Front Row at The Trump Show: The New Book by ABC’s White House Reporter Jonathan Karl
Today I finished Front Row at the Trump Show, the new book by ABC White House reporter Jonathan Karl. I’ve read most of the big books on Trump.* Front Row at The Trump Show is not as comprehensive a history of Trump’s presidency as some of the other books I have read (I think Tim Alberta’s American Carnage is the most comprehensive) and does not really try to be. But it’s one of the most entertaining — and arguably the most credible.
I’ll write this review by flying through a few of the tidbits that grabbed my attention, as signified by my Kindle bookmarks:
- Karl reminds us that the centerpiece of Donald Trump’s 1999 campaign for the Reform Party nomination was … a wealth tax of 14.25% on all wealth over $10 million. It would have been the biggest tax increase in human history by far.
- Sportswriter Rick Reilly wrote that he played golf with Trump, who introduced Reilly to anyone who would listen as the publisher of Sports Illustrated. Reilly asked Trump why he was lying about him. Trump replied: “Sounds better.”
- I had forgotten how Fox News was really on Jeb’s side at first, and was anti-Trump. But Trump got his airtime anyway — by going on Fake News CNN, once spending an hour with Don Lemon, who said Trump could come on any time.
- When Trump came down the escalator to announce his candidacy, there was a crowd of people applauding. They were paid actors. A company hired by his campaign had put out a casting call offering $50 a head to come applaud Trump as he announced that he would be running for President.
- One of the stories that bothers me the most is Karl’s lengthy description of a famous event at a campaign rally that many of you might remember. Trump started complaining that the cameras would never show the size of the crowd. He singled out the cameraman in the middle and started saying, over and over, that it was “terrible” that the cameraman would not turn the camera to show the crowd. Trump riled up the crowd for several minutes, whipping them up into a frenzy of anger at the supposedly biased cameraman who refused to show the crowd. I found the video online. You can view the relevant portion here:
Karl explains that the cameraman was a guy named Stuart Clark who was performing the role of a “pool camera operator” for the big five TV networks. He had one job: keep your camera on the candidate. The networks could then use other cameras for other shots, knowing that the pool camera was assigned to do one thing and one thing only: keep that camera trained on the face of the candidate.
Karl explains that many candidates might not know this, but Trump does:
Nobody understands this system better than Donald Trump. If you watch his speeches, he plays to that center camera. He knows it’s the pool camera and he knows that the pool camera shoots the video that cable networks use when they broadcast his speeches live.
If you watch the clip I have cut for you, you can see him playing directly to that camera. As you watch him look at that camera, it’s very obvious when you actually watch the video that Trump knows exactly what he is doing
Karl talked to Stuart about it afterwards.
“I just sucked it up and did my job,” Stuart later told me.
As the rally ended and the crowd left, Stuart stayed behind in the fenced-off press area. After that experience, he didn’t want to have somebody take a shot at his as he left, lugging all his equipment, heading off to cover the next Trump rally.
A CNN producer later complained to Corey Lewandowski, saying that this sort of thing was dangerous. The contemptible punk Lewandowski replied: “Yeah, right.”
I bookmarked a lot of other passages, but this post is getting long and you get the idea. If you’re a fan of this genre of book (and I definitely am), you’ll find this book as entertaining as any other on the market. And Jonathan Karl has a real integrity in the way he presents the story. He asked a lot of important, newsmaking questions, but he comes across like the consummate newsman — not looking to be the news, but merely to ask the questions that make the news.
I recommend this book.
*These include Fire and Fury (maybe 60-90% accurate!, Bob Woodward’s Fear (fun; pretty well sourced but take it with a grain of salt); Team of Vipers by Cliff Sims (enjoyable view from someone more favorable to Trump than most); A Very Stable Genius: Donald J. Trump’s Testing of America, by Philip Rucker and Carol Leonnig (enjoyed this one); and American Carnage: On the Front Lines of the Republican Civil War and the Rise of President Trump, by Tim Alberta (I never did a review but I found this book very wide-ranging and insightful).
Trump went on another unhinged tirade Sunday against – pretty much everyone.
He went on to attack Joe Biden, Mitt Romney and Democratic governors.
Dave (1bb933) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:50 amTrump supporters 90% of the republican party are populists being led before trump by right wing libertarian-conservative ideologues donor class and their opinion makers in conservative media. Trump has money so they couldn’t buy the nomination in 2016. Karl’s book talks about trivial minutia that nobody but the liberal media and clinton democrats care about. The reason you never trumpers were run out of the republican party is your economic answers have been tried and found wanting! Funding an economics nobel prize so you could give it to milton friedman means nothing to people free trade has destroyed. Socialism now reigns with moscow mitch mcconnel telling libertarian-conservatives like rand paul to take a hike. Businesses are now feeding at the socialist trough shoving the mom and pop business out of the way. How many times do we have to tell you and the book writers the people don’t care about this stuff!
asset (d21c56) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:22 amFree trade makes us all richer by increasing our purchasing power.
Trump was elected with unemployment at 4.5% and in the seventh year of a sustained economic expansion, but unfortunately he managed to @#$% it up with his ignorance.
Dave (1bb933) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:47 amDang.
I actually imagine if there was violence directed at the media Trump would try to show that it proved some populist point. Stupid little fights is what he’s all about.
Dave, good thing America is great again!
Dustin (c56600) — 4/20/2020 @ 3:01 amHow is your purchasing increased when you lose your job to free trade and you don’t have unemployment insurance or it runs out? How do you buy cheap chinese stuff when you have no money? The conservative-libertarian solution is cheap oxycontin to o.d. on. AOC’s solution re-education camp for free traders. Trumps solution make it here not china. If trump fails AOC will be waiting for you at the gates of the re-education camp.
asset (d21c56) — 4/20/2020 @ 3:09 amIf he focused on this, he would have a winning campaign. But he would have to work with people who are somewhat adverse to him. You can’t pick fights with GM over dumb stuff, tweet LIBERATE MICHIGAN, and then ignore manufacturing.
Rebuilding American manufacturing would serve many purposes from economic to national security, but I don’t think Trump cares that much beyond tweets, facebook memes, and attacks on opponents.
Ah, that sounds more like Trump’s actual legacy. Memes about Pelosi’s ice cream instead of some kind of new deal to rebuild America’s actual greatness.
But what do you want? Hillary and Biden’s defeat? Or a prosperous future for your family? These are not the same objective no matter what some politician tells you.
Dustin (c56600) — 4/20/2020 @ 3:32 amUnemployment was 4.5% when Trump was elected.
If you lose your job, you should find a new one. That’s what Americans have always done, rather than looking for a handout.
US GDP from manufacturing has been rising since 2009, and has been fairly steady at all-time highs (in inflation-adjusted dollars) for the last 2-3 years. We are manufacturing more than we ever have in the US.
Graph of GDP from manufacturing in billions of 2010 dollars
It’s not “free trade”, it’s technology, mechanization and improvements in productivity that allow us to produce more using less labor. Productivity is why we have the highest standard of living in the world, and increases in productivity are what drive it higher.
If you want to do an illiterate third-world peasant’s job, for an illiterate third-world peasant’s wages and standard of living, America isn’t the place.
Dave (1bb933) — 4/20/2020 @ 4:52 amYour last review was good. I’ll check this one out.
Many of these books have been written by very solid reporters such as Woodward and Alberta. IIRC Alerbta is a pretty well established conservative.
But none of them are remotely positive. Simm’s was reported to be the closest, and even he didn’t describe a high functioning or well lead white house.
Time123 (235fc4) — 4/20/2020 @ 4:59 amAnd – can you believe it? – he has since found people who are actually dumb enough to do it for free!
Dave (1bb933) — 4/20/2020 @ 5:13 am“ If you want to do an illiterate third-world peasant’s job, for an illiterate third-world peasant’s wages and standard of living, America isn’t the place.”
– Leviticus
Subsistence farming, you mean? You can do that in America, if you can pin down some viable land. Those who have done so may look wise by the time this is all over.
Leviticus (cdf0fe) — 4/20/2020 @ 5:58 amThis is quintessential Trump, and really does sum up his game. Even now. Showman, playing for the cameras, presentng a false image and creating illusions. And while some people still buy into it, he is angered when they dont’.
Given that Karl’s book was released at the end of March, it might explain why, a week later, Trump went after him at a press conference. It would be like him to to take out his ire at anyone who further exposed him before the public.
Dana (0feb77) — 4/20/2020 @ 6:46 amIn previous interviews he’s been ever more calculating. He will explicitly attack/praise reporters to get positive coverage. He’s not pushing for honest reporting. He’s pushing for positive reporting. The more positive the better.
Time123 (235fc4) — 4/20/2020 @ 6:53 amI wonder when the usual costumers will come by to rage that someone wrote something about trump that wasn’t fawningly positive?
