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The Coronavirus - a virus from eating bats, an accident or something sinister gone wrong?


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3 minutes ago, Howe said:

Last week the New York Times published this article by four psychiatrists. Apparently the NYT considers psychiatrists experts in the field of virology.

No. These Medicines Cannot Cure Coronavirus

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/25/opinion/coronavirus-drug-treatment-trump.html

Notice the very top of the article is labeled in large print "Opinion". I have seen "opinions" on a lot of topics that have been published; from both sides. So, what exactly in the article is inaccurate? 

IF this treatment does work; awesome. But the comparisons to people who have been treated with it to those who were not are not overwhelmingly convincing. If we reach a point where there is no doubt, awesome. I really do hope this does work in the long run, especially since I am in a higher risk group. 

The one concern the article did raise is that people who need the drug for treatment of Lupus, are being left short of the supply they need because so many others have chosen to self medicate with it. 

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Unemployment Claims Hit 6.6 Million. It's Officially Worse Than the Great Recession.: https://reason.com/2020/04/02/unemployment-claims-hit-6-6-million-its-officially-worse-than-the-great-recession/

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More than 6.6 million Americans filed for unemployment benefits in the week ending March 28. That's a record-breaking number of unemployment claims for the second week in a row, and way more than analysts were projecting for last week.

The actual number of claims was "more than double the estimate of 3.1 million analysts expected," points out CNBC correspondent Eamon Javers. "The American job market is in free fall."

In the two weeks ending March 28, 9.9 million people filed for unemployment benefits.

At the peak of Great Recession joblessness in 2010, "there were 7.7 million more officially unemployed people than before the downturn," noted Atlantic writer Derek Thompson."The labor market is contracting at the rate of one Great Recession per 10 days."

Before March 2020, the highest number of unemployment claims filed in a single week was 695,000.

Ladies and Gentlemen, witness the destruction of the American Economy, courtesy of your local, state, and federal governments.    

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11 minutes ago, Irishman said:

Notice the very top of the article is labeled in large print "Opinion". I have seen "opinions" on a lot of topics that have been published; from both sides. So, what exactly in the article is inaccurate? 

IF this treatment does work; awesome. But the comparisons to people who have been treated with it to those who were not are not overwhelmingly convincing. If we reach a point where there is no doubt, awesome. I really do hope this does work in the long run, especially since I am in a higher risk group. 

The one concern the article did raise is that people who need the drug for treatment of Lupus, are being left short of the supply they need because so many others have chosen to self medicate with it. 

The authors are psychiatrists. None are experts in the field of virology. Who cares?

I am unaware of people self medicating with the drug. A prescription from a doctor is required in order to purchase the medication.

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1 minute ago, Howe said:

The authors are psychiatrists. None are experts in the field of virology. Who cares?

I am unaware of people self medicating with the drug. A prescription from a doctor is required in order to purchase the medication.

I get that; neither statement answered my question though. But, based on your logic, you are saying we SHOULD be listening to Dr. Fauci then, who said we need further testing, research, etc. before approving this drug for this treatment, since he IS an expert in the field and NOT to President Trump, since he is not an expert, right? 

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Will Pandemic Jobless Benefits Make Recovery Harder?: https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/04/will-pandemic-jobless-benefits-make-recovery-harder/?itm_campaign=headline-testing-will-pandemic-jobless-benefits-make-recovery-harder&itm_medium=headline&itm_source=nationalreview&itm_content=This Provision Might Be Making the Unemployment Problem Worse&itm_term=This Provision Might Be Making the Unemployment Problem Worse

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T he U.S. labor market is officially in free fall. Weekly jobless claims hit 3.3 million last week, smashing all previous records. The record was broken again this morning, when the Labor Department confirmed that 6.6 million people filed claims for unemployment benefits in the week ending March 28.

For perspective, weekly jobless claims during the Great Recession topped out at only 665,000, with a peak unemployment rate of 10 percent. Jobless claims from just the last two weeks already put us past that. Based on some simple back-of-the-envelope math, an economist at the St. Louis Fed recently estimated that the U.S. unemployment rate could easily exceed 30 percent by the end of this quarter. That’s Great Depression territory.

