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You are here: Home / Healthcare / COVID-19 Coronavirus / Late Night Sad Little Horrorshow Open Thread: Is This Your ‘Movement’?

Late Night Sad Little Horrorshow Open Thread: Is This Your ‘Movement’?

by Anne Laurie|  April 21, 202012:19 am| 58 Comments

This post is in: COVID-19 Coronavirus, Open Threads, Republican Stupidity, Show Us on the Doll Where the Invisible Hand Touched You, Our Failed Media Experiment

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I hope this is a spoof?…

Someone doing a spoof of protesters would say the same thing, I can't tell the difference anymore https://t.co/5GS3viTlyP

— Justin Fenton (@justin_fenton) April 20, 2020


Except Ms. Allison seems to be a mainstream reporter:

Much smaller crowd at the Tennessee Capitol today for the reopen rally, but @RepMartinDaniel is in attendance. He’s one of at least 2 other legislators who have sent letters to @GovBillLee asking him to lift restrictions. (Lee has set May 1 as tentative start date for that) pic.twitter.com/rxRGrIC1x6

— Natalie Allison (@natalie_allison) April 20, 2020

This lady is yelling toward the Tennessee Capitol at @GovBillLee, trying to compare the coronavirus shutdown to the Holocaust.

“80 years ago Jews didn’t have a chance. We f—ing do,” she shouts. pic.twitter.com/VEHoukbKyJ

— Natalie Allison (@natalie_allison) April 20, 2020

Not just the Volunteer (to Die for Free Refills) State…

A lot of the “liberate” footage is meant to make these events look big.

Here’s what the protest in Ohio today really looks like.

pic.twitter.com/0uxRuG0IxS

— Joshua Potash (@JoshuaPotash) April 20, 2020

While it is easy to just shake your head at people whose own ignorance did them in, that ignorance has been nurtured and fed by Trump, Fox News and conservative media.

https://t.co/wXGdw77JDJ

— The Hoarse Whisperer (@HoarseWisperer) April 20, 2020

"Look, we conservatives are idiots, whatcha gonna do?" https://t.co/NhZjEMEJxy

— dn (@dnnation) April 18, 2020

punditry voice: an underrated factor in the "open america" protests is that if we acquiesce to their demands, a large number of people will get sick and die. It will be a tough lift to make that broadly popular despite swiftly strong elite messaging

— krapp's last take (????) (@mmcgrath42) April 20, 2020

all you need to know about why the mainstream media is going out of business is that the straight-to-DVD sequel to the tea party is the dumbest shit ever and they're still impressed by it

— local jack please ban the nazis person (@pleizar) April 20, 2020

pic.twitter.com/sd22wfPCaQ

— KD (@Fly_Sistah) April 20, 2020

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Next Post: COVID-19 Coronavirus Update – Monday/Tuesday, April 20-21 »

Reader Interactions

58Comments

  1. 1.

    MisterForkbeard

    April 21, 2020 at 12:34 am

    I’m actually with Iglesias on this one. Trump has shown that with consistent propaganda 45% of the country will believe that the most ludicrous and stupid used car salesman of a president is a moral man who carefully considers all options and is the only man you’d want during a crisis.

    They can certainly turn convince those same people to put themselves and other at huge risk and kill a bunch of folks if they can convince their voters that liberals want them to stay home and stay safe.

  2. 2.

    Elizabelle

    April 21, 2020 at 12:37 am

    RE the Covid denier: John McDaniel’s family had a lot of time to write up a very personable obit for him. He loved hanging out at Georgian Bay in Ontario; also red wine and THE Ohio State University. They do add this to the end of the rather lengthy obit:

    On behalf of his family, they would like to extend a heartfelt “Thank you” to the nurses at Marion General Hospital and to all the staff at Riverside Methodist Hospital for everything they did to try and save Johnny’s life from Covid-19. They would also like to remind everyone to continue practicing social distancing to keep each other safe.

