Dr. Fauci has something Donald Trump will never have: the respect of most Americans. So Trump is picking a fight with Dr. Fauci. Bad move. An excerpt from The Atlantic:
Anthony Fauci isn’t about to quit, despite the White House’s clumsy attempts to stain his public image. More so now than at any other point in their uneasy partnership, it seems that if President Donald Trump wants to be rid of Fauci, he’ll need to fire him. In recent days especially, the White House has stepped up efforts to discredit Fauci, a move he describes as “bizarre.”
“Ultimately, it hurts the president to do that,” Fauci told The Atlantic in a series of interviews this week. “When the staff lets out something like that and the entire scientific and press community push back on it, it ultimately hurts the president.”
He described the White House attacks against him as “nonsense” and “completely wrong.” He also seemed dismayed that they are coming at a time when COVID-19 is surging across the country, deaths are once again rising, and Americans remain deeply confused about how to keep themselves and their loved ones safe.
Trump mumbled some nonsense about Fauci making “a lot of mistakes” last week. When gales of incredulous laughter knocked every fleck of paint off the White House, the “You’re Fired” chickenshit dispatched anonymous goons to distribute oppo research on Fauci.
Alleged grownup Dan Scavino Facebooked an anti-Fauci cartoon. Peter Navarro attempted a more thorough hatchet job late yesterday. It didn’t go well.
Meanwhile, a new Quinnipiac poll brings more bad news for Trump: a 15-point national lead for Biden. I know, polls schmolls, but this one contained an intriguing detail that I’ve been looking for and not seeing in all the latest good news polls: people are starting to blame Trump for the shitty economy too.
TRUMP JOB APPROVAL
Voters give President Trump a negative 36 – 60 percent job approval rating, a 6 point drop in his job approval compared to last month. In that June 18th poll, Trump had a negative 42 – 55 percent job approval rating. Trump’s net job approval is his worst since August of 2017.
TRUMP’S HANDLING OF THE ECONOMY
President Trump’s approval rating on the economy is underwater as voters approve 44 – 53 percent, compared to his 52 – 45 percent approval rating on the economy in June. Today’s numbers are his worst net score on the economy since August of 2017.
As I’ve said, I think Trump has been coasting on the economy because of low-info voters who still believe the bullshit premise of “The Apprentice,” i.e., that Trump is a decisive businessman who built a real estate empire. He’s not. He never was. He’s even too chickenshit to fire his own employees to their faces, despite the “You’re Fired” tagline of the show. It’s all a lie. We never believed it, but lots of people did.
When things fall apart, they fall apart quickly. Open thread.
WereBear
I’m beginning to suspect those reality tv shows aren’t real at all!
Jeffro
Please tell us, GOP spin-meisters: what would it take for trumpov to turn this thing around? Give us scenarios, policies…anything at all. Just so that we can laugh at you some more.
debbie
This was the best news all day; I literally stood up and cheered. Small and scrappy wins the day!
debbie
Except that he can’t be fired by Trump. How does The Atlantic not know this???
Matt McIrvin
“Fauci fucked up! He trusted me!”
jc
Trump pathetically doesn’t understand that there’s a reason Fauci’s approval is higher than Trump’s. It’s depressing to live in a country where the “leader” is incapable of learning the importance of basic scientific facts.
dmsilev
Oh, and with polls, you all will no doubt be shocked to learn that Trump’s favorite “news” organization does a wee bit of cherry-picking in the polls they report:
Sure Lurkalot
Huh. Can’t “fake news” a pandemic. Good to know.
dmsilev
@jc: If Trump had, back in early March, said “I’m going to let the experts handle this” and then gone off and golfed for four straight months, he’d probably have a higher approval rating right now.
Baud
@dmsilev:
The experts wouldn’t have deferred to his rich friends’ desires.
Amir Khalid
It looks like Trump is trapped in a feedback loop between flailing and panic.
sanjeevs
Trump’s polling with Latinx voters seems to be in line with his overall numbers.
i don’t get why.
