Trumpies Want To Make Post-Covid Symptoms "Pre-existing Conditions" As They Try To Get The Court To Scrap The ACA

At risk Covid patients (From WSJ, today, p. A14)

"The president showed off his sociopathic flair by demanding the repeal of Obamacare — just because he can’t stand that it was done by Barack Obama. Millions losing their jobs and insurance during a plague and he wants to eliminate their alternative? Willful maliciousness.
And this at the same time he has been ensuring more infections by lowballing the virus."   Maureen Dowd, NY Times, Sunday

"Turns out even people in Oklahoma really want health care.  They still voted for Medicaid expansion through Obamacare despite scare mongering that if they did  vote for it roads and bridges as well as public safety and education funding would be at risk. Oh, and 'AOC'  will send  her radicals to 'control Oklahoma's health care'.  Didn't work! Oklahomans statewide still voted to expand Medicaid to a few hundred thousand people'"   Rachel Maddow, last night on MSNBC

"If Donald Trump has his way those who have complications from Covid 19 could see them become the new pre-existing conditions. Some survivors have experienced lasting health impacts like lung scarring and heart damage.  If Trump prevails in court insurers would be allowed to strip away coverage or jack up premiums simply for the battle they survived.fighting ccoronavirus.  So these victims would now have their peace of mind stolen after needing it the most."  - Joe Biden,  speaking about the effects of Trump's effort to repeal the ACA

If it didn't actually happen, few would have believed it.   Barely 10 days ago,  the Trump administration asked the Supreme Court of the United States to overturn the entirety of the Affordable Care Act. This is incredibly stupid and dangerous. Not only do 23 million Americans get their healthcare coverage through the ACA, nearly half a million Americans have enrolled in Obamacare after losing their jobs due to the COVID-19 pandemic.  Apart from that nearly half a million others may be suffering from residual symptoms in a post-Covid recovery that the Trumpies now want to declare a new pre-existing condition.  A point brought home with force on Rachel Maddow last night.

 To expedite this perfidy Trump  filed a  brief with the Supreme Court to challenge the Affordable Care Act (ACA).  This would transpire  when the court hears the case this fall. Just before the election. In a pandemic.   How about timing? To see this as an actual Trump move, god knows why, you'd think the man has a permanent wish for political suicide.  How else explain it when we're still in the midst of a pandemic and over 30 million are set to see their unemployment insurance added benefit expire at the end of the month, and 18 million more see their moratorium on evictions go in three weeks.  

Yes, folks, this is the government we have, a band of criminals, vipers and grifting predators whose only objective is to let citizens die (including military picked off by Taliban compliments of  Russkie bounties) as they line their own pockets.  How else explain the fact the Repukes and their Fuhrer Dotard have no intention of helping 50 million people who now stand to lose their healthcare because of so many getting laid off and furloughed (WSJ,  June 27-28, p. C4)  and losing  their employer-linked health coverage. Worse, Trump and his gangsters (including Republican governors across the country are literally petitioning the Supreme Court to knock down Obamacare which will effectively gut the health care of 27 million who now depend on it.   This happened on the same day we learned of a half million new signups for Obamacare, clearly because the fear of Covid illness is now real and too many can no  longer get coverage under their employers.

But these new entries may be in for a shock.  This is given  the brief filed by the Trump administration in concert 18 Republican state governors specifically asks the Supreme Court to strike down Obamacare, also arguing the Affordable Care Act's rules for pre-existing conditions must be overturned as well.
 
According to Rachel Maddow last night:

"Dig into this a little bit. A lot of people have gotten sick from coronavirus which has left them with conditions they may be dealing with for the rest of their lives.  So coronavirus infections are poised to become the next pre-existing conditions.  And if the Trump administration has its way pre-existing conditions will be used to deny you health insurance.  ...

Remember Obamacare was the way we made sure that anyone with preexisting conditions could still get health care.  Now think of all the Americans that will get Covid 19 and survive it. It's just staggering.  If we have 100,000 new cases a day, as Dr. Fauci warns we could, that means tens of millions of  infected Americans who may not be able to get healthcare, not now, not ever.  Literally tens of millions of us may have new preexisting conditions now thanks to the other catastrophic, almost existential failure of this administration which is an absolutely, out of control coronavirus pandemic that is infecting 50,000 of us a day now."


Indeed, many long term symptoms are in dispute by the medical community.  As noted in a WSJ piece today (p. A14, 'Patients Struggle With Long Term Covid Symptoms')

"The lack of certainty around causes and even symptoms has created challenges for people suffering  from longer term effect. In interviews with more than 20 long haul patients ranging in age from 22 to 62 years old, a portrait emerged of patients struggling with wife-ranging symptoms. For some it comes in waves, for others it's constant.  Some say they are slowly getting better while others add new symptoms ever week."


The latter group would definitely find themselves in a world of hurt (physical, mental and financial)  if Trump and his cabal succeed in their nefarious plans to destroy the ACA.  In effect,  the country would  revert right back to pre-ACA days. Begging the question: What form of health care, if any, would Covid survivors with residual symptoms be left with?  Well, that would largely be in short term, high deductible mutations of Obamacare invented by the Trumpies and Repuke tight-fisted allies.  The same degenerates who have no intention of extending any stimulus for the tens of millions still struggling and now on the cusp of being evicted from homes and losing their unemployment bonuses that kept heads just above water.

