tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post7791012544951843..comments2024-03-06T06:34:42.881-05:00Comments on EconoSpeak: Open ThreadUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger71125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-53672950908595254852020-10-18T09:34:45.911-04:002020-10-18T09:34:45.911-04:00'the worst candidate in the history of preside...'the worst candidate in the history of presidential politics'<br /><br />FWIW, this is yet another example of what<br />psychologists call <a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/projection" rel="nofollow">'projection'</a>, asserting<br />something about another that you know <br />about yourself.Fred C. Dobbsnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-51059731324985695542020-10-18T09:26:26.162-04:002020-10-18T09:26:26.162-04:00Trump suggests he'll leave the US out of embar...<a href="https://www.axios.com/trump-rally-leave-us-biden-win-5181b6de-9cf0-4368-ba58-0d78f58ce711.html" rel="nofollow">Trump suggests he'll leave the US out of embarrassment if he loses to Biden</a><br /><br />Axios - October 17<br /><br />At a rally in Friday night in Macon, Georgia, President Trump mocked Joe Biden, saying, "The mask is always so large!" — and suggested that he would leave the U.S. out of embarrassment if he lost to the former vice president.<br /><br />What he's saying: "I shouldn’t joke because you know what? Running against the worst candidate in the history of presidential politics puts pressure on me," Trump said. "Could you imagine if I lose? My whole life, what am I gonna do? I'm gonna say: 'I lost to the worst candidate in the history of politics.' I'm not gonna feel so good. Maybe I'll have to leave the country — I don't know." ...Fred C. Dobbsnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-65038255806237909642020-10-18T08:05:52.045-04:002020-10-18T08:05:52.045-04:00Trump leans into fear tactics in bid to win Midwes...<a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/10/17/nation/trump-leans-into-fear-tactics-bid-win-midwest-states/?event=event25" rel="nofollow">Trump leans into fear tactics in bid to win Midwest states</a><br /><br />via @BostonGlobe - October 17<br /><br />JANESVILLE, Wisconsin (AP) — President Donald Trump leaned into fear tactics Saturday as he accused the left of trying to “destroy the American way of life” in a late reelection pitch to voters in Michigan and Wisconsin — two Midwestern states that were instrumental to his 2016 victory but may now be slipping from his grasp.<br /><br />In back-to-back rallies, Trump accused the left of wanting to “erase American history" and “purge American values.” <b>He claimed, with no basis, that Democratic rival Joe Biden would put communities at risk.</b><br /><br />Trump offered the dark message as he faces headwinds not only in national polling, which shows Biden leading, but also in key battleground surveys. His comments come after his campaign, with far less cash than Biden's, largely retreated from TV advertising in the Midwest, shifting much of its money to Sun Belt states such as Florida, North Carolina, Arizona and Georgia, as well as Pennsylvania. ...Fred C. Dobbsnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-3039989330712300772020-10-17T17:16:27.990-04:002020-10-17T17:16:27.990-04:00https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/17/science/astrono...https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/17/science/astronomy-black-hole-at1910qix.html<br /><br />October 17, 2020<br /><br />A Black Hole’s Lunch: Stellar Spaghetti<br />Astronomers observed a star become a “feast” for a cosmic monster.<br />By Dennis Overbye<br /><br />Astronomers call it “spaghettification,” and it’s not a pretty idea: It’s what happens when you venture too close to a black hole and fall in. Tidal forces stretch you and break you like a noodle, then your shreds circle the black hole until they collide and knock each other in.<br /><br />On the upside, the energy released by your long fall and the crashing together of what used to be your atoms might produce a flash — a cosmic funeral pyre, if you will — that can be seen across the universe.<br /><br />In a case reported last week, it was merely an anonymous star in a faraway galaxy that met its doom. Thanks to luck and ever-increasing vigilance of the heavens, the whole world was watching as the star went down.