel and trade ban he’s wanted to impose since January 2017 because he thinks it’ll force the EU to break up.

  314. 314.

    Sab

    March 11, 2020 at 10:18 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Sooo glad the rest of us can’t post media and pictures.

  315. 315.

    BobS

    March 11, 2020 at 10:18 pm

    @Ken: He’s used the stock market as a barometer for his success at governing. If there’s a silver lining to the crash, it’s that it’s screaming “You’re a failure!” at him in a language he (thinks he) understands.

  316. 316.

    Avalune

    March 11, 2020 at 10:19 pm

    I love that we are talking about a global pandemic and arguing adamantly about a fictitious “run” at the same time.

  317. 317.

    Brachiator

    March 11, 2020 at 10:19 pm

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:

    Jeebus. I just walked in the door from my writer group where we aren’t even allowed to have our phones on. No travel. NBA. Tom Hanks. Market futures. If he wanted to create panic and uncertainty, he couldn’t have done it better.

    I am not sure that we can blame the NBA and Tom Hanks on Trump.

    Someone else just noted that the Stanley Cup championship was canceled because of the Spanish Flu.

    And with the example of Italy being shut down, and countries such as Israel imposing quarantines on visitors, I am not sure what a measured reaction might be.

    The main thing I want from Trump is to make sure that health professionals are working on this thing, not political fools and Jesus freaks.

  318. 318.

    Mary G

    March 11, 2020 at 10:20 pm

    I’m so frustrated right now … that we can’t trust the media to tell us the truth without inflaming it to hurt Trump … that Trump has misled so many times we no longer know when to trust his word … that even I as a journalist am not sure where to turn for real info on COVID.— Megyn Kelly (@megynkelly) March 12, 2020

    Cry me a river, bitch.

  319. 319.

    Dadadadadadada

    March 11, 2020 at 10:20 pm

    @joel hanes: He was born and raised in Wyoming, and graduated from the U of Wyoming after flunking out of Harvard. He represented Wyoming in Congress for many years. He only moved to Texas in the 90s.

  320. 320.

    Patricia Kayden

    March 11, 2020 at 10:20 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: I find it so bizarre how Kushner is involved in every dang policy in this administration.  I don’t think I’ve even heard that pipsqueak speak.

  321. 321.

    Gin & Tonic

    March 11, 2020 at 10:21 pm

    @Mary G: So Adam was wrong, I can go to Ukraine via Istanbul (Turkish Airlines is very good.)

  322. 322.

    Amir Khalid

    March 11, 2020 at 10:21 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne: I was at Watson’s, a Malaysian chain pharmacy, looking for hand sanitisers and masks. They said the same thing: out of stock, can’t say when …

  323. 323.

    The Dangerman

    March 11, 2020 at 10:21 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    “This is a war unlike anything we’ve faced in US history & it’s going to take an unconventional president who isn’t trapped by preconceived notions of doing things the way they’ve always been done to lead us through this.”

    This person was high, right?

  324. 324.

    Marcopolo

    March 11, 2020 at 10:22 pm

    @Patricia Kayden: Nothing about flattening the curve.

  325. 325.

    Jeffro

    March 11, 2020 at 10:22 pm

    @The Dangerman: We actually did that here at Team Fro – switched over after trumpov’s speech to see/hear Hannity’s spin on it.

    For those of you not inclined to check out the video, here’s the short version: trumpov has been on the COVID-19 case from Day 1.  Day -1, actually.  Oh and by the way…let’s NOT politicize this crisis, ok?

    (which prompted a great conversation with Fro Jr and Fro-ette about how GOP presidents ALWAYS. PULL. THIS. SHIT.  Massive deficits?  Recession?  9/11?  Iraq?  Hurricanes Katrina and Maria?  STOP POLITICIZING TRAGEDY, DEMS!!)

    Meanwhile, 8 Benghazi investigations and also we’re STILL getting depositions from Hillz about her emails…

  326. 326.

    joel hanes

    March 11, 2020 at 10:22 pm

    @Dadadadadadada:

    I wish you hadn’t told me that

  327. 327.

