The Washington Post had a story yesterday about this photo taken at an anti-social distancing protest in Ohio. This particular photo is a thing because zillions of people noted how much it looks like a scene from a zombie movie. It really does!
As you’ve no doubt heard, there were similar protests in other states, and more are planned for the days ahead. It’s AstroTurf bullshit like the tea party nonsense — a nascent rebranding.
MAGA swag was a common denominator at the protests, from Michigan to California. In open carry states, the protesters showed up with guns.
Trump’s own task force supports stay-at-home orders, and Drs. Birx and Fauci credit social distancing with bending the curve. But Trump believes “restarting” the economy can save his ass politically, so he’s openly fomenting the protests.
The crack New York Times Beltway team is as obtuse about this dangerous, irresponsible turn of events as can be imagined. I mean, fucking hell:
Openly supporting those who challenge the stay-at-home orders could help the president re-energize the coalition of conservative Republicans and working-class populists who fueled his 2016 victory. @shearm @smervosh https://t.co/baFDkYFkjn
— Peter Baker (@peterbakernyt) April 18, 2020
We’re going to get the worst of both worlds, I fear: a ravaged economy AND out-of-control spread of the virus. Trump can’t make governors and mayors lift restrictions, but Republicans will go along with the coming monumentally stupid decision to reopen without the testing, tracking and tracing regime that every expert on infectious diseases says we need to have in place to resume normal activities safely.
I live among pig-stupid Trump voters, and during a grocery run, I noticed a marked decrease in the number of people wearing masks. That must mean Fox News is calling the pandemic a hoax again.
Turns out there is a looming zombie apocalypse, and it’s caused by viral stupidity. Dog help us.
Open thread.
On the Road: Special Post for Alain on Monday (and more information)
lgerard
From the Department of Unfortunate Metaphors
jackmac
Keep that mask on! Sadly, in a couple of weeks we’ll see the ramifications of what these monumentally stupid people have risked.
Elizabelle
I love that the sociopaths in that zombie photo are so clearly identifiable. Gonna be like the worst of the worst at the Trump rallies and the tiki parade in Charlottesville, where the outgroup (i.e. us and the people they know) go “oh really?” And then shunned (which would be healthy, right now) and possibly not a job to go back to.
What awful people. It just radiates off them. And this is against a public-health minded Republican governor.
germy
@lgerard:
kindness
The Zombie Trumpies need brains but they ain’t looking for any. Won’t find it where they go either. Hillary was right.
trollhattan
@lgerard:
Shoulda bought a better house. Loser.
Elizabelle
Maybe some of the worst of the deplorables will get themselves deceased, or disabled by serious heart and lung after-effects.
But they’re going to make it so much dangerous for the good people, and the essential workers in their path.
Barbara
@lgerard: Here is an all purpose response, in the form of an article that deserves to be read and shared, by a sportswriter no less, albeit one who is enraged. Source
The answer to this jackass is that “next phase” could come much more quickly if we ramped up TESTING. Ask Trump why it’s not a priority for him? Does he want people to die?
We spend more money on health care than anyone else in the world by a WIDE MARGIN.
West of the Rockies
I greatly dislike Peter Perma-Smirk Baker. He is a sanctimonious and smug both-sider.
Barbara
@West of the Rockies: They have to have their narrative.
SandyZ
Apparently now Germany, which was about ready to loosen some restrictions, is having the highest number of new cases in a week. I don’t see any reason to be optimistic about a return to even new normal any time soon. These boneheaded protests will prove how wrong these people are.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
the Saturday Follies are on
Steeplejack (phone)
@lgerard:
From the article:
They’re using the saps as cannon fodder in their campaign to hurt Democrats and reëlect Trump.
Uncle Cosmo
@Barbara: Fuck the WaPo and fuck Bezos – I’m not subscribing to his fucking rag to read a fucking article.
rikyrah
sad about what is about to hit Florida. that beach opening insanity!
Michael
@Barbara: Please don’t post links to sources like WaPo which are behind paywalls without identifying them. Better yet, copy and paste the whole thing. I can’t subscribe to everything.
batguano
I’m a DeWine declared essential worker (x2) and have been taking reasonable precautions (e.g. mask, frequent hand washing, wiping shared tools with dilute bleach, hand sanitizer) these protests make me much more nervous to go to work.
Michael
@Steeplejack (phone): This up and down vote-free comment system sucks. Meanwhile ^^^^^.
TaMara (HFG)
Steeplejack (phone)
@Barbara:
“Some may have to die to save the economy”? A modest proposal here.
lumpkin
I think Peter Baker deserves to be attacked by that mob of chuds.
Keith P.
@TaMara (HFG): Now that’s what I’m talkin’ about!
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
I live in Ohio, so I hope DeWine doesn’t go along with this. I know the state is talking about slowly reopening starting May 1st. I know lockdowns can’t last forever, but I have a really bad feeling about this. We’ve already had 37,000 deaths nationwide
Michael
@Steeplejack (phone): This up and down vote-free comment system sucks. Meanwhile ^^^^^.
I came across a video including some woman in a drive-by protest. She leaned out of her car to show the gray patch on top of her otherwise auburn hair and said she needed to get her hair done.
Sorry honey, you are hardly a fashion model. I’m pretty sure a $7 box of L’Oreal from CVS – WHICH IS OPEN – will do you just fine.
lumpkin
It apparently hasn’t occurred to the NYT that the pathological moron is actively undermining his own government’s policies. And inciting people to commit acts of violence against his political opponents. This is fucking nuts at an existential threat kind of level and they treat like the same old political horse race shit that contaminates all of their political reporting.
Brachiator
Trump may become the accidental dictator.
A commenter noted previously that Trump found getting a virus test to be particularly uncomfortable. Maybe he is against tests in part because of his viscerally personal reaction. And because he is venal and stupid. A less infantile president would push for the development of less invasive tests, not seek to dismiss them altogether.
Also unfortunately, once Trump gets an idea into his head and utters it out loud, it is hard for him to give it up. He declared that he had the divine right of Trump to re-open the economy and, having been rebuffed, he is now appealing directly to his nutcase supporters and fomenting insurrection. He is operating in high populist authoritarian mode, and although this ploy is probably doomed to failure, Trump will only try again.
Strangely enough, Trump wants power, but power without real responsibility. Like a demented child king, he wants more than anything else the satisfaction that he can get from the total obedience of the citizens. And he doesn’t care how much suffering he inflicts along the way.
ETA. These dopes in the photos look very much like the zombie apocalypse.
dmsilev
@TaMara (HFG): Joe Scarborough approvingly relaying Biden’s political ads? These are strange strange times.
geg6
@TaMara (HFG):
Excellent job by the Biden team. Really excellent.
Betty Cracker
@Michael: You can view a source without clicking through.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Steeplejack (phone):
Trump, GOP: “Some of you may die, but it’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make.”
@TaMara (HFG):
Stupid reply to that tweet:
Yes, I’m sure whatabouting a pandemic will work
Edit: Checked this Powell dude out on Twitter. Christ, I wish I hadn’t:
Is that what these idiots believe? How? Just 20 years ago, the right was pushing for vote-by-mail because they thought it favor voters that vote for the GOP.
geg6
@dmsilev:
He’s on Team Broken Glass and has been for a very long time. He had a thing for Mayor Pete but pivoted quickly to Joe.
lgerard
@Michael:
Is that the same clip where the guy is complaining about how he can’t get paint to paint his house?
Oh the humanity!
My answer to all these “thought leaders” who are advocating everyone just go back to work and hope to somehow survive is simple:
Please report to the nearest supermarket for frontline duty.
We will see who has the courage of their convictions
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Brachiator:
Like being able to warp reality itself to your whims and destroy those that disobey you.
So like that kid from, “It’s A Good Life”. Or the God from the OT.