<br /><br />“Indeed, it was quite a feast,” said Matt Nicholl, an astrophysicist at the University of Birmingham in England in an email. He led a team of astronomers that described this stellar apocalypse in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society on Monday.<br /><br />“This black hole was a messy eater,” added Kate Alexander of Northwestern University and a member of Dr. Nicholl’s team, in an email. In the end, she said, only about half the star was consumed by the black hole. The rest of its disintegrated material was blown outward into space at a breakneck speed a few percent that of light.<br /><br />The excitement began on Sept. 19, 2019, when the Zwicky Transient Facility, a telescope on Palomar Mountain in California, and other celestial surveillance networks detected a flare in the center of a galaxy 215 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Eridanus.<br /><br />The flare had the hallmarks of a tidal disruption event, the technical name for when a black hole rips a star to shreds and eats it.<br /><br />Astronomers rushed to their ground- and space-based telescopes to monitor AT2019qiz, as the flare was named. (“AT” stands for “astronomical transient.”)<br /><br />Over the next few weeks the flare rapidly brightened. At its peak, it was blasting out about a billion times as much energy as our sun. In the subsequent five months the flare slowly faded.<br /><br />The result was a unique and multidimensional look — based on radio emissions, X-rays and gamma rays as well as old-fashioned visible light observations — at the complexities of death by black hole....Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-41495149477319243692020-10-17T14:45:32.904-04:002020-10-17T14:45:32.904-04:00October 17, 2020
Coronavirus
US
Cases ( 8,320...October 17, 2020<br /><br />Coronavirus<br /><br />US<br /><br />Cases ( 8,320,718)<br />Deaths ( 224,001)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-683837504520743682020-10-17T12:25:04.590-04:002020-10-17T12:25:04.590-04:00October 16, 2020
Coronavirus
Massachusetts
Case...October 16, 2020<br /><br />Coronavirus<br /><br />Massachusetts<br /><br />Cases ( 142,346)<br />Deaths ( 9,702)<br /><br />Deaths per million ( 1,408)<br /><br />October 16, 2020<br /><br />Coronavirus<br /><br />New York<br /><br />Cases ( 516,752)<br />Deaths ( 33,451)<br /><br />Deaths per million ( 1,720)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-11539193712850809572020-10-17T08:31:35.069-04:002020-10-17T08:31:35.069-04:00There has been no coronavirus death on the Chinese...There has been no coronavirus death on the Chinese mainland since May 17. Since June began there have been 3 limited community clusters of infections, in Beijing, Dalian and Urumqi, each of which was contained with mass testing, contact tracing and quarantine, with each outbreak ending in a few weeks.<br /><br />Currently there is a limited community cluster in Qingdao, with mass testing, contact tracing and quarantine again being used to identify the origin, contain and end the outbreak.<br /><br />Imported coronavirus cases are caught at entry points with required testing and immediate quarantine. Asymptomatic cases are all quarantined. The flow of imported cases to China is low, but has been persistent.<br /><br />There are now 259 active coronavirus cases in all on the Chinese mainland, 5 of which cases are classed as serious or critical.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-46877356538279449532020-10-17T08:31:19.943-04:002020-10-17T08:31:19.943-04:00https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-10-17/Chinese-main...https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-10-17/Chinese-mainland-reports-13-new-COVID-19-cases-all-from-overseas-UEAqn0nhte/index.html<br /><br />October 17, 2020<br /><br />Chinese mainland reports 13 new COVID-19 cases<br /><br />The Chinese mainland on Friday registered 13 new COVID-19 cases, all from overseas, the National Health Commission announced on Saturday.<br /><br />No deaths related to the disease were reported on Friday, and 7 COVID-19 patients were discharged from hospitals, the commission said. A total of 374 asymptomatic patients remain under medical observation.<br /><br />The COVID-19 tally on the Chinese mainland stands at 85,659, with 4,634 fatalities.<br /><br />Chinese mainland new imported cases<br /><br />https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-10-17/Chinese-mainland-reports-13-new-COVID-19-cases-all-from-overseas-UEAqn0nhte/img/e06cfe13455c4b81a9e17b6ca75a92a9/e06cfe13455c4b81a9e17b6ca75a92a9.jpeg<br /><br />Chinese mainland new asymptomatic cases<br /><br />https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-10-17/Chinese-mainland-reports-13-new-COVID-19-cases-all-from-overseas-UEAqn0nhte/img/631dc1fdf7aa46f882a2b4911121adf2/631dc1fdf7aa46f882a2b4911121adf2.jpegAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-20183030375812150652020-10-17T08:27:48.475-04:002020-10-17T08:27:48.475-04:00October 16, 2020