 

Complicating matters is the fact that public officials are actively trying to discourage work. Take the new Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program, which passed into law last week as part of the $2.2 trillion relief package. States that participate in the program are required to waive the usual job-search requirements for unemployment-insurance (UI) recipients, drop the one-week waiting period for new applicants, and dramatically expand eligibility to reach anyone affected by COVID-19. In return, the federal government will pick up the cost and add an extra $600 per week to the base benefit (equal to half the state’s regular unemployment benefit) for up to four months.

This $600 per week add-on — equivalent to a $15-per-hour full-time income — means that many workers will soon be eligible to receive more in unemployment compensation than they would make on the job. Realizing this, Senator Lindsey Graham (R., S.C.) nearly derailed the legislation, suggesting that it must have been a drafting error. In reality, it was a compromise required by the backwardness of most state UI systems, which run on decades-old programming that cannot be easily modified.

The question remains whether, in the context of a global pandemic, unemployment benefits that pay better than your job should be considered a feature or a bug. To paraphrase my colleague, Will Wilkinson, the economic crisis is subordinate to the epidemiological crisis. To solve the former we must first solve the latter, which involves encouraging people to stay at home — and away from work — as much as possible.

And yet there are different ways to achieve this goal, with different risks involved. Graham, for his part, was widely mocked for apparently misunderstanding how unemployment insurance works. After all, you can’t simply quit your job and claim UI, so what’s the risk?

Except you can quit your job and claim the new UI benefit, at least under the letter of the law. Indeed, eligibility is nearly all-encompassing, covering anyone who provides “self-certification” that their ability to work has been disrupted for “COVID-19 related reasons.” This includes gig workers, independent contractors, and the self-employed. Only those who can telework or who have paid leave through their employer are explicitly excluded.

It should go without saying that no government in history has ever designed an unemployment-insurance program quite like thisone that virtually anyone can qualify for, and with benefits on par with the median weekly earnings of full-time workers. Will grocery-store employees and hospital administrative staff quit en masse, preferring four months of tax-free income to working under potentially hazardous conditions? We just don’t know, and anyone who claims to know is pretending.

Even the Left seems to be of two minds. While most are confident that the temporary nature of the benefit will keep employment rates from collapsing, some are rejoicing at “the possibility of millions of low-wage workers rebelling against their employers by quitting for $600/week super-UI,” as Vox’s Dylan Matthews tweeted. Which is it?

I personally am uncertain, but a worst-case scenario is easy to imagine: Essential services will go unstaffed, and businesses that would otherwise operate will falter. Some firms will retain workers by raising wages, but most won’t have the extra cash to compete against four months of generous paid leave. Then, once quarantines begin to lift, a fraction of Pandemic UI recipients will choose to stay on “extended benefits” because their former employer has disappeared. Temporary unemployment will become structural, and a jobless recovery will drag out for decades.

Liberal and progressive veterans of the Great Recession will likely roll their eyes at this prognosis, thinking I’m some kind of simple-minded supply-sider. Yet my primary concern is about labor demand. Maintaining a formal relationship between employers and their employees, even if they’re furloughed, will be key to ensuring a robust economic rebound. If those relationships are broken, businesses won’t spontaneously raise wages. Rather, they will either close shop or restructure around business models where that labor isn’t demanded in the first place.

This is the genius behind the relief package’s Paycheck Protection Program. Starting on Friday, businesses with fewer than 500 employees, hotels, and restaurant chains will be eligible for federally guaranteed loans to cover their payroll, benefits, rent, and utilities for up to eight weeks. The loans are forgiven in full if employers retain their employees and don’t reduce their wages. To be sure, the program has administrative challenges of its own, but at least the logic is sound: Employees continue to get paid even if their place of work is closed, and Main Street businesses can stand by to reopen quickly when quarantines end.