Time123 (653992) — 4/20/2020 @ 6:54 am*customers, not costumers.
Time123 (653992) — 4/20/2020 @ 6:54 amI liked it either way, Time
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 6:56 amJonah Goldberg reminds us that character is destiny.
Given T-rump’s character, America is screwed. My concern is that this thug’s legacy will have a long and terrible half-life, and that we will see his stain on us for years to come.
He’s made America WrestleMania combined with Trump University.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 7:01 amStrange how freer markets tend to be more prosperous. In a dynamic free market economy, jobs are destroyed and created all the time.
Paul Montagu (0073cc) — 4/20/2020 @ 7:04 amI would say that he wants positive reporting that makes him look good. In his book, there is no difference. As seen through his filert: If it’s positive news, he looks good. If he looks good, it’s positive news.
Dana (0feb77) — 4/20/2020 @ 7:17 amDuh Donald has been telling lies about trade and economics for literally decades now. As a result, several have become myths, and people just swallow the whole load without the least critical thought.
If only we could experience true free trade for even a decade, we’d never look back. Markets work like magic to people who don’t understand them, bringing innovation and efficient use of resources to raise the standard of living to everyone. BIG GOVERNMENT ruins, restricts the freedom of individuals, and wastes.
I’ll take the pale shadow of free trade we have over T-rump Trade any day.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 7:18 amThis is both true but unfair. If you read “a wealth of nations’ Adam Smith makes clear that the advantages will not be realized equally to all.
“Learn to code” is a snotty way to tell ppl to adjust to the new environment by updating their skills. But even if you have a skill that’s in demand it may not be in demand where you currently live. “Learn to code. Pull your kids out of school. Invest 2-3 months income in moving to a place where you don’t know anyone and set up a house there” is more accurate. It’s also a lot of work, even if your new income raises your standard of living. A lot of people don’t want to make 20% more money. They want a decent living and a chance to spend time with friends and family.
I don’t think there’s any perfect solution.
Time123 (235fc4) — 4/20/2020 @ 7:26 am-“Learn to code” ignores what people actually want.
-Protectionism makes everyone poorer.
-Socialism ignores that people want to earn their way, and can create a permanent underclass.
This is NOT true. A dramatic raise in the average is not the same thing as an increase in each individual data point.
Time123 (653992) — 4/20/2020 @ 7:34 amMarket-driven economies can hurt some people or cause pain, Time123, but people can choose whether they want to change/move. The key is giving people opportunity. It is up to them to seek it.
DRJ (15874d) — 4/20/2020 @ 7:46 amIf the solution you want requires magic, then it’s not also reality based.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (9878f6) — 4/20/2020 @ 7:51 amMy father’s job forced us to move every 6-12 months for 10+ years — most of my childhood. We never lived near extended family or long-term friends. But we learned to keep only the possessions that matter, how to make new friends, and how to appreciate new places and cultures. We appreciated seeing and being with family and friends when we could, something many people take for granted.
DRJ (15874d) — 4/20/2020 @ 7:52 amFront row at the Dan Crenshaw Show:
https://twitter.com/fleccas/status/1251745937069731841?s=20
harkin (358ef6) — 4/20/2020 @ 7:55 am_
You misunderstood, Klink. I didn’t say markets are magic. I said that to people who don’t understand market economics, their results look like magic. It’s a simple truth.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 7:55 amMarket-driven economies can hurt some people or cause pain, Time123, but…
Name a system that’s better.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 7:58 amMy second major in college was in Psychology, and I knew about sickening and disgusting fetishes that some people enjoyed watching performed even if they did not indulge in them themselves. I had not realized there were so many of them (those people) until they elected Trump President.
nk (1d9030) — 4/20/2020 @ 8:09 amJoe Biden
@JoeBiden
·
Donald Trump is not responsible for COVID-19, but he is responsible for our slow, uncoordinated response.
Experts say that if we had acted two weeks earlier, more lives could have been saved.
Trump failed to take swift action—and we’re paying the price. https://nytimes.com/2020/04/14/opinion/covid-social-distancing.html
__ _
JERRY DUNLEAVY
@JerryDunleavy
The White House “15 Days To Slow The Spread” guidelines were issued March 16. Two weeks earlier would’ve been March 2. Biden held rallies in Houston & Dallas on March 2, L.A. on March 3, St. Louis & Kansas City on March 7, Grand Rapids & Detroit on March 9, & Philly on March 10.
__ _
Jacob
@vetjr89
·
But I’m told everyone knew that this would be bad by the beginning of March.
__ _
kevin.furr
@kevinfurr
·
In fairness, whoever writes tweets for Biden probably doesn’t know what his campaign schedule was.
__ _
RickyBobby
harkin (358ef6) — 4/20/2020 @ 8:09 am@JTarby2
·
I guess he would know about “slow and uncoordinated”
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I will buy it. You might want to add an Amazon link.
DRJ (15874d) — 4/20/2020 @ 8:11 amI don’t think there is a better system, Ragspierre.
DRJ (15874d) — 4/20/2020 @ 8:12 amI wasn’t intending the “unfair” part, Time, just talking from a macro perspective. If someone’s job is going to disappear or be offshored, we have safety nets. Unless there’s a vital national interest (5G, for example), our economy is better off overall allowing the free market do its work and fill American jobs that better align with demand. There have been–and always will be–inequities and disruptions, which why is I prefer that our free markets be appropriately regulated and not unfettered, to soften the blows.
Paul Montagu (0073cc) — 4/20/2020 @ 8:12 amYour faith in the MSM is touching. Rick Reilly is a well known liar and throughout his “career” has made up quotes (that no one has heard except him) about people he doesn’t like. He lied about the Masters and he’s lied about Trump. Of course, you can believe him if you wish. After all, no left-wing journalist would EVER make up a story or a quote that helps his career, or hurts people his Editors dislike. Don’t they take an oath – after they leave journalist school?
rcocean (2e1c02) — 4/20/2020 @ 8:14 amI don’t think there is a better system, Ragspierre.
I was worried that I’d sounded adverse. I was corroborating what you said. I have so much difficulty typing any more that I’m sure I sound terse. It’s too abbreviated sometimes, I know.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 8:17 amThe video blurb is really chilling. Even to someone like me who understands that nationalist/poopulist pols TEND to be vicious demagogues, that was a remarkable example of manipulation and nastiness. What contempt T-rump has for people!
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 8:25 amReminds me of an old joke.
A farmer wins ten million dollars in the Lotto, and the reporter who comes out to interview him asks if he plans to change his lifestyle.
“Nope,” the farmer says. “I’ll just keep farming ’til it’s all gone!”
Dave (1bb933) — 4/20/2020 @ 8:34 amI hadn’t seen that clip before. What a disgusting, petty, lying jerk my country has elected to be president.
Victor (4355e3) — 4/20/2020 @ 8:39 amIt’s touching how Trump defenders are so resolutely determined not to acknowledge the gross defects of character and mind and personality that Trump openly displays. Just for starters, he is a well-known liar who speaks falsehood more easily than truth.
Trump defenders forget that we can watch and listen to Trump with our own eyes and ears. They tell themselves that critics are misled by the MSM, which they think is always making up stuff to “make Trump look bad.” As though Trump didn’t make himself look bad every hour of every day. But somehow they believe the MSM if it reports anything that makes Trump look good.
Radegunda (e20094) — 4/20/2020 @ 9:00 amRagspierre @ 35,
Which video are you referring to, as there are several linked in comments and post?
Dana (0feb77) — 4/20/2020 @ 9:25 amThere was an interview where he even used the words “negative” and “fake” interchangeably.
He regularly gets his knickers in a twist about how unfairly he’s treated by Fox-freaking-News.
In Trump’s reptile brain, there is no such thing as honest criticism of him, or good-faith disagreement with him.
Dave (1bb933) — 4/20/2020 @ 9:26 amTo his reptile brain, that’s called FAKE NEWS!…
Dana (0feb77) — 4/20/2020 @ 9:30 amDana, I was referring to the one in Patterico’s post. I suspect that I’d seen it during T-rump’s run, but one tends to lose acuity amidst all the crap he’s generated. It was terrible, what with the framing Patterico provided.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 9:33 amIn Trump’s reptile brain, there is no such thing as honest criticism of him, or good-faith disagreement with him.
Or a real agreement, judging by all the people he’s cheated over the decades. It’s the world of a pathological narcissist, and he’s a doozy.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 9:35 amRepost: In new poll, 60 percent support keeping stay-at-home restrictions to fight coronavirus
Nearly 60 percent of American voters say they are more concerned that relaxing stay-at-home restrictions would lead to more COVID-19 deaths than they are that the restrictions will hurt the U.S. economy, according to a new national NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll.
