"We've agreed that we will use metrics...we are still deciding what these metrics will be."
I thought the Stay Home, Stay Healthy order (in Washington state) wasn't unreasonable and wasn't just political babble, but I don't really know what to make of this piece. Anyone want to try to explain it like I'm five?
Listen to Newsome's news conference today and the answer he gave to a reporter about his reaction to Trump's announcement that the decision to re-open the economy is his (Trump's) alone. It's a masterpiece.
Has this actually occurred?
I know NY asked for way more ventilators than they got, but as I understood it they were giving them out "just in time" rather than up front in case they were needed more elsewhere.
https://www.metrotimes.com/news-hits/archives/2020/03/28/aft...
We seem to be doing just fine here without the Federal Government. In fact we've sent 400 ventilators back to the national stockpile and we also returned the Army hospital that was established at Safeco Field back because we didn't need the capacity. Trump did eventually authorize FEMA to pay for the National Guard response here.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/06/us/politics/coronavirus-f...
https://www.firehouse.com/safety-health/ppe/news/21133559/fe...
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/fema-denies-involvement...
I hate to be a conspiracy theorist, but this smells real bad to me. The reports of confiscations are coming from democratic states, not republican states. And it seems like republican lobbyists are getting into the game of distributing PPE:
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/bob-livingston-group-mike...
What it seems to me is happening is a coordinated yet amateurish attempt to restrict the PPE flow to/within democratic states, while allowing the free flow of PPE in republican states. This allows some lobbyists to make money off of it, as well as sticking a finger in the eye of dem leaders (and dying people/healthcare workers in dem states).
On the other hand, does the fire department for a town of 27,000 people really need 30,000 gowns, or could those be put to better use elsewhere?
Florida, where President Trump moved his residence to and who's governor he enjoys a special relationship with, has had greater success than other states in requesting and receiving allocations from the federal stockpile: https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/despe...
Have you used Internet or watched American TV in last five years?
Anyone else is, of course, free to say whatever they want. (For the time being.)
I mean, I guess if your ambition is to hold office for decades, then you might be concerned. But the downside seems minimal to me. (But then, I'm neither in politics nor in Massachusetts, so what do I know?)
Pardon, English being my 2nd language, would it be a confederation or a union?
https://fallout.fandom.com/wiki/United_States_of_America#Com...
He was complaining to me the other day that Oregon's requirement that you are not allowed to pump your own gas is an obvious COVID transmission vector.
To get gas in Oregon, he follows these steps:
1.) pull up to gas station 2.) Roll down window to hand attendant (who isn't wearing a mask, nor is required to) his debit card. 3.) Get card back from attendant. 4.) Sanitize the debit card 5.) Sanitize his hands 6.) Hope that the attendant is washing his hands, and that he didn't breathe COVID onto him through the open window.
Not saying this isn't a great, noble effort.
Just saying that, in some aspects, these states aren't doing a good job on obvious things within their own borders.
Why the hell is Oregon still doing this, and not requiring masks from gas attendants anyway? Maybe it is required, but my brother told me he has yet to have an attendant wearing a mask, so possibly not enforced???
I would say "Definitely yes."
https://katu.com/news/local/initiative-looks-to-limit-number...
https://www.koin.com/oregon-2/oregon-loosens-self-service-re...
Have they further loosened it since late March?
"Effective immediately, gas stations will be allowed to let drivers pump their own gas if they meet any of the following requirements:
The owner (of the gas station) retains documentation that there are no employees available to work as an attendant, including documentation for absences and employee hiring and retention efforts; The owner is subject to State Fire Marshal audit and has posted safety signs for how to safely operate a fuel pump; and The hours of operation under this subsection do not exceed 10 consecutive hours. “During this unprecedented time of state emergency, we need to ensure that critical supply lines for fuels and other basic services remain uninterrupted,” said State Fire Marshal Jim Walker.
Additionally, active stations must abide by the Fire Marshal’s latest guidelines:
Prepare, implement and enforce social distancing policies consistent with guidance from the Oregon Health Authority, Require an attendant to be on duty to supervise self-service refueling consistent with the social distancing policies and help mitigate the spread of COVID-19 through sanitization measures, and Designate an employee at each station to implement and enforce the social distancing policies."
The above doesn't seem like it's actually self-service unless the owner has certain issues. My brother just told me he isn't seeing self-service at his area, and wasn't notified it was an option.
The US governmental system has a long history of injecting bureaucratic nonsense that takes on a life of its own and ends up with outcomes like "teaching to the test" instead of being a net benefit.
I would feel differently if this were an announcement of a joint task force for sharing data to help each state make the best decisions possible. But this sounds to me like it will just make it harder for each state to make a decision on their own and that it probably doesn't really add any value. And that concerns me.
I have the same beef with Mayor Breed in San Francisco, who has otherwise shown standout leadership. She's publicly worried that people will let their guard done by assuming things are under control. Rather than worry about people's feelings and opinions, she should be setting expectations exactly as I described above.
This (along with the NE pact) is probably a big "no, you're not" to Trump.
““”
Asked whether the collaboration among the states was a rebuke to the President Trump, who has said the decision about businesses reopening was his to make, Gov. Philip D. Murphy of New Jersey said only that he was focused on making decisions based on facts and science, and he reiterated that an economic recovery was inextricable from a public health recovery.
Gov. Tom Wolf of Pennsylvania echoed Mr. Murphy’s comments in responding to a similar question.
“The sequence,” Mr. Wolf said, “is you’ve got to get people healthy first, and then you can reopen the economy.”
Interviewed later on CNN, Mr. Cuomo was more pointed in his remarks on who bears responsibility for restoring life to something like normal.
Trump administration officials, the governor said, could have enacted a nationwide shutdown to stem the spread of the virus.
“They didn’t,” he said. “They said we’re going to leave it to the states. Now all of a sudden when it comes time to open the economy, now it’s back to the federal government’s responsibility?”
“””
* Nursing homes, long-term care facilities, etc. will get some priority and focus.
* Socioeconomically-disadvantaged communities are taking indirect impacts from mitigation measures, and they will also get some priority and focus.
* We will not return to anything resembling normal until we have a way to efficiently test, track, and isolate at scale.
It seems nonplussed has two, almost contradictory definitions:
1. (of a person) surprised and confused so much that they are unsure how to react.
2. (of a person) not disconcerted; unperturbed.
The latter is an "informal" definition. This seems to be the process by which the word awful switched from meaning awe-inspiring to the opposite.
unsure about what to say, think, or do : perplexed
chiefly US : not bothered, surprised, or impressed by something
I'm an American. "Not impressed" is the closest thing I am seeing to what I was trying to convey. Unmoved might be a good substitute word in this case.
I quoted definitions from Google's search snippet.
Trump has been downplaying the seriousness of the disaster since January. He contradicts the statements of his own staff in the same press conference as the staff speaks. He exuberantly proclaims the effectiveness of "treatments" that haven't been studied in any serious way. All this is to say that we can't trust any decision he makes.
Contrast this with the way the Western governors have handled this. Inslee was one of the first governors to announce any kind of Social Distancing rules. And he followed Illinois in issuing a statewide Stay Home order that is probably the most restrictive such order in the states. There's a lot of evidence on the Washington DOH website that this is working and the spread of the disease is under control.
The fact is that Trump's response is mostly to bury the problem and apply wishful thinking when he can't bury the problem. The governors in this union are taking a facts-based approach to solving the problem that has largely been successful. And so it's a really bad idea to do anything that Trump advises the country to do because he has a track record of making really bad decisions throughout this crisis.