Monday’s Open Forum
What will the new week bring?
Steven L. Taylor
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Monday, March 16, 2020
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99 comments
About Steven L. Taylor
Steven L. Taylor is a Professor of Political Science and a College of Arts and Sciences Dean. His main areas of expertise include parties, elections, and the institutional design of democracies. His most recent book is the co-authored
A Different Democracy: American Government in a 31-Country Perspective. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Texas and his BA from the University of California, Irvine. He has been blogging since 2003 (originally at the now defunct Poliblog).
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@Teve:
Apple has now said that you can clean an iPhone with disinfectant wipes. In fact, if you follow this link, you will see that it is damn near impossible to damage your screen by cleaning it too aggressively. But Apple and its ilk would find it annoying to have to reimburse one idiot out of one billion.
Biden says he will select a woman vice president. Sanders says “in all likelihood” that he will too. So whom will it be for Biden? Harris?
The
jackassheadline of the dayMan who hoarded 17,700 bottles hand sanitizer to sell on Amazon donates his stockpile after national scorn
My money is on a cancellation of all non-emergency domestic flights by Friday.
Unthinkable, but so is all this.
Quarantined Italian tenor passionately sings ‘Nessun Dorma’ from his Florence balcony
@Liberal Capitalist:
I hope not. I am flying on Wednesday, and returning the following Monday.
@Kurtz:
As the kids say: assumes facts not in evidence.
@Kit:
Ahem. I have tickets to fly out Wednesday, and I plan on returning Monday.
đ
@CSK: Klobuchar and Harris are the front runners Iâd guess, but they donât do much to attract hard core Bernie supporters (though I suspect thereâs much to be reasonably done there anyway). Warren would be fine except for her State, and to some degree, her age. Katie Porter is awesome, but I donât know if sheâs well known enough. Stacie Abrahamâs i s possible I guess. Thereâs also Hilda Solis, Susan Rice, for less obvious choices (who have already endorsed Biden).
Or maybe Michelle Obama.
DJIA down 9.7% at the moment. 20,935.
@Teve:
Must be getting close to wiping out the market’s gains since Tiny’s election. So much winning.
Forking shirtballs, itâs now over 10%.
The DJIA was 19,827 the day Obama left office. Right now itâs 20,814.
Stock traders can see through the Administrationâs transparent BS to the complete mess behind it. Every inept effort to calm the stock market has made things worse. He really does have the reverse Midas touch.
Hmmmm – bland comment on VP picks disappeared into moderation?
@Teve:
If we print charts of today’s Dow movements and send them to the White House, do you think El Cheeto would sign them?
Damn few Trump supporters coming around here now. In response to the âhow is your 401(k) doingâ, Iâm quite happy about mine, because Iâm 43 and I need to put a lot of money into the market for the next 20 years and I want a cheap market.
The Trump supporters mostly lurk now, and only appear when called out, so one of them is probably going to show up soon.
@Kathy:
He’d claim it was the rate at which COVID-19 infections were falling.
@Teve: you must be a fan of The Good Place.
Financial planner: Why are you insisting on so little stock exposure?
Me: Because sooner or later shit will meet fan and we’ll have a howler monkey in the White House.
@Sleeping Dog: Had a similar thought the other day — googled “what was DJIA when Trump was elected”. Was referred to ballotopedia with an answer of 19,732.
If that’s correct, we’re close to negative territory for Mr Trump.
(Edit: late as usual)
All non-essential foreign travel to EU set to be banned for 30 days.
@Monala: i am. đ
The best (by far) actual expert briefing I have seen on the current US situation and what people should be doing (and should have done) is this one by Michael Lin.
Warning: Contains Facts
@Michael Reynolds:
Do you think DJT roars during sex?
I think a howler monkey would have more nuanced views on foreign policy. On the other hand, a howler monkey may also grab pussies without invitation, so YMMV.
Romney just called for every American adult to get $1000.
One local radio show: “As bad as Sherman’s March”
@Kingdaddy:
Everything Tiny touches turns to doo-doo.
Guess, they’ll just shoot the virus.
@Sleeping Dog: When all you have is a Second Amendment, every problem looks like a silhouette target?
I guess this is a few days old, but I just saw it…
Susan Collins calls for Trump to step back and put Dr. Fauci in charge.
https://bangordailynews.com/2020/03/13/politics/susan-collins-criticizes-federal-coronavirus-response-urging-trump-to-step-back/
@Pylon:
Unless you were joking about Michelle Obama, I doubt she’d consent to it.
@Sleeping Dog:
Or Trump could pay it $130,000 to keep quiet.
A cloistered nun is giving tips in one of my local papers about how to achieve happy social distancing.
Moscow Mitch is actively soliciting older judges to retire.
