dpberr

The WHO, CDC and NIH will be breathlessly protecting their cozy crew of academia too. If China is #1 at fault, the academics doing this work and funding it are #1A. They knew of these labs, of the work, and the danger and they will all cover each other's asses because....grant money and some will believe the science must move forward, regardless of how many pandemics these idiots cause.

Absolutely. And that comes from a person who voted for him in 2016. It has never been one of his strengths, and this crisis highlights the weakness.

She's a lot like President Trump - a leader with zero personal intuition for how desperate/lonely/useless the average person may feel right now. None of these governors seem to realize at least publicly is that these lockdowns will never work again in most parts of the United States.

Elaine Chao's presence on the newest task force suggests to me the government may be looking at reopening states, and regions inside those states by MPOs. MPOs are organized by counties, and most states are tracking virus activity at the county level. Essentially the governors would lift restrictions in small groups of counties at a time, instead of piecemeal one here, one there.

The government creates the civil unrest. This is just an example of another click of the ratchet. They close the parks. They close the liquor stores. They tell you you can't go outside. They tell you what they think is essential for your family. 99 percent of it is unnecessary. The amount of time people are cool with all of this is running out. All that Michigan governor is doing is making for a dangerous situation at Walmart, Target, etc. between employees and shoppers. It won't take many weeks of that nonsense before it's Black Friday chaos.

I'd bet you that every single pandemic that has started in China in the last decade has originated from that lab.

Feel free but the facts bear it out - that system broke under the strain of disinvestment. A couple bucks in the north is wholly irrelevant.

To a degree, the models were based on Italy's experience with the virus because it was providing the most transparent data to model. I always thought that was going to jack the numbers up significantly. Italy is a flat broke, corrupt country that invests zero dollars in anything infrastructure related, including its healthcare system. You layer on top of it it''s one of the oldest and unhealthiest countries in Europe and just so happened to also be frequented heavily by Chinese workers and tourists in the months prior to outbreak, and you could see the disaster taking shape in hindsight. People thought the United States was caught off guard - it was 100 times worse in Italy in terms of shortages of equipment and hospital infrastructure.

IMO, we're on borrowed time after Easter on the eastern seaboard. The government has really ratcheted up that pressure here in PA - they've closed the liquor stores, closed parks and trails, and in Philly, they even removed the basketball rims. That's on top of weeks without work, school and pay.

In PA, inpatient hospitalization as a result of the virus is low. It's not being readily broadcast because people are idiots and many would blindly assume the crisis is all over and do all sorts of stupid things to erase the progress that's been made. Despite the media's absolute thirst for the bad news, some states are indeed beginning to turn the corner. Delaware hospitalizations are low as well. Ohio and Maryland hospitalizations are a little higher. NY and NJ are obviously considerably higher.

C.J. Spiller was a phenomenal athlete but a terrible football player. He couldn't understand a playbook and IMO, that was his downfall as a professional player.

Instead of saying all that, why doesn't he just say "hey, as President, I am going to make sure the United States ends its commitment to the WHO" and really send the shot? Why pull punches, which is what he's doing there?

Whoops, my bad.

Fundamentally flawed approach to start - it's considered "entertainment" and produced by the same people that make the sitcoms and shows America allegedly "loves".

He didn't follow the proper chain of command. He wrote the letter instead of talking to his immediate superior officer first. He also sent that letter to several people in the Navy, without the authorization or knowledge of his superiors. Unfortunately, you can't do any of that when you're in charge of an aircraft carrier in the United States Navy. He was in trouble regardless, but the Navy leadership, from what I read, believed he deserved a hearing, and that it did not rise to being immediately removed from the Navy. Hell, the Navy has had captains of submarines that have hit fishing boats and ships that hit all sorts of stuff and they received due process. This captain...wrote a letter. Was he going to remain as captain of the ship? Highly unlikely as it doesn't show the best judgement, even under the stressful conditions. You always follow the chain of command. You just don't write a four page letter and send it to whomever you want.

Another not so bright one. Although most will point to the speech as to what did him in, I suspect it was his decision to relieve the captain of the Roosevelt against the recommendation of everyone in the military leadership that put the pressure on him to resign. I will say it does take some pretty big balls to fly to the ship and give a speech and talk trash about the guy you just fired. Either that or a ridiculous amount of stupidity and hubris, which the Trump cabinet appears to have a lot of these days. This whole episode was stupid and avoidable. The captain acted stupid. This secretary just doubled, and then tripled down on it.

Maybin stands out to me because he had all the red flags that the alleged football professionals should have seen and then thought about before making the pick. They were waving those red flags in Pennsylvania. He was a one -year wonder, undersized for the position, and had questionable interest in football even in college.

Safe, weak and uninspired move. I'd hate to work for that hand wringing, anxiety-ridden company. Instead of truly taking the time to fix the MNF product, they will instead have two broken products.

I like Dr. Brix and all her scarves. She's grown on me. They aren't going to open up the country with the deep south, Detroit, and Chicago all on deck.

On a daily basis, Kushner, Kudlow and Navarro routinely battle each other for who's the largest moron in the cabinet. I think Kushner is dangerously stupid. Kudlow probably still thinks the virus is contained and Navarro just likes making Trump happy. I don't buy for a second that the United States was caught completely by surprise by what was happening in China. It's just that we either didn't care, were too distracted, or not smart enough to figure it out, and that's on *everybody* in Washington.

I don't think Trump has managed the pandemic as effectively as he could have and could be. The federal confusion has put a lot of mediocre governors in positions of actually having to lead and make really big decisions. However, much like 2016, the Democrats have selected a person that inspires even less faith in managing a crisis like this. Joe Biden inspires zero confidence.

Both men are correct despite the messengers. That's the difficult problem. Yes the "mitigation" works. It is giving hospitals time and saving lives. However, in perpetuity, it will seed civil unrest and put exceptional strain on already battered cities, police departments, the NG and the supply chain. That's the scenario when the grocery store closes. The virus is trouble. The virus with looting, fires, and a 24-7 crime wave is the big trouble that has so many more vulnerable people than the virus alone. .

The NBA season is over. The MLB 2020 season probably won't be played. I doubt the NFL season starts on time. Sure, we might knock this first wave down but with the fall comes cold weather, and you can't have tens of thousands of people packed in stadiums. If they do it, it's probably a fan every other seat, zero tailgating.

I was an early purchaser of your #2 theory, actually. I think both the 2009 swine flu outbreak and this outbreak were the results of Chinese screwups in their labs. In both instances, the US government seemed to have a heads up about something awry in China well before the outbreak came into focus for the rest of the world.

I enjoy a good conspiracy theory. Please share with the class.