OGLiberal
The economy thing is that the media and many Americans – even Dem voters – have the default position that Republicans are just better at the economy, evidence be damned. NBC poll just came out with Biden at 51%-40% nationally. But in that poll voters give Trump a 54%-42% rating on the economy….and that is, according to NBC ” his highest mark on this question since becoming president.” Trump’s personal approval rating is -15%. Biden is -12%. And Dems went from +11 generic to +4. I mean, the fuck?
Lapassionara
Thanks, BC. This lifted my spirits, which desperately needed lifting.
Trump is going to be interviewed on Fox this Sunday. I won’t watch, but I’ll see snippets later. He has seemed really incoherent to me recently. I’ll be interested in what others think.
Baud
A 20 point different is what you saw in the blowout elections of Nixon and Reagan. We have no chance of an electoral college blowout due to the small red states however.
jonas
For Trump to be a completely different person than he is, or is capable of being.
WaterGirl
Dr. Fauci
Baud
@OGLiberal:
We don’t sell ourselves on the economy (or on national security), possibly because we need to balance various factions within our coalition.
HuCat
“Mmm, I’m shattered, unh
Sha oobie, shattered,…”
WaterGirl
Dr. Fauci – Beatles
WaterGirl
@Amir Khalid:
That works for me!
jonas
Mostly boomers who (mis)remember Reagan’s “victory” over the 80-81 recession. Millennials and Gen-Xers who have now lived through two massive economic collapses overseen by Republican presidents will probably not cling to that myth so easily.
Another Scott
Relatedly…
This is all on Moscow Mitch. Don’t forget.
Grr…
Cheers,
Scott.
Brachiator
I want to see the media push back on this, right in the administration’s face. No one should care about Navarro’s opinions or judgements. The question should be, where are his experts to back up his opinion?
Any time these jokers make an assertion about the virus, the question should be, where are the experts whose judgements you are basing this on?
And it should be clearly thrown back whenever they lie or distort known facts.
Some of these dopes keep focusing on the number of tests and the number of cases. The question is, what are they going to do to reduce the number of hospitalizations and reduce the number of deaths.
And I applaud the doctors and others coming to Fauci’s defense.
Danielx
@Jeffro:
Personality transplant!
no comment
Did you know there is a conspiracy theory about Coronavirus testing being used for “brain access?” I guess for implanting microchips for mind control or something — I just glanced at the headline in the pic. I shouldn’t be surprised at this, given the virus hoax conspiracy. I learned this because my husband just unfriended someone on Facebook who was spreading this lie. No clue if it was originally parody/satire or not, but the “friend” certainly seemed to believe it and was telling people not to get tested!
Mike S
If you read the Navarro op/ed follow the links. Almost every single one disproves what he said they prove. The very first one goes to a fact check that ends with ‘all evidence shows that the president is wrong to say this.’
Jim, Foolish Literalist
he wants violence and civil unrest
Peale
@sanjeevs: Latinx voters are citizens and many live in conservative parts of the country. There are large numbers of latinx – about 16 million – adults who are not eligible to vote. There’s going to be a difference between the voters and non-citizens in that group.
Mary G
Finished and e-filed my taxes and swear I will never put it off that long again.
Covid19 daily cases and daily deaths already over the 7 day moving average and the day’s nowhere near over yet.
Mary G
randy
I wasn’t going to boycott Goya until the kids in the the white-house set up their beans and flavor-aid stand on the front lawn. I don’t want to be contributing to the delinquency of immature spawn.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Mary G: she wants the first debate tonight! conventional wisdom says an incumbent calling for debates is scared, and Collins wants 16….
OGLiberal
@jonas: Probably right. I am a Gen-Xer and there are plenty of folks that I grew up with, went to college with, etc, who still grasp to the “GOP good for economy” myth and that Reagan was a great president and Gordon Gekko was a model for success. But for the hometown folks, having grown up in a very working class and very white town in Central NJ where those few who did get out didn’t go very far, I think their Trumpism is mostly based in racism/fear of change. Mind you, I’m talking about folks who are between around 45-55 years-old…not seniors, not boomers.