Mike S
It takes a foreign paper to show what’s really happening:![]()
The rightwing groups behind wave of protests against Covid-19 restrictions
the Guardian
AliceBlue
@lgerard: It’s the same clip. And the guy who couldn’t buy paint sounded like he was on the verge of tears.
LuciaMia
All out of fucks to give. Hope everyone of these whiny, self-important brats comes down with Covid. No, I dont anyone to die, just sick enough to scare the shit out of them and curse the assholes who put them up to it.
different-church-lady
@Brachiator:
He doesn’t want power — he wants status.
It’s probably the only reason things aren’t much much worse right now.
donnah
Trump’s back on TV now and he’s waaaay off the rails. He went into the weeds right off the bat and ranted about inheriting a mess from the previous administration in regards to the pandemic response and testing abilities. He added a hate screed about Maggie Haberman and how she should give back her Pulitzer prize because she lied about him and Russia.
And he started crowing about how he made it possible to get ventilators made and PPEs sent out and built hospital spaces and they weren’t necessary because all of the requests for them were ridiculous and the Democrats were just overreaching. And then he devolved into more rants about spending in other countries and how he’ll need to look at the budget again. Also added how the Christian faith is mistreated in this country. yikes!
The gist is now that the death numbers are leveling off and they were actually low, compared to per capita numbers worldwide, and they want us to believe the curve is flattened and it’s just a matter of days and weeks until we can all go back to normal. It’s frightening. It’s frightening that people will believe it and they’re going to disregard the facts.
trollhattan
@SandyZ:
Japan’s current situations seems dire. Hospitals maxed out.
The Thin Black Duke
Thing is, as Mike Tyson said, “Everybody has a plan until they get hit in the head.” So I think that once enough people start getting sick and dying, it doesn’t what alternative reality these morons believe in, everybody else who doesn’t watch Fox News and isn’t crazy is going to do what they need to do to stay alive. Reality Is A Harsh Mistress.
Mandalay
@dmsilev:
Hardly. Scarborough (now) hates Trump as much as anyone who posts here, and he and the lapdogs on his show have been shilling for Biden for months.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): California is taking about the same things starting May 1st so apparently this is the governor’s collation’s plan; what this is the Grifter pulled these Fake Protest so they can go to their billionaire donors claim they forced the governors to do this when they ask for more money.
Barbara
@Uncle Cosmo:
I will post whatever I want and you will read whatever you want and I promise not to judge you for it.
@Michael: You are right. I will warn about paywalls. I won’t cut and paste the whole thing but I will try to copy the gist of it.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@donnah:
Until the second wave hits and more people start dying, sadly. This is all so shortsighted. Reopening isn’t even likely going to help Trump politically
trollhattan
@TaMara (HFG):
Kickbutt ad. I do appreciate Joe can deliver a gut punch and smile while doing so.
WaterGirl
@TaMara (HFG): That add gave me goosebumps.
Another Scott
@Mandalay: Joe got his ratings and his tax cuts, so Donnie isn’t useful to him any more.
What? Me cynical??!
Grrr…
Republicans are not our friends.
Cheers,
Scott.
Brachiator
@trollhattan:
Yes. BBC News recently did a sobering story on the problems there.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Brachiator:
What’s scary about Japan is that they have a very elderly population
Gravenstone
@lgerard: Yet these stupid fucks never seem able to envision themselves or their loved ones as winding up dead or long term disabled. Funny, that.
Humdog
I really don’t understand how we are supposed to share a country with these morons.
Mandalay
@donnah:
Well Trump is lying again. The four highest daily death totals in the United States from coronavirus have come in the past four days.
Barbara
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Japan is first and Italy second in highest average age in the world.
Brachiator
@Mike S:
The president of Brazil fired his health minister for opposing his plans to open up the country. In the UK, Boris Johnson’s government is also ignoring the best expert advice.
It is sobering to see the degree to which conservative governments are on the same page. They seem determined to defy rationality in favor of blind, stubborn adherence to ideology.
Another Scott
@Humdog:
That’s from 1980.
It goes back much, much farther than that, of course, as Isaac says.
We can’t give up. We have to keep pressing forward for progress.
Cheers,
Scott.
dmsilev
@Mandalay: I know, and that’s sort of what I was trying to get at. We’ve gone so far down the rabbit hole that Team Relatively-Sane includes Joe Scarborough and Bill Fucking Kristol.
NotMax
A mask over a full ‘stache and beard is pretty much useless window dressing, and I most certainly have zero intention of attacking my mug with a sharp object. That and have yet to encounter any sort of mask which doesn’t make breathing so laborious that I get lightheaded and need to lean on something or sit every few minutes.
YMMV.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@donnah: Actually the deaths per capita is right. The EU easy tops the the US on the total deaths and then
Spain deaths per million 428
United States deaths per million 113
Sweden, deaths per million 137
Hardest hit
Belgium, deaths per million 452
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1104709/coronavirus-deaths-worldwide-per-million-inhabitants/
Sobering thought that if we were like Italy we would be looking at 100,000 dead in a month.
Sloane Ranger
The thing about the protests I noticed is that they were were full of rhetoric about how people wanted to get back to work but the people who were interviewed seemed to be more about how they wanted OTHER people to get back to work so THEY could get their roots coloured or buy fertiliser for their lawn.
In other words, entitled white people wanting other people to risk their health and lives so they aren’t inconvenienced. Can’t you get hair colours and fertiliser online in the USA? We can here in Old World Britain.
dmsilev
@trollhattan: Yeah, I have a couple of colleagues there that I’m in regular communication with, and what they’re describing now is eerily like here a few weeks ago.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
We’ll see how it goes, I guess
CaseyL
OT, but: Is anyone else having problems with Twitter? Mine takes forever to load, and embedded videos don’t show up at all, just a blank space where they ought to be.
No other site is affected.
Steeplejack (phone)
Regarding the protests:
Brachiator
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
I noted in an earlier thread that the problem with the virus in nursing homes is a worldwide problem. Japan is seeing clusters of the virus in nursing homes, and as you note, they have a large population of elderly people, and a reputation for treating them well. And yet they have the same issue with the virus as other countries.
Also, in Japan, there was a cluster of the virus at a sports gym. What may be similar to a nursing home is that you have bodies concentrated in a social space and staff regularly moving among the people and spending time in close proximity with them.
WestTexan
@LuciaMia:
You’re a lot nicer than I am. I grew up on a ranch, and if the herd of these folks gets thinned out, I won’t lose any sleep. Being around these types of folks for more than 60 years makes you a little numb to their continual desire to compete for Darwin Awards.
Barbara
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: You probably need to factor in some underreporting, especially in states like Florida.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@TaMara (HFG): I’m tempted to start a Facebook account just so I can post things like that ad. That last shot of trump folding his arms is like a visual definition of petulance
dww44
@jackmac: If the world we inhabit is the least bit just, then you will be correct. I’m making note of the date. Let’s all check back on May 2 or thereabouts.
Another Scott
@NotMax: For those of us out in the normal world, we’re not trying to stop every possible virus particle. We’re trying to stop droplets. Any sort of mask will help, even with a beard.
People working with symptomatic patients need N95 and all the rest because the viral load of the patients in hospitals is huge – orders of magnitude higher than we’re likely to see in every day life.
Wear a mask – every little bit helps. Don’t leave home without it.
Cheers,
Scott.
errg
@TaMara (HFG): That is a really great ad.
Ed Marshall
What I see is Republicans don’t want to own the economic loss and don’t want to own the bodies so you get this Kabuki Theater where they pretend they want the quarantines gone, but they don’t actually want them gone. Sort of like the dude that talks shit and picks a fight with the big guy praying like hell that his friends all grab him and pull him away like he was *gonna* whup that dude if someone hadn’t stopped them.
