How the DNC could turn the Coronavirus into the boogaloo

From NBC News:

Informal discussions begin on 9/11-style commission on coronavirus response
The “preliminary” talks about a look at the response are taking place mostly among Democrats for now.

Informal discussions have begun on Capitol Hill about the possibility of creating a panel to scrutinize the Trump administration’s response to the coronavirus pandemic that would be modeled on the commission that investigated the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, according to four people familiar with the discussions.

They described the discussions as “very preliminary” and involving mostly congressional Democrats.

If this is true, then I suspect that the Democrats believe that Trump will win reelection and they are setting the stage for a second term Trump impeachment based on what they claim was an inadequate response to the Coronavirus outbreak.

Here is the problem.  It seems that much of inaction came from the Democrats and media.  Miquel noted earlier, you can’t memory hole the anti-Trump media headlines from January and February.

If this goes down, the Democrats will try and prove that Trump needs to be impeached for the Coronavirus outbreak that was caused by Democrats not acting just to be contrary to Trump.

Essentially the “it’s Trump’s fault I fell down on my job” defense of the mayor of New Orleans will be the articles of indictment against Trump.

They can try but I don’t think that the American people who put up with a first impeachment over bullshit will put up with a second.  Especially since while the first impeachment was over some minutia of the law and foreign policy that a lot of people really didn’t understand, this evidence against this one is widely available and plain as day.

Impeaching Trump because NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio told people to go to a Chinese parade to spite the false accusation of Trump’s racism will not fly with the American people, at all.

I doubt that such an attempt will end well for them or this country as a whole.

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Dear Media: It Is Hard to Memory Hole In The Internet. (BRUTAL UPDATE)

I don’t think I have seen such desperate attempts to avoid responsibility since Pontius Pilate was doing the 20 second hand-washing thing back in Judea a couple of millennia ago.

And here is Maer:

And here is the collection of a fraction of headlines by many media outlets (including big names) advising people Corona Virus was not deadly.

Click to enlarge

They are trying to staple the blame on Trump for political purposes, but also they are afraid of payback.

As they should.

And deserve.


Savage Update: J. Kb. sent me this just now:

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In times like this, a reminder: Avoidance, Deterrence, and De-escalation

Police in Johnstown, Pa., said shots were fired at a local Sheetz gas station during a dispute that began with a man coughing and not covering his mouth last weekend.

The suspect, Guillermo Alvarez, allegedly fired into an occupied vehicle Saturday, prompting the driver, William Sauro, to drive home from the scene and call 911, a local NBC affiliate reported.

Officers arrested Alvarez, who dropped the gun when told to, and found that he did not have a concealed carry permit.

Surveillance video shows Alvarez stopping at the front door of the building, looking back at Sauro in his vehicle and appearing to converse with him. The footage eventually shows Sauro striking Alvarez with his vehicle, at which point Alvarez pulled out the gun.

Pennsylvania man opened fire after confrontation over coughing without covering mouth: report

Echoing some of the campaigns from World Word II I have to ask, Was that confrontation necessary? And specially in times like we are having where tension is ratcheted so high and people lose their minds because our collective fuse is about a millimeter long.

Don’t be a Dick and avoid exchanging “dickness” with other Dicks. Your goal is not to win the argument but to sleep in your bed that night. Your self esteem should be adult enough to withstand some dumb comments and insults thrown your way.

Words Don’t Hurt. Hollow Points Do.
Lawyer Fees Hurt.
Felony Sentences Hurt.
Be smart.


Your number one philosophy for personal security should be a life long commitment to avoidance, deterrence, and de-escalation.

Avoidance: The act of avoiding or keeping away from (Three Stupid Rule.) If you can safely retreat from the encounter, by all means do so. For instance, if you are out for a walk and feel threatened or intimidated by an occupant of a car, you should retreat in the opposite direction that the car is traveling.

Deterrence: The act of discouraging someone from taking hostile action against you by being aware of them and their possible intent.

De-escalation: The act of decreasing in intensity. To not let your ego or emotions get the best of you, to refrain from escalating the problem into more than it already is. As a CCW you may need to back down from non-life threatening, argumentative encounters in order to not allow things to spiral out of control.
When these things do not work, then and only then may you need to show or use the gun. Just because we are carrying does not mean that we need to use the gun. You want to do whatever is reasonably possible to avoid using the gun. But when your well researched, well thought out “line in the sand” has been crossed you need to act without hesitation.

Roger Phillip.

Hat Tip Mark C.

 

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Something interesting at yesterday’s White House press conference

When Dr. Anthony Fauci and Dr. Deborah Birx were showing and talking about the projections and showing the graphics, they repeated several times that they were based in what happened in Italy. No mention whatsoever of China data.

I guess the distrust about the Chinese and the “information” they shared is too big to bet American lives in it.

Good for them.

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Bag ’em and tag ’em

There are rogue New Yorkers on the loose.

Story Number 1:

Mount Sinai hospital leaders holed up in Florida vacation homes during coronavirus crisis

Dr. Kenneth Davis, 72, the CEO of the Mount Sinai Health System who pulled down nearly $6 million in compensation in 2018, is ensconced in his waterfront mansion near Palm Beach.

Davis has been in the Sunshine State for weeks and is joined by Dr. Arthur Klein, 72, president of the Mount Sinai Health Network, who owns an oceanfront condo in Palm Beach.

