(h/t Mary G)
Lots of science-y folks are posting this graph. But if there is one thing I have learned from being on the internet, it is this:
Data/graphs: Not compelling to many.
Kitties: Compelling to many.
So I present: #Catteningthecurve.#scicomm #epitwitter pic.twitter.com/Cr1xQXMppr
— Anne Marie Darling (@amdar1ing) March 11, 2020
We've experienced parts of this before, just never all at once.
As others noted, it's like the Spanish flu of 1918 and the stock market crash of 1929 at the same time, but overseen by Harding's total incompetence plus Nixon's pettiness and paranoia.
It's like Disaster Voltron. https://t.co/tc6GHpF6Yk
— Kevin M. Kruse (@KevinMKruse) March 13, 2020
Thoughtful advice from Anne Helen Peterson, at Buzzfeed:
… I say this as much to myself as to all of you — we can change our behavior to lessen the risk we pose to other people. Limit your travel; work from home if you can. Making sure you don’t pass the virus on to someone who might be more severely impacted by it is the most important way you can help. But we can also channel some of our anxious energy away from reading articles on the internet and toward thinking about who in our lives and in our communities will certainly need help or assistance.
Who can you talk to now to make a plan to help them later? (With supplies, with groceries, with caring for their pets or children or parents.) Can you start a group text now with your neighbors to keep up on one another’s health and needs? If you’re able, can you donate to your local food bank, which will be supplying families whose income is curtailed, or donate additional supplies to the homeless shelter? Can you buy things from local businesses, restaurants, and artists now (or buy a gift card!) so that things might be less lean for them in the months to come?
If you’re someone who’s at high risk, how can you be honest with yourself and others about it? If you’re able to work from home and still pull your normal salary, can you commit to still paying someone who provides you with a service (a housecleaner, a hairdresser, a babysitter, a yoga teacher, a manicurist) even if they have to stay home? If you know someone who might lose their job or see their hours cut back, can you ask them how to help?
Can you understand how making the next few months better for as many people as possible will also, by extension, make it better for you?
Earlier today, I was talking with a friend who lives in the Mountain West, in one of the most rural places in the United States. She spent yesterday in a meeting with other county officials about their plan for when the coronavirus reaches their community. Some of it was straightforward public health education — telling farmers that “quarantine” doesn’t mean they “can’t go feed the cows” — but a lot of it had to do with preventative planning (what to do if someone gets sick at the county courthouse, which is physically connected to the county’s nursing home and the health center’s emergency room).
But the ~1,200 members of the community have been through a significant natural disaster before, and they know how to take care of one another. They know who would need regular check-ins, who would need to have prescriptions picked up for them hundreds of miles away, who would need support if their income was cut off by quarantine. Their community is small enough that every death, every tragedy, and every joy reverberates through it. And they are planning now — even though the virus has yet to hit anywhere in their state — with each of those people in mind.
“We think that anything we can do to prepare to protect our vulnerable residents is worth it,” my friend told me. “Because we could absolutely never forgive ourselves if we didn’t take the time to plan.”…
And a warning: There’s a fake ‘Stanford tips for diagnosing coronavirus’ story going around; someone actually posted a (now deleted) version of it on a previous thread here. Don’t want to spread it further, so here’s an update, per Mother Jones:
There's a Facebook coronavirus post going viral claiming to be from Stanford. Don't believe it. https://t.co/2whHexXO3M
— Mother Jones (@MotherJones) March 11, 2020
rikyrah
Good Morning, Everyone ???
rikyrah
Baud
@rikyrah: Good morning.
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
The “Stanford Tips” crap was also posted at the end of the Senate thread.
Baud
@rikyrah:
The ideal time for America to get serious was 2016.
rikyrah
rikyrah
rikyrah
debbie
@rikyrah:
AND HE SAID IT OUT LOUD TO REPORTERS WHEN HE TREKKED TO THE CDC!
Meanwhile, his supporters chide us for not setting aside partisanship and McConnell refuses to allow paid sick leave, etc. to proceed through Congress.
Should I already have the virus, I believe my blazing, furious anger will kill it right off.
OzarkHillbilly
When you lose DB,
It is the end of the world.
debbie
@OzarkHillbilly:
I posted something from The American Conservative last night with similar sentiments. I wonder how long until his approval rating is at that magical 27%?