    They’re doing a livestream funeral and a drivethrough visitation in a country club parking lot.

    Experience is a cruel teacher. Learn up, Ohioans.

    Six feet apart (minimum) or six feet under.

  3. 3.

    rikyrah

    April 21, 2020 at 12:39 am

    A round of applause, please, for Calvin Duncan, a former jailhouse lawyer whose relentless advocacy led to a landmark decision today on unanimous juries. https://t.co/OrLI89hrhy— Adam Liptak (@adamliptak) April 21, 2020

  4. 4.

    Ed Marshall

    April 21, 2020 at 12:40 am

    If 45% of them actually want to all run out there and do that…well.

    That is one way to get to herd immunity!  God Speed Pioneers!

    I wish I believed they actually would rather than making a bunch of noise and saying they *would do it any second now if the gubmint wasn’t holding me back!

  5. 5.

    Calouste

    April 21, 2020 at 12:44 am

    I disagree with the last but one tweet. It’s not that the media are impressed by it, they just see easy copy. And it sold well last time, so why not try again? They’re not as much dumb as lazy. Although of course it can be hard to distinguish between intellectually lazy and dumb.

  6. 6.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    April 21, 2020 at 1:02 am

    @MisterForkbeard:

    Yglesias is full of shit. You can’t spin bodies piling up, sorry. Especially not when those people dying are some of your friends and family, not (relatively) small numbers of troops dying in a far off foreign war. This is going to be personal for a lot of people, sadly

    Also, didn’t mean to come across so harsh. It’s not directed at you! : )

  7. 7.

    different-church-lady

    April 21, 2020 at 1:09 am

    “Give me freedom AND give me death!”

  8. 8.

    Villago Delenda Est

    April 21, 2020 at 1:15 am

    My poor head.  My poor desk.

  9. 9.

    MisterForkbeard

    April 21, 2020 at 1:15 am

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): All good. But I really do think Trump voters are in a closed system and even bodies can be spun as Democrat’s fault. We’ll see, I suppose.

  10. 10.

    Elizabelle

    April 21, 2020 at 1:20 am

    @Calouste:   Yep.  The FTF NY Times went for it hook, line and sinker.  Jeremy Peters reporting.

    How Abortion, Guns and Church Closings Made Coronavirus a Culture War

    Flattening the curve is now one of the most contentious issues in politics.

    Multiple quotes from Republicans bloviating, trying to make this seem more widespread than it is.  The NY Times, giving them a megaphone.  As usual.

    But some conservatives who support the president’s re-election campaign said they believed that many Americans are growing frustrated with the orders that keep them from socializing, working and worshiping normally.

    Earlier, we had one man’s view — an elite, let’s be honest:

    “There’s a tremendous amount of social unrest,” said Jeff Landry, the Republican attorney general of Louisiana and an ally of Mr. Trump. “Governors who are using the pandemic as an excuse to keep certain measures in place do so at their own peril.”

    Peters drags Ralph Reed out.  (When’s the last time you heard from him?)

    “My sense is that this is a caldron,” said Ralph Reed, the founder of the Faith and Freedom Coalition and a veteran organizer of the religious right. “It is simply unsustainable to tell people that they have to sit helplessly in their homes watching their businesses go bankrupt, their jobs disappear and their lives destroyed.”

    …. Mr. Reed said that there were growing questions among religious conservatives, like “why liquor stores and grocery stores can be open, but their churches are closed.”

    We see a photo of white people protesting.  One woman is carrying a sign with a red line over a mask (it looks a little like a bra, but it’s a surgical mask) and the words:  My Body My Choice.  So much for grasping the basic problem with infectious diseases.

    Peters will never tell you these protests are astroturfed, although the NYTimes makes some progress as there are multiple euphemisms for Trump lying, and he labels a few Trump statements as “falsehoods.”  You can say that in the FTF NY Times, but you can never simply state “the president lied.”

