Tag Archives: pandemic

national news

Trump aligns with protesters … and endangers Americans’ health

Oh, that Donald Trump just cannot control his idiotic impulses.

Trump took to Twitter today to declare it was time to:

LIBERATE MICHIGAN!

LIBERATE VIRGINIA!

and LIBERATE MINNESOTA!

Protesters had marched in Lansing, Mich., seeking Gov. Gretchen Whitmer to pull back on her stay at home mandates. They want the state to relax the restrictions put in place to battle the coronavirus pandemic.

All three of the states mentioned, I need to add, are governed by Democrats.

The social distancing being sought, as well as the stay at home and shelter in place mandates are helping turn the tide against the coronavirus. So, what’s the president trying to do here?

Hmm. I believe the president of the United States is endangering the health and well-being of the citizens he took an oath to protect.

This man is a menace to the nation.

media news

Crisis producing a whole new category of hero

I am more than willing to admit that I do not like watching all this televised coverage of the coronavirus pandemic.

It is non-stop, relentless and unforgiving. The news is mostly grim and it frightens me as I think of my family and wondering if they’re safe from the killer disease.

Now, is the entire coverage depressing and frightening? No. Much of it also is uplifting. I refer to the feel-good stories we get to see on TV or read in newspapers or online. They tell us about heroes and the truly magnificent heroic acts they are performing.

We need to effectively re-establish the definition of “hero.” The term no longer applies just to military personnel who thrust themselves into harm’s way; they aren’t just firefighters who rush into burning buildings to rescue people caught in the flames; or police officers who stop a criminal from inflicting havoc on a community.

Heroes now include doctors and nurses who are tending to infected patients. They work in nursing homes and assisted living centers tending to elderly residents who are highly vulnerable to the ravages of this disease. They are grocery vendors who deliver food to retail outlets to ensure that residents can purchase the goods they need just to get through the day or the week. Heroes are ambulance drivers, paramedics and utility workers who expose themselves to those in need … who well might be infected with the disease.

I also want to point out that the media that keep getting panned unfairly for the coverage they provide. We hear from those in the conservative media that their “mainstream media” colleagues are overhyping the danger being delivered by the virus.

The media that get vilified unjustly also are telling us regularly about the heroes among us. The media are reporting throughout the day the stories we want to hear, we want to see and about which we want to read. They are giving proper praise to those who are risking their lives to save the lives of others.

Although I am weary of the onslaught of grim news, I am strengthened by news of another sort. The heroes make me humble and proud of the work they are doing to serve all of our communities.

national news

Trump continues to seethe at Mitt

Donald Trump asked members of the U.S. Senate to join a task force to help craft a plan to restart the nation’s economy that has been shut down by the coronavirus pandemic.

He asked almost the entire Republican caucus in the Senate to join. Trump left one GOP senator off the list: Mitt Romney of Utah.

Gosh, why is that? Oh yeah! Romney was the lone GOP senator to vote to convict Trump in the impeachment trial; he voted “yes” on the abuse of power article brought to the Senate by the House of Representatives. He made history with that vote, becoming the first senator to vote to convict a president of his own party.

Trump is steamed. It’s not that he and Romney were longtime pals. Mitt spoke in 2016 about how he believes Trump is a “phony” and a “fraud.” He didn’t want him to be the party’s presidential nominee.

Romney has been periodically critical of Trump over the past three years. The Senate trial vote was the last straw.

Trump’s congressional team comprises a lot of smart folks from both parties. Mitt Romney could have added considerable expertise and perspective to the discussion. Donald Trump, though, won’t sweep aside a grudge … even when the nation’s economic health hangs in the balance.

State news

Classrooms remain empty for the rest of the school year

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MANDEL NGAN/AFP/Getty Images)

BLOGGER’S NOTE: This post has been corrected. Your blogger regrets the error of the original post.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott made what might be among the most predictable decisions yet in this coronavirus pandemic fight.

He has closed Texas’s public schools for the remainder of the academic year. The state’s 5.4 million students and their teachers and school staffers are still at work. They are studying at home. Teachers are sending study materials to the students’ homes; the students are turning in their work. However, the school buildings themselves remain dark.

A relaxation of other restrictions appears to be coming. Abbott announced the formation of a task force that will craft a list of recommendations to be presented in fairly short order on how the state should proceed with lifting certain restrictions.

