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Comment by FireBeyond | Hacker News Reader

> The the DoH wants to step in and redirect until a congressional rep steps in. That's the odd part to me.

Not the DoH, DHS, Homeland Security. Whose oversight of the COVID-19 management is being coordinated with Jared Kushner.

It has been heavily implied, sometimes outright stated, that some of these "redirections" are going to states who are "being nice" to the President.

I would be entirely unsurprised to learn that others are going to "battleground" states (in the election sense, not the disease sense). Or to "government authorized private contractors" for resale (with its own due sense of irony).

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A republican fundraiser started Blueflame Medical at the end of March and boasts of being able to fill 100 million orders of masks and PPE. I don't know how he secured these supply lines out of thin air, but I wouldn't be surprised if the federal government is indirectly propping up their stockpile with these seized shipments.

Innuendo and rumor mongering? That's where HN is now?

These are serious accusations, and you owe it to the rest of us to provide some serious proof.

EDIT:

And no, politico is not serious, nor does it address this innuendo:

> I wouldn't be surprised if the federal government is indirectly propping up their stockpile with these seized shipments.

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/03/27/republican-fundrais...

http://archive.is/pyVeC

Do you have a source for this claim?

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/03/27/republican-fundrais...

Some choice quotes:

> Asked how he’d managed to procure such equipment when there are shortages in hospitals across the country, Gula said, “I have relationships with a lot of people.”

> Thomas declined to specify how he and Gula had managed to obtain masks that have become so rare that some hospitals have resorted to reusing them or having health care workers tie bandannas or scarfs around their faces. “It’s just relationship-based,” he said. “I can’t say anything else.”

> “I don’t want to overstate, but we probably represent the largest global supply chain for Covid-19 supplies right now,” he said. “We are getting ready to fill 100 million-unit mask orders.”

This last one is the kicker. This guy, who works with/for the Republican party, is able to set up shop in TWO WEEKS, "the largest global supply chain", "based off of relationships", and alarm bells aren't ringing?

I would love for someone to buy masks from Blue Flame, and check lot numbers / serial numbers on those supplies, and see who the original intended recipients were.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

I think your statement is true, but I question whether the statement you are replying to is extraordinary given the track record this President and their administration have had since 2016.

Speaking as someone from outside the US, it feels like this story is plausible. The fact is, they have displayed zero accountability for what they are doing with their stockpile.

That is extraordinary in and of itself. Why aren't they transparent about who gets what?

And what about the 500 ventilators that Colorado arranged to purchase, which were diverted by the Federal Government, which then provided 100 to Colorado, while criticizing the "blue" Governor, but praising the "red" senator, saying that the ventilators were the result of the senator's lobbying.

That looks a lot like the exact thing being discussed here.

https://www.denverpost.com/2020/04/08/colorado-coronavirus-v...

Evidence should still be demanded before action like lawsuits, impeachments, &c. are considered, but I suggest there's room to call this plausible speculation, rather than an extraordinary claim.

>is extraordinary given the track record this President and their administration have had since 2016

Do you know how many "Trump admin seizes masks" and related corruption stories have been quietly retracted in the last month?

I'm not saying the administration is innocent but it's nearly impossible to accurately evaluate what's going on because almost every media source puts spin on what should be primary source reporting. Even the daily covid briefings receive real time antagonistic headlines from outlets like CNN.

Even in your own example

>FEMA bought 500 ventilators out from under state, governor said last week

So they were outbid at the last second. But all over the thread the sentiment is that they were "seized". Not the first time people's eagerness has opened them to false conclusions influenced by media.

> Do you know how many "Trump admin seizes masks" and related corruption stories have been quietly retracted in the last month?

I assume you threw the "quietly" in there to be safe in case someone asks for examples?

Well, I doubt you can do anything "quietly" on the internet these days. Have any archive.org links for stories that were later deleted?

>assume you threw the "quietly" in there to be safe in case someone asks for examples

Why is any comment remotely construable as defending of the current administration automatically presumed to be made in bad faith? The typical internet response to anything related to Trump is completely irrational at this point.

I used the term quietly to emphasize that the damage was done and outlets aren't exactly bending over backwards to broadcast their mistakes on their front pages. I post on mobile so no, it's not trivial to find examples. But you can dig around for the German reported seizure, for example, which turned out to be totally legitimate. Headlines talk about piracy when deep in the article you see that other nations are being outbid legitimately.

Even if these dealings aren't intentional, there is still a problem when outlets suspend goof journalist practices, like vetting, in order to be the first to publish any information critical of the president.