These short term plans (WSJ, 'Gaps Found With Short Term Health Plans', June 26, p. A4) are literal disaster and presage what's in store if the Supremes bend to the will of Der Fuhrer and his minions. Specifically:

"Numerous examples were found of patients who were denied coverage for treatment and were left on the hook for hundreds of thousands of dollars."

Worse (ibid.):

"Coverage limitations vary widely from plan to plan and limits are not made clear in marketing materials.  This makes it extremely difficult for consumers to understand what they are purchasing."

What can those now under the gun do?  There is no question: Focus singly on getting Trump out of office in November!  Do not lose focus over distractions or refuse pumped out about Joe Biden's gaffes or other short comings. Never mind!  No Biden shortcoming or gaffe can compare to Trump's continued brain farts, authoritarian delusions and treason.    Keep eyes on the ball and ensure this orange fungal growth doesn't see the daylight in the Oval Office after Jan. 20 next year!


See Also:

Healthcare Policy

In the Middle of a Pandemic, Trump Argues to Supreme Court That 'the Entire ACA Must Fall'

And:

Covid-19

In the U.S., the Second Wave Is Already Here

And:

Covid-19 | Donald Trump

As COVID Burns Through the South and West, Trump Fans the Flames

Again, WSJ Editors Live In Fantasyland As They Pull Up Stats To Try To Prove U.S. Isn't Really A Covid Failure

It's hard to believe that with 40, 041 new cases, an 80 % increase over two weeks, the WSJ editors continue to peddle fairy tales. ('Covid Comparisons, Europe and the U.S.', June 29, p. A14).  Writing:

"Even with the latest outbreaks, the U.S. has recorded fewer deaths per 100,000 people than the United Kingdom (66), Spain (61) and France (44).  Death rates are a lagging indicator, but Arizona (21), Florida (15) and Texas (80), are still well below Europe"

Well, leave it to the WSJ op-ed crew to find one stat which makes it appear the U.S. isn't really in the morass of Covid response failure it is.   But again, the  little Neolib mutts just don't get it.   They don't get that the core issue is preventing our limited medical system (including in terms of supplies, health workers) from being overrun. Already in Arizona, my niece Heidi informs us it's almost impossible to get into any ER - they are all being overrun with sick patients. (She is also a nurse so this is most concerning especially as she has two kids to look out for.)

The Journal's editorial wankers can babble all they want about per capita death rates but they have to know these do not tell the full story, namely whether a nation is truly succeeding in confronting and controlling the virus - as opposed to giving into its depredations. If you glance at all the rate increase curves (e.g. 'Spread Accelerates Across The U.S.', June 26, p. A6) you will see how 29 states and counting bear  the exponential rise in infections that foreshadow overrun medical facilities, ICUs.    The aggregate curve, indeed, is nowhere near flattening for the country, e..g.

And this is largely due to the pathetic response of the Dotard and his minions, i.e.


 Trump Has Sabotaged America's Coronavirus Response.

Contributing to the ever upward trajectory are red states like Florida, e.g.


Which like Texas and Arizona also opened way too early, and especially without taking proper mitigation precautions, such as mandating wearing of masks, and social distancing.  I mean, good grief, this stuff isn't rocket science or advanced astrophysics, folks.  This is basic biology of a stealth virus that as many have said "has a long fuse" and because of so many stealth carriers, silent spreader, can wreak havoc.

Again, it is clear the WSJ editors must also know these relevant facts, given their own main news pages, i.e. today ('Coronavirus Cases Are Surging Amid Strains On Hospitals, p. A6), wherein we read that AZ Gov. Doug Ducey is having to reclose gyms, movie theaters, water parks and bars - which he should have done earlier, or at least mandated masks and social distancing if he was hell bent to reopen so early.

Meanwhile, in LA county things aren't much better and Christina Ghaly (Director of LA Country Dept. of Health Services) has warned that the county "could begin running out of hospital beds in the next few weeks."

But this is what happens when you don't take full precautions and treat this virus lightly, or in the case of Repuke males - treat it as if it were nonexistent and you are invincible, so see no need to wear masks.  Which they regard as "slave wear", "shameful" and "signs of submission".

At the end of the day this disease doesn't care whether one is Dem or Repub, or from a red or blue state. It will keep mowing people down, burning through the nation with more infections (especially as there remains 93% of the populace to go) so long as people react in a stupid or ignorant way.  Don't like any mask or social distancing mandates? Then I guess you'd prefer another lengthy lockdown, because those are the only choices. 

If you prefer delusion to reality, keep reading the WSJ daffy editorials how "the America -is-a failure' reporting has a heavy dose of partisanship."  In fact, it has a heavy dose of truth which no amount of per capita mortality stats can obscure.

If you don't believe it, just wait while you disregard the mandates and warning and end up with a severe case of Covid with lungs resembling rotten hamburger, e.g.