The school recommendation was pretty much a fait accompli. Abbott had set a May 4 target date for classes to reopen with students and teachers, but that date became unrealistic because the state was unable to curb the infection rate sufficiently to allow the reopening of schools.

Now comes the harder part. The “strike force” that Abbott announced will decide on a phased-in approach to restarting the Texas economy. Abbott already has announced some loosening of restrictions at hospitals, certain retail businesses and — this is my favorite item — reopening of state parks; my wife and I are itching to awaken our fifth wheel from its extended winter hibernation and take it to a state park for a few days.

Abbott pledges that his actions will be guided by “data and doctors.” That’s a welcome pledge from the governor. Proceed, Gov. Abbott … but with maximum caution.

I, too, am anxious to return to some semblance of what we used to think of as normal. However, the stakes are too great to mess this up by proceeding too hastily.

medical news, national news

Will POTUS seek to take credit for states’ pandemic-reduction success?

Donald John Trump’s well-known penchant for clumsy incoherence is likely to present itself when more of our states report an actual decline in the hospitalization caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has delivered some good news on that front. My concern, as always, is how center on how Donald Trump might seek to take credit where he doesn’t deserve it.

The national response, such as it has developed, has been pitiful and pathetic. Trump claimed to have “total authority” over every decision made at the state level; then he backed off that statement, releasing a blueprint for guidelines to relax certain restrictions that governors could follow if they wish.

He has downplayed the impact of the pandemic, then declared he knew it was a pandemic before anyone else knew it. Trump has accused hospitals of hoarding masks and ventilators. He has scolded governors, calling one of them a “snake.” Trump has accused Democrats of playing politics. He has blasted the media for reporting “fake news.”

Donald Trump has contradicted analyses given by his top medical experts.

Meanwhile, governors have been left to employ their own devices to battle the pandemic. The epicenter of the outbreak in this country, which started in Washington but moved across the nation to New York, has caused untold heartache and misery.

Now we’re beginning to see more than a glimmer of hope that social distancing and other measures enacted by governors are starting to pay dividends, as Andrew Cuomo has suggested.

I just don’t want Donald Trump to get in the way of this message. I do not want to hear this Bloviator/Braggart in Chief take credit he doesn’t deserve. I want him to keep his yapper shut.

I know I am asking for too much. I just have to get it off my chest.

State news

Undocumented immigrants getting unfair punishment

Oh, if we only could muster up a bit of compassion in this country for U.S. residents who lack proper immigration documents, but who perform “essential” work, pay their taxes and behave themselves.

These folks are being neglected by the “economic stimulus package” that is being sent to millions of Americans. They won’t receive the help that is going to U.S. citizens.

Call me a bleeding heart if you wish. I’m OK with that as it regards this issue.

The Texas Tribune reports that roughly 8.2 percent of Texas’ workforce comprises undocumented immigrants. Yes, they are here “illegally” in the strict definition of the term. They face deportation by the Trump administration.

But they pay their taxes, giving money to the U.S. Treasury. They do not break other U.S. laws. They act as de facto law-abiding citizens. Except they are being shut out of the government’s economic stimulus initiative activated by the coronavirus pandemic.

I do not believe that is fair. It is as unfair as the effort to criminalize the Dreamers who live here “illegally” because their parents brought them to this country as children. They are recipients of the Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals measure enacted by President Obama, but which was revoked by Donald J. Trump. The state and nation are full of DACA recipients who have lived as model “citizens,” even as they lack the documentation that grants them citizenship, or even legal immigrant status.

And so the unfairness is now spilling onto those who deserve some economic relief in this perilous time.

media news, medical news

Pandemic coverage = failed prevention policy

Something occurred to me this week when I began reading the Dallas Morning News that my carrier tossed onto my driveway.

The newspaper’s front page story count was devoted totally to the coronavirus pandemic. Then I looked at some of the inside pages. Multiple pages contained full coverage of the pandemic. The editorial page also had many letters to the editor and opinion columns devoted to the pandemic.

Then the light bulb flashed on: When have we ever witnessed such wall-to-wall, 24/7, nonstop, relentless coverage of a single issue? I guess the last issue that did that occurred on Sept. 11, 2001. That’s how big this pandemic has become.

Why mention this? Well, I also remember earlier this year when Donald Trump was downplaying the onset of the virus that he was highly critical of previous administrations’ efforts at handling earlier health crises. He mentioned the Ebola virus and the H1N1 outbreaks that dogged the Obama administration. He exerted a bit of effort to tell us that in his view President Obama did a lousy job of corralling those crises.