    Mary G

    March 11, 2020 at 10:22 pm

    A key clarification from DHS on the European travel ban – it doesn’t apply to US citizens or permanent residents. pic.twitter.com/NzpbYnsjK9— Michael Li 李之樸 (@mcpli) March 12, 2020

  328. 328.

    bluehill

    March 11, 2020 at 10:24 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Man, Vlad is on such a roll.

  329. 329.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 10:24 pm

    Nice new open thread is posted for you all to frolic in!

  330. 330.

    BobS

    March 11, 2020 at 10:24 pm

    @Dadadadadadada: Yeah, I was going to write that I remembered Cheney representing Wyoming in Congress throughout the 1980’s.

  331. 331.

    joel hanes

    March 11, 2020 at 10:24 pm

    @Mary G:

    we can’t trust the media to tell us the truth without inflaming it to hurt Trump

    That’s som DARVO bullshit right there.

  332. 332.

    Marcopolo

    March 11, 2020 at 10:24 pm

    @Amir Khalid: Hope they were observing social distancing.  You can do that on a football pitch, right?

  333. 333.

    Mary G

    March 11, 2020 at 10:25 pm

    I haz a confused:

    Hoping to get the payroll tax cut approved by both Republicans and Democrats, and please remember, very important for all countries & businesses to know that trade will in no way be affected by the 30-day restriction on travel from Europe. The restriction stops people not goods.— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 12, 2020

    This is like a bad imitation of a Monty Python script.

  334. 334.

    TS (the original)

    March 11, 2020 at 10:25 pm

    @Elizabelle:

    I hope that goes on that fucker’s tombstone.

    A fitting epitah

  335. 335.

    Luciamia

    March 11, 2020 at 10:26 pm

    English not his first or second language

  336. 336.

    Gin & Tonic

    March 11, 2020 at 10:26 pm

    @Leto: Did you know that Star Wars was fiction?

  337. 337.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 10:26 pm

    @opiejeanne:  Ok, so how is it wrong? Are two points in space always fixed distances? Regardless of what he thought, how is the line wrong? Is the distance between Alpha Centauri and Earth always X parsecs? Was it less in the past? Will it be more in the future? Will always be the same even though we have an expanding universe?

  338. 338.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    March 11, 2020 at 10:26 pm

    @Mary G: he saw the futures markets crash and he’s furiously trying to figure out how to backpedal?

  339. 339.

    Steeplejack

    March 11, 2020 at 10:27 pm

    @Leto:

    Are you deliberately being a dumbass? In the original movie, Han Solo is specifically bragging to Obi-Wan and Luke about how fast the Millennium Falcon is, and that’s when he says it “made the Kessel run in under 12 parsecs.” He’s clearly talking (mistakenly) about a unit of time.

    To take your flawed analogy about traveling between New York and Los Angeles, where the distance is about 3,000 miles, it’s as if Han said, “But we did it in under 2,000 miles!” It makes no sense at all.

  340. 340.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 10:27 pm

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: The reporter of this article at The Scotsman has his teeth in the Trump Organization’s financials in Scotland and Ireland and he is not letting go!

    https://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/revealed-blow-trump-organisation-obscure-legal-fight-member-numbers-fall-turnberry-2260444

  341. 341.

    sdhays

    March 11, 2020 at 10:28 pm

    @Mary G: Someone should let Megyn know that she is not, and never has been, an actual journalist. And since she’s so worried about Trump being “hurt”, she should just trust whatever he says and go to public washrooms and start licking the floor.

  342. 342.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 10:28 pm

    @Gin & Tonic: So were so many things in the Star Wars/Star Trek universe… until young kids watching that shit said, that’s cool, and decided to make it reality.

    But this is also a much more productive conversation than our umpteenth regurgitation of how Trumpov/Republicans are threatening our lives on a daily basis.

  343. 343.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 10:28 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: That’s him. No chin.

  344. 344.

    Citizen Alan

    March 11, 2020 at 10:28 pm

    @Amir Khalid: IIRC, to make the Kessel Run, you have to navigate between various dangers. Black holes or somesuch. You can make the distance shorter if you cut dangerously close to said dangers. It’s not a new retcon though, Star Wars nerds explained it to me that way back in the 90’s if not earlier.

  345. 345.

