Lurker > SmartMuffin

if it's all a big panicmongering exercise designed to advanc progressive political ends, how were you right in march about prepping being a super big deal

Because in March it wasn't clear. It looked risky. And the primary reason to prep was to avoid supply chain issues (toilet paper, which happened) and economic devastation (layoffs happened for many, but fortunately not me).

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https://twitter.com/jeffreyatucker/status/1286458377749626887

Oh, and this is probably an underrated aspect of our collective delusion. Trump, personally, is famous for his gemophobia. God only knows how many other deranged people we've placed in positions of power...

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Yes, it's absolutely a fact that early on, everybody (including the experts you insist I worship) dramatically underestimated COVID. And then they immediately flipped to dramatically overestimating it. And they were wrong both times. That's actually pretty impressive.

Almost as impressive as me being right both times! I prepped and told others to do so in early March, then by May, correctly realized it was all a big panicmongering exercise designed to advance progressive political ends...

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https://nypost.com/2020/07/23/dr-fauci-flattens-curve-straight-into-ground-on-opening-day-first-pitch/

Still more accurate than his COVID estimates!

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A dogwhistle to what?

You think I'm racist against Asians? When I openly acknowledge that they have higher IQs than whites? When I constantly refer to their success as proof that the problems of the black and hispanics communities are not properly attributed to "white supremacy?"

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"Everything you say is correct but it doesn't matter because I have declared you evil."

Unsurprising that this is the level of political discourse in the current year.

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Do you dispute that the virus originated in China, and that the Chinese government did not properly contain its spread?

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https://twitter.com/VinceCoglianese/status/1286081068722991104

"all ya'll look alike"

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mnkboy907 posted...

Damn, cases are suddenly exploding in my county (Kern, CA). It had been staying around mid 100s to low 200s per day, but over the past week it's jumped to 400-500, then to 800-900, and now today it's over 1120. Fuck.

They're also doing a very terrible job of getting through the tests in a timely manner. The county website shows the cases based on when the tests were performed, and hundreds of these newly confirmed cases are still being added to days in June.

So I guess it's not a sudden explosion of new cases so much as a very delayed explosion.

No reason to panic. Looks like another place that simply missed out on any real spread during the "first wave" and is only now seeing significant community transmission.

https://www.latimes.com/projects/california-coronavirus-cases-tracking-outbreak/kern-county/



This is going to happen everywhere. You either deal with it now, or deal with it later. But you have to deal with it eventually.

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XFD

That one must have come from him personally off the cuff. No fucking way anybody with any sort of responsibility would write that for him...

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Sean Hannity isn't really free market. He's just a corporate stooge.

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https://twitter.com/emilyelarsen/status/1285746682118967296

Looks like Tucker's time at Fox is up. They want him gone. And it'll be better if he goes... stop giving those shameless RINOs free ratings they don't deserve. Watch him go to OANN or something and see that place explode in popularity.

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By promising a long, epic, and satisfying hot take to conclude his topic, and then failing to deliver much of anything at all, his point about the ME3 ending was fully made...

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TheRock1525 posted...

We actually agree there: Trump is literally doing this to save his election chances and that's it. He saw how much his ratings bumped when he first "took it seriously" and now he's gonna try it again.

It's honestly probably one of the dumbest things Trump has ever done. COVID is basically over now, everywhere except the isolated rural states that never really had it. It's entirely possible that by November, we'll look back on this very week as the moment when everything started trending down and it became a non-issue.

"It's going to get worse" may have been true in March and early April. And it may have been true again in late May or early June. But it's absolutely NOT true today. Not even close.

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TheRock1525 posted...

Oh God, Trump actually said Covid 19 will get worse before it gets better.

Is Muffin gonna be okay?

I saw a Fox News article the other day stating that Trump's polling was cratering, that Biden was trusted to do better against COVID, and that lockdowns were super popular.

I'm honestly Trump hasn't ordered a national lockdown by now.

I've never claimed Trump isn't stupid, or that he won't do exactly what he thinks will help him win with no regard for much of anything else.

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and excluding Indians not taxed

Well illegal immigrants are certainly not taxed (not at the federal level, at least).

And the entire Hispanic ethnicity is basically a result of interbreeding between Spanish and native Americans, so they likely would count as "Indians" under a definition the framers would have been comfortable with!

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My prediction is that whenever this is all said and done, we'll see about the same number of cases per million everywhere on Earth, with small exceptions for particularly small/isolated states (New Zealand), tyrannical regimes who are willing to do unimaginably cruel things to maintain lockdowns (China), and developing nations that just don't bother testing/counting (India).

