Trump Keeps Tweaking Expected Coronavirus Death Toll Upward — But Who Could Have Known???!?!
MSDNC reports: For the 5th time in two weeks, Trump tweaks projected death toll. I’d say it’s been four tweaks and not five, but they’re right that he keeps doing it.
Now, we’re going toward 50, I’m hearing, or 60,000 people. One is too many. I always say it: One is too many. But we’re going toward 50- or 60,000 people. That’s at the lower — as you know, the low number was supposed to be 100,000 people. We — we could end up at 50 to 60. Okay? It’s horrible.
A week later the lower bound was 60,000. (“[W]e’re probably heading to 60,000, 70,000.”) This past Wednesday it was 65,000.
"If we lose 65,000 people" — Trump has moved the goalposts from no deaths to fewer deaths than the Swine Flu to 60,000 deaths & now to 65,000 or 70,000 deaths.
He's positioned himself to proclaim any death toll smaller than 2 million Americans as a reflection of his good work. pic.twitter.com/y0pOhf3iEE
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) April 29, 2020
If you lose 65,000 people — it’s so crazy to say it, it’s just so horrible — but if we lose 65,000 people, and instead of that, going the other route, we would have lost a million or a million and a half or 2 million — it’s possible, it’s possible that you lost more — but could you imagine?
Last night (see MSDNC link above) he gave two numbers. First it was 80,000 or 90,000, although that appears to be a prediction rather than a lower bound:
“I used to say 65,000,” the president said, pointing to a total he promoted just a few days earlier. “And now I’m saying 80,000 or 90,000.”
Then it was even more, in the same town hall:
“Look, we’re going to lose anywhere from 75, 80 to 100,000 people. That’s a horrible thing. We shouldn’t lose one person out of this,” Trump said speaking during a Fox News virtual town hall.
Let’s give him credit for only one tweak, since this was the same night: 75,000 as a lower bound and 100,000 as an upper. That’s four tweaks.
No figure that is not six digits is remotely plausible, and I continue to think the death toll will be in the hundreds of thousands. We’ve lost nearly 70,000 people with barely over a million cases — and 100 million people could easily get this disease in this country before we are done.
Well, it’s not like someone could have known, around the time that Trump gave that first 50,000
to 60,000 number, that it was an absurd number. Oh, wait:
"Remember in April when we thought we were going to have only 60,000 coronavirus deaths?" is going to be something people say months from now as they shake their heads in disbelief.
— Patterico (@Patterico) April 23, 2020
Which reminds me: Larry Kudlow is trying to tell the world that at the end of February, “it was contained” based on the actual facts known in February:
That is horseshit, and you know how I know? Because I said this on February 28:
National Economic Council head Larry Kudlow says the Trump administration has “contained” the “caronavirus”, while the CDC has said of a spread of the virus in the U.S.: “It’s not so much of a question of if this will happen anymore but rather more of a question of exactly when this will happen.”
Americans will have to decide whether the Trump administration and its top officials like Kudlow would be more likely to put Donald Trump’s interests above those of the United States, and whether they would say false things to calm markets and benefit Trump politically. There is a rich history of material from the past three years with which Americans could make such a decision.
I’ll simply note that in Lent, I was trying to operate under a stricture of not criticizing people. I came to see this pledge as a fool’s errand for political punditry and revised my pledge to be operative only in my private life — but early on I was trying pretty hard to apply it everywhere, even on the blog. If my reaction to Kudlow seems uncharacteristically muted, that’s why.
There is indeed some distortion by hindsight going on these days. People criticize others, including Trump, for action or inaction in January when it was nowhere near as obvious that there was an impending crisis as it is today.
That said, Trump, Kudlow, and others took far longer to figure it out than some of us ordinary citizens who don’t receive a Presidential Daily Briefing that they don’t read.
So what? Looks like you found a way to attack Trump, Congratulations! The Biden/DNC/MSM Meme, that they will push till November election – is that Trump reacted too slowly to the virus in Jan/Feb. Or as “objective” Reporter Chuck Todd said: “TRump has blood on his hands!!”
Except, none of his critics were praising his shutdowns of China/EU Travel. Instead they were calling him a racist/bigot. Nor were the D’s calling for shutting down the country in Feb/March. They didn’t even want to shut down Chinatown.
But this is their story, and they will stick to it. Because they want to win in November and elect Biden. Truth be damned.
rcocean (846d30) — 5/4/2020 @ 8:50 amI tend to agree.
Maybe for different reasons.
BuDuh (0e9a0c) — 5/4/2020 @ 8:51 amBTW, Trump had a dead-on tweet about Bush II “Calling for unity”:
@PeteHegseth “Oh bye the way, I appreciate the message from former President Bush, but where was he during Impeachment calling for putting partisanship aside.” He was nowhere to be found in speaking up against the greatest Hoax in American history!
Exactly. All this “We need to stop being partisan and unify” is just Bush Code for “Lets give the D’s what they want”. Just more establishment loser talk. The D’s don’t care what Bush-II says about anything, they only listen to him when they can use his words to attack Trump. Ford tried to stop impeachment of Clinton. Bush-II said ZERO about Pelosi impeachment of President Trump. But the Bush was happy as a clam being invited to McCain funeral, while President Trump was blackballed.
rcocean (846d30) — 5/4/2020 @ 8:55 amYou seem very devoted to truth, yet you did not tell the truth in your comment. Chuck Todd did not “say” Trump had blood on his hands. He asked a question. That is the truth. What you said was not. But you care deeply about truth.
Patterico (115b1f) — 5/4/2020 @ 8:55 amIf you look at deaths CV-19 death stats, you’ll see that NY/NJ/Conn have 36,000 of 68,000 deaths. Only 8 states have death rates in excess of 300 per Million. Basically we’re talking about NY Metro area, DC, Detroit, Chicago, NOLA, Boston, PHilly.
Calf has a death rate of 57 vs. NY state of 1,127. And almost all the Calf deaths are in LA and SoCal.
Yet, the entire country is locked down. We’ve flattened the curve. Mission acomplished. Time to let the rest of the country – outside big metro areas and NY, open up.
rcocean (846d30) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:01 amChuck Tood: “Some say Trump has blood on his hand, Mr. Democrat, what do you say?”
