LONDON — Queen Elizabeth II threw him an extravagant state banquet at Buckingham Palace. Former Prime Minister Theresa May welcomed him to Blenheim Palace, the family seat of his hero, Winston Churchill. Her successor, Boris Johnson, refused to join a global chorus of criticism after he ordered troops to break up a Black Lives Matter protest outside the White House.
Few countries have worked harder than Britain to please President Trump. But now, with Mr. Trump trailing in the polls to former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., British officials are waking up to an unsettling prospect: The president they tried so hard to accommodate may be out of power next year.
In Paris and Berlin, a Trump defeat would be welcomed as an unalloyed relief, removing a leader who has sundered alliances, threatened a trade war, and tried to dismantle the European project. But in London, where Mr. Johnson’s government just left the European Union, it is more complicated.
At a moment of British isolation, Mr. Trump’s full-throated endorsement of Brexit has made the United States a safe harbor. His promise of a lucrative trade deal gave Mr. Johnson a selling point with his voters. His populist politics were in sync with the bare-knuckle tactics of the Brexiteers.
If Mr. Biden wins in November, Britain would face a president who opposed Brexit, would look out for the interests of Ireland in a post-Brexit Europe, and would have little motive to prioritize an Anglo-American trade deal. His former boss, President Barack Obama, once warned Britons that if they left the European Union, they would put themselves at the “back of the queue” in any trade talks with the United States.
“It will not be lost on Biden that the last two British prime ministers went out of their way to be nice to and about Trump,” said Peter Westmacott, a former British ambassador to the United States. “He is instinctively comfortable with Brits, but London will have to work on the relationship.”
As Mr. Trump’s polling numbers have eroded, pro-government papers have begun to make the case that a President Biden would actually be better for Britain than President Trump. Unlike Mr. Trump, he is a believer in alliances. He would not subject Mr. Johnson to rude lectures about the need for Britain to take a harder line against China. He would not be toxic with much of the British public.
In a recent column in The Sunday Times, a well-connected political journalist, Tim Shipman, quoted an unnamed government minister saying that a Trump defeat ‘‘would make things much easier.’’
That sounds like a government hedging its bets. Mr. Johnson has been careful to say nothing about the American election but he has already tried to keep Mr. Trump at arm’s length even as he avoids offending him. Mr. Trump, by contrast, called into a London radio show in the heat of the British election to praise Mr. Johnson and run down his opponent. ...
(Somebody has a book out: Nick Adams, Trump and Churchill - Defenders of Western Civilization)
"Trump and Churchill both fought valiantly to protect Western Civilization, and while fighting different forms of tyranny, Trump could very well be to the twenty-first century what Churchill was to the twentieth.
What do Winston Churchill—the eloquent, eternally quotable wordsmith, pudgy politician of fifty years, wealthy aristocrat, war-time Prime Minister of England—and Donald Trump, the 6’4”, brash, Twitter happy, political neophyte, billionaire entrepreneur—have in common?
In his new book, complete with never-before-told anecdotes, bestselling author Nick Adams explores how both leaders, with seemingly nothing in common, turned their day’s prevailing politics on its head.
In doing so, they both endured shockingly similar battles instigated by the political establishment seeking their destruction.
Trump and Churchill’s unorthodox approach to both domestic and international relations has rescued Western Civilization from the brink.
Foreword by Newt Gingrich." ...
(Not the Nick Adams who was 'The Rebel', the western that ran on the ABC network from 1959 to 1961, presumably.)
The education of school children is essential, for any country!
My 3 YO grand daughter is in 3 half day per week "school", Nassau Cty Metro NYC. She is also getting "catch up" sessions. My 13 YO in 8th Grade is bright and computer literate, she will miss the plays she acts in and other enriching activities. Her 7 YO second grade sister lost 4 months already! Her Gramma is retired and can home school her, a luxury not many have.
Losing social skills. Grade's 1 through 3 not suited to computer learning. Harming the disadvantaged student at all grades.
Cost benefit: open the schools. CDC director the guy with the trimmed beard said it is okay.
What is the science behind keeping schools closed?
The observations on risks to children encourage openings, for school age it is the less than the flu.
Teachers' union positions are not scientific. LA union is pleading politics, sounds like anti Trumper.
Outside Israel, countries have either not closed or opened their schools with no major issues. There is more to the Israel story than reported.
As to existence of community spread, there are other essential activities on going.
Too much politics, not enough reasoned decision making.
(Surprisingly enuf, much of the science establishment may agree with you. If I had grandchildren, I wouldn't want them jeopardized, but do go ahead, if you think best. Education is worth some sacrifices.)
Looking around the world the virus is doing what it will. Unless you can get the vaccine out before you ruin your country!
If you look at the daily record for Tx, Fl, Az or Cali you see a 'flat curve' until it is not, it goes to a skewed bell curve like NY and Ma. Or Sweden with no lock down!
For daily deaths or daily positive tests.
Note Tx, Az, and Fl are on the down slope side of the curve, like NY was in May.
