It is past election day. Covid-19, unlike Ebola in 2014, is still being discussed as it is real, it is pervasive and it is ripping through the upper plains at the moment.
Devastating – 104,004 cases today and 1,114 deaths, per WaPo. We're in the midst of a very serious nationwide resurgence.
— Caitlin Rivers, PhD (@cmyeaton) November 4, 2020
It seems like high COVID death rates is not a political negative:
President Trump is still outperforming his 2016 margins in counties where the COVID-19 death rate was highest. pic.twitter.com/uAjyMs0wFK
— Brad Heath (@bradheath) November 4, 2020
I can’t even….
WaterGirl
Dave, I didn’t see your post in the works, and it looks like we put ours up at the same exact time.
I don’t think they are really in competition with one another, but I can pull mine for an hour if you like.
Sideshow Bob
Trump cannot fail, he can only be failed. Therefore, the virus cannot possibly be his fault. It is our fault for not being worthy enough for him.
WaterGirl
At first glance, it looked crazy to me too – how can the areas with the highest death rates STILL be for Trump?
But it’s actually backwards. The people who believe in Trump and all his lies don’t wear masks and don’t take precautions, and are dying as a result.
I wonder if there will be a lag, and if people in those areas will turn on Trump as more and more people are dying. But I wouldn’t bet on it. They seem determined to follow Trump off a cliff. Lemmings marching into the sea.
Cervantes
They are more afraid of being shunned by their neighbors for the sin of wearing a mask than they are of getting sick or dying. Identity is stronger than reality.
Brantl
I have to wonder if there’s a betting pool for how many ways Stump can find to sit on his thumb, and spin. Right answer: all of ‘em , Katie.
Sideshow Bob
@WaterGirl: I think you’re exactly right – trump areas didn’t take it seriously.
My concern is that they won’t see any sort of correlation or introspection at all. Death rates will continue to climb, but now under (God willing) President Biden. So it must be HIS fault.
dmsilev
@WaterGirl: I think this is right. The current worst-hit states are the Dakotas, which have been aggressively resisting imposing mask mandates (ND has a “mask suggestion” or something like that), have fewer restrictions on large gatherings (“cough Sturgis cough cough cough gasp intubation”), etc.
Citizen Alan
Nicole
There was a good twitter thread up yesterday, from Monjula Ray, about the white male vote:
https://twitter.com/queerBengali/status/1323989880012218369?fbclid=IwAR2aLQVsVkq3ixq_ygwyu8E0jdoqnUDdJBjmxBCrMu-vHH_i9WK4u0aiRno
In the comments, someone tried to get into, yes, well, but white men benefit from things being this way, and Ray stepped in pretty quickly to say, unless they’re already rich, no, they actually don’t. White patriarchy is literally killing them, but they’re as susceptible to being gaslit as anyone else. Maybe more so, since this version of gaslighting is telling them they’re on top, meanwhile the wealthy are picking their pockets and taking away their chances for a stable life, too.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
It sure seems that way. I mean look how North Dakota, plague rat capital of the US, elected a guy who just died from COVID.
I am thinking we should have seen this coming the way the Right went full conspiracy theory. They no likee reality there in the Red States.
DCA
It would be interesting to know the market share for Fox News in these counties. I’ll bet very high,
and I suspect that this is the cause for both Trump and death.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Sideshow Bob: Of course everything after the 1st of 2020 will be Biden’s fault if he becomes president. Just like Republicans hold that Bill Clinton was President from 1994 to 2010, Obama was president from 2011 to 2016, and President GW Bush is a liberal lie that never happen. On the other hand it’s not until mid January until he takes office so by that time enough of these idiots will have gotten sick / crippled / died to put the fear of god into these survivors that the Winter Wave will be dying down.
topclimber
@DCA: Don’t miss out on your chance to buy prime Great Plains property at upcoming estate auctions! Contact Trump Easy Pickins LLC c/o Trump Tower, NYC.
Sideshow Bob
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: I doubt it will die down at all. Why would it? No one’s doing anything about it. I think those of us with sanity just have to protect ourselves as best we can and either wait for them to die off or for some sort of vaccine.