My question:
Rcocean: “Some say Chuck Todd, is a lying communist thug posing as a newsman, what do you say Patterico?”
Hey, not calling chuck any names, just askin’ a question!
rcocean (846d30) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:03 amGoing by the excess deaths that haven’t been reported as COVID-related, we’re probably already over 100,000.
Paul Montagu (b3f51b) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:04 amThe UW modeling is a moving target, but it does look like they’re too low, even their top end of the range (114,228).
Because Trump did react too slowly. He shares responsibility for the deaths of thousands of Americans.
Paul Montagu (b3f51b) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:06 amWithout evidence, Chuck todd claims “others” were declaring “trump had blood on his hands”. We need a fact check!
rcocean (846d30) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:07 amTell me when in Jan/Jeb Biden, Pelosi, or Schumer were saying that AND demanding a countryw-wide lockdown. Tell me when in Feb/Jan YOU were writing we needed to lockdown the USA.
That’s the Democrat talking point. they will repeat it over and over. Despite Pelosi/Schumer/Biden spending all of Feb talking about how Trump was a racist for shutting down China Travel and wanting to remove him from office because of a phone call to Ukraine.
The D’s know their record is terrible, but they know the best defense is a good offense.
rcocean (846d30) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:11 amNope. You’re making things up. Again.
Patterico (115b1f) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:15 amPatterico, If we had a president that could be relied on to provide accurate information this would be troubling because it would weaken their ability to lead. But we don’t have that. We have Trump. His statements of fact are famously wrong and he has little to no desire to actually lead. He’d rather get maximum attention and the least amount of responsibility possible so that no matter what happens he can brag about how well it reflects on him personally.
Time123 (306531) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:16 amHe reacted too slowly.
He didn’t stockpile PPE or make sure we had sufficient testing.
He also didn’t shut down travel from China until after the airlines had already stopped flights, and 40,000 people came her from China after his supposed shutdown.
Your boy royally screwed the pooch because he’s a weak leader.
Time123 (306531) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:19 am@3, this is a great examples of him acting like a garbage person who cares only about himself.
Time123 (306531) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:21 amWell, linked above. But some of us weren’t getting the PDB and still managed to call it months before the man who was.
If this isn’t the responsibility of the job of the president, what is? Remember when you were claiming…
Well, there is a pandemic and there are tens of thousands of deaths. Was Katrina Bush’s? You seem to think this has been a game, well, if it is, it has a scorecard, and Trump’s winning by a huge margin, 50k “points” so far. Of course, those points are people.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:21 am“Despite Pelosi/Schumer/Biden spending all of Feb talking about how Trump was a racist for shutting down China Travel”
Trump didn’t shut down China travel.
Davethulhu (744195) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:22 am@7
Not convinced that the excess deaths all are caused by COVID. There are many deaths attributable to other causes that persons involved did not seek medical care as a result of fear of COVID.
And, in many cases, COVID was listed as the cause of death if the person tested positive (and sometimes even if not), even if other factors were involved, so long as the person tested positive.
So the statistics, frankly, are junk.
Bored Lawyer (56c962) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:38 am@17, to what do you attribute the sudden spike in death if not cv?
Time123 (9f42ee) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:45 amBTW, Trump had a dead-on tweet about Bush II “Calling for unity”:
He had a brain dead tweet about Bush.
He could have pivoted off it with some sort of tweet that called on everyone to unite behind his own leadership.
Instead he whined that Bush was not nice to him.
Kishnevi (1e395f) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:46 am@17 So the statistics, frankly, are junk.
The way my statistics professor framed it was, “There is always some way of measuring events that is better than not measuring them at all.”
John B Boddie (f7954e) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:47 amYour boy royally screwed the pooch because he’s a weak leader.
More than weak, he is an extreme narcissist whose only interest in anything is if it makes him look good, or he can spin it that way.
And, BTW, this same criticism applies in the other direction. As far as I can see, Trump basically (if belatedly) acceeded to the experts’ push for a complete national lockdown. Very little pushback there in terms of policy (although there was some rhetoric). A real leader would have questioned them closely, and also questioned whether the severe economic harm is worth the savings in lives. And whether other, less drastic measures (ala Sweden) might not have been better.
Point is, if you think what we have done is a gross over-reaction (as I and many others do), then you have to blame Trump, not Drs. Fauci and Birx. They have expertise in a limited area. They can advise, not run the country. That’s Trump’s job.
(In a prior post, I analogized the decision to Harry Truman’s decision about dropping the atom bomb. Either decision would have monumental consequences. The “experts” could advise him the likely results from each decision, but ultimately it was his to balance them.)
Bored Lawyer (56c962) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:47 amDeflection noted. Biden, Pelosi and Schumer don’t run CDC and FDA, Trump does, and his job is to execute the Office of the President, not any of those Democrats.
Paul Montagu (b3f51b) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:48 amPutting aside his travel restrictions that still allowed 40,000 to come here from China, Trump’s record of inaction and incompetence and lying and downtalking in January, February and a good part of March about the virus is well documented. That’s not a “Democrat talking point”, it’s basic truth.
@18
I gave one example — patients sick with something else who were too afraid to go to the hospital, or stayed away until they were much worse.
And there are other things. In NY, the state required nursing homes to take elderly patients who had COVID-19, and that resulted in many of them become death centers. Now while the immediate cause of death was the virus, you also have to blame that bone-headed rule.
Life is complicated. I don’t doubt that, because of COVID-19, many have died who would not have died so soon. But quantifying it is very difficult. And comparing statistics for different geographies is even harder, since their counting rules can differ widely.
Bored Lawyer (56c962) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:51 amThere are many deaths attributable to other causes that persons involved did not seek medical care as a result of fear of COVID.
Paul Montagu (b3f51b) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:56 amThat is true, BL, but if a person died because he/she failed to get necessary medical care out of fear of catching the virus, I would still call it a COVID-related death.
Off-topic: Has anyone noticed what a sewer “Instapundit” has become? Particularly the comment section.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:59 amThat is true, BL, but if a person died because he/she failed to get necessary medical care out of fear of catching the virus, I would still call it a COVID-related death.
