Random but related thoughts:
–On second thought, maybe it wasn’t the best idea to install Joseph Goebbels as the president’s speechwriter. Stephen Miller may be newly married, but that hasn’t softened his racist and xenophobic views. Last night he had Donald Trump referring to it as a “foreign virus,” blamed the European Union for accelerating its spread, congratulated himself for doing more than Europe or China, and then announced he was suspending flights to the U.S.A. from Europe for 30 days—but not from the U.K. (I would assume this exemption is due to the fact that Boris Johnson “treated me fairly”).
Also, you may remember that Miller’s bride is the one who scolded a reporter who tried to ask V.P. Pence earlier this week a question as he left by saying, “Raising your voice isn’t going to help.” Which the reporter would never have had to do if Pence had not ignored the question.
–If you’re a Ride-Or-Die Trump supporter, it may be time to think of yourself as a Ride-And-Die Trump supporter.
–It’s rather incredible, no, how all of the coronavirus news came to the forefront only after the impeachment trial ended. If there had been no impeachment trial might Americans have had their eyes on the ball sooner? Isn’t it ironic that Republicans had the opportunity and, more importantly, the evidence to pull the plug on this presidency, and opted to defy the facts? And I know that Mike Pence is a science denier, but he would’ve been far more malleable about this. The deaths of countless Americans will also be on the hands of Republican senators.
–It was about two weeks ago that CNBC’s Jim Cramer, a former newspaper reporter, opined that if he were a young and enterprising reporter right now, he’d head to JFK and interview passengers coming off flights from Milan to see if they’d been tested. I don’t know if anyone followed up on his suggestion, but anecdotal evidence from Twitter states that people were getting off planes from Italy and other European precincts and not being checked at all. Trump’s suspension of European flights last night is just another instance of his closing the barn door after every last horse has escaped.
–It’s cute how leagues or teams are taking incremental steps to block the virus. Like the fact that Notre Dame has told all of its students to stay away for the remainder of Lent (April 13) but that it plans to have the football team return for practice Sunday night. It’s Thursday morning as I write this and let me tell you, those practices ain’t happening.
—Remember how on Sunday I wrote that there were 17 states that had yet to test positive for the coronavirus? We’re down to six: Alabama, Alaska, Idaho, Maine, Montana and West Virginia (my Wyoming bet backfired). I don’t for a moment believe that those six states don’t have a coronavirus patient. They just don’t have the test kids or the people who will go and get tested.
–Let’s make this perfectly clear: Patient Zero in the United States, as far as history will mark it down, is Donald Trump. He’s the one who spread this disease more than any other person. And come election time this November I think a lot of Republicans are going to find out that their extended exposure to him over the past few years going to be equivalent to the plague as far as their political careers are concerned.
–A message to leagues, schools, churches, etc. Do NOT listen to the president. Suspend all activities immediately. Everything should cease through March 31. I hear that the PGA event still is scheduled to tee off today as are spring training games. Golfers and ball players, even if they must be individual renegades, simply should not appear. If people have learned anything in the past two weeks, you’d think they’d have learned not to downplay the gravity of this virus. I fear they haven’t.
–There are too many deniers on-air right now, particularly in financial news, who need to shut up. Joe Kernen of CNBC chief among them. It’s not about worrying about how to put a band-aid on the economy when the patient is bleeding out.
–You’d think Donald Trump’s most stalwart defender on the other side of The Pond would be smart enough to answer this question himself:
He’s not the first and he won’t be the last Donald Trump supporter to switch his allegiance. Just go away.
—The New York Times is now making its comprehensive coronavirus page free. Good move (but you should subscribe to The Times just the way you actually do pay for gas when you fill up your car).
–Donald Trump: “The virus will not have a chance against us.” It’s not ISIS, it’s VIRUS. This entire “the terrorists can’t win” mentality that has taken hold of red-cap America since 9/11 is frightfully dangerous because it encourages group-think, authoritarianism and blind patriotism in the face of reason and academic intelligence. And so now a bunch of soft-brained Americans are going to listen to a soft-brained president who think if we simply don’t kneel when the anthem is being played we’ll defeat the coronavirus. That’s not how it works, Stupid. And you’ll find out.