Ksmiami
@Citizen Alan: This was my point on Tuesday- even if the GOP prevails, their people will become sick and die so we can move forward anyway
WaterGirl
@DCA: Excellent point. I would not be surprised to find that you are right about the FOX market share in those areas.
Spanky
@WaterGirl:
They’re getting Trump Nation, good and hard. Fuck ’em. They’re a lost cause.
jonas
I think it’s a combination of simple spite — if liberals are for fighting the pandemic, I’m agin’ it! — and statistical illiteracy. For every 100 people who contract Covid, about 10 of them are going to get pretty damn sick, possibly with long-term repercussions even if they recover, 5 will end up in the hospital and about 1 or 2 will die. They look at that and shrug: “What’s the big deal?” They think that’s the same mortality rate as the seasonal flu, whereas it’s much, much higher. Plus, it’s almost all old people in that 1-2% figure, so double shrug.
Cheryl Rofer
One of the BIG things that Biden will bring is a rational approach to controlling the virus.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Sideshow Bob: Go look at the graphs; it goes in these three months cycles, you can see when the fear sets in in the general population. Then there is a month of two of normal, everyone forgets, because Americans, and it starts again.
hells littlest angel
Life in the Fox hinterlands:
The chocolate ration has been increased to 25 grams per week!The death toll has decreased to 1200 per day!
mrmoshpotato
Dying to own the libs? ?♂️
Mallard Filmore
@WaterGirl:
“Lemuels marching into the sea”
https://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/uploads/monthly_03_2019/post-83-0-14839900-1552165489.gif
Sideshow Bob
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Yeah, but I thought they were saying this wave was so bad contact tracing was damn near impossible. I figured once that goes out the window, we’re running out of ways to actually control it in large numbers.
Bruuuuce
It will be just like the debt, or the deficit: IOKIYAR, but gods help the Democrat who doesn’t do miracles immediately if not sooner to fix the mess their GOP predecessor(s) left.
Sideshow Bob
@mrmoshpotato: I swear to God, if Trump told them to put a gun to their temple to prove their loyalty we’d have something like 30 mil suicides.
Maybe we should start a trend. They already reject things like eating healthy and exercise because that’s “too granola” so maybe we can make living in general a liberal trend. “Liberals want to take away ma right to play Russian Roulette drunk! I’ll show ’em!”
Bobby Thomson
Heath is looking at causation wrong. Death rates are high in pro-Trump counties because they are pro-Trump counties, where wearing a mask is treason and everyone is supposed to carry on as though nothing has changed.
I’m a bad person for not being particularly bothered by this.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Sideshow Bob: oh yes, at some point it’s beyond the government to control it, but remember people have an hardwired fear of disease like they do with fire. It gets that bad 80% of the population runs for cover and hides.
Apparently the Midwest is going to be an experiment on how bad it can get with no government intervention
Oh and remember Sideshow, plenty of places in country got this shit under control more or less. Just because they aren’t REAL America(tm) were not allowed to talk about them.
TomatoQueen
My father tested positive for COVID and was moved from his memory care unit at Masonicare in Wallingford CT early yesterday morning to a small isolation floor so he’s in a private room. He is 90 years old, has COPD, congestive heart failure, and vascular dementia (not Alzheimer’s). Masonicare is a big ol’ reputable facility that has been on self-imposed lockdown since before COVID, because of a winter outbreak of shigella. Until now, Masonicare has had a very low incidence of COVID cases, 3 or 4 patients and 5 staff. No visitors at all permitted since Feb 28th (approx). As of last night, Daddy is still a-symptomatic, and is comfortable, medications keeping everything as is, tho’ his blood pressure is a little low. I don’t know whether he understands what is happening. I’m terrified.
Bobby Thomson
@mrmoshpotato: please proceed.
gene108
@Cheryl Rofer:
Rational approaches won’t matter, because too much of the country is determined to act irrationally.
Biden is damned if he tries to impose something like a national mask mandate, because it will whip right wingers into a frenzy. He’s damned if he does not do anything, because new cases and deaths will be blamed on him.
EDIT: By frenzy, I mean a sustained agitation like the Tea Party driven by right wing media, and astroturf groups to set the stage for a repeat of 2010.