The thing is that when they stir these people up enough they start changing public behaviors that probably matter more than the quarantine orders. When these people believe there is no virus or it’s over, or whatever they have convinced themselves of they don’t wash their hands, they aren’t careful, and etc… and I can see it in the behavior of the people around me when I make my occasional ventures out into the wild to buy food.
You are going to see it in the new cases two weeks out.
NotMax
@Barbara
It’s a nice courtesy to note a WaPo link as such. That said, their paywall is more porous than tissue paper.
Elizabelle
@Sloane Ranger:
LOL. You just called it.
Selfish fuckers. The only COVID death in my social circle so far is a friend of a friend. A lively 70 year old hair stylist in Florida who died a few weeks ago. It was a shock to her friends, because she did not seem particularly vulnerable.
I know that my hair colorist is a cancer survivor who is younger than I am. Cannot imagine her being called back into service. Stay safe, Lara.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Barbara:
I assumed Japan was probably the oldest from everything I’ve read. Not good.
Ohio Mom
Fun fact: The woman on the far left of the photo, with the trim blond hair and red jacket, is running for the Ohio State Senate. Melissa Ackison.
Barbara
@Brachiator: The issue at nursing homes is almost unavoidable, unless you have basically blanket testing of nursing home workers and a large pool of reserve workers ready to take over when those who have tested positive have to stay away. I have written earlier about my sister. She does not work in a nursing home, but with a similarly fragile population of developmentally disabled adults. Her coworker tested positive, and she was told to come to work unless she began having symptoms, by which point, of course, she could have infected multiple people. She is not being offered a test. I cannot articulate the level of fury I feel at our utter incompetence in the area of testing.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@NotMax:
No joke. I use incognito mode to get past the WaPo’s and NYT’s paywalls
WaterGirl
@dmsilev: You beat me to it. I was about to go with the tried and true… “when you’ve lost Joe Scarborough…”.
geg6
@WestTexan:
Come sit by me, at least six feet away. I live in and grew up in Western PA and I’ve had it with the idiots around here. Thin the herd, I say. Fuck ‘em, as a very wise man once said.
zhena gogolia
@Michael:
Inorite? I saw the same clip.
I love my beautiful silver hair. Hubby trimmed the bangs and I’m good to go.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Barbara:
Wait, what the fuck? That’s a guaranteed way to infect a whole bunch of people
Don K
I’ve noticed a – mmm – pattern in the usage of masks on shopping trips in my neighborhood. Here in the rarified precincts of Bloomfield and Birmingham, MI, people seem to be taking this seriously. In the local boutique grocery, masking is pretty-much universal among the customers. At Kroger, drawing from Pontiac and parts of Waterford as well as Birmingham/Bloomfield, masking was maybe 30-40%. So there’s a definite class component to taking this thing seriously. Sorry if that makes me a snob, but I calls it like I sees it.
ThresherK
@Mandalay: Yeah, I don’t know how badly I want Joe Scarborough agreeing with me.
I don’t trust his decision-making process, or whatever his “North Star” is.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@WestTexan:
If they weren’t endangering other people who can’t avoid them– like the Home Depot workers I’m sure they’re yelling at about their paint and fertilizer, and those workers’ colleagues and parents and kids and….– I’d be right there with you.
Sloane Ranger
@Brachiator: To be fair, the UK government is now following expert advice. It’s the fact it ignored that advice for 4 – 6 weeks that’s the problem. A government adviser has testified to a Select Committee that we will end up with the highest mortality in Europe because the government was so slow to react.
dww44
@West of the Rockies: Glad to know that others feel the same way about Peter Baker, the heir to David Broderism journalism, except from a different by line. He’s paying for access, you know. or, he could genuinely be a real GOP’er. I think the former explains a lot though. I don’t think he’s got any other journalistic principles, other than access and bothsiderism. Never call a spade a spade seems to be his motto.
Don K
@geg6:
I feel the same way about the Michigan Morons.
Suzanne
@Sloane Ranger: We can buy hair dye online. I just did that this week. What I can’t buy online is the experience of someone doing it for me. I would like a haircut and a mani/pedi, but going without won’t kill me. It’s just an inconvenience.
If these people were positively identified and then denied medical care should they contract this illness…. well, that would be ohhhhh so sad.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@ThresherK:
Mika? Who knows. People change. John Cole, example. I’m not saying I trust Scarborough, he and his awful show are what convinces people like Howard Schultz that they’re “centrists”, but I’ll take all the allies we can get for the next seven months
Josie
Some of you may remember my posting about my next door neighbor who believed everything Trump was saying a couple of weeks ago. She phoned me yesterday and expressed how relieved she was that this was almost over. When I tried to say that it probably wasn’t close to over, she was very sure that the worst was behind us. We live in central Texas, but I am sheltering in place with my son’s family in Houston. I am so glad that I am not next door to her right now, or she would be wanting to come over and visit. I am such a terrible person.
NotMax
@Another Scott
You will note I nowhere said I don’t try to wear one, cumbersome and frequently adjustment prone as they are. Frankly, I’ve found donning two T-shirts and pulling the top one up to cover nose and mouth a reasonable compromise over constantly having to fiddle with one that ties or straps on.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@dww44: When Jonathan Chait published his Obama book, he said he was pleasantly surprised to get a positive review from the “right-leaning” Peter Baker. His wife, Susan Glasser, has written some good stuff in the last couple of years, but I’ll never forget when she said something about Obama “spiking the ball” when OBL was killed, and equated it (whatever the hell she was talking about) with Bush’s “Mission Accomplished” stunt.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
Possibly sooner. While the incubation period is as long as 14 days and occasionally even longer, it can be as short as 1 and is most commonly around 5 days.
Source: WHO.
Mallard FIlmore
@NotMax:
When you speak, little flecks of saliva spray out of your mouth. Put a hand mirror an inch from your face and speak for30 seconds and see the results.
A mask is to protect others from YOU.
Suzanne
@Josie:
Come sit by me.
The Thin Black Duke
Don’t apologize for having common sense.
trollhattan
@Brachiator:
This article contains a list of California nursing homes with at least one case and more than half the pages are for Los Angeles. LA has the lion’s share of the state’s cases and deaths, while the Bay Area has cooled off since being our first hot spot.
One home in our area has more than fifty cases between staff and residents. Hell on earth.
Elizabelle
Enjoying this Global Citizen One World streaming concert. It’s an antidote to Trump messaging. The World Health Organization is one of the good guys.
So are people who care enough to isolate and protect their communities. And a lineup of talent that would never perform for Trump. It’s all good.
I really like seeing the singers on their own, without a lot of instrumentation. They’re quite good.
trollhattan
@Mallard FIlmore:
Yeah, it’s a different calculus than if you’re sanding drywall or something.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I had the same theory yesterday when he had his morning twitter nutty. Ive more or less given up hope on anybody flipping, but I wouldn’t be surprised if his super-secret polling looks really bad in places like AZ and FL, maybe even Ohio
Brachiator
@Barbara:
Yes, we absolutely need more, and more efficient testing. But then what? I don’t know the answer, but we need to rethink how we deal with people in social spaces.
I noted in an earlier thread that all they early deaths in Pasadena, California was among patients and staff at nursing homes. And you are right that facilities for developmentally disabled people must also present challenges.
Also, I have read that in some nursing homes, maybe most, a doctor is on call, but not regularly on staff. And nursing homes don’t have the equipment to treat virus outbreaks in the early stages.
Our idiot president and many right wing pundits think that we can magically just return to normal. This only compounds the foolishness of bad decisions.
Also, I note that treating family at home is not always an easy alternative. My sister is trying to find out the latest information about two cousins by marriage. They are sisters. One was wheelchair bound and the other is her caregiver. They both were recently diagnosed with the virus.
dmsilev
@trollhattan: The LA Times has a good tracker for the whole state. Scroll down about halfway for a graphic showing number of cases and number of deaths over time, broken down by county. It looks like LA County passed the peak in new cases a week or so ago, so hopefully the death rate here will start coming down soon.