    And there is a clue, many paragraphs down.  Peters never develops this.

    It is not difficult to understand why Mr. Trump feels the impulse to back the demonstrators. Footage of the recent protests shows a significant presence of Trump paraphernalia and an outpouring of support for him. At the Michigan event, which was documented on Facebook by a reporter for The Detroit Free Press, one man waving a Confederate flag explained through his protective mask why he was there. “Trump. Trump all the way,” he said.
    Others carried the bumblebee yellow Gadsden flag, its coiled snake and “Don’t tread on me” emblem a symbol of the Tea Party, which Mr. Trump has always felt an affinity toward.

    … The people at these protests have been overwhelmingly white. And while the coronavirus can strike people of any race, nationality, religion or political persuasion, data shows it is infecting and killing black people in the United States at disproportionately high rates.

  11. 11.

    lollipopguild

    April 21, 2020 at 1:25 am

    @different-church-lady: “Give me freedom and a jelly donut, and free refills!”

  12. 12.

    piratedan

    April 21, 2020 at 1:28 am

    @Elizabelle: well, for one (and every damn thing else) it’s Jeremy Damn Peters…

    We need to start keeping a list of these fucking journos that have their heads professionally placed up their asses, so we can readily discount what they write.  I’d be happy to wager that there are at least 5 to 6 completely infuriatingly corrupt spin-meisters working there and we completely allow them to grab us by the short hairs and throw an endless series of spanners into our spokes.  We need to pay attention to who is writing this trash because essentially we would save ourselves a lot of fucking grief just acknowledging that certain members of the press are no fucking better than the series of asshats who write op-ed pieces for the Grey Lady herself.  They continue to trade on her reputation while their collective thumbs are still on the scales…

     

    fuck them.

  13. 13.

    mrmoshpotato

    April 21, 2020 at 1:28 am

    @Elizabelle: Why is the “How” unnecessarily in that headline?

    Here’s a better one: A Bunch of Whiny Bitchwaffles Used Abortions, Guns and Church Closings To Be Fucking Idiots Who Might Die Now.

    Accompanying article doesn’t exist because everything needed is in the headline.

    ETA – Alternately: Libs Owned, Trump Trash Fighting For Their Lives

  14. 14.

    Kent

    April 21, 2020 at 1:29 am

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):

    @MisterForkbeard:

    Yglesias is full of shit. You can’t spin bodies piling up, sorry. Especially not when those people dying are some of your friends and family, not (relatively) small numbers of troops dying in a far off foreign war. This is going to be personal for a lot of people, sadly

    Also, didn’t mean to come across so harsh. It’s not directed at you! : )

    Bush was toast when 1800 mostly poor black people died in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.

    And Trump is going to ride to re-election the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Americans from every corner of the country?

    Because a few hundred racist gun nuts take to the streets?

    Yeah. I don’t think so either. The November election is going to be the worst fucking shit-hurricane in the history of politics. And nothing Dems should be taking for granted on any level.  But I don’t see how the worst economy in 100 years and hundreds of thousands of deaths is a positive for Trump.

  15. 15.

    Villago Delenda Est

    April 21, 2020 at 1:30 am

    @Elizabelle: Peters is one of the most worthless “journalists” working for the Vichy Times.  No doubt he’s a Baquet favorite.

    Wipe them out.  All of them.

  16. 16.

    West of the Rockies

    April 21, 2020 at 1:30 am

    A lot of these pinhead rallies feature 6 or 50 people.  They are small, tiny even, compared to the big majority that accept the science. I wish the media would address this.

  17. 17.

    Kent

    April 21, 2020 at 1:33 am

    Off topic, but CNN is currently reporting breaking news on the North Korea situation.  That Kim Jong Un is in critical condition after surgery.

  18. 18.

    Kent

    April 21, 2020 at 1:34 am

    @West of the Rockies:A lot of these pinhead rallies feature 6 or 50 people.  They are small, tiny even, compared to the big majority that accept the science. I wish the media would address this.