I suppose the good news is this implies heâs less than confident heâll have Trumpsky and a GOP senate majority next year.
@CSK: Yeah, I was joking -sheâd never do it.
@Tyrell: Iâm puzzled. You say that as though Shermanâs March to the Sea was a bad thing.
@Michael Reynolds: Exactly. I went to 60% cash and government securities a couple of years ago. Had some seconds thoughts along the way, but never felt the basic premise was flawed: “Never bet on stupidity triumphing over the long term”
Is my math right? The Lancet is saying covid-19 is *57 times* more deadly than the flu? (5.7% adjusted rate.)
@Kurtz:
And if they had the technology they could tweet scat. Just like Trump.
@gVOR08:
That’s how I read that, too.
@Jen:
The briefing I linked earlier shows an Infection Fatality Rate (IFR) of 0.5% in China but 1.9% for South Korea, comparable to Spanish Flu (~2%). Typical seasonal flu has IFR < 0.2%. Keep in mind that the early days in any country are more deadly, as cases are diagnosed too late and widespread testing has not yet been deployed.
The Lancet numbers are based on confirmed cases, which is only a subset of total infections (and contains all of the most severe cases).
Delete.
I know that itâs a fast-moving target, but has anyone seen any creditable estimates for the ultimate cost due to corvid-19 from loss of GNP, bailouts, and whatever else needs to be included? Based on what Iâm seeing with my own eyes, social activity is way down. Unless, like an iceberg, the vast bulk of economic activity is invisible to the eye and largely independent from the visible tip, I cannot help but think that the economy is going to be rocked, perhaps unlike anything Iâve ever lived through.
@Kit:
While it depends on how long this goes on, but this will be worse than the 08 recession in the short term and if it goes on for a while we could be looking at Great Depression levels of economic turmoil.
The Guardian had an article this morning that Public Health England is telling the National Health Service that this could last till spring of 2021 in the UK and effect 4 of 5 citizens. If that happens we will be in a depression.
Went to the grocery this morning because we haven’t laid in for a siege and I’ll need to pick up things once or twice a week. There were two classes of shoppers: those who have decided to lay in for a siege, and those picking up a few things. The siege shoppers were required to stand in a long line that fed them through the regular cashiers. Those with only a few things were shuffled into the self-check, although the clerk there would check your items for you if you wanted. There were some empty self-check positions when I was ready to go. The shelves weren’t entirely back to normal, but getting there.
The obvious vector for the virus in my suburb is tween-aged girls. School is out, and while I was out I saw several small herds of them roaming. It’s been a long time since my daughter was that age but if my memories are accurate, after a couple of days it would be enormously tempting to push them out the door to socialize with their friends so long as the viral threat is less lethal than Ebola.
@Michael Reynolds:
I wouldn’t bet against them being able to tweet more coherently than Trump with a few months of training.
@Sleeping Dog: they’re prepping to either: 1) repel home invaders after their stash of TP and canned goods; or 2) become those home invaders after other people’s stashes.
@Liberal Capitalist:
So, the discussion on cancelling domestic flights have begun:
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/16/coronavirus-makes-airlines-consider-chances-for-a-halt-to-us-flights.html
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/15/coronavirus-domestic-travel-restrictions-possible-to-curb-virus-says-trump-administration.html
@Kurtz:
I hope where you are going Wednesday is nice… Nice enough to stay longer than Monday, maybe?
@Kit:
This Is How the Coronavirus Will Destroy the Economy
You remember all those publicly traded companies that took Tiny’s tax cuts and used them to buy back stock? Well the tax cut has been squandered, if they had banked that money rather than paying top of the market prices for their stock, they could be buying that stock on the cheap today and would be carrying less debt on the balance sheet.
I was ordering parts at NAPA today and the clerk told me they have been told to be prepared for interstates to shut down. Commercial trucks will still be on the road, but they’ll switch drivers at each state line.
Normally they can have parts here overnight, but she had no idea when my parts would get here with the situation so fluid.
@Kit: I had dinner last night at Red Ginger, an Asian restaurant. Me and my friend, and one other person, were the only customers there.
Can we just ignore Trump and put Cuomo in charge of the Pandemic Response?
DJIA down 11.55%.
@CSK: My list from a week ago was mostly women. That wasnât a coincidence: Iâve long suspected the 2020 ticket would consist of one man and one woman (in either order), and Biden signaled a while ago that he probably intended to choose a woman. Here are the ones I mentioned:
Amy Klobuchar
Tammy Baldwin
Tammy Duckworth
Catherine Cortez-Masto
Stacey Abrams
Kamala Harris
Elizabeth Warren
The Coronavirus Hoax, by Ron Paul.