Keeping the virus at bay at best puts off the rising bell curve. The only plan that works is if US had the vaccine fully deployed by 15 May in the US.
This virus is kharma.
Today the best we have is remdesivir which shows a slight decline in hospital stays of patients who do not go to the ICU and Vents.
On vaccines we have to worry ADE and Th2 (Oxford, Russia, Chinese...spliced CoV 'vectors' on "harmless viruses" effects (monkeys seem okay) on humans, and not much more than tamping the illness, or invading human T cells with mRNA riding nanoparticles thought up by DoD!
The debate is 10% science, we do not know anything and 90% dump Trump
... Nearly everyone involved in reporting on, analyzing or forecasting the upcoming presidential election agrees that Donald Trump could win another term in office. But no one save his most dedicated sycophants thinks he could do so with a majority of the public on his side. We have accepted, as a matter of course, that Trump could be constitutionally re-elected through the Electoral College, but not democratically selected by the voting public.
That’s how he won in 2016, and the reason is straightforward. Enough of the president’s base is concentrated in swing states like Florida, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Because of that fact, he can lose by as many as five million votes and still win an Electoral College majority. ...
The presumptive strategy would seem to be Remain Hunkered Down, until a vaccine is available, distributed, and in effect. And then get back to business (and socialization, partying, even education) as usual. Not til then.
Meanwhile, wait it out. Wear a mask. Stay home as much as possible. Do social distancing. Skip school, except for on-line learning.
"Meanwhile, wait it out. Wear a mask. Stay home as much as possible. Do social distancing"
Imposing that on our 40ish kids' generation has created a lot of support for Trump! My d'in law in particular is now as radical a Trumper as my brother who is Archie Bunker incarnate!
What evidence there is (see the first of 3 links above from Fred Dobbs @ 4:12pm on 8/4) do indeed suggest that schools can open reasonably safely under certain conditions:
-very low levels of infection in the community -small class sizes -well ventilated classrooms
I would add generally sensible behavior on the part of adults
None of these describe much of the USA, and the small class sizes and well ventilated classrooms require resources. The USA has been generally stingy about funding education in recent decades. Getting at the last item in the list, an alternative is outdoor classes. This might work well throughout much of the southern third of the country, but not well further north past (say) Halloween.
"Imposing that on our 40ish kids' generation has created a lot of support for Trump! My d'in law in particular is now as radical a Trumper as my brother who is Archie Bunker incarnate!"
Well, you have pledged not to vote for Trump, so that's good.
Apparently others in your family don't feel that way.
Perhaps all of you would like to believe that Trump is going to win anyway, especially if voting is suppressed, so why bother to vote, and certainly not for Biden.
The stress on house-bound families (with kids) is quite possibly becoming unbearable.
To put it mildly, that is Most Unfortunate.
This country may not survive another 4 years of Trump.
"The debate is 10% science, we do not know anything and 90% dump Trump"
The science is we absolutely need vaccines, the sooner the better, and a massive, massive effort to dispense them widely, All else is just a waiting game.
Keep infections to a minimum to avoid overloading the medical system. Elect a president who understands this.
The summer months have not been kind to the Gulf States when it comes to the coronavirus pandemic. Since June, Texas, Florida, and Louisiana have all seen some of the most drastic spikes so far, with infection rates and hospitalizations breaking records week after week. But two states in the region that've been largely overlooked are now showing signs of becoming the biggest new coronavirus hotspots in the U.S.: Alabama and Mississippi.
These two states are currently on track to take the least coveted spot in the fight against COVID-19, according to reporting from Vox. In terms of hospitalizations, Alabama is looking at a looming crisis, with 76 percent of ICU beds in the state currently occupied, according to Covid Act Now. The site also says Alabama's positive test rate is 20.6 percent and rising. (For reference, the widespread understanding is that that number needs to be at 5 percent or less to contain COVID-19.) Mississippi is unfortunately not faring much better, with its daily new cases doubling from 639 on July 1 to 1,178 on August 2. Mississippi's positive test rate is also dangerously high at 23.3 percent and rising, according to Covid Act Now. ...
Nearly every country has struggled and made mistakes, but the US is the only affluent nation to have suffered a severe, sustained outbreak for so long.
The New York Times set out to reconstruct the nation’s blunders, through numerous interviews with scientists and public health experts around the world. ...
... one country stands alone, as the only affluent nation to have suffered a severe, sustained outbreak for more than four months: the United States.
Over the past month, about 1.9 million Americans have tested positive for the virus.
That’s more than five times as many as in all of Europe, Canada, Japan, South Korea and Australia, combined.
Even though some of these countries saw worrying new outbreaks over the past month, including 50,000 new cases in Spain ...
... the outbreaks still pale in comparison to those in the United States. Florida, with a population less than half of Spain, has reported nearly 300,000 cases in the same period.
When it comes to the virus, the United States has come to resemble not the wealthy and powerful countries to which it is often compared but instead to far poorer countries, like Brazil, Peru and South Africa, or those with large migrant populations, like Bahrain and Oman.