    If 50 lefties were protesting Trump it would not even make the local news anywhere.

  19. 19.

    Elizabelle

    April 21, 2020 at 1:35 am

    The WaPost is so much more honest.  Karen Tumulty is channeling her inner Jen Rubin (the good Jen Rubin):
    The tea party is back — and endangering lives
    Complete article about what nihilists — her word — and poseurs (my word) — these fools are.

    Tea party 2.0 is proposing a tri-cornered suicide pact: Give them liberty from stay-at-home orders and give them death. And while they are at it, endanger the lives of everyone around them as well.

    … It is perhaps overstating things to describe these protesters as a movement. Even as tens of millions are filing applications for unemployment compensation, polls show the vast majority of Americans want restrictive measures to remain in place to fight the virus.

    … But while the protesters are not representative of how most Americans view the difficult choices that their local leaders are making, they are getting a powerful signal boost from right-wing media and the president.

  20. 20.

    mrmoshpotato

    April 21, 2020 at 1:36 am

    @West of the Rockies: I wish I could ride a Brachiosaurus.  Oh the adventures we’d have. :)

  21. 21.

    Amir Khalid

    April 21, 2020 at 1:36 am

    @Kent:

    Check the previous post and thread.

  22. 22.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    April 21, 2020 at 1:37 am

    @MisterForkbeard: All good. But I really do think Trump voters are in a closed system and even bodies can be spun as Democrat’s fault. We’ll see, I suppose

    Example “Why didn’t that filthy Democrat SOB Governor stop my late brother and his friends from doing those Anti-Quarantine group huddles? White lives matter too!”

  23. 23.

    Mai naem mobile

    April 21, 2020 at 1:42 am

    All I can say is that the Phoenix anti lockdown protests only had a couple of hundred people show up.  That’s including some pro lockdown/pro adequate PPE  people who showed up. That’s in a city of over 5M in a county which barely voted for the Orange Douchebag. If you can’t even get 500 people to show at the AZ Capitol, which would not be that hard to do a social distance protest at, you’re losing.

    I am actually waiting for COVID19 deniers like Holocaust deniers. People actually saying all those people didn’t die. Those gurneys transporting bodies are all fake.  It’s all a Democrat/Chinese/Mexican/Deep State conspiracy…etc.

  24. 24.

    West of the Rockies

    April 21, 2020 at 1:43 am

    @mrmoshpotato:

    Yeah, my wish that corporate media would proceed responsibly is pretty unlikely to come true.

  25. 25.

    Elizabelle

    April 21, 2020 at 1:44 am

    Catherine Rampell in the WaPost:

    Trump has almost nothing to lose. That’s why he wants to reopen the economy.

    Public health experts worry that “reopening” the country too soon will be bad for public health. Economists worry it will be bad for the economy. The general public worries it will bad for, well, everyone.

    So why is President Trump agitating to do so anyway, even encouraging insurrection against his own administration’s stay-at-home guidance?

    Because it’s the only Hail Mary chance he has at reelection. And, sure, it probably won’t pay off. But just as he’s done his entire life, Trump has no problem gambling with other people’s money and well-being — even if the stakes could be fatal.

    …. That’s why he is encouraging protests against stay-at-home orders, even though his administration has recommended those orders, and even though the protests put more lives at risk as unmasked crowds cluster together. It might also be why he’s taken hostage fiscal aid that states and cities desperately need; the administration reportedly thinks that withholding aid can pressure states to reopen their economies sooner.

    Right now, Trump is a man with almost nothing to lose, and that makes him dangerous. He’s more than happy to risk the lives of the old, infirm or otherwise vulnerable, even if they’re his voters.

