Wednesday Morning Links

by | Apr 15, 2020 | Daily Links | 508 comments

Had enough of waiting.

Yankees co-owner Hank Steinbrenner died in Florida yesterday after a lengthy illness. New York has probably counted it as a coronavirus death. And Dana White is planning on a major UFC event on May 9th. So there was some sports news for a change.

Hee-Haw!

Super-genius Leonardo da Vinci was born on this day. He shares it with Sikhism founder Guru Nanak, commie asshole Nikita Khrushchev, super-commie asshole Kim Il-sung, (overrated) chocolate-egg maker Adrian Cadbury, Bewitched actress Elizabeth Montgomery, Hee-Haw’s Roy Clark, advice-columnist writer Heloise, actress Emma Thompson, King Philippe of Belgium, Canadian person Seth Rogan, man-jawed actress Emma Watson, and the lovely Maisie Williams.

That was an interesting list. And now…the links!

Trump must have his ego assuaged. I don’t know what the purpose this serves. And the media will rightly make hay of it.

PAY ATTENTION TO MEEEE!

Older man and woman suffers some side effects from medication. Gotta make sure that’s the lede rather that, you know, “person survives Coronavirus while taking experimental drug”.

This seems legit. Actually, wait a minute. It doesn’t seem legitimate at all.

For those governors and health experts out there saying we’ll never gat back to normal until there’s a vaccine, this will hopefully shut them up for good.

Hooray!!! Now do the United Nations.

Identical twins

Poor Fredo. He can’t even verbally assault someone without getting shit in return. I hope he makes it out of this by getting the mental health care he obviously needs.

Governor refuses to order statewide ban. Has localized outbreak. Media goes bananas.

When anecdotal evidence gets passed off as fact. I guess those bears knew the virus would happen so they reproduced a lot more vigorously last year.

Hopefully people start singing this once the lockdowns end.

Now go have a great day, friends!

About The Author

sloopyinca

sloopyinca

508 Comments

  1. Scruffy Nerfherder

    commie asshole Nikita Khrushchev, super-commie asshole Kim Il-sung

    Not real commies.

    • sloopyinca

      “We like your way of thinking. You looking for a job?”
      -Ivy League History Department

    • Don Escaped Kenosha

      We watched Death of Stalin the other night. Buscemi is a master actor: he’s so believable, while everyone else has this Broadway musical overprojection about them; he’s real . . . even as Khruschchev.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        That’s on my list of to things to watch. I’m trying to get thru Tales From The Loop right now, but the incessant Sally Struthers UNICEF piano riff is annoying me.

      • Ted S.

        Something about that movie kept rubbing me the wrong way. Probably that the dialogue felt so inauthentic.

      • Don Escaped Kenosha

        no doubt: if you turn on your comic sensibilities, the authenticity leaks away

        I watched it like Josey Wales or, if you like, Joe Pesci: suspending disbelief in a way

        loved the clothes and cars

      • Don Escaped Kenosha

        This Gilmore . . . this one time . . . was not my fault.

      • Don Escaped Kenosha

        Glibs have it all wrong

        But while Blade Runner’s once-distant future of November 2019 feels resonant in so many ways—vast corporate power, persistent surveillance, life in a time of constant crisis—it misses the actual 2019’s most salient feature: an inescapable, painful awareness of politics and of the presence or deliberate absence of government in daily life.

        * stupefied blink *

      • WTF

        deliberate absence of government in daily life

        I wish I could live in the alternate reality they are living in.

  2. Scruffy Nerfherder

    I guess those bears knew the virus would happen so they reproduced a lot more vigorously last year.

    Need Tonio to weigh in on this one.

    • Not Adahn

      Might want to go with Animal or Grzzly for this one.

  3. Pat

    I don’t know what the purpose this serves.

    I would presume the goal is to embed in the minds of the plebes the man they have to thank for their stellar good fortune.

    • sloopyinca

      It’s egocentric, that’s for sure. I can’t believe people close to him didn’t try to talk him out of it. The optics are terrible and I assure you opponents will beat him over the head with it.

      • Don Escaped Kenosha

        It absolutely does not move the needle: it doesn’t surprise a single soul, and it doesn’t change a single electoral vote.

        Mr Trump’s inclinations, principles, and postures are well understood; there’s no need for any more research in the matter.

      • SUPREME OVERLORD trshmnstr

        It absolutely does not move the needle

        It galvanizes the base, especially the low-information portion of the base.

        People aren’t going to remember the media backlash 6 months from now. They may, however, remember whose name was on that $1200 check they got.

      • Don Escaped Kenosha

        galvanizes the base

        I guess we have different understandings of what moving the needle means

        there is no base in Kenosha to motivate

        and MS only has six electoral votes

      • SUPREME OVERLORD trshmnstr

        Two points:

        1) elections are turnout driven these days, which means that almost everything a politician does is geared toward galvanizing the base.

        2) youre giving the voting public way too much credit. If you can’t express a sentiment in caveman logic, it goes over the head of your average voter. The thought process (if you can call it that) is “Virus scary, job gone. Trump bad leader.” He’s trying to change it to “Virus scary, job gone, Trump give me dollars. Trump good leader.”

      • SUPREME OVERLORD trshmnstr

        To be clear, it’s not that the individual voter is an idiot (many are), but that all nuance gets cut off when you gauge the sentiments of 80 million people in aggregate.

        It may seem that my points are in tension, but I don’t think they are. Turnout relies on momentum, much like sports. It’s why Jimmy Carter got soundly beat in his second election. It’s really hard to motivate voters when they’re suffering through a shit economy.

      • Don Escaped Kenosha

        great points; I’ve made them myself

        1/ WHO votes WHERE, a drum I pound here almost daily

        2/ Well, we don’t want to John this thread, so I’ll just agree with you: there’s great news in the recent Trump machinations that, when advertised in a way that the past three years and decades of identity politics didn’t already enshrine, might get the one guy in Kenosha who always wanted to vote for Trump but just stayed home for some reason in 2016 and 2108 to, by heck, get up and get down to the precinct in 2020. It could happen.

      • RAHeinlein

        See also:

        Why come I no received any tax cut? (person who had their Fed tax rate cut to zero).

      • Agent Cooper

        It takes the heat off of other things that might be happening in the immediate vicinity.

    • Certified Public Asshat

      This. I wonder how many people getting a check do not even know they are getting a check?

      • Grosspatzer

        Turns out I am actually getting a check. From my employer. $500 to every employee to “defray the cost and inconvenience of working from home”, which is funny since I am saving big $$ by not needing to commute. Anyhow, this is how businesses exploit the poor working class, amirite?

    • Fatty Bolger

      Yep. Just like how $20 million of the stimulus funds were spent putting up stimulus road signs, so everybody would know who they should thank for their shiny new roads.

    • Heroic Mulatto

      EVERYBODY IN AMERICA WHO NOT MINORITY GOT TRUMPBUCKS! KEEP TRUMP IN PRESIDENT, YOU KNOW? HE GAVE US A CHECK!

      • Not Adahn

        I didn’t get Trumpbux. That makes me a minority?

        *dunks basketball*

      • UnCivilServant

        Yeah, you’re in the minority that makes $99k+/year fed taxable gross.

      • Heroic Mulatto

        You try making sense out of the Obamaphone lady’s rant.

    • Slammer

      The checks were being called Trumpbucks right after they were announced. It sucks they’re not an actual, physical check tho. Having a wheelbarrow of them to buy a load of bread

      • DrOtto

        Get ’em in ones to have something to wipe with.

  4. Nephilium

    One of my friends thinks we have to continue the lockdown until there’s a vaccine. Damn all of these unseen and unforeseeable consequences that are happening now due to the shutdown!

    In local news, the hero we need?

    • Drake

      That was the great thing about living in a free country. If your friend was too risk adverse to go outside, he was free to stay in (until he’s evicted at least), while I was free to leave my house and do whatever I wanted.

    • Drake

      Whose ready for some Taiwan baseball? I would watch at this point. It’s from the good China.

  5. Pat

    This seems legit.

    They found the bodies in the trunk of a car along with 50 boxes of all-Democratic party line ballots.

    • Rhywun

      LOL

      What a disgraceful, but thoroughly expected, act. Gotta keep up the Panic!

    • Spartacus

      Mayor Bill de Blasio admitted last week that the true number of deaths was far higher than the official tally, and said the city would start including presumed coronavirus cases in its data just making shit up.

  6. UnCivilServant

    Poor Fredo. He can’t even verbally assault someone without getting shit in return. I hope he makes it out of this by getting the mental health care he obviously needs.

    I donno, it sounds like the guy on the bike was the one who started shit. Fredo just aired his greivences publically. So they’re both assholes.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      This. It’s New Yorkers being New Yorkers.

    • sloopyinca

      I think the guy’s argument was reasonable seeing as Cuomo was there at a property being built, with multiple people, some not even his immediate family, when he’s supposed to be in quarantine since he tested positive.
      He’s been touting his brother’s severe restrictions and isn’t even following them although he’s tested positive.

      • UnCivilServant

        I still have a severe dislike of people who hassle others and poke their noses into other people’s business. So bike riding Dave gets no credit just because he’s hassling a hypocrite

      • SUPREME OVERLORD trshmnstr

        It’s a story where everybody thinks they’re the protagonist, and nobody actually is.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        It’s a Karen versus Fredo situation,

      • Festus

        So we are all in agreement here? Inconceivable!

      • Pope Jimbo

        K-Fredoline?

        worst b-list celebrity

      • Festus

        He gets some credit for hassling an asshoe even though Dave is a Karen.

      • sloopyinca

        If I saw somebody out and about who had tested positive for a highly communicable disease, and who had been touting lockdown rules, I’d probably let my frustration over the lockdowns boil over too. Especially if they were out and about with other people.

        It’s not like he gave someone shit who hadn’t tested positive. He gave it to someone who had tested positive and made a big show of it and was banging the quarantine drum hard for weeks.

      • sloopyinca

        And no, Dave is not a hero here. And he shouldn’t have gone to the cops, which makes him a Karen. But he was right to tell Cuomo that he’s an asshole for violating a legit quarantine (since he actually does have the infectious and communicable disease).
        He’d have been wrong if Cuomo hadn’t tested positive.

      • The Hyperbole

        It’s just the flu.

      • Not Adahn

        Yeah, Sloop is the hypocrite here. Not Cuomo.

        One of them thinks rules are for other people, the other one actually gets in his own boat to go out and rescue people because he thinks it’s his personal responsibility.

      • The Hyperbole

        You’re correct I forgot that once you do a good deed it’s impossible for you to be hypocritical. I apologize Sloop, you’re a good man and I shouldn’t have thrown a snarky quip your way.

      • Not Adahn

        Let’s try this again:

        If I saw somebody out and about who had tested positive for a highly communicable disease, and who had been touting lockdown rules, I’d probably let my frustration over the lockdowns boil over too. Especially if they were out and about with other people

        Now, where in that is Sloop being a hypocrite? How is your “it’s only the flu” even responsive to that? It’s not. You were just looking for an excuse to be a dick. And even though one wasn’t there, you decided to be a dick anyway.

      • bacon-magic

        You go out of your way to be an asshoe Hyperbole. *social distances

      • The Hyperbole

        Lighten up, Francis.

        But in all seriousness, yes I saw Sloop and others seeming to move from the fairly site-wide opinion that it’s ‘just the flu’ so as to get their outrage on in this case and I made a ‘dickish’ comment. I did not intend to single Sloop out but I can see how you might think that, since I was responding to him, and if he did as well, then I truly do apologize.