Oh, and you need the magic drug remdesivir to survive, for which Gilead plans to charge you $3, 120 for a 5-day course.   Those inclined to line up on the WSJ editors' side might also want to consider why Americans are banned from more than 20 European nations as travel destinations.

See Also:

Could America’s pandemic response be any more medieval?

• By Dana Milbank

And:

Covid-19 | Donald Trump | Healthcare Policy

"Back to Normal" Thinking and Why Trump's Anti-Mask Stance Has Been So Deadly

And:

2020 Elections | Covid-19 | Donald Trump

New COVID Infections Surge in US as Trump Fixates on His Election Prospects

Savaging The Right's "We're Tougher Than You Pansies!" Meme On Reopening - And The REAL Risk Of a Second Wave

"The whiteness of the protests alongside the stark racial disparities in COVID-19 mortality underscores that the desire to reopen businesses is rooted in white supremacy. " - Sonali Kolhatkar, smirkinghcimp.com blog

"The coronavirus has exposed this delusion of individualism for what it is. For one thing, the virus doesn't care if you pop on a tricorner hat and declare yourself a rugged individual. It'll infect you just as easily as it infects a person who stays home, wears a mask and pays their taxes without complaint. Individualism can't stop the virus — only collective action can.

But on a deeper level, the virus has exposed the incoherence of the individualist ideology. Right now, the same people who fueled the Tea Party protests, including Trump himself, are out there insisting that the lockdowns end - Amanda Marcotte, 'Right Wing Individualism Is Just Selfish Garbage' 

"It's obvious there's a huge disconnect between those willing to follow our state's guidelines and those who feel their rights are being violated...I suggest those in the latter group - who refuse to wear masks or obey social distancing, offer to volunteer at one of our hospitals.  Maybe if they spent time with the health care workers risking their lives every day they might understand why the people working to save us are pleading for us to stay home." - Rebecca Cook, letter to Sunday Denver Post, p. 3E.

"In some places you see reopenings that respect Mother Nature’s power, are coordinated and grounded in science, and in other places you see crowded restaurants or a gym owner defying his governor’s guidelines as cheering demonstrators waive signs that read “My freedom doesn’t end where your fear begins.  The people making those signs, and the morons on Fox cheering them on, don’t get it. We’re not up against each other. We’re all up against Mother Nature".- Thomas Friedman, NY Times

"The whole point of the shutdown was to buy ourselves time so we could do it right the second time after we muffed the first response. It's not only important to avoid opening up too aggressively but  if you don't have a good amount of testing, tracing and isolation, you won't be able to keep infected people away from susceptible people. The basic biology then is the infection is just going to take off again-  Dr. Ashish Jha,  Professor of Global Health, Harvard University, on 'All In' , April 27th


As all fifty states have reopened in some form, and we learned yesterday that 3 million more Americans have joined the unemployed, the Right's propaganda mills and talking heads (as well as scribes) are working overtime. They want to paint reality to conform to their myth that it is the "tough Americans and freedom lovers" - also most "real workers" who need $$$- who demand states reopen now.  That as opposed to the "elite, blue state pansies" who prefer security to being warriors for the economy ....oh yeah, and "personal liberty".

One headline in the NY Times 2 days ago blared:

Mnuchin Warns of ‘Permanent Damage’ to Economy if Lockdowns Persist

Suggesting that it's got to be workers' lives instead of dollars to be sacrificed. Or as Sen. Sherrod Brown asked: 'How Many Workers Should Give Their Lives To Increase The GDP By One Half A Percent?

In a forgettable column titled “Scenes From the Class Struggle in Lockdown,” The Wall Street Journal’s Peggy Noonan wrote: “Here’s a generalization based on a lifetime of experience and observation. The working-class people who are pushing back have had harder lives than those now determining their fate.”  Incredibly, Noonan then added a bone to the "he-men" of the Right with this balderdash:

"Since the pandemic began the Overclass has been in charge - scientists, doctors, consultants - calling the shots for the average people. But personally they have no skin in the game."

And this piffle at the end:

"This is no time to make our divisions worse. The pandemic is not only about our health but our humanity".

As if the two can be conveniently separated, so Noonan feels obligated to create another false choice.  The fact is there need not be such a false choice if we'd had our heads on straight from the get go. But as Rachel Maddow so often puts it, we've been saddled with the worst, god-awful government at the worst moment in our recent history - when extraordinary leadership skills were needed.  

Don't believe it?     The fact is that 99 percent of the chaos, ineptitude and division falls on Trump himself. He repeatedly undermined the guidance and credibility of his own health officials including by initially dismissing the pandemic as  a "hoax".  Then fomenting anti-quarantine protests - even as he incited his latter day Tea Baggers to flout the reopening guidelines his own administration released.   Then to top it off, this criminal loser buried a detailed CDC document showing states how to reopen by minimizing risk.  Oh, and he's now hawking an unproven malarial drug that he claims he's taking for prophylactic reasons.