But while strong majorities of Democrats and independents are more worried about the coronavirus than the economy, Republicans are divided on the question, with almost half of them more concerned about how the restrictions could affect the economy.
The poll also finds a significant change in attitudes about the coronavirus. The percentage of voters saying they’re worried that a family member might catch it has increased by 20 points since last month’s survey.
And those saying the coronavirus has changed their families’ day-to-day lives in a major way has jumped by more than 50 points from the March NBC News/WSJ poll.
……
“We have not seen a change at all” for Trump, said Republican pollster Bill McInturff, who conducted the survey with Democratic pollster Peter Hart and his colleagues at Hart Research Associates.
But Hart cautions that a long-lasting crisis could change things for the president.
“In every crisis, we go through this coming-together phase. And then we come to the recrimination phase,” he said.
“President Trump faces some tough sledding ahead in the recrimination phase.”
……..
In the poll, 58 percent of registered voters say that what worries them more is that the U.S. will move too quickly to loosen stay-at-home restrictions, resulting in the coronavirus’ spreading and more lives’ being lost.
That’s compared with 32 percent who are more concerned that the U.S. will take too long to loosen restrictions, which will harm the economy.
……..
Also in the poll, 44 percent of voters say they approve of Trump’s handling of the coronavirus, while 52 percent disapprove.
That’s essentially unchanged from March, when 45 percent gave the president a thumbs-up and 51 percent gave him a thumbs-down.
Trump’s overall job rating stands at 46 percent who approve and 51 percent who disapprove, which is identical to his score in March and consistent with his numbers over the past two years.
Only 36 percent of respondents in the poll say they generally trust what Trump has said when it comes to the coronavirus, while 52 percent say they don’t trust him.
By comparison, 69 percent say they trust the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; 66 percent trust their own governors; 60 percent trust Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert; 46 percent trust New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo; and 35 percent trust Vice President Mike Pence.
……..
As for the federal government’s response to the coronavirus, 50 percent of voters say they’re satisfied with the measures intended to limit the disease’s spread, versus 48 percent who are dissatisfied.
But just 34 percent are satisfied with the federal government’s ensuring that there are enough tests to limit its spread, and only 34 percent are satisfied with the amount of medical supplies.
…….
In March, 53 percent of voters said they were worried that someone in their immediate family would catch the disease. Now it’s 73 percent.
Also in March, a combined 26 percent said the coronavirus has changed their day-to-day lives in a “very” or “fairly” major way. Now it’s 77 percent.
And in a CNBC poll conducted in early April by the same polling firms, 27 percent said they personally know someone infected by the coronavirus. Now, just more than a week later, it’s 40 percent.
…..
In the new poll, a plurality of 45 percent describe the economy as being poor, which is up more than 20 points since March.
That’s the highest percentage of respondents calling the economy poor in the NBC News/WSJ poll since 2012.
Thirty-one percent rate the economy as being “only fair,” and a combined 22 percent say it’s either “excellent” or “good” — down 25 points from last month.
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 4/20/2020 @ 9:42 amRepost: As newsrooms face coronavirus-related cuts, 54% of Americans rate media’s response to the outbreak positively
Many U.S. news organizations are covering the coronavirus pandemic while themselves facing financial pressure from it. A growing number have announced layoffs, furloughs and other cost-cutting measures as the virus inflicts widespread pain on the economy, and these cuts come on top of years of earlier reductions in newsroom staffing, especially at newspapers.
Amid the financial challenges facing newsrooms, 54% of U.S. adults say the news media have done an excellent or good job responding to the coronavirus outbreak, according to a survey conducted March 19-24 as part of Pew Research Center’s Election News Pathways project. A slightly smaller share (46%) says the media’s response has been only fair or poor.
Americans rate the news media’s response to the virus more positively than that of President Donald Trump, but more negatively than the responses of other key actors, including public health officials, state and local elected officials and ordinary people in their communities.
The public’s assessment of this media response comes at a time when most Americans are paying close attention to coronavirus news. Around six-in-ten U.S. adults (57%) say they are following the news about the virus very closely, and an additional 35% are following it fairly closely, according to the survey of 11,537 adults who are members of the Center’s American Trends Panel.
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 4/20/2020 @ 9:43 am………
Paul, Rags, DRJ,
How’s the quote go “Free market capitalism is a terrible system whose only redeeming virtue is that no one has yet found a better way.”?
I think this is accurate. It’s certainly possible to move frequently. But many people would consider a system that gives them the choice between a lower standard of living and having to move regularly a bad system.
I think this is more likely as you get older and as the cost of moving becomes a larger % of your income.
I think people who feel a strong tie to their hometown or to their way of life would say that.
I think moving because Mom/Dad got a better job is easier than chasing parity.
I think moving is expensive, and when we’re talking about families making 50K or less a year a move is much higher risk financially.
My thinking is that choice is good, capitalism is good, and we can’t protect everyone from every bad thing but free markets need to come with safety nets to help those who end up losing on the short term. Short term being at least several years.
See the GDP chart for Janesville WI after GM closed their plant in 2008 for a sense of a quick turn around. Flint MI still hasn’t recovered.
Time123 (653992) — 4/20/2020 @ 9:44 amRepost:
Trump is reacting (and looking pretty bad) to these numbers.
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 4/20/2020 @ 9:46 amFIFY
Time123 (653992) — 4/20/2020 @ 9:46 am“In every crisis, we go through this coming-together phase. And then we come to the recrimination phase,” he said.
“President Trump faces some tough sledding ahead in the recrimination phase.”
Then there’s the “walking away from the burial” phase where the tough sledding hits the trees.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 9:46 amMichiganians favor Whitmer’s COVID-19 handling over Trump’s
So far the attacks on Whitmer seem only to boost her standing, not tear it down.
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 4/20/2020 @ 9:49 amrcocean (2e1c02) — 4/20/2020 @ 8:14 am
Well, this does sound different than other stories people tell about Trump.
And it’s peculiar. Unlesss there was some basis for Trump’s claim (in the story) that Reilly was the publisher of Sports Illustrated – like that someone else had called him before. Here Trump tells glaring lie, and expects Reilly to go along with it.
But what is real is Trump putting up a memorial on his golf course in Virginia to soldiers who died in a battle in the Civil War that never happened.
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/25/us/politics/in-renovation-of-golf-club-donald-trump-also-dressed-up-history.html
There should have been a battle over there.
There could have been a battle over there.
That was enough for Donald Trump He wanted his own historical marker. He wouldn’t even listen (if it got to him) to someone who offered to write something that would be real
The article finishes:
Sammy Finkelman (3bf6ea) — 4/20/2020 @ 9:52 amMeanwhile…….
CJ Ciaramella
harkin (358ef6) — 4/20/2020 @ 9:59 am@cjciaramella
·
Today’s Supreme Court opinion finding that the Sixth Amendment requires unanimous jury convictions notes the explicitly racist origins of Louisiana and Oregon’s non-unanimous jury rules https://supremecourt.gov/opinions/19pdf/18-5924_n6io.pdf
__ _
Seeing the morons out protesting the stay at home orders from the “NAZIs and Commies” is funny/insane/outrageous and not in a good way. Where they are not getting locked up for or tanks rolling over them. Not wearing masks, not keeping a distance, screaming in each others faces, holding signs that say all the deaths are lies, it’s just the flu, ban homo marriage (because…sure).
Most wearing MAGA hats, lots of Trump 2020 flags…again, these are the recommendations directly from the podium by Trump…then protesters encouraged by Trump, to protest the policy of Trump…because…I got nothing.
I try not to wish ill on people I don’t know, but if a few of these people are sick, they are infecting others there, if they get sick, I just want them to have to give back their stimulus checks, or enhanced unemployment, because that was the government bribing you to stay home…I don’t get it, it’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 4/20/2020 @ 10:06 amWhite House, GOP face heat after hotel and restaurant chains helped run small business program dry
Big corporations scamming a program designed for small business? I am shocked!
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 4/20/2020 @ 10:07 amMust be nice hanging out at home retired – collecting on my dime – telling everybody what to do. I work – I have mouths to feed.
mg (8cbc69) — 4/20/2020 @ 10:13 amFront row at the Dan Crenshaw Show:
That was a good clip, harkin. Thanks. Bill Maher is by no means stupid, but his alleged deep thinking and unassailable debating skills is largely the product of being surrounded by a studio audience who worships him and will cheer is every utterance. It’s a lot different when he’s at home in a one-on-one setting without that support, isn’t it?
And Dan Crenshaw is really good. His line about “when bullets are flying all around you it’s best to remain calm and not start panicking” is awesome. I really wish Trump would have decided against a second term and we could be working to prep a Nikki Haley-Dan Crenshaw ticket.
