Coronavirus 2019

You’re thinking of this in the wrong way. These are racist people that already hate Asians (non-whites in general) and are looking for a green light. Does that make any more sense? It’s not that Trump calling it the “Chinese virus” are going to turn normal people into racists by hearing that. It’s that it’s encouraging the racists among us, which is why you’re getting the backlash to it here.

New York on a pace to be doubling the number of deaths daily.

May is better than nothing, but that’s worth fuck all for people out of work now and in the next two weeks as more and more businesses are now shutting down to try to survive the lockdowns.

Plus, they’ll probably send actual physical checks, which is kind of insane.

How?

In the small town you mention, intervention took place - quarantine and isolation.

And I’m not aware of mortality figures for the hardest hit small town.

The Diamond Princess is the closest thing we have to a case study, and without antibody tests we still don’t know how many were actually infected, and that population was hardly representative.

All we have is an upper limit (it’s severe enough to cause the deaths we’re seeing) and a lower limit (it’s not so infectious as to be uncontainable). Within that it’s all models. I doubt we should operate on the optimistic parameters of that one study through.

You could look at countries literally doing nothing (Iran?) but can you trust the data?

China’s out there looking like the good guy by sending desperately needed doctors and equipment to Italy. Meanwhile, we’re the rabid dog threatening that guy.

I guess this is what happens when you completely gut the “Deep State Department”. And elect a psychopath, of course.

I know, right? It’s an ugly base reaction in a lot of humans, unfortunately, and it takes someone particularly despicable like Trump to try to fan those flames and encourage the hatred as a way of deflecting blame for his own ineptitude.

Trump, and his sycophants, calling this “the Chinese virus” is an intentional act, not designed to inspire racism, but rather to distract from his incompetence.

Their plan is to shift the narrative to another one of these bullshit arguments about how Trump is racist, rather than “Trump’s incompetence is destroying America”.

Folks need to shut up about it. Fuck Trump calling it The Chinese virus. Ignore it.

Hate. Intense seething hate for being losers, and on the other end thinking anyone that isn’t white should bow down and kiss your feet. They are the most selfish, the most evil, the people who would sacrifice their parents for a buck.

Not when it’s brought here. I think it’s more than fine to push back on the usage here.

Any more than that and they turn into welfare queens

“Chinese virus” is partly racist - because Trump’s entire political history is to separate out the “Other”. And he has a non-negligible number of followers who are out-and-out flaming racists who don’t really even need an excuse to hate Asians - but here’s a new one anyway.

But I think in this case, “Chinese virus” is blame deflection - the other defining feature of Trump’s politics. “However badly the US government responds, this isn’t our fault anyway”.

I believe the Federal government is also kicking in $600/week to everyone on unemployment above whatever they are getting from the state.

I still have my job so the $1200 is nice but I don’t really need it, other than to save or buy something I’ve had my eye on. If I was unemployed and didn’t qualify for the $1200 but was getting the extra $600 per week for four months that would help me much more.

If I read things right with the stimulus bill.

This is incorrect.

There is the initial check and then there is a $600/week addition to unemployment benefits, which is a huge and unprecedented. That will last for four additional months and is on top of what people are already getting from the state.

This is also, for the first time ever, open to contract and “gig” workers like Uber drivers. There is also some sort of sharing available for workers who have had their hours cut but have not been laid off.

It’s not the best bill ever, but it is very good.

If true, awesome! I can imagine Trump’s hand shaking with rage as he signs the bill, knowing he won’t benefit from it. I want to believe!

It figures that, given how hard they’ve resisted helicopter money for so long, now that they have come around they only have the appetite for smallish helicopters.

That’s what I’ve read as well. The unemployment boost seems to be the best part of the bill from what I’ve seen thus far.

What you just described about the $1200 check is a perfect example of why they shouldn’t have saddled the bill with requirements which are going to cause delays. Even for people who don’t need the $1200, the money is going to get used. At worst it’s a bonus that people can then go out and buy stuff, which is what we want happening anyway with the economy being so suppressed all of the sudden. And that way you don’t have delays and don’t have people fall through the cracks. People getting these checks in May is going to do fuck all for the people that have to make April rent next week, or feed themselves tomorrow.

That would be nice for people in Arizona, because unless something has massively changed unemployment benefits really suck here. In 2003 when I was unemployed for a bit, it was $200 a week.

Most of his followers are racists.