    …. As a political strategy, this is atrociously irresponsible. But it’s consistent with Trump’s pre-politics career, which involved getting himself into a hole; taking ever-bigger risks with other people’s money in the hopes that one of those long shots could get him out of the hole; and then, when he still couldn’t repay, blaming creditors for being foolish enough to lend to him. Given that he managed to persuade a major bank to lend him billions of dollars even after his first four corporate bankruptcies, perhaps his assignation of blame wasn’t entirely wrong.

    As a businessman, Trump successfully persuaded creditors to throw away good money after bad. As a politician, he may yet persuade states to risk more lives, and livelihoods, after so many have been lost already.

  26. 26.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    April 21, 2020 at 1:44 am

    @Kent: And Trump is going to ride to re-election the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Americans from every corner of the country?

    Trump isn’t a politician, he is a media personality. He’s worried about keeping is his audience share.  At the very lest he can blackmail Republicans with this rabid, suicidal fan base. Noticed Trump was feuding with the Republican governors today?

  27. 27.

    Elizabelle

    April 21, 2020 at 1:47 am

    @Mai naem mobile:   I am impressed with Joshua Potash’s social distancing in the tweet above.  As in, behind glass and several floors up from the nihilist protesters, making it clear they’re a small group.

  28. 28.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    April 21, 2020 at 1:56 am

    @Elizabelle: Similar note the host of Good Morning Britain supposed to be hard right and there is a rant of him going off on Trump about how Virus was Trump’s golden ticket to re-election by claiming to be a crises leader and then Trump blew it by being a twat.  I am more than little convinced the House Dems did the Virus relief bill knowing perfectly well Trump would treat is as a personal slush fund because it would piss off his voters when they didn’t get their share of the relief and their business is destroyed.

    Looking at it that way, you could see this Forced Reopen attempt from Trump as like some collage kid whose parents sent him the rent and then he blew on hookers and blow and is now screaming at his roommate it’s all his fault the rent is short.

  29. 29.

    Elizabelle

    April 21, 2020 at 2:05 am

    The NY Times political writers suck.  Just suck. And that’s not an accident. That’s Dean Baquet and the Sulzbergers.

    The Times redeem themselves with their op eds, about 90% of the time.  I hope this is a free click for you, because it’s coronavirus-related.

    Point of article:  buy a [fingertip] pulse oximeter.  They’re inexpensive (less than $20, I think), if not hoarded, they’re easily available at drugstores and through Amazon.

    This physician is worried about silent hypoxia.  A person with covid-caused pneumonia will naturally breathe more deeply and faster, possibly without a lot of pain, not realizing how the virus is invading both lungs until too late.  Monitor your blood oxygen levels.  Get help before the disease progresses too dangerously.

    The Infection That’s Silently Killing Coronavirus Patients
    This is what I learned during 10 days of treating Covid pneumonia at Bellevue Hospital.

    Author:  Dr. Richard Levitan, an Emergency physician.

    … We are just beginning to recognize that Covid pneumonia initially causes a form of oxygen deprivation we call “silent hypoxia” — “silent” because of its insidious, hard-to-detect nature.

    Pneumonia is an infection of the lungs in which the air sacs fill with fluid or pus. Normally, patients develop chest discomfort, pain with breathing and other breathing problems. But when Covid pneumonia first strikes, patients don’t feel short of breath, even as their oxygen levels fall. And by the time they do, they have alarmingly low oxygen levels and moderate-to-severe pneumonia (as seen on chest X-rays). Normal oxygen saturation for most persons at sea level is 94 percent to 100 percent; Covid pneumonia patients I saw had oxygen saturations as low as 50 percent.

    To my amazement, most patients I saw said they had been sick for a week or so with fever, cough, upset stomach and fatigue, but they only became short of breath the day they came to the hospital. Their pneumonia had clearly been going on for days, but by the time they felt they had to go to the hospital, they were often already in critical condition.

    … A vast majority of Covid pneumonia patients I met had remarkably low oxygen saturations at triage — seemingly incompatible with life — but they were using their cellphones as we put them on monitors.