As in several of those other countries, the toll of the virus in the United States has fallen disproportionately on poorer people and groups that have long suffered discrimination. Black and Latino residents of the United States have contracted the virus at roughly three times as high of a rate as white residents.
How did this happen? The New York Times set out to reconstruct the unique failure of the United States, through numerous interviews with scientists and public health experts around the world. The reporting points to two central themes.
First, the United States faced longstanding challenges in confronting a major pandemic. It is a large country at the nexus of the global economy, with a tradition of prioritizing individualism over government restrictions. That tradition is one reason the United States suffers from an unequal health care system that has long produced worse medical outcomes — including higher infant mortality and diabetes rates and lower life expectancy — than in most other rich countries.
“As an American, I think there is a lot of good to be said about our libertarian tradition,” Dr. Jared Baeten, an epidemiologist and vice dean at the University of Washington School of Public Health, said. “But this is the consequence — we don’t succeed as well as a collective.”
The second major theme is one that public health experts often find uncomfortable to discuss because many try to steer clear of partisan politics. But many agree that the poor results in the United States stem in substantial measure from the performance of the Trump administration.
In no other high-income country — and in only a few countries, period — have political leaders departed from expert advice as frequently and significantly as the Trump administration. President Trump has said the virus was not serious; predicted it would disappear; spent weeks questioning the need for masks; encouraged states to reopen even with large and growing caseloads; and promoted medical disinformation.
In recent days, Mr. Trump has continued the theme, offering a torrent of misleading statistics in his public appearances that make the situation sound less dire than it is.
Some Republican governors have followed his lead and also played down the virus, while others have largely followed the science. Democratic governors have more reliably heeded scientific advice, but their performance in containing the virus has been uneven. ...
As COVID-19 cases tick up in Massachusetts, no one is eyeing the numbers more keenly than the hospital leaders who will have to respond to a second surge.
Hospitals officials are watching the case counts daily, with memories still fresh of legions of sick people filling wards in the spring. The number of people hospitalized with COVID-19 around the state remains low, but has been inching up in certain places in the past couple of weeks. So, too, has the rate of positive COVID-19 tests reported statewide. And any increase in cases in the community will eventually reach the hospital doors. ...
The percentage of positive COVID-19 tests in Massachusetts rose to 2.2 percent, up from the mid-July low of 1.7 percent, according to Wednesday’s report from the state Department of Public Health.
Usually hospitalizations start to spike about two weeks after positive tests results go up, and intensive care unit admissions increase two weeks after that. ...
When researcher Monica Gandhi began digging deeper into outbreaks of the novel coronavirus, she was struck by the extraordinarily high number of infected people who had no symptoms.
A Boston homeless shelter had 147 infected residents, but 88% had no symptoms even though they shared their living space. A Tyson Foods poultry plant in Springdale, Ark., had 481 infections, and 95% were asymptomatic. Prisons in Arkansas, North Carolina, Ohio and Virginia counted 3,277 infected people, but 96% were asymptomatic.
During its seven-month global rampage, the coronavirus has claimed more than 700,000 lives. But Gandhi began to think the bigger mystery might be why it has left so many more practically unscathed.
What was it about these asymptomatic people, who lived or worked so closely to others who fell severely ill, she wondered, that protected them? Did the ‘'dose'' of their viral exposure make a difference? Was it genetics? Or might some people already have partial resistance to the virus, contrary to our initial understanding? ...
The coronavirus has left numerous clues - the uneven transmission in different parts of the world, the mostly mild impact on children. Perhaps most tantalizing is the unusually large proportion of infected people with mild symptoms or none at all. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention last month estimated that rate at about 40%.
Those clues have sent scientists off in different directions: Some are looking into the role of the receptor cells, which the virus uses to infiltrate the body, to better understand the role that age and genetics might play. Others are delving into masks and whether they may filter just enough of the virus so those wearing them had mild cases or no symptoms at all.
The theory that has generated the most excitement in recent weeks is that some people walking among us might already have partial immunity.
When SARS-CoV-2, the technical name of the coronavirus that causes the disease covid-19, was first identified on Dec. 31, 2019, public health officials deemed it a ‘'novel'' virus because it was the first time it had been seen in humans who presumably had no immunity from it whatsoever. There’s now some very early, tentative evidence suggesting that assumption might have been wrong.
One mind-blowing hypothesis - bolstered by a flurry of recent studies - is that a segment of the world’s population may have partial protection thanks to ‘'memory'' T cells, the part of our immune system trained to recognize specific invaders. This could originate from cross-protection derived from standard childhood vaccinations. Or, as a paper published Tuesday in Science suggested, it could trace back to previous encounters with other coronaviruses, such as those that cause the common cold.
'‘This might potentially explain why some people seem to fend off the virus and may be less susceptible to becoming severely ill,’' National Institutes of Health Director Francis Collins remarked in a blog post this past week. ...
a study finds at least 97,000 children were recently infected.
As schools face the daunting challenge of reopening while the coronavirus continues to spread, at least 97,000 children around the United States tested positive in the last two weeks of July, according to a new report from the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association. It says that at least 338,000 children had tested positive through July 30, meaning more than a quarter tested positive in just those two weeks.
