Saturday
Mar072020
The Commentariat -- March 8, 2020
Afternoon Update:
Darius Tahir of Politico: "The government's top infectious disease expert on Sunday said that the coronavirus outbreak is getting worse and warned elderly and sick people to think twice before traveling or circulating in crowds. The remarks from Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, signaled a change in tone from health officials representing the Trump administration, making it clear that the outbreak is past the point where it can be prevented from spreading or easily tracked. That contrasted with the more measured language from some Trump officials including Vice President Mike Pence."
Matt Wilstein of the Daily Beast: "After Surgeon General Jerome Adams advised on State of the Union Sunday morning that older Americans and those with underlying medical issues should 'think very carefully' before taking long flights or going into big crowds, CNN host Jake Tapper reminded him that all three men currently running for president -- Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump -- fall into that at least one if not both of those categories. 'Should those three stop traveling? Should they stop holding rallies?' Tapper asked. Without answering that question directly, Adams told Tapper that he has been reminding President Trump to wash his hands frequently. 'But speaking of being at risk, the president, he sleeps less than I do and he's healthier than what I amthe surgeon general, who is in his mid-40s, insisted."
Justine Coleman of the Hill: "President Trump in an early morning tweet on Sunday accused the 'Fake News Media' of attempting to 'make us look bad' on the administration's coronavirus response. The president called the White House's plan to combat the growing outbreak in the U.S. 'perfectly coordinated and fine tuned.'"
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Brian Resnick of Vox with "eight things to know about 'springing forward.'" Mrs. McC: One thing to know about daylight savings time, which I never knew: "... it's definitely called 'daylight saving time.' Not plural. Be sure to point out this common mistake to friends and acquaintances. You'll be really popular."
Brett Samuels & Jessie Hellmann of the Hill: "The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has tested 1,583 people for the coronavirus since the first cases were identified in the U.S. in January, health officials said Saturday. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Stephen Hahn told reporters at the White House that figure would increase as more tests are shipped nationwide to address demand. But officials made clear that an individual could be tested only if it was approved by a doctor or public health official, contradicting President Trump's previous claims about test availability. Meanwhile, the CDC had recently shipped enough kits to public health labs to test 75,000 patients, Hahn said.... After facing criticism over the CDC's slow pace of testing in the U.S., the FDA made it easier for commercial labs to manufacture and perform their own tests. More than 2.1 million of those tests will be shipped by Monday to commercial labs, Hahn said, which would translate to roughly 850,000 people who could be tested because current CDC guidelines require two swabs per patient. However, Americans will not be able to get tested for the coronavirus unless it is ordered by a doctor or public health official, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said Saturday. Azar's comments contradict President Trump's assertion a day earlier that 'anybody that wants a test can get a test.'..."
** Mike Stobbe of AP: "The White House overruled health officials who wanted to recommend that elderly and physically fragile Americans be advised not to fly on commercial airlines because of the new coronavirus, a federal official told The Associated Press. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention submitted the plan this week as a way of trying to control the virus, but White House officials ordered the air travel recommendation be removed[.]" --safari: Only one source of the info., but believable. ~~~
~~~ Bob Brigham of the Raw Story: "... Donald Trump was harshly criticized following the [AP] report's publication, here's some of what people were saying[.]"
~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: If you're over the age of 60, see advice in the right-hand column under "Public Service Announcements" on how to avoid contracting the coronavirus (or other communicable illnesses, for that matter). The advice includes, uh, avoiding air travel.
Darlene Superville of the AP: "... Donald Trump says he isn't concerned 'at all' about the coronavirus getting closer to the White House after the nation's capital reported its first case Saturday. Maryland officials warned Saturday that a person who attended the recent Conservative Political Action Conference [CPAC] in the suburb of Oxon Hill had tested positive for the virus. Both Trump and Vice President Mike Pence spoke at the conference. The White House said Saturday there was no indication that either had met or were in 'close proximity' to the infected attendee. Asked if he was concerned about the virus getting closer, Trump said: 'No, I'm not concerned at all. No, I'm not. We've done a great job.'"