The mistake of Noonan and others mocking the lockdowns as the product of effete snobs is that they forget or discount certain pertinent facts.  That is, that more blunt options were needed to prevent the spread of the virus-   and the collapse of our health system - once the Trumpies fucked it all up. Meanwhile, in South Korea massive testing and contact tracing kept deaths to a minimum in relative terms - and far less per capita than the U.S. Further, only recently when a new outbreak threatened S. Korean officials using GPS directed contract tracing were able to immediately track the new emergence to one source: a 29 -year old male  with the virus who'd visited a series of Seoul nightclubs.  The process uncovered 102 infected individuals and a total of 5,500 who'd been in contact with the infected subset -initially infected by the 29 year old.  The new cluster was a setback but also marked a success story in that officials were able to rapidly contain the virus.  THIS is what the U.S. under Trump has been unable to do, and why the reopening in too many red states is premature. 

 It's not because blue state "commies"  and "pansies"  are trying to control the red staters and gut their freedoms, but because the critical jobs of testing and contact tracing still lag behind those states' capabilities. (So much so that Georgia, for example, has stooped to publishing spurious graphs to try to show it's flattened the infection curve). In other words, by recklessly reopening before those processes are in place we risk a second wave wiping out all the progress made thus far- and even worse economic fallout.  And mammoth consequences especially when idiots in crowds disregard masks and social distancing.  

As reported today (WSJ. p. A1) "a study published last week by the National Academy of Sciences found that one minute of loud speech was enough to produce thousands of virus droplets that remain in the air for about 12 minutes, potentially able to infect anyone in the area."

The phenomenon also most likely to give rise to high viral loads and "superspreaders" -with the capacity to infect hundreds. Hence  blue state governors and citizens are not against opening up but against opening up stupidly - with no adequate testing plan - and no means to contact trace any outbreaks.  The smart reopening also includes social distancing  and mask wearing, As former CDC Director Tom Friedan explained yesterday morning on CBS:

"It's not open versus closed. It's not health versus economy. It's  gradual, stepwise, data driven, science driven reopening that takes account of both health and the economic impacts of the virus and our response to it. This is doing three things: we empower people to protect themselves, we hold governments accountable for getting data and sharing it openly and we accelerate toward a new normal"

So it is NOT a case of the "elites" lording it over the "salt of the earth" types to keep them locked down and unable to earn a living and feed their families - or just get outside.   Rather, the issue is  opening recklessly devoid of any sound plans to track or detect the virus.   A goal already hobbled by a dysfunctional administration which has operated below even minimal competence  levels needed to ferret out the virus., turning the whole national response into a side show. At least on the Right.  Given the above, we can say a recent comment by  W. Bradford Wilcox, a sociologist at the University of Virginia, (published in NY Times yesterday) is total hogwash.  That comment is::

Progressives have grown more likely to embrace a culture of “safetyism” in recent years. This safetyism seeks to protect them and those who are deemed the most vulnerable members of our society from threats to their emotional and physical well-being.

But it isn't a case of "safetyism" at all, but science-driven SANITY, as former CDC Director Tom Friedan already noted.  NY Times columnist Michelle Goldberg aptly spelled it out 3 days ago:

"The assumptions underlying this generalization, however, are not based on even a cursory look at actual data. In a recent Washington Post/Ipsos survey, 74 percent of respondents agreed that the “U.S. should keep trying to slow the spread of the coronavirus, even if that means keeping many businesses closed.” Agreement was slightly higher — 79 percent — among respondents who’d been laid off or furloughed.

Researchers at the University of Chicago have been tracking the impact of coronavirus on a representative sample of American households. They’ve found that when it comes to judging policies on the coronavirus, “politics is the overwhelming force dividing Americans,” and that “how households have been economically impacted by the Covid crisis so far” plays only a minimal role.

Donald Trump and his allies have polarized the response to the coronavirus, turning defiance of public health directives into a mark of right-wing identity. Because a significant chunk of Trump’s base is made up of whites without a college degree, there are naturally many such people among the lockdown protesters."

Basically, she nailed it, unlike a Texan turkey by the name of  Dan Crenshaw -  who belched out the following op-ed  codswallop ('Why Does Reopening Polarize Us?, WSJ, May 19, p.A17)

"It isn't obvious that such a debate should be partisan yet it is. Why? One popular explanation is that all roads lead to Trump. Whatever he says, the left will say the opposite."

This cornpone knucklehead, so far up Trump's ass he can't see the Sun,  doesn't seem to know it wasn't the "left" that screwed the response up to a far- thee-well.  It was his lord and master Dotard - ignoring warnings, babbling that the virus "will just go sway like magic".  Oh, and then dismissing it as a hoax, before then forgetting Harry Truman's maxim that  "the buck stops here". Essentially frittering away weeks we had to get our act together - thanks to the Chinese lockdown of their own nation- as well as isolating the infected from their families also to contain spread. All immensely effective despite Holman Jenkins Jr. further yammering (WSJ, p. A15 yesterday) the Chinese failed and oh, by the way, "the U.S. and China are in a contest now to see which world power can emerge from this chaos with the most realistic policy toward the virus".

Obviously scribbled while popping his usual opioids, speed and MJ candies. Because the efficacy of the Chinese response was exactly what gave us time to get our own act together instead of fucking it up.  As proof, a new Columbia University study released yesterday showed that up to 54,000 lives might have been saved had restrictions - including lockdowns - started two weeks earlier.  So, the total deaths now might have been 40,000 as opposed to 94,000.   But this is what the white boy conservative death mongers like Jenkins Jr. chide liberal state governments about, and ceaselessly.

