Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Presidents are not kings, and Plaintiff is not President.

“But what about the lurkers?”

Republicans seem to think life begins at the candlelight dinner the night before.

Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gives a damn.

Prediction: the GOP will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

The poor and middle-class pay taxes, the rich pay accountants, the wealthy pay politicians.

Today’s GOP: why go just far enough when too far is right there?

Accountability, motherfuckers.

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

I was promised a recession.

Sadly, there is no cure for stupid.

We are aware of all internet traditions.

A last alliance of elves and men. also pet photos.

Fuck the extremist election deniers. What’s money for if not for keeping them out of office?

New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

If you’re pissed about Biden’s speech, he was talking about you.

Infrastructure week. at last.

“Squeaker” McCarthy

“More of this”, i said to the dog.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

You are here: Home / Healthcare / COVID-19 Coronavirus / COVID-19 Coronavirus Update (Domestic) – Thursday/Friday, April 2/3

COVID-19 Coronavirus Update (Domestic) – Thursday/Friday, April 2/3

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It’s FUBARs all the way down!


… A tangle of military protocols and bureaucratic hurdles has prevented the Comfort from accepting many patients at all.

On top of its strict rules preventing people infected with the virus from coming on board, the Navy is also refusing to treat a host of other conditions. Guidelines disseminated to hospitals included a list of 49 medical conditions that would exclude a patient from admittance to the ship.

Ambulances cannot take patients directly to the Comfort; they must first deliver patients to a city hospital for a lengthy evaluation — including a test for the virus — and then pick them up again for transport to the ship.

At a morning briefing on Thursday, officials said three patients had been moved to the Comfort. After The New York Times published an article with that number, Elizabeth Baker, a spokeswoman for the Navy, said the number had increased to 20 by late in the day. “We’re bringing them on as fast as we can bring them on,” she said.

Hospital leaders said they were exasperated by the delays…

Top story on all the local news channels:

Suspect the next two stories may just possibly be related…

Reader Interactions

30Comments

  1. 1.

    Patricia Kayden

    Reading through all those tweets is so depressing but what did we expect when a clown was elected with foreign interference?  Trump is incompetent and the sycophants he surrounds himself with are just as bad.  Dr. Fauci is the only trustworthy person connected to this regime.

    Democrats need to hammer the fact that Trump’s incompetence has caused unnecessary, avoidable deaths.  We can’t afford another four years of this.

  3. 3.

    Nicole

    I guess favoring of red states over blue feels during this is the inevitable result of 30 years of FOX News pushing “Us vs Them.” Except now it’s the power of the federal government sticking it to the libs and by that I mean watching them die.
    Ugh.

  4. 4.

    NotMax

    Just make whatever you want. It doesn’t matter.

    Holy plastic sheeting and duct tape, Batman.

    //

  6. 6.

    rikyrah

    @Nicole:

    Here’s the thing. Those red states are being led by incompetents who don’t believe in science. Their orders are useless because they aren’t doing what needs to be done in order to protect their population.

  7. 7.

    Chyron HR

    House Oversight Committee reports that FEMA officials told them this week that only 9,500 ventilators are in the national stockpile and only 3,200 more will be there by April 13.

    Maybe when Jar-Jar said it was “their stockpile” he meant there was only enough medical supplies for the President’s immediate family.

  8. 8.

    Wanderer

    This impeached and failed administration is unfit to serve. Every decision they make worsens our status. The N95 masks portrayed as “help on the way” and then clarified as soon available for purchase on the world market was deceitful and will just be more profiteering. The Admiral who delivered that nonsense should be ashamed … Medical workers in NY,NJ, MA are crying out for PPE so they can care for us with some degree of safety.

  9. 9.

    WereBear

    I’ve concluded that with this administration, we cannot assign stupidity when it is better explained by malicious profit-seeking.

    True, they never meant to sink the stock market with hundreds of thousands of deaths, but they regarded our nation as overstuffed with workers, anyway. Now, they can make more money selling our medical supplies on the black market. So they are.

    Stalin killed Ukrainians for cold hard foreign currency. He deliberately perpetrated the Holomodor to use their deaths as finance for his industrialization. I think we are seeing the same thing happen with the Republican party.

    All these deaths (and we will be lucky to reach low hundreds of thousands, frankly) are going to be converted into cash as they sell everything which has value in a pandemic. The lives of their followers will be lopsidedly lost because they obeyed.

    But they turn out not to count as much as they always thought they would. And it will, in their last thoughts, be blamed on liberals, of course.

  11. 11.

    Nicole

    @rikyrah: True, but we’re right now seeing states in desperate need of help having it willfully denied by the federal gov’t because the state votes for the opposite party than the guy in the WH.  It’s the withholding of aid from states that need it the most right now because they’re blue states that is a cruelty I just can’t fathom.  It was infuriating when all that money was poured out for homeland security just under 20 years ago and waaaaay more of it went to rural states than possibly had any need for it, but at least then I realized most of it was money no one needed anyway, because large-scale terrorism was unlikely to keep occurring.  But this- people are dying right now and it’s just getting started and the gov’t is happy to watch blue states suffer, and it’s been fed by 30 years of propaganda.