JVW (54fd0b) — 4/20/2020 @ 10:14 amThen you ought not be out putting yourself and your family at risk, taking even basic safety protocols.
I would encourage you, and them, to follow the guidelines as defined by the White House.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 4/20/2020 @ 10:20 amBig corporations scamming a program designed for small business? I am shocked!
Hang on a second. Here is a key part of that article you quoted:
This is kind of how franchising works. I open up a McDonalds or Shake Shack or Ruths Chris in my area and I am required to pay my franchise fee and adhere to corporate regulations, but the business is mine and it is entirely my concern whether or not it is profitable. So if I own a McDonalds that employs 50 people I am indeed a small business person, even if I own a franchise of a large corporation. Is this WaPo article claiming that the stimulus funds went directly to the corporate offices instead of to the local owner? That would, of course, be awful. And it maybe sounds like that was the case with Shake Shack and that’s why they returned the money. But I wouldn’t be so quick to assume that evil greedy corporate interests were necessarily looting the program, even if that sells newspapers (or clicks) for the Washington Post.
JVW (54fd0b) — 4/20/2020 @ 10:24 amGet back to us when Trump comes out in person to shake your hand and all the other people like you, mg.
nk (1d9030) — 4/20/2020 @ 10:30 am@58-Only after intensive lobbying. From the article, but edited from my summary:
Some of the companies receiving money are clients of JPMorgan Chase, adding fuel to criticism that Wall Street banks had helped their clients obtain large amounts. The bank put out a statement Sunday saying that it is “proud to have secured more funding for small businesses than anyone else in the industry” and that 80 percent of its PPP loans have been for businesses with less than $5 million in revenue.
JPMorgan explained that larger companies may have been served more quickly because its commercial banking unit, which serves larger clients, was able to complete “most of the applications it received” while many more applications poured in from traditional small businesses.
The PPP program was intended to benefit workers at businesses and nonprofit employers with fewer than 500 employees that are unable to obtain credit elsewhere, according to the Small Business Act, which formed the basis for the program.
But after intensive lobbying by the restaurant and hotel industries during the weeks leading to the passage of the $2 trillion Cares Act economic stimulus package, Congress allowed separate subsidiaries and locations to apply as businesses, even if they were part of a national or international chain.
Thus multiple Ruth’s Chris locations could apply under separate entities even though the parent company employed about 5,740 people at the end of last year, according to public filings. Other industries and advocates lobbied against affiliation rules as well, including the private equity industry.
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 4/20/2020 @ 10:31 amWatch my family starve and loose my properties, GFY. Its America you fricking dolt.
mg (8cbc69) — 4/20/2020 @ 10:34 amnk – my own being has nothing to do with shaking trumps hand.
mg (8cbc69) — 4/20/2020 @ 10:36 amI happen to be a individual, not a subject as you and others appear to be.
I have no time to protest. Between working 40 and another 40 in the garden, my days are full.
mg (8cbc69) — 4/20/2020 @ 10:38 amI try not to wish ill on people I don’t know
Awfully big of you…
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 4/20/2020 @ 11:12 amIs this the same Jonathan Karl who invited ChiCom-owned news orgs to have seats in the briefings?
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 4/20/2020 @ 11:14 amBecause that is worse than OANN?
Why thank you, I appreciate it.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 4/20/2020 @ 11:30 amOANN is already offset by the ChiCom News Network (and several others).
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 4/20/2020 @ 11:41 amColonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 4/20/2020 @ 10:06 am
They are unlikely to be sick (less than 1% chance if that) and if they are sick, and it is not noticeable, unlikely to transmit it to others – this separation of people to break the chain of infection only matters when carried on on a scale of thousands.
Sammy Finkelman (3bf6ea) — 4/20/2020 @ 11:46 am“ And Dan Crenshaw is really good. ”
I just wish he had reminded Maher of his pre-virus wish for a serious recession if it meant Trump being voted out.
Sort of like the Never-Trumpers early in the outbreak gleefully posting Dow and NASDAQ drops.
harkin (358ef6) — 4/20/2020 @ 11:47 am_
@.2 Yep.
Echo chambers.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/20/2020 @ 11:49 amSo noticing that Team Trump’s attempts to distract from Trump’s failures is facilitating Chinese propaganda…
The WHO and CNN and the others shouldn’t have accepted Chinese lies as truth. But Trump accepted those same lies, too. And it’s part of his job to be skeptical of China. He’s pretending to be angry with people who failed in the same way he did because he’s hoping people won’t noticed his failure.
Kishnevi (aef29b) — 4/20/2020 @ 11:51 amBreaking-
Oil plummets as storage capacity runs low, and a quirk in pricing wipes out one benchmark.
Something bizarre happened in the markets on Monday: The price of a barrel of oil went negative.
Oil prices tumbled as the economic crisis set off by the coronavirus pandemic continued to destroy demand for energy, and as concerns grew that storage tanks in the United States are near capacity and unable to hold all the unused crude.
Oil that is scheduled to be delivered in June fell 12 percent Monday to about $22 a barrel, but at the same time a benchmark for oil to be delivered next month was essentially deemed to be worthless. Owing largely to a quirk in the way that oil prices are set, the May benchmark actually fell into negative territory, suggesting people who had oil to sell were willing to pay people to take it off their hands.
The problem is that the United States is running out of places to store its oil.
Oil is already being stockpiled on barges out at sea, and in any nook and cranny companies can find in their storage facilities. Now, traders are worrying that even this space is running out. Under futures contracts, West Texas Intermediate — the American oil-price benchmark — is delivered to Cushing, Okla., but investors are worried that there will be no place to put it there.
…..
Broader worries also growing that the deal reached on April 12 between the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, Russia and other producers will not be sufficient to prevent the oil markets being overwhelmed with a record surge of surplus oil. With much of the world in lockdown because of the coronavirus pandemic, global demand for oil has collapsed, leading to record surpluses.
The numbers explain why investors are worried. Under the terms of the arrangement brokered by President Trump, Saudi Arabia, Russia and other countries to cut will cut 9.7 million barrels a day in production, beginning in May. Analysts forecast that oil consumption in April will fall by about three times that.
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 4/20/2020 @ 11:54 am…..
And Dan Crenshaw is really good. His line about “when bullets are flying all around you it’s best to remain calm and not start panicking” is awesome.
ROFLMAOPIP
A claw hammer who thinks it’s the architect.
“Knowledge is good.” – Emil Faber.
Awesome!
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/20/2020 @ 11:55 amGood lord, that is exactly the opposite of how infection works. If you’re infected and asymptomatic and your out and about, you are INFINITELY more infections than sick at home, because words have meaning. Infected means I-N-F-E-C-T-E-D, asymptomatic has zero to do with infected status.
That there are people that don’t know this, is frightening, and this isn’t some complex scientific concept. This is purely basic.
But if you want the science. Or. Etc, etc, etc.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:00 pmThey are being wasted anyway and it is not saving the country from a depression, because it’s badly conceived.
What they should have done (in addition to attempting to give some money to people who did not use bank accounts much or at all) is give every bank account a line of credit, up to a certain amount of dollars, equivalent to the amount of money deposited there in January and February, 2020, or maybe three times as much, since this, and its aftereffects, could last some time. And it would give people some capital too. Or some of them could use the extra borrowing capability to help out family members.
At a very low interest rate. But still only the people who needed it would borrow since they would owe the money, as long as that line of credit didn’t expire. And then give some people stimulus checks/payroll maintenance on top of that.
Another idea is a payroll tax cut. Better than other tax cuts but it only affects people getting paid. I’d continue it later – exempt the first X number of dollars earned in any calendar year with any new employer/
We need strong incentives to hire people who didn’t earn much and it should kick in automatically whether abusiness tried to take advantage of it or not. If they discovered, to their surprise, the IRS credited them (based on the recent quarterly Social Security work record of that employee) that they got back money, later on they would look for such people.
And before they passed the legislation nobody bothered to think through how it would really work.
Sammy Finkelman (3bf6ea) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:00 pmAnd it’s not just that, the US intelligence agencies spend $81.7B annually to find out that intelligence isn’t just reading press releases. You know, with spies, signals intelligence, watching the news in January, or February.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:04 pmSounds just like a lot of stories people tell about Trump.
Patterico (115b1f) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:04 pmName one person who “gleefully” posted such numbers. You’d better not be talking about me.
Patterico (115b1f) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:08 pmI saw his press conferences from the beginning of this, to yesterday, he lied, put his advisors on the spot to support him, they corrected him, and he keeps on lying. Every day, over and over again, it’s never ending, and some people are still acting like it’s a news people problem, a Fauci problem, an “elites” problem.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:08 pmColonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:00 pm
Well, in theory, staying at home or not moving around, you can;t infect anybody unless you live in a nursing home, but if someone is asymptomatic you probbly can’t infect anybody either.