Brachiator
@Jeffro:
If the economy improved significantly AND a workable vaccine were announced, Trump would be in hog heaven.
David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch
dmsilev
@Mary G: She must really be terrified of losing; trying for that many debates is no show of strength.
cain
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Ah yes, trying to interfere in a city government – that’s not going to end well. Most small cities generally don’t like “big govt” coming in and throwing their weight around.
Well it used to be that way but I guess that’s all changed now for Republicans, huh?
schrodingers_cat
@Mary G: I finished yesterday!
Roger Moore
@Jeffro:
If Trump would just stop acting like a spoiled toddler and turn into a great statesman, he would totally have this.
Hoodie
This must be driving Trump nuts. Fauci was clever enough to generally avoid becoming a stooge for Trump while not directly crossing him before the media had invested a lot in Fauci’s credibility. He plays the earnest scientist, but he’s pretty cleverly cultivated media without alienating Trump until recently. It helps the the virus is a reality that Trump can’t warp, I don’t think this tactic would have worked as well for someone in an area that is less tethered to immediate reality, e.g., for some of Trump’s past “controllers” like Mattis.
Miss Bianca
@WaterGirl: About time someone did this! (I love “Dr. Robert”, btw)
dmsilev
Twitter apparently shit the bed badly:
schrodingers_cat
OT Because I am tired of discussing the Orange Clown.
I asked a question on Twitter, will ask it here too
What was the last movie you saw?
Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly, Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.)
Yeah, when things go wrong, they often go wrong in a hurry. I liken it to a badly built, teetering building. It wobbles; it sways. But with a lot of work, people can keep it standing. For a while. But when the big winds hit, it begins to sway farther and father, and it’s harder to right again each time. And then one last little gust hits, and it’s already weak and off balance, and it tips just over the line. And then it begins to go. Fast. And there isn’t anything anybody can do but watch it crash.
I’m hoping we’re about at that point now.
Mary G
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: @dmsilev: Dead Senator walking! Her voice is so annoying, I can’t imagine anyone watching even one hour of debates.
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
@dmsilev:
@Mary G:
What’s the thinking behind having more debates? Why would Collins think that helps her?
Brachiator
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Second Amendment, law and order, fighting back against the “mob.” Pushing all the right wing buttons.
Also, if you pardon Roger Stone, the little people can also be excused for anything they do. As long as hey are the MAGA crowd.
Mary G
I don’t know if this is true or not, because I’ve also seen that he deleted his tweets himself, but it’s still good either way:
His 2 & 2 are up.
WaterGirl
@Mary G: Congratulations, good for you, and I’m sorry! In that order. :-)
WaterGirl
@Miss Bianca: I don’t think I’ve heard that one. Do you have a link?
Roger Moore
@Baud:
Even so, his rich friends’ desires would probably have been better taken care of by a competent pandemic response than by the current shitshow. Money doesn’t make them smart.
dmsilev
@Baud: If you’re in a deep hole, or at least think you are, the more opportunities there are to have some sort of dramatic event that upends the race, the better. If both Collins and Gideon freeze themselves in carbonite with a ‘thaw in 3.5 months’ timer, Gideon wins. Collins needs to change that.
Miss Bianca
@WaterGirl: Ask and ye shall receive.
The Beatles wrote it about a Dr Feelgood (maybe *the* Dr Feelgood) they encountered after one of their American tours, I think.
David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch
Mass graves have been a drag on Dump’s numbers
piratedan
@Baud: Sara should simply decline and state that the voting record of the esteemed Senator Collins more than illustrates where she stands and then proceed to name off all of the heinous shit that Collins signed off on.
SiubhanDuinne
Just saw that Tammy Duckworth has released her hold on the promotions list once she received written assurance that Alexander Vindman was approved for full Colonel.
I hope it’s true. I’m happy for the 1,000+ officers in line for promotion, and I really hope Col. Vindman will be able to collect his pension at the higher level.