The report comes as some schools have tried to reopen, only to quickly order quarantines or close their doors. North Paulding High School in Georgia, which drew attention after images of its crowded hallways circulated on social media, announced on Sunday that it would switch to online instruction for Monday and Tuesday after reporting at least nine virus cases.
States in the South and West accounted for more than seven out of 10 infections in the new report, which relied on data from 49 states along with Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico and Guam. The count could be higher because the report did not include complete data from Texas and parts of New York State outside of New York City.
Missouri, Oklahoma, Alaska, Nevada, Idaho and Montana were among the states with the highest percentage increase of child infections during that period, according to the report.
New York City, New Jersey and other states in the Northeast, where the virus peaked in March and April, had the lowest percentage increase of child infections, according to the report. ...
... The last time the economy went over the cliff’s edge, in 2008, the federal government encased the banking system in plastic Bubble Wrap and allowed millions of Americans to lose their homes. It’s about to make the same mistake all over again. ...
The government dismissed the woes of homeowners and renters as personal tragedies that did not require the attention of the Treasury Department. The government was wrong. The millions of individual tragedies required action. A nation is a collection of people; the first job of government is to keep people from harm.
Even on its own terms, the government’s indifference was a mistake. The massive dislocations shredded communities, as families were replaced by abandoned homes. Schools struggled to help displaced children, whose test scores declined and behavioral problems increased. Businesses lost their customers. Cities starved for property tax revenue slashed spending: Colorado Springs turned off one-third of its streetlights.
The accumulation of individual tragedies left lasting scars on the economy and on society.
As the coronavirus spread around the country in the spring, federal policymakers and authorities in many states announced temporary bans on evictions, part of a broader effort to weather the pandemic by suspending economic activity. The federal government also expanded unemployment benefits for people who lost jobs, providing many with the means to keep paying the mortgage or rent.
But the federal aid ended last month. More than 20 percent of households say that they don’t expect to be able to make their next monthly rent or mortgage payment, according to a Census Bureau survey. Some eviction bans have ended, and others will end soon. Americans once again are beginning to lose their homes.
The dislocations could be worse than last time. Even before the pandemic, the nation was facing a housing crisis. Years of residential underbuilding have driven up prices, particularly in the areas where jobs are concentrated. Tens of millions of lower-income families already were struggling to afford a place to live. Millions already were evicted each year. And many more Americans have lost jobs this time around.
In a policy memo published Friday, a group of housing policy experts and affordable housing advocates said, “The United States may be facing the most severe housing crisis in its history.”
Some state and local governments are trying to help. ...
The federal government has the power to avert a crisis by imposing a moratorium on tenant evictions in each state through the end of the year. That would provide enough time to create a program of federal aid for people who can’t afford to pay rent. The most direct approach would be to give federal housing vouchers to every needy family.
(The apparent simplicity of proposals for rent forgiveness is misleading. That would simply move problems up the food chain. Roughly half of apartments are owned by small landlords, many of whom face foreclosure if they can’t pay their own mortgages. That, too, would lead to tenant evictions.)
This crisis is hitting tenants harder than homeowners because job losses are concentrated among lower-income households, and the last crisis sharply reduced homeownership among such households. But many homeowners need help, too. Congress can facilitate mortgage modifications by changing bankruptcy laws that bar courts from reducing most mortgage debts. President Barack Obama promised to make the change during the 2008 campaign, but failed to do so while in the White House. Joseph R. Biden Jr., the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, has made the same commitment — hopefully with a different result. ...
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27 comments:
Back on 1 March, Steve Bannon declared that the pandemic would be Trump's Churchillian Moment. We wait.
UK Officials’ New Trump Dilemma: What if He Loses?
NY Times - July 31
LONDON — Queen Elizabeth II threw him an extravagant state banquet at Buckingham Palace. Former Prime Minister Theresa May welcomed him to Blenheim Palace, the family seat of his hero, Winston Churchill. Her successor, Boris Johnson, refused to join a global chorus of criticism after he ordered troops to break up a Black Lives Matter protest outside the White House.
Few countries have worked harder than Britain to please President Trump. But now, with Mr. Trump trailing in the polls to former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., British officials are waking up to an unsettling prospect: The president they tried so hard to accommodate may be out of power next year.
In Paris and Berlin, a Trump defeat would be welcomed as an unalloyed relief, removing a leader who has sundered alliances, threatened a trade war, and tried to dismantle the European project. But in London, where Mr. Johnson’s government just left the European Union, it is more complicated.
At a moment of British isolation, Mr. Trump’s full-throated endorsement of Brexit has made the United States a safe harbor. His promise of a lucrative trade deal gave Mr. Johnson a selling point with his voters. His populist politics were in sync with the bare-knuckle tactics of the Brexiteers.
If Mr. Biden wins in November, Britain would face a president who opposed Brexit, would look out for the interests of Ireland in a post-Brexit Europe, and would have little motive to prioritize an Anglo-American trade deal. His former boss, President Barack Obama, once warned Britons that if they left the European Union, they would put themselves at the “back of the queue” in any trade talks with the United States.