Coronavirus (Deaths per millio...October 16, 2020<br /><br />Coronavirus (Deaths per million)<br /><br />US ( 674)<br />Mexico ( 659)<br />UK ( 639)<br />France ( 510)<br /><br />Canada ( 257)<br />Germany ( 117)<br />India ( 82)<br />China ( 3)<br /><br />Notice the ratios of deaths to coronavirus cases are 10.2%, 6.3% and 4.0% for Mexico, the United Kingdom and France respectively. These ratios are high, but have been significantly higher, while falling recently.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-6397886902280848312020-10-17T08:23:51.444-04:002020-10-17T08:23:51.444-04:00October 16, 2020
Coronavirus
US
Cases ( 8,288...October 16, 2020<br /><br />Coronavirus<br /><br />US<br /><br />Cases ( 8,288,278)<br />Deaths ( 223,644)<br /><br />India<br /><br />Cases ( 7,430,635)<br />Deaths ( 113,032)<br /><br />Mexico<br /><br />Cases ( 834,910)<br />Deaths ( 85,285)<br /><br />France<br /><br />Cases ( 834,770)<br />Deaths ( 33,303)<br /><br />UK<br /><br />Cases ( 689,257)<br />Deaths ( 43,429)<br /><br />Germany<br /><br />Cases ( 356,792)<br />Deaths ( 9,836)<br /><br />Canada<br /><br />Cases ( 194,106)<br />Deaths ( 9,722)<br /><br />China<br /><br />Cases ( 85,646)<br />Deaths ( 4,634)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-24060242470078871202020-10-16T18:17:39.726-04:002020-10-16T18:17:39.726-04:00In the hearings for Amy Coney Barrett, Democrats h...In the hearings for Amy Coney Barrett, Democrats have, rightly and understandably, hammered on the possibility that such a court would use transparently spurious arguments to overturn the Affordable Care Act, causing tens of millions of Americans to lose health insurance coverage. Roe v. Wade is also in obvious danger.<br /><br />But I’d argue that the biggest threat this court will pose is to environmental policy.<br /><br />Put it this way: Charles Koch is reportedly investing millions trying to get Barrett confirmed. That’s not because he’s passionately opposed to abortion rights, or, probably, even because he wants the A.C.A. overturned. What he’s looking for, surely, is a court that will block government regulation of business — and above all a court that will hamstring a Biden administration’s efforts to take action against climate change.<br /><br />Sure enough, during her hearing, Barrett, asked about climate change, uttered the dreaded words, “I’m certainly not a scientist.” At this point everyone knows what that means. It’s not an expression of humility; it’s a signal that the speaker intends to ignore the science and to oppose any attempt to avert the biggest threat facing humanity.<br /><br />It’s hard to overstate just how dangerous it will be if the power of the Supreme Court ends up being used to undermine environmental protection. Biden has made it clear that climate action will be at the core of his economic agenda. And this action would come not a moment too soon. We’re already starting to see the effects of global warming in the form of fires and floods, and if we waste the next few years it will probably be too late to avoid catastrophe.<br /><br />In other words, if a G.O.P.-stacked Supreme Court blocks effective climate policy, it won’t just be an outrage, it will be a disaster, for America and the world. So that can’t be allowed to happen. Never mind all the talk about norms (which only seem to apply to Democrats, anyway.) What’s at stake here could be the future of civilization.Fred C. Dobbsnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-54575350397735013282020-10-16T18:16:53.064-04:002020-10-16T18:16:53.064-04:00How the GOP Can Still Wreck America