Put differently, the Paycheck Protection Program pays businesses to maintain their labor demand, while Pandemic Unemployment Assistance pays workers to reduce their labor supply. How the two programs will interact is unclear. Unfortunately, even at $350 billion, estimates suggest the Paycheck Protection Program is deeply underfunded relative to the number of businesses at risk of failing in the months ahead. Without additional funding, mass unemployment and rolling business failures seem inevitable.

Some have argued that the goal of the relief package is to put the economy into a “medically induced coma.” Yet the reality looks more like the economic equivalent of mechanical ventilation: a necessary but blunt intervention to keep the economy breathing. Without strong incentives for reemployment and new-business formation in the next phase of emergency legislation, U.S. labor markets — like the lungs of a recovered COVID-19 patient — now risk suffering ominously permanent damage.

Yep, you will see thousands if not ten of thousands of individuals quit their jobs so they can qualify for this sweet, sweet increase in their pay for four months, all courtesy of the federal government.  And this they are hooked, and we have still another generation of Americans living off of the public dole.

 

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10 minutes ago, Muda69 said:

Unemployment Claims Hit 6.6 Million. It's Officially Worse Than the Great Recession.: https://reason.com/2020/04/02/unemployment-claims-hit-6-6-million-its-officially-worse-than-the-great-recession/

Ladies and Gentlemen, witness the destruction of the American Economy, courtesy of your local, state, and federal governments.    

I understand your position on this, but I also understand the concerns about the virus. It is a double edged sword. How many lives are worth losing to keep the economy going? Is it worth contaminating the food supply chains that exist in the country? How many people would lose their jobs because they do get sick, and need the extended time off beyond what an employer allows? Are we ok with the notion that with no limits, that hospitals will be the ones deciding who to treat and who to not treat? I already know of a few cases in this area of those choices already being made, but with no closures or orders, how many more would that involve? 

Ultimately, wouldn't the economy end up being just as damaged or even worse than it is now if there were not bans or restrictions in place? 

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2 minutes ago, Muda69 said:

Yep, you will see thousands if not ten of thousands of individuals quit their jobs so they can qualify for this sweet, sweet increase in their pay for four months, all courtesy of the federal government.  And this they are hooked, and we have still another generation of Americans living off of the public dole.

Agreed. The average American is lazy.

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1 minute ago, Irishman said:

I understand your position on this, but I also understand the concerns about the virus. It is a double edged sword. How many lives are worth losing to keep the economy going? Is it worth contaminating the food supply chains that exist in the country? How many people would lose their jobs because they do get sick, and need the extended time off beyond what an employer allows? Are we ok with the notion that with no limits, that hospitals will be the ones deciding who to treat and who to not treat? I already know of a few cases in this area of those choices already being made, but with no closures or orders, how many more would that involve? 

Ultimately, wouldn't the economy end up being just as damaged or even worse than it is now if there were not bans or restrictions in place? 

No, I don't believe it would.  Let freedom and personal responsibility reign, not government fiat.   It is what America was built on.

 

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3 minutes ago, Muda69 said:

No, I don't believe it would.  Let freedom and personal responsibility reign, not government fiat.   It is what America was built on.

 

ok....how about the other questions I asked? 

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37 minutes ago, Irishman said:

I get that; neither statement answered my question though. But, based on your logic, you are saying we SHOULD be listening to Dr. Fauci then, who said we need further testing, research, etc. before approving this drug for this treatment, since he IS an expert in the field and NOT to President Trump, since he is not an expert, right? 

Hydroxychoroquine and chloroquine have been FDA approved dugs for 65 years. Both have been approved by the FDA for COVID-19 treatment as well.

Dr. Fauci: Of Course I Would Prescribe Choroquine To Coronavirus Patients.