 Potentially 54,000 fewer deaths but the dyspeptic Trump was unable to summon one ounce of  minimal leadership and consistent national planning or leadership. Instead babbling back in January that the U.S. "has it totally under control"  and in February blabbed that  "within a couple of days the cases will be down to zero."  And a week later,  "One day it's gonna disappear ...like a miracle."   As Chris Hayes put it on 'ALL IN'  last night:

"Well there have been no miracles, just mass unemployment and mass death"

Facts the Reepo Trump asslickers and opinion propaganidists just can't face, so they have to deflect.  Which explains why  this Texas yokel Crenshaw feels compelled to write this twaddle:

"The far left is treating the lockdown and the consequent economic devastation as an opportunity to restructure America into a socialist utopia."

Uh no, asshole. We just want to ensure the 39 million people who've now lost their jobs - thanks to Trump's tomfoolery and haphazard response-  get the money they need to buy groceries, pay utility bills and keep a roof over their heads. Get it?  Again, Michelle Goldberg does - parsing both Noonan's canards and Crenshaw's as she observes:

"But it’s a mistake to treat the growing ideological divide over when and how to reopen the country as a matter of class rather than partisanship"

 Apart from that this yahoo doesn't get the connection between controlling the virus and successfully opening the economy. As the Times Paul Krugman notes:

"One thing I keep hearing, however, is that we must reopen for the sake of workers, who need to start earning wages again to put food on their families’ tables. So it’s important to realize that this is a really bad argument.  For America is fully capable of shielding workers idled by the lockdown from severe economic hardship. As Jerome Powell, the chairman of the Federal Reserve, said in a TV interview aired Sunday, we can and should pursue policies that “keep workers in their homes, keep them paying their bills. Keep families solvent.”

A salient point I made in another post not long ago, i.e.

• Why Holman Jenkins & His WSJ Wrecking Crew Want T...

Noting:

"So whisking millions back to work prematurely serves two main purposes for the WSJ's hacks: 1) Disabling any need for the govt' to step in again to send relief checks or expand food stamps etc., and 2) To provide more billions for the rich, the one percent, hedge fund owners, Repuke donors and the like.. "

Also quoting Nobel winning economist Paul Romer who posited over 300 million tests were needed nationwide before we could even think of returning to business as usual. We haven't even met one hundredth that standard, so we are asking for it. This is given the virus is ready to roar back at the slightest hint of relaxing our efforts, and slacking off means letting millions resume work without proper safeguards.

But, incredibly, one must evidently - and in addition to the usual political polarization- factor in a "white male"  tribal factor as well. (According to a Times article 'When The Mask You're Wearing Tastes Like Socialism')  This is derived from a contingent of knuckle dragging, conservative white males who see those advocating for mitigation and safeguards as embracing a "feminine"  stance.  Much like these mutts (brainwashed for years by Limbaugh etc.) who believe any gov't help amounts to a 'nanny state" interfering.  Peter Ditto, a psychologist at the University of California-Irvine, posits that:

"While liberals adopt their nurturant role, bemoaning the climbing infection and death rates and are willing to accept economic carnage in favor of minimizing the loss of human life, conservatives are more likely to, in effect, tell the American people to “walk it off,” increasingly staking out the position that some loss of life must be endured for the greater economic good."

  Which is preposterous, and why I believe it more important than ever these "macho" white boy conservos be dragged into a Covid ward to see the intubation process, and men their age having to be on dialysis, and otherwise put into a medical coma.  All of which brings Janice's favorite cartoon to mind;

The cartoon perfectly embodies the ultimate "feminization" these wannabe tough guys face as they continue their ludicrous risk taking.  A pose especially choice given most of these macho apes run for cover and scream like little girls when you show them the face of even a 2 -inch diameter spider, i.e.

 But especially now in the midst of a virus they know nothing about, their fake bravado is laughable, given they also feel the need to march with their guns.  But then are reduced to hapless, impotent invalids after Covid lays them low.  Especially justified after we read that they regard the CDC, WHO scientists as (ibid., 'When The Mask You're Wearing Tastes Like Socialism'):

 " typical liberal pansies who just can’t accept the reality that people die."

Yeah, but not 93,000 in 3 months!  Headed for 100,000 plus by June 1.  As Janice puts it, all this posturing makes her want them to "choke on their own snot" - to see what  a Covid death is like.

All of which brings up a timely warning from Krugman (ibid.):

 "Suppose, after all, that the epidemiologists are right, and that premature reopening leads to a second wave of infections. What we’ll need in that case is a second lockdown. But all indications are that Republicans are totally opposed to extending benefits. What they want, instead, is legislation that would protect businesses from liability if their employees get sick.  That is, they want to force Americans to go to work even if it kills them."