@Teve: The sad part is that he’s exactly right about the PATRIOT Act, but only because a broken clock is right twice a day. He has no ability whatever to distinguish actual from illusory threats.
One wonders if he would argue against taking any action in response to a tsunami warning, on the grounds that the wave has hardly killed anyone yet…
Tweet of the day:
Honestly, for the most part it was a better presser, with far more grounded statements from PoTUS. And then we got to Q&A and this one:
And he follows with:
The leader of the party of personal responsibility folks…
@Kylopod:
He can’t take Warren, MA has a GOP governor. Stacy Abrams, who I like, will look like stunt casting – she has zero serious experience.
I’d add Susan Rice to the list.
I don’t think choosing a woman helps Biden very much, but not choosing one would hurt a little, and we’re looking at narrow margins. I don’t know much about Cortez-Masto, but a Latina might be more help than just ‘a woman.’ Kamala would eviscerate Pence if – and I think it unlikely – either Trump or Pence agrees to debates. Klobuchar’s the safe, don’t rock the boat candidate.
Hellâs Bells. DJIA fell 2,997 points today. -12.93%.
It was at 19,827 when Obama left office. Itâs 20,188 today.
Oklahoma governor will continue to ‘take his family out to dinner’ amid pandemic
From the musical O-K-L-A-H-O-M-A!
Pore Jud is Daid
@Kylopod:
Interesting. In this order?
@Teve:
FYI – on Black Monday, October 28th, 1929 the market fell 12.82%.
The next day it fell 11.73%.
Reading for the Moment
The Plague
Love in the Time of Cholera
Waiting for Godot
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead,
@Kylopod:
I wonder if Trump jettisons Pence and counters with Nicky Haley?
@Teve: You mean the economy is so strong that even a national shutdown can’t bring the stock market down to Obama-era levels? Wow, Obama must have been terrible.
@Pylon:
Haley is no longer at all popular with Cult45. On the other hand, they think Pence is dull but reliable. A good minion.
@Kylopod:
How about Val Demings?
@CSK: I think the Cult will swallow whatever Trump says.
The day of Obamaâs inauguration the Dow Jones industrial average was at 7,950. The day Obama left office it was at 19,732. After 3 years of Trump itâs at 20,188.
@95 South:
Obama era levels?
DJIA went up 69% during Obama’s first term, 45% during his second term, 145% during his presidency.
Trump? Up 2% so far. And it will fall further.
Who would have thought that election a f*cking idiot would have serious consequences? About three million more than those who voted for Trump….
@Jax: hmm. Sounds like a baseless rumor. Doesnât really make any sense. After all, there are lots of ways to get between states besides the federal highways
@Teve:
Great minds, yada yada yada. đ
@95 South:
Prediction — this post will not age well.
2nd Prediction — You are going to be reminded of that fact over and over again.
Also, what do you think about the PoTUS sending signed copies of the brief spike in the market out to Fox News and others on Friday?
@mattbernius: We really should be keeping like a text file with all the Trumper nonsense, and links to them.
@MarkedMan: I don’t know how it could feasibly be implemented, most long haul drivers right now are not in their “home states”. What would they do, give everybody 5 days to get home? What about states with no drivers available, or only a few compared to the loads that need run?
I can’t decide which leg of I-80 would be the worst…..Wyoming or Nebraska.
@Jax: I donât think we even need to get to âHow would they do it?â, I just donât see what good it would do. Probably 2 million people live in New Jersey or Connecticut and commute to New York State every day. Hundreds of thousands live in Wisconsin or Indiana and commute to Illinois every day. Not to mention the millions and millions of people who travel down suburban streets or rural highways from one state to another just to go to the grocery store. There is no physical border between any of the states. Or is the orange idiot planning on building walls around every state?
@MarkedMan: And hospitals. Our closest “emergency room” is 70-90 miles away either direction, and trauma centers are 3-5 hours by ambulance. 5 hours if you stay in Wyoming, 3 if you go to Utah or Idaho.
I jumped back into the market today, right before the close, with my IRA, that has been 100% cash since about 23,500 in Dec. 2018. I got out then, and missed the rest of the up move, but I didn’t lose anything recently.
Not a huge buy in, but getting my toes wet.
Bought 1000 shares of GE at $6.70, after it bounced off of it’s 52 wk low of 6.55 – Looking at doubling this within 18 months.
Bought 100 shares of Bank of America at 20.50. This could go down more, but I’ll keep buying 100 shares at a time on big dips to lower my cost, and stay in this longer term.
Bought 100 shares of American Airlines at 13.06. That’s already doing well. Should have bought more. Haha. No.
Not intended to be advice to anyone. Just sharing. Anyone else dipping their toes in yet?
@MarkedMan:..There is no physical border between any of the states.