It;s when you;re sick, bit not too sick, and moving around that you can infect anyone. It could be before the coughing starts, if the virus is present along the path of air that you exhale.
All infections are not equal.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/12/health/coronavirus-superspreader-why-infectious.html
Now I think COVID-19 is harder to stop than SARS or MERS, because the disease progresses slowly. Not as slowly as tuberculosis, but much slower than a cold.
Sammy Finkelman (3bf6ea) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:18 pmPatients with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19. Who;s that? Not asymptomatic people.
Inferred. Stupidly and incorrectly.
If there are no symptoms, the only way it gets into the air is by loud talking or singing. It can’t be that, in the real world, infectiousness peaks…before symptom onset.
Now maybe people are less careful.
They also don’t say how serious the secondary infections were compared tp the primary ones.
Sammy Finkelman (3bf6ea) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:27 pm79. Patterico (115b1f) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:04 pm
There are subtle differences.
Usually Trump tries to justify his statements. not give an excuse for lying. An excuse he has no reason to believe the person he makes that excuse to would accept.
And when else did you hear about Trump raising the importance of the person he is playing golf with?
Sammy Finkelman (3bf6ea) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:32 pmOff-topic: The LA Times runs a story today about US citizens who won’t be getting a stimulus check. It’s all very upsetting until you see the reason: Their spouse (who they actually claim as a dependent) is a foreign national here illegally and does not have a Social Security number.
At that point my sympathy disappeared, and I wondered how they would feel if the government prosecuted them for harboring an illegal alien.
To begin with, spouses have the highest priority within the immigration system and a failure to follow the rules here is simple sloth. Sure, there are forms and hearings and all kinds of bureaucratic nonsense, but unless the spouse is a felon or a repeated deportee or some such thing, there should be no problem.
Or maybe that’s it, and this is merely the latest scam. TFB. Why should Uncle Sugar send them money.
But hope is not lost for these families:
California, what a country!
https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2020-04-20/u-s-citizens-coronavirus-stimulus-checks-spouses-immigrants
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:33 pmAnd when else did you hear about Trump raising the importance of the person he is playing golf with?
EVERY time it would polish his ego.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:37 pmFree trade makes us all richer by increasing our purchasing power.
That’s the theory all right. Tell that to the 50yo unemployed factory worker who was too old for anyone to want to retrain. Free trade has created a lot of discarded people, and they all vote for Trump.
But on average, and in the long run, you’re right. It ignores an awful lot of damage though.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:40 pm@85 Kevin, fully agree. My proposal would be to use some of the extra wealth created by free trade to help the type of people you’re talking about.
Time123 (653992) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:43 pmUnemployment was 4.5% when Trump was elected.
Are you blaming the job crash on Trump now? It is better laid at the feet of free trade. Without the opening up of China that the free traders brought, Coronavirus would only be mentioned on “Save the Children” informercials.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:43 pm“Learn to code” is a snotty way to tell ppl to adjust to the new environment by updating their skills
It’s a particularly asinine thing to tell a recently unemployed 50yo, since none of those software companies will hire a coder that old. None of them. It’s not discrimination, of course. Reasons!
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:45 pmTell that to the 50yo unemployed factory worker who was too old for anyone to want to retrain.
And yet I hear of employers avidly seeking workers, and putting a premium on older workers. These are NOT big box stores, but high-pay positions.
So strange…
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:48 pmand it also blocks U.S. citizens if they file a joint tax return with a spouse who does not have a Social Security number.
The article only talks about illegal immigrants, but if that description of the law is accurate, it would also block anyone who is a citizen and who is married to someone who is here legally but only has one of the visas with limited duration that don’t allow the holder to have a SSN. It also seems to say that the US citizen themself can not get the $1200.
And these people have enough documentation and standing to have secured a TIN and file tax returns with those TINs.
Kishnevi (aef29b) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:48 pmI am always amused by the way lawyers (who exist within the last great guild, which even writes the laws that protect that guild) are so enamored of free trade. Let the law allow remote lawyering from Bangladesh and see what they say.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:48 pmwho is married to someone who is here legally but only has one of the visas with limited duration
AND who is listed on their tax return, which means they’ve been here for some time. But, OK, they ,married a student on a student visa. Like the Obamas. They could file separately.
But that’s not the redress they are asking for, and the Democrats would never settle for that as it splits the victim class.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:52 pmAnd yet I hear of employers avidly seeking workers, and putting a premium on older workers. These are NOT big box stores, but high-pay positions.
Post a link to an ad: “Wanted entry level employee. High pay. Older workers preferred.”
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:53 pmIt is better laid at the feet of free trade. Without the opening up of China that the free traders brought…
Here we dive off into the silly. People around the world move at unprecedented rates and with unprecedented ease. CV19 was coming here in any event.
The Black Plague managed to make it to Europe in an age when people could MAYBE move from the Mideast to Florence a few times in a life-span.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:54 pmPost a link to an ad: “Wanted entry level employee. High pay. Older workers preferred.”
I guess you intentionally missed the part about “high paying”.
Think before you type.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:56 pmHigh Pay is relative. Hard to get someone to move a family of 4 200+ miles away for 20$ an hour.
Look, I’m all for free trade. But the reason that so many people aren’t is that the tools that mitigate the downsides haven’t been adequate to the need. More welfare spending isn’t the end all be all. There are a lot of creative solutions that we just haven’t pursued.
Time123 (235fc4) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:56 pmUnemployment was 4.5% when Trump was elected.
I may have misread that, Dave.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:58 pmAnd it’s not just that, the US intelligence agencies spend $81.7B annually to find out that intelligence isn’t just reading press releases. You know, with spies, signals intelligence, watching the news in January, or February.
If only Trump hadn’t fired all the professionals in the CIA, NSA, etc, and replaced them with unemployed carpenters and circus clowns.
Oh, wait, you mean this was the long-standing professionals that screwed up? Again?
Never mind.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:01 pmI am always amused by the way lawyers (who exist within the last great guild, which even writes the laws that protect that guild) are so enamored of free trade. Let the law allow remote lawyering from Bangladesh and see what they say.
Long before I took any degree, I studied economics. I learned that market economics is the sole system consistent with liberty and the use of property by its owners.
And every profession…and a few that only pretend to professional status…that springs to mind has its own guild.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:01 pmChina as a dominant exporter goes back to the readjustment 1982. Export went from 15% to 35% overnight, growth pegged at 5% in 1990, and then hovered around 10% all through the 90’s, aughts, until roughly 2010 where it’s flattened.
All this misses the point, that free trade in the US was already out the door, going to Japan, Mexico, Canada, etc. Low wage jobs fled to lower wage regions, with China being a big recipient of the Japanese outsourcing of manufacturing.
So China as a partner is just the latest in a 60 year cycle, and saying that “Oh, in the 1980’s we didn’t liberalize trade with China, we would have avoided this thing in 2020”, just assumes a billion things didn’t happen.
Russia’s liberalization didn’t follow China’s path to partner with the west, little green men from Uranus didn’t bring free energy, and energy->mass converters… Lots of things didn’t happen, and lots of things did. I’m sure there were a lot of people talking about the “Spanish Flu” from Kansas in much the same way a hundred years ago.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:02 pmTrump ignored their information and recommendations.
Time123 (653992) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:05 pmThat’s a nice meme, but reality is intruding. Like the intelligence reporting into the White House in January, like Azar’s warning’s from the intelligence reporting in January, like Tom Cotton’s warnings to the admin in January to be wary of China, based on the briefings in the Intelligence Committee.
It’s not only having the people, it’s actually being engaged enough to read the briefings, or listen when they’re showing the cartoon version of the PDB to him.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:06 pmDo you have any response about how the impacts of free trade will have disparate impacts and what we should do about that?
Time123 (653992) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:07 pmIt’s also endorsing all of the CV-19 precautions and reopening plans, then actively working against them.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:09 pmBut the reason that so many people aren’t is that the tools that mitigate the downsides haven’t been adequate to the need.
A perhaps larger reason is the demagogues like Duh Donald who purvey myths about economics to a people so lacking in ANY economics education that they simply slurp it all up.
The “tools that mitigate” TEND to be permanent BIG GOVERNMENT solutions that crowd out all others.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:09 pmDo you have any response about how the impacts of free trade will have disparate impacts and what we should do about that?
You’d have to be a lot more specific.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:10 pmKarl’s a soldier in the field, not cable/network brass. His “anecdotes” are mostly ‘inside baseball’ tales, many of which known for years–like the $50/head for a crowd at the escalator ride. It’s a little Johnny-come-lately to quill a tome about Trump foibles now but cashing in is what it is all about.