OzarkHillbilly
OzarkHillbilly
NotMax
FYI. As it is bound to come up sooner or later, a very short primer on some case law involving the 1st amendment right to peaceful assembly.
JPL
@rikyrah: Who made him Pollyanna
JPL
@OzarkHillbilly: Someone needs a salad bar fix.
Jeffro
@OzarkHillbilly:
I get the sense that…David Brooks tried desperately to ‘both sides’ this crisis, and just gave up.
sanjeevs
This is all Obama’s fault according to Twitler this morning.
Xentik
@OzarkHillbilly: Wasn’t he just telling us a month ago that we liberals need to stop whining so much about Trump?
I’m not normally one for dumping toxic waste into our oceans, but I cannot think of a better place to dump him and the rest of the NYT staff. I’m sure the dolphins and whales will forgive us one day.
TS (the original)
@OzarkHillbilly:
These people always crawl out and say something sensible when it is so obvious their previous behaviour has been 100% wrong – but now they are the epitome of righteousness and will enter the next administration with their sinecure intact.
Lapassionara
Good morning, everyone. Was there a thread on all the sports cancellations that I missed? The news about that just kept piling up, and as far as I can tell, there is not a single college or professional sport being played for the foreseeable future.
Year of the rat, indeed.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
It’s fake news on the left. Please don’t spread it.
OzarkHillbilly
But her emails.
RobertDSC-Mac Mini
@OzarkHillbilly:
No doubt. Absolutely shameful.
Cheryl Rofer
@Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism: Thanks. I deleted it. And thanks to AL or whoever deleted the other version.
Betty Cracker
Disney World is closing this weekend. Wow. Spring training is shut down. The Florida economy is going to crater.
My father has operated a marina and dive tour business on the west coast of Florida since 1976. I didn’t think he’d ever retire, but he’s in his 70s now and decided to sell out the business and become a full time fisherman at the end of this month. He was lucky in his timing, as it turns out!
OzarkHillbilly
@Lapassionara: I was talking about the upcoming season with my oldest 2 days ago, line ups, the rotation, the bullpen, can Tommy Edman replace Ozuna’s bat in left, will Bader find consistency at the plate, will Reyes get hurt again…. The boy lives and breaths Cardinals baseball (broke my heart to cancel an early season game with him on Sunday).
I may have to drive into STL this morn and talk him down from the upper deck of the Eads bridge.
Baud
@Betty Cracker: Too bad Raven left us. He and your dad could have hooked up.
OzarkHillbilly
@Betty Cracker: I hope he’s not financing the deal himself. My aunt and uncle sold their Canadian fishing camp 3 times before they found someone who could actually make the payments.
Joey Maloney
@Xentik: “So long, and thanks for all the
fishshitweasels!”Bruce K
An online friend of mine from the LiveJournal days had this perspective on the whole thing:
This is World War III. It’s just that the enemy is a virus, not other people.
OzarkHillbilly
MAGA.
NotMax
@Lapassionara
Bread without circuses.
And with the upcoming April 1 changes impacting SNAP, this maladministration is contriving to remove the bread part.
Kirk Spencer
@OzarkHillbilly: And impeached but not removed. I haven’t found a good, pithy phrase for it but once I do I hope to say it frequently.
Kirk Spencer
Oh, and respectively good morning and bleah.
Betty Cracker
@OzarkHillbilly: Fortunately, it’s in the hands of a deep-pocketed hotel chain! It’s a bittersweet thing for Dad; that business has been his life for decades.
My husband is surprised I’m so unsentimental about it, but I was forced to provide unpaid labor there throughout my teen years. I was the surliest cashier/tour guide who ever snarled at a customer!
Speaking of fish camps, my husband and I have a mission to visit all the remaining fish camps in Florida. There aren’t that many left, which is a pity.
tokyocali (formerly tokyo expat)
Tokyo Disneyland closed down at the start of March, along with other major tourist places, like Tokyo Tower, and SkyTree. I heard they were paying their employees during this time. Many of the foreign cast members who were finishing up their contracts were sent home earlier.
All events in my small city have been canceled as have all community centers, which cater to classes and lots of activities. This was supposed to be until March 15th. Now it is until the end of March and I hear Tokyo Disneyland will stay closed through early April.