    So we have blue states where people will die because the federal government won’t do what’s right for them, and red states where people will die because the state government won’t do what’s right for them.  Ugh.  Just ugh.

  12. 12.

    OzarkHillbilly

    NYT: Take Government Aid? We’ll See, Some Businesses Say

    Grants, low-interest loans and other government support might seem like manna for businesses under financial strain. But some chief executives and corporate boards might balk at the offer of billions of dollars in aid to help them ride out the coronavirus pandemic and keep the economy from sliding into a deep recession.

    Already, some corporate leaders are bristling at the potential terms of the grants and loans authorized by the stimulus legislation President Trump signed last week. Boeing’s chief executive, David Calhoun, for one has suggested that the aerospace company could raise money elsewhere if it found the government’s terms too onerous.

    Well then sir, may I suggest you do so?

    The Treasury Department, led by Steven Mnuchin, a former investment banker, might try to avoid imposing conditions that companies find burdensome. But if the aid appears too lenient, popular support for the rescue could evaporate as it did with the bailout of banks and other businesses after the 2008 financial crisis. And some lawmakers and experts argue that Mr. Mnuchin ought to resist the temptation to cut businesses too sweet a deal to prevent them from walking away from the government’s offer.

    “Either they don’t need money, which means they shouldn’t get the money,” Senator Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of Massachusetts, said in an interview. “Or maybe they really do need it, in which case they should agree to some restrictions on how the money is spent.”

    I’m going with A) “If I can’t wet my beak, why bother?”

  13. 13.

    Anya

    @rikyrah: I have less than zero familiarity with Wisconsin politics but I can assume the public will still blame the Governor and those legislators will still be voted in. I seem to recall the republicans were doing the same thing in North Carolina after they lost the governorship, why did the North Carolina governor retain some power but the Wisconsin governor is basically a figure head?

  14. 14.

    Jeffro

    This is all “heckuva job, Brownie!” on steroids.  It’s trumpov’s Katrina, times twenty (at a minimum).

    Where are the calls to resign, from our national snooze media and from the Democrats?

  16. 16.

    Anya

    @Nicole: I wonder, is our country so fractured that red state Americans would not care if blue state Americans die due to Trump administration’s negligence and incompetence? Would people in Florida and Texas, not be angry if Americans died in New York and other blue states because Trump decided he won’t do what’s right for them because they didn’t vote for him and he won’t expect them to vote for him? If this is the case then what’s the point of the union?

  17. 17.

    Nicole

    @Anya: I agree.  I think there’s something incredibly American about needing someone to be “them,” and we’re seeing the denouement of a major media source making “them” fellow Americans.  I don’t know what it’ll mean for the union long-term, but nothing good, I imagine.

    @rikyrah: Yeah; I hear you, too.  And I’m enough of a bleeding heart liberal that I still feel TERRIBLE for all the folk in red states who are gonna die, even though I first-hand watched some of them turn into raving conspiracy theorists after years of FOX News (and then cut them off because it was just too much and too toxic to deal with them anymore).

    I’m listening to a podcast on Slate about Christian Nationalism, and its takeover of the US gov’t- it’s not a religious moment; it’s a political one, and one of the tenets is a disavowal of science, which we see the effects of now, too:

    https://slate.com/podcasts/the-gist/2020/04/christian-nationalists-crippled-public-health

  18. 18.

    SFAW

    I was ruminating about the whole situation the other day. My sister-in-law, and her husband, are both  Trumpistas (as far as I know, based on “reasons,” but I’ve never actually asked). They’re still adopting some of the “well whatabout [Bullshit excuse X]?” Fox-like idiocy. They’re not as bad as Jeffro’s family, for which I count my (meager) blessings, but still … [Jeffro: I hope I’m not mixing you up with another jackal. If so, my apologies.]

    On a personal level, I like both of them, and am close to both of them, but I wonder whether I’ll be able to speak with them in a civil manner/tone after this is all over. I guess it may depend on if they’re still spouting the RWMF party line. And whether any of those I love succumbs to COVID.

  19. 19.

    Geminid

    @SFAW: I am guardedly optimistic that Trump will be crushed Nov.3rd, and I think the spell will then start to fade for many Trump fans, although  some older ones will stay loyal to their graves. I hope you all can make it through this safely and have the chance talk.

  20. 20.

    Matt McIrvin

    There’s been a ghoulish undertone in some of the discussion, that the plague may alter demographics enough to affect November election results simply by killing people. The story about the huge number of black people dying in Michigan shows us why any such effect is unlikely to be in our favor. Yes, it kills old people–but which old people? Predominantly, the ones who live in cities; the ones who can’t practically seal themselves away from the world; the ones who can’t get the best medical care when they do get sick. These aren’t Trump voters.

  21. 21.