“It will not be lost on Biden that the last two British prime ministers went out of their way to be nice to and about Trump,” said Peter Westmacott, a former British ambassador to the United States. “He is instinctively comfortable with Brits, but London will have to work on the relationship.”
As Mr. Trump’s polling numbers have eroded, pro-government papers have begun to make the case that a President Biden would actually be better for Britain than President Trump. Unlike Mr. Trump, he is a believer in alliances. He would not subject Mr. Johnson to rude lectures about the need for Britain to take a harder line against China. He would not be toxic with much of the British public.
In a recent column in The Sunday Times, a well-connected political journalist, Tim Shipman, quoted an unnamed government minister saying that a Trump defeat ‘‘would make things much easier.’’
That sounds like a government hedging its bets. Mr. Johnson has been careful to say nothing about the American election but he has already tried to keep Mr. Trump at arm’s length even as he avoids offending him. Mr. Trump, by contrast, called into a London radio show in the heat of the British election to praise Mr. Johnson and run down his opponent. ...
(Somebody has a book out: Nick Adams,
Trump and Churchill - Defenders of Western Civilization)
"Trump and Churchill both fought valiantly to protect Western Civilization, and while fighting different forms of tyranny, Trump could very well be to the twenty-first century what Churchill was to the twentieth.
What do Winston Churchill—the eloquent, eternally quotable wordsmith, pudgy politician of fifty years, wealthy aristocrat, war-time Prime Minister of England—and Donald Trump, the 6’4”, brash, Twitter happy, political neophyte, billionaire entrepreneur—have in common?
In his new book, complete with never-before-told anecdotes, bestselling author Nick Adams explores how both leaders, with seemingly nothing in common, turned their day’s prevailing politics on its head.
In doing so, they both endured shockingly similar battles instigated by the political establishment seeking their destruction.
Trump and Churchill’s unorthodox approach to both domestic and international relations has rescued Western Civilization from the brink.
Foreword by Newt Gingrich." ...
(Not the Nick Adams who was 'The Rebel', the western
that ran on the ABC network from 1959 to 1961, presumably.)
The education of school children is essential, for any country!
My 3 YO grand daughter is in 3 half day per week "school", Nassau Cty Metro NYC. She is also getting "catch up" sessions. My 13 YO in 8th Grade is bright and computer literate, she will miss the plays she acts in and other enriching activities. Her 7 YO second grade sister lost 4 months already! Her Gramma is retired and can home school her, a luxury not many have.
Losing social skills. Grade's 1 through 3 not suited to computer learning. Harming the disadvantaged student at all grades.
Cost benefit: open the schools. CDC director the guy with the trimmed beard said it is okay.
What is the science behind keeping schools closed?
The observations on risks to children encourage openings, for school age it is the less than the flu.
Teachers' union positions are not scientific. LA union is pleading politics, sounds like anti Trumper.
Outside Israel, countries have either not closed or opened their schools with no major issues. There is more to the Israel story than reported.
As to existence of community spread, there are other essential activities on going.
Too much politics, not enough reasoned decision making.
School openings across globe suggest ways to keep coronavirus at bay, despite outbreaks
Keeping Schools Closed Next Fall Could Worsen Science's Diversity Problem
Let them learn – The risks of keeping schools closed far outweigh the benefits
(Surprisingly enuf, much of the science establishment may agree with you.
If I had grandchildren, I wouldn't want them jeopardized, but do go
ahead, if you think best. Education is worth some sacrifices.)
Fred,
Keep the virus at bay? How does that happen?
Looking around the world the virus is doing what it will. Unless you can get the vaccine out before you ruin your country!
If you look at the daily record for Tx, Fl, Az or Cali you see a 'flat curve' until it is not, it goes to a skewed bell curve like NY and Ma. Or Sweden with no lock down!
For daily deaths or daily positive tests.
Note Tx, Az, and Fl are on the down slope side of the curve, like NY was in May.
Keeping the virus at bay at best puts off the rising bell curve. The only plan that works is if US had the vaccine fully deployed by 15 May in the US.
This virus is kharma.
Today the best we have is remdesivir which shows a slight decline in hospital stays of patients who do not go to the ICU and Vents.
On vaccines we have to worry ADE and Th2 (Oxford, Russia, Chinese...spliced CoV 'vectors' on "harmless viruses" effects (monkeys seem okay) on humans, and not much more than tamping the illness, or invading human T cells with mRNA riding nanoparticles thought up by DoD!
The debate is 10% science, we do not know anything and 90% dump Trump
Trump Doesn’t Need the Most Votes
NY Times - August 4
... Nearly everyone involved in reporting on, analyzing or forecasting the upcoming presidential election agrees that Donald Trump could win another term in office. But no one save his most dedicated sycophants thinks he could do so with a majority of the public on his side. We have accepted, as a matter of course, that Trump could be constitutionally re-elected through the Electoral College, but not democratically selected by the voting public.