But, of course, the Reeptard tough guys love that stuff, that hyping of faux masculinity - part of which entails an anti- expertise mindset, which itself reflects a long -standing anti-intellectualism in American life.   In the end it's all well and good for this sliver of non- college educated white male miscreants to parade their imbecility. It's a "free country" as they like to say.  But that doesn't mean the rest of us ought to follow like freaking lemmings, or buy into their batshit crazy conspiracy ideations - like the medical workers are behind the pandemic and making it appear worse than it is.  

Fortunately, it looks like the sensible, cautious segment of the nation is in the majority - for now.  According to a new AP-NORC poll 83 percent of Americans are concerned lifting restrictions will lead to many more infections.  53 percent are prepared to continue those restrictions indefinitely.  So the racist death mongers on the Right don't yet realize their precious corporate economy will still founder if so many lack the confidence to engage with it - never mind the minority of loudmouth simpletons now getting all the press coverage.  What we need more of is sane voices like that of Dr. Richard Besser, former CDC head, who said last night ('All In'):

"Public health is not about keeping people unemployed... But you need to dial this up slowly and carefully, so that we don't see major outbreaks occurring and going back to the same situation of everyone under lockdown."


This was reinforced last night by Jeffrey Shaman,  the lead researcher of the Columbia University study, which showed 54,000 lives could have been spared had the lockdowns begun 2 weeks earlier.  In Prof. Shaman's word, from his MSNBC appearance:

"This pandemic is not over by any means, and most of the country has not been exposed, not been infected. So it's really vital that we actively seek it out in our communities and monitor what is happening as we loosen restrictions.  Especially as we open the economy further and further to make sure we don't have flare ups. And if we identify any growth in cases we have to respond more quickly, That's because if you stop the virus in the early stages you will limit the number of deaths that occur over time. Important because the growth process can sneak up on you,

I like to use the illustration of  a pond and there's this invasive lily flower that gets into it.  Every day it doubles in size, the number that are there. By day 30 the entire pond is covered with lilies. And the question is 'On what day was it halfway covered?'  Well, on day 29, just the day before, because it is a doubling process.  So we can't get complacent particularly as we're moving into summer.  We need to squash this virus, at least until a vaccine is available."


See also:

The Great and Grand Re-Opening of America

by Jaime O'Neill | May 20, 2020 - 6:32am | permalink

AND:

Covid-19 | Economic Policy

Florida, Georgia and Trump Are Lying. COVID Is Far From Over.

And:

Economic Policy

Why Are Working People Forced to Sacrifice for the Common Good But Not the Titans of Capitalism?

And:

Conservatives and the Right

Bamboozler-in-Chief and Council on National Policy Recruiting Pro-Trump Doctors To Promote Rapid Re-Opening

And:

Donald Trump

Never Have So Few Done So Much to Destroy America

Governors Should Really Shut Down Radical Right, Pro- Trump Protests - But Then It Probably Won't "Fix Stupid"

Right wing nuts, and Michigan Militia crazies prove they're a threat to the common good 

ER Nurse in Denver blocks Trumpie buffons screaming "Are you a communist?" -  from committing gross, criminal stupidity.

"All I keep hearing is that the curve is flattening, the curve is flattening. So that may be true but all the ICUs are still full. The sickest are still there. People are waiting to be intubated.  We're full we can't handle anything more. We can't open this country. If you want to live you stay home. My God,  don't open up this country. It needs to be closed until at least June."
-   Amy Pacholk, Trauma Nurse, Stony Brook University Hospital, New York

A friend of ours in Barbados , watching the spectacle of loud Trump-tard loons on CNN, put it succinctly:  "If Trump rallies are off limits now, they also ought to be in any mini -form with all these nuts going off about their 'rights' in the state capitols! The majority shouldn't have to put up with this every day!"

She is, of course, totally correct. Why are we, the silent majority following the laws and orders to stay in place - to protect the greater good from this rampaging virus- being held hostage by a minority faction of squawking nuts?  Why are these totally partisan protests allowed in any case when they risk the health and welfare of the greater community, including elderly people and those with compromised immune systems?  Also, why are these obviously political protests allowed to go on when across the globe all other protests have been halted out of "an abundance of caution"?  Those include climate protests- organized  by Greta Thunberg-  leading up to Earth Day Wednesday. The very fact  this minority of screeching fake patriots are allowed to hog the national TV spotlight is bad enough, given it skews perceptions to make it look like the pro-Trump nuts are in the national majority. They are not! (WSJ, today, 'Most Americans Fear Opening Too Early', p. A4)

Further,  when one sees they aren't even practicing social distancing then they become a dire threat as super spreaders to the whole state or states.  This is even as one read today's headline in the conservative Colorado Springs Gazette, "Coronavirus now leading cause of death in Colorado."

So hey, I don't give a good goddamn about your supposed "personal rights" or individual "liberties" - which stop when your virus spreads to my face or loved ones' noses. So you are out of bounds with these demonstrations, and it's time for the gubernators to shut them down. By use of sweet reason and persuasion, if possible, else deploying the National Guard. The time for bullshit and folly has to end, especially as Colorado now has 9,730 cases.