CHRIS STIGALL:If you’re a doctor listening to me right now and a patient with coronavirus feels like they want to try [Chloroquine] and you’re their doctor, you’re not Anthony Fauci the guy running the coronavirus task force, would you say ‘alright, we’ll give it a whirl’?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: Yeah, of course, particularly if people have no other option. You want to give them hope. In fact, for physicians in this country, these drugs are approved drugs for other reasons. They’re anti-malaria drugs and they’re drugs against certain autoimmune diseases, like lupus. Physicians throughout the country can prescribe that in an off-label way. Which means they can write it for something it was not originally approved for. People do that all the time, and it really is an individual choice between the physician and his or her patient as to whether or not they want to do that. 

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/03/25/dr-anthony-fauci-of-course-i-would-prescribe-chloroquine-to-coronavirus-patients/

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42 minutes ago, Muda69 said:

Will Pandemic Jobless Benefits Make Recovery Harder?: https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/04/will-pandemic-jobless-benefits-make-recovery-harder/?itm_campaign=headline-testing-will-pandemic-jobless-benefits-make-recovery-harder&itm_medium=headline&itm_source=nationalreview&itm_content=This Provision Might Be Making the Unemployment Problem Worse&itm_term=This Provision Might Be Making the Unemployment Problem Worse

Yep, you will see thousands if not ten of thousands of individuals quit their jobs so they can qualify for this sweet, sweet increase in their pay for four months, all courtesy of the federal government.  And this they are hooked, and we have still another generation of Americans living off of the public dole.

 

Have you applied for your unemployment benefits yet?

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1 hour ago, Irishman said:

How many lives are worth losing to keep the economy going?

More than one, less than one million.

1 hour ago, Irishman said:

Is it worth contaminating the food supply chains that exist in the country?

Yes, if by "contamination" you mean the fear that too many workers in the food industry or transportation industry would become ill and no longer able to work.

I have a close friend who works at the Frito-Lay facility in Frankfort, the 2nd largest facility Frito-Lay owns in the country.   No layoff there.  Normally this time of year is somewhat a slow period for them.  Not so now, they can't keep up with demand for the products they make.  

1 hour ago, Irishman said:

 How many people would lose their jobs because they do get sick, and need the extended time off beyond what an employer allows?

I don't know, depends on the employer.  I'm sure there is something in the newly passed "stimulus" bill (largest spending boondoggle in American history BTW, passed by an unrecorded voice vote) to address this, right?

1 hour ago, Irishman said:

Are we ok with the notion that with no limits, that hospitals will be the ones deciding who to treat and who to not treat?

Don't know about you, but I'm ok with that notion.  I'm sure there will be scientific rational applied behind such decision, don't you?

 

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54 minutes ago, gonzoron said:

Have you applied for your unemployment benefits yet?

Since I am currently still employed, no.  How about you?

All the government employees on this forum should be feeling fat and sassy right now.  No chance of them losing their jobs during this pandemic, and lot of them get to sit and home and "teach" remotely.

 

 

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2 minutes ago, Muda69 said:

Since I am currently still employed, no.  How about you?

No, I won't need to. I'm still employed in an "essential" job as an "essential" employee.

Non-essential employees are eligible for unemployment even if they are still employed. 

Why haven't you applied?

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Are There Fiscal Conservatives in a Pandemic? The Club for Growth Says It Doesn't Matter.: https://reason.com/2020/04/02/are-there-fiscal-conservatives-in-a-pandemic-the-club-for-growth-says-it-doesnt-matter/

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On its website, the Club For Growth describes itself as "the only organization that is willing and able to take on any member of Congress on policy who fails to uphold basic economic conservative principles…regardless of party."

The Club does indeed have a long track record within conservative politics. It was the tea party movement before there was a tea party movement; the rare D.C. organization that cared more about who was paying for the government than who was getting paid by it. The Club made its name by providing grassroots activists with congressional scorecards and candidates with a sought-after endorsement for abiding by the principles of low taxes, balanced budgets, and smaller government.

The Club prides itself on "exerting maximum pressure on lawmakers to vote like free-market, limited government conservatives," as the organization's website explains. "And when they don't, we hold them accountable by publicizing their voting record."

Except, well…not right now.