        No, back to dickishness. I can’t believe that I may have exaggerated the cpmments or read more into them than was intended by the original posters. I must be the first person in history to do that. **Eye roll emoticon thingy**

      • sloopyinca

        First, I never said it was “just the flu”. Although I said it should be treated like the flu and people most at risk or those with the disease should self-quarantine while the rest of us are allowed to exercise our fundamental rights and get in with our lives.

        But that’s beside the point I was trying to make, which is: Cuomo is a hypocrite who has been touting his brother’s heavy-handed response but then took his family and others out in public when he had actually tested positive for CV and should be one of the few people following (or perhaps even forced to follow) quarantine rules. Because, you know, he actually has the infectious and communicable disease.

        Not sure what part of that you misunderstood, whether accidentally or intentionally.

      • robc

        If I saw someone contageous with the flu out and about it would annoy me too. Stay the fuck at home when sick.

        It was like I said about the house arrest story the other day. Probably bad precedent, but of all the things that have been done, mandated quarantine for conforming cases is by far the least bad. It might even fall over into the good category.

        Here is a proper government response to this (and why I am a minarchist and not an ancap):

        0. Encourage (but do not require) WFH and social distancing.

        1. Throw a fuckton* of money at developing reliable tests fast in large quantities.

        2 Test [sld]everyone[/sld], both for cuurent sickness and antibodies.

        3. Quarantine anyone currently sick.

        4. keep up regularly testing of group S (not infected and not recovered).

        *About 1/2 of 1% of the stimulus package, according to Massie.

      • robc

        Wait…I thought the anti-karen story the other day said that no one referred to a man as a karen?

        Also, I hate the karen meme for entirely other reasons. Can’t we just call them nanny-state fucktards instead?

      • Heroic Mulatto

        Shut up, Karl.

      • Bobarian LMD

        Also, I hate the karen meme for entirely other reasons.

        Your real name is Karen?

      • Tulip

        This.

      • bacon-magic

        So a “journalist” who hassles others and pokes his nose in other people’s business just got a taste of his own medicine.

    • Trigger Hippie

      David said the woman who looked like Cuomo’s wife came over to him and said, “May I help you?”

      He said he replied, “I’m riding my bike” — then started asking why Cuomo was there out of quarantine and not social-distancing from the group.

      He said Cuomo then started toward him, coming to within about 40 feet.

      “He said, ‘Who the hell are you?! I can do what I want!’” David said. “He just ranted, screaming, ‘I’ll find out who you are!’

      “I said to him, ‘Your brother is the coronavirus czar, and you’re not even following his rules — unnecessary travel,’” the resident said.

      “He just began to boil more.

      “He said, ‘This is not the end of this. You’ll deal with this later. We will meet again.’ If that’s not a threat, I don’t know what is,” David said.

      The man said he waited till Monday afternoon to call East Hampton cops to report the incident.

      “I hate bullies,” David said.

      I think I’ll just hate everyone involved.

      • Festus

        *shrugs* It’s The Hamptons, what’s not to hate?

      • Slammer

        “I will do you the way you guys do each other”

        What did he mean by this?

      • Sean
  7. Scruffy Nerfherder

    I’ll repeat what I said last night about South Dakota. A shut-down would not have included the pork plant, therefore they most likely would have had a breakout in that facility regardless.

    This has everything to do with “proving” that Democrat governors are doing the noble and right things while Republican governors are nutjobs and nothing to do with reality.

    • Nephilium

      Except for DeWine. For some reason, his shutdown is good and noble.

      Fuck DeWine.

      • Agent Cooper

        To be fair, (said in my most to be fair Letterkenny voice) his restrictions have been less onerous than either Michigan or Pennsylvania.

    • Rhywun

      NY Post’s take:

      Coronavirus cases skyrocket in South Dakota

      My goodness!! That sounds scary!

      “The people themselves are primarily responsible for their safety,” she said. “They are the ones that are entrusted with expansive freedoms.”

      Oh my God.

  8. Certified Public Asshat

    For those governors and health experts out there saying we’ll never gat back to normal until there’s a vaccine, this will hopefully shut them up for good.

    We cannot get back to normal until we have a vaccine for every virus.

    • UnCivilServant

      Well, if we quarantine the insufferable worryworts and meddlers, then the people not quarantined and get back to their lives.

    • J. Frank Parnell

      Get back? This is the new normal.

  9. Shirley Knott

    Some pushback is happening in Michigan. 3 lawsuits have been filed against Gov. Whitmer. The best of them is a 5th Amendment ‘illegal takings’ suit filed by a small business owner. here
    I’m curious as to how the news outlets cover this as the cases proceed, and hopefully increase in number.

    • Q Continuum

      Won’t matter. FYTW. The courts will create some kind of precedent out of thin air and that’ll be that.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Penalvax

      • Festus

        ^ unloved comment.

      • Festus

        Swissy comes through!

      • Shirley Knott

        While that may be true, it is far better that the pushback happen than not.
        Even if we believe we are doomed to lose, we must fight back or we’ve already lost. And no, we have not “already lost” so long as we can fight back.

      • sloopyinca

        Agreed. We need to go ahead and either win this fight or lose it so we can plan our next move. And I think we will lose it and the next move will be to (or at least try to) peacefully split the country up between those states who want a large government and those who want a small one.

      • Q Continuum

        …and when that fails?

      • sloopyinca

        Then it’s Boogaloo Time.

      • Shirley Knott

        I love the confidence with which you predict the future. How’s your stock portfolio?

      • Q Continuum

        Only idiots play the stock market! Powerball is my retirement. It’s a sure thing.

    • Translucent Chum

      The lawsuit runs up against firmly established powers available to the governor in the interest of public health in an emergency, said Bob Sedler, a Wayne State University constitutional law professor.

      “As far as the Constitution is concerned, the state of Michigan has enormous discretion in deciding what is necessary during a pandemic to protect the public health, safety and welfare,” Sedler said. “The suit’s not going to go anywhere.”.

      Wayne State has weighed in…

      • Shirley Knott

        Opinions are like assholes. Everybody has them and they all stink.
        Wayne State is irrelevant.

      • Translucent Chum

        Oh, I agree. I’m just not sure why a reporter would only reach out to a single source on the constitution. Hmm.

      • sloopyinca

        All these guys saying “it’s quite clear the states can do this” never seem able to cite the clause in the state constitution granting them the power and a federal court case confirming it.

      • Viking1865

        The Institute for Justice podcast went full Niskanen, IMO, when they talked about it. They talked about the general police power, and how it supposedly applies to epidemics, that declaring and enforcing quarantine is a legitimate power of the state.

        But as far as I understand, the legal meaning of quarantine is to direct State authority against infected persons for purposes of containing the spread. So banning flights from China, Italy, Spain, etc would be the modern equivalent of the old Venetian “park your ship over there for 40 days, if you leave we’ll kill you”. I’m even willing to concede the State has the legal authority to tell infected persons they must isolate in their homes.

        But going from targeted quarantine at infected people to a general lockdown of the entire country seems to be a massive expansion without any kind of actual legal backing.

      • Fatty Bolger

        Pretty sure it’s in the FYTW clause.

    • robc

      I would love to see every business that shuts down to file a class action lawsuit against their governor.

  10. Rebel Scum

    Trump must have his ego assuaged.

    Luckily Democrats have yet to learn to use this to their advantage.

    • Festus

      Instead of shrieking RHEEEEE! every time Trump tried something they could have met as partners in Governance. Somebody picked this fight and now nobody is willing to back down. They made their bed and Sleepy Joe is the result. Sure hope that straw is comfy, Dems…

      • AlexinCT

        Your idea never crosses their mind, because you are assuming they are interested in the business of running the country effectively. But their agenda is about accumulating power to themselves and fucking over the serfs so they know who is boss. They don’t want to work with anyone: they want to destroy that person and take over.

      • gbob

        It’s the most amazing thing about the Trump presidency. Dude is a NY Republican, which makes him a democrat, and somehow the dems decided it was better to march with pussy hats and screaming at the rubes instead of stroking Trump’s ego and getting their agenda through. Somehow the Dems managed to become both the evil and the stupid party at the same time.

      • J. Frank Parnell

        The problem for the left is that they never reached the “acceptance” stage of grieving over 2016.

      • R C Dean

        The problem for the left is that they never reached the “acceptance” stage of grieving over 2016 2000.

        The Dems have never gotten over Gore losing to Bush.

      • J. Frank Parnell

        They’re still mad about 2000, but they did grudgingly accept that Bush was the President.

        With Donnie, they’re just sticking their fingers in their ears and saying “lalala can’t hear you not my president lalala”, and getting angry with anyone who bursts their illusion by acting like he’s the President.

    • RAHeinlein

      I was living in New Jersey when Obama was elected – stimulus dollars were flying and his name was plastered all over road/work-site signs

      • WTF

        I was living in New Jersey when Obama was elected – stimulus dollars were flying and his name was plastered all over road/work-site signs

        The media will of course try to send that down the Memory Hole.

  11. Pat

    Hopefully people start singing this once the lockdowns end.

    Won’t matter, the government will be singing this

    • sloopyinca

      Hopefully they’ll get the producer to turn the vocals up and the synthesizer down.

    • Festus

      Video unavailable in your country. That’s fine, I’ll just make up my own lyrics.

  12. Q Continuum

    Sweet Jesus is Cuomo ever a loser. That guy is an absolute joke.

    • I. B. McGinty

      Which Cuomo?

      • Rebel Scum

        Both?

    • Rebel Scum

      But he’s totes hot because he stood up to Trump by saying something in a stern tone.

    • straffinrun

      The encounter went like this.

      • J. Frank Parnell

        I was expecting this.

  13. The Late P Brooks

    As scientists are racing to develop a vaccine for COVID-19, a new study has confirmed a significant novel coronavirus mutation that may render current vaccine developments “futile.”

    The research team from the National Changhua University of Education in Taiwan and Murdoch University in Australia said that the new coronavirus mutation showed changes in the spike protein that enables the virus to bind to the enzymes found in the lungs.

    Scientists have been studying this receptor and looking into the right antibodies to counter its effects. However, the unexpected structural change “raises the alarm that the ongoing vaccine development may become futile in future epidemic if more mutations were identified,” the experts wrote in their paper published on biorxiv.org.

    Who didn’t already know this?

    See, also: “Flu shot”

    • sloopyinca

      Who didn’t already know this?

      Apparently most governors and state public health officials.

      • Pope Jimbo

        They knew better, but they used the “vaccine” as a fig leaf to grab that glorious ring to rule them all. If they had said “We’re going to shut everything down and ruin things big time and the outcome will be the same as if we did nothing” how many people would have gone along with that?

        My wife thinks that this is to buy time for a cure. Maybe this will break her out of that bubble.

      • UnCivilServant

        Potential cures have been coming out of the workwork, some will even leave you worm-free. Every time I turn around the virus just looks like less and less of a threat to anyone with working lungs.

      • Fourscore

        You’re a good man UCS, and smart too.

        I fear the government far more than CV.

        Nursing homes are where sick and old people go to die. That’s the purpose of them.

      • Pope Jimbo

        When my mom was in hospice the one things she was scared of was being put in a home.

        It was hard on everyone the last week, but I am pretty sure she wouldn’t have lasted as long as she did in hospice if she had been in a nursing home.