NY Times - Pa...<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/15/opinion/election-trump-republicans.html?smid=tw-share" rel="nofollow">How the GOP Can Still Wreck America</a><br /><br />NY Times - Paul Krugman - October 15<br /><br />After 2016, nobody will or should take anything for granted, but at this point Joe Biden is strongly favored to beat Donald Trump, quite possibly by a landslide. However, Trump’s party may still be in a position to inflict enormous damage on America and the world over the next few years.<br /><br />For one thing, while Democrats are also favored to take control of the Senate, the odds aren’t nearly as high as they are in the presidential race. Why? Because the Senate, which gives the average voter in Wyoming 70 times as much weight as the average voter in California, is a deeply unrepresentative body.<br /><br />And it looks as if a president who is probably about to become a lame duck — and who lost the popular vote even in 2016 — together with a Senate that represents a minority of the American people are about to install a right-wing supermajority on the Supreme Court.<br /><br />If you want a preview of how badly this can go, look at what’s happening in Wisconsin.<br /><br />In 2018, Wisconsin voters elected a Democratic governor. A strong majority — 53 percent — also voted for Democratic legislators. But given the way the state’s districts are drawn, Democrats ended up with only 36 out of 99 seats in the State Assembly. And Wisconsin’s elected judiciary is also dominated by Republicans.<br /><br />You probably won’t be surprised to hear that the Wisconsin G.O.P. has tried to use its remaining power to undermine Gov. Tony Evers. What you may not know is that this power grab is now turning lethal.<br /><br />You see, Wisconsin is experiencing a frightening coronavirus surge, which looks on track to match the wave that hit Arizona in the summer. Arizona eventually contained that surge with mask mandates, bar closures and limits on indoor gatherings. But Wisconsin’s Republican legislature has obstructed Evers’s attempts to get control of the pandemic. And on Wednesday a Republican judge blocked an order limiting the number of people who can gather in bars and other public places.<br /><br />In Wisconsin, then, a party rejected by the voters is nonetheless managing to inflict immense damage, probably including hundreds of unnecessary deaths. And something similar but far worse could all too easily play out on a national level.<br /><br />First of all, while Trump has very little chance of winning the popular vote, he might still eke out an Electoral College victory. If he does, it could be the end of American democracy.<br /><br />A more likely outcome is that Trump loses but Republicans hold the Senate. In that case, we know exactly what will happen: fiscal sabotage on a grand scale. That is, the G.O.P., which has been completely indifferent to budget deficits under Trump, will suddenly rediscover the evils of government debt and block every effort by a Biden administration to sustain the economy and living standards in the face of a pandemic.<br /><br />And even if Democrats take both the Senate and the White House, they’re now almost certain to face a 6-3 Supreme Court — that is, a court dominated by appointees of an increasingly extremist party that has only won the popular vote for president once in the past three decades. ...<br />Fred C. Dobbsnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-3314401627939049432020-10-16T17:51:25.550-04:002020-10-16T17:51:25.550-04:00https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-10-16/Qingdao-heal...https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-10-16/Qingdao-health-authorities-identify-source-of-latest-COVID-19-cluster-UDaGzVJsu4/index.html<br /><br />October 16, 2020<br /><br />Qingdao health authorities identify source of latest COVID-19 cluster<br /><br />The COVID-19 cluster in east China's port city of Qingdao originated in two port workers who stayed at the same hospital, the local health commission declared on Friday.<br /><br />The pair contracted the virus and were put on hospital quarantine in September.<br /><br />According to authorities, they used a scan room for examination, but the room was not properly disinfected, before receiving other patients on the following day.<br /><br />Authorities said sequences of the virus' genome of recent cases and the two patients have shown a high level of similarity.