Cheryl from Maryland
@errg: What impressed me the most about the Biden ads so far is that Biden isn’t the main voice, it’s his advisors with some of their background. Reassuring us that Biden will have a great staff in his administration. I find that notion extremely comforting.
NotMax
@Mallard FIlmore
Well aware of that.
If I speak for 30 seconds per week other than on the landline at home, that’s well above the usual. Local tradition is to, as the patois has it, ‘talk story’ with cashiers, tellers and such, oblivious as to whether others are lined up behind, a practice to which personally do not adhere .
;)
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Jager
My niece is a doc in Sioux Falls, she said the entire staff at her hospital knows the shit is going to hit the fan over the next couple of weeks. Meanwhile, the wingnut governor is declaring SD is “business-friendly” and “we’re open for business”. Of course, Governor Kristi Noem has had some wonderful phone calls with Jared Kushner. I got the feeling that my niece would go full Doctor Mengele on the governor if she showed up at the hospital.
H.E.Wolf
The photo of the zombies in Michigan reminded me of this photo by Will Counts, taken in 1957.
https://allthatsinteresting.com/segregation-in-america-photos#3
[Note: the intended photo at that link takes a few moments to show up.]
trollhattan
Did someone say “testing?”
Some punchline.
japa21
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: True, but just a week or so ago we were in the 50 deaths per million category. We will probably end up over 200 per million. Still not at the level of some countries but a lot higher than most.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): The other problem that may mitigate opening up, is that without testing, folk won’t want to go out and do things. It doesn’t matter if stuff is open if there’s no business.
Elizabelle
@H.E.Wolf: Yes. Exactly. It is the same type who were screaming at having the schools (and buses) integrated.
They are always with us, but there are more of us.
Sloane Ranger
@Suzanne: Exactly! I had a hairdresser appointment today that has been cancelled until who knows when. This is a crisis We all have to put up with some inconveniences until it’s over.
geg6
@Don K:
Same here except it was the difference between the Giant Eagle grocery store and Target with lots of masks and the Walmart super center with many fewer.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Another Scott: Joe’s a former Republican, but I’ll fully trust him when like our Blogfather who art in West(By God) Virginia registers as a Democrat.
Mallard FIlmore
@NotMax: I have also been using your trick with T-shirts. Masks are always out of stock here.
debbie
I’ve become convinced Trump has his own plan for voter suppression, and it is to kill off the voters who won’t be voting for him. No PPE, no tests, no aid, etc.; however, this latest move of his to get his supporters out and spreading their angry spittle may have just evened the playing field.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@NotMax: A mask isn’t to protect you, it’s to protect those around you if you’re a carrier of the the virus. If you go out in public wear your mask.
Calouste
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Belgium does probably the most complete reporting on COVID-19 deaths of any country, including nursing homes etc. The UK for example routinely only includes positively identified deaths in hospitals, not in nursing homes, in the official figures.
I’ve also seen reports that in the Netherlands there are about 60% more deaths per week than last year, and the officially reported COVID-19 cases only account for half of that.
Josie
@Suzanne:
I will, for more than one reason. I also bought my L’oreal online this week and trimmed my own bangs. Lol
khead
@Humdog:
I hope you like anthrax and tire rims.
khead
@Sloane Ranger:
Becky and Karen are more interested in complaining.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Josie: I ordered hair clippers and coiffed my own melon and I may only go back to the Hair Barn for fancy special occasions
jl
This, from the NYT link, is crap BS pandering from a story that is not labeled opinion:
” Trump is tapping into a powerful well of political energy as he seeks re-election this year. ”
So far, all the protests that I have seen in honest actual news reports (as opposed to BS NYT style opinionating disguised as news) is that the protests are piddly sparsely attended obviously astroturfed tokens, bought and paid for by the DeVose family, attended by ignorant dupes and malicious radical extremist elements.
The mealey mouth, lies by omission, counter to the lie that there is some substantial popular groundswell of support for this fraud was down at the bottom of the story. DeVos support not mentioned. Astroturfing not mentioned.
Lemme tell ya, I have contacted CBS, NPR, NYT and told them to knock off the horsecrap and am making a mental note of who is advertising (or ‘sponsoring’) them and will boycott their asses, and I don’t listen t national CBS news or NPR anymore, and I get my NYT through an institutional subscription and they’ll never get a penny from me because they are meretricious pompous failed upward garbage.
debbie
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Maybe this?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
How do these people get their shoes on in the morning ?
prostratedragon
At some point someone here must have linked to a specimen image by the scientist Lalo Alcaraz, of the greatest threat to our public health, safety, and sanity today:
In all seriousness, I imagine that the forces of evil lunacy view the covid-sars pandemic as made to order for their election shenanigans, but if it takes a Flight 93 attitude to get one’s vote in, me and my oxygen tank are there.
Bill Arnold
@Uncle Cosmo:
WaPo links work in a private browsing/incognito window. You have to click a couple of times. (Same for NYMag.)
jl
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Checked out the links. Looks like two or three dozen, at most, mentally and emotionally damaged people. Did they get a box lunch from the de Vos family for showing up?
Edit: also note the frequency of preprinted, professionally produced, signs and flags. Pretty effing transparent, IMHO.
NotMax
Heh. Perusing the offerings of a wide-ranging music and song channel on the Roku, came across several rather esoteric categories. Descriptions and titles are verbatim.
1) Baseball’s All-time Great Walk-up Tracks – “The songs Major League sluggers choose to play at the stadium as they step up to the plate.”
2) Thanks For Holding! – “You’re on-hold, so enjoy this music and we’ll pick up soon.”
3) Love Is A Bummer – “Pop & alternative rock for the sad, the cynical and the scorned.”
Aleta
Patton Oswalt @pattonoswalt
Anne Frank spent 2 years hiding in an attic and we’ve been home for just over a month with Netflix, food delivery & video games and there are people risking viral death by storming state capital buildings & screaming, “Open Fuddruckers!”
Ohio Mom
I had a moment of being bummed out earlier today, when I realized that one of my favorite annual occasions, the Burlington Kentucky Antique Fair, won’t be opening tomorrow. It’s our local version of Brimfield.
Then I tried to imagine being able to go to the final Fair of the season in October, and I couldn’t.
I can’t imagine what would have to happen — short of a vaccine — that would make me willing to go into a crowded space again.
DeWine can open Ohio up but I’m not going.
Poe Larity
Given we all have so much time on our hands, perhaps we can collectively answer some of the greatest mysteries of our time. As i have a channel that plays a lot of old bad movies, I was wondering “Who is the greatest conservative actor of our time?”
I’d like to nominate Steven Seagal. Perhaps you can do better.
Rob
@CaseyL: Are you using Ad Blocker Plus? I had the same embedded video problem you had, which disappeared when I turned off ABP for Twitter.
debbie
@Ohio Mom:
The local Fox station had a viewer poll earlier this week which asked when would it be safe to return to pre-pandemic life. I was shocked that 80% of them said only when there was a vaccine.
Trump’s not going to win this.
Reboot
@Poe Larity: Well, speaking semi-seriously, Fred Astaire/Ginger Rogers.
Martin
@Humdog:
We aren’t supposed to. That’s why they’re so heavily armed.
Just One More Canuck
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Flowbee or GTFO
NotMax
@Poe Larity
Would have to go with Jon Voight.