    Mnemosyne

    March 11, 2020 at 10:28 pm

    @Patricia Kayden:

    Jared is married to the narcissist’s Golden Child Ivanka, so that makes him a Golden Child as well. It sounds like Jared’s dad may also be an amoral narcissist, so Jared knows how to kiss ass and keep Big Daddy happy. Someone from a normal family would have fled screaming long ago.

  346. 346.

    BobS

    March 11, 2020 at 10:29 pm

    @Gin & Tonic: I was tripping the first time I saw it in a theater in 1977. It seemed pretty fucking real.

  347. 347.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 10:29 pm

    @Sab: You’re welcome?

    I’m not sure if this is sarcasm, so if it is, I’m sorry you can’t, but the concern is some troll would ruin it for everyone.

  348. 348.

    Gin & Tonic

    March 11, 2020 at 10:29 pm

    @Mary G: So it’s just theater, then.

  349. 349.

    Amir Khalid

    March 11, 2020 at 10:30 pm

    @Leto:

    ??

  350. 350.

    Feathers

    March 11, 2020 at 10:30 pm

    Aide to Sen. Maria Cantwell has Coronavirus. No contact w/Senator or other Members of Congress.

    ETA: DC Office

  351. 351.

    Mnemosyne

    March 11, 2020 at 10:31 pm

    @Mary G:

    Good thing US citizens are immune to the coronavirus; amirite?

  352. 352.

    Brachiator

    March 11, 2020 at 10:31 pm

    @Steeplejack:

    Are you deliberately being a dumbass? In the original movie, Han Solo is specifically bragging to Obi-Wan and Luke about how fast the Millennium Falcon is, and that’s when he says it “made the Kessel run in under 12 parsecs.” He’s clearly talking (mistakenly) about a unit of time.

    He’s talking techno-babble made up by a screenwriter.

    I think the Han Solo movie tried to make sense of this, but it doesn’t really matter.

  353. 353.

    Bookeater (formerly JosieJ)

    March 11, 2020 at 10:31 pm

    @Formica: Yes. Welcome to the club!

  354. 354.

    sdhays

    March 11, 2020 at 10:32 pm

    @Amir Khalid: Is Watson’s Malaysian? I know you have them in Malaysia (I have, in fact, been to your lovely country), but I thought it was a Hong Kong company.

  355. 355.

    Jerzy Russian

    March 11, 2020 at 10:35 pm

    @Leto:   As I recall, Han was bragging about how fast his ship was, so one assumes having a superior speed allows one to go to Kessel faster, which for a fixed distance, implies going there in less time.    In the movie Solo, we find that Han somehow found a shortcut to Kessel, meaning a shorter distance.  Note that makes much sense when talking about space and the actual vast distances between stars.

  356. 356.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 10:36 pm

    @Steeplejack: So if you were able to cover a distance in a faster method used to measure that distance…

     

    To take your flawed analogy about traveling between New York and Los Angeles, where the distance is about 3,000 miles, it’s as if Han said, “But we did it in under 2,000 miles!” It makes no sense at all.

    Except it would in this context and would also explain why they were incredulous? It’s as if you were used to car travel this entire time, were using that as your point of reference for travel (where your 3k miles is correct), and then they told you they could do it in 2.4k… which is correct for a plane. I can go from LA to NYC in 2.4k. You’d call me a liar, or a dumbass like you did here, and yet I’d still be correct.

    Hmm, using a fixed point of reference but coming up with two different distance measurements, which would also come up with two different time measurements. But yes, I’m using a flawed analogy here.

  357. 357.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 10:37 pm

    @Patricia Kayden: His voice sounds like an 12 year old girl on helium.

  358. 358.

    Brachiator

    March 11, 2020 at 10:38 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    Jared is married to the narcissist’s Golden Child Ivanka, so that makes him a Golden Child as well. It sounds like Jared’s dad may also be an amoral narcissist, so Jared knows how to kiss ass and keep Big Daddy happy. Someone from a normal family would have fled screaming long ago.

    The Trump family is an unfinished Tennessee Williams play.