Yes, but now we are getting into semantics, and secondary causes.
Suppose (as has and will happen) people who are economically devastated commit suicide. Is that COVID-related?
Or the stress from worrying about COVID causes someone to have a heart attack?
The virus has devastated the world, and caused 100s of thousands of deaths. That much is clear. The question is how to evaluate different methods of dealing with it, and how we can do better next time (and we are told that “next time”) will be 6 to 8 months from now.
Bored Lawyer (56c962) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:00 amBTW, Trump had a dead-on tweet about Bush II “Calling for unity”:
That tweet was just about the crassest, tone-deaf and most moronic thing that Trump has tweeted, out of a large number of crass, tone-deaf and moronic tweets.
That people think he’s some kind of genius only reflects poorly on them.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:02 amYes, excess deaths could over or under measure deaths related the Covid-19 because the response has a secondary impact. If anything I tend to think there are probably less other deaths. Traffic is down (less traffic accidents). Normal flu deaths should be down as well because everything we’re doing to lower the transmission of the Coronavirus will also lower the incidence of the flu. While there may be some people avoiding the hospital for treatable conditions, it’s unlikely those numbers are that significant as most people in immediate distress will seek help. However, occam’s razor would suggest that the biggest contributor to excess deaths might be that nasty pandemic I hear is going around….
tla (7ab14a) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:08 amrcocean,
Here is the question Chuck Todd asked Joe Biden. I’ve transcribed it directly from the video of the exchange:
(Note the question marks at the end of the sentences.)
You originally claimed that Todd emphatically said that Trump has blood on his hands:
This is manipulative misrepresentation of what Todd asked. It’a cheap tactic to cherry pick a few choice words that are part of a larger question to push your company line. You have intentionally misrepresented what Todd said. And you need to admit it. You put words into his mouth. And however distasteful you find the question (like Biden did), it was nonetheless a question that was asked.
When it was pointed out to you that what you said was not correct, you doubled-down to protect Trump:
But that’s not what Chuck Todd said. And you know that. You’ve made several false claims, and you need to stop it. It’s too bad that you are willing to surrender your integrity to protect Trump. Our integrity should be worth more than throwing it away for any president, let alone a demonstrably corrupt one.
Dana (0feb77) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:08 amBL, I don’t have a way to post the chart. But I downloaded weekly deaths from the CDC website starting with 2014, the first year they have data.
If you plot weekly deaths from all causes CW13 2020 shows the start of trend. CW14 2020 is much higher then then any from 2014 on and well outside 3* the standard deviation. This is true if you look at the US as a whole or the the US less NYC. Although it’s very true that NYC is a big contributor.
Bottom line, I think the data fully supports the assertion that deaths too an unusual spike starting in CW13.
Again this is just total deaths from all causes.
If any of contributors is interested in doing a post about this data I’m happy to share my work with them.
Time123 (ca85c9) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:10 amYes, and Reynolds makes it worse by quietly deleting comments he disagrees with. They still show up in Disqus, but they’re disappeared in the threads.
Paul Montagu (b3f51b) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:11 amYes, and that means trying to get better at statistics, statistical models and determining causes of death. We already know the numbers are imperfect at best, but it’s better to use the best ones available instead of not using any, no?
Paul Montagu (b3f51b) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:17 amHere’s Chuck Todd’s “Hard hitting” question to Democrat nominee Joe Biden on MTP:
Your campaign put out — in a critique of President Trump and says, “If he doesn’t do these things he could cost lives.” Do you think there’s already — do you think there is blood on the president’s hands considering the slow response? Or is that too harsh of a criticism?
I don’t think Biden’s press secretary could have thought up a better question. And he labeled Trump’s response “slow” without evidence.
rcocean (846d30) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:24 amNotice how Todd in the FIRST sentence quote’s a Biden campaign meme, then jump’s to the 2nd sentence. Note: there’s a silent AND in it. So your campaign says Trump is costing people’s lives NOW, AND given the slow response doesn’t he have blood on his hands? Or is that too harsh?
LOL. Its not a question, Its Chuck Todd Elect Joe campaign tweet.
rcocean (846d30) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:28 amSince you think the response was so timely can you list a few things he actually did and how they helped us?
Time123 (ca85c9) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:29 am“And he labeled Trump’s response “slow” without evidence.”
There’s plenty of evidence that Trump’s response was slow.
Davethulhu (744195) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:31 am“Since you think the response was so timely can you list a few things he actually did and how they helped us?”
The only thing he can list is “shut down China”, which isn’t even true.
Davethulhu (744195) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:32 amBTW, I’ve already mocked the ridiculous defense that a MSM “reporter” can say anything or call anyone any insult they want in the PREFACE to a question, and its “Unfair” or a “Lie” to say they’re calling that person a name.
Sorry, just putting a question mark at the end, doesn’t change the meaning. I got Todd’s “question” wrong, because I gave him too much credit. No one thought up “Trump has blood on his hands” except Chuck todd.
rcocean (846d30) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:32 am@37, I know.
Time123 (306531) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:38 amWow dude. Trump insulted Mccain for being a prisoner of war and was disrespectful at all times to him. Why would Trump be entitled to attend his funeral? Bush’s video was great because it wasn’t about Bush. It was about our country getting through these times by remembering what matters. Trump had to make it about him, had to pick a fight, had to ignore what really matters.
Sad that you just march along with that.
Dustin (e5f6c3) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:39 amIt’s OK for you to insult people. It’s OK for the president to insult people. It’s OK for Trump’s fanblogs to accuse people of murder or say cuck five million times.
But the second someone insults Trump (by asking about his responsibility for his actions) you get upset.
Trump ain’t worth it, man.
Dustin (e5f6c3) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:42 amJERRY DUNLEAVY
@JerryDunleavy
·
DHS report shows China “stockpiled medical supplies… before its official notification to WHO that COVID-19 was contagious” and drastically decreased medical exports & increased medical imports while covering up the coronavirus.