VeniceRiley
I’m just relieved Justice Ginsburg is out of hospital resting at home
Matt McIrvin
@OGLiberal: I think there are Democratic-leaning centrists who feel like they have to say something nice about Republicans in these polls, and “the economy” is sort of the default thing that you say Republicans are good about, unless it’s a time for saber-rattling.
I’m not sure people even know exactly what it is they’re talking about when they say “the economy.” Sometimes it seems like a synonym for “the deficit” and they don’t understand what that is either. Sometimes it just means “Republicans lower my taxes” which has to be good for the economy, right?
WaterGirl
@Miss Bianca: They need to have images with that so we know who they are singing about! :-)
dmsilev
Trump administration, congressional Republicans eye tying school aid to reopening in next funding bill
Miss Bianca
@David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch:
I know, and it’s SO UNFAIR!
Martin
@Roger Moore: That ship sailed ages ago. Someone is going to have to murder his children for the public to find any sympathy for him.
Matt McIrvin
@Another Scott: I always get a kick out of seeing Beyer’s name in the national news… my parents bought a Volvo from his dealership, before he was lieutenant governor, and I guess it’s still going.
dmsilev
@Martin: Have you seen his (adult) children? ‘Massive upswell of sympathy for the bereaved father’ is not the reaction I’d expect. It’d be more along the lines of ‘ one less grifter we need to worry about’.
natem
Hard to imagine Trump turns this thing aroun, BUT, it’s a good time to remind that, despite being a harbinger, these polls aren’t the one that counts. That’s still a few months out, and anything can happen until then. No sleep til November!
debbie
@SiubhanDuinne:
I believe he resigned so that her hold would be moot and the promotions could proceed.
natem
@dmsilev: losing a child is long a child. Still, it’s Trump, so he’d probably cock that up too.
Ken
If he could suddenly sweat a COVID vaccine from his pores, it would be a first step. Which he would immediately screw up by demanding payment.
Ruckus
@dmsilev:
It is of course hard to consider them anywhere in a solar system that allows any truth whatsoever.
Ruckus
@Amir Khalid:
So, in his normal world, in the middle between idiotic and stupid, leaning very hard towards idiotic.
Calouste
@dmsilev: 1) It sounds like a serious security issue on the side of Twitter. I don’t use twitter myself, but I would assume they have two factor authentication these days, and I would assume that most of those accounts would use that.
2) Note that the hackers thought that even though the shitgibbon’s followers are the most gullible out there, even those followers wouldn’t believe that he was giving away free money.
natem
@dmsilev: blue checkmarks can’t post right now. Awful, awful day for freedom of speech.
Jeffro
@Brachiator: Tell us more about how the economy improves significantly between now and November.
Jeffro
@Roger Moore:
Yup ; )
Jeffro
@Ken: Also ewww. It would be all orange and oily and stink to high heaven.
But true, that would work!
Baud
@natem:
All of them? Including Trump?
Brachiator
@Jeffro:
Trump will jump all over any improvement in unemployment figures.
But he has to have this AND a vaccine. But hell, he would declare victory just on the basis of a vaccine.
Betty Cracker
@schrodingers_cat: Haven’t seen a new movie in a while. “Little Women” maybe? I liked it.
WaterGirl
Last night I mentioned that Joe Biden had sent James Taylor after me to get me to donate again. As I said last night, how do you say ‘no’ to Sweet Baby James? (But I am out of donation money for this month, so I was trying to figure out if I could swing it.)
Today it’s Carole King! Tomorrow they will write me together and I will be overcome with guilt if I don’t donate. :-)
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@natem: oh man, The Beast can’t tweet? Fox is gonna be an all presidential call-in for the foreseeable future
Ken
@Jeffro: Trump puts Jared in charge of turning the economy around, of course.
Baud
@Ken:
Right after Jared fixes Twitter.
Ken
Because that worked so well when he was crowing about the drop to 11%.
Baud
@WaterGirl:
They have a file on you.