Tomorrow I head to my university’s graduation. They have broken up the departments to hold mini graduations at different times and classrooms throughout the day. There will be no ceremony, just students coming to pick up their diploma between 10am to 12 noon and chatting with the professor. (I believe @Martin mentioned something like this as way to deal with graduation.) We have been told not to congregate in groups or to chat too long with anyone. I’ve heard some students won’t come to avoid too many people and will come by before the end of the month to get their diplomas.
The new school year starts in April. We have no idea yet whether orientation for students will take place, the entrance ceremony or when the term will start. We are waiting to hear from the Ministry of Education. Many universities made changes to their schedules this year so that the term could finish by the Olympics to enable students to assist in volunteer activities. We are required to have 15 weeks of classes for each course by the Ministry. If they push back the start date and the Olympics goes ahead, it’ll be interesting to see what leeway they will give us to cut the terms short. If the Olympics are canceled, that’s a whole other story.
As for remote learning, it’s not going to happen. My university is private and has a large student body who come from lower income families. Most do not have computers at home and have poor computer literacy skills. Their smartphone on the other hand is a third appendage and they play that device like a fiddle. I am looking forward to learning from all the uni educators on this site who have to begin remote learning, particularly for student bodies like mine.
tokyocali (formerly tokyo expat)
@OzarkHillbilly: My husband is a huge MLB fan. Once the season starts he streams games every day. He had planned to visit the US this summer to watch some games, but not sure that’s going to happen now.
The Dangerman
@debbie:
Fuck that shit. is it partisan to have woken up hoping Donnie already has a case of the sniffles? He’s going to have world class care but I suspect he hates being sick. Poor boy. Maybe he can get Ivanka to come over and rub ointment on his chest (/Sheldon, BBT).
I don’t see how the crowd (Fox, et al) that have been downplaying this or slow rolling it in hopes of keeping Donnie’s numbers up don’t end up seeing their gigs go *POOF*. At some point, people are going to say something like Emperor has no clothes (No, Donnie, fuck you, put your clothes back on) and that they have been lied to for years and decades. Losing their jobs is the best that can happen to them. There are far worse downsides that could, and maybe should happen, to them for their activities propping up this fucker (what temperature would you like your tar, Sean?).
Back to bed. As if sleep happens in this madness.
Starfish
@debbie: Should you have the virus, please go hug Mitch McConnell
James E Powell
@OzarkHillbilly:
Will Brooks ever just say it? “We would be better off if we had Hillary.” If he can’t get the NYT to make it the headline, he could make it the first sentence. Come on David! Say it!
OzarkHillbilly
A sadness indeed.
PenAndKey
@tokyocali (formerly tokyo expat): Did you see the thread from last night? It’s a goldmine of e-learning info.
Lapassionara
@OzarkHillbilly: I know someone like that. In fact, more than one someone like that.
Van Buren
@OzarkHillbilly: Not just the President, the entire GOP. But that’s a bridge to far for Brooks.
NotMax
Has the FOX Business Network switched over to showing solely replays of Wall Street’s Greatest Hits programming yet?
//
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
DB must have taken a bath in the stock market. That’s the only thing they care about.
Starfish
@Bruce K: Did the friend move over to Dreamwidth?
OzarkHillbilly
@James E Powell: SATSQ, No.
Lapassionara
@NotMax: Sarah Kendzior is right. This is not a government. It is an international crime syndicate masquerading as a government.
tokyocali (formerly tokyo expat)
@Lapassionara: Yes, I’ve been busy copying and pasting!
Edited b/c hit the wrong poster. Should have been to @PenAndKey
OzarkHillbilly
@Lapassionara: I love baseball, and a day at the ballpark is a joy (w/ my son it is a joy to the nth power) but he and his wife are just rabid.
OzarkHillbilly
Literally. Jeebus, the difference between the 2 emergency covid packages couldn’t be more stark.
Another Scott
@Baud: Not to be Pollyanna, but if people just leave their stocks alone for the next year, things will bounce back once we have sensible people in power again. It only took 2 years to recover from Black Monday 1987. It will be much, much faster this time (because there is so much that needs to be done, and so much money looking for something useful to do).