<br /><br />Qingdao firstly reported three asymptotic cases on October 11, and since then 13 confirmed infections were found, all related to a local hospital.<br /><br />A five-day virus testing program that was launched on Monday (October 12) has been completed, covering all 11 million residents.<br /><br />As of 8 a.m. Friday, over 10.16 million of the collected samples had been tested, and results showed no new positive cases, results of the rest samples will be released by 6 p.m.<br /><br />The pair, surnamed Chen and Dong, were stevedores of Qingdao Port Dagang Company. They were moved into the hospital for medical observation after testing positive for the novel coronavirus on September 24. They were asymptomatic by then.<br /><br />One of the workers, 40-year-old Dong, developed symptoms after 20 days on October 14 and became a confirmed COVID-19 case.<br /><br />They had unloaded imported frozen products on September 19.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-81808169756798230392020-10-16T14:08:46.570-04:002020-10-16T14:08:46.570-04:00October 16, 2020
Coronavirus
US
Cases ( 8,248...October 16, 2020<br /><br />Coronavirus<br /><br />US<br /><br />Cases ( 8,248,062)<br />Deaths ( 223,171)<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-61222911996954646502020-10-16T13:32:08.504-04:002020-10-16T13:32:08.504-04:00As of two weeks ago, there were maybe five percent...As of two weeks ago, there were <b>maybe</b> five percent of<br />voters still undecided for the Nov 3 presidential election.<br /><br /><a href="https://www.newsweek.com/one-month-out-election-trump-biden-are-still-battling-5-percent-undecided-voters-1536067" rel="nofollow"><br />One month out from the election, Trump and Biden are still battling for 5 percent of undecided voters</a><br /><br />Newsweek - October 3<br /><br />For the vast majority of American voters, the presidential campaign is over because they've decided their candidate and have no plans of wavering from their choice. But that could leave about 5 percent up for grabs.<br /><br />Undecided voters helped propel Donald Trump to the White House in 2016 and they're partially credited with why his victory was such a surprise. Now the president once again has a chance to sway those who are undecided, but it may not be enough to overcome Democratic candidate Joe Biden's lead.<br /><br />"Undecideds know Trump and they're undecided because they don't like him. They may end up voting for him but it's unlikely the vote goes heavily his way," John Geer, a professor of political science at Vanderbilt University, told Newsweek.<br /><br />A poll from Quinnipiac University put the number of undecided voters at only 5 percent—about a 5 percent decrease from the same time in 2016. In a different poll conducted by The Washington Post and ABC News found 92 percent of the 1,008 people polled planned on choosing either Trump or Biden for president. Of those who didn't pick Trump, 9 percent said they would consider casting their ballot for him—the same percentage of people who didn't pick Biden but would consider voting for him.<br /><br />Similar results regarding people who would be open to casting their ballot for a major party candidate they weren't already supporting were found in a NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll. Of the 1,000 registered voters who were surveyed, 3 percent were unsure who they were supporting, and 3 percent said they weren't supporting either candidate. ...Fred C. Dobbsnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-61697363122580698952020-10-16T12:43:07.219-04:002020-10-16T12:43:07.219-04:00https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/16/us/trump-califo...https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/16/us/trump-california-wildfire-relief.html<br /><br />October 16, 2020<br /><br />In Rare Move, Trump Administration Rejects California’s Request for Wildfire Relief<br />The state had asked last month for federal aid to help recover from six of this year’s fires, including the Creek Fire, which is among the largest in state history.<br />By Thomas Fuller and Derrick Bryson Taylor<br /><br />MORAGA, Calif. — The Trump administration has rejected California’s request for disaster relief aid for six major wildfires that scorched more than 1.8 million acres in land, destroyed thousands of structures and caused at least three deaths last month.