OK, but … did those crises dominate the media coverage — not to mention the top of everyone’s awareness — the way this pandemic has done? No. They didn’t.

What does that tell me? It tells me that those crises either weren’t as widespread as the coronavirus pandemic has become and that the Obama administration did a good job of stemming their impact on the population.

It also symbolizes and illustrates one of the fundamental points that Trump critics — such as yours truly — have made all along, which is that Donald Trump has fumbled bigly in organizing his administration’s response to the crisis.

I have to circle back to something Dr. Anthony Fauci said, which was that had there been a concerted early effort to “mitigate” the effects of the disease that we wouldn’t be in the pickle we’re in at this moment.

So, here we are … with a disease overwhelming the media’s daily coverage of the news of the day. That, I submit, is a consequence of an inept governmental response.

economic news

‘Total authority’ takes a back seat to reality

Donald Trump’s claim to possess “total authority” to tell governors what to do in reaction to the coronavirus pandemic has taken a back seat to obvious reality.

I want to believe reason set in, that the president of the United States has looked — finally! — at the U.S. Constitution to see what it says about such authority.

But I cannot believe such a thing. What likely happened is that someone told Trump that his incoherent blathering was doing far more harm than good. I’ll go with that … or something like that.

The president is announcing “guidelines” that governors and local officials can exercise in deciding whether to relax restrictions imposed by the COVID-19 virus.

Of course his emphasis will be on the economic impact on the virus. Yes, he is giving some lip service to the suffering that has occurred among many thousands of Americans. Rest assured, Trump’s major concern continues to be — in my view — whether the economic collapse will harm his re-election chances this November.

All that said, the total authority that Donald Trump once proclaimed for himself has given way to a more reasonable approach that hands the vast bulk of that authority back to the states and those who govern them.

medical news, science news

Politicians should cease setting back-to-normal schedules

The feeble efforts by human beings to predict when they’ll be able to declare victory in a fight against a deadly virus make me want to … pull my hair out by the roots.

One such human being happens to be the president of the United States, who keeps insisting he has a preferred date in mind when he can start relaxing guidelines brought to bear by the coronavirus pandemic.

How many times must we tell Donald John “Stable Genius” Trump what should be patently obvious? Politicians cannot dictate to a deadly virus when it should stop sickening and killing human beings! We need science to determine when that will occur. We need human beings with deep scientific backgrounds and experience battling infectious disease to take the lead on this endeavor.

Donald Trump wants to establish some “flexible guidelines” that would dictate whether or to lift some of the stay at home directives that governors have issued. He keeps saying he wants a May 1 deadline to reopen the economy; then he talks about some states loosening restrictions even sooner than that!

C’mon! Let’s quit this game-playing!

We need science-based facts. We need to stop trying to outmaneuver a virus. Here is one more obvious fact that still needs to be brought up once more: A killer virus is no respecter of human deadlines, human wishes and human goals.

medical news

Waiting for the escape hatch to open

I believe I understand why the current worldwide health crisis is so unprecedented and devastating in its scope.

Let me say first that I totally understand the illness and death it has caused, creating untold misery, heartache and mourning. Its victims die alone, as hospitals cannot allow loved ones near them to hold their hands, whisper their love into their ears or just to act as comforters in time of pain and peril.

The unique quality of this coronavirus pandemic rests in the absence of any escape hatch for us to get away from the onslaught of bad news we are being forced to consume from our news networks.

Professional sports? College sports? Any sort of entertainment that allows us to sit among crowds of people who are cheering at the same performance? That’s all been put on ice.

Pro basketball and hockey has been shelved. Major League Baseball’s season has been delayed until only God knows when. The Summer Olympics in Tokyo has been postponed for an entire year … maybe even longer than that. College football is supposed to start later this summer, but they might not kick it off until much later.

New York’s Broadway theaters are closed. Movie theaters everywhere are closed, too.

So, we’re stuck. At home. Our governor asks us to stay put. He’ll get back to us soon to tell us where we might be able to go.

Some of us are going batty looking at the same walls for weeks on end. To be honest, we’re doing OK in our home. My wife and I happen to like each other’s company; at least I can speak for myself anyway on that matter.

This pandemic, though, is unprecedented simply by virtue of all the activities it has been on the back shelf. We are waiting now for an escape hatch to open.