@DCExaminer w/ @_carlbeck
https://washingtonexaminer.com/news/china-intentionally-concealed-the-severity-of-coronavirus-outbreak-to-hoard-supplies-dhs-report
__ _
Lachlan Markay
harkin (8f4a6f) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:58 am@lachlan
·
If there’s one positive development from this catastrophe it’s that it completely and irredeemably destroys Beijing’s credibility on the world stage. Every US policymaker should be working overtime to ensure that happens
__ _
People get angry when they are insecure and defensive. Defending Trump is a good reason to be insecure and angry.
DRJ (15874d) — 5/4/2020 @ 11:14 amI’ve observed that rcoceans is the most prolific liar and defamer on these threads.
It seems his favorite MO is to make the completely unsupported…and unsupportable…claim that David French or Johan Goldberg said a given thing. I have challenged him to provide a link each time I’ve caught him playing this game. He never has, because the claim…often totally out-of-the-blue and apropos of nothing…was simply his way of tarring people who are not full-throated T-rump suckers.
He is a TWOT (total waste of time).
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 5/4/2020 @ 11:17 amA certain school of thought says that because the experts don’t know everything and because their predictions aren’t realized exactly down to the decimal point, therefore we should discount everything they say — that they don’t know what they’re talking about.
It’s nuts. Whom should we listen to then? Rush Limbaugh? Sean Hannity? Donald Trump?
The experts have been more accurate in their predictions than the people who — presuming to be wiser than the experts — were saying “What’s the big fuss over a problem in one nursing home in one state in a corner of the country?” By that time, the experts were seeing signs of how the virus was spreading mostly invisibly through the community, and their knowledge of epidemiology gave them a good sense of how big it could quickly get without precautionary measures.
But who needs experts when we have wiser-than-thou “intellectuals” and pundits telling us how wrong the experts are.
Radegunda (354236) — 5/4/2020 @ 11:28 amOT, but interesting and well deserved:
Devin Nunes’ lawyer facing prospect of sanctions after two recent, rare court warnings
The attorney representing Rep. Devin Nunes in six lawsuits has received two recent, rare warnings from judges that raise the prospect of courts sanctioning him.
People and organizations that Nunes’ attorney, Steven Biss, is suing have begun asking judges to punish him in several other instances.
Three of the requests for sanctions – from National Public Radio, Twitter and a government whistleblower advocate – mark an escalation in their defense against defamation lawsuits Biss has filed.
The most recent request for sanctions against Biss came from Fusion GPS, the firm known for creating the so-called “Steele dossier,” which contained unverified tips about President Donald Trump’s connections to Russia.
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 5/4/2020 @ 11:29 am…….
SAN DIEGO MAN WEARS KKK HOOD TO SUPERMARKET AFTER COUNTY ORDERS PUBLIC TO WEAR FACE MASKS
Officials have condemned a man in California who was pictured wearing a makeshift Ku Klux Klan hood while shopping at a supermarket.
Pictures of the man wearing a white hood similar to one worn by the hate group at a Vons store in Santee, San Diego (County) emerged on social media over the weekend.
The incident occurred one day after San Diego imposed a new health order requiring everyone to cover their faces in public if they come within six feet of another person or whenever they enter a place of business from May 1 to help stop the spread of the coronavirus.
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 5/4/2020 @ 11:33 am…….
The city of Santee has a known history of white supremacist activity and racially motivated attacks, earning it the nickname “Klantee.”
…….
Free Nunes’ “mom”!
Paul Montagu (b3f51b) — 5/4/2020 @ 11:34 amhttps://am14.akamaized.net/med/cnt/uploads/2019/03/nunes-mom.jpg
Reopening states will cause 233,000 more people to die from coronavirus, according to Wharton model
New data from the University of Pennsylvania suggests that relaxing lockdowns across U.S. cities and states could have serious consequences for the country’s battle to contain the coronavirus, which has infected over a million people while killing more than 66,000 people.
According to the Penn Wharton Budget Model (PWBM), reopening states will result in an additional 233,000 deaths from the virus — even if states don’t reopen at all and with social distancing rules in place. This means that if the states were to reopen, 350,000 people in total would die from coronavirus by the end of June, the study found.
Kent Smetters, the PWBM’s director, said the decision to reopen states is ultimately a “normative judgement that comes down to the statistical value of life.”
…….
[T]he policy of reopening states would provide a much needed economic boost, according to the model.
“Almost all net job losses between May 1 and June 30 would be eliminated,” the report found.
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 5/4/2020 @ 11:38 am…….
The model aims to quantify the trade-off to the economic benefits of reopening states amid the coronavirus pandemic that has killed nearly 240,000 people worldwide, with some 60,000 deaths in the United States.
……
This is something that’s baffled me for a long time. Why does it bother some people so very much if Donald Trump is “insulted”? Haven’t they noticed that Trump is not someone who would be the slightest bit offended if someone insulted them? He would be more likely to laugh along with the insult.
Radegunda (354236) — 5/4/2020 @ 11:44 amWhy do people pin their sense of personal worth on someone so unworthy of respect?
Trump says he shares his famed uncle’s science genius. A friend says the uncle ‘would have been horrified.’
The famed scientist John G. Trump once explained his theory of how to treat one malady by the “direct injection of electrons” into patients’ skin. To treat another disease, he cited tests that showed it was possible to use electrons to “destroy or inactivate hepatitis virus in blood plasma.”
But, President Trump’s uncle said, “We unfortunately were not able to persuade anybody to try this,” because there had been “some casualties among volunteers.”
The president has long said that he and his uncle, who taught physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and died in 1985, represent a rare breed of “super genius,” benefiting from the same genes.
It is not known whether the president, in his widely condemned recent suggestion that disinfectant be injected into the body to kill the novel coronavirus, was somehow vaguely channeling his uncle’s theories. What is clear is that Trump has sought repeatedly to present himself as a man of scientific knowledge largely because his uncle was so renowned — and that his efforts in recent weeks have only highlighted the vast gulf between them.
…….
President Trump has for years cited the genes he shares with his uncle to try to demonstrate that he, too, has a scientific intellect, an effort that he has stressed while dealing with the novel coronavirus.
“I really get it,” the president said March 6 about benefiting from his bloodline, as he discussed the coronavirus at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “Maybe I should have done that instead of running for president.”