Tony Jay
WHAT THEY DID IN THE SHADOWS
I could go into mortifying detail about the many, many things the Tory administrators of this Lesser Brexshitopia outlet (formerly known as the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland) are in the process of screwing up where the Coronavirus Pandemic is concerned, either deliberately, because Conservative Ideology Uber Alles, or just through rank incompetence, because Conservative Idiocracy Utilities Arseholes, but the sad truth is that most of it would be entirely familiar to anyone suffering under the perpetual “Take Your Unemployable Wannabe Third-Rate Mobster Uncle to Work and Leave Him There Day” regime instituted by Preznut Wide-Load. In fact, I’d hazard a guess that a not-insignificant portion of the problem over here is that St Bozo the Martyr’s Premiership-in-Absentium has only one foreign policy maxim, and that is ” Do Not Offend the Demented One”. So they’re not testing and contact-tracing, partially because that might make Donald look bad, they’re not using Emergency Powers to source vital PPE from local sources or allying with the EU to produce ventilators, partially because that might make Donald look bad, they haven’t been proactive in going after a vaccine, partially because that might make Donald…. look, you get the picture.
OTOH they have foot-dragged and delayed at every turn in order to stick to a Donald-friendly Timeline of Inaction, they have trialled a ‘Blame China’ narrative online and through their friends in the ‘Independent British Media’, and they have turned the daily Press Briefings on the pandemic into festivals of back-covering, whitewashing and spoon-feeding so content free that it has fallen to that omniurge of self-regarding twattery Piers ‘The Polterzeitgeist’ Morgan to be seemingly the only majorish figure in the Infotainment industry willing to call out various Ministers and other Renfields of the Right for their complete and utter failure to uncork their thumbs from their bleached arse-spouts and at least try to look like they give a shit about all of the people who are DYING ON THEIR WATCH. Which they can’t, really, because they don’t. They care about (their) money, about (their) jobs, and about (their) futures, and since they’re trying to achieve those solipsistic priorities while up to their frequently auto-asphyxiated necks in the fetid necro-swamps of Modern British Conservatism, it wouldn’t surprise me in the least if the number one topic for discussion behind closed doors in Westminster isn’t how to strengthen the systematically underfunded NHS and keep its heroic staff from contracting C-19 in their thousands, but rather how to respond to the Toadwanged Tyrant’s latest call for mass virus spreading via armed insurrection against Democratic State Governments in the most ingratiating way possible. It’ll be tricky, but the likelihood of some of the more venomous hate-vectors in the Far-Right Press editorialising in favour of “The (white) People reclaiming the streets (of Labour voting London and other civilised bastions) from the Barmy Business-hating Bolsheviks of City Hall” just went up a thousandfold. So that’s the super-duper Brexit Trade-Deal with our good friend Don the Con assured, eh? Oh to be a fly on the wall when someone lets them know what’s scheduled to happen in November, and what that might mean for a foreign Government that owes a ton of favours to the Cambridge Analytica/GRU/Lord Mephisto of the Seventeenth Hell networks behind Brexit, Trumpalooka, and the wider Rise of the Shitehawkers franchise worldwide. Gonna be Good Times, innit?
Seems like a good time for the Labour Party to at least try to rustle up some interest in the Media for another viewpoint, but given the overwhelming pro-Tory bent in ownership and editorial authority that’s hugely unlikely. The new leader, Kier ‘Bland Toff” Starmer is in a pretty awkward position. He’s not Jeremy Corbyn, which is bound to be a plus when dealing with a national Media that utterly hated Jezza and everything (tax rises on their very rich owners to fund pay rises for public workers, mostly) that he stood for, but OTOH he is the leader of the Labour Party, so ignoring him unless he agrees with the Tory Government is pretty much baked into the Piss Pudding that is our national Media culture. He did come out with a nice little question about what, exactly, the Tories had in mind by the way of an Exit Strategy when and if social distancing and (non-existent) testing brings the pandemic under control, which was enough to send the usual suspects on the Right into paroxysms of spittle-flecked outrage… right up until later that afternoon when the latest Untervölksfuhrer assigned to fill in for our bravely recuperating St Bozo the Fecund (either Dominic ‘steroidal peanut’ Raab, Matt ‘nobodies favourite fool’ Hancock, or one of the other minions, it doesn’t really matter which) announced that of course the Government had an Exit Strategy that they’ll be sharing with the nation, just as soon as military planners could be certain that the dastardly Virus wasn’t looking. Can’t be too careful, eh? With the Tories’ entire strategy seeming to revolve around cosplaying this as an Our Finest Hour LARP (civilians died in that unavoidable clash of Good and Evil too, you see?) and the vast bulk of the Press and the BBC eagerly pretending that encouraging people to clap for the NHS every Thursday at 8pm is a national sacrifice on a par with The Blitz, Conscription and free blow-jobs for sailors, I suppose every effort to nudge the heartless master-class towards a slightly better policy is a victory of sorts.
Starmer’s main problem right now is an internal one. Corbyn had to go, politics demanded it, but the fact remains that the vast majority of the Party knows how unfairly he was treated and has no time (unless we’re talking time in a locked room with an assortment of alternately sharp and blunt implements) for the backstabbing shitbags of the Parliamentary Party who spent the last four years working hand in hand with the Press to destroy his leadership regardless of the cost to the Party and the country. Starmer had already sent shivers down more than one spine by wasting no time bending the knee to Britain’s version of AIPAC and handing ‘anti-Semitism sensitivity training’ over to the same Jewish Labour Movement (to be part of which you need to be neither Jewish nor Labour, but definitely some kind of ‘movement’) that many members blame for weaponizing the “Corbyn Hatez The Jooz” bullshit most ruthlessly. I, for one, don’t fancy being a member of a Party where I can be expelled if one of the JLM’s purity-police decides that my dislike of Likud and Israeli expansionism is a mask for secret anti-Semitism, thanks very much, and I’m far from alone.
Last week, though, a depth-charge hit the Party with the leak of an internal report into Labour’s handling of anti-Semitism accusations that was supposed to form an appendix to the Party’s main submission to the Equality and Human Rights Commission (which is investigating Labour to see if it breached anyone’s rights in the course of investigating accusations) until Labour Party lawyers decided (so we’re told) not to send it, hence the need for the leak. It’s 860+ pages long, but to summarise, it’s basically an exhaustive expose of how virulent antipathy towards Corbyn and the wider Left among the extremely right-wing apparatchiks who controlled (and mostly still control) the Party’s internal bureaucracy led to a toxic atmosphere where these complete jizmites exploited their positions in the Party’s legal and disciplinary offices to deliberately block the investigation of anti-Semitism complaints, some for years, while ignoring increasingly loud entreaties from the Leader’s Office to speed them up and expel the offenders, then lied to the Leadership that everything was being investigated (not true) and everything was proceeding as quickly as possible (also not true), while at the same time briefing the Media that it was, in fact, the evil Leadership who were intervening in the disciplinary process to prevent the expulsions of their fellow anti-Semites in order to facilitate some kind of Judenfrei Britain because, something, something, something, did you know that the Nazis were also National-Socialists, nudge-nudge, wink-wink, say no fucking more?