  14. westernsloper

    This seems legit. Actually, wait a minute. It doesn’t seem legitimate at all.

    Ya, they are pulling the same shit here. Gotta match that model some how.

    • Q Continuum

      And people should absolutely, 100%, without fail, trust climate models created by the same elite class of “experts”.

  15. Chipping Pioneer

    Trump is a buffoon (standard disclaimer before saying something good about Trump), but his instincts are sometimes right. Sometimes bigly.

    Suck it, WHO.

    • AlexinCT

      Our elite ruling class needs to stop forcing US tax payers from being forced to pay for their evil pet entities that always are or become beholden to the most vile and evil fucks on the planet. We need to close down these nasty high school cliques. The WHO is a good start, but I am hoping we stop wasting money on the UN.

  16. The Late P Brooks

    I don’t know what the purpose this serves.

    It’s a big fat greasy thumb in the eye to the Chuck and Nancy mob.

    You go to war with the self-aggrandizing moron you have, not the self-aggrandizing moron you wish you had.

  17. I. B. McGinty

    Which Cuomo?

  18. Q Continuum

    Ass Wednesday is very sad to learn that, despite all their big talk, Americans are no different from East Germans.

    http://archive.li/UrAAE

    • Festus

      Congrats! There were a few scattered hither and yon that were’n’t giganti-butts!

      • Festus

        Oh God. Ted’s is gonna hunt me down and kill me in front of my pets for that one.

      • AlmightyJB

        That dude has scored a lot of tail:)

  19. Pat

    Coronavirus: Denmark lets young children return to school

    Children up to the age of 11 are returning to nurseries and schools across Denmark, as the government becomes the first in Europe to relax coronavirus restrictions on education.

    Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen welcomed children as they went back to school in the capital Copenhagen.

    Denmark was among the first countries in Europe to impose a lockdown, with schools closed on 12 March.

    Infection rates have been low but critics warn the strategy is risky.

    “We’re all a bit nervous and we’ll have to ensure that we stick to hygiene rules,” Elisa Rimpler of the BUPL, the Danish Union of Early Childhood and Youth Educators, told the BBC.

    And here I thought Democrats loved the Scandinavian model.

    • Festus

      I hear tell that in Sweden they are bulldozing corpses into trenches.

    • PieInTheSky

      Won’t someone think of the children?

    • Rebel Scum

      I like Scandinavian models.

  20. The Late P Brooks

    The Long Island resident blasted as a “jackass loser fat-tire biker” by Chris Cuomo in a radio rant told The Post on Tuesday that the CNN host is nothing but a bully — and has even filed a complaint with cops against him.

    “Sometimes he’s scary stupid,” the East Hampton man, who asked to only be identified by his first name, David, said of Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s little brother.

    Wait. I thought the guy was on a motorcycle. When will these loser-on-loser outrages end?

    *gets up off floor clutching sides, gathers breath*

      • Festus

        “Listen, Fat!”

  21. Scruffy Nerfherder

    SJWednesday: COVIDalist Pigs

    The capitalist class, and their media outlets, have tried to present the pandemic as something that can be fought through individual actions: Wash your hands. Practice social distancing. Stay home! But this crisis wasn’t caused by individual irresponsibility. This emergency was provoked by the anarchy inherent in the capitalist system. The U.S. healthcare industry, for example, doesn’t care the slightest bit about saving lives if it’s not a profitable endeavor. So no attention is paid to preventing infectious disease, even though developing vaccines for these diseases would save the lives of millions around the world each year. As David Harvey notes, “Big Pharma rarely invests in prevention. It has little interest in investing in preparedness for a public health crisis. It loves to design cures. The sicker we are, the more they earn. Prevention does not contribute to shareholder value.”

    • Pat

      That must be why the virus has been absent from civilized countries with authoritarian governments and socialized medicine.

      • kbolino

        For people who love to talk about how the U.S. should be like other countries, they sure seem to forget those countries exist whenever it’s inconvenient.

    • Pat

      MIT uses wireless signals and AI to monitor COVID-19 patients at home

      As the coronavirus pandemic continues, hospitals are working to prevent overcrowding and keep healthcare workers safe. According to the CDC, more than 9,000 healthcare workers across the US have contracted COVID-19, and at least 27 have died. To address this, a team from MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) developed a wireless monitor that lets doctors monitor patients from a distance.

      The device, called Emerald, is similar to a large WiFi router and is mounted on a wall. It emits wireless signals, which reflect off of patients. The system then uses AI to analyze those patterns and infer a persons’ breathing rate, sleep patterns and movement. Emerald is sensitive enough to detect chest motion (which translates into breathing rate) and to distinguish between multiple people. It can tell when a patient is having trouble breathing, and all of that info can be accessed by a doctor remotely.

      This will surely never be used for nefarious purposes.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        So they invented radar.

        Hedy Lamarr would like to have a word.

        Also, I’m annoyed with the term “wireless signals”

      • sloopyinca

        It’s “Hedley”.

      • Patio

        Give the Governor a harrumph!

      • Pat

        It should go without saying this wasn’t intended as a reply. These 504s are killing me.

      • Jarflax

        Don’t like the straight legs?

      • Shirley Knott

        It’s absurdly redundant and unnecessary. When I was in the hospital 7 years ago, I was hooked up to equipment that monitored me “remotely.” Unless something showed as a problem, the only personal contact was the phlebotomist every 4 hours. And this was for a fairly minor, and distinctly non-communicable issue.
        But ‘wireless’! But “high tech”!! But “MIT”!!!
        Wanna buy my tiger-repelling rock?

      • Festus

        Last time I was treated it was a blessing that they didn’t use a rectal thermometer. That would have been the last straw. Bugging sick people every four hours whilst they are healing seems counter-productive.

      • Shirley Knott

        It was actually necessary in my case, and was not prolonged past necessity.
        The iatrogenic a-fib on the other hand…

      • Festus

        Was trying to make a funny, no offense intended! ETA Nurses were mean to me.

      • Shirley Knott

        No worries, I understand the issue.
        I was honestly amazed, pretty much across the board, at how very well I was treated and cared for. A-fib aside, of course ;-\

      • J. Frank Parnell

        Oh good, let’s give the AI access to data on the Chinese bioweapon and its effects on us meatbags. I’m sure it will be fine.

    • Drake

      The same people who reject 80-year-old cheap drugs that have been shown help treat and prevent the infection.

    • kbolino

      Damn GlaxoSmithKline and Pfizer, why were they not defying PRC authorities and risking imprisonment or execution to investigate this disease in Hubei in October when very few people even knew it existed?

      Their lack of inhuman prescience and their unwillingness to force their employees to bear all the risk is clearly an indictment of the capitalist system!

    • Rhywun

      Socialist Healthcare Workers Tell Us How to Fight the Pandemic

      *chortle*

  22. AlmightyJB

    “This will hopefully shut them up for good”

    Hahahahahahaha?

    • Count Potato

      $11,907,415,017

  23. Rebel Scum

    Mayor Bill de Blasio admitted last week that the true number of deaths was far higher than the official tally,

    Uh huh…

    and said the city would start including presumed coronavirus cases in its data.

    Presumptions are very scientific. I’m sure we can trust these numbers.

    • AlmightyJB

      “Seems legit’. Yeah, I pull the Ohio numbers every day. Most of the daily numbers you see each day in worldometer are actually adjustments to prior day numbers. Those adjustments have increased now that CDC changed the methodology to include “possible” CV in the official numbers. Even with the adjustments the cases new cases and deaths are declining. Not that they were that high to begin with.

      https://www.nbc4i.com/community/health/coronavirus/did-50-people-die-of-coronavirus-in-ohio-in-the-last-24-hours-heres-what-todays-data-says/

      • Festus

        We’re up to 26 confirmed cases up here. The majority from one long-term care facility. Zero deaths thus far.

    • kbolino

      This is, or is at least approaching, the “excess deaths” method. Wherein, you compare this month/quarter/year to the past N examples of the month/quarter/year. If e.g. 2,000 people died in April on average for the past 5 years but 12,000 died in April this year, then you have 10,000 excess deaths likely attributable to what happened this year but not those other years. However, while this method provides a better estimate of all-cause mortality related to an event, it does not establish an exact cause of death. If you died because you got something treatable but you didn’t want to go to the doctor because you were afraid of catching COVID-19, is that a COVID-19 death or not? Using that death to then justify making more people scared seems more dangerous than somewhat undercounting the deaths.

      • Festus

        The dude that puts some lead through his cranium because he can’t handle the wife and kids nomo is a Corona death.

    • Rhywun

      Some day the numbers will prove his deception and… nobody will give a shit.

      Sigh.

  24. Translucent Chum

    Speaking of inflating Commie Cough numbers…

    The truth is that no one has any idea how many Americans COVID-19 has killed. Except that it’s got to be a lot fewer than the number being reported.

    Around 2000 Americans on average die in hospitals every day. So, from March 13 to April 11, at least around 60,000 people should have passed away in hospitals from causes other than COVID-19. Suppose that the policies and financial incentives creating false COVID-19 diagnoses caused the virus to be listed on just 1/6 of those normally occurring death certificates. That would mean the actual number of COVID-19 fatalities is around half the roughly 20,000 reported on April 12.

    If 1/3 of the people who would have died of other causes anyway wound up with COVID-19 on their death certificate, that would be enough to account for roughly every single death certificate listing COVID-19 as a cause.

    We’ll likely never know how many people COVID-19 is really killing. Policies have been implemented that so blatantly inflate the numbers we’re getting that it has to be intended. Moreover, absolutely no effort has been made to provide us with meaningful data about how many extra people are actually dying. So, not only don’t we know, nobody has any interest in us finding out.

    • invisible finger

      I’ve been beating this drum for weeks. I don;t trust the Chinese numbers, and I don’t trust the US numbers nor do I trust the numbers from any other government. But it would not surprise me that China only listed “excess” numbers as Wuhan-Flu-related. That’s not scientific either, but it’s all about incentives. China has the incentive to reduce the numbers and the US has the incentive to inflate the numbers.

      I’ll refrain from ranting about my brother’s death certificate. I’ll just say that anyone that demonstrates that they don’t give a shit about accuracy is demonstrating that they don’t fucking love science.

    • PieInTheSky

      Look Q you can never really know something without a study. We need good academic jobs in these trying times.

    • PieInTheSky

      Let us give a test of the old comments

    • PieInTheSky

      Nope. THIS WOULD NEVER HAVE HAPPENED AT REASON

    • Slammer

      No wonder you’re blue, you’ve been locked up in a Pacman maze since the 80s

    • Agent Cooper

      Fox Butterfield, is that you?

  25. Scruffy Nerfherder

    SJWednesday: All These White People I Don’t Interact With Are Microaggressing Me

    3 Ways Microaggressions In The Workplace Got Worse After Trump

    As a Black woman writer who works virtually, I have the ability to curate my social interactions.

    The other day, I admitted to my friend — another woman of color — that I haven’t interacted with many white people recently, apart from a few friends and acquaintances or small talk with baristas and store owners.

    The last time I interacted with handfuls of white people on a daily basis was at my last job, and though I adored the experience and company, I often felt uncomfortable, spotlighted, and even gaslighted at work.

    Later, when I thought more deeply about this, I realized that after the election, my bonds with people of color became stronger. Naturally, I began seeking and strengthening my relationships with people of marginalized identities.