<br /><br />The rejection of aid late Thursday, a rare move in cases of disasters on the scale of California’s fires, escalated a long-running feud between the Trump administration and California on the issues of climate change and forest management.<br /><br />California has suffered a series of record-breaking fires since August, when freak lightning storms ignited hundreds of fires. Subsequent fires in September tore through parts of the Sierra Nevada and wine country north of San Francisco.<br /><br />Judd Deere, a White House spokesman, said President Trump had already come to the state’s assistance when his administration authorized increased funding for debris removal from the fires as well as relief for the August fires.<br /><br />“The more recent and separate California submission was not supported by the relevant data that States must provide for approval and the President concurred with the FEMA Administrator’s recommendation,” Mr. Deere said.<br /><br />California officials immediately pushed back on that assessment. Brian Ferguson, a spokesman for the state’s office of emergency services, said the state had a “strong case” that it meets the federal requirements for approval and planned to appeal the decision....Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-52504962875276376782020-10-16T10:10:21.223-04:002020-10-16T10:10:21.223-04:00https://voxeu.org/article/pandemics-and-inequality...https://voxeu.org/article/pandemics-and-inequality-historical-overview<br /><br />October 15, 2020<br /><br />Pandemics and inequality: A historical overview<br />By Guido Alfani <br /><br />The relationship between pandemics and inequality is of significant interest at the moment. The Black Death in the 14th century is one salient example of a pandemic which dramatically decreased wealth inequality, but this column argues that the Black Death is exceptional in this respect. Pandemics in subsequent centuries have failed to significantly reduce inequality, due to different institutional environments and labour market effects. This evidence suggests that inequality and poverty are likely to increase in the aftermath of the Covid-19 crisis.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-7709513643822948922020-10-16T09:37:42.927-04:002020-10-16T09:37:42.927-04:00https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-10-16/Chinese-main...https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-10-16/Chinese-mainland-reports-24-new-COVID-19-cases-all-from-overseas-UCVUf3W74I/index.html<br /><br />October 16, 2020<br /><br />Chinese mainland reports 24 new COVID-19 cases<br /><br />The Chinese mainland on Thursday registered 24 new COVID-19 cases, all from overseas, the National Health Commission announced on Friday.<br /><br />No deaths related to the disease were reported Thursday, and 11 COVID-19 patients were discharged from hospitals, the commission said. A total of 376 asymptomatic patients remain under medical observation.<br /><br />The COVID-19 tally on the Chinese mainland stands at 85,646, with 4,634 fatalities.<br /><br />Chinese mainland new imported cases<br /><br />https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-10-16/Chinese-mainland-reports-24-new-COVID-19-cases-all-from-overseas-UCVUf3W74I/img/485824c9529047a898589c8846fb656f/485824c9529047a898589c8846fb656f.jpeg<br /><br />Chinese mainland new asymptomatic cases<br /><br />https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-10-16/Chinese-mainland-reports-24-new-COVID-19-cases-all-from-overseas-UCVUf3W74I/img/00507c1120b64a998a26b3983a3b5450/00507c1120b64a998a26b3983a3b5450.jpeg<br /><br />[ There has been no coronavirus death on the Chinese mainland since May 17. Since June began there have been 3 limited community clusters of infections, in Beijing, Urumqi and Dalian, each of which was contained with mass testing, contact tracing and quarantine, with each outbreak ending in a few weeks.<br /><br />Currently there is a community cluster in Qingdao, with mass testing, contact tracing and quarantine again being used to identify the origin, contain and end the outbreak.<br /><br />Imported coronavirus cases are caught at entry points with required testing and immediate quarantine. Asymptomatic cases are all quarantined. The flow of imported cases to China is low, but has been persistent.<br /><br />There are now 253 active coronavirus cases in all on the Chinese mainland, 4 of which cases are classed as serious or critical. ]Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-5889917076935418632020-10-16T09:18:09.230-04:002020-10-16T09:18:09.230-04:00October 15, 2020