I have not been to all 50 states.
While most if not all states have weigh stations for trucks and sometimes busses and vehicles towing trailers or towing other vehicles, California is the only state line that I have crossed on the road that stops all traffic. These are California State Agriculture Inspection Stations.
I have passed inspection at several of these checkpoints over the years beginning in 1974. I have also found at least one route into the state that is not covered by any checkpoint. That would be US Route 95 at the Nevada-California State Line just south of the junction with Nevada State Route 163.
My brother tells me that stretch of US Route 95 in California is where Sam Kinison was killed in 1992.
@Jax:
Given the hassle of driving I80 through Chicago, I’d rather have the Wyoming-Nebraska leg.
@mattbernius: It was a joke. I’m not a Trumpist. and I don’t think he’s handled the crisis well. I was laughing at how excited the anti-Trumpists are that the stock market is falling. It makes you look bitter. PJ coming back with Trump losing the popular vote? I wouldn’t have commented if I knew how thin the skin was.
That would take up a few gigabytes, if not terabytes…
So is this president, so I suppose that’s an appropriate way to characterize what you wrote…
Bitter is the exact opposite of where i am. Every week 15% of my paycheck goes straight into my 401(k), and my company matches 6%. That money then buys shares in index funds. I want a cheap stock market for the next 20 years.
If I was retired I would be angry that a minority of our stupidest Americans elected a dipshit and then a crisis happened.
@95 South:
Everyone was at Woodstock.
And soon no one ever was a Trumpist.
@PJ: Did all you anti-Trumpists always think the DJIA was a good way to measure the President?
Ugh, please some of us are looking to retire in around 15 years, and had barely clawed back from losing most of what we had in 2008.
@PJ:
Not soon enough đ
@Jax:
Wouldn’t this INCREASE the spread of the virus, by forcing a bunch of people to take turns sitting in a potentially contaminated truck cab?
August 2019
…Commercial trucks will still be on the road, but theyâll switch drivers at each state line.
There are approximately 350,000 owner-operators of the Big Rigs in the US. I wonder how they will like handing off their ride to an unknown highway pilot.
Of course this may do wonders for the border town of Kanorado KS pop. 154. With all those drivers waiting to change mounts along Interstate 70.
Well certainly Trump himself believes that the DJIA is a good way to measure his presidency…
But…
So by Trump’s own standards, he’s a failure…
Hannitard has a new article up saying that Trump couldnât deal with the virus effectively because the Democrats were wasting his time with impeachment.
It makes perfect sense to me that the relatives I have who watch Fox News are the same ones who send money to televangelists.
@Stormy Dragon: Sounds pretty hypothetical. But if they did it Iâd think theyâd change tractors on the tractor/trailer semis. Maybe trade trailers. In any case theyâd need to improvise depots near the border. Probably need larger facilities than weigh stations and rest stops can accommodate.
I was browsing around a bit watching FOX et al shift from itâs a Chinese, fake news fraud to Trump is doing a great job of handling the crisis. I guess weâve always been at war with the Eastasia virus.
@gVOR08:
He could facilitate that by offering some kind of gratuity in exchange.
Patent troll attempting to block use of Covid-19 diagnostic test.
And you thought the Nigerian princes were a scam.
@95 South:
Ah got it. Due to text (and Poe’s law) its sometimes difficult to tell jokes from serious comments unless little markers are thrown in like emoticons or “/s” to signal sarcastic.
@95 South:
Speaking for myself, I’ve never thought it’s a particularly good sole way of determining success — though it should be taken into consideration.
However, what you seem to be missing in your anti-anti-Trumpist analysis, is that President Trump has specifically called this out as a *maker* for a successful presidency. So much so that after temporarily juicing the market on Friday, he sent out signed versions of a dead-cat bounce to supporters to show how successful he is.
Further, there’s a strong argument to be made that, as least in the short term, the President’s chaotic and pandemic-denying behavior has had an outsized effect on how far the market has fallen.
So there is context to the schadenfreude here, as repugnant as you apparently seem to find it.
I also agree that schadenfreude only goes so far. That’s why, based on people that I’ve talked to associated with the campaign, Joe Biden’s current plan is to largely based his messaging strategy around being a generally decent guy and avoiding personal attacks on Trump. Hopefully that will be enough to encourage you to commit to voting for him in the fall.
@Stormy Dragon: Yes considering that SARS-CoV-2 can survive in infectious numbers for up to 3 days on surfaces. Survival time can vary pretty wildly based on the surface.
More realistically they’ll swap out semi-tractors. Between the number of self owning truck drivers and the fact that SARS-CoV-2 can survive on surfaces for long periods of times means that the only option is to swap the trailer to a new truck. Which adds a whole lot of complication.