Now, I am not and never have been a particular fan of the Blairite Tendency and their relentless triangulation, hippy-bashing cynicism and billionaire-fellating hard on for stealth privatisation, but even I was goggling like a short sighted Granny at a Banana-Hammock Convention at the depths of their entitled mendacity. You’d really have to read it yourself to get the full picture, but from start to finish it’s absolutely horrifying. In their own words (e-mails and multi-party conversations from secret WhatsApp Chatgroups feature heavily) these bastards happily explain how anyone to the left of Gordon Brown and the Divine Blair is “a trot”, as in a Trotskyite, who should never be allowed in ‘their’ Party except as mute forelock-tugging votes-on-legs. Even Ed Miliband was too left wing for these fuckers, which is additionally uncomfortable for Starmer since he only just brought Miliband back into his Cabinet. They laugh about spending all of their time in the run up to the 2015 and 2016 Labour Leadership Elections pretending to work while actually trawling social media for ‘evidence’ that could be used to deny membership to anyone suspected of being a potential Corbyn vote (this has been denied and downplayed for years, BTW) in what they called “trot-hunting”. They’re even on the hook for secretly redirecting vital electoral funds during the 2017 election away from tight marginals and towards solid Labour seats held by trusted centre-right MPs, including the odious former Deputy Leader Tom Watson. Damningly they share their abject horror at how well the Labour Party actually did in 2017 and at how close Corbyn came to becoming Prime Minister. Again and again in chats to each other they make it crystal clear that their wing of the Labour Party has no actual policy disagreements with the Tories; opposition to May’s hated Dementia Tax (2017’s planned changes to funding for adult social care which were so incredibly unpopular with voters that proposing them may have been the single most damaging own-goal her Government ever scored) is simply incomprehensible to them. Pushing for laws to crack down on slum-landlords? That’s ‘landlord-bashing’. Returning corporation tax to where it was under previous Labour Governments? Utter madness. It’s hard (so I didn’t try) to avoid the obvious conclusion that the right-wing of the Labour Party sees the whole democratic exercise as nothing more than a chance for ‘their team’ to take over the grift for a while, different names on the payroll, but the destination remains the same. Tories are rivals, friendly competition, it’s the actual Labour Party that exists outside of their narrow clique that they reserve their genuine bile for, and boy, do they hate us.
As you’d expect, this leak has caused something of an issue in the Labour Party, shooting a great big hole through Starmer’s call for Party unity in the wake of the 2019 defeat. Given that there’s a wee bit of a health crisis going on I can understand the rapidity with which he’s tried to bury it for a while under promises of an independent inquiry, greatly assisted by the British Media, of course, which is doing its absolute level best to look anywhere else but at the clear evidence that all of those ‘trusted Labour sources’ they’ve been quoting at length for years were either lying to them….. or were telling them exactly what they were all agreed the Great British Public needed to hear, if you know what I mean, and I think you do. Personally I’m rather uncomfortable with some of the stated terms of that enquiry being an investigation into the reasons the report was commissioned and who leaked it, since the reason is obvious, it’s to showcase documentary evidence that the entire anti-Semitism scandal was stirred up, exacerbated and kept alive by the very same people who the Media have consistently lionized as brave, truth-telling whistleblowers waging a thankless battle within the Party against the Jew-hating Left, and though there may be very pertinent questions to ask about the source of the leak, it doesn’t detract for a moment from the reality that senior Party figures deliberately conspired with the national Media (most directly with the Guardian, but not just them) to falsely paint the entire Labour Party as a hotbed of anti-Semitism just to make sure that Jeremy Corbyn and the people around him would never get anywhere near Downing Street.
The looming disaster of a No-Deal Brexit, the millions of lives destroyed and tens of thousands ended by continued Austerity, and now the blackly comic reality of a Government (hardly even) led by Alexander Boris de Pfeffel fucking Johnson trying to Three Word Slogan its way through a dystopic pandemic, all prices well worth paying in their self-regarding shitweasel minds to keep those grubby little Socialists from messing with the gross inequality that they personally profit from. After mulling it over for a nanosecond, I think… maybe I disagree with them.
These fucking people.
Bill Arnold
@Ed Marshall:
This is “Stochastic Murder“.
Influencing people such they do not take (or relax) precautions against a real (and reasonably probable) deadly threat is not just negligent homicide, it’s murder. Whether the law agrees or not, I don’t much care.
geg6
@Poe Larity:
Andy Garcia, much as it pains me.
James E Powell
@khead:
I have two friends with those names who were not aware of the associations until I told them. They are not happy. Neither one is blonde, neither is anything like that.
Baud
Give me liberty and give me death.
Baud
@geg6: I didn’t know that.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
and he leads up to that with a little sing-song discussion of how NK is testing missiles, and he got a very nice note from KJU recently
Still hard for me to accept that probably 30% of the country watches this babbling moron and thinks, “Yup, he’s got this”, and another 10 or 12 thinks “close your eyes and think of Bret Kavanaugh.
mrmoshpotato
Which New York jackal wants the honor of smacking Peter Baker with an eight-foot pole? (Two feet to hold it.)
M^4, you up for some batting practice?
WaterGirl
@Rob:
How do you turn off ABP for twitter?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Poe Larity:
Robert Duval
debbie
@geg6:
Gary Oldman.
James E Powell
@Poe Larity:
James Caan
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Sloane Ranger: Boris Johnson sure saw the wisdom of science after his hospital stay. I saw the speech Johnson made when he came out and was he doing everything in his praise short of offering sexual favors to the medical people who saved his life.
debbie
@James E Powell:
Not sure any of the actors mentioned so far can top James Wood for rabidity.
mrmoshpotato
@jackmac: Dying of a highly infectious virus to own the libs?
CaseyL
@Rob: Thank you, thank you, thank you! That seems to have done the trick – consider yourself air-kissed, from a safe distance.
JMG
Alice’s birthday today. Didn’t get to shop for a gift (we were supposed to go to France to see our daughter, but that went south fast). Good birthday dinner though. Defrosted some bay scallops we bought in December during the season, had a vegetable medley of roasted broccoli, cauliflower and carrots and had a cremant de bourgogne sparkling burgundy with cheese and crackers as an hors d’oeuvre. Apple cake cooling before dessert and happy birthday song.
Just can’t get into raging or snarking right now. I heartily recommend clearing space in your day to do something to remind yourself life doesn’t suck overall, just parts of it.
Spanky
@Poe Larity: Well, nominating Steven Seagal shows you’re not serious about the acting part, but if you were, I’d go with Jimmy Stewart.
Rob
@WaterGirl: On my MacBook Pro/Firefox, Ad Block Plus is on the ‘URL bar’, on the right. I click on the ABP stop-sign ‘icon’ and I toggle “Block Ads On” to the left so ads aren’t blocked on Twitter. I have also done that for Balloon Juice.
Rob
@CaseyL: I’m glad that it worked!
CaseyL
@WaterGirl: Go the ABP icon in the upper toolbar and click on it. You get a window with Ad Block turned on for whatever site you’re at. It will say BLOCK ADS ON – with the website noted. Turn the adblocker off, then click on Refresh.
Cameron
@NotMax: You might try this. I’m using it and it seems to work pretty well. I take it off after I’m done shopping and am out in the open air again, since it’s pretty uncomfortable wearing a mask in Florida.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYIyylKphb8
JPL
@JMG: Happy Birthday It sounds like a lovely dinner. Finch’s dogwalker has a birthday on Monday and he’ll be fifteen.. We met outside when he returned from his walk and had cupcakes and soda outside six feet apart. Finch was more excited than anyone cuz he never could understand why the dog walker could no longer come inside.
prostratedragon
@donnah:
For less than 15 minutes of your (speaking generally) time you can get a summary of the last 20 press briefings, in more-digestible if somewhat free musical form. Each capsule sounds like a variation on the phrase, “What. The. Fu-u-u-ck?!”
mrmoshpotato
@TaMara (HFG): Morning Joe Blows is still a sack of shit, but that is a damn good ad.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Calouste: Oh doubtless the death toll is higher than the official number, but I think 100,000 dead in a month would be noticed. Keep in a mind a lot of these European countries dithered around during the early stages as badly as we did.
catclub
Helaine Olen – WAPO
Geoduck
@Don K: Also, the more money you have, the more likely you are able to make or acquire a mask in the first place.
BC in Illinois
@Tony Jay:
From Nicola Sturgeon:
Nicola again:
I don’t know if the SNP is doing everything right, but Nicola Sturgeon seem to be a totally reasonable voice.
Elizabelle
@JMG: Happy Birthday Alice. Sounds like a feast. With bubbly.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@debbie: I believe his fellow Smiley Alec Guiness was an old school Tory, too.