I realize that there will be real pain, and not everyone can wait that long. But traders (especially computer traders) love nothing more than volatility. “Sell Sell SELL!!” “Buy Buy BUY!!” They make money on each transaction. Don’t contribute to the trading noise if you don’t have to.
Cheers,
Scott.
Baud
@Another Scott:
I was already out because I didn’t trust Trump. But I agree that if you don’t need the money, don’t panic sell at a low price. The Covid situation will stabilize, and we’re less than a year away from Dem control of government.
JMG
@Another Scott: Somebody wise on Wall St. twitter said “your 401(k) is like your face. Don’t touch it.”
PenAndKey
@Another Scott: I figure I’m not even going to look at what my index fund investments look like for the next year. I don’t have much in there, but I can wait it out so there’s no need to give myself a headache over it. My parents, however, had a 401k withdrawal that was on a scheduled withdrawal date of yesterday to hand a surprise medical bill. Needless to say they woke up yesterday to a nightmare when they saw my note on the stock market dive over the last few days on Facebook. I’m sure we’ll be figuring out some way to help them in the coming months, and I don’t have a clue if there’s even anything I can do to help since I’ve got my own issues going on.
Like you said, for those of us that can wait it out that’s the best course of action. For those that can’t? They’re screwed unless they’re already rich.
Fester Addams
How about “There’s a club. You’re not in it.”
TS (the original)
@Another Scott:
@Baud:
I so hope you are both right. I had zero investments in 1987 – just a mortgage that reached 17.9% interest. Recovered from 2008 by 2011 but now am living on investments, which although they are not all in the stock market they are down worse than I have ever seen. So just hoping the recover in time to keep feeding me & paying the bills.
Bruce K
@Starfish: Yep. So did almost everyone I knew from there, after the implications of Russian law sank in.
Geoboy
@Another Scott: Scott – Thanks to 40 years of Republican misrule, we’re at 19 trillion and counting (going up 1+ trillion a year) on the national debt. When that comes home to roost, the stock market isn’t going to be coming back for a long time.
Mary G
I keep seeing that Pelosi and Mnuchin are negotiating a package of unemployment benefits for regular Americans and I will believe it when I see it. He was allegedly against the shambolic Oval Office speech on Wednesday, but as much as Twitler hates Nancy SMASH, I just can’t feel that it has any chance of success. Moscow Mitch has been scoffing at her ideas too. I hope I’m wrong.
Baud
@Fester Addams: Once again, please stop spreading the false news. Here’s the explanation (although not quite kindergarten level).
NotMax
What are the odds on Dolt 45, should he end up in Walter Reed, being presented the document to make Pence acting president, crossing out that name and writing in Ivanka’s name with with a Sharpie before agreeing to sign it?
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Baud:
By then, we’ll be living with my dad and my RWNJ mother, the only income being whatever chickens I can scavenge for legal fees, his teachers union pension and her non-soc!alist social security. Her lectures on the evils of liberalism will be fantastic.
Another Scott
@Geoboy: The debt is a non-issue. It’s money we owe ourselves. Plus, the US government has a monopoly on making it. There will always be enough.
Don’t buy the hype that Teh Debt Will Kill Us All In Our Beds!!1 What will kill us all is not spending enough money on things we need.
Like testing kits and health care infrastructure and resilience!
Grr…
Cheers,
Scott.
Baud
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: If we all live with your parents, at least we’ll have enough votes to defeat McConnell.
Shalimar
For Trump:
https://youtu.be/OK4fJhbRL1g
NotMax
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
If it doesn’t already exist, someone needs to come up with a book titled 101 Recipes for Eating Crow.
;)
Soprano2
@OzarkHillbilly: I liked Tommy Edman when he played down here in Springfield. I don’t know if he can replace Ozuna’s bat, though. I’m hoping games start by May. I’m being optimistic because even though the federal government response is a true shit show, the people of the U.S. are much better than that, and many states and localities have their shit together.
