As Betty mentioned in her post, New York, New Jersey and Connecticut have decided to cooperate, and all gyms, casinos and movie theaters will be closed. Restaurants and bars will be takeout only. Good! More to come, I’m sure. So, in our states’ rights utopia, little clusters of states will make their own healthcare policy to address a nationwide threat, while Trump alternates between shaking every hand in sight, and pushing Pence out in front of the public so mother’s husband can be scapegoated later. It’s much better to have our precious rights than our precious lives, so I can only say “keep up the good work” to Team Trump.
We can’t do much about this now, other than perhaps the changes Cheryl suggested today, but I have a couple of thoughts about what we need to do in the mid- and long-term, and what I’m storing away in my anodized titanium grudge carrier for later examination.
First, the bankers never got what they deserved after 2008, and goddamit, the fucking Republicans need to pay for all the cuts and other anti-science bullshit that caused us to be the last place country in virus testing. There should be no “bygones being bygones” on this fuckup. There will be an especially fervent effort by FoxNews to tell us that the response to this pandemic was as good as we could have expected, because it was a natural catastrophe that nobody could have predicted (except for the smart government officials that Trump fired or replaced with stupid toadies). Nope! We need a reckoning.
Second, we need to start advocating for mail-in elections, and that’s going to be a fight. Trump would prefer to have no election, so it’s in his interest to throw as much sand in the gears of changing election procedures as he possibly can. Josh Marshall has a good post on this.
Third, James Fallows makes some good points in this essay about the chaos that Trump caused at the airports, but his point is more generally applicable:
You probably can’t see this from seat 23D on United or Delta, but every commercial-flight airport has its own fire station, within a few seconds’ drive of the runway. A fire crew is standing by, every time you take off or land. That’s based on What if? thinking. What if five minutes from now, a plane comes in hard, and has a post-touchdown fire, which could threaten the passengers trapped inside? What if an airplane’s engine catches fire on the runway, and a hundred passengers have to get off all at once?
[…] I’m sure there are airports where the “equipment” has never been used in a real emergency, or not in many years. But it’s there and ready, every minute, because: What if?
Fallows makes a distinction between grinding efficiency, which keeps airlines profitable at the expense of making the experience sometimes unpleasant, and the What if? culture underlying safety systems in airplanes and airports. Our hospital system has been run on grinding efficiency, to maximize corporate profits and perhaps decrease the cost of patient care, but not so you’d notice, if you’ve received a bill lately. So we have no spare beds, we’re going to run short on protective gowns and masks because they’re sourced from China, we’re short of nurses, and so forth. When this is over, we need to What if? hospitals and the health care system in general. We need some slack in the system, some stockpiled supplies, some extra beds, increased pay for nurses and educational incentives and student loan repayments just like doctors get, and a recognition that we may “waste” some money on preparedness (just like we “waste” $800K on each of the airport fire trucks pictured). Because the What if? just happened, and we’re woefully unprepared.
trollhattan
Those of a certain age will recall the Civil Defense shelters sprinkled across the land in case of nuclear war. They had water and pilot crackers and the psychological task of giving false confidence to folks that the government had this. Nevertheless they did exist and took a good deal of thought and coordination.
Bill K
I agree with a lot of what you said, but I am leery of mail-in elections. I think it’s too easy to falsify the results. I keep thinking of _One Hundred Years of Solitude_ where the mayor is opening the mail-in ballots and replacing the ones he doesn’t like. In real-life, I can’t forget how our county clerk in Waukesha suddenly ‘found’ ten thousand mail-in ballots at the last second and they conveniently turned the tide in a tight race for governor.
low-tech cyclist
What I want to know is, why are the hospitals private businesses in the first place? Fifty years ago, they largely weren’t. You’d have Soandso City Hospital, Suchandsuch County Hospital, Whatsisname Methodist Hospital…(a) how did we get from there to here, and (b) any reason we can’t reverse that and turn hospitals back to largely government-owned and -run enterprises?
Health care should not be driven by profits. It just doesn’t work.
Fleeting Expletive
Pilot crackers? In the late sixties at an offshore training camp for Peace Corps volunteers they served Civil Defense-labeled cookies in metal cans, huge ones, that were from years before. They were pretty good but not quite as good as graham crackers.
cain
I have a feeling that we are going to see more contagions as our world falls more out of balance. This won’t end here I’m feeling. The past 12 years we’ve seen many different diseases spreading.
The conservative idealogy is literally killing us because it’s all based on wanting it to be like the 1950s except it isn’t like the 1950s . They want the life style of the 50s, the tax rates of today, and less immigrants.
waspuppet
This will absolutely happen, and not just on Fox. The lumpenproletariat at home thinks “I didn’t see this coming, so why should I expect anyone else? Except some eggheads who are always predicting doom and gloom?”
Bush got reelected after Sept. 11; don’t think for a second Trump might come out of this (politically) stronger.
bluehill
I’m seeing some conservatives now acknowledging that they downplayed this issue and now the government needs to get involved. Meghan McCain is on View criticizing Trump and government handling and decrying the distrust of government institutions without acknowledging how she and her husband and conservative inc contributed to this. Congrats for getting a clue, but unfortunately her credibility won’t suffer. She and Fox will move on to next BS scam and so it goes. The lack of self-awareness is frustrating, but not unsurprising.
We can actually take immediate action against covid, climate change won’t be so easy.
donnah
Get Trump’s tweet today:
Respirators, ventilators, all of the equipment — try getting it yourselves,” Mr. Trump told the governors during the conference call, a recording of which was shared with The New York Times.