That’s how he won in 2016, and the reason is straightforward. Enough of the president’s base is concentrated in swing states like Florida, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Because of that fact, he can lose by as many as five million votes and still win an Electoral College majority. ...
'Keep the virus at bay? How does that happen?'
The presumptive strategy would seem to be Remain
Hunkered Down, until a vaccine is available,
distributed, and in effect. And then get back
to business (and socialization, partying,
even education) as usual. Not til then.
Meanwhile, wait it out. Wear a mask.
Stay home as much as possible.
Do social distancing.
Skip school, except
for on-line learning.
Fred,
"Meanwhile, wait it out. Wear a mask.
Stay home as much as possible.
Do social distancing"
Imposing that on our 40ish kids' generation has created a lot of support for Trump! My d'in law in particular is now as radical a Trumper as my brother who is Archie Bunker incarnate!
RE: Opening schools
What evidence there is (see the first of 3 links above from Fred Dobbs @ 4:12pm on 8/4) do indeed suggest that schools can open reasonably safely under certain conditions:
-very low levels of infection in the community
-small class sizes
-well ventilated classrooms
I would add generally sensible behavior on the part of adults
None of these describe much of the USA, and the small class sizes and well ventilated classrooms require resources. The USA has been generally stingy about funding education in recent decades. Getting at the last item in the list, an alternative is outdoor classes. This might work well throughout much of the southern third of the country, but not well further north past (say) Halloween.
"Imposing that on our 40ish kids' generation has created a lot of
support for Trump! My d'in law in particular is now as radical a
Trumper as my brother who is Archie Bunker incarnate!"
Well, you have pledged not to vote for Trump, so that's good.
Apparently others in your family don't feel that way.
Perhaps all of you would like to believe that Trump is
going to win anyway, especially if voting is suppressed,
so why bother to vote, and certainly not for Biden.
The stress on house-bound families (with kids)
is quite possibly becoming unbearable.
To put it mildly, that is Most Unfortunate.
This country may not survive
another 4 years of Trump.
"The debate is 10% science, we do not know anything and 90% dump Trump"
The science is we absolutely need vaccines, the sooner
the better, and a massive, massive effort to dispense
them widely, All else is just a waiting game.
Keep infections to a minimum to avoid overloading
the medical system. Elect a president
who understands this.
Spare us the kharma bullshit.
Best to not encourage him.
Covid-19 is always moving on.
"Note Tx, Az, and Fl are on the down slope side of the curve, like NY was in May."
These Two States Are Becoming the Worst COVID Hotspots in the US
MSN - August 4
The summer months have not been kind to the Gulf States when it comes to the coronavirus pandemic. Since June, Texas, Florida, and Louisiana have all seen some of the most drastic spikes so far, with infection rates and hospitalizations breaking records week after week. But two states in the region that've been largely overlooked are now showing signs of becoming the biggest new coronavirus hotspots in the U.S.: Alabama and Mississippi.
These two states are currently on track to take the least coveted spot in the fight against COVID-19, according to reporting from Vox. In terms of hospitalizations, Alabama is looking at a looming crisis, with 76 percent of ICU beds in the state currently occupied, according to Covid Act Now. The site also says Alabama's positive test rate is 20.6 percent and rising. (For reference, the widespread understanding is that that number needs to be at 5 percent or less to contain COVID-19.) Mississippi is unfortunately not faring much better, with its daily new cases doubling from 639 on July 1 to 1,178 on August 2. Mississippi's positive test rate is also dangerously high at 23.3 percent and rising, according to Covid Act Now. ...
He Predicted Trump’s Win in 2016. Now He’s Ready to Call 2020
NY Times - August 5
... Over the past four decades, his system has accurately
called presidential victors, from Ronald Reagan in ’84 to,
well, Mr. Trump in 2016. ...
Spoiler alert: "Professor Lichtman just made my day! I do feel
hopeful we can be rid of the worst president in U.S. history.
Waiting to exhale...."
(Oogah-boogha!)
The Never Trumpers Have Already Won
The Never Trumpers Have Already Won
New Republic - AUgust 4
They’re not trying to save the GOP from a demagogue.
They’re infiltrating the Democratic Party. ...
Where cases are rising fastest
Hawaii +445%
R.I. +67%
N.J. +61%
Mass. +59%
Neb. +38%
Mo. +34%
S.D. +31%
Ill. +30%
Okla. +24%
(Percentages are increases from the average two weeks ago.
RI, NJ and MA are on the down-slope, so is this a second-wave sign?)
Latest Map and Case Count
NY Times - August 5
Graphic: US shows little signs of being able to control coronavirus spread
via @BostonGlobe - July 29
How Did It Happen? America’s Unique Failure to Control the Virus
NY Times - August 6
Nearly every country has struggled and made mistakes,
but the US is the only affluent nation to have
suffered a severe, sustained outbreak for so long.
The New York Times set out to reconstruct the nation’s blunders,
through numerous interviews with scientists and public health experts
around the world. ...
... one country stands alone, as the only affluent nation to have suffered a severe, sustained outbreak for more than four months: the United States.