I love the old BBC Tinker, Tailor series, but I have to agree with twitter Nixon, you can really the dark side of Smiley in Oldman’s face. He’s done some stuff.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Objection; Seagal champions American Indians and environmental issues. Not a True American Conservative, even if Seagal swore allegiance to Putin.
I nominated Kevin Sorbo for his series of Christian Persecution Porn movies.
mrmoshpotato
@Steeplejack (phone): The dead can’t vote. What do they think Michigan is – Chicago?!
feebog
I’ve been saying this for a few weeks now; we should be comparing current death levels to the same period last year. Most states keep these statistics on a weekly basis. Cause everyone gets a death certificate. It would give us a much better baseline.as to what the real death toll is.
NotMax
Way early notice of an event which might be of interest amongst jackaldom.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Speaking of which….
the wing nut meme coming to a Facebook near you is that mosques will be getting special treatment during Ramadan while the woman in Michigan didn’t want you to be able to celebrate Easter
BC in Illinois
@Baud:
Alexandra Petri, WaPo:
Give Me Liberty And Give me Death
NotMax
@Cameron
Thanks, but have none of the materials required at hand.
WaterGirl
@Rob: So I would have to let ads through? If so, not worth it. Bummer.
Ladyraxterinok
@dmsilev:
Will Joe EVER admit his part in electing Trump?
He acts as if Trump came out of the woodwork!
prostratedragon
@Sloane Ranger:
entitled white people wanting other people to risk their health and lives so they aren’t inconvenienced.
Absolutely. Incidentally, I think there might be restrictions on fertilizer sales in this country because of the Oklahoma City bombing. Horrific things can be done with the stuff, because of the nitrogen.
Barbara
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): I don’t know how much contact she had with the coworker, but it was enough that it prompted a talk with the employer. How many health care workers have been exposed and how many are being told to continue working? A lot. You can’t just abandon people.
Sab
@Ohio Mom: I see why Melissa Ackison is so upset. She didn’t used to be a blonde, and pretty soon she will not be one again.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Tony Jay:
I won’t try to defend those Labour guys, but Corbyn lost for a reason.
I think both Corbyn’s, and Sanders’, electoral strategies rested on outdated assumptions about the electorate from this Vox Sanders post-mortem:
Sab
@geg6: Ohio gov says west pa people can’t buy booze in Ohio anymore.
Barbara
@Brachiator: Totally agree that it might not be easy to figure out what we should do with the knowledge of how prevalent the disease is and who has it, but flying blind is so much worse than arguing from a place of knowledge. And clearly, for nursing home workers who might have been exposed, being able to get tested after 3-5 days of isolation in order to confirm whether they need to stay away longer is much better than having them come to work until they have symptoms.
Sab
@Don K: I am noticing the opposite. Snowbirds don’t mask. POC do.
Tony Jay
@BC in Illinois:
Yup. The SNP are in the comfortable position of having no real challengers and the long term policy of wrapping their basic policy (Independence from London) in the blue and gold of rejoining the EU. They don’t need to bullshit anyone about Coronavirus and can just follow best practice while pointing at England and saying “See? That’s the other option”
Come the inevitable Referendum on cutting loose they’ll be disappointed if they don’t hit 60% for Yes. It turns out that if you combine the left-wing policies Scottish Labour abandoned in the 2000s with the flag wrapped nationalism normally harnessed by the Tories – only Saltire flavoured for Jock sensibilities – you can win a lot of Scottish votes.
Whooda Thunkit?
Jinchi
Looking at the current data on new cases (at 91-divoc), several states like Washington, Louisiana, and Michigan actually look like they’ve moved well past their peaks and are getting control of the situation. Others like California, Colorado, New Mexico appear to have hit their peaks and stalled .
South Dakota looks like it’s just gotten started and is still climbing fast (increasing 15% per day). If it keeps on the current trend they will have one of the worst per capita totals in the country.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
and another dignity wraith is wraithed
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Barbara:
Oh absolutely not. It’s a bad situation
CaseyL
@WaterGirl: So far as I can tell, you can block them individually – the way you block anyone whose tweets you don’t want to see. I’ve done that and so far have not seen a similar slowdown. It might depend on how many ads you wind up blocking!
mrmoshpotato
@Ladyraxterinok: LOL
How’s the veal?
Another Scott
@prostratedragon: Bad linky.
https://therobertreport.net/2020/03/06/pendejovirus-of-course-from-dr-p-hackett-my-personal-physician/
:-)
Thanks.
Cheers,
Scott.
Sab
@jl: Hear hear!
Chyron HR
Jesus Christ, the Berniebros have gotten into the NYT.
mrmoshpotato
@kindness: Hillary was nice to call these skidmarks “deplorable.”
Tony Jay
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
Of course there were reasons. I say they were Brexit, where a big chunk of Labour votes across the North went Tory to show ‘those people’ what was important to them (racism), and anti-Semitism, where endless repetition by the ‘Liberal Media’ convinced what Doug J calls the ‘totebaggers’ (socially liberal, fiscally conservative, intellectually lazy) that they simply couldn’t vote for that Corbyn fellow without looking like awful racists, so went Green or Lib Dem and handed the seat to the Tories.
The Tories were able to run and win with a boorish TV celebrity as their leader because they were campaigning against an entirely fictional opponent defined by years of venomous hostile media and undermined by a faction of the Party that simply refused to accept them as legitimate.
Sound familiar?
Just One More Canuck
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
the article says that Sanders worked hard to court black voters, but doesn’t say what it was that he did to court them
Fair Economist
@trollhattan: The numbers don’t look all that bad for Japan. Their cases per capita are still one of the lowest among Western countries and their growth rate is still slowish. They’re also supposed to have a lot of hospital beds per capita (not necessarily COVID suitable, of course). I don’t see why it would be all that bad there – certainly bad, sure, but compared to almost everybody it shouldn’t be.
Another Scott
@Tony Jay: Zooks!! Thanks for the report.
Is there any way for Starmer to somehow clean house of the backstabbers?
I’ve been flabbergasted by most of the BBC coverage these days. “Oh, another 900 people died of COVID-19 today and our brave NHS doesn’t have enough PPE, but here let’s go live to Downing Street for today’s live briefing. And afterwards, we’ll go live to the White House for the live briefing from Washington…”
They report it like it’s the weather – he’s what happened, but eh, what are you going to do? Let’s see everyone smile and clap!!1
Grrr…
Cheers,
Scott.
mrmoshpotato
@Just One More Canuck: Wagged his finger and shouted at them?
Rob
@WaterGirl: I also run uBlockOrigin at the same time as I run ABP and I still have uB running for Twitter. There’s something currently in/on ABP but not uBlock that affects embedded videos in Twitter.
eta so I don’t see ads in Twitter because uBlock is on.
Fair Economist
@Jinchi:
The California numbers are really frustrating me. Here in Socal we’re off our peak but not all that much, and we’ve been shelter-at-home for a month. The parks and stores around me are being pretty reasonable; spacing respected, no crowds, etc. Hats off to those cities that are making it work; I just wish we could make it happen here.
NoraLenderbee
@Chyron HR: The cover of the May 2020 issue of Harper’s magazine features Thomas Frank and “How the Anti-Populists Stopped Bernie Sanders.”
I sent a nastygram reminding him that Bernie was stopped by nobody except the voters, nearly 2/3 of whom chose not to vote for him. When is this shit going to stop?
eddie blake
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
helps that both corbyn and sanders are complete assholes.
i’m a democrat. i’m not a corrupt, corporate whore, i’m a carpenter, and i got very tired of sanders and his spokespeople talking shit about me and my party.
Tony Jay
@Another Scott:
The BBC is utterly broken where the Tories are concerned. Cameron changed the system in the 2010s so that the Government appointed the members of the top management who then got to appoint the rest of the board, leading to the present day where the vast majority of BBC top executives are placemen moved over from the Murdoch empire, the Telegraph, etc, with a licence to suck arse and wreck shit in advance of privatisation. Job done.
