Archives for February 2020

Day 1137 The Immorality of Health Care

Friday February 28, 2020 

247 Days until the election on November 3rd

327 Days until the Inauguration on January 20, 2021

The other day I was reminded of Mike Pence’s having to be convinced to give clean needles to drug addicts by the CDC. Mike didn’t want to do it because he was “morally opposed” to it. What exactly he was morally opposed to I have no idea. Drug addiction? Clean needles? I don’t know.

This led me to ask myself if the Corona Virus cares what your morality is. I’m betting no. I’m guessing it has no sense of morality. That it just does what it does. If what it does is in conflict with your moral code – so what? It doesn’t know.

If you think our president is going to tweet away this crisis I think you are sadly mistaken. If you think Mike Pence is going to pray it away. You are sadly mistaken. If you think PR releases saying the number of virus cases is going down. You are sadly mistaken. If you think the media: liberal, conservative, Christian, far-right, or Russian reporting on its effect you are sadly mistaken.

The only thing that helps is knowledge and therefore the truth.

If you think Mike Pence or Donald Trump are going to help in the knowledge and truth business then I think you haven’t looked at their records very closely.

What will happen I wonder when  dyed in the wool Trump supporter comes up against the reality of death. Say of a loved one. What will Trump do if someone close to him dies? Like a member of his family? Who is he going to blame?

Another interesting point was raised yesterday. What if you are out in public and you see someone coughing and sneezing? Do you have any assurance that person has seen a doctor? In a society where health care was more readily available you would. Here – no.

So by the time the election rolls around we will know the effect of this virus on the population. We will know how effective Mike Pence and Trump and the rest of his team have been in combatting this virus. 

Trump and Rand Paul and Steven Bannon have all been for “shrinking the administrative state.” Trump has cut funding to the CDC and eliminated the pandemic response team. Over 1600 scientists have left the government since Trump came into office. I think he believes he can hire people at the last minute if he needs them. This is not the case. It takes years to develop a research team and response teams. Then you need good leadership. Just ask George W. Bush about his response to Hurricane Katrina. 

Compare what Trump has done to date on the Corona Virus to what Obama did with Ebola. Barrack sent teams to Africa, to the source. Joe Biden on the debate stage said that if he was in charge he’d have people over in China, working with the Chinese and monitoring the situation. What are we doing? Appointing a person with a record of hostility to health workers and people in need and who has a fawning allegiance to the president. The president is way over his head and has no idea what to do.

247 Days until the election on November 3rd

327 Days until the Inauguration on January 20, 2021

PS The twelve astrological sundials at the observatory in Jantar Mantar, Rahasthan, India. In Indian/Hindu astrology knowing your sun sign is very important. that is knowing the sign of the zodiac which is directly behind the sun when you are born. Each of these sundials point at one of the astrological signs when those signs are at their zenith and have a thirty degree radius to mark the particular exact position of the zodiacal sign at that moment. Very weird.

Thursday February 27, 2020 

248 Days until the election on November 3rd

328 Days until the Inauguration on January 20, 2021

The president has told us that the cases of coronavirus in the U.S. are 15 and it’s going to zero pretty soon. 

At the same time the president was saying this the CDC said the number of cases is 60 and that it’s going to get worse.

Who ya gonna believe?

It doesn’t matter. If people start getting sick and dying you’ll know the CDC was right.

We also know that Trump gutted the government’s pandemic response team.

Now we’ve got Mike Pence as our point man on this. Trump says it’s because of Mike’s terrific job implementing a health care plan in Indiana. As Donald was announcing this the news reports were reminding us that under Mike’s governorship there was, and I quote, “a completely preventable outbreak of HIV” in Indiana. Hum.

Now I know Mike and his minions have been busy hollowing out HHS for women’s reproductive rights, and given Mike’s reported outlook on gay people I’m sure he regards AIDS as a “gay disease” and therefore was ignored in Indiana.

Every reporter I heard yesterday when asking a health official what the most important thing the government can do in response to this disease said, “Tell the truth.”

Well, that ain’t gonna happen, because Donald Trump has no idea what the truth is.

But I’d like to bring up another point. Did you notice that Donald was wearing a pink tie at his press conference? Did you also notice that the tie matched his eye shadow? And his lips? So the question is, “Does this president wear pink eye shadow and pink lipstick?” I think not. And I being a patriot (not that that has anything to do with this) think that he does not (I repeat.) 

I think the president’s pink eyelids and pink lips come naturally to him. Maybe he’s gay. Maybe he’s a drag queen and is wearing pink eyeshadow and pink lipstick and forgot to wipe it off before going in front of the cameras. If that is the case, at least he got out of the pink tutu. We could ask Mike Pence for clarification because Mike is frequently seen close to the president, but unfortunately the only side of the president that Mike is familiar with is the president’s backside (right rear to be specific.) Now if Mike has been kissing the president’s ass, as has been alleged then maybe he’s seen the president’s sphincter and maybe that is pink as well.

However, I believe the president and his vice president are entitled to some privacy. Whatever Mike is doing at the daily luncheons with the Donald are between him and the president.

Now on to some really really strange stuff. The president had two people speak at his press conference who knew what they were talking about. Personally, I don’t expect this very often, if ever again. Well, I don’t expect the president to hold another press conference either. Actually, it’s been a relief not to hear some poor slob having to make stuff up to cover for Donald, only to be contradicted the next day by the president, and then have to explain that away. In other words, why cover bull shit with bull shit about bull shit? We’ve cut out the middle man (or person) and are now getting the bullshit straight from the horse’s mouth. (Think about that bullshit from a horse.)

The two people who actually told us something useful were from the CDC. One said the virus was going to spread and the other said a vaccine was a year to a year and a half away. 