“We will be backing you, but try getting it yourselves. Point of sales, much better, much more direct if you can get it yourself.”
The suggestion surprised some of the governors, who have been scrambling to contain the outbreak and are increasingly looking to the federal government for help with equipment, personnel and financial aid.
Fucking POINT OF SALES for supplies? He’s absolving himself of all responsibility and forcing states to do his job. God, this is criminal behavior because he’s killing people.
Wag
James Fallows is an american treasure. It is good to have him back on the trump beat again.
cain
Healthcare is just not profitable – govt has been working too hard to help make it profitable instead of just making it all govt controlled. It should be a national security issue, after all if you have bioweapons – it can be used to bankrupt hospitals quickly.
glory b
I thought that the hospital bed shortage could also be traced to the closures of smaller, more rural hospitals because of the refusal of some states to go along with the ACA expansion, right?
JoyceH
This is perhaps a bit off-topic but today I remembered something that occurred to me quite a while ago, before this whole pandemic business blew up. And that is that there are tiny little simple things that can be done that can demonstrate competence or at least the appearance of competence, and this administration doesn’t even do those things. One of those tiny little simple things is to just start a scheduled briefing at the pre-announced time. And this administration has never done that, not even during ‘normal’ times.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@donnah:
he thinks it’s about buying lamps in bulk for one of his tacky hotels thirty years ago
different-church-lady
I see the algorithms have decided I should see ads for face masks with very specific specifications, and so as far at the free market is concerned I’m back on a “fuck everything and the shrink-wrap it came in” footing.
Martin
@Bill K: Mail-in elections, particularly done as California does, is solid (other states may be as well, but I’m not as familiar with their process).
In CA, you are mailed a ballot with your information on it, you don’t self-identify. You need to sign the ballot envelope. The reason the counting here is so slow (we still have 1.3 million ballots to count 2 weeks after our election) is that they both validate that there’s only one vote per resident, and that includes checking that you didn’t mail one in and then go hit a machine. If there is any irregularity on the ballot – you didn’t sign it, it’s unclear what you marked, they will call you and ask you to clarify the ballot, etc.
So, in many ways our by-mail system is more secure than any other. Even if someone stole your empty ballot from your mailbox and sent it in, you can request a replacement, send it in, and when they see two for you, they’ll call and ask you to clarify which ballot should be counted. I don’t think other states are quite so thorough because they don’t give their counties a month to certify the count to do all of this, but it can be done in a very thorough way.
I think with similar consideration an electronic voting system could be designed, but it would need to lean on infrastructure very different from what we have now, so not any time soon.
donnah
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Honestly, that set me on fire! He always reverts to dollars and cents. And fuck him, he’s failing on every level.
mad citizen
@donnah: What a Magnificent Leader! Do it yourselves. His whole leadership is like the moments of Bill O’Reilly’s “We’ll do it live” meltdown.
gene108
Any healthcare reform plan that does not force hospitals to open their books and figure out transparent pricing is not going to solve much.
We’ve all seen the $2,000 bill get reduced $500 because of insurance discounts. Makes no sense. A very arbitrary pricing system.
Martin
@low-tech cyclist: They’re private because starting in the 60s we found ways to properly treat all manner of things that before would have just been ‘go home and die’ responses. That created a HUGE surge in hospital demand that as we rolled into the 70s and 80s we didn’t want to fund.
And I’ll dispute a bit that they weren’t private. We have a long history of Catholic owned and run hospitals, going back decades. I was born in one, and I bet most of you were too. They were non-profit, but they weren’t public.
Aziz, light!
@Bill K: Our Oregon vote-by-mail system has been working well for over 20 years and I’ve not heard of any reports questioning the integrity of our voting. Of course it must be administered by a state office that guards carefully against corruption and can’t easily be derailed by political hacks.
Betty Cracker
@donnah: It’s criminally dumb on a bunch of levels, including the obvious point that the federal government has greater purchasing power than individual states and has sole power to order production for national defense purposes. Great googly-moogly. Pence’s press conference this afternoon will be a doozy!
Martin
@donnah: So much for the Defense Production Act that would let Trump order businesses to produce those goods.
p.a.
The direct line of this century’s trajectory goes back to Sandra Day ‘my biggest mistake’ O’Connor’s vote in Bush v Gore
Mary G
O/T poor lamh:
Martin
@JoyceH: Yep. Presidents have a long history of voting with the cameras rolling, getting flu shots, tests, anything that you are trying to encourage the public to do. It’s always done in public. Hell, they even sometimes do that in authoritarian countries.
gene108
@Aziz, light!:
Disqualifies every Republican controlled state
bluehill
Waiting for the inevitable, except for the coronavirus, which no one could have foreseen, Trump led the greatest economic boom ever. Kind of like Bush kept us safe after 9/11.
Catherine D.
@Martin:
I was born in a kosher Jewish hospital, because my catlick mother wanted a doctor who put the breathing one’s life first.
Martin
@Aziz, light!: An aside. When my son was in high school he was in marching band. One of his band mates was named ‘Aziz’ and he was tasked with setting up the lights in all of the trucks to transport instruments and props just so everyone could yell ‘Aziz, light!’
That was his job for 4 years.
TS (the original)
@Martin:
We had (I think it still exists) a system in Australia whereby when you apply for a postal vote you are immediately crossed off as voting. If you lose the postal vote you cannot vote. If you go to a polling booth & try to vote, you are told you have already voted. This allows all the checking to be done before election day. (I learned this the hard way when I lost a postal vote)
We also have never had signature checking as part of the right to vote. If you are on the roll, you turn up, give your details & get a vote.
mrmoshpotato
It’s time to stop calling them cosplay commies and just call them fascists.