  359. 359.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    March 11, 2020 at 10:38 pm

    @Mary G: If only there were a group of professionals who specialized in studying contagious diseases. If only the US Federal government had an agency that’s mission was combating infectious disease, if only there was international organization dedicated to disease abatement. Alas what is Megyn  Kelly supposed to do since she only has Trump, a failed real estate agent and a bunch of MSM hacks who owe their jobs to this friends in the channel’s management. Poor, poor Kelly.  Talking heads have failed the poor woman.

  360. 360.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 10:39 pm

    @Jerzy Russian: I mean it still would? See my Steeplejack response about LA to NYC for an answer. Regardless, still better use of my time than this shitshow.

  361. 361.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 10:39 pm

    @bluehill: Makes you wonder what the President would do differently if he was a Russian asset?

  362. 362.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 10:40 pm

    @Mary G: Scavino did the tweet, he didn’t write the speech.

  363. 363.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    March 11, 2020 at 10:44 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: I wonder if McConnell got spooked by that speech

  364. 364.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 10:48 pm

    @Jerzy Russian: He covered both distance and time in that scene: Kessel Run (12 parsecs) followed by talking about out running the big heavy Corellian Star Destroyers. Idk, they’re worked up over parsecs but let the .5 past lightspeed zoom on past…

  365. 365.

    Dave

    March 11, 2020 at 10:51 pm

    Imagine you’re traveling to Kessel.  This region of space has a cluster of black holes, so to get there, you have to travel through a carefully-planned S-shaped course.

    Now imagine that you have a really fast, really powerful ship, one that can get closer to the event horizon of a black hole and still pull away.  With these special modifications, you could “flatten the curve” of the S, and get to Kessel while traveling a shorter distance.

  366. 366.

    Emma from FL

    March 11, 2020 at 10:53 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne: 70% alcohol prep pads, the ones in first aid kits.

  367. 367.

    Aleta

    March 11, 2020 at 10:53 pm

    People dying is not going to work as a joke when the media gets around to reporting on sick  homeless people.

  368. 368.

    Jerzy Russian

    March 11, 2020 at 10:53 pm

    @Leto:   Agreed about the better use of time.  I need to move my classes online and this is as good reason to avoid that as anything.

    Getting back to the important topic:  the vast majority of people viewing that seen would say that “parsec” referred to time in that scene. Also, the distances between stars are constantly changing, but not due to the expansion of the universe.  Stars in our galaxy has small random motions relative to their “average” net motions around the galactic center.  On  small scales, the expansion of space is not apparent.

  369. 369.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 10:53 pm

    @Dave: Unfortunately you wouldn’t get there faster because of the time dilation. Hence why Han is a time traveler if he did in 12 parsecs over the standard 18. I’m perfectly fine with time travel being in the Star Wars universe.

  370. 370.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 10:55 pm

    @Jerzy Russian: Here, let me pose this question regarding stars in our galaxy: why do most time travel movies/books get it wrong?

  371. 371.

    Jerzy Russian

    March 11, 2020 at 10:55 pm

    @Dave:   Yes, but none of that is apparent from the 1977 movie.  Using the “reasonable” doubt standard, the term parsec as used in the 1977 film referred to time.

  372. 372.

    opiejeanne

    March 11, 2020 at 10:56 pm

    @Baud: Governor of Washington, Jay Inslee, in an announcement on tv tonight, said there are now possibly as many as 60,000 infected persons in Washington in just 4 weeks

    . Just in Washington.

    And he also announced that there are now 30 dead of COVID-19 in Washington.

  373. 373.

    Jerzy Russian

    March 11, 2020 at 10:57 pm

    @Leto:   Get what wrong?

  374. 374.

    Steeplejack

    March 11, 2020 at 10:58 pm

    @Leto:

    Ah, I see from reading the thread that you’re being a deliberately trolling. Wank on, bro’.

    “Against stupidity the gods themselves contend in vain.” – Schiller

  375. 375.

    Brachiator

    March 11, 2020 at 10:59 pm

    @Leto:

    Here, let me pose this question regarding stars in our galaxy: why do most time travel movies/books get it wrong?

    When did time travel become a real thing?

  376. 376.

    sdhays

    March 11, 2020 at 11:02 pm

    @Brachiator: When Back to the Future II predicted the Cubs winning the World Series, missing by only a year (you have to allow for some contamination of the timeline).