Over the past month, about 1.9 million Americans have tested positive for the virus.
That’s more than five times as many as in all of Europe, Canada, Japan, South Korea and Australia, combined.
Even though some of these countries saw worrying new outbreaks over the past month, including 50,000 new cases in Spain ...
... the outbreaks still pale in comparison to those in the United States. Florida, with a population less than half of Spain, has reported nearly 300,000 cases in the same period.
When it comes to the virus, the United States has come to resemble not the wealthy and powerful countries to which it is often compared but instead to far poorer countries, like Brazil, Peru and South Africa, or those with large migrant populations, like Bahrain and Oman.
As in several of those other countries, the toll of the virus in the United States has fallen disproportionately on poorer people and groups that have long suffered discrimination. Black and Latino residents of the United States have contracted the virus at roughly three times as high of a rate as white residents.
How did this happen? The New York Times set out to reconstruct the unique failure of the United States, through numerous interviews with scientists and public health experts around the world. The reporting points to two central themes.
First, the United States faced longstanding challenges in confronting a major pandemic. It is a large country at the nexus of the global economy, with a tradition of prioritizing individualism over government restrictions. That tradition is one reason the United States suffers from an unequal health care system that has long produced worse medical outcomes — including higher infant mortality and diabetes rates and lower life expectancy — than in most other rich countries.
“As an American, I think there is a lot of good to be said about our libertarian tradition,” Dr. Jared Baeten, an epidemiologist and vice dean at the University of Washington School of Public Health, said. “But this is the consequence — we don’t succeed as well as a collective.”
The second major theme is one that public health experts often find uncomfortable to discuss because many try to steer clear of partisan politics. But many agree that the poor results in the United States stem in substantial measure from the performance of the Trump administration.
In no other high-income country — and in only a few countries, period — have political leaders departed from expert advice as frequently and significantly as the Trump administration. President Trump has said the virus was not serious; predicted it would disappear; spent weeks questioning the need for masks; encouraged states to reopen even with large and growing caseloads; and promoted medical disinformation.
In recent days, Mr. Trump has continued the theme, offering a torrent of misleading statistics in his public appearances that make the situation sound less dire than it is.
Some Republican governors have followed his lead and also played down the virus, while others have largely followed the science. Democratic governors have more reliably heeded scientific advice, but their performance in containing the virus has been uneven. ...
In calm before the storm, hospitals prepare for second wave of COVID-19
via @BostonGlobe - August 5
As COVID-19 cases tick up in Massachusetts, no one is eyeing the numbers more keenly than the hospital leaders who will have to respond to a second surge.
Hospitals officials are watching the case counts daily, with memories still fresh of legions of sick people filling wards in the spring. The number of people hospitalized with COVID-19 around the state remains low, but has been inching up in certain places in the past couple of weeks. So, too, has the rate of positive COVID-19 tests reported statewide. And any increase in cases in the community will eventually reach the hospital doors. ...
The percentage of positive COVID-19 tests in Massachusetts rose to 2.2 percent, up from the mid-July low of 1.7 percent, according to Wednesday’s report from the state Department of Public Health.
Usually hospitalizations start to spike about two weeks after positive tests results go up, and intensive care unit admissions increase two weeks after that. ...
Many people with the coronavirus don’t show symptoms. Researchers want to know why
Washington Post via @BostonGlobe - August 8
When researcher Monica Gandhi began digging deeper into outbreaks of the novel coronavirus, she was struck by the extraordinarily high number of infected people who had no symptoms.
A Boston homeless shelter had 147 infected residents, but 88% had no symptoms even though they shared their living space. A Tyson Foods poultry plant in Springdale, Ark., had 481 infections, and 95% were asymptomatic. Prisons in Arkansas, North Carolina, Ohio and Virginia counted 3,277 infected people, but 96% were asymptomatic.
During its seven-month global rampage, the coronavirus has claimed more than 700,000 lives. But Gandhi began to think the bigger mystery might be why it has left so many more practically unscathed.
What was it about these asymptomatic people, who lived or worked so closely to others who fell severely ill, she wondered, that protected them? Did the ‘'dose'' of their viral exposure make a difference? Was it genetics? Or might some people already have partial resistance to the virus, contrary to our initial understanding? ...
The coronavirus has left numerous clues - the uneven transmission in different parts of the world, the mostly mild impact on children. Perhaps most tantalizing is the unusually large proportion of infected people with mild symptoms or none at all. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention last month estimated that rate at about 40%.
Those clues have sent scientists off in different directions: Some are looking into the role of the receptor cells, which the virus uses to infiltrate the body, to better understand the role that age and genetics might play. Others are delving into masks and whether they may filter just enough of the virus so those wearing them had mild cases or no symptoms at all.
The theory that has generated the most excitement in recent weeks is that some people walking among us might already have partial immunity.
When SARS-CoV-2, the technical name of the coronavirus that causes the disease covid-19, was first identified on Dec. 31, 2019, public health officials deemed it a ‘'novel'' virus because it was the first time it had been seen in humans who presumably had no immunity from it whatsoever. There’s now some very early, tentative evidence suggesting that assumption might have been wrong.