The children have a demand.
Wow.
HumboldtBlue
@Mary G:
I just read an interview where Utah Jazz player Donovan Mitchell realized the single greatest concern he had after testing positive was that he felt absolutely no symptoms.
I don’t have teenagers nor do I regularly interact with them but this may of use for those who do.
A pediatrician put together a fact sheet specifically aimed at teens regarding the impacts of the virus.
Hoodie
The entire DoD operates on “what if.” The problem with public health is that it doesn’t tickle the lizard brains of the GOP electorate like guns and ammo.
Roger Moore
@low-tech cyclist:
Those Methodist- and Catholic, Presbyterian, Jewish, etc.- hospitals were always privately owned. They were generally non-profit, but they weren’t run by the government.
Martin
@TS (the original): Ours don’t work that way. The mail vote is an option, so everyone gets a mail ballot, and everyone can pull a lever. You can drop off the mail ballot at any polling place and it’ll get routed to the right precinct.
It’s a really good system for a mobile population. If you fill in the mail ballot but leave it at home, just pull the lever. If you don’t mail it in time, just drop it off (and it just needs to be postmarked the day of the election, not received).
If you fill in your ballot and your candidate drops out the day before the election, you can go in and get a new ballot and fill it in. It’s really nice. It feels like a system that wants everyone to vote.
mrmoshpotato
@Catherine D.: I hope your mother was handed you and a pastrami on rye after delivery. ?
JanieM
@Martin:
That explains a lot. ;-)
Not me. Anyone else?
ThresherK
@mrmoshpotato: I have seen online cartoons (okay, let’s face it, no cartoons are printed anymore) joking (sic) that they should scare older Dem voters away from polling places with Covid-19 fearmongering, so the younger voters can carry the day for Sanders.
I’m waiting for the first Bernie Bro to start aiming posts at Biden’s demographic sweet spot. “Bernie voters: VOTE in the primary tomorrow, Tuesday 3/17. Biden voters: VOTE in the primary Wednesday 3/18.”
They really are no different than the R’s now.
Subsole
At times like this I am reminded of Cola de Rienzo. He was sort of a medieval proto-Mussolini who came to power during the Plague. Same flamboyant idiocy, same showmanship, same empty narcissism, same incompetence, same everything. Short story long he talked a bunch of cash-money bullshit about being Rome’s annointed savior, then Decameroned himself for the duration while Rome got acquainted with Y. Pestis.
Ended up stabbed over a thousand times on the steps of his villa by an angry mob.
JaneE
Close to three decades ago my company give a management class to all the salaried employees before starting on a continuous improvement program. One book they wanted us all to read was “The Goal” by Eliyahu M. Goldratt. It is in novel style, but with a message. The basic message is you won’t or can’t do the right things if you have the wrong goal in the first place.
When I see things like the Covid-19 mess, and then the president comes out and praises everyone for their great job, I just think that we really just don’t know what their actual goal is. I doubt it has anything to do with the good of the country. I can’t say they are deliberately trying to kill as many of the poor and weak and costly citizens as they can, but preserving their lives and health is definitely not on their agenda.
Major Major Major Major
Meanwhile, De Blasio continues to be a goddamned idiot about this, to the degree that he went to the fucking gym today.
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?
@Hoodie: I’ve been wondering though…if that’s true can’t we call in a bunch of MASH units and other military equipment to at least help save some lives? Maybe suspend all but defensive military operations to minimize the casualties the military medical supply complex has to service and bring everything else stateside to help add hospital capacity.
Chyron HR
@mrmoshpotato:
We demand:-The election of Bernie Sanders-Emergency Medicare For All-Worker protections-Right to safe housing-Keep families together-Debt forgiveness-Lifting of sanctionsDuring the COVID-19 crisis.
“During the Covid-19 crisis”? Are they threatening to go around and cough on cough on people until we agree to their demands?
low-tech cyclist
@Roger Moore: Yeah, I misspoke myself there. But given that I talked about city, county, and denominational hospitals v. what we have now, I think you know what I meant.
HumboldtBlue
This how I envision Cole playing with his animals.
Calouste
@mrmoshpotato:
Putting the “Democratic” in Democratic Socialist I see.
Also: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7xxgRUyzgs0
Martin
I was excited to see an epi graph on the CDC website but it hasn’t been updated since March 12, so what’s the fucking point?
bemused
I got a text saying to clorox delivered packages. Is this something that is actually effective against coronavirus? And how does one “clorox” a package?
The Dangerman
@mrmoshpotato:
That’s nice. While we ponder, how about some cookies and milk? OK, pondering over; fuck you and the horse you hopefully didn’t ride in on. Have a nice day.
Assholes all the way down.
Martin
@Chyron HR: I mean, they had to close the bars because that’s more or less what was happening.
Kent
Yes, but many of them were built with the blood sweat and tears of many hundreds of local community members who volunteered time and money to make them happen. And communities who provided all manner of subsidies from land to tax breaks. So they were truly “community” hospitals even if they were non-profit.
What has happened in our generation, is that many of these now aging and now struggling hospitals are getting snatched up by mega chains like Ascension Health which is Catholic in name but runs them like a multinational corporation with maximization of profit and minimization of costs. So you get cutbacks in staffing, outrageous billings and so forth. And complete loss of local control over hospitals.
mrmoshpotato
@ThresherK:
Ugh. These childish shitheads. My ballot is already marked for Biden, and I’m finishing it up today and dropping it in the mail.