Coronavirus (Deaths per millio...October 15, 2020<br /><br />Coronavirus (Deaths per million)<br /><br />US ( 672)<br />Mexico ( 659)<br />UK ( 637)<br />France ( 507)<br /><br />Canada ( 256)<br />Germany ( 117)<br />India ( 81)<br />China ( 3)<br /><br />Notice the ratios of deaths to coronavirus cases are 10.2%, 6.4% and 4.1% for Mexico, the United Kingdom and France respectively. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-90280840901857665782020-10-16T09:14:39.880-04:002020-10-16T09:14:39.880-04:00October 15, 2020
Coronavirus
US
Cases ( 8,216...October 15, 2020<br /><br />Coronavirus<br /><br />US<br /><br />Cases ( 8,216,315)<br />Deaths ( 222,717)<br /><br />India<br /><br />Cases ( 7,365,435)<br />Deaths ( 112,144)<br /><br />Mexico<br /><br />Cases ( 829,396)<br />Deaths ( 84,898)<br /><br />France<br /><br />Cases ( 809,684)<br />Deaths ( 33,125)<br /><br />UK<br /><br />Cases ( 673,622)<br />Deaths ( 43,293)<br /><br />Germany<br /><br />Cases ( 348,816)<br />Deaths ( 9,810)<br /><br />Canada<br /><br />Cases ( 191,732)<br />Deaths ( 9,699)<br /><br />China<br /><br />Cases ( 85,622)<br />Deaths ( 4,634)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-37735406959091885722020-10-16T08:43:37.482-04:002020-10-16T08:43:37.482-04:00https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/23/opinion/coronav...https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/23/opinion/coronavirus-federal-reserve-cities.html<br /><br />April 23, 2020<br /><br />The Money Machine That Can Save Cities<br />As Congress fumbles, the Fed’s unlimited ability to create money may be the only lifeline that communities have left.<br />By Claudia Sahm<br /><br />State and local budgets across the United States are beginning to buckle under the economic strain caused by Covid-19. Because the economy is essentially in a medically induced coma, sales tax revenue and revenue from other business taxes have dried up. That means the funds to take care of communities — to pay teachers, to support Medicaid, to hire emergency medical workers, to maintain roads, to build low-income housing — are also drying up.<br /><br />Because 40 out of 50 states have laws mandating that both the state’s overall budget and the budgets of nearly all cities be balanced, state governments are already laying off employees and cutting services. More than 14,000 workers in state governments lost their jobs in March. Terrifyingly, those losses, counted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, only stretch through mid-March, before the shutdowns were nationwide.<br /><br />Local officials were blindsided by this crisis and the costs it required to rapidly ramp up medical care and the social safety net. But so far Congress has allocated only $150 billion for state and local governments from the trillions of dollars it approved for pandemic relief. It’s too little and often it’s arriving too late.<br /><br />The Federal Reserve knows this....Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-74722634954758985482020-10-16T08:39:05.519-04:002020-10-16T08:39:05.519-04:00https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/16/opinion/america...https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/16/opinion/americas-money-men-could-save-us-but-theyre-stuck-in-the-seventies.html<br /><br />October 16, 2020<br /><br />America’s Money Men Could Save Us. But They’re Stuck in the Seventies.<br />(And, unfortunately, yes, they mostly are men).<br />By Claudia Sahm<br /><br />Let’s face reality: It is likely that no further economic relief is coming from Congress before the election. For months, negotiations between Democrats and Republicans over a follow-up package have alternated between stopping, starting and stalling.<br /><br />Congress and the White House became mired in partisan politics as soon as a tenuous recovery from the worst of the pandemic began. Congress started strong this March, passing the $2 trillion Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act. The measures taken, though imperfect, worked. But we are now the victims of that success, as Congress has lost the will to do more. The outcome is as predictable as it is tragic: as soon as the crisis stabilized enough for partisan inaction to not be political suicide, legislative paralysis returned.