Ken
@Baud: Well obviously, priorities. Like invoking presidential powers to keep slaughterhouses open, while doing nothing about protective equipment.
debbie
@Ken:
And also labeling them as new jobs rather than returning jobs.
Brachiator
@dmsilev:
This is the GOP Trojan Horse. Trump voters don’t care that much about free college. But the GOP has been looking for ways to funnel more government money to private schools, religious schools and “segregation academies.”
The pandemic gives them the perfect excuse.
frosty
@schrodingers_cat: Ford vs. Ferrari, last December. It was a rainy Monday night and there were only 4 people in the theater. Great flick, though!
Matt McIrvin
@Jeffro: Nothing can make people feel better about Trump. But a lot of things could make people feel worse about Biden (and we all know that, as Obama said, Trump is graded on a curve–it would take much less to sink any opponent than it takes to sink him).
Any scenario where Trump wins, unless the election is so rigged that it bears no relation to actual voting (which is possible), has to involve a scandal that takes down Biden.
LongHairedWeirdo
@OGLiberal: That makes sense.
The Reagan era was a good time for the well-to-do, and the start of a long, hard, decline for the working class.
Well, the well-to-do drive memories and ideas, since they are the ones who have the most influence, in one way or another.
Whereas the working class can probably point a finger to where they’re *sure* they started getting the shaft, and have it very near, or in, that same era.
One reason for that is, the tax cuts made workers *far* more expensive. See, when you run a business, worker salary and benefits are tax deductible. If the tax rate is 70%, each dollar in deductible expenses only cost a net of 30 cents. (I.e., if you took it home as profit, you’d pay 70 cents tax on it, and only get 30 cents to keep.) Dropping that rate to 35% means workers now cost over twice as much, so there’s that much more incentive to squeeze the workers as much as possible.
Wyatt Salamanca
@WereBear:
Reality tv is the ultimate oxymoron and Trump is the ultimate moron.
David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch
@schrodingers_cat: Greyhound. The naval combat scenes are really good.
Special “30 Rock” reunion comes out tomorrow.
LongHairedWeirdo
@natem: Shoot, I can even see how – he’d start to whine about how the press isn’t showing him the same sympathy they had for Sleepy Joe Biden.
Seriously, I’m right, and we all know this, right?
Miss Bianca
@schrodingers_cat: Lincoln, last night. I don’t love everything Spielberg – I find him too emotionally manipulative at times – but man, I fell for this one, hook, line and sinker. Even when I could tell I was being emotionally manipulated, I just didn’t care, because MAN. I totally needed the reminder in the Present Shit Times that we’ve been through much, much worse times in our national history.
Now we just need to get Dems elected and kick some righteous ass.
ETA: Oh, were you talking about movies in the movie theater? Probably would have been Little Women. We showed the last Star Wars movie the weekend before we shut down.
Miss Bianca
@dmsilev: This is so FUCKING infuriating.
Mike in NC
Network news reporting Idiot-Americans are stabbing and shooting one another over the wearing of masks. Well played, Fat Bastard.
Brachiator
@Ken:
If he was not a fool trying to get “back to normal,” he could have presented even a modest change in unemployment as good news.
The economy was artificially shut down. Economists are wrong to look at things as a standard recession or depression.
But either way, Trump can’t force the economy to pick up.
TerryC
@randy: and now we know what the brand looks like on the shelf!
NotMax
@schrodingers_cat
Marty playing on TCM as this is being typed.
japa21
@WaterGirl: Heck, they only send Obama after me. He’s easy to say no to.
SiubhanDuinne
@debbie:
Right, I think so too. So what does that mean for him? He resigned as a LtCol, right? So will his promotion to full Colonel be retroactive so he can get the higher pension?
hitchhiker
Mary Trump’s book is really good.
She’s utterly without mercy, and her insights about her uncle resonate hard after the last few years. The most brutal thing she says is that he’s never understood that people are using him. His dad. Mark Burnett. His lawyers. His siblings. The press — basically everybody with an IQ over 80 saw that he was a stupid, vain man who could easily be manipulated with enough praise.