Michael Shear, et al., of the New York Times: "From the beginning, the Trump administration's attempts to forestall an outbreak of a virus now spreading rapidly across the globe was marked by a raging internal debate about how far to go in telling Americans the truth. Even as the government's scientists and leading health experts raised the alarm early and pushed for aggressive action, they faced resistance and doubt at the White House -- especially from the president -- about spooking financial markets and inciting panic." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Situation Normal -- All Fucked Up. Ashley Parker, et al., of the Washington Post: The Trump Administration made "many preventable missteps and blunders in [its] handling of the coronavirus crisis -- the embodiment of an administration that, for weeks, repeatedly squandered opportunities to manage and prepare for a global epidemic that has killed thousands worldwide and at least 19 so far in the United States.... Public health experts and officials faced a deluge of challenges, almost from the beginning. First there were the problems with the initial coronavirus test kits, which contained an unspecified problem with a compound that prompted inconclusive results.... Infighting quickly materialized among agencies that have long had poor relationships ... and when the situation went awry, recriminations were swift.... Trump and many of his aides were initially skeptical of just how serious the coronavirus threat was, while the president often seemed uninterested as long as the virus was abroad." ~~~
~~~ Dan Diamond of Politico: "For six weeks behind the scenes, and now increasingly in public, Trump has undermined his administration's own efforts to fight the coronavirus outbreak -- resisting attempts to plan for worst-case scenarios, overturning a public-health plan upon request from political allies and repeating only the warnings that he chose to hear. Members of Congress have grilled top officials like Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar and Centers for Disease Control Director Robert Redfield over the government's biggest mistake: failing to secure enough testing to head off a coronavirus outbreak in the United States. But many current and former Trump administration officials say the true management failure was Trump's.... Interviews with 13 current and former officials, as well as individuals close to the White House, painted a picture of a president who rewards those underlings who tell him what he wants to hear while shunning those who deliver bad news."
David Nakamura of the Washington Post assesses Trump's performance at his CDC Atlanta visit Friday. Nakamura doesn't grade Trump, but his review reads like a "D-", at best. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~
~~~ Adam Rogers of Wired: "As a reporter, in general I'm not supposed to say something like this, but: The president's statements to the press were terrifying. That press availability was a repudiation of good science and good crisis management from inside one of the world's most respected scientific institutions. It was full of Dear Leader-ish compliments, non-sequitorial defenses of unrelated matters, attacks on an American governor, and -- most importantly -- misinformation about the virus and the US response."
~~~ Dana Milbank of the Washington Post: "Do you have a nagging medical concern?... Well, fret no more. America now has a leading medical expert -- some say the best -- who will dispense diagnoses and prognoses to all -- for free! This bold new telemedicine initiative, 'Ask Dr. Trump,' will be offered on an unpredictable but highly frequent basis to all Americans (whether they like it or not). Dr. Donald J. Trump, of course, is the pioneering scientist who first determined that climate change is a hoax and, more recently, discovered that windmills cause cancer. In between, he proved that forest fires could be contained by 'raking' and identified a previously unrecognized tropical cyclone pattern targeting Alabama. Dr. Trump acquired what he calls 'a natural instinct for science' not through formal education but because 'my uncle was a great professor at MIT for many years.' Sadly, the elder Trump didn't live to see his nephew's greatest discoveries in the medical field: The flu shot is basically 'injecting bad stuff into your body' and exercise can shorten your life. Dr. Trump used his instinctive grasp of medicine to become 'the healthiest individual ever elected to the presidency' with an innate life expectancy of 200 years." Read on. (Also linked yesterday.)