ETA – The The USA Today currently has Biden ahead by 151 delegates.
Subsole
@mrmoshpotato:
BEND.
THE.
KNEE.
HumboldtBlue
@Kent:
It’s St. Joseph’s Health up here and you describe exactly how it came to be owned and operated as it currently is.
Martin
@bemused: Yes, a 0.1% bleach solution will kill the virus. Need to give it a few minutes to sit. Dilute household bleach 10:1 or a bit more if you are running low on bleach and wipe it down.
Alternatively, just let the package sit for 24 hours. Coronavirus only lives for 24 hours on cardboard.
It’s 2-3 days on plastic/metal, so wipe down plastic containers you get at the store.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@mrmoshpotato:
It’s also terribly formatted. I can barely read it
mrmoshpotato
@Subsole: How DARE you not vote for Berrrrrnie! He deserves your vote, you stupid idiot!
danielx
@mrmoshpotato:
And a pony.
The Dangerman
@bemused:
That’s the thing I don’t quite get about a mail-in election. There are probably a lot more hands that touch a mail-in ballot than traditional voting. Not sure, just a guess…
…and I don’t know that I have heard lifespan on paper of this thing; I’ve heard about metal (although I don’t recall the number right now) but not paper.
If postal people start dropping, just with regular mail, well, mail in might not work.
Agreed that I have no idea how you Clorox a package.
mrmoshpotato
@Chyron HR: Haha, I don’t fucking know. I’m so sick of this We’ll-have-a-utopia-if-Berrrrnie(say it whinily)-is-elected bullshit.
“Oh yeah? Utopia? What are your plans?”
“Shut up, you corporate shill!”
TS (the original)
@Martin:
Voting down under is compulsory so we don’t have concerns about “wanting everyone to vote“. Guess that is one reason for the difference. We do have no reason postal voting (a fairly recent change) but you still have to apply for such a vote. I didn’t realise that everyone gets a postal vote without asking in your state. That is the obvious major difference.
Kent
Mail-in balloting avoids the grouping and lines and repeated use of voting machines by hundreds of people.
They use machines to open the envelopes and the people running the counting machines can use gloves and masks. Or just let them sit for 24 hours before counting. It seems like a hugely better way of doing it.
Also, in mail-in balloting states like here in WA they have secure drop-boxes for your ballots scattered all over in public locations like in front of post offices and government buildings where you can basically drive through and drop your ballot out the window of your car like a postal mailbox.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@bemused:
spray it with a bleach-based bottled cleanser is my best guess, assuming whatever it is won’t be damaged by the bleach. I would then leave it out in the sun, if possible, to dry
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Martin:
Around Feb 26, I got a package of N95 masks shipped from San Francisco. I made sure to wipe that sucker down with Chlorox wipes and spray it with Lysol. I was basing this on it possibly being able to live on surfaces up to 9 days. I shocked it arrived so quickly: I placed the order on Monday night and it arrived two days later
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@mrmoshpotato:
Bernie is love, Bernie is life!
trollhattan
Sliver of good news–California is getting a proper winter storm that is both soaking the Valley and putting snow in the Sierra Nevada. The central range snowpack is up 10% since Friday. This is excellent both for the water supply and pushing back forest fire season.
The gloom suits the mood, too.
Martin
mrmoshpotato
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Are you looking at the plain text embed?
It looks better as the actual tweet, even if it’s still fascist bullshit.
mrmoshpotato
@danielx: Unicorn. Rainbow-farting unicorn. Ponies actually exist in the real world.
danielx
@The Dangerman:
With disposable gloves, put bleach solution in spray bottle. Use paper towel to spread solution over the entire surface, put it on a baking rack and let it dry. You’re good.
Catherine D.
@mrmoshpotato: Hah! No, but she had to save her milk from breakfast to put in coffee later. It was in the long-ago days of rooming-in, and she had a mini-fridge.
Martin
@TS (the original): I would dispute that slightly. I work in government and have lots of compulsory things that I need to enforce, and there is a world of difference between the things we’ve made easy and enjoyable vs the things we have not.
Even (maybe especially) compulsory things need to be respectful of the individual.
trollhattan
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Alternatively, open it wearing disposable gloves.
This presumes one isn’t paranoid of the contents.
bemused
@Martin:
I thought packages in mail or delivered were a fairly low risk but if wiping down with clorox wipes is recommended which I don’t have, does that mean every item bought in stores need to be “cloroxed”, cans of food, bags of chips, packaged meats, cereal boxes, plastic bottles of whatever, etc.?
Coronavirus confirmed cases are in the other end of our state, so far.
danielx
@mrmoshpotato:
you’re thinking small. Rainbow unicorns that deposit buttnuggets of purest gold. Or finestkind BC buds if your fancy runs in that direction.
catclub
@mad citizen: They have GOT to plaster that “I don’t take responsibility for anything line” all over the world.
Your president, not at work.
Nora Lenderbee
7 million people just got told to stay home.
Martin
So, we’re just letting any packages we get sit in the garage for a day. Downside to one/two-day shipping is that if the contents are plastic (including the air bags to protect your stuff) then the virus could still be active on the contents. By just waiting a day everything takes care of itself.
mrmoshpotato
@danielx: Fantastic. I’ll need a new ballot now.