I listened to that part and thought about people like Lindsey, Mitch, Ted, Mario, Melania, the various generals — all of whom believed they could manage his ass.
She also correctly names our current crisis, that we’re all under the power of someone who can never get enough praise, who believes himself to be a victim of massive injustice, and who punishes anyone who crosses him.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@schrodingers_cat: I just finished, I’m looking at the Google about selling a kidney.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@jonas:
Reagan wrecked my economic future twice – the ONLY people who did well were scammy finance assholes and the already wealthy.
Tenar Arha
@schrodingers_cat:
Streaming: I rewatched The Old Guard yesterday, but before that I watched The Departed for the first time. (I was never really into seeing it, no idea exactly why, probably something to do with if there are any bad Boston accents it pulls me out of films. Anyway I’m doing a group watch thing & this was on the list. Wasn’t bad, really tightly plotted. Some really great shots of Boston).
Last theater experience was at the AMC Boston Common where I watched Wendy.
jc
@schrodingers_cat: Just saw “The Accountant,” which was better than I expected. Still too much gun-related action.
Barbara
@Hoodie: The thing you have to remember about Fauci is that he somehow managed to survive the wilderness years when HIV was an escalating crisis and not understood at all. He changed his view and approach contrary to his working assumptions for how research should be conducted in order to be effective. The New Yorker had a profile on him earlier this year. He even became friends with activists who had reviled him. He worked summers during college as a construction worker in New York. Like many born and bred New Yorkers (Cuomo comes to mind) he seems to instinctively understand how to handle people like Trump.
Steeplejack (phone)
@schrodingers_cat:
In theater: Weathering with You, January 26. Excellent.
At home (watching all the way through in one sitting): Minions, last weekend. Disappointing.
frosty
@frosty: OK, that was the last flick in a theater. I’ve seen a bunch on TV since then. The last one was Airplane, I’m starting to sit down with my millenial son to watch the classics.
WaterGirl
@Baud: Apparently!
Patricia Kayden
Sigh
Brachiator
@Tenar Arha:
And The Departed is a remake of a great 2002 Hong Kong film called Internal Affairs.
Patricia Kayden
@schrodingers_cat: The comedy starring Will Ferrell and Rachel McAdams. Eurovision Song Contest: A Story of Fire Saga. It’s on Netflix. Pretty good.
RSA
@Mike S:
Good catch. You’re right, but I would not have thought to do that.
zzyzx
Potentially really good news for the hopes of long term immunity based around T cells. As always, never overreact to just one study, but I’d rather see ones like this :)
Patricia Kayden
@Brachiator: Interesting. I thought it was based on Whitey Bulger.
debbie
@SiubhanDuinne:
Google’s not showing any definitive answer, but I’d bet the promotion doesn’t go through. Trump would have to approve it.
Barbara
@zzyzx: I didn’t read it in depth, but the question is, if prior exposure to other strains is protective, why are so many people dying?
Marcopolo
@schrodingers_cat: Emma. Visually gorgeous. Well acted. I’d recommend it for folks who like films made from classic English novels.
zzyzx
@Barbara: I’m guessing not enough people were infected by the other strains in the last 17 years?
SARS apparently infected 8,098 people in 2003, so that’s not exactly a massive pool of immunity.
Ken
@Barbara: Derek Lowe’s latest is fairly readable. Exposure to SARS and possibly other coronaviruses may provide resistance, but even if so, many people have not been exposed.
Ken
@Patricia Kayden: How fortunate for justice that the body cam didn’t “break” or “accidentally” get turned off. They seem particularly susceptible to that – perhaps a design flaw.
Aziz, light!
@schrodingers_cat: Palm Springs, new on Hulu. A very funny twist on Groundhog Day.
Brachiator
@LongHairedWeirdo:
Corporate tax rates were 52% during the 1950s and dropped a bit in the 60s and 70s before Reagan messed with things.