  377. 377.

    Tailfedders

    March 11, 2020 at 11:04 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne: longtime lurker here.  I can’t remember  who said this a night or two ago here, but someone recommended BulkApothacary.com.  I got right online and ordered a gallon.  They sound like good folks, ramping up production to help, and doing right by their employees as well.

  378. 378.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 11:04 pm

    @Jerzy Russian: Time machines are presented as 1 of 2 vehicles: DeLorian or HG Wells Time Machine. Both machines transport the user back in time, usually keeping you in roughly the same place on the Earth. But as we mentioned earlier, the Earth isn’t in the same place in the cosmos at that time. The Earth travels, roughly, 18 miles a sec. So if you were to go back one second, you’d also have to calculate where your destination point on the Earth was… 18 miles ago. And so on and so forth. Pose that one to your students!

  379. 379.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 11:07 pm

    @Brachiator: The same time that breaking the speed of light was accepted.

    @sdhays: I still want my hoverboard and self drying jacket, dangnabbit!

  380. 380.

    Brachiator

    March 11, 2020 at 11:08 pm

    @sdhays:

    When Back to the Future II predicted the Cubs winning the World Series, missing by only a year (you have to allow for some contamination of the timeline).

    Ha! Good one.

  381. 381.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2020 at 11:09 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: As long as McConnell can get what he wants from the President, the novel Coronavirus doesn’t matter to him.

  382. 382.

    Ruckus

    March 11, 2020 at 11:09 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    Have you tried zolmitriptan? Works pretty good for me to stop a migraine. Also I think I mentioned this before I take 100mg magnesium oxide and 400mg B2 per day and that helps me avoid about 90-95% of the volume I was getting when I started 3-4 yrs ago. Now of course your mileage may vary due to cause and locartion but MgO and the B2 are worth a try and there are other triptans that work slightly differently if the zolmitriptan doesn’t cut it.

  383. 383.

    Narya

    March 11, 2020 at 11:09 pm

    @Baud: nah. But my boss is a PA and I work in a health center so I have resources. Feels like a cold, so gonna stay home and hydrate.

  384. 384.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 11:11 pm

    @Brachiator: Also tachyons and neutrinos. Also they’ve done it with light particles in weird lab experiments.

  385. 385.

    doug

    March 11, 2020 at 11:12 pm

    @Elizabelle: you win the Internet for all time

  386. 386.

    Elizabelle

    March 11, 2020 at 11:15 pm

    @joel hanes:   That’s kinda catchy.  I speak of the song, not the virus.

  387. 387.

    Brachiator

    March 11, 2020 at 11:16 pm

    @Leto:

    Time machines are presented as 1 of 2 vehicles: DeLorian or HG Wells Time Machine. Both machines transport the user back in time, usually keeping you in roughly the same place on the Earth.

    I came late to the Dr Who series, with Matt Smith’s version of the good Doctor.

    I don’t get deep into fandom, but I noted that some old fans of the series, especially of “classic” Who hated Steven Moffat’s timey wimey Who stories.

    They seemed greatly to prefer the idea of the TARDIS (the Doctor’s time travel device) as a kind of automobile. That is, you jump into it and drive to a point in the past or future, have an adventure, and then jump in again and drive to another destination. Always in a kind of straight line without complications or time paradoxes. They would become greatly annoyed with any other kind of story or treatment of time.

     

    When I started reading sci fi, I loved robot and time travel stories. And I was a big fan of the 1960 movie version of The Time Machine.

  388. 388.

    Eunicecycle

    March 11, 2020 at 11:18 pm

    @Ruckus: I take sumatriptan and it is like a miracle.

  389. 389.

    opiejeanne

    March 11, 2020 at 11:20 pm

    @joel hanes: We drove through the Wind River Canyon two summers ago. Beautiful drive, difficult to photograph the wonderful geology. It makes no sense without something to provide scale, it’s so huge.

  390. 390.

    Yutsano

    March 11, 2020 at 11:28 pm

    @opiejeanne: We just had a meeting about this at work this morning. It has to have made it to this side of the mountains.