Trump deserves much credit for knowing how the media operates and using it, quite cost-effectively BTW, to his fullest advantage. It was the not the Karls of the biz but the likes of the now disgraced Les Moonves- and other top TeeVee execs, who crowed over the ratings gold mine telecasting Trump rallies had become. They were programming that cost nothing to produce and reaped windfall profits. Viewers tuned in for the show; they were live, unscripted and most importantly, entertaining. The guy can riff for 90 minutes straight; the Jebs, Tedtoos and JoeyBees of the political world cannot.
Never forget that in this era, Americans don’t want to be governed– they wish to be entertained. And you can thank the Hollywood Reagans and their minions Deaver, Ailes, Atwater, Rollins– and many others, for planting the seeds of today’s hell with Sinatra soirees, Heston butt kissing- and glittery crap like this from– yes, those evil ‘lefties’ in Hollywood:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d6oPG-ZN4ps
Trump is a conservative creation; the Frankenstein monster who got loose from Trump Tower; conservatisms living ‘picture of Dorian Gray.’ He is you.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:12 pmIf free trade helped american working class jeb bush not trump would have got the nomination and you free traders wouldn’t have been run out of the republican party by 90% of republicans who are populists not free trade libertarian-conservatives. You have no answer to the question how do you buy cheaper chinese good when you and all around you have lost their jobs and have no money. Move or find another job is your answer. Tumps answer make it in america and bring the jobs back. AOC’s answer have unemployed build re-education camps for free traders as works program.
asset (233c8f) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:17 pmDo you have any response about how the impacts of free trade negatively impact older workers with low to middle income who have fewer in demand skills and live in regions where economic activity is declining due to free trade.
Time123 (235fc4) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:23 pmCalifornia lessons from the 1918 pandemic: San Francisco dithered; Los Angeles acted and saved lives
…..
Los Angeles and San Francisco in the early 20th century were vastly different places than they are now. But they already had distinct cultures and leaders who responded to the great Spanish flu pandemic of 1918 in markedly different ways, thereby producing distinctly different outcomes.
At the helm in one city was a headstrong public health commissioner, who defied the mayor and City Council to lock down his city, but only so much. The other also had a physician as its chief health officer, but one who relied even less on quarantine-style limitations, grasping, instead, for a dubious solution.
Yet Los Angeles, San Francisco and 20 other cities across America shared one common failing, a mistake that would spur a “double hump” of contagion. That second surge of influenza infections in 1918 hit both Los Angeles and San Francisco and killed more people than the first wave in other cities, such as Denver, Kansas City, Milwaukee and St. Louis.
“The really important lesson of 1918 is to keep interventions in place as long as possible,” said Alex Navarro, assistant director of the Center for the History of Medicine at the University of Michigan. “Because once the controls are removed, it’s very difficult to reinstate them.”
The Michigan center, along with the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, compiled and analyzed historical accounts of the 1918 plague. Their research found “a strong association between early, sustained and layered use of [non-pharmaceutical interventions] and mitigating the consequences of the epidemic.”
In Los Angeles, the first signs of trouble arrived in mid-September 1918, when sailors aboard a Navy ship in San Pedro fell mysteriously ill. By the end of the month, 55 students at Polytechnic High School in downtown L.A. had the bug, which eventually killed 675,000 in the United States and an estimated 50 million worldwide.
The city’s response in the coming months would be crafted largely by a headstrong North Carolinian, Dr. Luther Milton Powers. The doctor managed to remain in power through the tenures of at least half a dozen L.A. mayors.
Publicly, city Health Commissioner Powers called the cases “alleged influenza,” but he advised Mayor Frederick T. Woodman in private to prepare a campaign to stop an epidemic in Los Angeles, then a city of fewer than 600,000 souls.
By Oct. 11, the mayor had declared a state of emergency. Commissioner Powers ordered most public gathering places — including movie houses, theaters and pool rooms — closed as of 6 p.m. that night. Adding a peculiarly L.A. flavor, Powers told the city’s ascendant movie moguls they would have to stop filming mob scenes, according to the Michigan archive.
Even though its first influenza cases appeared about the same time as those in L.A., San Francisco’s board of health did not vote to shut down “all places of public amusement” until a week later, Oct. 18. The city did not include churches in the shutdown, leaving that to their leaders’ discretion.
The importance of acting promptly might not have been obvious in 1918. But this week, UC Berkeley biostatistician Nicholas Jewell and his daughter Britta, also an epidemiologist, calculated the enormous advantage of early social isolation. In the current pandemic, a one-week advance, nationally, in social distancing could have cut the total United States death count from something around 60,000 to 23,000, they projected.
In the early-20th-century outbreak, Los Angeles stuck to its more rigorous response, despite considerable pushback. Religious leaders questioned the constitutionality of closing churches, and the Ninth Church of Christ Scientist, on South New Hampshire Street, reopened, only to see its leaders promptly arrested.
Los Angeles shut down its Liberty Day parade, while many other cities went ahead with the mass gatherings, exposing tens of thousands of people to others who were contagious. “In Los Angeles, however, residents had at least one less opportunity for getting sick,” the University of Michigan researchers concluded.
L.A. theater owners protested that the shutdown should be even broader, to stop the virus more quickly. They demanded the closing of shops and department stores. But Powers thought such a comprehensive shutdown would be impractical. The stores remained open.
San Francisco’s leaders eventually also closed a significant number of public facilities, but they obsessed on a singular response to the disease: face masks. That response came courtesy of the city’s health officer, Dr. William C. Hassler. He had first gained acclaim after the Great Earthquake of 1906, for helping fight off a rat infestation and fears of bubonic plague that menaced the city.
Hassler came to believe that face masks would help San Francisco tamp down the influenza, which experts theorized had been brought back from Europe by soldiers returning from World War I. It was later determined that the flu originated from an H1N1 virus, with genes of avian origin.
The doctor began by ordering barbers to wear the coverings, quickly expanding the order to workers at rooming houses, banks, drugstores and shops, the University of Michigan archive says.
By Oct. 25, the Board of Supervisors required every resident and visitor to the city to wear a mask. The Red Cross pronounced that “the man or woman or child who will not wear a mask now is a dangerous slacker.” California Gov. William Stephens concurred, calling it a “patriotic duty for every American citizen.”
The vast majority complied, with those who did not usually being fined $5. Eventually, “slackers” were jailed, and San Francisco’s lockup soon filled with the malefactors. Even with less rigorous restrictions, new influenza cases had declined enough that, by Nov. 13, 1918, Hassler recommended reopening San Francisco.
When the ban officially ended on Nov. 16, pent-up San Franciscans swarmed theaters, movie houses and sports arenas. They thrilled to an appearance by movie star Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle. The city’s stringent mask law remained in place, but residents of freewheeling “Baghdad by the Bay” had grown well tired of the pesky shrouds.
……
Los Angeles went in a different direction. Despite repeated attempts by Mayor Woodman and others, the City Council refused to order Angelenos to wear masks, with the exception of health workers and those known to be in contact with influenza patients. (It didn’t hurt that the U.S. surgeon general had questioned the usefulness of masks.)
Other issues that moved front and center 100 years ago would be echoed in the L.A. of 2020. Church leaders demanded to be able to restore group worship, but the city insisted that indoor services be put off. And civic groups fought (somewhat successfully, back then) to get hotel rooms set aside for the poor and infirm.
Most significant, L.A. had gone into semi-quarantine a week before San Francisco and stayed shuttered longer, reopening public facilities Dec. 2. That meant L.A.’s controls (if not its face masks) stayed in place 16 days after San Francisco lifted restrictions; after beginning seven days earlier, it was a 23-day isolation advantage.
Both locales would soon learn that they had not been cautious enough. A quick jump in cases in Los Angeles led to a re-closing of schools, which did not open again until January 1919. San Francisco saw its own spike in influenza deaths and ordered the public to put their masks back on as of Jan. 10. They could not cast them off again until February.
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:28 pm…..
The researchers examined “excess” death rates in 50 cities, the number who died of influenza above the normal yearly expectation. L.A.’s rate was 494 excess deaths per 100,000 residents, lower than that of many other American cities. With its shortened public distancing requirements and preoccupation with masks, San Francisco suffered 673 excess deaths per 100,000.
……
asset and DC DSM should get together and share hatreds!
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:29 pmThat’s insulting. My experience is that most people fully get how free trade works. But the theory isn’t as compelling as the fact that they got laid off because the factory closed. They’re happy that off season strawberries from South America are 2.99$ a quart. But they want to know what are they going to do about the 25% loss of income they just got when they went from 16-20$/hr + OK health care to 12-15$/hr no/crappy perks.
Time123 (653992) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:29 pmHe’s not doing that yet. He talks about it, and people like it, but he’s not doing it.
Time123 (653992) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:31 pm@111. Ignorance is bliss; stay happy, Raggy.
