Octopus Overlords

Skinypupy wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 2:08 pm

I realize this is a single anecdote, but it's concerning to me that the “health be damned…I’m losing money here!” attitude is coming from not only those who are very well off and should be able to manage (yes, I get that having lots of money doesn't necessarily mean they manage it well), but from those who are healthcare providers as well.

msteelers wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 2:32 pm When I worked in radio we had a lot of doctors come into the station. Some as guests, others paying for their own show. I got to talk and speak with all of them both on and off the air.

It was depressing how as soon as the mics were off, their attitude went from “I want to help you get healthy” to “I want to get all your money”.

LawBeefaroni wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 2:36 pm There are Doctors and then there are Doctor Ozes.

Zaxxon wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 2:49 pm

LawBeefaroni wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 2:36 pm There are Doctors and then there are Doctor Ozes.

This. Don't paint docs with a single brush. I know a bunch for whom money had nothing to do with their choice of profession.

The idea of reopening the country based on antibody tests runs into the technical limits of the tests themselves. Scientists don’t know exactly how long immunity to COVID-19 will last and what level of antibodies confers immunity. “There are just unknowns for an individual,” Gigi Gronvall, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security and a co-author of a recent report on antibody testing, told me. “The ‘get out of jail free’ card we’re hoping for, it’s just not how it should be sold,” she said. The World Health Organization on Friday warned that issuing “immunity certificates” based on antibody testing would be premature.

Moreover, Osterholm said, antibody tests don’t give a snapshot of the present. It can take two weeks for a patient to develop a detectable amount of antibodies in their blood, so antibody surveys are necessarily backward-looking. But when public-health officials are deciding whether schools or businesses are safe to reopen, the key piece of information is the number of people currently infected. “I want to know what is happening now,” Osterholm said, “and antibody testing will not get that to you.”

The key strategies for stopping the disease are still the same ones experts have been promoting from the beginning: testing, contact tracing, isolating for those who test positive for COVID-19, and social distancing for everyone else. “There’s going to have to be some level of new normal for a while,” Dean said. Ongoing antibody surveys will help clarify the true scope of the pandemic and the true proportion of asymptomatic carriers, and those data can indeed help inform public-health decisions. But as far as antibody testing goes, Gronvall said, “it’s not the silver bullet for everything.”

El Guapo wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 3:07 pm

Zaxxon wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 2:49 pm

LawBeefaroni wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 2:36 pm There are Doctors and then there are Doctor Ozes.

This. Don't paint docs with a single brush. I know a bunch for whom money had nothing to do with their choice of profession.

I would think that working in radio would skew the percentage of Dr. Ozes that you would encounter.

El Guapo wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 3:07 pm

Zaxxon wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 2:49 pm

LawBeefaroni wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 2:36 pm There are Doctors and then there are Doctor Ozes.

This. Don't paint docs with a single brush. I know a bunch for whom money had nothing to do with their choice of profession.

I would think that working in radio would skew the percentage of Dr. Ozes that you would encounter.

Faced with worries of a meat shortage caused by the coronavirus, President Donald Trump plans to order meat-processing plants to remain open, officials said Tuesday.

Trump plans to declare meat plants as critical infrastructure, and cite the Defense Production Act to justify an order to keep them open, said two officials familiar with the discussions, speaking on condition of anonymity because the order is not yet completed. The officials said Trump could sign the order Tuesday.

Zaxxon wrote:This. For a substantial part of the population, the economic side really is as bad as a major and potentially deadly health issue.

Zaxxon wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 6:51 pm And I'm fully in agreement that financially assisting these folks would have been the way to go. Rather than rewarding airlines for ruinous stock buybacks and putting out a PPP that largely benefitted those businesses not in the most dire of straits.

gbasden wrote:

Zaxxon wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 6:51 pm And I'm fully in agreement that financially assisting these folks would have been the way to go. Rather than rewarding airlines for ruinous stock buybacks and putting out a PPP that largely benefitted those businesses not in the most dire of straits.

Yes, but that would require a functional government, not a kleptocracy.

Isgrimnur wrote:To cannibalize a Second Amendment argument,

When days count, the government is months away.

Zarathud wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 7:39 pm

Isgrimnur wrote:To cannibalize a Second Amendment argument,

When days count, the government is months away.

When days count, the Trump administration plans on never having to act or take responsibility.

Mortoned.

coopasonic wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 4:09 pm He doesn't need a mask, he has God.

They are also all standing way too close together. Maybe this is Trump's way of trying to ditch Pence before the election.

Zaxxon wrote:True, I shouldn't have said it's as bad. That's clearly not true. But it will feel to some as though it is, and from a mental health perspective it might as well be--years or decades of work down the tubes, possibly effectively ending dreams permanently.

All's I'm saying is there's a subset of folks who I could empathize with should they be protesting. Which perhaps is a worthless position for me to post about, since it's largely not those folks doing the protesting.

And I'm fully in agreement that financially assisting these folks would have been the way to go. Rather than rewarding airlines for ruinous stock buybacks and putting out a PPP that largely benefitted those businesses not in the most dire of straits.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Tuesday that the next coronavirus bill has to include liability protections for employers or it will not pass the Senate.