–We need testing kits. We need testing kits. We need them immediately.
–Last week I heard Donald Trump refer to Washington governor Jay Inslee as “a snake.” Two nights ago I watched him on Rachel Maddow and thought, Oh, this is how a president reacts to a crisis. I didn’t know much about Jay Inslee before that night. Right now I know he’s 100 times more qualified to be president than Donald Trump.
–Listen to this guy. This guy knows…
–From CNN, a compilation of all of President Trump’s lies or dishonest statements about the coronavirus.
–Moments such as this are why the Germans invented the word “zeitgeist.”
–At least Harvey Weinstein got what he deserves.
–Buried beneath all this coronavirus news? The Russian parliament tore off the band-aid, turned its back on its own Constitution, and installed Vladimir Putin as the nation’s leader until 2036. No more elections. Well, at least they’re being transparent now.
–I’m on a flight today so that should be interesting. Was headed to Arizona for a little R&R with our No. 1 reader (no, Susie B., you’re No. 2) but now we may have to re-brand it as self-quarantining in the desert. This will likely be our only post today (and I’ve got latex gloves for the flight).
–Be well, everyone.
Lemme get this straight – you’re about to ‘ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK’? Got your eyepatch in place? 🙂
I’m glad you’re going to a place of “lower population density”, which in these scary times means a better chance of survival. Plus, maybe all-you-can-eat lasagna is just the thing to fight off COVID-19!
Last night, I was watching the USWNT play Japan in the final game of the She Believes Cup (unlike the disgusting, needs-to-be-overhauled-ASAP US Soccer) when I saw the blurb that the Jazz-Thunder game was cancelled right before tip-off, with “no explanation”. I knew right then that the shi-it was about to hit the fan & that some player, coach, or other team personnel had tested positive. Yup, next thing you see is that the NBA suspends the season. After testing all the Jazz players, etc & everyone who works in their building, they need to test ALL the other teams (& their personnel) that have been in contact with them during the last 10 days. That pretty much uses up ALL the current USA testing kits, right?
I may sound a bit cavalier here at MH, but I’m actually getting quite worried. As you so helpfully remind me, I AM a bit older than you (although MY hair is less than 40% gray!), plus I have some health “issues”. So, scary times.
I was thinking about The Kitty last night (AKA “Mirk”) as it’s been a year since he joined the big litter box up in the sky (& is hopefully eating his weight daily in Chirping Chicken). After almost 18 years together, this past year must have been strange if not difficult for you. Maybe one day you’ll get a new “roommate” although I’m not sure what you can name him/her unless it’s “Two”, short for “Kitty 2”. 🙂
I join you in wishing everyone at the MH to be safe. In addition to worrying about my own personal health, we have THE WORST PERSON POSSIBLE in the WH & the WORST “administration”, which extends that worry for the entire country. What we need right now is the Green Arrow – to swoop into the Oval Office, yell “YOU HAVE FAILED THIS COUNTRY!” to Trump & then ‘dispatch’ him. Harvey Weinstein is now off to prison, so I’m not ruling anything out…
So, ahem, I have some good news & some bad news. 1st, the bad – my individual stock portfolio has now lost a THIRD of its value in 3 WEEKS. (Home Alone face slap!) Today I actually braved looking at the Total & current gain/loss columns (a skill I’ve recently discovered is I can go onto one of my investment sites & AVOID looking at these numbers & just click thru to a different screen; quite handy!) & TODAY’s “loss” is staggering. I’d gotten used to $9-11k swings but today – ARGH! Anyhoo, now the good news – I finally picked up some more DIS! I split my order & lowered the price targets, but I did get a little. I also finally got my 1st tiny bit of NEE; a stock I’ve been wanting for almost a year but it kept going up even when the rest of the markets went down, so I kept waiting for that ever elusive “pullback”. This week, it finally started going down substantially too.
Are you still playing with INO; the, er, “Bitcoin of Biotech”? I don’t know jdubs, I’ve read up a little since you mentioned it & the day (earlier this week) it got hammered for a 48% LOSS? That’s when it was called out for “gross exaggeration” about a COVID-19 vaccine. Be careful. Of course, if you play your cards “right”, you too can see a THIRD of your portfolio disappear in less than a month! 😉