The Know-Nothing President*. Ctd. ... I didn't know people died from the flu.... And ... you had a couple of years where it was over a 100,000 people died from the flu. -- Donald Trump, Friday ~~~
~~~ Gillian Brockell of the Washington Post: "There have been several years where more than 100,000 Americans were killed by particularly nasty influenza strains. One of those episodes was ... 1918. That is the year Trump's paternal grandfather ... died of the flu.... Friedrich Trump was a successful, 49-year-old businessman, husband and father of three living in Queens, according to Gwenda Blair in her 2001 book 'The Trumps: Three Generations That Built an Empire.' One day in May, he came home from a stroll feeling sick. He died almost immediately. He was a victim of the first wave of the Spanish flu pandemic. A second, deadlier wave hit in the fall. All told, the pandemic killed at least 50 million people worldwide and 675,000 in the United States, according to the CDC." ~~~
~~~ ** Kali Holloway of the Daily Beast has the story here. "The president's grandfather, in fact, was one of the first domestic casualties of the world's worst modern pandemic, which ultimately millions. The death toll was undoubtedly worsened by the efforts of President Woodrow Wilson's administration to talk down the health risk. Sound familiar?" Mrs. McC: Holloway's report on the 1918 Sedition Act should terrify you. What probably is saving us from a similar law now is House Democrats.
Not So Funny Now, Is It, Frat Boy? Kim Bellware of the Washington Post: "Days after Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) wore an enormous gas mask during a House floor vote on an emergency funding package for the coronavirus response, the congressman announced that a resident in his northwestern Florida district had died of covid-19." Mrs. McC: It doesn't take a stable genius to figure out that joking about a pandemic will not well-serve the joker, but perhaps he does have to extricate himself from the Trump Bubble to know that Covid-19 is not a "Democrat hoax" ripe for mocking.
Taylor Locke of CNBC: "Amtrak is canceling its high-speed Acela nonstop service between Washington, D.C. and New York through late May as consumer demand weakens amid concern over the coronavirus outbreak.... The Acela nonstop service will be temporarily suspended starting Tuesday, March 10 until Tuesday, May 26. Passengers can still take Amtrak’s slower, northeast regional trains between the two cities."
Lorenzo Tondo of the Guardian: "The Italian government is to lockdown the northern region of Lombardy, as it battles to contain the spread of the coronavirus. A draft decree would extend the quarantined areas, so-called 'red-zones', ordering people not to enter or leave the region.... Rome is also considering prolonging the closure of schools across the country until 3 April, while major sporting events, such as Serie A football games, will be played behind closed doors. The number of coronavirus cases in Italy leapt by more than 1,200 in a 24-hour period, the civil protection agency said on Saturday." According to the Wall Street Journal, the quarantined area also would include 11 surrounding provinces. (Via the Verge.) ~~~
~~~ Update. Jason Horowitz of the New York Times: "Italy's government early Sunday took the extraordinary step of locking down much of the country's north, restricting movement for about a quarter of the Italian population in regions that serve as the country's economic engine.... By taking such tough measures, Italy, which is suffering the worst outbreak in Europe, sent a signal that restrictive clampdowns at odds with some of the core values of Western democracies may be necessary to contain and defeat the virus.... More generally, the wobbly Italian government, which has had difficulty passing basic laws, was attempting a crackdown of historic scope in a continent fiercely protective of its personal liberties and in a country with a tendency to interpret laws as suggestions or hurdles to circumvent."