20 minutes of this and you’ll develop diabetes for life:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d6oPG-ZN4ps
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:35 pmSpoken like a true Buchananite (or Teamster), which was a fringe Republican position 20 years ago. The reality is that Trump lied his into the White House, chumping enough Republicans to get the nomination, and he had the good fortune to run against a woman who was such a goddawful politician that even a clown could beat her.
Paul Montagu (0073cc) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:45 pmDo you have any response about how the impacts of free trade negatively impact older workers with low to middle income who have fewer in demand skills and live in regions where economic activity is declining due to free trade.
Well you start out from a premise I don’t accept…at least at face value.
For instance, prior to CV19, American manufacturing output was at an all-time high, and the trend had been up for many years (giving the lie to T-rump). At the same time, manufacturing sector employment had been sharply down.
Why?
The answer is simple; capital, or more correctly the investment in productivity tools by capital. Every American employed in manufacturing is several times more productive than in, say, 1970.
If you look at graphs for every industrialized nation in the Western world, you’ll see the same trends.
But as Bill Whittle makes very plain in one of his excellent presentations, this isn’t a zero-sum game. The Los Angeles of a couple of dusty streets could not have become the sprawling megalopolis we know EXCEPT for one true fact; we create wealth via market economics essentially out of nothing.
Since we can agree that any economics model will necessarily bring displacement of some workers, we always have to ask which of them creates the least for the most. My answer is market economics, without question hurts fewer and benefits the most.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:45 pmDoing so requires many things, one is leadership that isn’t as lazy as humanly possible. It would require trillions of infrastructure build out, not just public, but private capacity. You can’t just reopen shuttered steel plants, or auto plants. We don’t have mining capacity, etc, etc, etc. The US consumers spend more money on goods and services than the US has capacity to satisfy, so you’d have to ration goods and services, and I don’t think that’s going to fly.
This also ignores the practical impact of greatly increasing the price of finished goods, and also making US consumers disadvantaged against the global market. So, to maintain the standard of living, wages have to rise, which raises prices, which raises….
We do not live in Fortress America, we are not an island unto ourselves.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:46 pmThat’s insulting. My experience is that most people fully get how free trade works.
Really? My experience is that very few Americans have any understanding of the law of supply and demand.
What’s insulting is they graduate from high school in that condition of ignorance.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:49 pmLike the intelligence reporting into the White House in January
I haven’t seen those. Do you have a link?
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:59 pmAnd every profession…and a few that only pretend to professional status…that springs to mind has its own guild.
I remember when the legal profession tried to stop people from writing their own wills, using published instructions. So much for free trade, with a profession that cannot abide people doing things themselves.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 4/20/2020 @ 2:13 pm85. Kevin M (ab1c11) — 4/20/2020 @ 12:40 pm
If that’s the case, technology and mechanization (automation) and maybe just plain competition create even more discarded people. Is the solution featherbedding?
I don;t believe in job training, it’s a scam, except maybe when the people doing the training are spending their own money. Did they get special training for the job they lost?
All of these things help many more people than they hurt.
This is a separate matter from the issue of sourcing things in China.
Sammy Finkelman (3bf6ea) — 4/20/2020 @ 2:14 pmI remember when the legal profession tried to stop people from writing their own wills, using published instructions. So much for free trade, with a profession that cannot abide people doing things themselves.
You “remember” that, huh? People write their own wills, conveyances, contracts, instructions to physicians, etc. and more etc. every day.
BTW, if I need an engineer’s stamp on a plan, who do I see?
So much for more of your blather.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 2:25 pmSo much for free trade, with a profession that cannot abide people doing things themselves.
The idiot concept of “free trade” is fascinating. There’s a LOT of dishonesty around the OFTEN loaded term “free trade”. It’s like Jonah Goldberg’s observation about fools and liars going on about “untrammeled capitalism”. Not only IS there no such thing, there never was.
I’m a pretty frothing-at-the-mouth advocate for market economics, but nobody I know or read is an advocate for “free trade” in the idiot or dishonest sense of the term.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 2:34 pmLast week: Trump brags about his deal to artificially inflate oil and gas prices.
This week: The price of oil goes negative.
#winning
Dave (1bb933) — 4/20/2020 @ 2:35 pm100. Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:02 pm
That happened under FDR and the New Deal, or the nearest thing to it. They built dams.
https://www.hydropower.org/a-brief-history-of-hydropower
Once you get past the capital investment, hydropower is nearly free.
I think you mean mass->energy converters.
That was the Eisenhower Administration. The “Atoms for Peace” program.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atoms_for_Peace
There were some problems, but the problems have been solved, and a bigger problem would be caused by decommissioning them. They’ve made a big problem now also out of disposing of nuclear waste.
Sammy Finkelman (3bf6ea) — 4/20/2020 @ 2:46 pmThis week: The price of oil goes negative.
Oil companies are paying customers to take their oil and store it. They’ve got no place to keep it. Of course, in the end they’ll be charged if they use it up.
Sammy Finkelman (3bf6ea) — 4/20/2020 @ 2:49 pmRagspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 1:49 pm
Well, it isn’t true because demand creates its own supply, ad pretty fast. If at all possible.
Sammy Finkelman (3bf6ea) — 4/20/2020 @ 2:51 pmOne of the many different reports.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 4/20/2020 @ 3:06 pmRagspierre 34,
Not at all, but thanks for your comment. I empathize. My fingers are ok but my eyes aren’t as young as they once were.
DRJ (15874d) — 4/20/2020 @ 3:39 pmTaxpayers paying to be confined by the gubmint.
mg (8cbc69) — 4/20/2020 @ 3:45 pmstay the fluck off my property
@116, Rags, You remind of the explorer who upon first seeing a Giraffe declared “There ain’t no such animal.”
Kidding aside you keep responding to questions about specific sub-populations by side stepping the question and pointing back to the overall trend. I agree that on balance free trade is better than protectionism. But if you’re seriously arguing that there aren’t a significant number of people who undergo meaningful long term pain due to free trade I’m going to suggest that you don’t understand the field of study as well as you claim.
Time123 (36651d) — 4/20/2020 @ 3:51 pmThis was a great answer, and shows how persuasive you can be when you don’t talk down to people.
Time123’s point (which Kevin often expresses too) is still worth addressing:
If this displacement of workers motivates those affected to elect protectionist charlatans like Trump, it is still a big problem for America. Throwing out the baby with the “creative destruction” bathwater, as it were.
But I think this is a narrative that is accepted too uncritically.
The peak of US manufacturing employment was in June 1979, at 19.5 million jobs, in a private workforce of 74.1 million (26%).
At the start of this year, manufacturing employment was 12.9 million, in a private workforce of 129.3 million (10%).
Anyone who says they are going to bring back the good old days of manufacturing is a liar or a fool (or in one very relevant case currently, both).
If we talk about the difference in number of jobs (19.5 vs 12.9), it is 5% of the current workforce. This number is an overestimate since just about anyone who held a manufacturing job in 1979 has reached retirement age or passed away, but let’s use it to get a feeling for the size of this allegedly “forgotten” sector of society. This is large enough to (rightly) have some weight in politics, but there are many other demographics of comparable size. It’s 1/3 the number of veterans, and only about 40% of the number of people with postgraduate or professional degrees, for example.
In short, it’s one of many competing special interests, and one that can be expected to diminish in size and influence as younger, better educated workers enter the workforce and older workers retire. On the other hand, we should be careful because there will always be workers who find their skills no longer support a comfortable lifestyle.
One possibility is the traditional conservative one – generate growth, which generates new, better paying jobs. This would probably help younger workers more than older ones, but new high tech jobs also create new jobs for drivers, construction, etc.
A non-exclusive variation on the traditional conservative one is to help workers learn new skills. This is investment in human capital, and economically beneficial to the workers and the economy as a whole. But again, older workers are less amenable to learning new skills that are in demand today. But those who *are* willing to help themselves could do so, regardless of age or experience.
Another possibility is to try distorting the economy to somehow make jobs that are economically unprofitable artificially so. This is the European/nanny state/socialist approach. It leads to loss of competitiveness, stagnation of economic growth and makes society as a whole less well off.
The final possibility is just to buy off the unemployable with direct or indirect hand-outs. We could create subsidized jobs doing something considered socially/economically useful, like day-care or assisting local schools, law enforcement, or whatever, in some capacity. It has the advantage of keeping the economy competitive (although if paid for – as it should be – by increased taxes, there will still be a burden).
Anyway, I think the electoral and economic importance of “lost manufacturing jobs” is greatly overstated. That doesn’t mean we can or should ignore them, but we should be realistic about how they compare to other, competing interests.
Dave (1bb933) — 4/20/2020 @ 3:51 pmlike Jonah Goldberg’s observation about fools and liars going on about “untrammeled capitalism”. Not only IS there no such thing, there never was.