Edit: ironically, it's hard to find anything supportive of my point because even searching with quotes and plus signs, Google and DDG both refuse to return results that actually contain the words I'm searching for (correction, retraction).

Was a story from a credible source (if you prefer, any source) on the German seizure ever retracted?

The story that was shared here on the German seizure did not contain enough information that a retraction would be necessary.

The only German stories I can find currently are misleading in a different way. The headlines use words like "piracy" and "seize" when the text indicates legitimate market bidding.

In these cases my point is the same - this may not be wrong enough for a retraction but the misleading negative influence is still accomplished.

At some point we have to trust readers to understand that a headline is just a headline, and it's the most prone part of a news story to editorializing. (since it's the part that's written by an editor) A bad headline is not necessarily indicative of the quality of the story - although you can probably tell that you've picked up a tabloid or something if they're all bad.

> In these cases my point is the same - this may not be wrong enough for a retraction but the misleading negative influence is still accomplished.

In this case, headlines involving piracy are a poor example of the point you're trying to make. The word "piracy" originated from a quote from a German minister, so it's not an example of editorializing gone mad.

> Why is any comment remotely construable as defending of the current administration automatically presumed to be made in bad faith?

First, because reputable media sources don't do "quiet retractions". The New York Times has a section for corrections: https://www.nytimes.com/section/corrections

If you catch them just deleting a full article, you'll be a hero for the alt-right. They've been complaining about the Iraq war coverage for the last 18 years, and at some point even they start finding it a little odd that there are no more recent example of major errors for something supposedly evil incarnate.

More or less the same applies to other reputable sources.

I believe part of the misunderstanding here is that your accusation, if true, would be far more serious than you believe it to be. Extraordinary claims require evidence of the same magnitude. But because you consider journalists to be routinely lying, you don't see the need for any evidence.

I consider it reasonable to expect people mentioning such a scandal, which they would have read about in the last week or so, to remember one or two details from the story, such as the outlet it supposedly ran in, or the place where it happened.

With the name or a state or hospital, plus maybe the publisher, it should be easy to find someone on twitter or reddit mentioning it, or other outlets picking up on the story (and its eventual fate).

Instead, this thread is now four-deep with meta discussion, but nobody has found a link which would easily settle the matter.

I stand by my scepticism.

Where there's smoke, there's fire.

And there's a whole lot of smoke coming from a place that has has historically burned a lot.

Which is the extraordinary claim though?

That he found access to 100MM masks and the ability to procure more, that no-one else had? Because if I had 100MM masks for sale and no-one was knocking on my door to buy them now, I'm sure I could drum that up in a good minute or so with a quick communication. But this is just "access to new supply chains".

or:

That it very easily could be resold masks, since we DO know, _for a fact_, that the (federal) government _is_ intercepting PPE and making them available to certain private companies to resell.

Worth a read.

“I don’t want to overstate, but we probably represent the largest global supply chain for Covid-19 supplies right now,” he said. “We are getting ready to fill 100 million-unit mask orders.” He being John Thomas the political operative turn business associate of Mike Gula.

(Mike Gula) said he decided to trade in fundraising to sell medical supplies “because nobody was doing it. Because the president and the vice president were asking people to help.”

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/03/27/republican-fundrais...

> to sell medical supplies “because nobody was doing it

They seriously think that we are all unquestioning, credulous simpletons.

There is a bunch of issues with the US government that this administration has revealed, but I'd really love to see some stronger anti-nepotism laws rolled out, maybe coupled with some anti-dynastic laws to prevent familial repeats with elected officials that came to power in a large part due to legacy.

This is yet another problem that exists largely because our system stabilized at two parties. In a coalition-based system one party being this blatantly and continuously corrupt would risk turning their coalition members against them. As it is, turns out you can just dig in and ignore complaints for years and nothing happens.

Here, sadly, I disagree. I believe a lot of problems arise from having a concentrated two party system but up here in Canada Trudeau #2 the re-trudeauening has happened - now, Trudeau isn't a terrible leader and hasn't felt significantly different from any other Liberal candidate, but nepotism and dynasticism is a problem all across the world when not actively fought against.

The more likely scenario is that the government is inefficient and you have multiple agencies chasing the same issue and not talking to each other.

Well, just read through the other threads here. You'll see that goods are being seized and redirected based on the whim of the President for his friends and allies. This is happening.

The question is what possible orders DHS could have from their leadership that would make seizing PPE destined for a hospital even considerable.

the resale bit is happening for sure.

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