…..
“The John Trump I knew would have been horrified,” said John Van de Graaff, whose father, the famed scientist Robert Van de Graaff, was John Trump’s longtime business partner.
Van de Graaff told The Washington Post that he joined his father in many conversations with John Trump, and recalled him as a man dedicated to the rigorous testing of ideas who would not have approved of the way the president has blurted out dangerous supposed remedies for the novel coronavirus.
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 5/4/2020 @ 11:45 am……
Trump has justified his forays into dispensing scientific advice by citing what he calls his shared traits with his uncle. Yet some who have studied John Trump say they see no justification for linking the intellect of the two men.
…….
Someone wore a KKK hood. Wow, fascinating. My rabbit just ate carrot.
rcocean (846d30) — 5/4/2020 @ 11:46 am@rcocean, #1:
At its core, this is a totally fair observation. One can criticize Trump for reacting too slowly, or for reacting too quickly…but not both. One can criticize him for being overly cautious, or for not being cautious enough…but not both. And when someone tries to have it both ways at different times, depending on what they think will best suit their narrative, it’s 100% legitimate to let them have both barrels (rhetorically speaking).
But just because their conjunction is illegitimate, that doesn’t invalidate either argument by itself. They still must be considered on the merits.
Demosthenes (7fae81) — 5/4/2020 @ 11:49 amRcocean’s comments are valuable because people agree with him. It is important to respond seriously and discuss the pros and cons. Insults won’t change any minds.
DRJ (15874d) — 5/4/2020 @ 11:57 amSecretary of Senate says she cannot comply with Biden request to release records on purported Reade complaint
Which I am sure Biden knew …….
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 5/4/2020 @ 11:59 am@53-
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 5/4/2020 @ 12:00 pmI wear a keffiyeh when I go outside. ……
Sorry, that was directed at @52.
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 5/4/2020 @ 12:01 pmTreasury plans to borrow $3 trillion from April through June as enormous coronavirus costs pile up
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 5/4/2020 @ 12:05 pmI agree. And hopefully this doesn’t come across as obnoxious but Bush’s video yesterday is really helpful for Trump critics to bear in mind.
Dustin (e5f6c3) — 5/4/2020 @ 12:07 pmR.I.P. Don Shula
Icy (6abb50) — 5/4/2020 @ 12:19 pmI think the value in his comments is that they inform us as to the extreme lengths that Trump loyalists will go in order to defend him. Truth and accuracy doesn’t matter. In fact, the only thing that matters is to defend him – even if the price of that defense is the compromise and/or loss of one’s integrity. These sorts of comments serve as a cautionary tale of what happens when one acts if they esteem a man with the feet of clay as one who walks on water. The deification of man is always a dangerous proposition.
Dana (0feb77) — 5/4/2020 @ 12:21 pmI’m glad RCocean comments here and I hope he doesn’t stop. I don’t often agree with him but I’ve always felt he was presenting what he believed. It’s nice to have a place online where I can politely talk with someone I disagree with politically.
Time123 (306531) — 5/4/2020 @ 12:25 pmI agree, Time123. There are far too few places on the internet where people of every political stripe are able to come together. I do wish, however, that the goal is a clear representation of what has been said when making claims about what a politician has said, rather than adjusting it to suit one’s preference.
Dana (0feb77) — 5/4/2020 @ 12:28 pmRe the Penn Wharton modeling
The Yahoo article was a bit too elliptical. Here’s a fuller description of what the model predicts
https://www.cathlabdigest.com/content/penn-wharton-budget-model-covid-19-mortality-estimates-based-varying-levels-reopening-states-nationwide
Kishnevi (5b662e) — 5/4/2020 @ 12:43 pmBack during the 2015-16 primaries I saw an emerging pattern of Trump fans responding to criticism of Trump with personal insults of the critic. (Or against the musical taste of the critic, on this comment board, because I happen to like a singer-songwriter who is also well regarded by Chris Martin, Elton John, Paul McCartney, JC Chasez, Beverley Knight, Brian May, the queen of England, and millions more.)
There’s also the fact that Trump fans fiercely defend someone with a well-known habit of lobbing petty insults at any and all, in a very public way.
So while I hope I’m not gratuitously insulting toward people because they don’t share my opinions, once in a while I wonder why it’s so terrible if a Trump defender’s feelings are hurt.
Radegunda (354236) — 5/4/2020 @ 12:48 pmDRJ,
rcocean called out a partisan hack for being a partisan hack using the excuse that he was just asking questions while putting a blood libel out there. In response, hes been attacked on semantics and you have Ragspierre blatantly insulting and name calling yet another person without reprisal.
As I’ve said, it appears that as long as you insult Trump repeatedly, you can get away with insulting his supporters without fear of reprisal.
To the usual suspects, I’m not going to follow up to this post so don’t bother trying to provoke me.
NJRob (7c05ea) — 5/4/2020 @ 1:10 pmIt looks like 150k’ish to 300k’ish through June. That feels perfectly realistic based on the trajectory. I can’t see how people go back to a pre-911-er-covid mindset, but I’ve seen these yahoo’s protesting for weeks sans mask or distancing, so living in reality world doesn’t seem to be universal. This is directly from the admins own taskforce docs from today.
Heck, 35 states are flat to increasing in hospitalization and mortality, many of the states that are “reopening”. By the end of the year it is entirely possible that Covid will surpass 500k deaths, approaching heart disease and cancer. The admins own projections are adding another 1k more deaths a day to 3k by June 1st with the partial reopening, since not a single state has hit the metrics that the admin actually stated with their reopening plan.
So the admin had a plan, but the leader of the admin has been pushing to ignore the plan, so why are surprised that the temporary flattening of the curve is temporary. If we listen to the admin, it will be 1M to 2.2M by the end of the year. I watched the Fox News thing with Trump last night, and he was pushing for faster reopening, again counter to the actual plan from his admin.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 5/4/2020 @ 1:16 pm13. Time123 (306531) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:19 am
But most of them China was screening.
The real problem, you could say, is that he didn’t shit down, or carefully monitor, travelers coming from Italy.