Barbara
@Jeffro: I wrote a comment to the Brooks op-ed, something I almost never do anymore. His article drones on about how humans abandon altruism during epidemics, basically ignoring the facts on the ground over the last week, where many people at very low risk are intentionally changing their behaviors in an effort to protect those at higher risk. The 1918 pandemic was so vicious because it struck people in the “prime of life.” The author, Mary McCarthy and her three siblings became orphans when they were traveling with their parents by train from Chicago to Seattle to see their grandmother. There were so many sick and dying people on the train that it had to stop so that they could be ministered to and if needed taken off the train for burial. And their experience was quite typical. We aren’t going to see anything like that, and the willingness of people to abandon normal daily activities to try to help people at higher risk is what should be highlighted here, not what happened in 1918 or during the various plagues that beset pre-industrial Europe.
It’s just so much superficial principles drawn from a veneer of historical awareness and it’s wrong through and through.
NotMax
Larceny, Inc. coming up in a few minutes on TCM. Edward G. Robinson parodying his gangster screen persona is a hoot.
Baud
@Barbara:
He means that Democrats are being selfish opposing tax cuts proposed by Republicans.
Another Scott
TheHill:
They should have done this in January, if not earlier. (The earliest case I’ve seen in China was mid-November.) There’s no reasonable excuse why this has taken so long.
Donnie’s criminal interference with actions like these must be investigated and punished and never permitted again.
Cheers,
Scott.
Shalimar
@Barbara: Brooks is hardly an expert in having any altruism to abandon. Or in how to be human either.
NotMax
@Baud
Yeah. As if altruism has been the byword of the past 3+ years. Typical babbling Brooks.
Barbara
@Another Scott: I have to hold my husband back, because he comes home every day and asks me why we aren’t 100% in cash yet. Never mind the tax consequences. My time horizon is a lot more compressed these days, so I do feel more nervous than I did in 2008 as the bottom dropped. But my willingness to do nothing then meant that I reaped the gains that began by 2010 all the way through to this year, with some fairly significant downturns (2014, if you don’t remember). The problem with the “safer” investments is that it looks more and more like the interest rates that let people live quite happily off safe bonds during the 70s through the 90s will not be back in my lifetime.
Betty Cracker
The Never Trumper scamps at the Lincoln Project (Rick Wilson, Steve Schmidt, etc.) have a new ad up slamming Trump’s grifting adult children:
I hate smarmy attack ads like that, but sauce, goose, gander, etc., and at least this time, the insinuations are true.
Soprano2
So the second case in Missouri was announced last night, and it’s in Greene County, where I live. The stores are already pretty much stripped of toilet paper, sanitizing wipes, paper towels, and other sanitizing products. I also heard you can’t find ramen noodles anywhere, although I haven’t checked that out. I assume things will start to be cancelled today. I wasn’t going to go to our industry conference, which is at Tan-Tar-A from March 29-April 1, but I’m betting now it’ll be cancelled or postponed anyway. There’s going to be lots of temporary financial hurt, that’s for sure. You’d think Republican in Congress, being up for re-election and all, would be more concerned about that. Selfishly, I’m the saddest about our upcoming concerts, which I’m betting will be cancelled since my choir is at the local state university. Plus, there was going to be a world premier of a choral work about a local Civil War battle at the next symphony concert on March 24th, which I’m betting will now be cancelled. I hope they figure out a way to schedule it next year, because the musicians work hard on that stuff and it would be a shame not to perform it.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
Meanwhile, Reddit Bernie Bros are still pushing the Biden has dementia angle.
SFAW
@Betty Cracker:
*THUNK*
That was the sound of me falling out of my chair, stunned as I was by that statement.
germy
JMG
@OzarkHillbilly: The baseball season is very long. It could start on May 1 without damaging its competitive integrity in any meaningful way. Think of the hiatus as an extended Hot Stove League period.
OzarkHillbilly
@Soprano2: He really impressed me last year, but as I kept saying to my son, “Sophomore slump.” Pitchers learn and adjust. The question then becomes, can he?
danielx
From the Department of Well, Of Course:
Trump Ties Obama to C.D.C.’s ‘Inadequate’ Testing System
Because nothing, but nothing that goes awry is ever his fault. Nothing, I tell you!
There will be many MAGAts out there who will treat this statement as gospel, never mind the logical fallacies in this assertion.
NotMax
@Baud
Reddit (noun) an echo chamber without benefit of a scenic canyon.
;)
danielx
@Betty Cracker:
Big Pine Key Fishing Lodge. It’s worth the trip. Mind the raccoon herd if you tent camp.