As for Starmer…. I’m willing to give him a chance, but I’m yet to be convinced that he actually wants to get rid of the backstabbers. If anyone on the Left had done anything remotely like the crap those bastards pulled we’d already be looking at mass expulsions and widescale Media coverage of Starmer’s firmness and decisive leadership. Since it was the Blairite Right…. silence.
I hope I’m wrong.
WaterGirl
@Rob: I appear to have both running at the same time, also
I get so frustrated with ad blockers now that Apple put all the restrictions on which ones you can use. So I start to set them up and then walk away in disgust. I haven’t taken the time to delve into any of them. First time I’ve been really pissed at Apple.
Mnemosyne
@Sloane Ranger:
My gray roots are pretty bad, so I got some fun semi-permanent colors online from a company called Overtone. The purple for brown hair is almost gone, so rose gold for brown hair will be next. I have orange and vivid purple next in line after that.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Fair Economist: Folk are still out and about(playing soccer in MacArther Park, etc) here in LA county, that’s what’s keeping the numbers up.
Fair Economist
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Yes, the driving force behind the left shift in the world isn’t class consciousness anymore. Marxists are stuck in the wrong century. The driving force now is the huge requirements and benefits for cooperation – climate change is an existential threat the whole world will have to work on, and the information economy works better the more people get along. Policy preferences are pretty similar between New Left and Old Left and they *can* get along but the New Left is driving the bus now.
Procopius
FIFY
Mike in NC
Since the stay-at-home stuff went into effect, one thing we haven’t seen are more mass shootings. That’s downright unAmerican!!!
Time to Make America Bleed Again, say the Sovereign Citizens.
eddie blake
@Just One More Canuck:
hired michael moore to say that the democratic electorate in south carolina wasn’t representative of the country as a whole, so sanders’ crushing loss didn’t count.
burnspbesq
@NotMax:
Try to keep your vanity from killing anyone.
Kim Walker
@jl: is there some reason why nice people aren’t tracking all Fox News ads and letting sponsors know there will be consequences for advertising on Fox. Why not make Rupert pay for all of it without subsidies from the commercial sponsors? Has a well thought out boycott been tried?
danielx
@Poe Larity:
James Woods
Jon Voight
Procopius
@Steeplejack (phone): As a Michigan voter I’m grateful that the Republicans shot themselves in the foot if they actually did reduce Gov. Whitmer’s chances of being selected vice president. That means she can stay on and do good as our governor (dog knows there’s enough damage the Republicans have done that she can start repairing) and also have a better chance when she does run for President. There’s a curse on the office of Vice President, which I think means a good chance that Trump will win in November despite the depression that’s coming
ETA: I don’t want to see Elizabeth Warren running as vice either. We desperately need her in the Senate.
BC in Illinois
@Tony Jay:
If they do go independent, I will put on the Clan C tie, go back to the Clan C ancestral homeland, and drink scotch with the descendants of the people who kicked my ancestors out of the highlands.
cain
@dmsilev:
I don’t think it is so strange. Scarborough and others are classic conservatives and ultimately believe in institutions – christianity, government, etc. What we have here is not conservatism, but something else that is akin to unchecked fascism coupled with religious zealotry. and cult of personality.
We’re going to all have to get together and start really working to get this very dangerous man out of power.
Tony Jay
@BC in Illinois:
It’s only a matter of time. I’ve got a friend who works up in Aberdeen as a helicopter engineer. English, ex-military, occasionally flirted with being a bit of a ‘patriot’ in the antipathy to ‘those people’ sense. He’s grown out of that, and while he’d prefer to move closer to his family he’s pretty much 80% behind voting Independence and making Scotland his home if it comes to it, such is his disgust with what Tory England has become.
The English Press has made it crystal clear that its Tories or close enough to Tory to confuse all but experienced spotters down here for the foreseeable future, so why not get the fuck out while its still possible.
Looking more tempting to me by the day.
Rob
@WaterGirl: Hopefully you’ll replicate my experience?
What kind of devices does this Apple adblocker restriction affect? I’d be pissed at Apple too.
WaterGirl
@Rob: It’s been implemented in Mojave, and will be implemented in the OS going forward.
That’s 10.14. It came on my replacement computer. I was running one iteration earlier on my previous computer.
Rob
@WaterGirl: Ah, thanks, I’m obviously behind. What kind of restrictions are there in the newer OS? Do they apply to Firefox, or are you using Safari?
WaterGirl
@Rob: I believe it’s only Safari, but i hate Firefox and Chrome, so Safari is my browser.
This is about AdBlock specifically, but if you google you will find all sorts of info. The new AdBlock that we can use with Safari isn’t half as good as the old one. My opinion.
https://help.getadblock.com/support/solutions/articles/6000202459-where-s-the-adblock-for-safari-extension-
Sab
@Tony Jay: American National Public Radio plays a 5 minute BBC news at the top of the hour every hour. I hadn’t heard it in months until yesterday. It really has become awful.
Rob
@WaterGirl: Thanks! That matches what happened to me, which I had forgotten about until my last reply to you. About 18 months ago Safari/Apple “said”, more or less, that I had to get the adblockers from the app store (I had been using ABP not from the app store in Safari there iirc). Since I was already not that impressed with Safari’s cookie blocking, I abandoned the browser and did everything in Firefox.
EmbraceYourInnerCrone
@Mandalay: we are closing in on 40000 dead in the US and I think we are under counting by a lot.
joel hanes
@Jinchi:
Looking at the current data on new cases (at 91-divoc)
The availability of tests has actually declined, as the labs that evaluate have saturated, and as shortages of various sorts begin to bite.
Although deaths are a trailing indicator, IMHO the number of deaths is far more reliable. Several of the states that have been discussed as “past the peak” have recently recorded new highest deaths per day. That’s what I’m watching on 91-divoc.
Hope is good. Don’t fool yourself. Until there’s a vaccine or a very good and affordable remedy (as I understand it, remdesivir currently costs $1000 / dose), most of us should social distance and mask, shelter at home if we can, and face-to-face public gatherings will be … ill-advised.
geg6
@Sab:
We were kicked out of West Virginia, too. West fucking Virginia!
dww44
@Brachiator: I have been fuming all night since the daily briefing. While we were watching the Global Citizen event on almost all the major news outlets, Fox was airing Kudlow on Jessee Watters about how Americans were protesting mitigation. They both come across as simply out of it and living in a different reality from the sane world. Truly they are all of them just insane and they are gonna get us all killed.
dww44
@Mandalay: Yep, and I will gleefully accept his and his guests support. We have to win versus a building meme on the part of those media outlets that ought to know better. This is no longer a country or world where namby pamby bothsiderism journalism should carry the day. Any sentient being who loves this country should be in the ABT camp.
Matt McIrvin
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Why would Ohio even be talking about such a thing? It looks like they’re having a major burst of new cases–they looked like they were getting it under control and now the counts are taking off.
dopey-o
@Tony Jay: nice rundown of Labour’s ongoing car crash / train wreck / giant asteroid trouble.
What about that Intel report on Russian influence on the brexit vote?
Uncle Cosmo
@NotMax: Anyone who understands anything about chem/bio defense (in which field I worked for ~15 years) knows you can’t keep more than a very well-trimmed moustache without fucking up a mask.
I’ve worn a short beard or van Dyke for most of the last decade, but when I decided to venture out after a couple of weeks selif-isolated, I shaved the whole shebang that morning, even though shaving irritates the crap out of my skin. And I’ll do it again the next time. Needs must when COVID drives.
You can’t be bothered? Stay the fuck home & pay someone to deliver stuff for you. And tip them well.
(Tl;dr version: My mileage sure the fuck does vary, boychik.)