Igor Derysh of Salon: "President Donald Trump's properties have charged taxpayers nearly eight times more than previously claimed for Secret Service stays, according to new documents obtained by the watchdog group Public Citizen. Eric Trump has claimed that Secret Service agents 'stay at our properties for free -- meaning, like, cost for housekeeping.' He insisted last year that 'we charge them, like, 50 bucks.' But receipts ... show that Trump's properties have charged the Secret Service $396 per night for 177 rentals at Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort since he took office.... The report found that taxpayers spent more than $471,000 on Trump properties, but the new receipts show that the Trump Organization charged Secret Service an additional $157,000 since 2017, bringing the total to more than $628,000." --s
Martyn McLaughlin of The Scotsman: "[A]n official European Union agency has issued a series of far-reaching decisions which experts believe will impact on the Trump Organisation's ability to enforce its rights over numerous products and services associated with the Trump brand.... Trump's company has been engaged in a fight with a little-known firm based in the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg since March 2018...,[producing] nearly 1,300 pages of evidence..., includ[ing] a series of statistical sets detailing a decline in golf custom at Turnberry, the US president's flagship international resort, since he bought it in 2014.... [T]he number of visitors booking use of golf facilities at the property ... has fallen from 11,835 in 2014 to 7,483 in 2018.... [T]he number of golf club members ... has dropped from 434 to 373 over the same period ... despite a sizable investment..., anywhere between £150m and £250m." --s
Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: AND I guess we'll have to mention Melanie's Covfefe-19 Memorial White House Tennis Pavillion, since Anonymous raiseed the matter in yesterday's Comments: ~~~
~~~ Eliza Relman & Ellen Cramley of Business Insider: "... Melania Trump tweeted on Thursday about the construction of a new private White House tennis pavilion amid concern that the Trump administration isn't doing enough to contain the coronavirus outbreak. 'I am excited to share the progress of the Tennis Pavillion at @WhiteHouse,' she tweeted alongside photos of herself in a hard hat at the construction site. 'Thank you to the talented team for their hard work and dedication.' Critics were quick to condemn Trump's announcement.... The first lady pushed back against her critics in a tweet on Saturday morning.... 'I encourage everyone who chooses to be negative & question my work at the @WhiteHouse to take time and contribute something good & productive in their own communities,' she tweeted, adding the hashtag for her childhood wellness campaign, #BeBest." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Sharon LaFraniere of the New York Times: "Attorney General William P. Barr ... increasingly appears to be chiseling away at [Robert Mueller's investigation]. The attorney general's handling of the results of th Russia inquiry came under fire when a federal judge questioned this week whether Mr. Barr had sought to create a 'one-sided narrative' clearing Mr. Trump of misconduct.... In fact, Mr. Barr's comments then were but the first in a series of actions in which he cast doubt not just on the findings of the inquiry by the special counsel ... and some of the resulting prosecutions, but on its very premise.... Mr. Barr has assigned a federal prosecutor to investigate the [investigation] further and has suggested that the inquiry might conclude that the F.B.I. acted in bad faith.... Last month, Mr. Barr appointed another outside prosecutor to review a case that Mr. Mueller brought against the president's former national security adviser Michael T. Flynn for lying to the F.B.I. And in a second case that the Mueller team brought against Roger J. Stone Jr., Mr. Trump's longtime friend, the attorney general overruled career prosecutors to seek a more lenient prison sentence...." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
"All the Best People," Ctd. Daniel Lippman of Politico: "The White House has placed another college senior in an influential administration position.... Anthony Labruna, who starts on Monday, is not slated to graduate from Iowa State University until early May. In the meantime, he'll be deputy White House liaison at the Department of Commerce.... One person familiar with the matter said that Labruna was foisted on Commerce at the urging of 29-year-old PPO director John McEntee, who has been charged by the president with keeping his administration stocked with loyal officials.... The role is a sensitive one: The job of a White House liaison entails matching qualified people with political vacancies at the department, headed up by Secretary Wilbur Ross, and moving appointees in and out of those positions as needed." --s
How Low Will They Go? So Low, Can't Get Under It. Mark Mazzetti & Adam Goldman of the New York Times: "Erik Prince, the security contractor with close ties to the Trump administration, has in recent years helped recruit former American and British spies for secretive intelligence-gathering operations that included infiltrating Democratic congressional campaigns, labor organizations and other groups considered hostile to the Trump agenda, according to interviews and documents. One of the former spies, an ex-MI6 officer named Richard Seddon, helped run a 2017 operation to copy files and record conversations in a Michigan office of the American Federation of Teachers.... [Prince's sister Betsy] DeVos has been a vocal critic of teachers' unions.... Using a different alias the next year, the same undercover operative infiltrated the congressional campaign of Abigail Spanberger, then a former C.I.A. officer who went on to win an important House seat in Virginia as a Democrat. The campaign discovered the operative and fired her. Both operations were run by Project Veritas.... The Trump Foundation gave $20,000 to Project Veritas in 2015, the year that Mr. Trump began his bid for the presidency." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
~~~ Dave Itzkoff of the New York Times reports on SNL's cold open.