Steeplejack (phone)
@Baud, @rikyrah:
Good morning. ?
Base camp in Las Vegas established. Family drama starts today. I’m staying at the home of my old friend who I’ve known since college. She was going to a wedding in Houston and I was going to take care of her cats, but she canceled her trip. (She also found out that a lot of other people were canceling their attendance at the wedding.) She’s got plenty of room, so no problem.
The airport here seemed “normal” yesterday. A few masks. I did see one couple, thirty-ish, with serious masks and goggles on the guy.
My flight was about two-thirds full. They’re usually packed solid. Sat next to a young guy who was coming out for the concrete trade convention (130,000 people!). He was knowledgeable about the coronavirus thing, concerned but not panicked. We agreed that we’ll see how bad the shit hits the fan in the next couple of weeks and take it from there. His company is already doing a lot of work from home. He travels a lot, and they are looking at cutting that down.
My big fear is, as Elizabelle said in a previous thread, getting stuck in Las Vegas, either because of flight restrictions or because I get sick and can’t fly. I’m supposed to return to D.C. next Wednesday. Fingers crossed.
NotMax
@Betty Cracker
(can’t resist)
Were you working for scale?
OzarkHillbilly
@JMG: Due to the late start of the Covid-Testing League, I don’t see a start before June 1st.
NotMax
@Steeplejack
Nothing directly related to what you said but did spark the query as to how much Steve in the Wherever’s travel had been impacted.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@rikyrah: Trump isn’t the cause of all this stuff; The Chines Communists need to prove they are better capitalist than Americans is why the conditions for the virus happened in the first place and the Markets have screwed up for years now. But Trump’s reactions to this have been beyond inept and have actively made both situations worse. If Trump had just sat watching Fox News and said nothing the entire time both situations wouldn’t be so bad.
Tata
Did anyone see the Twitter thread about how the only way folks’ active parents and grandparents will get with social distancing is if there’s a segment on NPR? It was hilarious and sad, and I can’t find it now.
Geoboy
@Another Scott: Grr yourself. They can print it but that doesn’t mean people are going to take it. See Weimer Republic, early 1920s, pictures of people with wheelbarrows full of cash to buy a loaf of bread. And how did that work out for everybody?
Gin & Tonic
@Steeplejack (phone): Even though it’s not currently affected by the moron’s travel restrictions, I’m thinking my planned trip to Ukraine in mid-April is off the table. I’m recalling some years back, when I was there in April, and that volcano in Iceland whose name nobody can spell erupted, closing European airspace completely. Not a huge hardship, but left me there a week longer than I had planned. Being stuck there for an extra month would be harder.
Kathleen
@Baud: And AOC, when asked by Bret Baer on Fox News why Joe Biden received so many more votes than Bernie in Michigan replied, “Voter suppression.” If I weren’t on my phone I’d link to the tweet with the video clip.
NotMax
@Tata
It’s easy to scoff but for the very elderly maintaining a modicum of independence and not feeling like a prisoner in one’s own domain is a BFD.
PenAndKey
@Geoboy: The US is not post-WWI Germany, nor have we tried to pay for a world war exclusively via borrowing only to end up owing the world reparations instead of gaining resource-rich territory to repay said debts.
Could the US reach a point where we enter hyper inflation? Sure, anything’s possible, especially with an ascendant China making inroads to hyperpower status itself. That day isn’t today, nor any time in the near to moderate future.
They have my sympathies, but that’s a piss poor excuse for being irresponsible with their health and the health of their community. I have as much respect for an elderly person who insists that they won’t be responsible as I do for my right wing coworkers who insist that they’re going to go on vacation no matter the consequences because “it’s all a liberal freakout”.
Betty Cracker
@danielx: I’ve seen that one but never stayed there. Fancy for a fish camp!
@NotMax: :)
Another Scott
@Geoboy: Do some reading. Weimar Germany and Zimbabwe have nothing to do with the USA.
https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/03/the-hyperinflation-hype-why-the-us-can-never-be-weimar/254715/
HTH.
Cheers,
Scott.
Tata
@NotMax: My mother died a year ago, but I know-know-know she wouldn’t have quit running from place to place without a segment on NPR telling her to stay home. For me, it was reading the chaos I barely avoided because – again – my mom listened to nobody but NPR and NPR didn’t tell her to have surgery sooner.