Brachiator
@Patricia Kayden:
They looked at actual Boston crime figures in adapting the characters, but the story itself is based on the Hong Kong film.
Wyatt Salamanca
@hitchhiker:
Rachel Maddow is interviewing her tomorrow.
David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch
@Brachiator:
Infernal Affairs
Wyatt Salamanca
@SiubhanDuinne:
Kudos to Tammy Duckworth. She’s been among the brightest and most eloquent voices in recent weeks.
Fair Economist
@Baud:
Praying that Gideon will make a gaffe the media can spend the rest of the campaign talking about. Such a ridiculous number of debates means Gideon will run out of significant things to talk about, which increases the chances. Kind of a Hail Mary pass, but Collins is desperate.
JMG
The Republicans don’t seem to get that Pelosi and the House Democrats have the whip hand here. They won’t be blamed if there’s no new package and the economy collapses by Labor Day. They can play hard ball. Trump can just bluster. But Wall St. has already priced in a fourth corona economic rescue/stimulus package. If it doesn’t happen, another couple of 1500 point daily Dow drops will cause Trump to surrender quickly.
Wyatt Salamanca
@schrodingers_cat:
Parasite and it was every bit as brilliant as most professional film critics claimed.
dmsilev
Twitter is apparently back online. Which means we’re getting a few hours of gossip all at once. Such as:
Fair Economist
@zzyzx: The duration is no surprise – T cell immunity normally is lifetime, although it weakens with time. Likewise the cross-reactivity to SARS – T-cells recognized relatively short peptides and can react to fairly distant pathogens as long as they share sequence. Apparently even the common cold coronavirus can sometimes provide T-cell protection to SARS2. I’d guess via conserved polymerase sequences.
Fair Economist
@JMG:
Pelosi has had a strong relief package sitting on McConnell’s desk since May. Can’t blame her for nothing gettting done.
Brachiator
@David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch:
I knew that. I have even seen the movie. I always get the title mixed up with an older film, Internal Affairs, with Andy Garcia and Richard Gere.
I blame it on the ‘Rona.
Stacib
@Martin: depends on which kid.
rikyrah
@schrodingers_cat:
Pinky- ‘race drama’
randy khan
@natem:
That’s an impressive amount of effort to take to cancel Bari Weiss.
tokyokie
@schrodingers_cat:
I don’t do Twitter, but the last movie I saw in a theater (watching something at home doesn’t count) was the Korean film The Man Standing Next (남산의 부장들), starring Lee Byung-hun, the first week of March. I think 4 1/2 months is the longest I’ve ever gone without seeing a movie in a theater since I was in 4th grade.
Brachiator
@Wyatt Salamanca:
Totally agree and I managed not to learn too much about the plot.
Parasite and Knives Out were the last films I saw in a movie theater.
And I began thinking about Parasite more as we entered lockdown. Some nice little parallels.
randy khan
@schrodingers_cat:
A friend got us into a preview of Emma. It was lovely, and even a bit cheeky. (For those who’ve seen it, yes, that was intentional.)
Bill Arnold
@Hoodie:
He is the earnest scientist. Doesn’t mean he’s politically stupid. Underestimating the political skills of very smart, accomplished scientists is seldom a good idea. I’ve been toying with the idea that the attacks on him were designed to fail, but that makes near zero sense, particularly with Peter Navarro involved, with arrogance and self-confidence approaching Dunning-Kruger levels.
(Good for him; he called the pandemic in January. So did some other people; the hard part was getting the DJT administration to do something effective about it, and Navarro failed at that. NYC would like to have a word with anyone who talks glowingly about the (very) partial China ban.)
Wyatt Salamanca
@Brachiator:
Given the current situation and my present disposition, Parasite will be the final feature film I see in a theater, I’ve decided to quit while I’m ahead and just go out on top. There’s also an avalanche of documentary films on my must see list and life’s too damn short.
