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Steve De Young Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 01 April 2008 Location: United States Posts: 3488
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Posted: 08 April 2020 at 5:09pm | IP Logged | 1
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Biden is already being badly outmaneuvered by Trump, who is on his left on several issues already. Examples:
Trump: The Federal government is going to pay for coronavirus care for the uninsured. Biden: Reopen the exchange so the uninsured can buy insurance with high deductibles to cover their care.
Trump: We need 2 trillion dollars of infrastructure projects to put unemployed Americans back to work, FDR-style. Biden: How are we going to pay for that?
It's looking bad, barring Biden moving way to the left to try to get Warren and Sanders' support.
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Peter Martin Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 17 March 2008 Location: Canada Posts: 15816
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Posted: 08 April 2020 at 8:11pm | IP Logged | 2
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And Trump is going after the WHO, saying they got the pandemic wrong.
22 January: Trump says, "We have it totally under control... It's going to be just fine."
30 January: WHO declares a global health emergency.
10 February: Trump says, "I think the virus is going to be... it's going to be fine."
11-12 February: WHO convenes a research forum on COVID-19, attended by more than 400 parties from around the world, in order to share information and experience.
19 February: Trump says, "I think when we get into April, in the warmer weather, that has a very negative effect on that and that type of virus."
26 February: Trump says, "The 15 within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero... that's a pretty good job we've done."
10 March: Trump says, "Just stay calm. It will go away."
11 March: WHO declares a global pandemic, says, "We are deeply concerned...by the alarming levels of inaction". Trump says, "I think we're going to get through it very well."
With hindsight, we might look back and say the WHO could have done things differently... Maybe. What is certain is that Trump repeatedly underplayed the virus when the WHO was issuing strong warnings.
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Philippe Negrin Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 01 August 2007 Location: France Posts: 2644
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Posted: 09 April 2020 at 4:58am | IP Logged | 3
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It’s so sad that Bernie withdrew. We could have had a real human being in the race...
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Dave Kopperman Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 27 December 2004 Location: United States Posts: 3152
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Posted: 09 April 2020 at 7:24am | IP Logged | 4
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Philippe: Whatever Biden's failings (real or perceived), not being "human" is not even remotely one of them. His brand is pretty much the gaffe, which is about as human as a politician can get.
Edited by Dave Kopperman on 09 April 2020 at 7:25am
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Eric Ladd Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 August 2004 Location: Canada Posts: 4506
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Posted: 09 April 2020 at 7:47am | IP Logged | 5
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Peter, oversea US military personnel sounded the alarm about a highly contagious pathogen ravaging Wuhan, China back in November 2019. That information was in briefing notes to the President since the end of last year. He said nothing about it until January and then his comments were lies. The virus most likely went unchecked for 2-3 months in the US because an idiot was in power.
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Philippe Negrin Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 01 August 2007 Location: France Posts: 2644
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Posted: 09 April 2020 at 8:57am | IP Logged | 6
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Ok Dave. He just looks wooden and robotic to me...but I hope to be wrong.
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Eric Sofer Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 31 January 2014 Location: United States Posts: 4789
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Posted: 09 April 2020 at 9:27am | IP Logged | 7
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Biden's human enough. I hope he has the fire to truly challenge Trump face to face, as well as at the polls. He's shown some... but he's also seemed to slip in his control just the littlest bit. And if Trump gets Biden to blow his top - it's all over. Not that President Murder doesn't have a few buttons of his own to push.
Eric L. - It seems that the warnings of corona were extant before Trump started paying attention. However - and this kills me - I don't know if I can blame him. It seems that in so many disasters - World War II, the Twin Towers, etc. - information and warnings have been there. But so were others about disasters that never occurred. Sometimes it's hard to separate the dross from the gems.
However, so y'all don't think I'm getting sentimental, I STILL blame Trump. Preparation is NECESSARY, and in this case, completely harmless. The President, or HHS (or whichever department is suited) could have put the word out early enough to get hospitals to check their stores; we could have checked the national stores of equipment; the military could have been put on alert of the possibility of a pandemic; and other steps that could have been made to get ready for a very viable disaster, and those steps would have been good maintenance anyhow.
