Coronavirus

[Badger]

19 hours ago, Doc Democracy said:

 

*Speechless*

 

well, the reality is these counties are being hurt disproportionately to how the disease has moved..   The sparse population insulates them from the danger of the disease.  But, it also works against them, as there aren't enough of them for government to give a damn what happens to them.  My point was from their point of view, I could see someone thinking  "we cant get money to buy supplies, we (theoretically) might not be getting a decent amount of supplies even coming in, what are we doing this for?".    On a most basic level, it is hard to justify closing down a random small mountain community because some city 300 miles away has a disease.  Especially if little to no business is done between the 2, and their only connection is that they share a state.  

[Lord Liaden]

29 minutes ago, Badger said:

THough, I have pondered comments made about the big businesses being the ones pushing to open.  That would be foolish and short-sighted of them.  The longer this goes the more small businesses that get crushed.  The more crushed small businesses the less competition.  The less competition, the greater future profits.  

 

Big businesses should want this to last.

 

Big business is also being impaired by the shutdown. Taking that approach will mean having to wait for their profits.These same interests have been fighting against regulations on their business to help curb climate change, which threatens the future of the whole planet. Does that suggest they have that kind of patience or foresight?

 

There's another factor at play here, too. The elites are terrified that the longer this goes on, the more of us peons will realize they need us a helluva lot more than we need them. When people are impoverished, when they feel powerless and desperate, they get angry, and their anger always turns against those who have money and power.

[Badger]

I don't disagree, but they can survive, the small businesses cant.  With minimal patience, they could everything they dreamed of.   But, yeah, not a too long quarantine.  

[Cancer]

COVID-19 victim: John Rowlands, who scored the Seattle Sounders' first goal back in 1974

 

He was 73 years old at the time of his death, at home in England.

[Lord Liaden]

34 minutes ago, Badger said:

I don't disagree, but they can survive, the small businesses cant.  With minimal patience, they could everything they dreamed of.   But, yeah, not a too long quarantine.  

 

Again, "minimal patience." Not their strong suit. Remember, Donald Trump grew up in the same environment.

 

But small businesses aren't direct competitors to the big corporations. They don't want to control every convenience store or dressmaker or garage or shawarma restaurant -- the profit margin is too small for the work involved. But small businesses employ a great many people, putting money in their hands with which to buy what the corporations make.

[Badger]

yeah, small businesses "serve some purpose" to them.  Regardless, the small business is in much more desperation at the moment, than they are.

[Badger]

13 hours ago, Starlord said:

 

Big pharma didn't want him beating them to their trillion dollar covid vaccine so a black ops team setup a fake murder-suicide and shifted it to Chinese on Chinese violence.  Standard FX channel thriller plot.

 

For better or worse, I might have trust Big Pharma than I trust the Chinese Government.  Mind you, that says very little for benefit to Big Pharma.   You're still asking if I want to get kick in the groin 5 times or 10 times.

[Old Man]

Oh ten is no problem, let me get my boots. 

[Doc Democracy]

3 hours ago, Badger said:

 

well, the reality is these counties are being hurt disproportionately to how the disease has moved..   The sparse population insulates them from the danger of the disease.  But, it also works against them, as there aren't enough of them for government to give a damn what happens to them.  My point was from their point of view, I could see someone thinking  "we cant get money to buy supplies, we (theoretically) might not be getting a decent amount of supplies even coming in, what are we doing this for?".    On a most basic level, it is hard to justify closing down a random small mountain community because some city 300 miles away has a disease.  Especially if little to no business is done between the 2, and their only connection is that they share a state.  

 

To me it is the ultimate expression of "we" are only "we" when it doesn't cost me anything.

It plays to an isolationist trend in citizens of the USA, self-sufficiency etc.  This episode is the opposite of a natural disaster like wildfire or a hurricane.  In a natural disaster, the community at large rallies round and supports the tiny community in need.  In this there is a need for every tiny community to rally round and support the community at large.

The problem is that they do NOT know where the virus is or where it is moving.  It would be impossible to have a balkanised country where the rules are different every time you cross a county or state line.  It would quickly collapse to a lowest common denominator, the worst possible outcome in facing a pandemic.

I would bet these scarce population counties are net beneficiaries of the state tax programme, such places usually cost more in infrastructure than they contribute in taxes.

 

I have no sympathy.

 

Doc

[Doc Democracy]

Pretty stark reading about racial differences in survival here:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-52574931

 

[Tjack]

  AOL just reported that Trump’s personal valet just tested positive for the virus.  That means he’s got it, ‘cause if I had to work for him I’d spit in his coffee every morning.  Wouldn’t you?