    While living an introverted lifestyle as a freelance writer and striving to build new communities, I realized that I became more sensitive, bothered and angered by the microaggressions I faced when interacting in certain predominantly white spaces.

    I became more aware of gentrification, my natural hair, and the way I dance when in these spaces. I also noticed the overwhelming white guilt some white people feel about Trump’s presidency.

    Most importantly, I remembered how these feelings can be magnified when in predominantly white spaces.

    • Mojeaux

      Breaking: Isolating oneself gives one more time to gaze into the navel abyss.

    • kbolino

      Something, something, maybe you’re the asshole

    • AlmightyJB

      OK Hadley

    • straffinrun

      Someone invite her to the next Glib Zoomathon.

      • Mojeaux

        Too many myths at Zoomathon. She would feel halfway at home.

      • Q Continuum

        We’ve been told that Brochettaward will be masturbating for everyone at the next Zoom. Hopefully he doesn’t disappoint.

      • Festus

        I’ll be whacking it with the lights off. Method/Madness FTW!

      • AlexinCT

        Now I am feeling bad I didn’t stay on for the full duration as it looks like I am missing out on some interesting happenings…

    • Festus

      That’s an ugly attitude and that person is right to social distance because she is pure poison.

    • Rebel Scum

      If you see the world through the veil of skin pigment you are a racist.

    • B.P.

      I started hunting around for reasons to be miserable, and now I’m miserable!

  26. The Late P Brooks

    Science demands

    So while the official global death toll stands at more than 126,000 on Wednesday, according to Johns Hopkins University, that number represents a mere estimate. Only countries with extensive testing can confirm their mortalities and, even in those with the necessary medical technologies, the simple act of counting the dead reflects the chaos that COVID-19 has wrought.

    Accurate counts are critical to understanding where to place scarce resources, such as ventilators and personal protective equipment. They are also one of the few ways to understand how and where the disease will likely intensify.

    I’m sure there will be downward revisions as well, reflecting a better and more specific definition of what constitutes a death directly caused by the virus.

    • PieInTheSky

      The issue is that lockdown caused deaths from “nonessential” medical care may never be counted.

      • Gustave Lytton

        Bastiat weeps.

  27. topnotchtoledo

    Protesting is not an essential activity
    -armed govt goons

  28. Rebel Scum

    Coronavirus Throws A Curveball: New Mutation Can Make Current Vaccine Research ‘Futile’: Study

    So lockdown is the new normal?

    • Festus

      *Karen nods in the affirmative*

    • Drake

      Ha! Enjoy your special assignment in Saudi Arabia – it’s really nice there in the summer, like Phoenix warm but next to water so it’s also humid. Maybe Thule in November after her assignment in Saudi Arabia.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      The disturbing part of this is that she’s an art historian. She wrote some foreign policy stuff Rumsfeld liked back in the 00’s at RedState so they offered her a position. She then ended up on the NSC.

      She’s the GOP version of Ben Rhodes.

    • AlmightyJB

      NSA huh. No Deep State to see here folks.

    • Sensei

      Typical DC.

      If you don’t agree with your boss don’t work for him or her.

      No need to fear the swamp will find her a new job.

    • Gustave Lytton

      Ah, The Shield punishment.

  29. PieInTheSky

    In these trying times, I believe every glib shouted preface every comment with the phrase “in these trying times” to show support to people who suffer in these trying times.

      • AlexinCT

        AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH MEN!

      • Grosspatzer

        +1 Scrivener

    • Nephilium

      /offers Pie an egg

      • PieInTheSky

        is it boiled?

      • PieInTheSky

        I would like to use it as a stress ball

      • pistoffnick

        Pie has lost his balls!

    • The Hyperbole

      But can I put “Look, Fat” first? “In these trying times, Look Fat…” doesn’t seem to flow very well

      • UnCivilServant

        Switch it around. “Look fat, in these trying times…”

  30. The Late P Brooks

    The last time I interacted with handfuls of white people on a daily basis was at my last job, and though I adored the experience and company, I often felt uncomfortable, spotlighted, and even gaslighted at work.

    “Whaddaya mean, I’m not actually a slave?”

    • Shirley Knott

      How does one reconcile “I adored the experience” with “I often felt uncomfortable”.

      • AlexinCT

        Crazy bitch is my guess…

  31. Rebel Scum

    Reopening the county by May is “not even remotely achievable,” said TenHaken, who, like Trump and Noem, is a Republican. “We’re in the early innings of this thing in Sioux Falls.”

    If you overstep it is going to be sue city when this thing is over.

    • invisible finger

      And if they understep it is going to be sue city.

      Who needs analysis paralysis when we have regulatory paralysis.

  32. The Late P Brooks

    In these trying times, I believe every glib shouted preface every comment with the phrase “in these trying times” to show support to people who suffer in these trying times.

    That would be the new normal. Just like having to pump-fake comments to get them past the squirrels.

    • AlmightyJB

      How about “In these lying times”?

  33. Rufus the Monocled

    Re WHO. You’ll know who (not that Who) the useful idiots are.

    I’ve already seen reactions to the effect of ‘OmFg tRUmP iS A looNaTic!’

    • DOOMco

      You’re friends with my mom on Facebook?

    • Florida Man

      May 1 is the projected surge by my institution. So far there are only 110 COVID-19 in a system that treats 10s of thousands of patients l.

    • Tres Cool

      Weren’t we told “in 2 weeks” something like 2 weeks ago? I’m guessing we have at least 2 more weeks.

    • kbolino

      While I don’t inherently believe this advantages the Democrats exclusively, as anyone with some preparation and organization can participate in “ballot harvesting”, it does undermine the integrity of the election. This was just the crisitunity they were looking for. It is rather pathetic how many people who talked very recently about “protecting democracy” now shit all over it, from the governors to the legislators to the tech giants (no unapproved opinions for you, peon).

      • Q Continuum

        ^^^This. Elections will be decided by which Team can most effectively train operatives on how to defraud the process.

      • Rhywun

        It it telling, though, when one looks at which TEAM consistently supports this stuff and which one doesn’t.

      • kbolino

        Yes. Much like the national popular vote movement, I think one side thinks they’ll have the advantage. But that is just hubris. My problem with these measures is not that they advantage one party or the other but that they ultimately end up changing the axes of representation. NPV, instead of balancing representation of rural and urban people as well as different regions of the country, just ends up representing the largest number of voters in all things. It makes the system more reactive and more likely to trample the rights of minorities (all kinds, not just racial/ethnic).

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Whycome you hate mob rule?

      • Rhywun

        Fair enough. They are both terrible ideas in and of themselves.

    • UnCivilServant

      Next stimulus – election day is a federal holiday, manditory voter ID in federal elections, early voting and ballot harvesting are felonies.

      Anything less is treason.

      • invisible finger

        Just make Armistice Day election day

      • The Last American Hero

        Or tax day. And end withholding tax from paychecks so people know how much they’re paying.

    • Spartacus

      Does that mean they will go back and pardon those NC people and redo that election (again)? Or will they come up with some explanation why vote-harvesting by Republicans in North Carolina is evil but otherwise it is totally legit?

  34. PieInTheSky

    Economy journalist in Romania are starting to worry all this lockdown business may cause a bit of an economic downturn.

  35. Rufus the Monocled

    “Sometimes he’s scary stupid,” the East Hampton man, who asked to only be identified by his first name, David, said of Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s little brother.”

    Not that I’m a fan of being a douche telling people ‘social distancing!’ in this case props to him for ‘reminding’ celebrities they’re not above anything.

    Up here, SURPRISE! – Justin packed up his family – defying his own damn orders telling people to stay home on Easter – and heading to Harrington Lake….in Quebec…..he lives in Ottawa. He broke all kinds of his own directives.

    More and more you’re going to see this kind of full of shit and hypocritical behaviour.

    Either they’re lying and hiding something or they just think they can ignore they’re own rules.

    • sloopyinca

      or they just think they can ignore they’re own rules.

      It’s “there”.

      • Rufus the Monocled

        their

        Fuh.

        I’ve been doing that a lot lately – always self-correcting. Sometimes I miss some. I’m starting to get worried.

    • Invisible BEAM of the comment stream

      As has been said so often in the context of Global Warming, I’ll believe it’s a crisis when the people who claim it’s a crisis start acting like it’s a crisis.

    • creech

      Bike boy should have taken a picture of Fredo violating his brother’s quarantine orders and put it out on the toobs.

  36. Rebel Scum

    WWE deemed essential business.

    The New York Post reports that on Monday night Orange County mayor Jerry Demings announced he had been in discussions with Governor Rick DeSantis that eventually led to an agreement to reconsider the WWE as an essential business given their impact on the Florida economy. A spokesperson for DeSantis said in a statement that the WWE is “critical to Florida’s economy.”

    • Rebel Scum

      I don’t see how gloves would help. And you gotta remove a mask in order to eat.

      • Drake

        #me too. My glasses fog up every time I where that fucking mask.

    • Rhywun

      Yep, NO.

      I am not playing quarantine theater in order to get some asshole politician’s “new normal” flag flying.

  37. PieInTheSky

    Scandal of the day i old Romania: The tradition on Easter is to take from church holy water and a sort of holy bread. Now the government, although the churches are closed, wants to allow people to go and pick up holy water and bread. Off course this is akin to murder.

    • PieInTheSky

      Another Easter thing is during midnight service between Saturday and Sunday on Easter, there is some holy light involved, where the priest brings a candle it from church and people light their candles and the trick is to get that candle (or another one if the first is done) with the holy flame all the way home, the key being an uninterrupted flame from the original holy one. There was a suggestion to allow priests to go from house to house to give the holy flame, without going in. This is also murder.

      • Slammer

        Just make a ten foot long candle

    • Pat

      The baby daddy looks like a solid fellow.

      • Rhywun

        *curiosity piqued*

        Oh, lord. ?

      • l0b0t

        He murdered a golf pro for those clothes because she told him to look nice for the picture.

    • Pat

      The Government Has A Lot More Emergency Powers Than Libertarians Like, But It Still Can’t Control Everything

      In the last month, I’ve found myself in the awkward position of defending all sorts of outlandish government actions.[…]

      Don’t these orders go beyond the Commerce Clause, infringe the Privileges or Immunities Clause, or violate one of the other constitutional provisions I’m constantly banging on about? Surely I can’t approve such extreme impositions on economic liberty, the right to travel, and just the basic freedom to go about your daily life as you choose so long as you don’t get in the way of others’ freedom to do the same?

      Well, that’s the rub. As I explained during Cato’s online forum on “Coronavirus and the Constitution,” in a pandemic when we don’t know who’s infected and infections are often asymptomatic, these sorts of restrictions end up maximizing freedom. The traditional libertarian principle that one has a right to swing one’s fists, but that right ends at the tip of someone else’s nose, means government can restrict our movements and activities, because we’re all fist-swingers now.

      This isn’t like seatbelt mandates or soda restrictions, where the government regulates your behavior for our own good, because—setting aside the issue of publicly borne health care costs—the only person you hurt by not wearing a seatbelt or drinking too much sugar is yourself. With communicable diseases, you violate others’ rights just by being around them.

      Nice to see Cato continuing it’s ignominious descent into a Koch-sponsored Democratic Party mouthpiece.

      • Pat

        I swear to god…

      • leon

        I saw David Boaz make some mealy mouthed “Well of course libertarians understand that the government has to have certain powers during an emergency”. This is the bulshit that means you can’t shout fire in a crowded theater. CATO will be with Niskansen in 15 years.