But nothing - NOTHING - must affect Murder's ego. No challenge to the national status - which means nothing to damage his (tarnished) self-image. Nothing can be not-perfect in THIS administration.
For God's sake, we buy life and auto and home insurance - not because we PLAN to have an accident. But because the chances of it happening are too great to ignore completely. But President Murder has an advantage; he can ignore ANYTHING.
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Dave Kopperman Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 27 December 2004 Location: United States Posts: 3152
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Posted: 09 April 2020 at 10:50am | IP Logged | 8
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Eric Sofer wrote:
It seems that in so many disasters - World War II, the Twin Towers, etc. - information and warnings have been there. |
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I find it helpful to separate these things out into a couple of different columns. One of the columns - the one that represents true, gross, amoral mismanagement - is one that I call "The Empathy Test" (which I've probably mentioned here before). That's the massive problem that we as a nation saw looming but chose to ignore because it only affected a subset of the population, generally one that's been dehumanized in public image. So the AIDS crisis and slavery both fall into the Empathy Test column - problems that were ignored by those in power because the vast majority of Americans couldn't bring themselves to give a shit about it or the people it affected. The Empathy Test has been given over and over, and it seems like we always fail it and then only take action after thousands or millions of lives have been lost.
I personally think Corona falls into this column, with the tells being Trump trying to brand it as the "Chinese" virus (ie, 'othering' it), and by the depressing statistics that African-American communities appear to have higher death rates proportionally than other ethnicities - in part because the communities are more prone to the diseases of poverty that leaves them more vulnerable to Corona. The third tell is, of course, the depressing way some seem to be willing to sacrifice people who would be at greater risk for the sake of protecting the economy - which would be all fine and good if that had been presented as an argument and acted upon in the weeks (and MONTHS) of lead time we had to act as a nation, but are the worst of bad-faith positions once the NOW unavoidable scale of the crisis really arrived.
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Brian Miller Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 28 July 2004 Location: United States Posts: 30904
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Posted: 09 April 2020 at 11:26am | IP Logged | 9
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A point I see coming up is his victory in the fall may come down to whether or not hydrochloroquine actually works against Covid-19. If it does, he'll get ALL the credit for it. If it doesn't, it may just keep him from winning. So, which do we hope for?
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Eric Ladd Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 August 2004 Location: Canada Posts: 4506
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Posted: 09 April 2020 at 11:28am | IP Logged | 10
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Dave K, great post. I’m definitely going to use this in future discussions.
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Dave Kopperman Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 27 December 2004 Location: United States Posts: 3152
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Posted: 09 April 2020 at 12:31pm | IP Logged | 11
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Eric Ladd: Thanks! When that first occurred to me a few years back, I was struck by how useful it was as both an analytical tool to work through American history, and also as a gauge for my own beliefs and gut reactions in relation to current events.
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Rebecca Jansen Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 12 February 2018 Location: Canada Posts: 4545
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Posted: 09 April 2020 at 1:31pm | IP Logged | 12
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Trump is definitely responsible for throwing out a lot of established federal infrastructure and people without logic behind it other than loyalty or personal advantage to him/his brand/his family. Not a person in the top position you want during any kind of challenges, regardless of claims of being strong he weakens most everything!
It is sad that Bernie through circumstances was not able to take things as far as he would've liked, he has put a lot of his life into giving voice to a large number of people. Regardless of how I felt about the making Canadian prescription medicines part of his solution, Democrats should thank him for stepping aside and make sure he has real input into future rebuilding/restoring that will be needed. As it turned out it would've been better for the people of one state had he announced a few days earlier, but that is thanks to Republicans and Supreme Court acting as an extension of partisan will to deliberately inflict damage, not Bernie Sanders' doing, and they will continue to try to damage, divide, muddy, misinform, provisional ballot, and above all blame. Barring a successful challenge to Trump for the nomination, if there are any conservatives with integrity they should be invited by Biden to join him to some degree. Others acting selfishly and negatively on the extreme and downright diseased right have made it not a time for progressives or revolutionaries. Needed is not perfection but simply restoring some kind of stability, balance and credibility to be viable again. Four more years of Trump will kill everything but perhaps the stock market and some generational accumulations of extreme wealth. It seems impossible but so did the 2016 result.
Edited by Rebecca Jansen on 09 April 2020 at 1:34pm
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