    … [you can detect] silent hypoxia early through a common medical device that can be purchased without a prescription at most pharmacies: a pulse oximeter.

    Pulse oximetry is no more complicated than using a thermometer. These small devices turn on with one button and are placed on a fingertip. In a few seconds, two numbers are displayed: oxygen saturation and pulse rate. Pulse oximeters are extremely reliable in detecting oxygenation problems and elevated heart rates.

    Pulse oximeters helped save the lives of two emergency physicians I know, alerting them early on to the need for treatment. When they noticed their oxygen levels declining, both went to the hospital and recovered (though one waited longer and required more treatment). Detection of hypoxia, early treatment and close monitoring apparently also worked for Boris Johnson, the British prime minister.

    Widespread pulse oximetry screening for Covid pneumonia — whether people check themselves on home devices or go to clinics or doctors’ offices — could provide an early warning system for the kinds of breathing problems associated with Covid pneumonia.

  30. 30.

    lgerard

    April 21, 2020 at 2:06 am

    @Mai naem mobile:

     

    They are called 5G truthers

    check out this guy

    https://twitter.com/alberttrigg

  31. 31.

    prostratedragon

    April 21, 2020 at 2:11 am

    Our cup overfloweth (from Bloomberg):

    Supply cuts that were supposed to bolster the beleaguered lumber market are now creating an unintended effect: the wood chips required to make sought-after toilet paper and wipes during the coronavirus pandemic are becoming more scarce.

    Right now, about 25% of Canadian sawmill capacity is shut after producers from West Fraser Timber Co. and Canfor Corp. idled operations amid a price slump and poor outlook for spring building as the coronavirus spreads. That’s reduced the output of wood chips that pulp mills rely on to make everything from toilet paper and wipes to cardboard boxes and paper bags, said Derek Nighbor, president and chief executive officer of the Ottawa-based Forest Products Association of Canada.

    Without federal aid to get some sawmill capacity back on line, input costs could rise or there could be a shortage of the materials pulp mills need for household products, he said. Panic buying has already caused shortages of toilet paper and other hygiene products in supermarkets around the world.

    Good thing the federation in question is Canada.

  32. 32.

    Elizabelle

    April 21, 2020 at 2:11 am

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques:   Yup.

  33. 33.

    Elizabelle

    April 21, 2020 at 2:30 am

    WaPost again.  Dana Millbank.
    The problem isn’t a lack of information. It’s Trump.

    RE Trump scapegoating the WHO.

    He’s actually guilty of what he’s trying to project onto them.  We knew that.  But I am liking the WaPost’s headlines and NFLTG attitude these days.

    Whereas the FTF NY Times does not want to do anything to make Ivanka cry, or have a bad day.  Access.

  34. 34.

    Elizabelle

    April 21, 2020 at 2:34 am

    One of the WaPost reader commenters is calling Trump “the Manchurian Cantaloupe.”  That’s pretty good.

  35. 35.

    rikyrah

    April 21, 2020 at 2:36 am

    White House will now require nursing homes to report to patients and their families when there are COVID19 cases inside nursing homes and require them to report directly to CDC when they have a case, according to Seema Verma, Administrator for Medicare & Medicaid Services.— David Begnaud (@DavidBegnaud) April 19, 2020

  36. 36.

    rikyrah

    April 21, 2020 at 2:37 am

    @rikyrah:

    This is because of Maddow, who has been on this story.

  37. 37.

    leeleeFL

    April 21, 2020 at 2:41 am

    @Villago Delenda Est: I totally feel you!

  38. 38.

    Bruuuuce

    April 21, 2020 at 2:42 am

    @Elizabelle:

    “the Manchurian Cantaloupe.”

    Author David Gerrold was using that at least a couple of years ago on Le Livre des Visages. I think he coined it, though it’s possible he picked it up elsewhere.

  39. 39.

    leeleeFL

    April 21, 2020 at 2:49 am

    @Elizabelle: hence my new subscription to the WaPo

  40. 40.