      • kbolino

        With “friends” like these, who needs enemies?

        We could all see this coming. This started with the “libertarian” argument for mandatory vaccination and ends up here.

        They fundamentally at the end of the day do not respect human liberty. Sure, it offends their sensibilities when they witness some violations of rights by the government, but those are aberrations, isolated incidents, nothing to besmirch the grand project of putting the right people in charge.

        Libertarianism is not a project to put the right people in charge, the LP’s charter notwithstanding. It is a project to put human liberty at the forefront of government’s mission. The way you do that is by electing people who care first and foremost about liberty. But one should not confuse the means for the end.

      • Shirley Knott

        Voting for the LP is like f*cking for chastity.

      • R C Dean

        If I don’t have the virus, I’m not “swinging my fist”.

        From false premises, false conclusions flow.

  38. robc

    South Dakota was the only state above the 10% next cases threshhold I have been using. New record at 49 states, but come on SD, get us over the top!

    • Count Potato

      That’s not only white, but against marijuana.

      • UnCivilServant

        I thought Reggae was the product of weed

    • J. Frank Parnell

      +1 Christian White and His Aryan Reggae Band

    • PieInTheSky

      America’s loss I suppose

      • UnCivilServant

        Bernie doesn’t even have the backbone to defend his own stage when someone storms up onto it and steals his mic. This has happened more than once.

        Doormat or dictator, he is a disaster.

      • sloopyinca

        Doormat or dictator, he is a disaster.

        Damn, dude. Dat’s deep right dere.

    • Dr. Fronkensteen

      Both, it was an offer he couldn’t refuse.

  39. Dr. Fronkensteen

    In these trying times, I’m testing posting.

    • AlexinCT

      Half fail?

  40. The Late P Brooks

    Suicide

    A large crowd of at least 100 protesters gathered Monday outside the Ohio Statehouse in Columbus, demanding Gov. Mike DeWine end a statewide stay-at-home order meant to curb the spread of the coronavirus, according to reports.

    Meanwhile, DeWine — a Republican — is also facing pressure from several GOP lawmakers in the Ohio General Assembly to reopen the economy to relieve jobless Ohioans, even if some social distancing measures must continue in the coming months, The Columbus Dispatch reported.

    Holding signs that read “The cure is worse than the virus,” some demonstrators outside in the statehouse atrium were seen on video banging on the windows of the media room, WCMH-TV in Columbus reported.

    Other protesters waved American flags and chanted “We are not afraid” and “O-H-I-O Acton’s got to go.” They held signs with other messages, including: “Open Ohio: We want our rights back” and “My inherent rights don’t end where your fear begins.”

    The protest was meant to interrupt DeWine, Lt. Gov. Jon Husted and Ohio Department of Health Director Dr. Amy Acton’s daily press conference. But to adhere to social distancing measures, the officials are positioned in another room in the courthouse separate from members of the press. By Tuesday, the Ohio Statehouse had installed black curtains to block the windows so protesters wouldn’t be able to look inside the media area, WBNS-TV reported.

    It appeared that most protesters were not wearing personal protective equipment (PPE) and did not adhere to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC’s) guidelines to stand at least 6 feet apart, according to Cleveland Scene. Scott Shoemaker, a well-known “anti-vaxxer” advocate, began a Facebook Live showing the rally.

    Stupid plebs don’t know what’s good for them.

    • Q Continuum

      “It appeared that most protesters were not wearing personal protective equipment (PPE) and did not adhere to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC’s) guidelines to stand at least 6 feet apart”

      LOL

    • Nephilium

      Small rays of hope.

    • leon

      “Open Ohio: We want our rights back”

      Well if you stopped giving them away for nickles, maybe someone would respect them.

  41. Rebel Scum

    WRONG.

    Emanuel: Yes, restarting the economy has to be done in stages, and it does have to start with more physical distancing at a work site that allows people who are at lower risk to come back. Certain kinds of construction, or manufacturing or offices, in which you can maintain six-foot distances are more reasonable to start sooner. Larger gatherings — conferences, concerts, sporting events — when people say they’re going to reschedule this conference or graduation event for October 2020, I have no idea how they think that’s a plausible possibility. I think those things will be the last to return. Realistically we’re talking fall 2021 at the earliest.

    • Q Continuum

      Yeah right. The lockdowns will end on the second Wednesday of November no matter what.

    • Rufus the Monocled

      Let’s be safe. Make it 2022.

      Just in case. /gently applies diaper to self.

  42. Certified Public Asshat

    Personally, I'd prefer a reparations check signed by Xi Jinping— David Burge (@iowahawkblog) April 15, 2020

    He’s not wrong.

  43. Evan from Evansville

    OT:

    I’m not how much of this I have mentioned. Memory and me don’t get along very well. Sorry if this is a repeat of last week. I’m mostly going to talk about today.

    I spent last Tues-Thurs in a hospital. Lots of hallucinations and most of my memories of those days involve me hallucinating and not being to tell what was real and what wasn’t. I finally got back to work last Friday and took care of Mon-Wed this week. I took some audio clips of today and listened to them later. I swear I was surrounded by loud hallucinations all day today, especially with my young kids. Age 6 or so. Five 40 minute classes with them. I hit record seven times and other than obvious talking there was no reality to the loud spiraling sounds that surrounded me. Lady and I got new meds for that and we’re a couple of days in. Keppra is the main one. Anyone have any experience?

    I still have such harsh (read strong and ever-present, not scary) sounds swirling around me. Lady can’t get a proper paycheck here yet, but we’re working on it. So I feel a large commitment to what I’m doing so we can support ourselves. Being surrounded by the little ones for so long is difficult. I am happy that I have been able to deal with this as well I have. But it’s very hard. I hope I can stay upright as best I can. There are still things trying to knock me down.

    About to talk to hyper-successful older bro. He thinks that I should go back to the US. I have no idea what I would do there. I’ve been working in Asia as a teacher for a decade now. What in the god fearing fuck would I do in the States? Yikes.

    I hope everyone is well. Time to talk to the brother. The Good One. I’m the weirdo.

    • Q Continuum

      That’s really tough man. I’m kind of surprised they haven’t tried an antipsychotic; have you considered that? Seems like teaching kids that young would be incredibly draining even without your other health problems. Is there any way to teach English to adults?

      I can’t say about moving back to the US; being closer to family might be nice, but you also might have trouble finding a job. Who knows? Hopefully things improve with the new drug.

      • Evan from Evansville

        @Q: I have seen a neuroscientist a couple of times (getting hit by the car was September 22, but I’ve had long-term anxiety issues well before that) and he wants to try this out before testing out some other stuff.

        @Drake: Nah, I turn 33 (BOOM!) in a couple of weeks and I’ve spend the last decade in Asia teaching. About five years in Korea, then two in Singapore and another 8 months in Thailand (where I got hit). Now I’m back in Daejeon, Korea. I have no idea how to live as an adult in America.

        @ Pat: We just started teaching remotely the last week. I’m an idiot when it comes to tech. That’s why my bro is the millionaire tech business owner! It has been…incredibly difficult to learn the ropes. I take a lot of pride in my teaching, but I am also a performer and do my best to keep the kids absorbed by a completely foreign (depending on the student—now young kids, but I’ve taught as young as 2.5 (fuck off, Singapore) and as old as 17).

        Living in America seems more foreign to me than living elsewhere. Well, I did do a semester in Germany as well. Freiburg is the best city on the planet. It is known.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        I have no idea how to live as an adult in America

        It’s easy. Get yourself a twitter account. Bitch incessantly. Collect Trumpbucks!

      • Drake

        He gets it.

      • UnCivilServant

        From what I’ve seen a lot of ‘adults’ don’t know how to live as an adult in America either.

      • Drake

        Well that wasn’t meant as a reply.

      • Toxteth O’Grady

        I thought you and the lady split up. Is this a different lady?

    • Drake

      Teach Korean to Americans?

    • Pat

      In the US there is a substantial population of foreign students at the high school and collegiate level who need tutoring in English to get into selective programs and meet the expectations of their demanding parents. That might a possibility. There are many private learning centers that hire independent contractors for that sort of thing. It can even be done remotely.

    • Ozymandias

      Hang in there, Evan. You have many people here rooting for you. I am completely unqualified to offer anything but moral support and positive vibes your way.
      You’re not a “weirdo”… at least not here at Glibs! Hope your auditory phantasms ease and your journey gets a little easier. You’re amazing, Bro. And you should journal all of this. Might help (might not), but the record of it might be something you can look back at for reference and help.

      Q: When those start, what happens to other sounds around you? Are they still audible, but less so than the noises? Would music be able to… not drown them out, but… shift your auditory focus away from them?

  44. Count Potato

    “Why is it so hard to make a coronavirus antibody test? Scientists admit it can take YEARS to find the exact antibodies made by any infection – but say it’s happening at ‘lightning speed’ for COVID-19

    Antibody tests for coronavirus that indicate precisely who has battled the infection have been pointed to as the key to reopening the US and Britain.

    But despite various devices cropping up across the nation, government officials are yet to find one that is good enough for widespread use.

    A Columbia University expert admitted it could take years to find an antibody test accurate enough.

    But they added that scientists are desperately trying to find a blood-based test at ‘lightning speed’ – within a few months.”

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-8219793/Why-hard-make-reliable-coronavirus-antibody-test.html

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      I use crystals to tell if someone’s chi field has been corrupted by the Kung Flu.

      • Count Potato

        That is some top-shelf bullshit.

      • Count Potato

        Thank you very much, I’m reading it now.

    • UnCivilServant

      Actually, the payments have been made blisteringly fast by the standards of bureaucracy. I was expecting a few more months before any motion was visible.

      And this plague is very much not what it’s been shilled as.

      • Certified Public Asshat

        I guess, still would have been faster had they not porked up a giant bill. Just send everyone some money with no strings attached.

    • Q Continuum

      If only they’d embrace Leninism, we’d have everything we need!

    • Pat

      Most Americans aren’t sniveling, pathetic, wretched cowards collecting money for gazing into their navel, so they’re actually pretty psyched to go back to work and replace the 2+ months of income that many of them have lost at a cost substantially higher than the $1,200 pittance from Uncle Sam, you fucking cunt.

      • robc

        $2900 arrived today…it will be thrown against the mortgage by the end of the week. Should knock about 4 months off the end.

      • robc

        Wife has already written a check for $2520.45. She likes making our principle remaining a nice round number.

      • UnCivilServant

        I understand the impulse.

        I don’t know the value of the interest to come out of my payments, and I can’t be arsed to do the math to get it to a round number.

      • robc

        She used the monthly mortgage statement…apparently the amount it said we owed after the last payment ended in 520.45.

  45. The Late P Brooks

    Random thought-

    If you think virus test lines are long now, wait ’til they say you can go back to work if you have been tested and came back negative.

    We’re going to need a bigger magic hat.

    • invisible finger

      Why not go door-to-door and combine Deep State Flu testing with census taking?

    • Rhywun

      Camping is fun!

    • ChipsnSalsa

      How can you “short” a city on the stock market?

    • KSuellington

      In many ways SF is libertopia. That is absolutely true.

      • robc

        But not in any of the important ones.

      • KSuellington

        Drug policy, “victimless crimes”, anti-social behavior, police use of force are the ones I am referring to.

      • KSuellington

        That should have read “tolerance of anti social behavior”

  46. The Late P Brooks

    No kidding

    South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem argued in a press conference Tuesday that the explosive outbreak of coronavirus at the Smithfield Foods plant in Sioux Falls could not have been prevented by a stay-at-home order.

