Day 1138 Leap Day

Day 1138 Leap Day

Saturday February 29, 2020 

246 Days until the election on November 3rd

326 Days until the Inauguration on January 20, 2021

A person whom I really don’t know, but comments frequently about my screeds on facebook said of my screed where I asked if the president was gay because his pink eyes and lips matched his pink tie said that it was dumb and then said goodbye. I don’t know if that means he is done commenting or if he has flipped a switch on facebook so he doesn’t have to see my screeds. I find it interesting that a dyed in the wool Trumper doesn’t see the humor in a far right smear tactic used as a humorous piece. There are two varieties of this smear. One is a Trump favorite ploy, “I don’t know but a lot of people are saying …” and the other is “I don’t have a dog in this fight …” In the first instance no one is saying whatever it is (except Alex jones at InfoWars and Rush Limbaugh and Anne Coulter and Tucker Carlson.) In the second case I’ve never seen anyone lead off with that dog comment that doesn’t definitely have a dog in the fight. 

But that isn’t what I want to tell you about today. It being leap day I think it important to tell you what the longest year on record is. Do you know what it is? I know the last few years have seemed like the longest years on record but they aren’t. The longest year on record is 1972. 

It was a leap year – yes. But did you know that the Earth is slowing down? Every so often the National Observatory in Washington DC has to add a second to the year to make up for the Earth’s slowing down. I assume there are still people working there, but that may not be the case what with the cutbacks and all. In some years a second has to be added to the official time to make up for the fact (FACT! OMG! Kill it.) that the Earth is slowing down. That second is called “a Leap Second.” I do not know to which minute or hour it is added, but it is added.

However, in 1972 they did not add just a Leap Second, but two! Two Leap Seconds! Making 1972 the longest year in recorded history. 

The woman who told me this at my tour of The National Observatory was so excited that the only thing I could think of was “Honey, you need to get out more.” (Maybe, shake them pocket protectors?)

Another thought, and this is unrelated, is that there was a piece awhile back about a guy on Fox News who said that germs weren’t real because you can’t see them, and therefore he did not wash his hands after using the bathroom. The report which was done by Stephen Colbert also said that Trump is a germaphobe. The next picture showed this guy shaking hands with Trump.

Now we turn to the Coronavirus. Mic Mulvaney said this was getting way overblown. He pointed out that SARS and MERS were corona viruses and that not that many people died from it. The press was making too big a deal about this. Only 2% of the people infected died from it – big deal, he said, Turn off the TV for 24 hours.

There was a scientific reporter on last night who said old Mic was right about one thing and dead wrong about another. (Emphasis on “dead.”) 

Yes only 2% of the people who get this Coronavirus are dying from it, but we don’t have really good data yet. And yes not that many people died from SARS or MERS, but not that many people were infected. Therefore the total number was low. We know that the total number of people infected from this Coronavirus (labeled CoVid-19) is much higher than previous corona viruses. Therefore the number of deaths will be much higher. 

By China reacting as quickly as it did, bought us time. Time to get ready. Instead of getting ready we’ve stuck our heads in the sand. The woman who spoke at the president’s news conference, a scientist, who gave us real facts, has been reassigned. 

Then this scientific reporter said something startling. “When one third of our parliament has it we’ll have to shut down that public assembly.”

I have to ask, “What will it take?” What will it take for Trump and the Trumpers to start dealing with facts – real facts, not alternate facts. How long will they explain away deaths? What will they do when a member of their family gets sick? Tell them they’ll be fine? Not to worry?

One of the things we’ll need for this outbreak is respirators. They cost $20-50,000. How many do we have? About one tenth of what is projected we’ll need. 

We need a quick and mobile response to wherever the virus has an outbreak. Do we have teams in place? No. Do we have the proper equipment? No. Do we have testing kits? There was a problem, so – no. 

Prepare for the worst. Hope for the best. Is what epidemiologists tell us to do.

But that is from scientists and people who have spent their careers studying and working on these kind of things. What do we have? We have Mike Pence. A man whom the CDC had to convince that handing out clean needles to drug addicts was a good idea from a health prospective because he was “morally opposed” to it. Will Mike be morally opposed to testing for this virus? Will he be cowed by the president and not do it for that reason? 

Joe Biden said if he was President he’d have sent teams over to China to try and figure out what was going on and to help stop the spread of the virus. 

Did Trump do that? No. He’s wishing it away.

Dark days are ahead. And with Trump it’s everyone for themselves. It’s like a zombie apocalypse. 

The president isn’t leading. He’s cowering. 

God I wonder what those idiots on the couch at Fox and Friends must think when Trump calls in. It seems they shut off their brains.

Seth Myers regularly plays interview with the president. It’s worth watching. If I were going to run a campaign against the president I would just play those clips. He babbles. It’s nonsensical and the reporter has to sit there, I guess, and not break out laughing. Or crying.  Most recently Trump said Elon Mush likes rockets and we have to protect him and his invention. Then he babbled about electricity and protecting Edison and then went on to mention the wheel. It seemed he thought the wheel was invented here in the good olde U – S – of – A! 

Funny?

Not anymore. It never really was.

But now people will be dying. Dying because of the likes of Donald Trump, Mike Pence, and Mic Mulvaney who are so ignorant and incompetent that they don’t even have the good sense to stand back and let the people who know what they are doing do their jobs.

Of course, many of the positions have gone unfilled and Trump eliminated all the people that were in the positions of pandemic response. So we are unprepared, understaffed, undersupplied and totally head in the sand. But let’s not talk about it – okay? Because talking about it will make it worse. Right? Am I right? 

I mean “Pray the Gay Away” worked so well we can dot he same for the Coronavirus.

Am I right? 

OMG!

Saturday February 29, 2020 

246 Days until the election on November 3rd

326 Days until the Inauguration on January 20, 2021

PS What? Me Worry?