TS (the original)
@Martin:
I wasn’t saying that compulsory voting is the answer – or whether it is better than the systems used by most countries around the world (I think we are one of the few where voting is compulsory) – I was simply saying that it exists in my world – consequently things such as GOTV & encouraging people to vote are not considered when designing the election process. Despite it being compulsory, there are still about 10% of registered voters who do not vote, there are people who are not registered, and there are those who deliberately spoil their ballots. There are always ways around compulsory.
Martin
@bemused: I’ve been doing that. A plastic bottle that was touched by another customer or by the stocking person can hold the virus for 2-3 days.
So, we have a designated place where we put our groceries down now, we then wipe them down with diluted bleach on a cloth. Let them sit for a few minutes, then put them away. We then wipe down the table where they were, put the cloth and the grocery bags in the wash, and wash hands.
We use cloth bags and cloth mesh bags for produce. A regular wash kills the virus.
Suzanne
There seem to be a lot of questions about hospital buildings…. why they are the way they are, how bed capacity is decided, etc. This is my area of professional expertise (hospital architecture and planning). Would it be helpful if I did Q&A?
bemused
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
That’s what I thought but it would have to be a light spray if it’s cardboard and we would not enjoy smelling that in the house. It’s still too cold here to open windows to air out. I use a bleach spray (Up & Up) in kitchen sink, bathrooms only when needed due to the bleach smell.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@mrmoshpotato:
Plain text embed I guess?
You’re right, it is foolish to “demand” that St. Bernard be elected. That’s not how electoral politics works. There’s no crying in baseball
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Suzanne:
Absolutely! You have my vote. The hospital I did clinicals at had all private rooms afaik. A few negative pressure rooms on each unit too. I wish I could readily find that information. You would think number of beds would be public info
sdhays
@trollhattan: Where is Pat Robertson declaring that the Lord has blessed California for homosexual sex in this time of crisis?
mrmoshpotato
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Can’t have crying in baseball without any baseball. ?
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Nora Lenderbee:
Yeah, the Bay Area counties. A lot of places are probably going to become the same way
Formica
@Martin: you beat me to it. I am glad I did all my shopping last Thursday. I’m in Contra Costa county. The wartime metaphors are becoming more and more appropriate.
mrmoshpotato
@sdhays: Probably too busy smoking pole.
bemused
@Martin:
I read that virus stays on stainless steel and plastic longer.
Taking a box of disposable gloves on next grocery, etc shopping trip and use a new pair at each stop. Is checking library books a risk now too? Damn, everything we do is complicated now.
Betty Cracker
Oh Christ, the Beast is speaking.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
trump starts speaking, according to my phone, DJIA is down 9.64%. Unless he announces some huge stimulus, I predict it will drop further before he runs out of the room to shouted questions.
He begins by congratulating the press for practicing social distancing, speaking from a podium crowded with toadies, like the Surgeon General
mrmoshpotato
C-SPAN notification tells me Dense will be sucking Dump’s fat, orange fascist ass soon.
Tune in I guess if you didn’t like what you ate for lunch.
PJ
@glory b: In New York City, hospitals have been closed and sold off to become luxury condos. Thousands of hospital beds have been lost this way. https://cooperator.com/article/hospital-to-condo-conversions/full
Suzanne
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): How do you want to do this? Via email? FB? A thread full of questions?
Bostondreams
Meanwhile, in Nashville…
Bars tell the Mayor they aren’t closing because they are now all run by constitutional scholars apparently
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@bemused:
Personally? As long as you remember to wash/disinfect your hands and frequently touched surfaces in your home/car and not touch your face, you should be fine. It wouldn’t hurt to either leave packages sit for a few days or wipe them down with disinfectant clothes.
trollhattan
@Martin:
How does that possibly work (asked rhetorically)? Everybody can’t stay at home for two freaking weeks.
Suzanne
@PJ: Mostly, those are hospitals that are too difficult/expensive to bring up to modern standards of care.
Martin
@Suzanne: Oh yes! Even in normal times that would be very interesting to me.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Those stupid press briefings would be more informative if they didn’t include all the sloppy blowjobs done from the microphone.
You congratulate people after a task is complete and some level of assessment of performance has been accomplished, not before. Did they learn nothing from “heck of a job, Brownie”?
Mallard Filmore
@Martin: If anyone has one of those smallish tubes of Clorox wipes, save the empty canister. It will have a pool of cleaning solution on the bottom. I know because I tipped over an empty one a while back.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@mrmoshpotato:
Eh, sports are boring anyway unless you’re there in person. But that’s just me
mrmoshpotato
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
BWHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!! Fuck.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@trollhattan: Looks like that storm will be a bust down here in the southland. They were predicting about a inch of rain, but it’s dwindled to about a 1/3. Any rain is good though.
Mike in NC
Stupid people aren’t just hoarding stuff like toilet paper. Sales of guns and ammo are going through the roof. Only in America.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Suzanne:
I think a guest BJ post would be best
Martin
@trollhattan: Three weeks. You can still go out for groceries, etc. All non essential gatherings of any size are banned, so your D&D group is now illegal. (We always knew that was coming.) Police will be stopping people that are on the street.
I don’t think they know exactly how this will work. I predict parking in SF will still be a shitshow.
mrmoshpotato
@Suzanne: Interpretive dance.
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
@Martin: @Formica:
I did my grocery shopping this morning for us and for my elderly parents who’ve already been self-quarantining for over a week. Trader Joe’s was jammed but the shelves were full. I did not wipe down everything I bought – honestly, it didn’t occur to me, although it should have. Ugh. I think all I can do now is wait and worry.
mrmoshpotato
@Bostondreams: Trump trash culling themselves?