Am I being too extreme here in endorsing a hard nosed approach? Not at all. 19th century Utilitarian moral philosopher John Stuart Mill posited that when individuals contemplated actions that affected only themselves then a strong case existed that they be allowed to choose for themselves.  This is even if they ended up acting in ways deemed by reasonable observers to be self-destructive.  So, a drunken imbecile has every right to ruin his own life if he wants, just as the rolling fringe Trump rally jackasses have the right to get sick- on their own time and dime.

However,  when an individual's (or group's) actions have the potential for substantial negative effects on others, Mill asserts that strong intervention is justified in principle and may be advisable in practice.  Thus, the Trump rolling rally fools have every right to risk their own illness, but not spreading it to the vulnerable citizens in their states-- by their reckless actions, stupidity.

Anyway, as we watched the wingnuts gathered Sunday in Denver,  "creating a cacophony and circus with cowboys on horseback, bullhorns and car horns" (as reported in the Post)  it was apparent their moorings to any sanity had been dissolved. Probably from excessive exposure to the Reich media looneytunes like Rush Limbaugh, Hannity and the rest of the FOX News stable of know nothings.

Watching the ABC News coverage of the Denver display Janice caught one nitwit holding a sign reading:

"Give me Liberty - Or give me COVID -19!"

To which Janice instantly shouted, "Give that idiot COVID -19! And let him choke on his own snot like Trump!"

Ok, you go, girl!  Took the words right out of my mouth. Yet another parade of forlorn fools and brainless imps - who fancied themselves authentic individuals  (as opposed to puppets controlled by Hannity, Limbaugh and the DeVos family) -  made other asinine remarks or held imbecilic signs.  These included bollocks like:   "My Constitutional Rights Trump Your Fear!"   Uh, no, asshole, you have NO constitutional right to become a "Typhoid Mary" and spread a deadly pathogen by your fucking, self-absorbed actions.  Got that?

Other signs and comments could be read in today's Denver Post, i.e. signs such as:

"Death is a part of life!"

Suffocating as your lungs fill with fluids and the ER nurse can't get the ventilator tube down your swollen windpipe? I  don't think so.

"Don't tread on me!"

Ha!  But you're perfectly okay if the virus does.   

Mary Conley of Jefferson County, held a  home made sign that read, 
- “Trust the people,” 

 Not if they're certified morons, Mary, I prefer to trust science, i.e. the epidemiologists.

Then there was Jim Fenimore, of Colorado Springs, who said he attended because he "believes the drastic response to the coronavirus pandemic has been ginned up as a political tool, one intended to make the economy crash and subsequently cause Trump to lose support and be ousted from office."   

In other words, parroting the usual regurgitated slop created by the Right wing media machine.   The numskull went on to spout

“I don’t want to see anyone die, but there are far more deaths for other reasons.”

Which idiotic argument I already skewered in my Saturday post, noting those other reasons don't include transmissible aspects and exponential growth - to the point of overwhelming hospitals and staff.  Fenimore's estimated IQ? Maybe 75.

Many protesters spoke of "individual liberty"  and suggested that the state’s stay-at-home order "violated their constitutional rights".   Clearly they haven't really read or studied that document. They also carried signs that read, “Facts not fear” and “More freedom, less tyranny.”    Each loaded with irony in its respective context but I doubt any of  these clowns would get it.

A "brilliant" Millennial, Angie Conde, when asked for her opinion, blabbed:

"I just feel like they are making too big of a thing out of this virus,” 

On what basis do you arrive at that conclusion, Angie?  From the last Rush Limbaugh rant?  Have you even watched the scenes of the patients inundating ERs?   How about the crematoriums now being overworked,  with hundreds of bodies still to be burned piling up? As in Brooklyn  Borough. Or do you regard those as 'fake news'? Estimated IQ?  60.

None of these boisterous buffoons waving American flags, chanting "USA!  USA!  USA!"  - like they're in an Olympic stadium, merit being referred to as citizens.   How could they be? A citizen, after all, doesn't militate against the interests of fellow citizens to spread  deadly disease.   Thomas Jefferson in his Notes on Virginia perfectly defined the warp and woof of the citizen when he wrote:

"Every government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves therefore are its only safe depositories and to render them safe their minds must be improved."

Translated, that means NO citizen must be so bereft of critical thought and education that he simply trusts a leader, say like Donald Trump. If so, the government that is supposed to involve all of us, degenerates - as we have seen with this one- devolving into factionalism - splitting people apart, forcing states to fight each other for scarce medical supplies etc.,  the abuse of authority and outright propaganda. (Trump's daily "briefings")  See e.g. 

Charles M. Blow

Stop Airing Trump’s Briefings!

Further, the only way citizens can be rendered safe from these adverse effects is if their minds are improved. They cannot be if they swallow wholesale the lies hurled out by the likes of FOX News or Limbaugh. Oh, and  believing codswallop like "making too much of this virus" - which a majority of these imbeciles still believe is no different from the flu. (Even as Colorado now reports the highest death rates from COVID-19, i.e. beyond any other causes)

Anyway, among the items learned over the weekend was that former Right wing talk radio shock jock Michael Savage has now (kind of) joined the good guys. At least in terms of calling out the feckless liars and propagandists spreading the crap that the protesting morons are swallowing.

