In the late 1930s Britain stocked up on caskets, in anticipation of the germans bombing English cities. They stored them in church basements as fascism/naziism poured remorselessly across borders like trump plague. ribbentrop/molotov (actually hitler/stalin) in Poland, Latvia, Lituania and Estonia swept in murdered with the speed and compassion of ‘spanish’ flu and cholera. neville chamberlain obviously knew what he was doing, getting his conservative government into the coffin business. Knew damned well that he’d helped cook up a catastrophe. The point is, at least he was ready to tidy up the mess.
‘Modern’ ‘conservative’ economists deplore overcapacity, such as stockpiles of coffins, as inefficient. Having scads of dead and dying people in hospital hallways and lobbies (not to mention park benches and under bridges) is more efficient. We humans exist for the modern economy ‘modern’ ‘conservative’ economists rather than vice versa.
Here and now, the government is depending on the ‘hidden hand of the market’ to provide the necessary equipment needed. This is that brain-dead, drunken bum larry kudlow’s fixation. Milton Friedman might have written that monetary policy and the market are no damn good in emergencies, I don’t remember. But if he did he should have put a warning to that effect on the front page in colossal bold font and red ink.
grrrr
craig, last thread you said: “Local news ratings are skyrocketing due to virus…” which is wonderful if one can get local news. unfortunately, the local stations here are having to run the IMpotus show during the usual 6:00-7:00 p.m. news hours these last few weeks. altho’ last night, wonder of wonders, the ABC channel ignored him. so wish the others would or at least choose one among the lot and alternate. bad timing during the tornado scare the other day when local reporting was vital.
X-R, thanks for the thread topic. the “hidden hand of the market” must be pointing at us with the middle finger right now. I think some of what you said is what was behind nancy’s comment the other day as reported by cns news:
.
speaking of the market, NYTimes:
GOP trash . Nixon, Reagan, Bush II, now this one. Decent people don’t have a prayer and don’t stand a chance.
Trump on FOX & Friends at 8:55am ET. This will be his last chance to tell his base to take this seriously, hunker down and save lives. If he doesn’t, we’ll know he doesn’t care whether they live or die.
Quote Of The Day: @Austan_Goolsbee ex Obama econ adviser, “Let’s not spend more time analyzing Donald Trump’s policy ideas than he spent coming up with them.” @MSNBC
XREPUB, your post makes me think Hunker down folks. We can lock the barn but the horse already stolen.
Jamie, beautiful song to start the day. Vince is IMHO one of the top 2 or three talents in country music, and Emmylou Harris has the voice of an angel. And I love the shoutout to John Prine. I’m sure Patsi would be grinning Over this selection.
This tweet from Gavin Newsome:
From Harvard Asst. Prof of exposure and assessment science, Joseph G. Allen at WaPo today.
The article is well worth reading.
craig, bun in oven for Wednesday (April you-know-what Day) if you need it
1. Mr Crawford, There was a Sherlock Holmes story about stolen livestock, but the tracks lead only toward the barn/stable. I believe ‘Twas from the second collection of Holmes stories.
2. Ms Pat, mnuchin is on the same pagan path as kudlow ? Oh, ye gods and little hidden pinkies ! No wonder we are being visited by this destroying plague.
I’ve been exchanging private messages via FB with a niece this morning. Last year she did her last test to be a dental hygienist and didn’t make it. There’s always a certain percentage that make it and it’s smaller than the numbers that try. She was very distraught at the time, but determined to take her classes and use them for another degree. She just told me she’s getting her associate’s degree in May for Healthcare Crisis Intervention and Management. Talk about taking lemons and making lemonade… I’m proud of her.
Granddaughter is home from hospital still recuperating, but at least has company of husband and children.
/rant/ I CAN’T stand it!!!! The ads! The ads! Every website is JUNKED up with ads. I NEVER look at the ads. I’m trying to read what I came there for. Seems like a waste of space. In the older days it was better. There weren’t so many useless ads. Sometimes I just click off the page because navigating around the ADS takes too much time. Don’t the advertisers realize this??? AArrgghh!!! /end rant/
Good news about your granddaughter, Jamie!
…needed some good news. Thanks, Jamie.
Tiptoe- you using Google as a search engine? If so it compounds the numbers of ads you’ll see. I swear the bastards can read my mind as well as my shopping history.
I think I’ve got this baking for one down pat.
You need a counter top convection oven, btw if you are baking for one or two people you should have bought one of these long ago. It and the microwave are side by side on my counter.
1/3 cup of self rising flour(flour that has salt and baking powder in it) or you can make your own
heaping tablespoon of Greek yoghurt
2 tablespoons of milk.