Elizabelle
@WaterGirl: For dog’s sake, WG, we can multitask.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@gene108: Biden is also going to be blamed for stuff that happened this April.
On the other hand Biden will be able to help the people who willing to be helped. At some point the pain and death is going to break threw the Conspiracy theories.
Sideshow Bob
@TomatoQueen: I’m so sorry for you. That must be so miserable :(
Matt McIrvin
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: The spring peak in the Northeast was actually worse than the current situation everywhere else–general infection rates were likely far higher than the current peak but there was almost no testing to detect it, so the peak looks smaller. If you look at the deaths it really stands out.
They got it under control by just locking down hard for a few weeks. Of course, if you do that and don’t put an aggressive program of testing, contact tracing and isolation in place, it’ll just come back–and we still don’t have enough of that. And it seems like even here, the fear subsides enough that people start clamoring to reopen everything far earlier than they should.
Elizabelle
@TomatoQueen: Hugs. Fingers crossed for your father, and please keep us posted. That would be terrifying. I hope your dad ends up with the asymptomatic variety, or the very lightest case possible.
Matt McIrvin
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Just not actively sabotaging state COVID control programs will be an improvement. Trump had federal agents intercepting and stealing shipments of medical PPE to states he didn’t like! Governors essentially had to arrange to smuggle it past them.
WaterGirl
@TomatoQueen: That’s scary. I’m so sorry.
I hope your dad comes through the whole thing without a worry!
WaterGirl
@Elizabelle: I know that, and I seldom care about bigfooting. But some front pagers do, so I like to be respectful of that.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Same here in California, there is a spike, the State gets aggressive with the testing and like the day after the spike seems to have died down some twatwaffle is screaming Opression and we should reopen the bars.
WaterGirl
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Some American adults are like spoiled children. Me, me, me. Now, right now.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Matt McIrvin: Yes, isn’t there something that the states are shipping each other needed supplies by their Air National Guards so the Trump admin can’t play those games.
Sideshow Bob
@WaterGirl: That’s been my reaction to the whole election. So much of Trump’s support seems to be based around “Well, I’M not dying so lemme have my beer and concerts! I can get married, so what do I care about a buncha gay people?” Depressing as hell.
Subsole
@Ksmiami: Attrition only works if we don’t get attrited too.
And in in Red states it disproportionately hits folks who don’t get equal care. Read: our core constitiencies.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@WaterGirl: There was shit like that with AIDs, lot of OPPRESSION! when it was shown the bath houses and random sex was spreading it. While I could see why the gays rightfully though that the government was out to get them, I though it was really strange that they weren’t protecting themselves (I know, men, it’s a bridge to far to ask us to keep our junk in our trunks lol)
Subsole
@Spanky: Thanks. Hope they don’t take me with ’em.
Seriously, we talk all this monolithic shit about any place that isn’t midnight blue, then wonder why the latino vote swings against us. Who the fuck do you think is gonna get the brunt of this? Cause it ain’t kylie and mckimber.
dmsilev
@Matt McIrvin: Hospitalizations per capita in the Dakotas are now at roughly 2/3s of where New York peaked at, and are still climbing. At this point, the situation is in the same “very bad” ballpark.
Subsole
@Cheryl Rofer: It just hit me all over again that it is gonna be months before we even have accurate casualty counts.
Kushner needs to burn over this.
NYCMT
I have unformed thoughts about mental dream-castles and the will to ignore Covid-19 in service of orange gods, and Heinrich Mann’s Der Untertan.
Mel
@TomatoQueen: I am so very sorry you and your father are going through that. Sending you a big hug. Please say if there is anything we can do to help.
Sasha
The “Harder, Daddy!” electorate.
Sideshow Bob
@Subsole: I get what you’re saying. We (progressives/dems/rational people/whatever) do tend to talk in absolutes, especially around groups of people. I know we can’t write-off, for example, the 1/3 of Biden voters in Wyoming. But then again, there’s only so much you can do for people who won’t help themselves. If a state/majority is THAT determined to drive themselves into a ditch, what can we actually do?
