DL Open Thread: Sat., March 28, 2020
The Rethugs Created Thomas Massie. The love-child of Newt Gingrich and Rand Paul. An extremely rare good read from Dana Milbank.
“We Need Ventilators, We Don’t Need Ventilators, We Need Ventilators. It’s GM’s Fault”. What passes for the Trump ‘policy’ on ventilators. Where there’s a Trump failure, there’s a scapegoat. This time–GM? Hadn’t they already voluntarily agreed to make ventilators? BTW, Trump’s poll numbers continue to rise while Ol’ Joe is off in the ether somewhere. Pretty soon we’ll be getting assurances that he’s in great health. Waitaminnit, didn’t we hear that song before from the Bidens?
Everything Falls Apart, Ctd. The updated carnage: 104,837 cases in the US; 1711 deaths. The Chinese largely limited the deaths to Wuhan Province. That ain’t happening here. New York is just the beginning. Betcha that Florida blockhead governor gets everything he needs from Trump while D governors get screwed. They need to be nicer to him. “If they don’t treat you right, I don’t call.” Don’t know how that’s gonna help him in Michigan. Bright side to everything, I guess. The funeral service industry is in crisis as they are ‘last on the food chain’. BTW, Trump is using ‘kind words’ from Cuomo and Newsom in new campaign ad.
Why Won’t Trump Use The ‘Officially Designated Backstop System’? AKA the Veterans Administration?:
The VA serves 9 million veterans through 170 hospitals and more than 1,000 clinics, but it’s also legally designated as the country’s backup health system in an emergency. As part of the National Disaster Medical System, the VA has deployed doctors and equipment to disasters and emergencies in recent instances such as Hurricane Maria and the Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando, Florida. The VA system has 13,000 acute care beds, including 1,800 intensive care unit beds.
But for the coronavirus pandemic, VA Secretary Robert Wilkie told lawmakers this week that the agency won’t spring into action on its own. Instead of responding to pleas for help from states and cities, Wilkie said he’s waiting for direction from the Department of Health and Human Services or the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
“VA stands ready to support civilian health care systems in the event those systems encounter capacity issues,” press secretary Christina Mandreucci said. “At this time, VA has not received specific requests from FEMA for assistance.”
The White House referred questions to the VA. The VA referred a question about taking directions from HHS and FEMA to those agencies. HHS referred questions to FEMA, and FEMA referred questions to the VA.
Oh, makes sense.
‘Carny’ Exempts Car Dealers From Mandate To Shutter Businesses. Not even a pandemic can put a dent in the Delaware Way. John, I need a new pair of shoes for work. (I do, actually). I usually buy them at Dick’s Sporting Goods, which has the added plus of having banned gun sales. I’m not going to buy them from the criminal enterprise enabled by Delaware known as Amazon. Can you hook me up?
What do you want to talk about?
Trump Signs Fiscal Stimulus Bill, Immediately Proclaims That He Will Not Adhere To Oversight Protections:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/03/27/trump-coronavirus-inspector-general/
We should be doing this:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-27/rhode-island-police-to-hunt-down-new-yorkers-seeking-refuge?fbclid=IwAR27wdhUCEqBlmQj2VSj9PKFVnVp9HaqJRqVOn21djs5XeSfZAcaHse3ZcY
RSE
Perhaps we should, but our limited resources are stretched to the max hunting down and caging children of those illegals sneaking in through Mexico and Canada. Maybe Trump can build a “wall” around New York and have Cuomo pay for it with all the money the “Orange Freak” is saving by not supplying ventilators, PPE or test kits to medical providers and such. Hell, let’s give free rounds of ammo to all of those well-armed militia “magats” if they’re willing to patrol the borders of states threatened by those “liberal” New York invaders.
Workers are going out every day in Delaware and exposing themselves to the virus because our government is greedy and keeping so many businesses open. I’d like to blame Trump for our problems but Delaware is acting slowly and unwisely. Want examples? Real estate sales have been deemed “essential.” Gun sales are essential now. It’s a joke and we can’t blame DC for any of it. Fix it, Kowalko. Wait, you can’t, the legislature shut down in a time of crisis leaving a shaky hand at the helm. Good plan.
This is what we have to deal with in a fact-free Trumpian environment:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/28/technology/coronavirus-fauci-trump-conspiracy-target.html
Not only won’t he adhere to the oversight provisions of the stimulus bill, he wants his signature on the checks when they go out.
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/03/trump-wants-signature-coronavirus-stimulus-checks.html
Stimulator in chief?
Self “stimulator in chief”. The nuns warned me that I would go blind if I continued with it. One can only hope they were right in Trumps case.
Just another one of his “gut instincts.” People who think with their gut should have a colonoscopy every week.
What’s the “carny” joke?
Harold, the term ‘carny’ has several meanings, all of them pertaining to the ‘working the rubes’ mentality of the carnival. It can be a noun, as in someone who is part of the carnival, but mostly it’s associated, at least in my mind, with the notion of ‘carny-speak’, which goes back to parting the rubes from their money. Or, as the definition reads, ‘often one who uses exaggerated showmanship or fraud’
I can’t remember when I first used it in conjunction with John Carney, but it was likely either his double-speak on the private-public giveaways to corporations or his ‘budget-smoothing’ mumbo jumbo.