At this point if you just want a biscuit
just combine everything and knead the dough as you would with yeast bread. I spry the spatula I use and the mixing bowl with some spray grease. As I knead the dough I may do this several times. You may need to add milk or flour depending on if it is too dry or wet. I have a small tart pan and usually divide the dough into 4 small biscuits but you can make just one big one if you want.
Now if you want a sweet, add a 1/4 cup of sweetner, I usually use the yellow stuff and a bit of sugar added to it. I always like a bit of sugar for texture and taste. But any combination from none to all sugar will work, An 1/8 teas of vanilla and a bit of fruit. plus enough liquid to make a cake batter. Today I used some canned cherries I had in the pantry. A heaping table spoon of them and a some liquid from them. stirred it up like a cake and poured it into the tart pan and bake about 15 min at 350 degrees.
Easy thing to do, quick and you can scramble some eggs, a quick morning breakfast.
Jack
This quote is from scholarly paper on how politicians exploit crises.
When societies are confronted with major, disruptive emergencies, the fate of politicians and public policies hangs in the balance. Both government actors and their critics will try to escape blame for their occurrence, consolidate/strengthen their political capital, and advance/defend the policies they stand for. Crises thus generate framing contests to interpret events, their causes, and the responsibilities and lessons involved in ways that suit their political purposes and visions of future policy directions.
So…what is going on right now is a “framing contest” regarding who gets blamed and what the “solutions” to the crisis are.
Trailmixers;
What is absolutely critical is that you STRICTLY shelter in place for the next two months, if possible. (No food shopping, except for online deliveries.)
For most of April and May it is predicted that every hospital in the USA will overwhelmed with very ill Coivid-19 victims and there will be no beds available if you get sick, and no ventilators.
If you can isolate yourself for two months, once the Peak infection period has passed, you will have a better chance of survival as you may be able to get a hospital bed and a ventilator.
If you do not have a two-month supply of food and other supplies already, go out and buy what is needed as soon as possible.
We probably have no more than a week or two before the hospitals are at full capacity.
Today’s Harvard/Harris polls not so good for SFB. Approval on job performance -4, handling coronavirus even, General election -10 to Joe, -4 to Bernie. Rasmussen job approval -9. And the economy? Fuhgeddaboutit. His attempt to lower expectations about the coronavirus death toll? Projecting 100,000 deaths as a great job – that’s only twice the American deaths in Vietnam – which occurred over a decade. If he hadn’t dodged that one someone might buy that shit.
Online food retailers that will deliver to your door, in most places.
schwans.com (frozen foods, delivered to your door while you are at home, or left at your door in insulated boxes.) You get to choose the day and time of delivery.
nuts.com (nuts and dried fruit)
edenfoods.com (misc foods)
wildplanetfood.com (cannded fish and other items)
bragaorganicfarms.com (organic foods)
These vendors allow you to extend your food supply indefinitely without entering a grocery store.
Another safe option is to order online and then go to a store for pick-up. Wal-Mart does this as do many grocery store chains. Some of them have employees bring the packages to your car (good), some require you to go into the store (bad). I would avoid the second group.
Nash, good advice. East Bumfuck has no grocery delivery – maybe online orders although I never have attempted that. I’ve never even done the order online, pickup at store thing – guess I’ll have to try it. If it keeps me out of the great sea of the unwashed, all the better.
Briefing gonna be bullshit. Only SFB (science denier I) and presidential fluffer Penske (science denier I). Oh, wait, Azar is there. What 2 assholes plus 1.
Nash, we haven’t left the house for two weeks. Luckily there’s nothing I can think of we can’t get delivered. All no contact, just left at the door. But wear gloves to unpack, wipe hard surfaces such as canned goods and wash hands after.
One of the fun things to do is sort out all the stuff that has not been sorted in the warehouse (anti-virus non-floating pod where I live when not on a boat). Time to make sure the booze supply is inventoried. Will thirty cases of hard stuff and six cases of wine make it for another two or three months (asking for a friend)? Four cases of mac and cheese? Ten cans of Spam. Four boxes of canned corn and four boxes of canned red beans (succotash). Still working on the inventory. I did find a half jug of maraschino cherries so I can use up some of the rye and vermouth for manhattans. Gotta plan the diet when holed up in the pod.
Oh god damn. I can’t stand it anymore. Lying sack of shit.
Ms. Bronc, your approach to diddling while bored is admirable. Glad to see your priorities are where they should be.
The NY Times doesn’t think much of Dr Debbie
KC, what we’re hearing from Dr. Debbie is not what we would have heard under any other presidents. She’s walking on eggshells and shading her words to please Cheeto. Bad situation for someone who’s supposed to be coordinating the WH response to the CV.
It truly is the Trump Plague
Pogo
She has gone over to the dark side
She is the one who gave lardbutt lines he could use. She is not a friend to the public
She is the one who dismissed the idea of ventilator shortages. She is not helpful
I’m not going to argue with that. It could certainly be true. My comments really address reasons, not results. As Rick Wilson’s book explains, everything tRump touches dies.