Deaths per million will vary quite a bit; however. Places that got hit early on, when the best treatment methods were unclear (Italy), will have it worse than places that got hit later. Places that got hit early and deliberately sacrificed the elderly in nursing homes to free up capacity will look the worst (New York). Basically, pushing the curve out in time is useful in preventing deaths, but not in preventing cases. Pretty much the only way to prevent cases is to stay in lockdown indefinitely. If you ever want to re-open, the cases are going to come. Unless you're the small island willing to shutdown international travel forever.

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so they're doing poorly but also good?

Yes! In strict terms of deaths per capita to date, they are doing relatively poorly (although they're not THE worst, which they absolutely should be if lockdowns or masks requirements have a significant impact)..

But in the overall balance of things, the fact that they've achieved that without mass lockdowns, shutting down the schools, violating individual rights, etc. and that the worst seems to be over for them and they can basically return to normal (while other jurisdictions that have fewer deaths for now are going to have to continue to scratch and claw and lockdown to keep it that way).

It's short term pain for long term gain. Like chemotherapy. The day after a cancer patient receives chemo, they're going to feel a lot shittier than someone with the same cancer who didn't get chemo. But long term, they're much better off.

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Mr Lasastryke posted...

also, weren't you arguing that sweden was doing pretty good not too long ago? literally using it as an example of a country that's doing poorly now lol

Sweden is doing very good in the sense that they engaged in basically no mitigation whatsoever and stack up favorably to various other countries that instituted draconian lockdowns. Also, it appears they've basically achieved herd immunity and that their pandemic is essentially over and they can go back to normal pretty soon.

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And still fewer deaths per million than France, Italy, Sweden, Belgium, and the UK!

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NHL: OK Edmonton, you're a hub city. You'll even get the cup finals maybe. Just try not to screw this up.

Edmonton: https://twitter.com/theDanalytic/status/1283913560758931456

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https://twitter.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1284104344225423361

LET'S GOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

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Sure, they may spread the disease further

Little to no evidence this actually happens.

and/or have lifelong medical consequences.

All still anecdotal. Little to no actual statistics or evidence.

But they're not dead, so who gives a shit.

I am not in favor of disease. I wish it didn't exist. The relevant question is, are the costs worth the benefits.

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how do you know re-opening is the right thing to do

Because government does not have the moral authority to hold us indefinitely as slaves. Regardless of the severity of the virus.

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https://twitter.com/KatrayesG/status/1283821950977093632


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Any and all relief should stop immediately. It's the only way to get corrupt politicians to do the right thing and re-open.

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RaidenGarai posted...

https://amp.sheboyganpress.com/amp/5450212002

But kids dont get sick! Oh wait...

Random anecdotes, meet statistics!

https://twitter.com/BenMarten/status/1283974620589076480

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the belgium numbers are wrong

You have no evidence that the US numbers are any better. If everyone knows the Belgium numbers are uniquely wrong, compared to everywhere else, then why don't they fix or revise them?

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https://twitter.com/AlexBerenson/status/1283853096108601346

The south has peaked. The disease is pretty much done spreading. In another month or so, we'll be where New York is now, only with a dramatically lower peak because we didn't deliberately sacrifice the elderly the way that Cuomo did.

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Didn't Vietnam get way ahead of COVID by hacking the Chinese and revealing that they were covering it up?

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Imagine believing school is anything more than government-provided childcare in the first place!

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https://twitter.com/GloriaPazmino/status/1283768179437850624

Exactly what makes "government provided childcare" any more or less safe than "school?"

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As a Florida man, it's pretty laughable that anyone believes their numbers on deaths are even remotely accurate.

I agree. There's lots of evidence to suggest that their case counts are wildly exaggerated and are not nearly as high as are being reported.

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FFDragon posted...

Using just the fatality rate is a bit disingenuous considering even if you survive you can be left with permanent organ and/or brain damage.

But what does that have to do with anything I just said?

Even if that's true, it doesn't change the fact that pretty much every non-isolated non-totalitarian place who has "dealt with the disease" has done so by allowing it to spread, peak, and then fall off of its own natural accord.

Like, what specific intervention do you think New York implemented that caused cases/hospilizations/deaths/whatever else to dramatically fall? And how do you explain all kinds of places that didn't implement that specific intervention to also see cases/hospitalizations/deaths/whatever else dramatically fall?

The point is that the "shape of the curve" is about the same everywhere (with exceptions for extreme isolationism and strict totalitarianism). The peak is higher or lower based entirely on success of keeping it out of the nursing homes. Which strongly suggests all of your precious interventions are just bunk, just noise.

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They got hit hardest because there was a fundamental lack of understanding about it early, but since then they have done a good job.

Why does the shape of Sweden's curve look approximately similar to that of New Yorks?

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HeroDelTiempo17 posted...

smuffin is really going with "some people are going to die to the virus so we should just kill them quickly and get on with it," huh

I mean that was literally Andrew Cuomo's policy to deal with the disease in New York.

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FFDragon posted...