The Club for Growth is not including last week's vote on the $2.3 trillion Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES Act) in its annual congressional scorecard. The bill passed the Senate without a single dissenting vote and cleared the House on a voice vote after Rep. Thomas Massie's (R–Ky.) effort to require a roll-call vote was thwarted.

David McIntosh, president of the Club for Growth, said in an interview with Morning Consult that the group chose not to include the vote in its scorecard because "we understand the politics of needing to show the public we're doing everything we can."

As Morning Consult's Eli Yokley observes, that's pretty much how conservatives are reacting across the board. Prominent conservative groups are refusing to criticize Republican lawmakers and President Donald Trump for the massive spending package, and polling shows fewer than 1 in 10 Republican voters disapprove of the measure's passage.

That tells you something about the current state of the conservative movement. When the last Republican president signed the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), otherwise known as the 2008 bank bailout, polling from Gallup found that fewer than half of all Republicans supported it. When President Barack Obama signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the $833 billion stimulus passed in the wake of the last economic collapse, only about 30 percent of self-identified conservatives approved, Gallup found.

Now, we're spending a whole lot more money with a whole lot less opposition.

As Reason Editor at Large Matt Welch put it last week: "There is no more politics of fiscal prudence in America, just a competition to see who can wag the biggest firehose."

If fiscal conservatism still held any cache among Republican lawmakers, voters, and activists, there would have been an outcry about President Donald Trump and Republicans in Congress inflating the deficit to record highs over the past three years. It wasn't all that long ago that grassroots conservatives were toasting the toppling of high-ranking Republicans for lesser slights.

If it meant anything, the Club for Growth wouldn't have sided with a deficit-hiking president in his blood-feud with Rep. Justin Amash (I–Mich.). It wasn't all that long ago that the Club for Growth was pouring money into Amash's campaign coffers, probably because he owns a 98 percent lifetime rating on the group's scorecards—you know, the ones that apparently don't matter anymore.

The CARES Act was never going to be stopped by token opposition from the Club for Growth or its fellow travelers in the formerly influential circles of fiscal conservatism. That's not the point. Holding people accountable doesn't always mean they lose their jobs. But there is value in keeping voters informed, even if only as a way to deter future votes on similar measures. The lawmakers who voted for the CARES Act would be free to explain to voters why it was necessary to hand $60 billion—$32 billion in straight cash—to America's airlines to stop COVID-19. Voters would decide as they will.

"We hold them accountable by publicizing their voting record," is what the Club promises to do. And when you don't do that thing—you had literally one job—it sends a signal about priorities that unfortunately run a lot deeper than a single vote.

 

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9 minutes ago, gonzoron said:

No, I won't need to. I'm still employed in an "essential" job as an "essential" employee.

So what line of work makes you such an "essential" employee?

11 minutes ago, gonzoron said:

Non-essential employees are eligible for unemployment even if they are still employed. 

Why haven't you applied?

Apparently I don't qualify:

https://www.cnet.com/how-to/coronavirus-unemployment-payments-applying-and-more/

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If you're able to work from home or currently receive paid leave, you won't qualify for the updated unemployment benefits.

Besides, am currently still working,  and I don't accept government handouts.  My spouse and I have enough financial liquidity to easily last for the next 6 months or so.  Do you?

 

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2 minutes ago, Muda69 said:

Besides, am currently still working,  and I don't accept government handouts.

How are you still working if you're non-essential? Is your employer defying the ban on non-essential businesses?

 

3 minutes ago, Muda69 said:

My spouse and I have enough financial liquidity to easily last for the next 6 months or so.  Do you?

Yes

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3 minutes ago, gonzoron said:

How are you still working if you're non-essential? Is your employer defying the ban on non-essential businesses?

I'll answer your questions if you answer mine, which you ignored:

So what line of work makes you such an "essential" employee?

 

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4 minutes ago, Muda69 said:

I'll answer your questions if you answer mine, which you ignored:

So what line of work makes you such an "essential" employee?

 

"vital support in the food, beverage, pharmaceuticals, medical supplies, and
sanitation industries."

Edited by gonzoron
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