    Aussie Sheila

    April 21, 2020 at 3:02 am

    @Villago Delenda Est: Amen

  41. 41.

    Lacuna Synechdoche

    April 21, 2020 at 3:07 am

    Crooks and Liars via Anne Laurie @ Top:

    Man Who Called Ohio’s Lockdown Order ‘Bullshit’ Has Succumbed To COVID-19

    In March, John McDaniel called Ohio’s shutdown order of non-essential businesses “madness.” A few days ago he died.

    Amazing, the things Conservatives will sacrifice to own the libs.

  42. 42.

    prostratedragon

    April 21, 2020 at 3:34 am

    @Elizabelle:
    Pulse oximeter bonus: by monitoring a couple of times in the last year when I didn’t feel right, I picked up highly irregular pulse that turned out to be atrial fibrillation, a condition the docs long suspected I had, but were never able to capture on ekg.

  43. 43.

    blacque_jacques

    April 21, 2020 at 3:38 am

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques: That’s Piers “Moron” Morgan for you, a known bellend.

     

    It’s pretty rich when conservative pundits temper their opinions with bits of sane (and obvious) advice for the GOP that no sane observer expects them to take. Repeatedly. That’s either  wishful thinking or bad faith.

  44. 44.

    Amir Khalid

    April 21, 2020 at 4:14 am

    Neuester Bericht: Wegen des Koronavirus wird Oktoberfest 2020 abgesagt! 

    (English subtitle:

    Latest Report: Because of the coronavirus, Oktoberfest 2020 is cancelled!)

  45. 45.

    Baud

    April 21, 2020 at 4:26 am

    The Hoarse Whisperer@HoarseWisperer

    While it is easy to just shake your head at people whose own ignorance did them in, that ignorance has been nurtured and fed by Trump, Fox News and conservative media.

    Because there are no other news channels on the TV that these people can watch.

  46. 46.

    Tony Jay

    April 21, 2020 at 4:32 am

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques:

    Piers Morgan’s shtick is to figure out which ‘side’ is going to ‘win’ an argument and turn himself into its most obnoxious mouthpiece. That’s why he’s been on a racist, sexist, anti-PC bender for years – he saw the way the British zeitgeist was leaning and ran with the pack, frex, dumping his Remainer stance and jumping on the Brexiteer bandwagon.

    Him blasting the Tories and their transatlantic crush so vehemently on this issue means he’s done the (pretty easy) math and reckons the majority are going to be out for pro-pandemic blood soon enough.

    Plus, it insulates him against valid criticism the next time he spews some corrosive far-right bullshit all over Twitter. As in, “You liked Piers when he was attacking poor old Bozo and The Blob Father, didn’t you? Lefty hypocrite?”

    tldr: Piers Morgan is an ambulance chasing prick.

  47. 47.

    James E Powell

    April 21, 2020 at 5:00 am

    @Baud:

    Because there are no other news channels on the TV that these people can watch.

    That would require radical changes in identity, worldview, relationships with FOX-ified family members and social circles. So much easier to endure the collateral damage from comforting delusions.

  48. 48.

    Brachiator

    April 21, 2020 at 5:23 am

    Georgia Republican Gov. Brian Kemp announced Monday that certain businesses can reopen this week in a move that breaks from the majority of state leaders and defies the warnings of many health officials.

    Kemp said specifically that fitness centers, bowling alleys, body art studios, barbers, hair and nail salons, and massage therapy businesses can reopen as early Friday, April 24. Theaters and restaurants will be allowed to open on Monday, April 27, while bars and night clubs will remain closed for now.

    This will be an interesting experiment, especially since many of these businesses seem exactly the type that should remain closed. I am not sure how these places can actually maintain social distance, even if required.

    And fitness centers? I recall reading news stories about a cluster of virus cases at gyms in Japan. Bodies in close proximity, staff moving around customers, making it easy for the virus to infect people.

    The governor says they will be on the alert for hotspots. They may be overestimating their ability to contain a significant outbreak.

    It will also be interesting to see how many people roll the dice and put their lives at risk.

    Should we have mandatory testing for Georgia residents who travel to other states?

  49. 49.

    Amir Khalid

    April 21, 2020 at 5:47 am

    @Tony Jay:

    I figured that out when I saw him at SuBo’s BGT audition.

  50. 50.

    SFAW

    April 21, 2020 at 6:08 am

    I imagine it’s been floated somewhere among the InfoWars/QAnon psychos, but I’m half-expecting an “Obama’s minions created and released COVID-19 in order to get people to want ObamaCare” meme to get mainstreamed by Fox and the Murderer-in-Chief.

  51. 51.

    Brachiator

    April 21, 2020 at 6:13 am

    @Tony Jay:

    Piers Morgan’s shtick is to figure out which ‘side’ is going to ‘win’ an argument and turn himself into its most obnoxious mouthpiece.

    Yep. I never really paid much attention to him before, but this really nails my suspicions about him.

    I would read summaries of his comments bashing Meghan Markle and wonder why he was so hot to jump on the racist bandwagon. There is something extra obnoxious about people who choose to be hateful because they think it sells well.

  52. 52.

    Tony Jay

    April 21, 2020 at 7:10 am

    @Amir Khalid:

    Oh God, yes!

    “Eeeeuuugghhh! This hefty woman is unattractive and will never appeal to the audience. I must sneer at her and win their favour.”

    SuBo knocks it out of the park and becomes an immediate star.

    “Your success completes me and all those who laughed at you are my mortal enemies!”

    Craven, shit-flinging maggot with the soul of an acidic vapour.

  53. 53.

    Tony Jay

    April 21, 2020 at 7:11 am

    @Brachiator:

    There is something extra obnoxious about people who choose to be hateful because they think it sells well

    Which in turn says a lot about the outlets doing the selling.

  54. 54.

    satby

    April 21, 2020 at 7:40 am

    @James E Powell: this. Expecting them to just change the channel is like expecting them to give up their social circle, maybe their church, etc. It took (now 50) years of a carefully constructed alternate infrastructure of conservative churches, think tanks, media purchases and politicians to get us to this point.

  55. 55.

    SFAW

    April 21, 2020 at 8:06 am

    @Brachiator:

    There is something extra obnoxious about people who choose to be hateful because they think it sells well.

    Somewhere in Hell, George Corley Wallace is either smiling, or saying “Hold mah beer!”

  56. 56.

    Uncle Cosmo

    April 21, 2020 at 8:07 am

    @Mai naem mobile: I am actually waiting for COVID19 deniers like Holocaust deniers. People actually saying all those people didn’t die. Those gurneys transporting bodies are all fake.

    Sitting down?

    Checked in with a college buddy who lives in Queens yesterday, just to make sure he’s OK.

    He babbled something at me about how corpses are being trucked from one hospital to another & photographed to create the illusion that many more people are dying from the virus than they are.

    This is a retired CUNY prof with no need to “reopen the state,” a stock-market-Republican who’s never been all that political, & he’s spewing this shit. I told him he was right on the edge of conspiracy theory. Unfortunately I didn’t ask him where he got this crap from. Probably the only newspaper he reads – the Wall Street Urinal.

  57. 57.

    SFAW

    April 21, 2020 at 8:26 am

    @Uncle Cosmo:

    Elitist libtard! Can you PROVE he’s worng? Q, E, and D!

     

    Gotta say, I never saw the WSJ referred to in that way before. Now if only we could go piss on Rupert Murdoch’s grave.

  58. 58.

    JDM

    April 21, 2020 at 12:03 pm

    @Calouste:

    Yeah, it’s harder to both sides an issue when some 80% or more are on one side. But our media is up to the task, having sharpened their skills on the gun control issue for years.

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