    …

    I’m gonna firebomb my cubicle tomorrow morning.

  391. 391.

    TriassicSands

    March 11, 2020 at 11:37 pm

    Late to the circus.

    Trump claims the EU failed to restrict travel, which resulted in lots of cases of COVID-19. They’re now to blame because some of those cases came to the US and seeded infections here. Huh? If Trump thinks Europe screwed up by letting infected people from China get into the EU, then why is it Europe’s fault that we allowed infected people to come here from Europe? Trump is too stupid to see the inconsistency.

  392. 392.

    Ruckus

    March 11, 2020 at 11:50 pm

    @The Dangerman:

    Could be high and stupid. Although the big words, like preconceived,  is a little be too much for that much stupid.

  393. 393.

    opiejeanne

    March 11, 2020 at 11:50 pm

    @Avalune: I’m not amused by it.

    But I’m cranky because I’m sick. Dry cough, etc. No fever yet* but headache and stuffy nose.

    *I’ve been dizzy, though and I just realized that usually accompanies a fever, for me. Both of our thermometers are reading my temp as 97; maybe they’re both broken.

  394. 394.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 11:53 pm

    @Brachiator: Matt Smith is also our doctor! I love a good time travel tale, and I also grew up reading sci-fi. I never though about the Earth in space portion until Avalune brought home a book last year that featured that as part of the plot but as soon as I read it it was like… that makes so much sense! Doesn’t take my love away from The Time Machine or BtF, but just adds another element for future considerations. :)

  395. 395.

    Ruckus

    March 11, 2020 at 11:55 pm

    @Luciamia:

    Has gibberish become a recognized language now that we have a president who only speaks that? And if so, which dialect is the official one for gibberish, is it stupid, moron or demented because trump speaks a combination of all three?

  396. 396.

    Leto

    March 11, 2020 at 11:56 pm

    @opiejeanne: I’m in the same boat, and I’ve also used both of thermometers and they both read the same (97). I just had my NyQuil bedtime chaser so I’ll see everyone in the morning.

  397. 397.

    Sebastian

    March 11, 2020 at 11:57 pm

    @Leto:

    plus rotation

  398. 398.

    opiejeanne

    March 11, 2020 at 11:57 pm

    @Leto: The shortest distance between point A and point B in space would be a known. It might not be a straight line, it might be an arc, but there would be no way of shortening that known distance.

    And much as I love you, I think you need a little pie. Just a little. Until I feel less cranky, because I’ve been worrying since yesterday that I might have the virus.

  399. 399.

    Ruckus

    March 12, 2020 at 12:01 am

    @Brachiator:

    Is that what killed Tennessee Williams, trying to make sense of anyone in the trump family?

  400. 400.

    Ruckus

    March 12, 2020 at 12:06 am

    @Eunicecycle:

    Sumatriptan doesn’t work for me but but I know that it does for a lot of people.

  401. 401.

    Ruckus

    March 12, 2020 at 12:08 am

    @TriassicSands:

    trump is getting to the point of being too stupid to remember to breathe. I give him less than 4 months to get all the way to that stupid.

  402. 402.

    Misterpuff

    March 12, 2020 at 12:31 am

    @dmsilev: Every time BLOTUS said Corona virus, it sounded like it was digitally inserted. Your Name Here!

  403. 403.

    trnc

    March 12, 2020 at 1:09 am

    @Mary G: A key clarification from DHS on the European travel ban – it doesn’t apply to US citizens or permanent residents. pic.twitter.com/NzpbYnsjK9— Michael Li 李之樸 (@mcpli) March 12, 2020

    So DT made a rare address to the public from the Oval Office, which usually implies a high degree of preparation – and he and the speechwriter (Miller?) still completely fuck up the message.

  404. 404.

    ljdramone

    March 12, 2020 at 6:08 am

    @Emma from FL: yeah, no, stores are sold out of alcohol prep pads too.

    I figure if my stash runs out I’ll use vodka on a cotton ball to sterilize my insulin injection sites.

  405. 405.

    satby

    March 12, 2020 at 8:24 am

    @ljdramone: better than nothing, but Titos vodka came out with a statement that theirs is only 40% alcohol and other major brands are probably similar. Get Everclear.

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