Today Governor Cuomo claimed we didn’t learn until last week. What happened last week is the CDC published a report. The facts were in the New York Times of April 14. Governor Cuomo himself talked about it coming from Italy (“the back door”) numerous times before.
And on the TV you could see:
You could see, in smaller type to the left of the screen hat the report is entitled Public health Response to the Initiation and Spread of Pandemic COVID-19 in the United States, February 24–April 21, 2020
Anna Schuefeld (?) MD, CDC COVID-19 Regeria (?) Scan May 1, 2020 (I couldn’t make out all the letters in the part giving the author
I later saw online this was: Anne Schuchat, MD; CDC COVID-19 Response Team )
Here it is:
https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/mm6918e2.htm
It’s a history that pulls together month old and longer information.
Here’s the New York Times story:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/08/science/new-york-coronavirus-cases-europe-genomes.html
Note this:
They found that the earliest cases identified in New York were not linked to later ones.
That means they contained the first few cases that reached New York, or they had an R0 of less than 1. It might mean a minority of people who get it are principally responsible for its spread.
Sammy Finkelman (af3697) — 5/4/2020 @ 1:22 pmCount Rob along ocean as the guy who defends Trump no matter what, and gets angry when his political idol gets criticized or insulted.
Paul Montagu (bd6210) — 5/4/2020 @ 1:24 pmJoe Biden has no number sense. On Friday he said there had 600,000 deaths (in the USA) He was corrected by Joe Scarborough, acknowledged the correction and blithely went on.
Rush Limbaugh played it to demonstrate that Joe Biden can’t be allowed to speak spontaneously.
I don;t have the transcript. Just a transcript of the part of the interview conducted by Mika Brzezinski
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/01/us/politics/joe-biden-tara-reade-msnbc.html
Sammy Finkelman (af3697) — 5/4/2020 @ 1:37 pm#67 — Meanwhile, I see people bashing the experts for not having made precisely accurate projections at every step, and for not having perfect knowledge of how to treat COVID-19 the minute it appeared (never mind that a novel virus is by definition one not seen before) — and then telling us we should go along with the higher wisdom of … Donald Trump.
They cannot tell us on what basis we should believe that Trump knows better. They are simply committed to the doctrine that he must know better.
Radegunda (354236) — 5/4/2020 @ 1:39 pmColonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 5/4/2020 @ 1:16 pm
They’re led by anti vaxxers, at least in California, according to the New York Times.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/02/us/anti-vaxxers-coronavirus-protests.html
White supremacists and worse are also involved:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/03/us/coronavirus-extremists.html
Of course, Russian president Vladimir Putin probably has a hand in this. He;s know to encourage the anti-vaccine movement outside of Russia. (inside Russia, it’s a different thing.)
Sammy Finkelman (af3697) — 5/4/2020 @ 1:54 pmThey contained the first few cases that reached new York City.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/08/science/new-york-coronavirus-cases-europe-genomes.html
Note this:
They found that the earliest cases identified in New York were not linked to later ones.
That means they contained the first few cases that reached New York, or they naturally had an R0 of less than 1.
It might mean a minority of people who get it are principally responsible for its spread.
They really don;t know how it spreads. Why here and not there?
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/03/world/asia/coronavirus-spread-where-why.html
Sammy Finkelman (af3697) — 5/4/2020 @ 2:00 pmSecurity guard in Flint killed for doing his job to protect the public:
https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/michigan/2020/05/03/police-flint-guard-shooting-mask-family-dollar/3075515001/
Radegunda (354236) — 5/4/2020 @ 2:02 pmHere is a history published last Fruday by the CDC that pulls together month old and longer information.
The report is entitled: Public health Response to the Initiation and Spread of Pandemic COVID-19 in the United States, February 24–April 21, 2020
by Anne Schuchat, MD; CDC COVID-19 Response Team
https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/mm6918e2.htm
Excerpt:
Sammy Finkelman (af3697) — 5/4/2020 @ 2:04 pmAnd DRJ thank you for politely remarking on rcocean in response to other intolerant remarks.
NJRob (7c05ea) — 5/4/2020 @ 2:04 pmFactually incorrect. Enjoy tilting at those windmills.
NJRob (7c05ea) — 5/4/2020 @ 2:05 pmThis is manipulative misrepresentation of what Todd asked.
Yes, but it was also a manipulative question, and suggestive of Todd’s thinking. Did Biden answer him, or did he passively allow the question to stand by hemmming and hawing?
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/4/2020 @ 2:15 pmYes, and Reynolds makes it worse by quietly deleting comments he disagrees with.
And leaves what is there? Much worse, and not just for the comment section.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/4/2020 @ 2:18 pmIn my experience, factually true. And noted, you didn’t keep your word about “not going to follow up to this post”.
Paul Montagu (bd6210) — 5/4/2020 @ 2:19 pm26. Bored Lawyer (56c962) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:00 am
I do;t thik it;s stress. That is another symptom of the virus. It causes blood clots.
It’s no more stress than ulcers are caused by stress.
You can have some deaths caused by not seeking (or not being able to get) not quite emergency care.
Well, 100s of thousands means at least 200,000 because plural means at least two
The worldwide coronavirus Death toll is now estimated as 251,509 so far.
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/coronavirus-death-toll
But there’s under reporting (in China and Iran for instance) and under-attribution.
Sammy Finkelman (af3697) — 5/4/2020 @ 2:20 pmRipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 5/4/2020 @ 11:59 am
Oh, please.
All you should need is signed consent forms from Tara Reade and Joe Biden. If a complaint concerns someone else that could either be requested or that fact cold be said, or maybe it could be redacted.
Sammy Finkelman (af3697) — 5/4/2020 @ 2:28 pmI will pose a few questions:
1. what is the difference between an “insult” and an “observation” when the predicates for the observation are laid out clearly? Many here observe that Duh Donald is a liar; is that an “insult”?
2. when one decides that his or her time is not fruitfully spent engaging with anyone…and says so, is that a call for them to be censored?
3. when one has MANY times offered a poster the opportunity to substantiate claims that one finds incredible (and defaming), and no substantiation is forthcoming, what is rational to conclude about the veracity of the poster?
4. if someone lies demonstrably and often, when did it become “impolite” to note they are a liar? How is that an “insult”?