According to the Denver Post piece ('Michael Savage Slams Right Wing Media', p. 7A):

"Savage's views are striking departure from the accepted version of events among Trump's loyalists in the media, who have made a concerted effort to downplay the pandemic and have helped fuel support for protesters against stay-at-home orders in states such as Michigan."

Adding:

"Savage has attacked the credibility of the conservative media, attacked its biggest stars of being too rote and unthinking in their views of the president, and demanded they be held accountable for misleading millions of Americans."

Well, about damned time that someone from outside the "liberal media" and the liberal cognoscenti handled this job.  Especially powerful was when Savage said (ibid.):

"We're living in a terrible time in America when truth has died."

No argument, there. It's been dead since Trump eked his way into office using the Electoral College.  In respect of the way Trump's ass kissers invariably attack the Left over "fake news", Savage said: 'This is crazy!"

But Michael Savage's contempt has been especially reserved for the  two top mind vomit peddlers, Hannity and Limbaugh, as when he warned the lockdown protesters who've been gobbling their effluent:

"Do you understand the danger you're in by listening to these people and just following them blindly over a cliff?"

Well, truth be told, they don't because none of them possess the least bit of critical thinking skills. They likely don't even know what the term means.   When a few of them were interviewed at the Denver lockdown protest, their responses disclosed a mean IQ of maybe 90, if that - and zero critical thought. What else can you infer from answers such as we've read?

Though Savage does appear to have upped his own mental appreciation for the moment, he still exhibits blind spots, or maybe a residue of Right wing rubbish. That is since - according to the pieces - he still believes the current lockdowns are a "threat to individual liberty", which they emphatically are not.  No one is being locked down as in incarcerated - since people can still go to the grocery and pharmacy.  Nor is anyone having to wear an ankle bracelet to the best of my knowledge. Further the American version is  partial only, different regions - different rules-   while in Barbados for example there is a universal 24 hour a day lockdown. So it is the epitome of exaggerated rhetoric to claim a "loss of individual liberty". What it is, in fact, is using the only weapon we have against this vicious virus given there is no vaccine yet, and no treatment.

The way a mature American needs to look at this lockdown is to be man enough, big enough, citizen enough, to help our medical heroes so their ICUs and hospitals are not overrun. And comparatively speaking, keeping your ass quiet at home 12 hours a day is nothing, nada, compared to doctors and nurses selflessly toiling 12-15 hours a day to save lives.

Even as the right wing nuts, cranks, Trumpie assholes and their ilk marched around the nation, we also learned Bill Gates has now been targeted by the QAnon fruitcakes and Reich media blowhards. Evidently this began when a 2015 video of Gates surfaced in which he opined that the "greatest threat to humanity was not nuclear war but an infectious virus."

Well, the nuts took this to heart, and created a conspiracy ideation from it (I refuse to dignify it using the term "theory")   Indeed, since the resurfacing of the video Gates has 'become the star of an explosion" of such ideations, pertaining to the coronavirus outbreak.   As the Post account notes (April 19, p. 2A):

"In post on Youtube, Facebook and Twitter, he is being portrayed as the creator of COVID-19, so as to profit from a vaccine".

Of course, if any of these simpletons knew anything or read even a bit of serious news or research, they'd know that was impossible. That is given that the examination of the genome of the virus discloses it could not have had an artificial (i.e. man-made) origin. But, of course, most of these clowns would no doubt call that "fake news" even the dolts swallow Limbaugh's claim that COVID-19 refer to "the 19th coronavirus of its type".  As opposed to the actual definition, referring to the year (2019) that the new virus (SARS- COV-2) erupted.

Another bunch of conspiracy morons have spread nonsense that Gates is "using COVID-19 as part of a dastardly plot to cull the global population".

No, folks, you cannot make this shit up.  This is how low the IQs of one segment of the population have fallen. And look, I have no problem if they want to share this B.S. amongst themselves.  But no more going out into the streets, blowing horns, waving flags, and threatening the lives of the silent majority - the 2 out of 3 Americans who want no part of opening early.   It's time now the needs and welfare of the many outweigh the desires of the minority.

More collectively organized societies (like Barbados)  get that, and it's time ours did too especially when we are in a similar war mode - in terms of mobilizing critical  resources-   especially medical equipment.  In this regard I am always reminded of my folks' sacrifices during World War II.  Did they bitch, protest and cry because they had to adhere to gas and food rationing and state rules, curfews?  Of course not,  because they put on their 'big boy' pants and  understood they were all in that great moment together, to subdue a common foe.  We can do less now. Less thought of "me", much more of  "WE".  

The bottom line:  Every manjack has to understand that the virus will determine the timeline of when to return to business as usual- not impatient twerps unable to tolerate any more social lockdown.

See also:

Republicans

Another Republican "Grassroots" Movement Hijacks the Media

And:

• 'He watched Fox, and believed it was under control': New York bar owner dies of COVID-19

And:

• This is how Trump supporters treated nurses in downtown Denver (video) 

And:

• Americans are now officially at war with a sociopathic monster named Donald Trump

And:

Covid-19

Virus as Metaphor: The Scourge That Stopped the World

And:

Covid-19

Rethinking Freedom, Government, and Expertise in the Time of Covid-19