    As of Tuesday, 438 Smithfield workers in Sioux Falls had tested positive for coronavirus, and the plant, one of the country’s largest pork processing facilities, is shut down indefinitely. But Noem said a shelter-in-place order targeted only at the surrounding community would not be coming from her office.

    “I’ve seen some national stories written that a shelter-in-place would have prevented this outbreak at Smithfield. That is absolutely false,” Noem said. The governor says that even with a broad order, the plant would have stayed open due to its status as a major food supplier. “This is a critical infrastructure job plant,” she said.

    Noem is one of a handful of governors who has refused to issue a stay-at-home order, rejecting a request from Sioux Falls Mayor Paul TenHaken.

    Worse than Hitler.

    WHYCOME SHE NOT DO LIKE OTHER MONKEYS?

  47. The Late P Brooks

    Smithfield is just one of the protein plants to have closed nationally, and the closure brings the nation “close to the edge in terms of our meat supply,” CEO Kenneth Sullivan said.
    “It is impossible to keep our grocery stores stocked if our plants are not running,” he said. “These facility closures will also have severe, perhaps disastrous, repercussions for many in the supply chain.”

    I blame President Cartoon Villain.

  48. Rebel Scum

    Faux News

    A shady liberal group filed a lawsuit against Fox News, attempting to restrain the network’s coronavirus coverage and get Fox News slapped with hefty penalties. The Washington League for Increased Transparency and Ethics (WASHLITE), which appears not to have a public website, filed a lawsuit against Fox, claiming that when Sean Hannity and Trish Regan condemned the left for using the coronavirus to attack President Donald Trump they had minimized the threat of the coronavirus, endangering viewers and violating Washington State’s Consumer Protection Act (CPA).

    On Tuesday, Fox News filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit, citing the First Amendment right to free speech.

    “It’s Constitutional Law 101: the First Amendment protects our right to speak openly and freely on matters of public concern. If WASHLITE doesn’t like what we said, it can criticize us, but it can’t silence us with a lawsuit,” Fox News General Counsel and Executive Vice President Lily Fu Claffee said in a statement.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      At least we know what the hardcore leftists will do if they get unified power.

      • Rebel Scum

        In VA they were somewhat thwarted on some levels. But now we know exactly what they want.

      • Rhywun

        Enact utopia?

        /New York, California, Virginia (welcome to the club!), et al.

  49. Pope Jimbo

    So I’ve been busy the last few days and haven’t had time to enlighten you guys with my wit and wisdom.

    What is the deal with the 504 errors? Is there a fix?

    • Swiss Servator

      Forget it Jimbo, It’s WordPresstown…

    • Tundra

      Post comment, stop its silly spinning after a few moments, refresh and enjoy spewing your wit and wisdom.

    • leon

      So this is how the dirty, war weary veterans felt when the new recruit showed up with his nicely pressed and cleaned uniform….

      • Pope Jimbo

        All I know is when I was still spending time here a couple days ago, shit worked. I leave and now it doesn’t.

        Are you going to blame me for not warning you that Tundra should never be allowed behind the counter?

      • leon

        Hey, he promised me candy!

      • Tundra

        Yeah, about that…

      • Nephilium

        And a new bike!

  50. Certified Public Asshat

    Amy Schumer changes son’s name after realizing it sounded like ‘genital’

    “Do you guys know that Gene, our baby’s name, is officially changed? It’s now Gene David Fischer. It was Gene Attell Fischer, but we realized that we, by accident, named our son ‘genital,” Schumer told cohosts Rachel Feinstein, Bridget Everett, and Keith Robinson.

    “My mom pointed that out to me, actually,” added podcast guest Claudia O’Doherty, who costarred alongside Schumer in the 2015 comedy Trainwreck. “My mum was like, ‘Amy’s called her son genital.'”

    Imagine growing up with Amy Schumer as your mom.

    • PieInTheSky

      At least you will be immune to people making fun of your mother.

    • leon

      Look…. If you’re having a kid and you haven’t spoken their full name out loud, and all the common permutations, that is where you went wrong.

      • sloopyinca

        Exactly. That’s what we did with our girls.
        Reason Sophia
        Liberty Ordeth Cranberry
        and
        Justice Forall Sloopy Juneteenth
        only made the cut after much handwringing over other alternatives.

    • Rufus the Monocled

      Now we know where her retard comes from.

      Jesus Christ these people.

    • Rebel Scum

      You’d think she would have caught that sooner.

      • R C Dean

        For a so-called comedian, she seems pretty tone-deaf to humor.

      • tripacer

        I actually chuckled. It’s probably the funniest thing she’s ever said.

    • Shirley Knott
    • DOOMco

      She did it on purpose. I saw the original post she made.
      Fucking bitch.

    • UnCivilServant

      No multiplayer game is worth it.

      Your personal preference may differ.

      I play videogames to get away from other people.

      • Sensei

        Same. I don’t do multiplayer either.

      • Not Adahn

        WoW is actually an excellent single-player game, though playing it that way is constraining if you’re a completionist.

    • kbolino

      This reminds me so much of DRM. Every game ends up pirated. It’s just a question of how long after release (and sometimes the answer is negative, as in the game is pirated before it’s official released). That does not give publishers an unlimited right to install whatever they want on a user’s computer in a quixotic campaign to fight piracy. Then there’s draconian DRM that makes the end user experience worse for legitimate buyers than pirates.

      Ditto cheating. Yes, I think cheating in a multiplayer game is a shitty thing to do. But installing a low-level kernel driver to fight it is not increasing the difficulty for cheaters all that much while it is increasing the attack surface for potential exploits substantially. It should also be left as a choice to the end user as to what level of anti-cheat protection they want vs. what level of intrusion into their system they will allow.

      • kbolino

        Also, the notion that the developer is going to be able to respond to a zero-day vulnerability in a matter of hours is laughable.

        1. You’d have to be made aware in the first few hours. That rarely happens.
        2. Those hours are worth a lot to an exploit developer. By the time you’ve pushed a patch and blacklisted your old driver, the exploit has installed a dozen other pieces of hard to identify and hard to remove malware. You’re trying to close the barn door after the horse has bolted.
        3. You’re not that good. Practically nobody is. You could easily spend more time diagnosing and fixing the problem than has elapsed since the first exploit went wild.

      • UnCivilServant

        Why do publishers still pay for DRM?

        All the market data shows that people who pirate don’t buy regardless. So they’re not saving sales, they’re spending hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing costs for what? Warm fuzzies? It’s a net loss paying for DRM tech.

      • kbolino

        There are a couple of arguments I’ve heard that stand up to scrutiny a little better.

        1. The first month is critical for AAA titles and traditional releases. While indie games do just fine (or not, as the case may be) with either a big lump investment up front from crowdfunding, or with a slow trickle over time from early access, AAA titles don’t work like that. Most of the money is made early on in the release cycle. The goal, then, of anti-piracy measures is to delay the release of a pirated version as long as possible. Of course, this argument, while perhaps backed by some data, doesn’t hold up when games that have been out for years still have DRM enabled.

        2. Not everybody who has a pirated copy got it for free. Some of them paid for it and thought they were getting a legitimate copy. Reselling stolen license keys and pirated copies is not uncommon. The user pays, but the publisher doesn’t get paid. To the extent it works, effective DRM reduces the opportunity for this to happen. Of course, in the long run, discounts through legitimate channels also reduce the incentive to seek out cheaper but questionable avenues.

      • kbolino

        I should say, regarding argument 1, that it doesn’t apply to games that have been out for years. The argument itself is not undercut by the existence of DRM on such games per se.

      • UnCivilServant

        #1 doesn’t hold up at all when you combine it with “pirate downloads are not lost sales” data.

        #2 is a new one. I’m going to need some data on the volume of these people who opted to avoid known legitimate channels for these fraud sites. I’d wager the number is laughable, but I’m open to being proven wrong. Though it’s probably cheaper and easier to slap a few cease and desist letters on the hosting providers.

      • kbolino

        On #2, while it is just one example, and for an indie game rather than AAA, there is some anecdotal detail in Friday Factorio Facts #303, specifically the section “G2A – Worse than Piracy”.

        I think #1 does hold up for certain developers. Without being too judgmental about it, let’s just say these developers have a tendency to release marginally modified, rebranded tripe every year, and some of the players might avoid getting uh, let’s say duped, into buying another questionable quality release by checking the pirated version first instead. In this case, piracy is lost sales in some sense, but then it is important to distinguish “lost sale” from “user who didn’t pay”. In the same vein, a review that says a game is bad is also lost sales. As my wording might intimate, I’m not super sympathetic to this particular case, although of course everybody’s gotta eat.

      • UnCivilServant

        So they’re admitting they have no confidence in their product?

        That problem can be fixed by doing a better job.

      • Fatty Bolger

        As a software developer, I understand the impulse. It’s maddening when you know people are stealing your product. But I also know you are right, and knew it long before any studies confirmed it. So we use a simple licensing scheme that somebody could easily beat if they really wanted to, but is enough to keep legitimate customers from being tempted into using the product for free.

      • kbolino

        When I was younger, I was more amenable to piracy because I had little money and I didn’t understand that it takes work to create and maintain something. When I got older, I got wiser. But no amount of metaphorical force would have compelled me to pay when I was younger, that was like getting blood from a stone.

      • UnCivilServant

        When I was younger, I had no money.

        Once I got a job and could afford to buy, I stopped pirating.

      • Mojeaux

        I don’t know about games.

        What I know about books is that people who pirate are many times, just hoarders.

    • Rhywun

      Malware. No thank you.

  51. Rebel Scum

    Birds of a feather?

    Obama praised Sanders as “an American original” who gives “voice to working people’s hopes, dreams, and frustrations.” He admitted that he and Bernie “haven’t always agreed on everything but we’ve always shared a conviction that we have to make America a fairer, more just, more equitable society.”

    But the former president went further still. He called Sanders’ ideas “critical” to progress in America, especially in “rebuilding our economy.”

    “The ideas he’s championed, the energy and enthusiasm he inspired, especially in young people, will be critical in moving America in a direction of progress and hope, because for the second time in twelve years, we’ll have the incredible task of rebuilding our economy. And to meet the moment, the Democratic Party will have to be bold,” Obama declared.

    The former president insisted that “even before the pandemic turned everything upside down, it was already clear that we needed real structural change. The vast inequalities created by the new economy are easier to see now, but they existed before this pandemic hit.”

    “For years, too many of the people who do the essential work of this country have been underpaid, financially stressed, and given too little support,” Obama lamented. So he argued that “we” — read “the federal government” — have to do more to make sure everyone succeeds.

    • Rhywun

      we have to make America a fairer, more just, more equitable society

      Once an empty suit, always an empty suit.

      • R C Dean

        Now tell us how many of your millions you have donated to charity, you fucking fraud.

  52. Tundra

    Hiya Sloopy!

    Thanks for delivering the lynx, on time and on budget!

    I can’t even get incensed anymore about the over counting deaths of the cerveza bug. Or the media’s freakout over SD. Or Trump’s and Hank’s retardation.

    I’m apparently on the far side of my outrage curve.

    I’m looking forward to summer hockey. That will be weird and fun.

    Oh, and I think it’s pretty certain we’ll be fooled again. We’re kind of dopey that way.

    I hope you all have a bright, sunshiny day!