Suzanne
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Sure…. but I want to answer questions that people have. So I need a list.
Nora Lenderbee
@trollhattan: From the SF Comical:
People can go outside for necessary trips and for exercise, but they should stay 6 feet away from each other.
No one’s yet figured out how the order will be enforced.
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
Huh. It’s normally a breeze in our little cul-de-sac, but tomorrow is street sweeping day and that’s always a pain. All part of the stupid little shit we have to worry about on top of everything else. This situation is like fine sand in a high wind – it seeps and creeps into every crevice.
mrmoshpotato
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: You monster. Why are you trying to deny Dump the chance to tell us he’s luxurious and classy and tremendous at everything?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
unmuted long enough to hear a reporter ask if he empathizes with the fears and anxieties people are feeling. He answers that people are feeling better because they’re doing such professional job. Re-mute. DJIA down 11.29%
Subsole
@mrmoshpotato: Apologies comrade. Will be sure to send donation to the good folks at Gringo Memehouse.
I really, really have come to loathe these assholes and how callously they lied to and used these kids…fuckin’ prepschool proletariate.
mrmoshpotato
@Mike in NC: (chef’s kiss) Now if only the virus were in a hurricane…
danielx
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
You’re not from Chicago or Cleveland.
LeftCoastYankee
I used to work at our airport next door to the fire station.
I’ve always thought it must be strangest job. You train constantly to be ready for your job, and pray you never have to do it.
I wish we as a country thought about our military that way. Be ready, be the best, and may boredom be your biggest danger.
Dorothy A. Winsor
The Dow is falling as Trump speaks.
mrmoshpotato
@danielx: Hey now. There’s always next year.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
unmuted: trump says ‘we’ve done a fantastic job from just about every stand point” re-muted
-11.66
ETA: doesn’t he usually cut and run from these things? I’m guessing the praise from his lackeys has been insufficient in recent days and he needs to hear himself praise himself
mrmoshpotato
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Anyone else feel like listening to some Tom Petty about now?
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Suzanne:
Well, maybe you could answer this one:
Gin & Tonic
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Boy, you can just watch the ticker to see when he’s talking.
mrmoshpotato
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: When the Dow reaches the Earth’s core, can it do some geological experiments?
trollhattan
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
We went a month-and-a-half without a drop, including the first no-rain February in history. This is surely welcome but like all storms, there will be pockets left dry.
Flow in the river that runs past us has never left fall conditions.
sdhays
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: At this point, you can start shorting the market and make a killing just by hearing that he’s going to be talking in public.
danielx
@mrmoshpotato:
Actually, I’m thinking Van Morrison’s rendition of T.B. Sheets.
Subsole
@danielx: Fuck it. We’re gettin’ dumptrucks full of gold-plated 100%-pure ground unicorn horn-infused rainbow cocaine, baby!
James E Powell
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
That thing on my phone says the rain should arrive 5 or 6 PM, depending on traffic on the 10.
Yesterday that same thing promised me a week of rain to match my mood, but today it’s walking that back a bit.
Gin & Tonic
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Sports boring? Watch this and tell me that again. (Honest, watch the whole thing, all the way through.)
James E Powell
@mrmoshpotato:
I get what you’re saying, but in my world there is never a bad time to listen to some Tom Petty.
mrmoshpotato
@Subsole: Wow. I’m gonna gracefully bow out now.
mrmoshpotato
Max Brooks with a good (and funny) PSA.
trollhattan
@Gin & Tonic:
The true genius of that video is the narration, which is letter-perfect and projects true sportscaster style.
scav
Actually, the stock market is the second curve Trump and minions are failing utterly to flatten.
David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch
Dow haz dropped 500 points since Dump got the air.
Major Major Major Major
@Martin:
You can also just use soap.
Martin
@James E Powell: I love that we’re in the middle of this global catastrophe and us Californians can still prioritize our energy on the miracle known as rain.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@James E Powell: No traffic on the 10 so it should get here early. //
trollhattan
@danielx:
That would bookend nicely with his excellent rendition of “St. James Infirmary.”
Baud
@David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch:
He really is running to Hillary’s left. #LateStageCapitalism #JumpYouFuckers
geg6
@Martin:
It’s interesting because the hospital I was born in was a brand, spanking new one built by Local 1211 of the United Steelworkers (including my dad and both grandfathers) and their employer, J&L Steel. Eventually, it was purchased by the city of Aliquippa and then sold to a consortium of local doctors. Of course, it shut down in the early 2000s because the doctors could not afford to keep it open and no one would buy it.
Martin
@Major Major Major Major: Soap doesn’t kill the virus in place. It requires a flow of water to carry it away – which is why the 20s rule is there. So yeah, it’ll work on your boxes if you stick them under the sink, but not if you don’t.
I’m from a generation that spent a fair bit of time in chemistry labs learning how to properly clean stuff.
Subsole
@mrmoshpotato: If I didn’t like it going down why on earth would I want to experience it again the other way?
A Ghost to Most
Dow down 3000.
Jump you fuckers
ETA looks like trading suspended at -13%
PJ
@Suzanne: I know that the one near me, Long Island College Hospital, was fully functional until SUNY decided to shut it down and sell it for a shit ton of money.
mrmoshpotato
@Subsole: Grr. Fair point.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@A Ghost to Most: I think the market may be sending a signal here, “Trump, shut your fucking piehole!”.
rikyrah
@Bostondreams:
take away their liquor license, and begin the fines for selling liquor without a license…they will close.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
on a scale of 1 to 10, how would rate your administration’s response?