This was quickly wiped away by the president who said we’d have a vaccine soon. Based on what? Based on bullshit. This guy can’t even listen to his own press conference and relay what is being said.

In other stunning news the HHS secretary Azar, I think that’s what he’s head of – who cares? Thought that he was the point person on the virus, until moments before the president said it was Mikey-poo. Imagine that! Personally, I bet he didn’t know until the president announced it at the podium.

The president then took to twitter to attack the judge and specific jurors in the Roger Stone case. He also attacked a hitherto unknown television channel MSDNC. 

So to recap:

The coronavirus is contained here in the U.S. 

Get ready for the coronavirus to spread like wildfire here and around the world.

There will be a vaccine for it shortly.

The vaccine, if there is one, is at least a year out. Probably a year and a half out.

We have a crack team on the case.

We have a team on crack on the case.

No one is gong to die.

We’re all gonna die.

The president is gay.

Just sayin’

248 Days until the election on November 3rd

328 Days until the Inauguration on January 20, 2021

PS Our pink pres. Right on bro.

Wednesday February 26, 2020 

249 Days until the election on November 3rd

329 Days until the Inauguration on January 20, 2021

The moment of truth is nigh. For decades Bernie has been saying the same thing. The question now is “Do You Want It?”

Affordable health care, Affordable education, Good jobs, a Living wage.

That’s what he’s suggesting we as a country do.

The neigh sayers are screaming “Socialist.” We crossed that bridge a long time ago. The question is< “Do you want the government to regulate capitalist enterprises so they can’t gouge the shit out of you?”

Socialism in the sense that Bernie is talking about is using our tax dollars to help us. The “capitalists” who are lobbying our government all the time are really socialists. Socialists for themselves. In other words they want the government to either give them money or not tax them or to let them have special exemptions and privilege.

The fear that the pundit have is that he, Bernie, can’t pull it off. The politicians are screaming he’s too far left. He ain’t left. Since the 1980s the conservatives have been moving the frame of our political discourse to the right. What Bernie is trying to do is move us back to the center, to reality.

Bernie isn’t my first choice, but he’s posing a question that is hard to ignore. It is before us and the question now is, “Will we help ourselves?”

249 Days until the election on November 3rd

329 Days until the Inauguration on January 20, 2021

PS The Tablet of the Foliated Cross, Palenque, Mexico. 

Not that it has anything to do with the subject at hand, but it’s really cool.

New Day 1134 This Can’t Be Happening. But It IS!
Tuesday February 25, 2020
250 Days until the election on November 3rd
330 Days until the election on January 20, 2021

There’s a joke in the computing community about a programmer looking at their output saying, “This can’t be happening.”
The point being – that it is happening.

Bernie has won every Democratic primary and caucus so far and the pundits and the democratic establishment are saying, “This can’t be happening.” But it is.
Last night in a round table discussion of punditry, the old pundits trotted out the arguments as to why this wasn’t really happening and one of the young people at the table said, “The people who said that are the same people who said Biden was unstoppable.”
The day before the Nevada caucus the pundits were saying that the health care workers union members wanted to keep their health care plan and wouldn’t vote for Bernie who wants to replace it with Medicare For All. They voted for Bernie in overwhelming numbers.
When asked members said that yeah, they like their health care but what if they lose their job? What then? And what about their friends and family members not in the union, who don’t have access to the health care plan they have?
Biden says Bernie can beat Trump but he won’t help folks running in red states win Senate races.
Socialism being the bug-a-boo word.
Whoa – evil socialism.
The Republicans trot out the soviet style pictures of socialist republics and their ilk and try to imply that is what Bernie wants. Of course, if you’ve listen to Bernie at all in the last forty years you realize that is not what he is saying. But why let facts get in the way?
My friend dean who likes a guy who has a big red bushy beard and does videos in his woodshed about politics says that the problem with the Democratic establishment is that they have stopped listening to their constituents and instead are listening to pundits.
Now the pundits and the never Bernie folks are pushing the fact that he mentioned Castro put in a literacy program in Cuba and Bernie asked, “Is that so bad?” OMG! Heads exploding.
Bernie has also said that he’s a Democratic Socialist, which means he believes in taxes to be used to help people. Instead of a brand of Capitalism that says, “If you can make a buck by screwing over people that’s a good thing.”
He says< “Health care for all.” The pundits say it will cost trillions. What they don’t say is that the overall expense is cheaper than if you go the route we are going now. They say it will lose jobs. Yeah, all the lobbyists and paper shufflers will be out of a job. Cry me a river.

So what’s happening? Bernie has been advocating for a revolution for decades and now it’s here and the establishment is worried, and rightly so, because like Joe Biden they will be swept away.

Maybe, we need a more moderate candidate, like Pete or Amy? Hum, we tried that before, remember? How’d that work out?

Oh we can’t win in red states with Bernie you say. Really? Hum, I’ll bet if you go into those states and say, “Everyone gets health care and we’ll get rid of the tariffs and help you reclaim the markets that Trump took away. I’m guessing those farmers and those left behind aren’t going to care what you call it. Remember in Kentucky when the Russians came in and said they were putting a plant in there? No one was yelling, “Communists!” Especially not Moscow Mitch who has never done a thing to help those people in his state.

Yeah, it’s a leap. You’ll have to think. You’ll have to ask yourself, “Is it time?” Or do you want to say, “Ah Gee, I wish …” Stop wishing. The time for that is over. Start making it happen.

250 Days until the election on November 3rd
330 Days until the election on January 20, 2021

PS Coronavirus? Hey don’t worry we have a “Pandemic Team” in the government for just such events.
PPS Too bad president Trump fired them all last year.

PPPS Problems Solved – Operators are Standing By