Story Number 2:

 

So we have two New York hospital executives and a New York Instagram influencer family of seven have broken quarantine.

The first two are hiding out in Florida.

The latter seven are headed west to infect Middle America.

More wealthy New Yorkers who think their money can save them from the consequences of what has happened in New York by fleeing that giant concrete Petri dish.

They cannot be allowed to do this.  I hope they are arrested and shipped back to New York.

Happy hunting boys.

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A little bit on masks and gloves

For the most part, I’ve liked Tucker Carlson’s coverage of the COVID-19 outbreak.  He’s been good about keeping the focus on China and criticizing other media sources that downplayed the outbreak because… racism.

But Tucker is a journalist and gets stuff wrong too.  When he does, I’m going to call him out.

Sorry, but the CDC is right.

My buddy sent me this picture he took from Publix today.

You know what that guy’s respirator is protecting him from?

Fuck.  All.  Nothing.

I saw something similar at Kroger the other day.  A woman was wearing a cartridge respirator, with a huge gap above her nose and under her chin.  She bought one or found one that was the wrong size and didn’t know any better, so wore it.

I saw another guy in an N95 mask over a beard.  He was wearing his N95 mask on top of a beard.

A respirator that doesn’t seal is useless.  Trust me, I know.  I’ve had to wear respirators for jobs in the oil and gas, chemical, and defense industries.

I’ve gone through periodic fit testing.  Fit testing is a real thing.  Here is a video on fit testing from the department of labor.

How many of these people wearing N95 masks or respirators have gone through fit testing?  Almost none would be my guess

Now let’s talk about the Coronavirus.  It’s a big virus at 120 nanometers in diameter.  N95 masks are NIOSH rated to stop 95% of particles 0.3 Microns or 300 nanometers in diameter.  So if there is virus just floating around in the air, even an N95 won’t do anything for you.

So who are masks good for?

Assuming that they are properly fitted, medical staff and people who are in close proximity to Coronavirus patients.  Those people who are sneezing and coughing and expectorating an aerosolized mist of saliva and mucus filled with virus.  Then masks will help block a health care worker from inhaling that virus mist.

The person I saw driving in their car with the windows up, wearing a mask wasn’t protecting himself from anything.

So what about all the Asian people wearing examination masks, the kind your dental hygenist wears?

They are not healthy people trying to stop themselves from getting sick, they are sick people who as a courtesy are wearing the mask so they do not spray their virus mist onto other people.

This is why your dental hygenist wears a mask.  Not to stop from catching something from you, but to stop her from coughing directly into your open mouth while you lie there getting your teeth cleaned.

The woman at the nail salon will wear one to stop from inhaling fingernail dust.  Some people, especially in Japan, will wear them for seasonal allergies, and they are useful (when you can get them cheap) for when you using a sander because they will filter out big particles like coarse dust and pollen, but nothing in the micron or sub-micron size.

For a healthcare worker, they are better than nothing to stop the spray of spit from a patient to coughs into their face at point plant range during a swab, but that’s what they are effective against, chunky particles like sneeze spray.  And only marginally at that.

Now let’s talk about gloves.

I cannot tell you how many people I’ve seen wearing gloves when they get out of their car, go through the grocery store, touch the credit card PIN pad, then back out to their car, and drive away in the same gloves.

Those gloves are contaminated.  They are carrying everything everyone who touched that PIN pad and shopping cart before them on their gloves and transferred that to their steering wheel and groceries.

The gloves at that point are useless.  Of course, these people do not practice proper glove removal procedures to avoid contamination.

This is also a problem with the masks.  Even with a properly fitted and sealed mask, improper removal and disposal exposes the user to the virus.

So yes, people who are not properly trained and fitted, who do not practice proper mask and glove procedure might as well be wearing nothing.  They get no benefit.

Here is where it gets worse.

People often engage in a behavior called risk compensation when it comes to safety gear.  A famous case from automotive engineering was when airbags first became mandatory.  People thought the airbag would protect them so they didn’t wear seatbelts, increasing the fatality rate of accidents.  Airbags only work in conjunction with seatbelts.

You can see this phenomenon every winter when some idiot drives recklessly in the snow because he has 4WD and thinks that makes his car magic in the snow.

So there is a likelihood that people wearing masks and gloves improperly, will engage in risk compensation and avoid social distancing or visit an infected family member or do something else stupid that gets them infected because they think “I’m wearing all the right gear, I’m not going to get sick.”

The government wasn’t lying.  It just wasn’t blunt enough to say:

“You dumb shits have no idea how to maintain safety and sterility with your equipment so it’s doing nothing to protect you.  All you are doing is wasting a resource that could go to someone who really needs it.  Just go to the grocery store only when necessary, stay out of sneeze distance from strangers, and wash your damn hands.”

Part of the problem here is that the media need us to panic to sell viewership.

They have a financial incentive to make you believe that this is the opening to The Omega Man instead of just a really bad case of the flu.

Pictured: not fucking reality.

 

For people with preexisting conditions, the elderly, and healthcare workers, every little bit helps.

But going to Kroger in a bad fitting drywall respirator and gloves and not practicing sterility procedures is a waste of money and will do precisely dick to keep you safe.

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