<br /><br />In the meantime, coronavirus deaths continue to mount and normalcy remains elusive. It was far too soon to end relief but Congress did it anyway. Temporary job losses have become permanent. Through no fault of their own, businesses have closed their doors forever. Communities have laid off even more teachers.<br /><br />That leaves the Federal Reserve — gatekeeper of the world’s reserve currency, America’s central bank and lender of last resort — as the only game left in town. And its game is not good enough.<br /><br />As with Congress, the Fed acted boldly in March. Financial markets were seizing up and stock prices plunged. The Fed stepped in and pumped trillions of dollars into credit markets to put them back in sync. They offered to lend vast sums to financial institutions and corporations temporarily short on cash. However, shortly after, the Fed fell prey to politics and, perhaps most crucially, to its own longstanding technocratic obsessions and misconceptions.<br /><br />The first signs of the Fed walking away from this crisis began with its two failed lending facilities: one meant for middle-sized businesses and the other meant for municipalities with gaping budget shortfalls. As I wrote * in April, these new programs were a watershed; the Fed was poised to support Main Street, for once, not only Wall Street. Even so, these two innovative facilities, authorized in the CARES Act, were rolled out too slowly and months later have made only a handful of loans, largely because the terms of the loans are needlessly onerous.<br /><br />Why is politics to blame? Both Democrats and Republicans took aim at the facilities. Democrats chastised the Fed for making midsize oil companies eligible, and Republicans scoffed at the idea of a “blue state bailout.” In turn, the Fed decided to essentially do nothing.<br /><br />* https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/23/opinion/coronavirus-federal-reserve-cities.htmlAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-43186449903757076092020-10-16T08:32:41.817-04:002020-10-16T08:32:41.817-04:00Cases classed as "serious, critical" are...Cases classed as "serious, critical" are increasing:<br /><br />October 15, 2020<br /><br />Coronavirus<br /><br />US<br /><br />Cases ( 8,216,315)<br />Deaths ( 222,717)<br /><br />Serious, Critical Cases ( 15,270)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-91895453777737917172020-10-16T08:30:49.903-04:002020-10-16T08:30:49.903-04:00Still sadly threatening:
October 15, 2020
Corona...Still sadly threatening:<br /><br />October 15, 2020<br /><br />Coronavirus<br /><br />Massachusetts<br /><br />Cases ( 141,579)<br />Deaths ( 9,672)<br /><br />Deaths per million ( 1,403)<br /><br />October 15, 2020<br /><br />Coronavirus<br /><br />New York<br /><br />Cases ( 515,024)<br />Deaths ( 33,442)<br /><br />Deaths per million ( 1,719)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-47988302199602874802020-10-15T15:56:25.163-04:002020-10-15T15:56:25.163-04:00https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-10-15/Saline-soil-...https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-10-15/Saline-soil-rice-breed-breaks-yield-record-in-E-China-UC9FzSpQdi/index.html<br /><br />October 15, 2020<br /><br />Saline soil rice breed breaks yield record in E China<br /><br />A team of Chinese agronomists led by Yuan Longping, dubbed the "father of hybrid rice," has set a record in rice output grown on saline-alkali soil in east China's Jiangsu Province.<br /><br />The rice breed, developed by Yuan's team, achieved a yield of 802.9 kg per mu on average, or 12.04 tonnes per hectare, * in three plots of saline soil in Rudong County in east China's Jiangsu province.<br /><br />It is a record output for rice grown on saline soil in China, said Fang Fuping, a researcher with the China National Rice Research Institute.<br /><br />Yuan's team had successfully developed varieties of saline-alkali tolerant rice in 2017 with the previous highest yield reaching 620.95 kg per mu.<br /><br />China has about 100 million hectares of saline-alkali soil, of which about one-fifth could be ameliorated to arable soil.<br /><br />* About 3 times a reasonable ordinary-soil yield.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com