One mind-blowing hypothesis - bolstered by a flurry of recent studies - is that a segment of the world’s population may have partial protection thanks to ‘'memory'' T cells, the part of our immune system trained to recognize specific invaders. This could originate from cross-protection derived from standard childhood vaccinations. Or, as a paper published Tuesday in Science suggested, it could trace back to previous encounters with other coronaviruses, such as those that cause the common cold.
'‘This might potentially explain why some people seem to fend off the virus and may be less susceptible to becoming severely ill,’' National Institutes of Health Director Francis Collins remarked in a blog post this past week. ...
How the pandemic might play out in 2021 and beyond
Nature – August 5
This coronavirus is here for the long haul — here’s what scientists predict for the next months and years.
fPDF version
Related article:
Two decades of pandemic war games failed to account for Donald Trump
Nature - August 4
PDF version
Widespread Infection Among US Children, Report Finds
Nearly 100,000 children tested positive in the last
two weeks of July, according to a new report.
As US schools reopen
a study finds at least 97,000 children were recently infected.
As schools face the daunting challenge of reopening while the coronavirus continues to spread, at least 97,000 children around the United States tested positive in the last two weeks of July, according to a new report from the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association. It says that at least 338,000 children had tested positive through July 30, meaning more than a quarter tested positive in just those two weeks.
The report comes as some schools have tried to reopen, only to quickly order quarantines or close their doors. North Paulding High School in Georgia, which drew attention after images of its crowded hallways circulated on social media, announced on Sunday that it would switch to online instruction for Monday and Tuesday after reporting at least nine virus cases.
States in the South and West accounted for more than seven out of 10 infections in the new report, which relied on data from 49 states along with Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico and Guam. The count could be higher because the report did not include complete data from Texas and parts of New York State outside of New York City.
Missouri, Oklahoma, Alaska, Nevada, Idaho and Montana were among the states with the highest percentage increase of child infections during that period, according to the report.
New York City, New Jersey and other states in the Northeast, where the virus peaked in March and April, had the lowest percentage increase of child infections, according to the report. ...
The Coming Eviction Crisis: ‘It’s Hard to Pay the Bills on Nothing’
NY Times - August 9
... The last time the economy went over the cliff’s edge, in 2008, the federal government encased the banking system in plastic Bubble Wrap and allowed millions of Americans to lose their homes. It’s about to make the same mistake all over again. ...
The government dismissed the woes of homeowners and renters as personal tragedies that did not require the attention of the Treasury Department. The government was wrong. The millions of individual tragedies required action. A nation is a collection of people; the first job of government is to keep people from harm.
Even on its own terms, the government’s indifference was a mistake. The massive dislocations shredded communities, as families were replaced by abandoned homes. Schools struggled to help displaced children, whose test scores declined and behavioral problems increased. Businesses lost their customers. Cities starved for property tax revenue slashed spending: Colorado Springs turned off one-third of its streetlights.
The accumulation of individual tragedies left lasting scars on the economy and on society.
As the coronavirus spread around the country in the spring, federal policymakers and authorities in many states announced temporary bans on evictions, part of a broader effort to weather the pandemic by suspending economic activity. The federal government also expanded unemployment benefits for people who lost jobs, providing many with the means to keep paying the mortgage or rent.
But the federal aid ended last month. More than 20 percent of households say that they don’t expect to be able to make their next monthly rent or mortgage payment, according to a Census Bureau survey. Some eviction bans have ended, and others will end soon. Americans once again are beginning to lose their homes.
The dislocations could be worse than last time. Even before the pandemic, the nation was facing a housing crisis. Years of residential underbuilding have driven up prices, particularly in the areas where jobs are concentrated. Tens of millions of lower-income families already were struggling to afford a place to live. Millions already were evicted each year. And many more Americans have lost jobs this time around.
In a policy memo published Friday, a group of housing policy experts and affordable housing advocates said, “The United States may be facing the most severe housing crisis in its history.”
Some state and local governments are trying to help. ...
The federal government has the power to avert a crisis by imposing a moratorium on tenant evictions in each state through the end of the year. That would provide enough time to create a program of federal aid for people who can’t afford to pay rent. The most direct approach would be to give federal housing vouchers to every needy family.
(The apparent simplicity of proposals for rent forgiveness is misleading. That would simply move problems up the food chain. Roughly half of apartments are owned by small landlords, many of whom face foreclosure if they can’t pay their own mortgages. That, too, would lead to tenant evictions.)
This crisis is hitting tenants harder than homeowners because job losses are concentrated among lower-income households, and the last crisis sharply reduced homeownership among such households. But many homeowners need help, too. Congress can facilitate mortgage modifications by changing bankruptcy laws that bar courts from reducing most mortgage debts. President Barack Obama promised to make the change during the 2008 campaign, but failed to do so while in the White House. Joseph R. Biden Jr., the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, has made the same commitment — hopefully with a different result. ...
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