this is the second time you’ve referred to this and I still don’t know what you mean. To what position do you refer. Im quite introspective and I open the Fox app before CNN, to ensure I consider both sides.
FWIW I work at a TMC hospital and they are very concerned. This is not just posturing and fake news or panic for TV ratings. Preparations are being made. So it is so bizarre to me to hear from people who are still shrugging this off.
They drank Trump's Kool-Aid. That's the best explanation I can give you. What flavor did you drink bigtexxx?
Gov of those NE states didn't act early enough. A main reason for that is everyone was mostly blind in those early time due to a lack of testing and prep caused mostly by a dysfunctional fed gov. States with a rapid raise in cases now.... The reason for that is no longer blindness due to lack of testing. It's due to a continuing dysfunctional leadership at the fed gov and a push to re-open without flatten the curve much, without fast and effective test, trace and isolate system in place, while at the same time handicapping local official from doing what make sense locally (ex. enforce masking, shutting down again if necessary). TX, for example, is a huge place with dense and rural areas - a one size baseline cap (you must not shut down again, you must not directly require people to wear mask) fit all approach looks to be deadly to both health and economy. This is the reality that you and other refuses to see - you aren’t going to solve this issue by being in denial or hoping it will just vanish, or to play political game of blue vs red states or whatever else. The virus doesn’t care. Until you solve or contain that, like so many other countries have done already, you are just gambling with our collective health and economy.
That's quite a projection on your part. I'm supportive of masks, distancing and contact tracing. And protecting the vulnerable (elderly, obese, other pre-existing conditions, etc). One of the key principles of science is to ask questions. How much of the rise in cases is due to testing? How much of the new cases are younger people, who have a tiny risk of death and many are asymptomatic? Do we even know if the lockdown we implemented was effective? Los Angeles had one of the most strict lockdowns in the country - why do they have the number of cases they do? Can you answer these questions?
If we learned anything from NYC it should be that we need to take action now, to not repeat history. There is absolutely no reason Texas should not close bars. They are not essential. There is no reason people should still be dining inside restaurants. That's not essential. These are mask free environments basically. Stop the spread. Harris County has a population of 4,664,159 and is averaging 959 new cases daily. Let's put that in perspective to countries abroad. If you add up the population of Australia, Denmark, Austria, Norway, Switzerland, Finland, Ireland, New Zealand, Italy, Spain, and Canada you have a total population of 214,633,844 people. If you add up the total new daily cases from all those countries you have 209,969,685 more people and only 22 more cases. Houston we have a problem.
So li'l t must be really upset with Trump's two recent rallies which were conducted with few masks, no social distancing, and in Covid hot spots. Not only were they incredibly dangerous for the attendees and everyone they will have contact with going forward, but they served as a horrible model for Trump supporters across the country. Yet, nary a word from l'il t. This is how you know he is a complete clown.
? I would have worn a mask, myself. Where were your social distancing complaints during the BLM/Antifa riots/looting?
Where were you social distancing complaints during the alt right protest/takeover of the Michigan capitol?
For whatever reason the federal government under the leadership of Donald J Trump has not been able to effectively handle the COVID19 pandemic as well as the rest of the first world. COVID19 has become a millstone around the neck of the President and he has not found a way to either solve and control the issue or to pass blame to someone else. It is having severe political consequences for him thus far. Part of the issue is that while things are optimistic in the rest of the first world, that is certainly not the case in the USA. There are areas that have followed the CDC guidelines carefully and are have optimism like NY and Illinois. However half the country is seeing increases in COVID19 infections. We can list reasons as to why the federal government under Donald Trump's leadership failed, but I am more curious as to what the next 6 months hold. I do not think the economic indicators are positive at all as the number of cases are not going down like they should be. It is pretty clear to me that the President does not know how to solve the issue and has taken the position that there is no crisis in hopes people do not care or let it impact his election chances.
If the rise in cases was solely based on an increasing number of tests, Texas’ positive test rate wouldn’t have also increased to 9.5%, like it has in the last two weeks. Yesterday, the state had 5,489 new cases out of 48,281 tests. That is a 11.37% positive rate. On Monday, the state reported 3,280 new cases on 22,829 tests. That’s a 14.37% positive rate. Last Saturday, there were 4,430 new cases and 39,484 tests. That’s a 11.22% positive rate. Last Friday, there were 3,454 new cases and 16,173 tests. That’s a 21.36% positive rate. Source: https://covidtracking.com/data/state/texas. The only day in the last five where the positive rate was at a decent level was Monday, with 3,866 new cases from 62,782 tests, and that’s still a 6.15% positive rate. Also, during the state’s 42-day lockdown, Texas only broke 1,000 new daily cases three times. 1,091 on April 8; 1,441 on April 10; 1,033 on April 30. So, yes, the lockdown worked to minimize some of the spread. Did it crush the curve? Absolutely not, but it flattened it along with our infection rate. The problem is unless you want an indefinite lockdown, all that does is temporarily slow the spread of the virus. If every Texan would wear a mask in public places, social distance and wash their hands regularly, you could be open for business and the daily case counts would start decreasing until they are virtually zero. That’s how Hong Kong (population size similar to Houston with the density of New York) and New Zealand (population of roughly 5 million, a little smaller than Houston) did so. Problem is Greg Abbott won’t put his big boy pants on and mandate that every Texan wear a mask or face punishable consequences. Going on television and pleading with everyone to do it isn’t enough because that isn’t going to persuade those that haven’t already been wearing masks to start doing so. As long as mask wearing is optional, there will be a certain percentage of people that won’t wear them, and very little will change. It has to be mandatory for the time being with consequences for rule breakers.
Show leadership? Governor DeSantis has been the most outspoken governor on re-opening and has stressed a very hands off approach. Hell he has fired people in the government that have stated the death toll in Florida is being under reported. There is zero chance of DeSantis changing his tune as it would be political suicide and would an affront to his personal beliefs. For better or worse Florida is in this for the long haul. The Governor politically will be fine as long as the death rates do not rapidly increase. The fear with Florida is that so many people go there and return home spreading the virus to other states.
DeSantis is basically in the same position as Mayor Vaughn was in Jaws...10% of Florida's GDP comes directly from tourism and more probably comes from entities related to tourism. Closing Florida down for the summer would basically kill the state and DeSantis knows it...which is why I agree with you that he'll probably survive politically (barring the Trump stench doesn't drag him down as well) as the economy is usually what rules in America. Just like Abbott, it would have been nice if he had pushed for more guidelines for social distancing and mask wearing, among other things, but Trump saw it as a sign of weakness so the Trump sycophants went along with it. We'll have to see how bad it gets...NBA and MLS are about to start, Disney is pushing for people to visit and the Republican convention will be in Jacksonville in a couple of months. If they don't get things under control, could get worse than New York there.
