Tag Archives: pandemic

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.

economic news

Sure thing, Mr. POTUS; keep saying you didn’t insist on the name issue

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The nation’s Liar in Chief revealed his penchant for prevarication once again this week; it occurred at his Wednesday “briefing” at the White House over the coronavirus pandemic.

A reporter asked him about whether his name should appear on the stimulus checks that are coming to millions of Americans.

Donald Trump said oh, no. He had nothing to do with putting his name on those checks. That he had no input on the matter. That was someone else’s call. Some anonymous staffer agreed finally to put “Donald J. Trump” on the memo line on the checks that are coming to us.

I believe that, right? Wrong! The liar who poses as president of the United States cannot tell the truth even if someone were to point a gun at him while he stands on Fifth Avenue. You know what I’m talkin’ about?

Our stimulus payment appears to be coming to us via the Postal Service that Trump might allow to go bankrupt later this year. I learned that by looking at the irs.gov website. It says we’re eligible for payment, but that the Internal Revenue Service doesn’t have sufficient information for us to qualify for direct deposit into our checking account. Whatever.

If it comes to us via snail mail, I am left with a decision to make: Do we deposit the check immediately or do we gaze fondly for days at the Idiot in Chief’s name engraved in the memo line? Well, you know how I feel about him and the notion that he would insist on putting his name on a document in an unprecedented display of ego.

And yet, Donald Trump insists he had nothing to do with putting his name on the check?

Got it. I will wait for the sun to rise in the west tomorrow morning.

military news

Capt. Crozier back to the USS TR? By all means … yes!

What do you know about this item?

The U.S. Navy is considering whether to return Capt. Brett Crozier to the bridge of the USS Theodore Roosevelt after he was summarily — and wrongly, in my view — removed from his command of the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier.

Former Acting Navy Secretary Thomas Modly canned Crozier after the captain fired off a letter to the brass complaining that the Navy was not doing enough to protect sailors who had been exposed to COVID-19. Several dozen sailors serving on the Roosevelt had tested positive for the virus. Capt. Crozier issued a plea for help!

For that he was relieved of his command. His sailors cheered him as he left the ship for what was thought would be the final time.

Modly himself was removed from his post.

Now we hear that the Navy is considering whether to return Crozier to the ship he commanded and to command the sailors who revere him.

Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Michael Gilday’s spokesman said the admiral hasn’t made a firm decision … which to me sounds as if he’s leaning toward that returning Crozier to his former — and possibly future — command.

The New York Times, though, reports that Crozier’s possible return to the TR might face an obstacle: the commander in chief might meddle in this military personnel matter. Donald Trump already has demonstrated a willingness to intervene in a command decision. Trump has criticized Crozier already for the way he communicated his concern over his sailors’ well-being. Thus, he well might feel inclined to block a rightful decision to return Crozier to commanding a crew that clearly respects and reveres him.

I hope Capt. Crozier is returned to the Theodore Roosevelt.

The men and women would welcome him. What’s more, if the commander in chief is as devoted to the men and women who serve our country as he claims to be, he will stand aside and let Brett Crozier resume his command.