Ragspierre (d9bec9) — 5/4/2020 @ 2:46 pm“Rush Limbaugh played it to demonstrate that Joe Biden can’t be allowed to speak spontaneously.”
Did Rush follow up with the clip where he claimed it was just “the common cold”?
Davethulhu (744195) — 5/4/2020 @ 2:59 pmTrolling. You didn’t respond to my post. Just name called.
NJRob (7c05ea) — 5/4/2020 @ 3:00 pm#66 – thanks. In a saner world, EVERYONE would be upset when a NBC news anchor suggests on Nation- wide TV that the President of United States has “blood on his hands” for not responding sooner in a crisis. Even Bush_II didn’t get that level of invective from the so-called Mainstream media for the Iraq war. Its simply unheard of.
rcocean (846d30) — 5/4/2020 @ 3:00 pmJust shifting topic slightly. People need to understand that until we develop a vaccine to CVY-19 anything short of locking ourselves down in our houses and apartments, will end up “Killing people.”
This entire effort since March has been an attempt to “flatten the curve” to ensure the medical system doesn’t get overwhelmed and to find out more on how the treat the virus. And get suffiicent medical gear/tests/etc. in place.
But we can’t shut down the United States of America for another 12 months, to “Save lives”. everything is a trade-off. WE “kill” about 20,000 people a year because we decide that everyone can go 65-70 MPH instead 35 MPH. Not to mention the number of people we “Kill” because we’ve decided to allow people to consume alcoholic beverages, MJ, and all kinds of unhealthy food and drink. We even allow people to advertise beer, wine, and hard liquor on TV, despite the medical damage it does. SOo, its all a trade off.
rcocean (846d30) — 5/4/2020 @ 3:07 pmOne, I didn’t name-call, but that’s the dishonesty I’ve come to expect from you. Two, I responded to your post, you just didn’t like the answer. If you want another answer, then I think your comment was a main dish of tripe with a side salad of victim card.
Paul Montagu (bd6210) — 5/4/2020 @ 3:49 pm@66 I’m pretty sure that Chuck Todd didn’t accuse Trump of using murdered Christian children in religious ceremonies.
@71 Marin county woo-obsessed super-liberals and far right white supremacists. Interesting bedfellows.
@82 1. Insult describes a person, observation describes a behavior. ie Trump is a liar vs Trump is often untruthful.
2. Nah. Just because I have the right to talk doesn’t mean you have to listen to me (or can’t say that I’m being untruthful and should be quiet.) A call to censor would be “So Patterico should delete their posts”
3. Whatever you choose to conclude from it.
4. See answer 1.
@84 Ummm, how is that name-calling?
Nic (896fdf) — 5/4/2020 @ 4:01 pmBush never launched invective at other people the way Trump routinely does.
It’s hard to be very offended by disrespect toward someone who is so regularly disrespectful of others. And the claim that Trump only ever “counterpunches” is based on the strange premise that people treat him exceptionally badly for no reason at all — which of course is what he believes, since he regards whatever he does as faultless by definition. But that doesn’t make it true.
I’m not in favor of baseless slander against anyone, but I reserve my moral concern for people who aren’t sociopaths with no honor or basic human empathy.
Radegunda (354236) — 5/4/2020 @ 4:31 pm“We’ve lost nearly 70,000 people with barely over a million cases — and 100 million people could easily get this disease in this country before we are done.”
Aren’t those only confirmed cases? Isn’t it clear from antibody studies that there are actually many times more cases than that?
Mark Johnson (7b32c0) — 5/4/2020 @ 4:37 pmThere have been reports of that, Mr. Johnson, but it doesn’t help the narrative being pushed, so…
Colonel Haiku (d8affe) — 5/4/2020 @ 4:55 pmTrump has killed more Americans in six weeks than the entire Vietnam War did in 20 years. Because when Azar tried to brief him on the coming pandemic he wanted to talk about vaping and then went out and called it a Democrat hoax to bring down the stock market and hurt him in the election and because he is a ridiculous buffoon like the Three Stooges rolled into one and it is not ego that drives him it is insecurity about his manhood of which he has none and he never had all his life but he tries to fake it by insulting people and assaulting women when he is not buying them and that is the truth.
nk (1d9030) — 5/4/2020 @ 5:11 pmThat strikes me as highly unfair, because it suggests Patterico has an agenda that does not include being accurate or truthful. The fact is the antibody studies vary with some suggesting there is a higher infection rate and some that there is a lower infection rate.
Debate the topic. Stop being an ankle-biter.
DRJ (15874d) — 5/4/2020 @ 5:29 pmI certainly hope you are not referring to me as attacking rcocean. He said something that was not accurate. Period. That is not attacking him, rather it is attempting to set the record straight. I bear no ill will toward rcocean, nor do I wish to see him leave this forum. It is wonderful that people from all political points of view can share here. But I think we should all make every effort to be as accurate as we can, and not misrepresent anyone – regardless of their political persuasion.
Dana (0feb77) — 5/4/2020 @ 5:46 pmI’m calling bullsh*t on this one, too.
There is not a word on either Pelosi or Schumer’s Twitter feed criticizing the travel restrictions from China. Also, the NYTimes articles about the travel restriction likewise do not contain a word of criticism from anyone. To the contrary, Schumer harshly criticized China a few days after the travel restrictions went into effect, and linked to a story about the doctor who was persecuted for “rumor-mongering” and later died:
I’ll stipulate that you can probably find someone, somewhere in cyberspace, or a fringe politician, who criticized Trump. But the only mainstream criticism I recall at the time was that the restrictions were too easy to circumvent and would not prevent the spread of the virus.
Howver, at the same time as Trump limited travel from China, on the anniversary of his original immigration ban targeting Muslims, he also extended his immigration restrictions targeting Muslims to 350 million Africans. *That* order, which was completely separate from the one related to the virus, was criticized as being bigoted.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/4/2020 @ 6:02 pmThis suggestion against Patterico never occurred to me, because when I read the statement:
This is how it sounded in my head:
I took the word “reports” as the needed lens required to view the statement’s intent as a reference to the media. But I will concede that if I were to take the word “narrative,” instead, to be the lens through which this statement is to be viewed, then yes, I can see how a reasonable person could infer that the intended reference was to Patterico, if the statement sounded this way in my head:
Further, I know that you will point out that there are two matters here. The matter of which Mr. Johnson speaks, and the the matter of which the Colonel speaks. Either the Colonel is speaking of the MSM, or he speaks about our host.