N.B.
That observation was made well before his time by none other than Ayn Rand. [It can be found in The Virtue of Selfishness, but my copy of that book is–somewhere or other, so I can’t provide the page number.]
Kishnevi (480bf9) — 4/20/2020 @ 4:06 pmN.B. again
“Asset” is the troll formerly known as “lany”. He started as a Bernie Bro, but I guess he decided the current pose is more profitable.
Kishnevi (480bf9) — 4/20/2020 @ 4:08 pmHere is a great graph showing that the “decline of manufacturing” has been a steady, inexorable process since the end of WWII. (Drag the little slider at the bottom of the graph all the way to right to extend to graph to last month).
The blue curve (and the left-hand scale on the graph), which is the one the protectionists like, shows total manufacturing jobs over time.
The red curve (and the right-hand scale on the graph), shows manufacturing jobs as a fraction of total non-farm employment (I used private employment instead of non-farm in my previous post).
In fact, exactly opposite what the protectionists want you to believe, since 2009, the steady, 60-year trend of manufacturing jobs declining as a fraction of all jobs (from 32% in 1950 to about 9% in 2009) has STOPPED.
In the last 10 years, manufacturing jobs have gone from 8.8% of the non-farm workforce in January 2010, to 8.4% in January 2020. The difference is comparable to the month-to-month fluctuations.
Dave (1bb933) — 4/20/2020 @ 4:11 pmWell, it isn’t true because demand creates its own supply, ad pretty fast. If at all possible.
But, Sammy, that has nothing to do with the general understanding of something as elemental as the law of supply and demand.
Nor is it especially true. There’s a huge demand for “free” energy. But no amount of demand will create it. Yet.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 4:14 pmColonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 4/20/2020 @ 3:06 pm
Yes, I know that. I wasn’t sure of the date, except that it was in January. The blaming of lung problems on vaping per se, and the slowness to acknowledge ot was cause by adding Vitamin E oil (also called Vitamin E acetate) illustrates some of the problems with these government health regulatory bodies.
Azar had to keep steering the conversation to coronavirus/
Sammy Finkelman (3bf6ea) — 4/20/2020 @ 4:22 pm1. Since free trade creates wealth it seems reasonable that some of that wealth would go to help these specific cases.
Time123 (36651d) — 4/20/2020 @ 4:45 pm2. Permanent support can lead to a permanent under class. No culture of work. No pathway from child hood to a productive adulthood. In short no build up of cultural capital. Because of that I think re-training is a better solution.
Kidding aside you keep responding to questions about specific sub-populations by side stepping the question and pointing back to the overall trend. I agree that on balance free trade is better than protectionism. But if you’re seriously arguing that there aren’t a significant number of people who undergo meaningful long term pain due to free trade I’m going to suggest that you don’t understand the field of study as well as you claim.
I thought my response was directly on point. I do think in global terms, or conceptually, but I did answer your question.
As I DID say, ANY economic model creates displacement. Market economics creates the least, I assert, while raising the standard of living for everyone.
Which is never to say there is no pain coming from what some call “creative destruction”. Indeed, where you have the greatest innovation in a society, you sort of necessarily have a lot of potential for displacement. I understand, for instance, that innovation from competition has led to big truck engines being more fuel efficient, durable, more powerful, and cleaner as they’ve become computer controlled. This, I’m sure, would lead to fewer heavy truck mechanics…ALL other things being in stasis. Interestingly, I bet there are more trucks on the road today than ever, judging by the explosion in truck stops we’ve seen.
Are there places in the US with “significant” numbers of people who used to have manufacturing jobs who have lost those jobs? Of course. In many cases those jobs were going down the toilet anyhow, and nothing short of central planning and the attendant loss of efficiency, the standard of living, etc. was ever going to stop that.
The management guru Peter Drucker recounted the story of touring a steel mill and having to gingerly step over sleeping men on catwalks. Those jobs were well-paying jobs that were already waiting to die. I’m absolutely sure that men like those felt deep resentment when their jobs were gone. I get it.
Barackula got a load of crap for saying that some jobs were gone and weren’t coming back. It was a simple truism. And it had little or nothing to do with free trade. It’s an easy prediction to make that some of the dirtiest, most dangerous jobs in a steel mill are going to be done…and soon…by robots, and that’ll happen if Duh Donald completely bans steel imports. But people are going to be hired to service, repair, and program those robots. Some of the same guys who lose a job will have the chance to learn some new skills and get another job at the same plant.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 4:54 pmI’m not sure if you mean to suggest it, but free trade is not the cause, or even a very important contributing factor. The redirection of labor and resources to more productive uses is a feature, not a bug; individual freedom and human ingenuity (technology) are responsible.
I agree entirely. And I don’t buy the assertions of some that this is any kind of new or unique phenomenon in 21st century America.
Any safety net should incentivize people away from relying on it longer than necessary.
Dave (1bb933) — 4/20/2020 @ 5:00 pmCapitalism is a Ponzi scheme. One percent of the pyramid gets money for nothing except organizing it, paying politicians to keep it legal, paying so-called economists to write apologia for it, and promoting it to the 99% who will never get a full return from their “investment” of their life, health, youth, sweat and blood.
nk (1d9030) — 4/20/2020 @ 8:33 pmShowing you don’t have any idea what a Ponzi Scheme OR capitalism is.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/20/2020 @ 8:49 pmIn Capitalism, man is exploit fellow man.
But in Socialism, is other way around!
Dave (1bb933) — 4/20/2020 @ 11:09 pmTrump manipulates the media and it’s coverage to his advantage. Well I never….when has a politician ever done THAT?
The idealistic free traders are again out here in force. Sadly China and every other country on earth failed to get the memo e live in the world, not your freshman economics textbook. What’s the price of oil in Fantasyland this week?
Bugg (ebf485) — 4/21/2020 @ 5:48 amThere’s a memo?
Nobody got my freshman economics textbook that we are living in?
Damn on both counts.
Welp, I guess we’ll all just need to turn our lives over to central planning “brights” so we can…what? Be Belgium, I reckon.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/21/2020 @ 6:11 amI agree.
I think your point here is that we don’t need to take any special action to address people who are negatively impacted by globalization because those jobs were going to go away eventually anyway. Am I correctly understanding you?
Time123 (797615) — 4/21/2020 @ 6:26 amWhat system would you prefer to use to allocate resources whose demand exceeds supply?
Time123 (797615) — 4/21/2020 @ 6:27 amI think your point here is that we don’t need to take any special action to address people who are negatively impacted by globalization because those jobs were going to go away eventually anyway. Am I correctly understanding you?
No, and on several counts. Market economics are WAY bigger than “globalization”, as I’ve tried to point out. Jobs in any economic system are going to go away. If we totally isolated our economy but kept market economics (where people and their companies got to use property as they chose, and the market was free to send price signals), there would still be “churn” as jobs became obsolete via technical advance. Even in the Soviet Union, this occurred though it was impeded by planners who spent vast resources to prevent it.
When you ask if I believe “we” need to do something to help people who lose jobs, you’d need to define “we” and what help. We currently DO have programs…that are very expensive and of limited value. Perhaps they are even net negatives.
Should we help displaced workers? Sure. One of the best ways is to make our market economic system is as robust and free as possible. It is a job-creating machine! Could private means be effective? Absolutely. Is there a role for local and state governments? I’d have to see what was proposed. Is this something the federal government should undertake? Probably not, and for the reason stated previously…it tends to crowd out all other initiatives.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/21/2020 @ 7:02 amWhat system would you prefer to use to allocate resources whose demand exceeds supply?
Use it up, wear it out,
nk (1d9030) — 4/21/2020 @ 7:19 amMake do, or do without.
Kill what you eat,
Eat what you kill.
An honest day’s pay,
For an honest day’s work.
Reap where you have sown,
And garner where you have winnowed;
And muzzle not the ox that treads the grain.
Rags, thank you for spelling it out, i appreciate the time you spent on it.
Time123 (797615) — 4/21/2020 @ 7:30 amYou know, I used to like Kellyanne, but now that smarmy smirk turns my stomach as much as her boss’s mangy head does.
nk (1d9030) — 4/21/2020 @ 7:34 amJust an addendum…
Plant operators along the Gulf coast make a very nice living. WalMart OTR drivers make 60k+, and there are trucking companies that will train CDL drivers and pay them well. Any draftsman makes a good income, and it isn’t hard to find training. An insurance adjuster makes good to very good money, though the licensing is remarkably hard (at least in Texas).
Just a few thoughts.
Also, one thing that hits you as you fall off in a deep river valley in Pennsylvania or Ohio is that the old mill towns existed there for a reason, but that reason has gone.
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 4/21/2020 @ 9:10 am