"My red line going forward on this bill is we need to provide protection, litigation protection, for those who have been on the front lines. ... We can't pass another bill unless we have liability protection," McConnell said during an interview on Fox News, calling the additional legal protections a "condition" for the bill.

noxiousdog wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 8:53 pmI'm with you. It is increasingly hard for me to justify stay at home orders for the roughly 100 Texas counties that haven't seen a covid-19 death.. or at least don't have one recorded.

"If you're an employer and you offer to bring your employee back to work and they decide not to, that's a voluntary quit," Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds (R) said Friday. "Therefore, they would not be eligible for the unemployment money."

Reynolds also said employers who have workers that refuse to return should file a report with Iowa Workforce Development.

...

The situation is similar for workers in Texas, where Gov. Greg Abbott (R) on Monday gave the go-ahead for retail stores, restaurants, movie theaters and malls to reopen on Friday.

According to the Texas Workforce Commission, to qualify for unemployment benefits in the state, a worker must be “willing and able to work all the days and hours required for the type of work you are seeking."

Cisco Gamez, a Texas Workforce Commission spokesman, told the Texas Tribune that employees who choose not to return to work will become ineligible for unemployment benefits.

Smoove_B wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 9:49 pm Regarding Pence and not wearing a mask, he said it was because he wanted to look them "in the eye".

That's how bad things are in the administration. No one wants to tell the VP that's now how masks work. But seriously, we all know he's not wearing it because it would have hurt Trump's fe-fes.

Spoiler:

Daehawk wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 10:47 pm Who cares why he wasn't wearing a mask...he can keel over for all I care. But why did they let him in there without one. Made everyone else wear one. Its a rule at the Mayo clinic. Bowing to a despot and his lackey doesn't make them look good.

LawBeefaroni wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 11:28 pm

Daehawk wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 10:47 pm Who cares why he wasn't wearing a mask...he can keel over for all I care. But why did they let him in there without one. Made everyone else wear one. Its a rule at the Mayo clinic. Bowing to a despot and his lackey doesn't make them look good.

He probably took it off for the photo. He's a vain man.

noxiousdog wrote: Tue Apr 28, 2020 10:29 pm "The meat shortage" that Tyson tried to pull was clearly bullshit

US President Donald Trump has ordered meat processing plants to stay open to protect the nation's food supply amid the coronavirus pandemic.

He invoked a Korean War-era law from the 1950s to mandate that the plants continue to function, amid industry warnings of strain on the supply chain.

An estimated 3,300 US meatpacking workers have been diagnosed with coronavirus and 20 have died.

A White House official told US media it will work with the Department of Labor to issue guidance for vulnerable workers, such as over-65s and those with chronic health conditions, to stay at home.

The UFCW said the White House order would provide legal cover to companies in case employees catch coronavirus at work.

"We're working with Tyson," Mr Trump told reporters in the Oval Office earlier on Tuesday. "We're going to sign an executive order today, I believe, and that will solve any liability problems."

Richard Trumka, the president of the AFL-CIO union, said: "Using executive power to force people back on the job without proper protections is wrong and dangerous."

Billionaire Tesla boss Elon Musk lashed out Wednesday at lockdowns meant to contain the coronavirus in a series of early-morning Twitter posts echoing calls from protesters around the US.

“FREE AMERICA NOW,” Musk tweeted at 2:15 a.m.

The 48-year-old tech tycoon crowed “Bravo Texas!” in an earlier post hailing the Lone Star State for moving to reopen restaurants and retail stores this week. His praise came a week after Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said the state should lift restrictions because “there are more important things than living.”

stessier wrote: Wed Apr 29, 2020 8:55 am I'm curious about that EO. He can order the plants open, but he can't force the people to work, right? They still have the option to not go in?

malchior wrote: Wed Apr 29, 2020 9:05 am

stessier wrote: Wed Apr 29, 2020 8:55 am I'm curious about that EO. He can order the plants open, but he can't force the people to work, right? They still have the option to not go in?

Correct. The plant can fire them for not reporting in most cases. That is an option even in the people's republic of NJ. But they can't stop sick outs, drag people into work against their will, etc.

LawBeefaroni wrote: Wed Apr 29, 2020 9:02 am“FREE AMERICA NOW,” Musk tweeted at 2:15 a.m.

Zaxxon wrote: Wed Apr 29, 2020 9:15 am

malchior wrote: Wed Apr 29, 2020 9:05 am

stessier wrote: Wed Apr 29, 2020 8:55 am I'm curious about that EO. He can order the plants open, but he can't force the people to work, right? They still have the option to not go in?

Correct. The plant can fire them for not reporting in most cases. That is an option even in the people's republic of NJ. But they can't stop sick outs, drag people into work against their will, etc.

And they then will not qualify for unemployment in many states.

Zaxxon wrote: Wed Apr 29, 2020 9:15 am You may be surprised to learn that Elon Musk can be a major dick.

pr0ner wrote: Wed Apr 29, 2020 10:59 am Giving money straight to people rather than corporate bailouts is pretty much what Justin Amash has been pushing for on Twitter for weeks.

Trump says he wants blue states to give him "sanctuary-city adjustments" in exchange for federal financial relief