I give us a ten…
Dow drops more than 3% just since he started talking
Formica
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice: Yeah, same experience in the east bay, TJs was packed but well stocked. We are apparently allowed to go to the grocery store and the pharmacy, so I’m going to let folks go nuts out there for a few days before I venture out again. Stay safe over there.
Of all the times to have a toddler narcissist in the oval office… ugh.
Immanentize
Trump could not describe the test he had. He never got tested. Now, the idiot Doctor described the test so Trump can now say he had the test.
Subsole
@Gin & Tonic:
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
Two words:
Roller. Ball.
David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch
Dow haz dropped 850 points since Dump got the air.
[SELL! SELL! SELL!] But, but… [stampede on stock exchange] but, but…. [market crashing] …. her emails… [collapse]
Major Major Major Major
@Martin: According to several sources, most recently a chemistry prof who’s been making the rounds (NYT Vox), as well as Cheryl in some tweets, soap and detergent molecules physically destroy the virus.
cain
@Mike in NC:
Suckers. A fool and his money are parted easily. They think that it’s going to be hordes of folks running around trying to steal food. These morons instead of spending it on food are spending it on guns.. it’ll be them that will be going around trying to take it from others most likely. I hope they eat their bullets.
mrmoshpotato
Immanentize
@Subsole: Jonathan! Jonathan!
MisterForkbeard
Looks San Francisco issued a “Shelter in Place” order for the whole city. :/
Trump’s press conference wasn’t actually as bad as I thought it would be. He lied about his own (and Republican) response repeatedly and praised his travel bans repeatedly, but also was very reasonable on some of the economy questions. He kept saying “We’ll take care of it, but the important thing is the get the virus under control” and tried to keep the focus on that.
He failed miserably at most of it, but hey, it’s a low bar.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
I want to hear, just once, Mnuchin/Trump/Kudlow indicate some plan for the middle class businesses and people that are getting destroyed right now.
You know, habits will change. Some things won’t come back.
Martin
@Major Major Major Major: Ah, sure enough. I stand corrected. Thanks for that.
Feathers
Does anyone know what temperature kills the virus? If so, is it one a home oven can reach? I’m assuming no if no one has suggested it, but I sterilize my manicure tools in the oven, as well as kill moths.
Martin
Amazon hiring 100,000 warehouse and delivery workers.
This would be an excellent time to reset the baseline for wages and benefits upward for those workers given that they have effectively no competition right now.
cain
What a shit show.. all they care about is the market, but the more they focus on it, the worse it is getting. These people have NO other ideas – wall st. is a crying baby and the trump administration is a shitty caregiver who cannot figure out what the baby wants
Major Major Major Major
@Martin: I think it’s great news! And totally counterintuitive for sure. I quadruple-checked before I shared!
Baud
@Martin: Didn’t they just raise wages to $15/hour?
Martin
@Major Major Major Major: Well, it’s not how soap/detergents normally work, but it makes sense now that I read more about why it works.
Calouste
@David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch: 300 more and everything the Dow gained since Obama left office has disappeared. And it’s not like were at the bottom yet.
cain
My hope is that as the economy continues to tank they will have no choice but to work with Pelosi knowing that they have absolutely no idea how to solve this.
Then maybe, just maybe we can end this stupid perception that Republicans know how to manage the economy.
David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch
Major Major Major Major
@Martin: Yeah, it’s one of those things that seems like total misinformation at first blush.
Martin
@Baud: They did. But they still have issues wrt to working conditions. They need to improve health insurance. Many of their delivery folks are contractors and don’t earn $15.
It’s progress, but they could meet Apple’s standard – stores closed but we continue to pay employees, unlimited sick leave. Amazon can afford to do more.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I’m listing to Boots Riley and Tom Morello do “Promenade” instead.
Seems fitting.
Middle daughter is sending me photos of the stock market shitting as he speaks.
mrmoshpotato
@cain: Dump’s bastard administration is yelling at the crying baby to shut up, and that’s just making it cry more loudly.
ETA – completely unrelated, but the baby from Dinosaurs was a total dick.
A Ghost to Most
@Mike in NC: Not just self-protection. Hunting is not just for pissing off city people.
cain
@Calouste:
A lot of boomers are going to be really angry – their retirement funds are going to be shit. The trump supporters have got to be hurting from all this.
Yet I hear all these people saying “he’s doing a fantastic job”. I just cant figure it out.
WaterGirl
@bemused: I bought all my stuff before 3/10 and I am leaving everything non-perishable in my car until 3/21. That seemed like the simplest solution.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch: There’s always a Tweet/quote…
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@mrmoshpotato:
If they just shake the baby some, it’ll stop crying.
cain
@mrmoshpotato:
Yep – lets hope he doesn’t strangle the baby and call it done.
mrmoshpotato
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: What’d you do to piss off your daughter? ?
catclub
@David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch: So is Trump gonna autograph the ppt showing that?
I could not believe how incredibly short-sighted it was when he did that on friday.
David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch
Run the Gubmint like a business that went bankrupt 6 times and squandered all it’s inheritance.
mrmoshpotato
@cain: “The Dow has stopped falling because I killed it. I’m tremendous!”
catclub
@David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch:
UNited federal government under republicans:
every-unified-republican-government-ever-has-led-to-a-financial-crash/
cain
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:
TIL America will collectively suffer from shaken baby syndrome
Jim, Foolish Literalist
David Gura reports trump was signing printouts of Friday’s stock market gains and sending them to the likes of Lou Dobbs
Kent
If it were me, I’d just throw them in the dishwasher and run on a sanitation and dry cycle if you have them. Especially with caustic dishwashing soap. Maybe ramp up the temperature on your water heater. As for ovens, the WHO apparently says that temperatures above 150 kill the virus. That’s for cooking food (make sure food temperatures exceed 150).