[Old Man]

State-by-state social distancing scoreboard

 

Spoiler: No state gets higher than a C-.

[Old Man]

42 minutes ago, Tjack said:

  AOL just reported that Trump’s personal valet just tested positive for the virus.  That means he’s got it, ‘cause if I had to work for him I’d spit in his coffee every morning.  Wouldn’t you?

 

Thoughts and prayers.

[Badger]

12 hours ago, Doc Democracy said:

 

To me it is the ultimate expression of "we" are only "we" when it doesn't cost me anything.

It plays to an isolationist trend in citizens of the USA, self-sufficiency etc.  This episode is the opposite of a natural disaster like wildfire or a hurricane.  In a natural disaster, the community at large rallies round and supports the tiny community in need.  In this there is a need for every tiny community to rally round and support the community at large.

The problem is that they do NOT know where the virus is or where it is moving.  It would be impossible to have a balkanised country where the rules are different every time you cross a county or state line.  It would quickly collapse to a lowest common denominator, the worst possible outcome in facing a pandemic.

I would bet these scarce population counties are net beneficiaries of the state tax programme, such places usually cost more in infrastructure than they contribute in taxes.

 

I have no sympathy.

 

Doc

 

I never disagreed on a macro level.  

 

But, you didn't have to tell us you have no sympathy, people in rural areas already know.  hence, why self-sufficiency becomes a big thing.   More about survival.   As unlike the rosy picture you painted, there is rarely that larger community that rallies around you, when in need.

 

I started to post more, but I realize banning is possible due to my feeling on the matter.  ANd I just don't care if you see the other side of things.

 

 

[Iuz the Evil]

On 5/5/2020 at 8:37 PM, Badger said:

Interestingly, mentioned in the paper, that there are 3 rural counties here in VA, still yet to have a case.  If I lived in one of those counties, it would be hard for me not to feel like that I am being buried into financial ruin, so some politicians can pat themselves on the back.  

This is happening in California as well. Modoc in particular has had no cases, is more land than humans (totally County population is 8777), and are really getting into it with the State. They've gone so far as to tell the State they won't comply to the governor's order, which I don't believe they can legally follow through on. There's a lot of that going around, and this is month two (in another 10 days). 

 

They aren't in an indefensible position to point out they're being impacted when they have not experienced the issue being protected against. And the State isn't wrong to assert their obligation to protect the citizenry. Small, poorer, rural jurisdictions don't have the resources of urban areas - this is going to be terrible for them. I would have preferred more of a jurisdictional, sequential approach based on prevalence and science but the lack of testing resulted in difficult decisions having to be made. 

 

In any case, the governor put forward the guidance for 19 business sectors today and targets Counties will need to certify to in order to move forward. I expect California will have limited reopening in more urban areas in the next couple weeks. Rural ones it'll probably happen this week in some cases, if they can possibly pull it off. 

[Badger]

Yeah, I understood where Doc Democracy was coming from because you do have to worry about people coming in with the disease and giving it to them.   And in fact, I am actually neutral on the whole thing, the quarantine is needed, but I can see the suffering that others particularly government officials have often blinded themselves toward.  

 

But, urban vs rural, can often be an abusive marriage.  The Urban areas can often have an attitude towards rural areas of "you must care about me when I am in trouble.  but care for you when I am in trouble, how dare you?"   And this moment in history has really amplified that attitude at times.  

 

I don't even really fault the lack of sympathy thing.  I know in the past, I have occasionally been situtational myself.   I admit, my empathy can move outward (local, state, federal, global) for better or worse.  It is hard to build up caring for someplace around the country or world.  When your own place is suffering so deeply, even if it isn't as much as that other place.  That attitude probably goes for NYC or some village in the Sahara.  It really isn't wrong or right.  It is often about survival.

[Badger]

on the lighter side, last night (got my toilet paper at the grocery store).

 

Failure at parenting.

 

Let the 3 year old granddaughter open up the bag of popcorn, what could go wrong?   Surely, she wont sling it around like rice at a wedding.

 

Got to feel sorry for the cleaning personnel.  Relatively minor, as spills go, but I for one, would be less angry over an a legit accident that was a worse mess, than one I know could have been prevented with minimal parenting.

[Old Man]

More detail on the methodology behind the White House's most recent coronavirus model

 

Tl;dr: Excel.

[ScottishFox]

Meanwhile in North Dallas we are clocking in at a devastating, way-of-life altering 2.2 deaths per 100,000.

 

It will probably get worse before it's over, but I can't fault people who think this thing has been grossly overblown.