Maybe NPR should take requests.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@NotMax:
At this point, I’m worried about me, my wife and my grown children being able to maintain our independence a fuckton more than I am about making random elderly people feel good about themselves. My household just lost six figures of annual income for the indefinite future with god knows what effect on my revenue which is already down 30 percent from 2016-2017.
At this rate, I’m half tempted to put together a list of big GOP donors in my area to send letters to after I get sick. I can lick a lot of envelopes; seal them with snot.
Gin & Tonic
@PenAndKey: “Social isolation and loneliness are serious yet underappreciated public health risks that affect a significant portion of the older adult population.”
From the National Academy of Sciences (US.) Source.
Notice they said “public health risk.”
Gin & Tonic
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:
With people being forced to stay home rather than go to work or go out, I’d expect the divorce rate to increase pretty significantly.
OzarkHillbilly
@NotMax: I’m with you on this one. When one is all alone, One. Is. All. Alone.
I have come to the realization that my weekly visits with my elderly, childless, widowed neighbor are a life saver for her. And now with this shit going on? Even more so.
ETA: @Gin & Tonic: Yep.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Gin & Tonic:
Sadly,with no money to pay for it. I’m wondering if deflation is coming.
NotMax
@OzarkHillbilly
Good on you and thanks. People interpreting what I mentioned as meaning hordes of olds
runningRascaling with scissors is somewhat astounding.Ken
@Gin & Tonic: It did in 2007-2008, and that was just from the economic stress. Now that we’ve got “Disaster Voltron” it will likely be worse.
germy
@OzarkHillbilly: I’ve been seeing commercials for grandpad.
A tablet for seniors, staying in touch with distant loved ones. I don’t know if it’s crap or not, but they’re certainly running a lot of commercials.
Betty Cracker
Huh:
Last weekend:
Whoopsie-doodles!
germy
@Betty Cracker:
catclub
They completely got over it. In contrast, in 1933, when they had 47% ! unemployment, they decided to take a shot on Hitler. We know how THAT worked out.
as an added note. The Germans have mostly learned the wrong lesson, because the 1923 hyperinflation hurt rich people with financial assets, Now they are terrified of hyperinflation. Because the Germans in power now are rich people with financial assets.
germy
catclub
@Another Scott:
There is substantial evidence ( Vanguard trading records) that Mom and Pop investors are extremely well behaved in this situation, while the big institutions are panic selling. I will also note that even that ‘panic selling’ is pretty small, it just is meeting even fewer buyers – so moves prices.
Chyron HR
@Kathleen:
Not AOC! Not the heckin squaderino! She was the one who was supposed to be reasonable and not an evil piece of shit who wants to burn the world down for the glory of Messiah Bernie!
germy
PenAndKey
@Gin & Tonic: Yes, isolation is a public health risk and a risk for the elderly. They often don’t have online interactions or social networks to fall back on.
But you know what? In a pandemic that’s irrelevant. They need do the responsible thing as much as the rest of us. Hell, more so since they are the ones most at risk.
I visited my neighbor every week for years because his wife died before I met him and his kids never visited. Before his kids finally moved him into a nursing home he saw my wife and I more than anyone else in his life. My son’s middle name is in his honor, and my wife considers him an honorary grandfather. So I get it.
Staying home for a few weeks to the maximum extent possible isn’t even in the same league as being unable to leave the house and never seeing people again if they don’t come to you. They can deal with it like responsible adults.
Gin & Tonic
@Betty Cracker: Here’s a better photo of Bolsonaro last weekend. So according to CDC guidelines, Trump should be self-quarantining now, correct?
Another Scott
@Gin & Tonic: We all know that Donnie is going to be hospitalized before this is over. Right? Maybe less than 2 weeks?!
Who in the Administration is studying up on the 25th Amendment, Section 3? Jared?? Anyone else???!
:-/
(I am not an MD. Just my supposition. I know no more than anyone else.)
Cheers,
Scott.
2liberal
@Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism: re: Stanford tips posting. I think that was me. It looked plausible and I’m not good enough in googling to avoid ruses. I posted in another place but it was deleted as it should have been. My apologies to the jackals.
Kathleen
@Chyron HR: The Great Hyped Hope.