Presidential Race
Sarah Kendzior of the Globe and Mail: "On Super Tuesday, voters decided that the best people to determine the American future were old men who, statistically, will likely not live to see even the near-term outcomes of their efforts.... Americans do not know if they will live in a democracy or an autocracy, but they will undoubtedly live in a gerontocracy. A gerontocracy is dangerous in a time of profound existential threats. The Democratic nominee will be battling the climate crisis, rising autocracy worldwide and a global recession exacerbated by a pandemic. They will also be facing off against the Trump regime, whose flagrant corruption and decimation of institutions has put American democracy in unprecedented peril.... To capture their votes, Democrats must make a compelling case about how they will protect that future -- even though their presidential nominee will not live to see it." --s
An Aspirational Freudian Slip. Benjamin Fearnow of Newsweek: "Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar mistakenly told cheering Joe Biden supporters in Michigan Saturday that she's honored to join his 2020 'ticket,' before she quickly corrected the apparent verbal slip-up.... Klobuchar's brief suggestion immediately encouraged speculation about who is vying for the vice president role on a potential Biden ticket."
The Guardian has a live blog on activities commemorating International Women's Day. --s
Nice Company, Andy! Ryan Fahey of the (U.K.) Daily Mail: "Prince Andrew has recruited an extradition lawyer once used by Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet after the FBI demanded an interview with the royal over his links to Jeffrey Epstein.... Claire Montgomery QC, known as the leading extradition lawyer in the UK, is said to be advising the 60-year-old Duke...."
Beyond the Beltway
Massachusetts. Ed Pilkington of the Guardian: "The US government has banned an electric shock machine that is used to zap children and young adults with special needs in a school outside Boston -- the only institution in the world known to practice the controversial punishment 'treatment'.... The ban brings to an end a decades-long battle against the use of electric shocks at the Judge Rotenberg Educational Center (JRC) in Canton, Massachusetts.... More than 40 special needs residents of JRC, many with severe forms of autism, are understood to be on the electric shock regime." --s
Way Beyond
Poland. A PBS Network Even Trump Would Like. Vanessa Gera of the AP: "Poland's president has signed a bill earmarking nearly 2 billion zlotys ($510 million) to fund public television and radio, broadcast outlets that have become mouthpieces for the country's right-wing government and given the president positive coverage as he campaigns for reelection. President Andrzej Duda, who hails from the ruling Law and Justice party, signed the funding bill late Friday as he campaigns for a second five-year term in a May election.... In [signing the bill], he allowed a large injection of money to go into broadcasters that were already helping his campaign." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~
~~~ I am excited to announce the introduction of "Fifth Avenue," an educational entertainment show for the kiddies featuring Big Eagle, Barack the Grouch & a cast of beautiful, rich white people. Today's show stars the Letter "A" for "Abercrombie." Tune in tomorrow to meet the letter "B" for "Bergdorf." And the kids won't want to miss "C" for "Cartier" -- they'll all enjoy learning to tell time the old-fashioned way with this beautiful Cartier watch with fuchsia alligator strap for only $70,800.00 (free shipping!).