Gin & Tonic
@Kent: If it’s WHO, maybe they mean 150 Celsius?
Immanentize
@Calouste: Not quite true.
As I commented this morning,
The magic number is:
19,827.25
That is the closing Bell number for Trump’s inauguration.
Not there quite yet, maybe tomorrow.
mrmoshpotato
@David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch:
Look at Mr. Goodbrain using his best words! And that shit is from 2004?
Time for some Lewis Black babblespeak when he can’t wrap his head around the stupid.
Ksmiami
I want the entire GOP under intense questioning, trials, jail etc. The party is a menace to the public good
Subsole
@cain: To do that we have to break network media. As long as they keep covering for these godawful atrocities; holding our side to a triple standard; never, ever, ever remembering what Republicans did five minutes ago, and generally abdicating their function, there will be no impetus to change.
A subservient media is the GOP’s golden parachute.
David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch
mrmoshpotato
@Gin & Tonic: Do you really want to know?
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch:
This is the “shut the fuck up, Donnie” phase of the crisis.
David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: I thought we were there a week ago, but Donnie keeps on talking.
catclub
It actually takes very little money to retire into a dystopian hellscape. If by retire you mean – thrown out of work.
catclub
so what will the ESPN be broadcasting? The only event I know of is the FIDE (chess) candidates tournament.
Kent
No, 70 degree C or 150 F. This was for avian flu but the principal is the same: https://www.who.int/influenza/resources/documents/food_risk_h5n1_11_2005/en/
Suzanne
@PJ: I don’t know about that facility specifically, but I do hospital replacements and expansions for a living, because most of these hospital buildings built before 1990 or so cost more to improve than to replace. And often the replacement can’t happen on the same parcel, because there’s no way to maintain service during construction, or there’s not enough utility capacity, or there’s zoning restrictions.
Major Major Major Major
@Kent: you can also just use soap!
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@catclub:
Maybe now is the time for…..
The Ocho…..
Kent
@Major Major Major Major: Like I said, I would just throw them into a hot dishwasher with caustic dishwashing soap. But the question was, how hot do you need to get things to sterilize them.
Feathers
@Kent: Thanks! I’ll do that on stuff that won’t be averse to being heated to 150 degrees. I was also thinking about books and how to sanitize them. When I had groceries delivered, I just left them in my door zone for a few days before putting away.
thalarctosMaritimus
@Catherine D.:
O. M. G. Your mother and my mother.
Although I think it would have been more age-appropriate to wait until I was an adult to tell me that.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
The White House handed out a set of guidelines.
I loved this one:
It omitted “quit your whining about your jobs, businesses and financial independence, snowflakes. There’s some boomers that never gave a shit about you that need their fears assuaged, and your lives are subject to their wishes and needs.”
Major Major Major Major
@Kent: fair, just saying that heat isn’t as necessary as you might think.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Suzanne: That’s what they did at UCLA after the old medical center was damaged in the Northridge quake, then went on to name it after a b-movie actor.
cain
@Subsole:
We do that by breaking up the media companies. They hold way too much power – we should never have allowed them to consolidate.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Kent: What’s a dishwasher?
Just Chuck
@The Dangerman: I’m convinced that a good chunk of Berners would have been LaRouchies 20 years ago. The ideology doesn’t matter, just the unbridled assholishness.
Chyron HR
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:
“BOOMER! BOOMER! BOOMER! REEEEEEEEEEEEE!”
Why don’t you go tithe your life’s savings to St. Bernie in divinely untrackable $27 increments while you’re at it?
Feathers
@Just Chuck: No. LaRouche meant cutting ties with respectability. Sanders is within that circle. It’s really telling that LaRouche got no real foothold in Democratic politics, while the Birchers would be considered moderates by today’s Republicans.
mrmoshpotato
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:
Also forgot, “Shut the fuck up, our stocks are doing great! Steve’s about to foreclose on a bunch of elderly women again, and throw them out into the street because he’s a sack of shit, and he loves it.”
James E Powell
@Just Chuck:
I remember the LaRouche people jostling for space with the Hare Krishnas at the airport.
ballerat
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice:
I’m inclined to think you’d be far more likely to pick up the virus for this reason than from the groceries.
It annoys the hell out of me that we spend so much time on things we have so little information about and are likely statistically insignificant, and not any effort at all on things we do have information about and we know is very significant.
Are there studies that show definitively how long the coronavirus lives on various surfaces? And if so, are there studies that show how likely someone can get infected this way? We will spend a ton of time staging, spraying, quarantining groceries, time that could be used to better advantage by just washing our hands more often.
Conversely, we already know social distancing works and it has been demonstrated it can significantly slow the infection rate. Yet we let people jam a store.
It seems we’re focusing on the unlikely scenarios of infection and ignoring the obvious ones.
ballerat
@Martin: Spraying everything with a bleach solution will not work for many asthmatics. Even healthy people breathing enough of that stuff can develop asthma as a result.
brantl
@Martin: The problem with any untraceable ballot, is that another ballot can be replaced with another. And the problem doesn’t get any better, the more the voter is divorced from the ballot.
Anybody who thinks that our elections aren’t stealable, isn’t paying attention.