    • Drake

      While walking the dog yesterday I encountered a neighbor I hadn’t talked to since this started. He was talking about how the local hospitals want to count as many patients as possible as having the commie cough because they get a big dose of federal money for each one. Like me, he just wants this nonsense over with so he can go back to work.

      • ttyrant

        Ah – so that is, in fact, a federal incentive? One of Minnesota’s state representatives is a doctor and mentioned that hospitals get $13K for each Covid (uninsured, I think?) case and another $39K for each patient that goes on a ventilator. Maybe I’m cynical, but my first thought was that those are some perverse incentives.

      • leon

        Look doctors are professionals, they take the hipocratic oath. We can trust them. Now if you don’t mind they need to rush to the ethics meeting to discuss how to measure a patients societal value.

      • R C Dean

        He was talking about how the local hospitals want to count as many patients as possible as having the commie cough because they get a big dose of federal money for each one.

        I think I saw something in the unending tsunami of info about federal funding that they were giving some kind of enhanced Medicare reimbursement for Commie Cough patients. I want to say it requires a positive test, though. The feds are actually pretty good about not paying us for diagnoses unless there is some basis for it. Like, you know, a positive test for a viral disease.

        hospitals get $13K for each Covid (uninsured, I think?) case and another $39K for each patient that goes on a ventilator.

        You know, we get paid for people in ICUs and on ventilators anyway. Not sure how much of a premium that is. Minnesota may have been talking about their Medicaid payments. Entirely possible that there is enhanced Medicaid for Commie Coughers. Should still require a positive test.

        The only way to inflate the numbers for positive tests is to commit no-kidding fraud. Maybe they’ve said that anyone with Commie Cough symptoms gets the premium, but I would be surprised if there isn’t a requirement for a positive test.

        Caveat: reimbursement isn’t my thing. Not an expert.

    • UnCivilServant

      I liked the visuals from Lynch’s version.

      • Sensei

        Me too. But I couldn’t stand Sting’s performance.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Grinning maniacallly and yelling is hard work man.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Just don’t ever watch the remastered Dune by Lynch on a 4K screen. Being able to see the cardboard set props doesn’t add anything to the film.

      • UnCivilServant

        You can’t really blame the filmmakers though, they didn’t expect that degree of detail to be visible.

      • kbolino

        Well, it would have been visible in the theater too, unless the projectionist didn’t focus the lens.

        The resolution of film, even the copies and reprints sent to theaters, is more than 4K.

      • kbolino

        Lynch’s movie received wide release in 1984-1985.

      • CPRM

        The resolution is higher for film, true, but the image isn’t as harsh. These new fangled higher def high definition defining higherers ruin the image and make it all look like video.

      • kbolino

        Something, something, fidelity vs experience.

    • RAHeinlein

      Josh Brolin as Gurney Halleck and Jason Momoa as Duncan Idaho – I’m in!

      • RAHeinlein

        Charlotte Rampling as the Reverend Mother.

      • Sensei

        That seems to be a good casting. Which means she’ll get something like six lines in the whole film.

    • PieInTheSky

      Overall I liked the Lynch. I mean the miniseries was vaguely okaish.

      Jodorowsky I would have liked to watch

      • PieInTheSky

        That being said, this could be decent. But

        — Duncan Idaho (played by Jason Momoa)
        — Gurney Halleck (played by Josh Brolin)

        This is bad casting imo

      • Not Adahn

        Duncan Idaho is canonically Asian.

      • UnCivilServant

        I thought he was a potato.

      • PieInTheSky

        Duncan Idaho is not as big/buff as momoa

        Halleck is waaay uglier than Brolin

      • PieInTheSky

        Update: April 14
        So far, COVID-19 is 69% more likely to kill patients in French-speaking cantons in Switzerland than German-speaking cantons, and 84% more likely to kill COVID-19 patients in Italian speaking cantons than in French ones.
        2nd image is COVID-19 prevalence per 10k.

        https://twitter.com/TrevorSutcliffe/status/1250211909095178240

      • UnCivilServant

        So, Wuhan hates romance languages?

    • The Last American Hero

      Or tax day. And end withholding tax from paychecks so people know how much they’re paying.

      • PieInTheSky

        Dune on tax day? Interesting

      • Sensei

        The spice must flow!

      • The Last American Hero

        I have not made proper sacrifice to the wordpress squirrels.

    • Fatty Bolger

      I’m cautiously optimistic. Director has a decent track record, and they’re not trying to cram the entire novel into one movie, which is good.

      I saw the Lynch version in the movie theater when it came out. Huge fan of the novel, so I was really looking forward to it. I wanted to watch the movie, but my girlfriend just wanted to make out. After about 20 minutes of fending her off I thought, “fuck it, this movie sucks” and she got her way.

      • The Last American Hero

        And Rebecca Ferguson in a more active role as Paul’s warrior princess mother.

        Aaaaaannnnd. we’re done.

      • WTF

        And they changed Liet Kynes to a black woman. No doubt a strong and wise presence among the toxic males.

    • JD is Unemployed

      Lynch’s Dune was about three hours too long, IIRC.

  53. Drake

    What Price Victory in the Coronavirus War? – Pat Buchanan

    For each American lost to the pandemic, 1,000 Americans have lost their jobs because of conscious and deliberate decisions of the president and 50 governors.

    Is it worth it? What does it say about us as a country and our values?

    • Tundra

      It says we no longer need a State.

      What really bothers me is that too many fuckos in my world think you can just flip a switch and things will go back to normal. We’ve already done incredible damage and the butterfly effect is gonna be more like fucking Mothra.

      I guess it’s time to think about flipping houses again…

    • R C Dean

      I have no doubt that the total bill for the lockdown, in terms of a shrunken economy, will be multiple trillions of dollars. There was a projection yesterday that the US economy will shrink by 6% in Q2 alone. Then you have the long slow climb back to where we should have been. While I am sure that some lives were saved, I doubt it was very many given the likely mortality rate of 1 – 1.5 per thousand cases. The bill per life saved could well be a billion dollars each.

      And that’s before you net out the lives lost because of the lockdown and deep recession. I wouldn’t be surprised at all of the lockdown took more lives than it saved.

      Naturally, none of this will ever be studied or publicized. It will be an unending stream of garbage data and worse models showing that Our Heroic Masters saved us all by bravely exercising emergency powers. I expect a new narrative, that Our Heroic Masters did so in the face of widespread public opposition.

      • Rhywun

        I’d like to know why we didn’t close flights from Europe until March something. We knew what was going on in Italy. The ‘vid in NYC has been traced to Europe.

    • Akira

      Is it worth it? What does it say about us as a country and our values?

      Too many people base their ethics on that overly simplistic bumper sticker slogan, “People before profits“. They think that the two are separate and in fact diametrically opposed.

  54. The Late P Brooks

    You can’t really blame the filmmakers though, they didn’t expect that degree of detail to be visible.

    That reminds me of every stupid movie ever where somebody wearing a stage makeup disguise runs around on the street in broad daylight and nobody can tell.

  55. The Late P Brooks

    I guess it’s time to think about flipping houses again…

    Ready money, baby.

    CASH IS KING!

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      I’m afraid cash is going to be trash in the near future.

  56. Hyperion

    “Trump must have his ego assuaged. I don’t know what the purpose this serves. And the media will rightly make hay of it.”

    He’s going to get his picture on the new thousand dollar bill. Unfortunately, it will take 10 of those to buy a loaf of bread after the upcoming run away inflation.

  57. Certified Public Asshat

    In this moment of crisis, it’s more important than ever that the next president restores Americans’ faith in good, effective government—and I’ve seen Joe Biden help our nation rebuild. Today, I’m proud to endorse @JoeBiden as President of the United States. pic.twitter.com/VrfBtJvFee— Elizabeth Warren (@ewarren) April 15, 2020

    Everyone is falling line now

    • leon

      Wonder if she was holding out for something, and then she got no calls. No offers…

      • R C Dean

        Oh, there was an offer made.

        Not sure what it was worth, since just about any offer would require Joe to win the election.

    • LJW

      Can only imagine the shit show if a Democrat was in power. Media would be touting how great the president was doing, the numbers probably wouldn’t be any different. Wed most certainly have less freedom, not saying I approve of the Republicans stripping our freedom.

    • Rebel Scum

      good, effective government

      Funny you should mention. “That government is best which governs least.”

    • bacon-magic

      “I will endeavor to persevere.” – Liawatha

  58. Ownbestenemy

    This has been the perfect moment for the largest amount of citizens to become dependant upon government handouts and I think it will stick.

    The sweet taste of staying home while getting free food, free money, etc will be too great.

    Even if we were to open up tomorrow, I predict a lot of those jobs are gone or pay several cut. Why go back to work once you tasted the lifestyle of the unemployed but full belly?

    • R C Dean

      Until they cut off the enhanced unemployment (which I think Trump can do be ending the state of emergency), there will be a lot people who were earning up to, probably $15/hour who will be declining job offers.

    • Pope Jimbo

      No, no, no. Aussies fuck sheep, not donkeys. So he would have been jailed for tappin’ ewe.

  59. Suthenboy

    G’morning all.

    Just got in and had a minute to watch some news and then check in here.
    Musical choice: Man, were these guys wrong. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uqUa_G1h3pw

  60. RAHeinlein

    To those eligible for economic impact payments – IRS site up for adding bank information. Potentially still some glitches as I just tried to input information for my son and couldn’t process.

    https://www.irs.gov/coronavirus/get-my-payment

    • YDAK

      Awesome! it went right through,
      /to a Nigerian Prince?

      • R C Dean

        I hope so. Yusef yanking the chain of a Nigerian scammer would make for excellent entertainment.

    • Tundra

      I wish them the best.

      Ftc:

      ricocat1 fahgettaboudit 2.0 • 2 hours ago • edited
      Are you suggesting a Boston Tea Party attack by “Indians” on all our tin-pot dictator “chiefs”? Good idea.
      TRUMP 2020!

      Uh, not sure that’s how it goes there, Cochise.

    • Sean

      Good on them. Let’s see more push back.

    • Q Continuum

      My parents are members there! Rock on!

    • leon

      Maybe y’all should start seeing other…. Oh wait.

    • Q Continuum

      Impossible. There are no female libertarians. Unless that’s MikeS with long hair and a lot of makeup.

      • Heroic Mulatto

        Yes.

      • Pope Jimbo

        Bullshit.

        You know what’s rarer than a Libertarian woman? A black NoDak!

        No way MikeS (no matter how well made up) would find that many brothers out there on the prairie.

      • Chipwooder

        Man, MikeS is TINY!

    • Drake

      This is how you navigate a rotary on the way to a Glib meetup.

      • Drake

        That didn’t work. Try this.

      • Not Adahn

        Nice to know Poles drive on the proper side of the road.

      • Pope Jimbo

        The only pole I saw was right in the middle of the picture the whole time.

      • Heroic Mulatto

        Holy shit! That’s some air!

  61. ChipsnSalsa

    With all these threading problems I think I figured the root. Gilmore got THD and died, his ghost is now haunting the Glib’s website and is causing all these errors.

    The solution, we’re going to all need to dress very nicely (VERY) and put on some sweet soul music to jam to.

    • Ownbestenemy

      Can we forgo the pants though?

    • Tundra

      Well, my joggers are high end and my Wild sweatshirt is a premium, licensed model…

      Funky soul.