Saudi Arabia. David Kirkpatrick & Ben Hubbard of the New York Times: "The scope of a new roundup of Saudi royals widened on Saturday with word that a fourth senior prince has been detained under orders from the crown prince, according to two people close to the royal family, the latest step by the kingdom's de facto ruler to consolidate power. The wave of arrests has now ensnared a former head of army intelligence, Prince Nayef bin Ahmed, as well as at least three other senior princes, all detained on Friday. The full extent of the roundup is still not clear. The detentions raised questions about whether Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, 34, would soon seek to take formal power from his aging father, King Salman, 84. They could also indicate that the crown prince was worried about discontent within the royal family as plummeting oil prices strained the country's budget and economy...."
News Lede
The New York Times' latest live updates on developments in the coronavirus epidemic are here. "The Grand Princess cruise ship that has been held off the coast of California after 21 people onboard tested positive for the coronavirus will dock on Monday at the port of Oakland, the vessel's operator said. Passengers on the ship who require 'acute medical treatment and hospitalization' will disembark first and be taken to facilities in California, according to the boat's operator, Princess Cruises." ~~~
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Reader Comments (9)
So Melanie's answer to "Let them eat cake." is "Let them play tennis."
Way to #BeBest, Mel.
Don't think of it as daylight "saving" time, think of it as one less
hour or trumpropaganda. And always wash your hands after
typing trump.
Gosh––a female(ex) presidential candidate who has a sense of humor and great timing–-who knew? SNL's got some of the best food for fodder ever!
While I was making the bed this morning Melania popped up –-in my mind–-and I thought how absolutely bizarre her "Be Best" slogan is–-does she ever! in the dark of night ponder the fact that her husband is doing just the opposite? Of course we do have another marital team that defies understanding–-the Conways so I guess when you enter Trump territory you just naturally enter the Twilight Zone.
My scientist son says best to stock your cupboards with staples and essentials just in case stores start to close their doors which has happened in Iran and Italy.
And since it's Sunday it's time again for The Sunday Sermon:
Epicurus asked the old question–-"Is God willing to prevent evil but not able? then he is impotent. Is he able but not willing? then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Whence, then, EVIL" Or put another way:
As Yehuda Bauer did in a pithy new form: "There is no way that there can be an all=powerful AND just God: He can either be all powerful OR 'Just'. Because if he's all– powerful, he's Satan. If he's 'Just' he's a Nebbish."
and so it goes~~~~~~~~~
And a happy International Women's Day to all RC women!
@Marie: Forgot to thank you for the info on the "Medicare for all" question I had. Much appreciated.
A few weeks ago, I discovered the twitter timeline of Rep Richard Dangler (D-WA). @RDangler. Probably late to the party. If you aren't offended by bluntness and profanity, he's hilarious and prescient on most subjects. On Melania Trump and her #BeBest scolding:
"I'll be changing out a shower head in a condo for an 81 year old woman. Thursday it was a baseboard heater.
We help the people who need it.
You do nothing of the sort.
That's why America is #BeBest ing your surgically enhanced ass out of the White House next November."
Clarificaiton may not be necessary, but I had to look Dangler up.
As best I can tell, Anonymous, while Dangler is funnier than most politicians--I'm excepting Obama and a few others- he is not a MOC here in WA ST. That moniker is just part of an extended joke I was uncertain about.
But yes, he is funny. Thanks.
Thanks for the story about 3-D printer house. This is what progress looks like.
And happy International Women's Day.
I'm 70 and it took 70 years to pass the 19th Amendment. Let's hope it doesn't take 70 more years to elect a woman POTUS--
KW. Thanks. I was duped I guess. But, like you said, he's pretty funny.
Yesterday I was going into STBX. A young woman ahead of me opened the door with her elbow. I chuckled. Last night, the school district (CA - 63K students) in my town closed the schools next week because a family with school aged children had tested positive for COVID-19. The particulars of their contact with the virus weren't made public. I guess that young woman knew something I didn't.