Herd immunity doesn't really apply anyway since you can get it more than once

OK then we're fucked anyway and the solution is to re-engineer society to be in "lockdown mode" literally forever or just to move on and accept that we now have a new virus with a 0.1% fatality rate among us and that sucks but nothing can be done.

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And yet, they still have the virus under control. While we don't.

Belgium, New York, and Sweden all have the virus "under control." How did they do it? What's the commonality among those three places? It isn't lockdown policy. It isn't mask policy. It isn't isolation from the rest of the world. It isn't track and trace. It isn't population density.

No, they all got it "under control" by allowing it to circulate and infect pretty much the entire segment of the population that it would infect. The only real difference in terms of driving the deaths per million count is how effective you are at keeping it out of nursing homes. If you do a really good job of that, you look like the average to good EU countries with deaths per million in the 100-200 range. If you do a really bad job of that you look like the Northeastern US with deaths per million of over 1000. If you do a decent/average job, you probably end up in the 300-600 range which is right where you encounter the US, UK, France, Italy, Brazil, etc.

In any case, Texas and Florida and everywhere else in the US, (the places where there never was a first wave and virus spread was minimal to non-existent back in March when they locked down just because New York did it and they figured that meant they had to too) are on the verge of achieving that as well. Whether it technically counts as "herd immunity" in the scientific sense isn't a debate I care to have, but it seems pretty obvious that this general pattern is the same just about everywhere (with a few minor exceptions such as isolationist islands, totalitarian regimes, and third-world countries that probably aren't testing or counting deaths at all). The virus circulates, outside of nursing homes, it kills whoever it is going to kill, then it's done and it fades away. The only reason the US ex-Northeast is spiking now is because it didn't spike when the Northeast did. But there was never any realistic hope that we could avoid that same spike. It's not practical for US states to isolate themselves indefinitely the way that New Zealand or Hong Kong or Ireland can. (Except where it is! Hawaii and Alaska should be taken as proof that geographic circumstances matter a hell of a lot more than "political leadership" or "masks" or whatever other obviously false boogeyman is the latest trend in media hysteria).

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https://twitter.com/Dierenbach/status/1283639562607050752

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Their death rate has steadily been under 2 per million each day since the beginning of June. The US on the other hand has had 7.36 Deaths per million as recently as June 26th.

In the last two weeks, US deaths per million have increased by 37. At this rate, even if Belgium experiences zero more deaths, it would take 22 weeks (around mid-January of 2021) for the US to "catch" Belgium in terms of deaths per capita. This also assumes that all of the recent mitigation measures (masks almost everywhere, re-lockdowns by many places, etc.) have zero effect and that US deaths per capita do not improve at all for the next six months.

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Give it time. I have complete faith in Florida to fuck things up more.

How much time? Pick a date. Any date you want.

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Wait on those Florida numbers, they are only getting worse.

At what date do you predict Florida will have more deaths per capita than New York?

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Sounds like a state that really could have used more help from the federal government.

What help did the federal government give to Texas and Florida that Maryland didn't get?

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No one gives a fuck about your whataboutism

Yes, I'm quite aware that you are wholly uninterested in figuring out what's actually causing COVID outcomes to vary across nations, states, etc. You'd rather just loudly declare it must be "quality of political leadership" even though there is absolutely no evidence for that and tons of examples that easily disprove it.

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Maybe he shouldn't have, since Maryland has the 9th most deaths per capita of all states in the US. Over 2x as many as Florida and over 3x as many as Texas.

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Dancedreamer posted...

Chuck Woolery, who said the Corona Virus was a hoax, is now changing his tune after his son contracted COVID19. He's also apparently deleted his twitter account. It's unfortunate he played politics with this virus, much like Trump has, and has led to who knows how many more people getting it -- including people who don't listen to him, but simply people who interact with people who do. It's like the people who claim that hurricanes are fake news and people don't need to evacuate. How can we turn something like this into something political? A decent President would've pulled people together in a time of crisis like this. Even George W. Bush would've handled this pandemic better. The sheer incompetence of the Trump administration is costing people lives, all to play politics that satisfy his ego.

What's your explanation for why the US has about half of the deaths per million as Belgium does? Is their political leadership 2x worse than Trump?

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Also my offer to bet is open to everyone here, not just pepper. You can also substitute Florida, Texas, or South Dakota if you'd like.

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https://twitter.com/boriquagato/status/1283527730001313799

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pepper2012 posted...

https://twitter.com/ap/status/1283587664290222081?s=21

I'd like you to give me an exact date at which you think Georgia's deaths per million will pass New York's. I'll bet you any amount of your choosing up to $1000 that you're wrong and it happens later/never.

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I said primarily, not exclusively.

The point is that New York and DC are college football dead-zones, and that's where all the political and journalist class lives.

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