    • leon

      The solution, we’re going to all need to dress very nicely (VERY) and put on some sweet soul music to jam to.

      I’d rather keep the 5XX errors.

      • Rhywun

        ^this

    • Chipwooder

      I miss Gilmore

    • Mojeaux

      sweet soul music to jam to

      See my music links somewhere in this mess of gateway errors.

  62. The Late P Brooks

    In this moment of crisis, it’s more important than ever that the next president restores Americans’ faith in good, effective government

    O K Karen

    • kbolino

      For people who generally like to make fun of the religious based upon generalizations and caricatures, they sure seem to love blind faith.

      • kbolino

        Yeah. I think believing that the President alone can restore your faith in government is reflective of a fundamental misunderstanding of what our government even is. The President is not that powerful.

        That the person in question is none other than Joe Biden says something else entirely…

      • leon

        Make America Moral Again

        :Fingerbangs Nuclear Launch Button:

      • kbolino

        Paging CPRM and SugarFree, CPRM and SugarFree to the white courtesy phone.

      • Tundra
      • RAHeinlein

        I hoped for this song and you didn’t disappoint!

      • Tundra

        Sometimes, out of a mixture of talent, chemicals and runaway egos, magic happens.

  63. JD is Unemployed

    Yo Sean, I just saw that ‘Crazy Train’ tea shart you linked to in the previous post. Are you fucking kidding me? Runes? You f&^*ing crypto-nazi fascist scum! I’m sending the shock troops to shut you down.

    Source: I once heard tell of a band’s show getting shut down by the local “anti-fascist” agitators because it was pointed out one of the members had a rune tat. I think in some garbled understanding of certain AB tats including runes, it was assumed that all tattoos with runes in must be nazi tats, so social justice saved people from hearing a “nazi” play the guitar, or whatever. I don’t know who the band was but I gather it was in the Olympia/Portland area. Go fig.

    • UnCivilServant

      Sheesh, Runes go back to at least the dark ages, probably earlier.

    • YDAK

      you don’t want to see my forearm tat, or my bag of Runestones…

    • Sean

      tea shart

      Hehe

  64. Tundra

    Powerline is doing a terrific job of documenting the insanity here in Minne.

    CORONAVIRUS IN ONE STATE (13)

    Median age 87. Almost 99% with serious conditions. More than 2/3 in homes.

    Nice work, Walz.

  65. Mojeaux

    Discovered two acts today: Moonchild and Tuxedo

    Oh, how I love those smooth grooves.

    If you’ve known of these people and now want to laugh at how 1995 I am, go ahead. I can take it.

    • kbolino

      The last time this dumb argument made the rounds, my first thought was of South Korea. That country has handled the epidemic “well” and yet for some reason they don’t have a female leader. It must be because they haven’t realized women are better leaders yet.

      • PieInTheSky

        The only difference between New Zeeland and the US is a woman leader. Hillary would mean no covid.

    • PieInTheSky

      this went wrong place exactly where I made fun of the same thing. I am not sure if counts as irony but…

      Update: April 14
      So far, COVID-19 is 69% more likely to kill patients in French-speaking cantons in Switzerland than German-speaking cantons, and 84% more likely to kill COVID-19 patients in Italian speaking cantons than in French ones.
      2nd image is COVID-19 prevalence per 10k.

      https://twitter.com/TrevorSutcliffe/status/1250211909095178240

    • Trials and Trippelations

      Trump should identify as a woman. Problem solved

    • leon

      stipulating the argument that Women are better at handling the pandemic, pandemics are rare, and most people don’t choose leaders off of rare and unlikely happenings.

    • AlmightyJB

      Lol. Send that to DeWine. He’s a Puritan Jihadist.

    • Rebel Scum

      Americans Are Excessively Eating, Drinking, Smoking Pot, Playing Video Games And Watching Porn While Quarantined

      And?

      • Drake

        We’re Americans dammit. We do everything excessively!

  66. B.P.

    From the Yosemite article:

    ““The bear population has quadrupled,” said Peterson, noting a surge of large megafauna into the fields, thoroughfares and open spaces of the park.”

    They interviewed the co-worker of a hotel saucier to get their data on wildlife trends.

    Also, when this COVID business is all done, I suspect we’re going to hear a lot more about how great it was for the environment than the lives that were crushed by the economic shutdown, as the media lubes up the public for the Green New Deal.

    • The Other Kevin

      The gestation period for bears is about 7 months. We should hire those bears to make COVID models, apparently they can predict the future.

    • KSuellington

      Yup, I’m already seeing stories of how this is a boon to the environment. I expect a full court push after this ends.

    • leon

      I often wonder how much people are willing to put up with. This has been an interesting test. People have been kicked out of their jobs and told they cannot produce for themselves. How far towards abject slavery will people be willing to go?

      • AlmightyJB

        Based on social media posts, they can’t get enough of sucking authoritarian cock.

      • UnCivilServant

        Social media is not reflective of the populace at large.

      • R C Dean

        But social media is what drives the mainstream media, and they both drive the government.

        The world is made up of People Who Matter, and People Who Don’t. To the government and media, the screechers on social media are People Who Matter. You and I are People Who Don’t. And never will.

      • UnCivilServant

        You give too much credit to these necrotic appendages.

      • Tundra

        Based on my irl conversations, those idiots are waaaay overrepresented.

        As usual.

    • invisible finger

      If the environment recovers this quickly, then there really is no environmental crisis whatsoever.

    • R C Dean

      What an idiot. There is no way on Earth that the actual population of bears has quadrupled. He is making the same error as the Branch Covidians – he confuses observed bears with actual bears, just as the Branch Covidians confuse positive tests with actual incidence.

    • RAHeinlein

      Our primary clients are predominately East coast. Literally, emergency phone calls were set-up because of concerns that Trump was talking about reopening the economy – “that’s so dangerous” – “workers will be confused” – “we are only miles from an epicenter”

  67. The Late P Brooks

    From the Yosemite article:

    ““The bear population has quadrupled,” said Peterson, noting a surge of large megafauna into the fields, thoroughfares and open spaces of the park.”

    WUT?

    *pounds head on desk*

  68. Chipwooder

    Had a depressing conference call this morning where multiple co-workers voiced their opinion that Coonman’s lockdown will extend later into the summer than the June 10 expiration date, and that they think that will be the right thing to do. One of them said it will be at least a year. They then said I was “being hyperbolic” when I asked what they’d do when people start starving.

    I swear, a lot of middle-class suburbanites think meat and vegetables are just created from scratch by a machine somewhere and will continue to keep reappearing in the grocery store regardless.

    • R C Dean

      One of them said it will be at least a year.

      When unemployment tops 30% and the economy has contracted by a comparable amount, what makes them think that they will be untouched?

      • Chipwooder

        Some people blithely, and naively, think unemployment only happens to other people.

    • invisible finger

      I went to the office today. I have more social distancing here than at my house where people are walking down the street more than usual. I haven’t seen a human being within 600 yards of me while at the office today.

    • B.P.

      Meat-packing plants are closing in several areas across the nation due to coronavirus infections among workers. There will be a big run on meat in the next week. My wife’s family is mostly farmers, and one reported to us that he can’t offload his cattle due to the lack of processing capacity.

  69. The Late P Brooks

    Americans Are Excessively Eating, Drinking, Smoking Pot, Playing Video Games And Watching Porn While Quarantined

    Just as long as they’re not engaging in anti-social activities like bible study.

  70. R C Dean

    Here’s a thought: pretend for a moment that Trump is actually a Machiavellian, long-range thinker (I know, stick with me).

    What if he starts lifting the federal state of emergency on a state by state basis, cutting off federal emergency funds to states selectively and thus essentially forcing them to lift the lockdown? I think he has recently been hinting at lifting it state by state.

    And what if he keeps it in place for states like CA, NY, other Deep Blue hellholes? They can’t complain because they are getting that sweet federal lucre.

    Meanwhile, their economies are being destroyed, forcing millions of their residents to leave. At the end of this road is Deep Blue hellholes with gutted economies and populations, in much less of a position of economic or electoral power. Essentially, a form of economic warfare against states that are unalterably opposed to Trump? Essentially, selling, hell, giving them the rope to hang themselves.

    • Don Escaped Kenosha

      a/ cutting off federal emergency funds

      not a/ they are getting that sweet federal lucre

      trying to follow: NY is or is not still getting USG money ?

      much less of a position of economic or electoral power

      they’re too poor to vote ?

      • R C Dean

        If federal emergency, then federal lucre. If federal emergency lifted, then no federal lucre.

        If NY is under a federal emergency, then NY gets federal lucre.

        If federal lucre, then lockdown.

        If NY gets federal lucre, then NY has lockdown.

        If lockdown, then economic disaster.

        If NY is under lockdown, then NY has economic disaster.

        If NY has an economic disaster, then NY’s economic power is diminished.

        If economic disaster, then people leave.

        If NY has an economic disaster, then people leave NY.

        If people leave NY, then NY has fewer representatives and electoral votes.

      • Chipwooder

        But then those NY migrants bring their statism with them wherever they roam and the cancer spreads.

    • Drake

      I assume that is what will happen given both the areas with higher infection rates and his power as President. Some of the deep blue states will gladly self-immolate if given the chance.

    • tripacer

      Pause the census counting until after they have all fled?

      • R C Dean

        True, the reduction in representatives and electoral votes will be delayed by 10 years due to an accident of timing. Hadn’t thought of that.

    • Fatty Bolger

      Sounds like something Hillary would do, with the targets reversed of course. But I don’t think Trump thinks that way. I think he’ll use federal pressure and funding threats to get those states to open up, and save them from themselves.

  71. The Late P Brooks

    Shameful. Horrifying.

    An Indiana congressman said Tuesday that letting more Americans die from the novel coronavirus is the “lesser of two evils” compared with the economy cratering due to social distancing measures.

    Speaking with radio station WIBC in Indiana, Republican Rep. Trey Hollingsworth asserted that, while he appreciated the science behind the virus’ spread, “it is always the American government’s position to say, in the choice between the loss of our way of life as Americans and the loss of life, of American lives, we have to always choose the latter.”

    “The social scientists are telling us about the economic disaster that is going on. Our (Gross Domestic Product) is supposed to be down 20% alone this quarter,” Hollingsworth said. “It is policymakers’ decision to put on our big boy and big girl pants and say it is the lesser of these two evils. It is not zero evil, but it is the lesser of these two evils and we intend to move forward that direction. That is our responsibility and to abdicate that is to insult the Americans that voted us into office.”

    Hollingsworth told CNN, in a statement provided by his office later Tuesday, that “It’s hyperbolic to say that the only choices before us are the two corner solutions: no economy or widespread casualties.”

    “President Roosevelt, do not allow a single American life to be wasted in this futile struggle against an inexorable and undefeatable enemy. Let us not take up arms against the Japanese, but rather accept their rule over us with gracious obedience. Unconditional surrender is the only reasonable option.”

    CNN, 12/8/1941

  72. The Late P Brooks

    Essentially, a form of economic warfare against states that are unalterably opposed to Trump? Essentially, selling, hell, giving them the rope to hang themselves.

    And, as those ships take on water, the rats are going to migrate.

  73. Enough About Palin

    “The move to add his name to the checks sparked criticism that Trump, who is aiming to be re-elected in November, is trying to get voters to believe he is giving them the coronavirus relief payments.”

    Who wouldn’t think that? I mean, I get all of my money from the treasury secetary who signs all of my currency, right? I really need to thank that guy.