    SFAW

    @Geminid:

    Thanks. I think my hopes are similar, to some extent. My worries are manageable — so far. But my anger toward the Murderer-in-Chief, and his perpetual lying — and his choosing to do so, instead of doing ANYTHING that would help America — and the needless deaths he has caused and continues to cause, grows daily.

    In a just world, any of the alleged “adults in the room” — Mattis, Kelly, et al. — would have strangled him. But the “dignity wraith” thing (per Josh Marshall) prevented that, I guess.

    ETA: And fuck Moscow Mitch, the Traitor Turtle, who’s as much a cause of this as the Murderer-in-Chief.

  22. 22.

    Shalimar

    @Anya: From seeing normal, otherwise not-insane members of the cult post on Facebook, not only would they not be angry, they are actively rejoicing at blue state people dying.  We didn’t vote for Trump.  We deserve to die.

    The evil they have been indoctrinated into is overwhelming at this point.

  23. 23.

    L85NJGT

    If you think Jared is foisting anything other than shoddy products off on Trump’s red state loyalists….

    LULZ.

  24. 24.

    Geminid

    @SFAW: Amy McGrath has a real shot at knocking off McConnell this fall. Polling shows that McConnell is not so popular among Kentuckians. That’s one reason McC. ties himself so closely to Trump.

  26. 26.

    Another Scott

    About Mississippi – I remarked a few weeks ago (it seems like a lifetime) that I was watching the JH map for it because while most states seemed to have confirmed cases concentrated in and around urban areas, in MS it was all over the state (just about every county). Just a small number of cases, but it being so spread out meant that it was everywhere and the numbers seemed likely to do nothing but explode (but slowly, since the population density is low).

    Only 4 counties in MS do not have confirmed cases. 1358 total cases, 29 deaths.

    Most of the rest of the south looks the same way now, except FL and TX – counties are still filling in there. :-(

    It’s all such a waste, and Donnie and his minions are responsible for this vast amount of death and suffering.

    Grr…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  27. 27.

    joel hanes

    I don’t think there’s any great mystery why Michigan’s critical COVID-19 cases are predominantly black persons — it’s well established that essential hypertension is a strong risk factor.

    There’s a reason that we’ve had decades of TV public service ads encouraging black people to be checked for high blood pressure, and to get treatment.   A far higher proportion of AA people suffer from high blood pressure than do other groups.   There are probably multiple reasons for this.

  28. 28.

    joel hanes

    @WereBear:

    [The Trump crime family] can make more money selling our medical supplies on the black market. So they are.

    This.

    “That’s _our_ stockpile.”   Jared

  29. 29.

    ballerat

    @Nicole: It’s not cruelty, it’s genocide.

    I don’t know why people can’t wrap their heads around this. Trump did the same to Puerto Rico, it shouldn’t be something totally unexpected and unthinkable.

  30. 30.

    LongHairedWeirdo

    More than 100,000 Americans are expected to die after a slow initial government response to the coronavirus pandemic and the first person to be fired is … the aircraft carrier captain who pleaded for help for his stricken crew. ⁦

    I’m sure there are people who know far better than I, but the news stories seemed (to me – layperson’s understanding of military/intel) to be saying “we don’t find fault with his actions, but his method of informing the brass allowed the popular press to know we had a carrier hors de combat, *before* the military could decide on actions to take, and messaging to provide.”

    And that strikes me as semi-sorta-fair, given a legend I’d heard. Legend was, any naval officer who runs a ship aground might not be found to be at fault, and might even still have a path to a high rank (maybe even admiral), but won’t get another command (i.e.: captaining a vessel) – just because there are always more command-qualified candidates (who, please note, have *never* run a ship aground) than there are command positions available.

    Of course, my brain then starts to imagine counterexamples :-) – “wait, what if it turns out that deliberately running aground prevented a far worse outcome, and tide was coming in?” Well, as always, hard cases make bad law (or rules). It’s far better to note an exception while emphasizing the normal order. (I learned that one from an old Heinlein book. Hm. I guess they’re all old, now.)

    Anyway: I think the point here was, “dude, you let a potential adversary know that your ship wasn’t able to respond, and *we weren’t ready for them to know that yet*.”

    (Um. Pause here: the news stories said that they don’t think *he* leaked – but that his communication blast, over improperly secured channels, allowed the news to be leaked. So “you let (them) know…” is passive sense, ‘you allowed them to be able to find out, by insufficient message security'”.)

    While the odds that it would be meaningful were low, the potential damage was really high. Military leaders need to think about things in ways normal people  don’t, because the stakes are higher.

    Again: I have no idea of the actual deliberations by the navy, but the sense I got from the news stories was that it was pure-D information security. And sure, the captain was under a lot of stress, and dealing with a confusing, horrifying situation, but part of being captain (especially of a vital resource like a carrier) is making the right call, even in confusing, horrifying situations.

    I have to say, though, there is one thing that sticks out for me. I would feel a lot less comfortable with that decision *if* the reason the captain chose to “blast” out the message was his quite legitimate fear that his CinC might try to cover it up, and force him to continue at sea.

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