Colonel, which is it?
felipe (023cc9) — 5/4/2020 @ 6:06 pmLikewise, Biden did not criticize the China travel restrictions, but he did criticize the extension of the ban on Muslims that Trump announced at the same time:
Dave (1bb933) — 5/4/2020 @ 6:16 pmPretty much all models align, 100k deaths by the end of the month, this month, 27 days from now. Models that have been pretty accurate over the last couple of weeks, the CDC and IHME models have been among the least accurate, or at least they’ve been overly simplified, the actuals have been pretty close if you look at the 95th percentile, but that’s not what people look at. Vox had a pretty good explainer of the different models. The reichlab has a nice combined tool, well, it’s not nice at all. reichlab.io/covid19-forecast-hub/
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 5/4/2020 @ 7:42 pmGoing further, Dave, Trump not lied when he said that Biden/Pelosi/Schumer called him a racist for implementing the travel restrictions from China, Trump lied that Biden apologized to Trump. If Trump didn’t lie so much, then he wouldn’t be called out so much.
Paul Montagu (b3f51b) — 5/4/2020 @ 8:07 pmTrump has a million tiny monkey’s in his head hitting even tinier keyboards using Word for Windows 2.0 and spell check. The words are actual words, just in the order they’re used in is nonsense. It’s not really a lie if there is literally no sense to comprehend what truth and facts are. That can be the only excuse, it’s much easier to count the true things he says on an annual basis, you don’t even have to take off your socks.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:05 pmI think it’s fairly clear that he lacks a normal sense of true/false — that he really does measure truth and fairness and goodness only in self-serving terms.
How so many people can be unable (or unwilling) to see it is a mystery.
Radegunda (354236) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:28 pmDRJ @94
Lower infection rate? Were does that article say that?
Incidentally, that article, from the free paper Am New York, mostly distributed near subways, has a nonsense sentence:
You can’t add these two numbers together , unless that percentage is the percentage of blacks and Hispanics who are in the survey.
But that would give you no clue as to the percentage of these subcategories who had antibodies.
By the way, the Roche test is not what is needed, according to what Dr. Scott Gottlieb wrote in a Wall Street Journal op-ed on Monday because he said you needed a rapid test. Dr. Max Gomez of WCBS said a blood test that involved drawing blood would be much less used than a finger stick test.
Sammy Finkelman (af3697) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:48 pmThere are people arguing that antibodies don’t necessarily indicate immunity (in what disease do they not>) and they are using the stupid argument that immunity to SARS doesn’t carry over to this. Well, why should it? A vaccine to one version of the flu isn’t much good for other versions.
Now there’s the question of the strength of the immunity.
Sammy Finkelman (af3697) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:52 pmStephen Miller has been tryng to se any excuse for restricting immigration and entry to the Unted States.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/03/us/coronavirus-immigration-stephen-miller-public-health.html
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/stephen-miller-has-long-term-vision-for-trumps-temporary-immigration-order-according-to-private-call-with-supporters/ar-BB139yu5
Sammy Finkelman (af3697) — 5/4/2020 @ 9:58 pmI don’t think I’ve even seen your remarks rise to the level of an attack. My remarks directly following what you quoted expressed where my dissatisfaction stems from.
I do think people are giving way to much deference to a leftist partisan hack who has a tv show.
NJRob (4d595c) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:07 pm87. rcocean (846d30) — 5/4/2020 @ 3:07 pm
Two things.
First, there’s a question some people claim – as to whether a vaccine is even possible. and it wouldn’t immunize everybody. And a SARS vaccine made a second exposure worse.
Second. New Zealand has a goal of completely eliminating the virus from New Zealand. Of course, that would mean that, for a long time, nobody would be able to go to New Zealand, with some half exceptions for crew members of ships and planes, who would have to stay on board and interact with very few people, and citizens of New Zealand who could go there but have to quarantine.
As a matter of fact, on April 22 this year, nobody is recorded as having entered New Zealand.
Australia doesn’t have quite such an ambitious goal, but may be heading there, and they are both considering the possibility of creating a bubble containing both Australia and New Zealand, with people being able to travel freely between them, and maybe including a few island states, if I am right..
Also, South Korea, without quite such a drastic policy, reported zero new cases on Thursday, April 30, down from 900 a day in February. One thing I am not clear about: That may not count four cases that came from abroad, unless that’s from the previous 24 hours before the 24 hours with no known new cases.
The baseball season is about to start there, at 1 am New York time that’s 10 pm Pacific time – seems like it must have already started.
Taiwan will also start soon, (each team?) playing 6 games a week, and even do it with each game having 250 spectators.
The first case in South Korea was January 20, and 10,765 people were diagnosed with coronavirus, of which 9,059 recovered and 254 died.
They had enough tests to est and trace nd I don’t know what they used to treat. I could look it up. some unapproved drug, undoubtedly.
Sammy Finkelman (af3697) — 5/4/2020 @ 10:28 pmfelipe, I read it as a comment aimed at Patterico because it references Mr. Johnson’s comment that quotes Patterico’s post.
DRJ (15874d) — 5/4/2020 @ 11:03 pm“We’ve lost nearly 70,000 people with barely over a million cases — and 100 million people could easily get this disease in this country before we are done.”
We will all get this, sooner or later.
Later is best, of course, because we may have a vaccine that makes us resistant (but probably not immune), and we may have better treatments (and for earlier in the disease’s progress).
But we will all get it, easier than we get the flu — it’s too easily spread and people don’t know they are spreading it. We may get it more than once. Any strategy that attempts to avoid this indefinitely must fail.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/4/2020 @ 11:36 pmDRJ (15874d) — 5/4/2020 @ 11:03 pm
Yes, that is reasonable. I join you in defending Patterico.
felipe (023cc9) — 5/5/2020 @ 4:43 am