We suffer a mortality rate about 100x higher than that by way of over-eating here.

 

If I take the top ten things that kill Texans the last entry is 6x higher than Coronavirus.

Add drug overdoses, suicide, firearms accidents and homicide the bottom of the 13 item list is still almost 3x higher than Coronavirus.

 

South Dakota didn't even shut down and they're clocking in at 3.5 deaths per 100,000.

 

It's not hard to understand why people in rural areas believe this was economic ruin in return for nothing at all.

 

We'll find out over the next month or so now that we're opened up.

[KA.]

Based on evidence that someone on the internet that shares my world view presented, I am extremely sure that whatever side I am opposed to is acting in a corrupt and irresponsible manner and will ultimately be held accountable for this entire event.

 

However, as a Libertarian, the only person I support and believe in is myself, and therefore everyone else is on the side I am opposed to.

 

Just letting everyone else in the world know that I am not fooled and I will be holding all of you accountable.

 

Just kidding,

 

ka.

 

[TrickstaPriest]

1 hour ago, ScottishFox said:

It's not hard to understand why people in rural areas believe this was economic ruin in return for nothing at all.

 

It's not hard, but it is somewhat despairing.  Given how this thing has hugely impacted other locations, it's their fortune that they haven't been ruined.  If they want to use that to argue they need to be opened up again, that's one thing.  I'm fine with that (as expressed elsewhere for sure).

 

It's another to say it was never a problem to begin with, which is pretty darn revisionist. 

 

We still don't know why the death rate in New York was so terrible.  Extreme population concentration in public areas is probably a major factor, it allowed the virus to spread insanely fast.  The numbers around it being much less, in the thousands, are because they shut down around the same time, while the reality is New York needed to close a month prior to that.  The virus was spreading so fast that the several weeks it takes from 'getting sick to dead' meant that a tremendous amount of population was already sick before the city was closed.

 

So do rural areas need to stay closed?  Probably not.  Was this not-real?  It was pretty darn real for anyone caught unprepared.  Fortunately it's pretty easy to be prepared when it moves so slowly through your area.  A lot less easy when you have major public transit, or packed factories.

 

And I'm sure people will call this a hoax, and climate change a hoax because of it.

 

Maybe this is an argument for breaking up the states.  That seems to be the only consensus that will make everyone happy.

[Iuz the Evil]

Oh it ain't over yet. Pretty predictable modeling we will be having an increase in spread over time given any level of reduction in current measures until we hit a yet unknown level of exposure (unknown because current infection rate is unknown due to asymptomatic and non reported numbers) or get a vaccine. That last option will probably be a while.

 

I get the arguments, we are just picking bad options though. More people die or generational poverty is created. So then you get into arguments about personal preference in response. 

 

I think folks are largely doing the best they can. It makes me sad to see the level of vitriol directed at people about the decisions being made. I am living in a very locked down, shelter at home, social distancing enforced and masks required location. I think it's the right choice we are making. 

 

I do not think the people who are upset at the impact of those decisions do not have a right to be very angry when we have little local spread and they lose their business, home and all the implications from those impacts. That happened directly from those local and state decisions we made. It was the choice made at the time, and seems like it worked. But being mad at that choice and the people who made it is inevitable. 

 

Such is government service. I'm tired. Have been off 3 days in last 50, but I remain grateful for the opportunity. Rambling now, going to bed. 

[TrickstaPriest]

4 minutes ago, Iuz the Evil said:

Such is government service. I'm tired. Have been off 3 days in last 50, but I remain grateful for the opportunity. Rambling now, going to bed. 

 

Get rest.  Just having someone to talk to can help cool heads.  I've avoided directing vitriol at others here I think.  And I won't get into why I think we are stuck with so many bad options, but it's a huge mess regardless.

 

I hope this drives more work-from-home options, and more companies take it seriously and learn how to manage it.  I think that would save people money, stress, and time, even if it's only done for half the week.

[tkdguy]

I'm practically unemployed. I'm still officially on the payroll, but I'm not being assigned any hours. My complaints have fallen on deaf ears. I would quit right now, but I may lose my unemployment benefits if I do. In the meantime, I plan to do some job hunting and training.

[TrickstaPriest]

23 minutes ago, tkdguy said:

I'm practically unemployed. I'm still officially on the payroll, but I'm not being assigned any hours. My complaints have fallen on deaf ears. I would quit right now, but I may lose my unemployment benefits if I do. In the meantime, I plan to do some job hunting and training.

 

Good luck.  I know people who've been getting work despite losing their job before all this hit.  Things can turn around.