Ksmiami
@TomatoQueen: I’m so sorry- innocent people do not deserve this scourge
Ksmiami
@Subsole: until the Democrats are able to say The GOP is the party of death all day everyday we will continue our national suicide
Subsole
@Ksmiami: Yes. Our reps are going to have to spine up and start clapping back at the media bothsiderism. Hard. Which means we are going to have to call them and badger them. Let them know we have their backs. Might even have to organize other folks for it.
Ruckus
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
The fear of god?
They are looking to meet god. They do everything in life to get that chance. COVID is god’s will to them. The fear of god? They don’t fear god, they fear not living by some asinine version of life that gives them any say or control at all. Something like Dumbass 3.0.
satby
@TomatoQueen: Keeping good thoughts for him. I would be terrified too.
Ruckus
@mrmoshpotato:
No, living to own the libs. The dying part is just the cost of business.
Ruckus
@WaterGirl:
They are not like spoiled children. The are spoiled children.
That’s why trump is their leader, he’s the most childish, spoiled brat among them.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Ruckus: Seriously, most of these people don’t believe in god anymore than an atheist does. Go talk to a “Christian” about dying and they will jump out of their skin. It’s all just a tribal marker when you get down to it.
Sloane Ranger
@TomatoQueen: I’m so sorry. Keeping you and your father in my thoughts. I hope everything goes well for him.
Caracal
@topclimber: This needs an upvote. Definitely.
ET
I was watching a CCN clip from a red state area that has shitty health care access and one guy they interviews just seem fatalistic. He didn’t seem to care about others (including his family) and was just fatalistic –that fatalism that is deeply selfish. It is here and it won’t go away so I will just continue to my life and if I die I die seems to have been his reasoning. He just seemed tired of it all and from my perspective seem to think that he/his community was somehow unique in this. There was no worry about what would happen if a lot of people got sick and where they would go for help. No though that his child could get it, that he could get and give it to her and she could be one of those kids that dies of it. He got really testy and defensive when the interviewer pushed back and while he seemed to be like don’t make this political and you are blaming tRump or some sort, he did reveal that for him it definitely seemed political. When they saw people with masked he said they assumed the person was a Democrat.
Ksmiami
@Subsole: for Biden less Obama more Harry Truman
ballerat
@Sideshow Bob: This is how it will go.
No change in behavior but they will soon blame Biden for the pandemic.
It’s what they do. They blamed Clinton for 9/11 and Obama for the 2008 recession.
Like Trump they accept no responsibility.
It suggests a deep streak of immaturity. How did so many people get that way? What did they miss growing up? Some people never accept the responsibilities of adulthood, but so many millions is a phenomenon.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@ballerat: Hell, they blamed Clinton for Saddam not being driven from power at the end of the 1st Gulf War.
Just those things are kind of abstract, unlike this virus which is the wolf at their doors. What is this some kind weird as evolutionary thing with humans, a percentage of the population is dimwitted Red Shirts driven by instinct to die in what ever shit that is happening as a warning to the rest of the population?
chopper
@TomatoQueen:
oh jesus, i’m sorry. that is shitty news.
Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony
@jonas:
Yes! And the illness and death happen in clusters. So, if one person in a peer group or family gets it, then that group gets hammered. You have multiple hospitalizations and maybe deaths. If it hasn’t hit your group yet, you might go for months without knowing a single person who has gotten sick. These people don’t believe anything that hasn’t happened to someone they know personally.
NJ Progressive
@WaterGirl: Read “Dying of Whiteness” by Jonathan Metzl from Vanderbilt and you will see the rationale behind these people’s attitude toward health and healthcare. Mind boggling!
WaterGirl
@NJ Progressive: Thank you. And welcome to Balloon Juice, if this is your first comment.
Bob Hertz
Over at the ACA Signups blog, Charles Gaba has done a great job of actually listing out the cases and deaths by county nationwide.
What comes clear is that in a sparsely-populated county, the Covid death rate can double and not cause a stir.
If a county with a population of 10,000 had 8 Covid deaths last month and this month had 16 deaths, its death rate has doubled. But would you as a resident be alarmed and change your attitudes?
If you were a scientist and thought exponentially, you might be alarmed. 99% of people are not scientists, however.