Wooohoooo
I think this might be my favorite
…grocery store i use has at least a 2-week pick-up backlog.
i figured out a neat trick to make my booze last longer, also: stop drinking so much. No sense sheltering in place only to destroy my liver.
So heeding Nash’s suggestion. All the online fresh produce delivery companies can’t fill an order til at least mid April. We could starve by then
Good news.
John Prine is in stable condition after being hospitalized last week while being treated for COVID-19-type symptoms, his wife Fiona Whelan Prine said on social media on Monday.
The singer-songwriter’s family said Sunday that Prine was critically ill. Fiona Prine’s recent message suggested his condition had improved overnight. Prine remains hospitalized.
https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/30/business/ford-ge-healthcare-ventilators/index.html
Great, but this should’ve started 6 weeks ago, at least.
A co-worker’s spouse has died (from cancer) but could not visit because of virus restrictions & now not really a funeral as there is a 10-person limit…and he’s been laid off. My boss called today. They are reviewing the situation on Friday, which means I will be laid off, at which point, I plan to relocate near relatives.
Do you you think it will be feasible/safe to move by the first week of June?
KC, it’s day 10 in the Pogo household. Wines good for now but hard liquor is looking better and better.
Don’t hoard food, they said. Just buy what you need each week, they said.
The time to prep for a crisis isn’t mid-crisis. Get what you need, manage expectations, stay positive.
I didn’t go to the store this week and I’ll be OK until Memorial Day; I may not have what I want, but I’ll have enough. Well, I did go to the pharmacy.
”I may not have what I want, but I’ll have enough.”
👍❤️🇺🇸
BiD, it could be safe to move by then depending on how diligent folks in your neck of the woods are. Where are your relatives? Dallas with 11 deaths leads the Texas towns. Getting out of there at any time should be safer than staying unless you’re going to a place with denser population or a higher death count. If it was me, I’d be outta there sooner rather than later.
ok so if you MUST go to the store and you’re of a vulnerable demographic and no one can go for you, you arrive at the store at 6am when most people are still waking up, wear a mask, gloves, and full-cover clothes (think improvised hazmat suit), stay away from others in the store, DO NOT touch your face, come home, take off your hazmat-suit at the door, put it in a bag to wash, disinfect, and enjoy.
You’re all smart people, you got this.
BID
Remember that the government supplement to unemployment will go by the last known address. If you move, put in your claim to the address where you will be moving.
https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/30/politics/dems-eye-fourth-covid-bill/index.html
Dems want to keep administering additional aide, while Republicans want to take a wait-and-see-if-the-patient-dies stance. Fine, Republicans don’t understand that America will not look like it did before Covid, but they apparently want it to be destroyed entirely. Dumbasses.
I’m still mulling over the move to a rural area near KC. It would be June, so I do hope it’s OK to travel then. My job may very well come back then or after, but I don’t know that waiting around is the smart thing to do. All I have here is/was my job.
Woke up with a fever, but wrapped up tighter in the blankets & stayed in bed until 10. It’s mostly gone. Don’t know what that was about.
other symptoms?
Headache. Took a migraine RX instead of OTC so I wouldn’t reduce the fever.
June will be the same as now. You’ll likely be able to change residences and we will have adapted more to conducting transactions remotely. Social interaction will still be dicey, complacency kills.
Headache not a C-19 symptom but could be result of dehydration caused by it
If you have mild Covid-19 symptoms Advil/Ibuprofen is recommended.
by whom?
It’s not the cofeve. I have headaches more days than I don’t have them. I just don’t like reducing fevers; that’s a body doing its job. Migraine RX isn’t a fever reducer.
So, you think we won’t be back to normal by June? They did close our office in another state until then/laid off everyone.
“So, you think we won’t be back to normal by June?“
No fucking way.
September might begin the “new normal”
it might be c-19, BiD. i was surprised when you said you went into the office, a week or so, ago, and you’re within the incubation period from then
if your governments weren’t run by criminals and charlatans you’d be able to drive to a testing site, tomorrow, and find out your results hours after that. But you likely can’t because trump wants to suppress the real numbers.
the socially-responsible thing is to assume you have it. Hydrate and rest, now, consider journaling your symptoms, call your health-care provider in the morning and find out if they recommend testing (they likely won’t because we STILL don’t have free universal testing, hmm wonder why hmmm)
Best wishes, keep us posted.
Bink: Mayo Clinic online recommends ibuprofen (Advil) for mild Covid-19 symptoms.
Republicons …. 🙄 (From WaPo)
Nothing, nothing, will deter their anti-[gay, abortion …] agenda.
wapo:
also from that wapo link above: