Cont: The all-new "US Politics and coronavirus" thread pt. 2

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"Ebola"? That's the ObamaVirus, you libtard!

(That's the color of sarcasm; don't want to Poe myself.)

Had Ebola originated in Western Europe, of course, Trump would have been far less concerned.
 
Mmm.

Now that there's been a chance for results to come in so we can look at the US numbers... when the information started being funneled through the HHS, something rather suspicious seems to be happening (as expected). From steadily climbing growth, suddenly, the numbers seems to immediately level off. Delving a little into that, the states that had been spiking suddenly had notable turnarounds and dropping increase numbers. Suspicious. It gets even more suspicious, though, when we take into account that...

the President’s very own Coronavirus Task Force released a report of hotspot States that totally muddies, if not directly contradicts, the DHHS State by State Covid-19 case increase numbers. According to what the Task force said, just yesterday, 21 States have such high rates of new cases that they should be closing down, rather than continuing to open up, with new infections exceeding 100 per 100,000 people, in —

Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Nevada, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and Wisconsin
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*sigh*
 
The governor of Tennessee says that schools should reopen, because in person learning is the best option.

https://www.tennessean.com/story/ne...s-plan-help-schools-reopen-safely/5527415002/


Meanwhile, Tennessee is the latest state to pass Michigan in the number of confirmed cases. It is still far behind us in deaths, but Florida and Texas are both coming very, very close to that total.


I wish I knew the answer to whether or not schools ought to reopen this fall, and how. More than that, I really wish that the people making the decisions knew. I don't get the feeling that they are making tough decisions based on realistic knowledge of virus behavior and the means to limit its spread.

A sensible approach, it would seem to me, would be to set a goal for that famous number, R0, to be less than 1, or, dare we dream it, give some margin of error and say less than 0.9 or some other threshold. Some combination of tests, shutdowns, masking, and whatever other means are available ought to achieve that, and then we could say that opening schools would likely raise the value to X. If X is greater than the tolerable threshold, schools stay closed. If within the tolerable thresholds, everyone goes home. Likewise with gyms, and theaters, and office buildings. If we could open up either schools or gyms, and stay within the limits, then we pick one. I would assume it would be schools, but that's what politicians are for, to make the decisions that are necessary when you can't have everything you want, as a society.

Unfortunately, that isn't what real people are demanding from real politicians. The people demand that the government tells them what they want to hear, and they want to continue to deny the evidence staring them in the face.

I hope schools here in Michigan open in the fall, but far more important than that is that I hope the decision, whichever way it goes, is made based on science, and not based on wishful thinking or denial.
 
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Aridas said:
Mmm.

Now that there's been a chance for results to come in so we can look at the US numbers... when the information started being funneled through the HHS, something rather suspicious seems to be happening (as expected). From steadily climbing growth, suddenly, the numbers seems to immediately level off. Delving a little into that, the states that had been spiking suddenly had notable turnarounds and dropping increase numbers. Suspicious. It gets even more suspicious, though, when we take into account that...
Click to expand...

When your problem is the number of people catching Coronavirus and dying as a result, there are two ways to tackle it:

  1. Do something to stop the spread of Coronavirus
  2. Do something about the numbers

Doing the former is difficult, may be unpopular among parts of society and isn't guaranteed to work in any case. It's also made more difficult because of the federal nature of the US (though Germany, which also has a federal structure, seemed to manage OK).

The latter is far easier and success is guaranteed. Both the UK and US governments are choosing Option 2 :mad:
 
Aridas said:
Mmm.

Now that there's been a chance for results to come in so we can look at the US numbers... when the information started being funneled through the HHS, something rather suspicious seems to be happening (as expected). From steadily climbing growth, suddenly, the numbers seems to immediately level off. Delving a little into that, the states that had been spiking suddenly had notable turnarounds and dropping increase numbers. Suspicious. It gets even more suspicious, though, when we take into account that...



*sigh*
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19/21 of those states gave their EC votes to Trump.

Anyway, policy-based evidence making has been around for a long while now...
 
Aridas said:
Mmm.

Now that there's been a chance for results to come in so we can look at the US numbers... when the information started being funneled through the HHS, something rather suspicious seems to be happening (as expected). From steadily climbing growth, suddenly, the numbers seems to immediately level off. Delving a little into that, the states that had been spiking suddenly had notable turnarounds and dropping increase numbers. Suspicious. It gets even more suspicious, though, when we take into account that...
*sigh*
Click to expand...

Another thing attack ads need to focus on, perhaps relentlessly.
 
Aridas said:
Mmm.

Now that there's been a chance for results to come in so we can look at the US numbers... when the information started being funneled through the HHS, something rather suspicious seems to be happening (as expected). From steadily climbing growth, suddenly, the numbers seems to immediately level off. Delving a little into that, the states that had been spiking suddenly had notable turnarounds and dropping increase numbers. Suspicious. It gets even more suspicious, though, when we take into account that...



*sigh*
Click to expand...

Well that is totally disgusting, if true. What I mean is whether there is actually evidence of cooking the books.

I like to give everyone the benefit of the doubt before I accuse them of malfeasance. That includes anyone that I suspect of malfeasance, which would include Trump or anyone associated with Trump. In other words, I suspect they are cooking the books, but I would like to be sure before I actually make the accusation.

It seems to me that some of those states did in fact take steps to control viral spread as their states became hot spots. I read about new mask mandates, or at least strong recommendations. I think bars were closed in some states. If nothing else, Donald Trump got on television and said that masks help. I know it distressed many of his loyalists, but did some of these clowns actually change their behavior as people around them started dying?

I would hate to think that HHS was literally cooking the books. If it were any other president you would have to work hard to convince me they were doing it. Sadly, with this one, I simply feel obligated to not jump to such a disturbing conclusion, even though my gut tells me that's exaclty what is happening.

ETA: I just clicked on the story. That's a pretty dramatic graph there. It wouldn't be explained by some order to shut down bars. Disturbing. Not exactly unexpected, but it would be nice if once in a while I were wrong about that .....thing.....in the White House.
 
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Meadmaker said:
Well that is totally disgusting, if true. What I mean is whether there is actually evidence of cooking the books.

I like to give everyone the benefit of the doubt before I accuse them of malfeasance. That includes anyone that I suspect of malfeasance, which would include Trump or anyone associated with Trump. In other words, I suspect they are cooking the books, but I would like to be sure before I actually make the accusation.

It seems to me that some of those states did in fact take steps to control viral spread as their states became hot spots. I read about new mask mandates, or at least strong recommendations. I think bars were closed in some states. If nothing else, Donald Trump got on television and said that masks help. I know it distressed many of his loyalists, but did some of these clowns actually change their behavior as people around them started dying?

I would hate to think that HHS was literally cooking the books. If it were any other president you would have to work hard to convince me they were doing it. Sadly, with this one, I simply feel obligated to not jump to such a disturbing conclusion, even though my gut tells me that's exaclty what is happening.
Click to expand...

Unless there's a whistle-blower, I'm not sure where any such evidence would come from. HHS has ensured that there cannot be a reputable alternative source of information to challenge their version.

I suppose something could be inferred in due course from excess death numbers but that's likely months, if not years, down the line and open to reinterpretation and debate.
 
The Don said:
Unless there's a whistle-blower, I'm not sure where any such evidence would come from. HHS has ensured that there cannot be a reputable alternative source of information to challenge their version.

I suppose something could be inferred in due course from excess death numbers but that's likely months, if not years, down the line and open to reinterpretation and debate.
Click to expand...

Not only that but they've systematically removed any watchdog who isn't in their pocket.
 
Meadmaker said:
Well that is totally disgusting, if true. What I mean is whether there is actually evidence of cooking the books.

I like to give everyone the benefit of the doubt before I accuse them of malfeasance. That includes anyone that I suspect of malfeasance, which would include Trump or anyone associated with Trump. In other words, I suspect they are cooking the books, but I would like to be sure before I actually make the accusation.

It seems to me that some of those states did in fact take steps to control viral spread as their states became hot spots. I read about new mask mandates, or at least strong recommendations. I think bars were closed in some states. If nothing else, Donald Trump got on television and said that masks help. I know it distressed many of his loyalists, but did some of these clowns actually change their behavior as people around them started dying?

I would hate to think that HHS was literally cooking the books. If it were any other president you would have to work hard to convince me they were doing it. Sadly, with this one, I simply feel obligated to not jump to such a disturbing conclusion, even though my gut tells me that's exaclty what is happening.

ETA: I just clicked on the story. That's a pretty dramatic graph there. It wouldn't be explained by some order to shut down bars. Disturbing. Not exactly unexpected, but it would be nice if once in a while I were wrong about that .....thing.....in the White House.
Click to expand...

Yeah. I used "suspicious" for a reason, regardless. The graphs and numbers really aren't proof of wrong-doing, in and of themselves. The circumstances around such put up some remarkable red flags, though. Given this Administration, unfortunately, wrong-doing is horribly likely in a way not seen for a long time in the US before the Trump Administration.

The Don said:
Unless there's a whistle-blower, I'm not sure where any such evidence would come from. HHS has ensured that there cannot be a reputable alternative source of information to challenge their version.

I suppose something could be inferred in due course from excess death numbers but that's likely months, if not years, down the line and open to reinterpretation and debate.
Click to expand...

Local numbers should be available as public information. Gathering them up, though, is another matter entirely. A number of state governments don't even do that for their own state, at last check. Of course, any local COVID numbers can be affected fairly easily with a number of tricks all along reporting paths - and have been, if a number of the stories floating around are true. From simply refusing to test for COVID to outright manipulating the numbers by highers ups in nursing homes and hospitals, there's been a plenty of reason to think that shenanigans are going on.
 
Aridas said:
Local numbers should be available as public information. Gathering them up, though, is another matter entirely. A number of state governments don't even do that for their own state, at last check. Of course, any local COVID numbers can be affected fairly easily with a number of tricks all along reporting paths - and have been, if a number of the stories floating around are true. From simply refusing to test for COVID to outright manipulating the numbers by highers ups in nursing homes and hospitals, there's been a plenty of reason to think that shenanigans are going on.
Click to expand...

One major problem at the moment is that the states with the worst infection and death rates are the ones which stand to gain reputationally most by understating those statistics.

This is compounded by the fact that most have Republican governors and legislatures who not only want to keep those inconvenient numbers low, but who also want to be seen to support President Trump. Even if numbers were available for those states, they wouldn't be released. :(
 
The Don said:
One major problem at the moment is that the states with the worst infection and death rates are the ones which stand to gain reputationally most by understating those statistics.

This is compounded by the fact that most have Republican governors and legislatures who not only want to keep those inconvenient numbers low, but who also want to be seen to support President Trump. Even if numbers were available for those states, they wouldn't be released. :(
Click to expand...

Similarly, though, as mentioned, nursing homes and hospitals are examples of relevant businesses that have motivation to lie or misrepresent numbers for the sake of their reputation, which is in a similar vein to the various firings and the like for having complained to outsiders about how inadequate PPE and general safety measures being done were.
 
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