I checked out QI which you recommended last week and enjoyed it very much. Thanks for that recommendation. If you’re not already familiar with them, I suggest looking at The Last Leg and Have I Got News for You. I need all the laughs that I can get.
tokyokie
@Tenar Arha: The Hong Kong movie on which The Departed is based, Infernal Affairs (無間道), is much better than the Scorsese film. And I’m guessing that Scorsese would concede that point. There’s no point in Mark Wahlberg being in the film other than to provide an authentic Boston accent and a character to neatly wrap things up at the end. (And if you want to watch a really good Boston-based gangster film, pick up The Friends of Eddie Coyle. Criterion released in on Blu-ray several years ago, and it’s probably Robert Mitchum’s last great leading-character part. It even features the old Boston Garden!)
Bill Arnold
@Fair Economist:
This is the bit that will catch a lot of eyes (bold mine):
SARS-CoV-2-specific T cell immunity in cases of COVID-19 and SARS, and uninfected controls (Nature, 15 July 2020)
SARS-CoV-2 T cells in uninfected donors exhibited a different pattern of immunodominance, frequently targeting the ORF-1-coded proteins NSP7 and 13 as well as the NP structural protein. Epitope characterization of NSP7-specific T cells showed recognition of protein fragments with low homology to “common cold” human coronaviruses but conserved amongst animal betacoranaviruses.
Matt McIrvin
@schrodingers_cat: The last movie I saw in a theater was Little Women (which, famously, features a major character dying of a contagious disease as a result of saintly caring for the sick). Before that, Knives Out.
Last movie I saw on TV was BlacKkKlansman. We were watching the Damon Lindelof Watchmen series around the same time and it’s odd how similar those two stories were in parts.
Morzer
@jc: Even North Korea, led by Kim Dun Don, appears to be shaking its collective head and wondering just what is wrong with the US of A.
Morzer
@Jeffro: Supplies of unobtanium will be distributed to the grateful masses by Generalissimo Kushner.
LongHairedWeirdo
@Brachiator: Yes, but partnerships (or sole proprietor) and S-corps worked under standard (individual) income tax. This is why Defined Benefit plans were very popular in the 70s, but fell out of favor quickly afterward.
A 50 year old successful businessman might have a couple of assistants, and want a tax write-off. They can create a moderately generous pension plan that promises to pay everyone a significant percentage of their salary at the age of 65. Well, with only 15 years for money to grow, the boss needs to make huge contributions to pay for his own expected benefits, and far less than 30% of that amount for the rest of his workers (who are likely both younger, and making far less money). Voila! That can be $75,000 on the $100,000 in pension fund contributions go to him, the other $25,000 (less than he’d get if he took the money home as a bonus) to the others.
Once the top tax rate was in the range of 40%, 401(k) plans dominated, where people defer part of their own salary to retirement. The tax deduction no longer made any sense for defined benefit plans.
In any event, the latest Republican Tax Cut, aka “make workers more expensive” plan cut the corporate tax rate to 21%, making workers and benefits even more expensive than they were for partners/Sole-Ps and S-corps, so there’s again, even more incentive to cut them.
dww44
@OGLiberal: A good portion of the media and a majority of the financial industry are hard wired to believe that Republicans are always best for the economy. I worked in that industry for 28 years and they always believed that Democrats were bad for the financial markets.
We watch a lot of CNBC and this is what they are selling even now. Some of the guest experts are now saying the markets perform best with a Dem President and a GOP Congress. So they are both pushing for and predicting a Trump defeat and Republican control of the Senate. I so hope they are only half right.
Matt McIrvin
@dww44: In the very short term, Democrats probably are bad for the financial markets, just because the traders are all Republicans and it makes them sad when Democrats win and happy when Republicans win. But that’s pretty ephemeral.
J R in WV
@frosty:
Us too, and it was a great movie, characters worth meeting as well as great cars and racing scenes. The characters were most of the meat of the film, the cars and racing were mostly backdrops until the end. Lots of drama, and Mr Henry Ford Jr and Mr Enzo Ferrari are the characters of the title… not the cars, the men.
Won’t mention any spoilers, but worth watching or re-watching in times of plague.