solidarity in the face of a pandemic

if you think we will have the same results as sweden when america re-open's it's economy, then you are making the same mistake as the left who thinks universal healthcare is good for america because it works in sweden. the mistake is ignoring the "competence" factor - the competence or ability to protect the old and vulnerable, and the competence of the old and vulnerable to not touch their face without first washing their hands. but re-opening the economy sooner rather than later is still the right decision because in the long run, the results would still be the same.

people's political emotions are being clouded causing destructive divisions at a time when solidarity is of utmost important. example my supposedly smart facebook friends are condemning trump for not preparing early enough for this pandemic. they could be right and there is nothing wrong with their judgement because it's all about perspectives and in some perspective, trump did make the wrong call or guess. but then they praise cuomo for a job well done. WHAT ????? it's the state's responsibility to prepare for any disaster and there is a law that says if they need any resources or additional funds they can request it from the federal government. if you praise cuomo you should also praise trump and if you condemn trump you should also condemn cuomo. cuomo was not screaming early on that we need to prepare and requesting the feds for more resources. here is a complete timeline of cuomo and trump's response - https://abcnews.go.com/US/timeline-cuomos-trumps-responses-coronavirus-outbreak/story?id=69914641

fox, cnn and msnbc are like icecream. i love icecream. but vegetables are important. if you want vegetables for your brain, read the articles of my blog- https://ian-crystal.blogspot.com/2018/12/table-of-contents.html. i think it's foolish for rhode scholar rachel maddow to insist that trump declare a nationwide lockdown as if the mayors and governors are elementary school children who can't decide on their own. however i want to praise rachel and msnbc for not playing identity politics (unlike the view) when trump declared a travel ban on china on jan 31. trump also deserves to be lambasted for calling it the chinese virus at a time when solidarity is at the utmost importance. fox idiotically defends this saying it's no different from the name zika virus. nobody knows where the fuck zika is. and when was the last time you met a zikan? however, blaming trump for lack of preparedness is like blaming your financial advisor for not recommending you invest 100% of your nest egg on apple, amazon, google or netflix when their stocks were still below $10. i think trump and governor cuomo are both doing a great job. of course with the benefit of hindsight is easy for us to say there are things they could have done better, but again it's like blaming your financial advisor.

the WHO have caring scientists and experts way way way smarter than trump but still screwed up big time. they freakin tweeted in january 14 that "there is no human-human infection" even if it already spread to 5 other countries (https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/23/health/china-virus-who-emergency.html, https://nypost.com/2020/03/20/who-haunted-by-old-tweet-saying-china-found-no-human-transmission-of-coronavirus/). the well respected govt of taiwan also said WHO failed miserably (https://www.ft.com/content/2a70a02a-644a-11ea-a6cd-df28cc3c6a68). to err is human. in fact i saw the leader of the WHO roger daltrey partying with 14 year old girls in a bar in tver russia in 1997 and he was still given the honor of performing in the superbowl.

trump didn't really fire the pandemic team. besides, obama also "disbanded" the pandemic team after he took office and he didn't put it back together until AFTER the ebola epidemic several years later (https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2020/mar/17/instagram-posts/celebrities-are-sharing-misleading-post-about-trum/, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/03/20/was-white-house-office-global-pandemics-eliminated/).

in 2015, experts reported that new york will have a shortage of 16,000 ventilators if a pandemic similar to 1918 happens (https://www.factcheck.org/2020/03/trumps-misleading-ventilator-counter-punch-at-cuomo/). but if i was the governor of new york i too would have surely ignored that report because at that time a 1918 like pandemic was highly unlikely. however the fact check article idiotically defends cuomo saying there was a shortage of nurses to operate the ventilators anyway. after 9/11 and katrina, the fed mandated the states and localities that it's their responsibility to prepare for any disaster and the fed would just provide the funding. so cuomo's administration could have trained more nurses to fill the shortage.

as usual, both sides are guilty of false claims and mistakes (https://www.politifact.com/article/2020/mar/17/we-answered-your-questions-government-action-coron/, https://www.dailysignal.com/2020/03/30/de-blasio-nyc-officials-downplayed-covid-19-threat-after-trump-restricted-travel-to-china-here-are-5-examples/).

(for more of my knowledge bombs, click the "ian's knowledge bombs" banner at the top of this article and choose any article in the table of contents that piques your interest)