Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, coronavirus chaos has officially overtaken the US!
Current Events
After initially claiming that the COVID-19 virus was nothing more than a hoax concocted by Democrats and the “Fake News Media” in order to ruin him politically, Donald Trump has been forced to eat those words and confront reality. The virus is no hoax. In fact, it is very real, very deadly, and is crippling society.
On Wednesday, the World Health Organization (W.H.O.) officially declared the coronavirus a pandemic.
“WHO has been assessing this outbreak around the clock and we are deeply concerned both by the alarming levels of spread and severity and by the alarming levels of inaction,” WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom said. “We cannot say this loudly enough, or clearly enough, or often enough: All countries can still change the course of this pandemic.”
His assessment was the beginning of a downward spiral and one of the worst 24-hour periods in modern memory.
The Dow dropped 1,400 points. Harvard, Columbia, NYU, Stamford, and other universities across the country closed their campuses for the school year. In fact, Harvard gave their students until Sunday to vacate dormitories. Actor Tom Hanks and his wife, Rita Wilson, announced they have each tested positive for the coronavirus while currently in Australia. The NBA announced that Utah Jazz center Rudy Gobert has tested positive and that they are suspending the remainder of the 2019-2020 basketball season until further notice.
And this was just Wednesday.
Here are the other most recent casualties of COVID-19:
- The NCAA announced it will play March Madness in empty arenas.
- The San Francisco Health Office announced it is prohibiting all events where 1,000 or more people assemble.
- The Seattle Public School System closed.
- Wheel of Fortune, Jeopardy, The View, and other TV shows have begun taping without a studio audience.
- The South By Southwest (SXSW) and Coachella events were canceled.
- NYC and Boston canceled this year’s St. Patrick’s Day parades.
- NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo declared that the NYC suburb of New Rochelle has “the largest cluster” of the virus “in the country” and ordered a lockdown.
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The Fake News Media and their partner, the Democrat Party, is doing everything within its semi-considerable power (it used to be greater!) to inflame the CoronaVirus situation, far beyond what the facts would warrant. Surgeon General, “The risk is low to the average American.”
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 9, 2020
So much FAKE NEWS!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 9, 2020
In 2018, Donald Trump fired the White House Global pandemic team because it was created by former President Barack Obama. Just last weekend as the US was unexpectedly about to be hit hard by the coronavirus threat, Donald Trump went golfing in order to (in his words) alleviate the anxieties of Americans. Yes, Donald Trump feared the virus would threaten his presidency, so he downplayed it. HUGE MISTAKE. Now, his lack of leadership combined with him being responsible for instigating much of the coronavirus chaos, his inaction and the very real threat to the economy could be what brings the entire Trump presidency down.
On Wednesday, The Atlantic published an article entitled “Cancel Everything!” With complete segments of society shutting down day by day, it appears that is exactly what is happening.
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Yes, Donald Trump feared the virus would threaten his presidency, so he downplayed it. HUGE MISTAKE. Now, his lack of leadership combined with him being responsible for instigating much of the coronavirus chaos, his inaction and the very real threat to the economy could be what brings the entire Trump presidency down […]- DJ
Morning DJ. I’ll get to Trump’s speech (last night) in a minute but first let me start with this:
Judging by the comments expressed by Some readers on a few of the “somewhat reputable” right-wing sites, it appears the scales really are beginning to fall from the eyes of Some Repub base voters.
Simply put. Some of those voters have seen and heard Enough of the “horror of a human-being” in the White house and his sh*tshow of a presidency. They want him gone. Now.
Re: Trump’s speech last night……….
As noted by several writers: in the most important speech of his presidency, one running just 12 minutes, Trump misled the public at least four times. This ignorant and incompetent clown:
[- Wrongly told the world trade with Europe was suspended
-wrongly said health insurers are waiving out of pocket for treatment
-exempted UK from travel ban (UK has 460 cases to date) unclear why
-detailed no new domestic public health measures. ] – The American Conservative (TAC)
Added to that: his tone was completely flat as he stumbled through reading his speech. But he also looked and sounded terrified to me. Clearly he’s in way over his head as Neither he nor any of the dim-bulbs in his administration has a clue as to how to manage this colossal crisis in an appropriate and timely manner.
National Review Reader:
Taiwan is a densely packed city right off the coast of China. By all estimations they should have been among the hardest hit countries. Instead they’ve topped out at about 40 cases because the central government is well organized, funded, and capable of marshaling whatever resources are necessary at a moments’ notice. Taken at scale, our response pales in comparison.
This is the ultimate lesson in “regulation and administration are necessary because the actions of One can impose a cost on others”. Politicians can pretend everything politically inconvenient is a hoax until you have a pandemic where the consequences are noticed on a wide-scale and in real time, severe enough that Americans are now going to die unnecessarily because of the stupidity and selfishness of those in power. […]
Truth you said it right. Trump is in way over his head. The only thing he knows to do is act like a bully and call names. Trying to save lives in a crisis and calm people down is not his thing. So yeah he lies and tweets because that is all he knows. I know I am not saying anything nobody else knows but he has to go. He is a danger to national security now and is the wrong one to be leading us during all this.
When they shut down the NBA and Tom Hanks said he has it, that was it for me. There are people working next to us right now or in our family who have it and we don’t know it yet. This is going to get much worse before it gets any better.
NY Post:
A passenger on a JetBlue flight from JFK Airport has tested positive for the coronavirus after landing in Palm Beach, Florida, according to reports.
Flight 253, with 114 passengers and crew aboard, landed at Palm Beach International Airport shortly before 9 p.m. Wednesday but remained on the tarmac for about three hours, according to WPTV.
One of the passengers told the station that a man near him was taken to the back of the aircraft.
“He was wearing masks and gloves. His wife was sitting in the same row as me and mentioned to others that he wasn’t feeling well,” Scott Rodman said.
“She said he had gotten a phone call with his test results right before we had taken off, implying that he had a positive test but not actually saying it,” he added.
Just before 11 p.m., two people wearing masks and gloves were seen walking off the plane, WPBF reported. About a half-hour later, the rest of the passengers were allowed off.
Palm Beach Fire Rescue officials told WPTV that the Florida Department of Health had spoken with all the passengers and that the isolated area where they deplaned was being sterilized.
Passengers who had been sitting near the infected flier also were given instructions to call the Health Department with any concerns.
“An individual on this flight got a text that he tested positive for the coronavirus,” Dr. Alina Alonso, health chief in Palm Beach County, told passengers at the airport, according to WPTV.
“He has not been coughing or sneezing or anything on the plane. At this point, you’re free to walk around and move around because, most likely, you’re not going to have anything because there was no activity. The way you get this virus is somebody has to cough or sneeze on you,” she added.
Rodman said he didn’t “feel good” about the episode.
“The guy was sitting, you know, five feet from me, and his wife was sitting two feet from me, so no, I’m not feeling great about it,” he told the outlet.
A JetBlue spokesman told The Post that the airline is urging any customers “who do not feel well or are concerned they may have coronavirus to not fly until cleared to travel by a doctor or health professional.”
NY Post:
Broadway will shut down for four to six weeks beginning tonight, due to the coronavirus outbreak, several sources told The Post. In what is the worst crisis the industry has faced since the attack on the World Trade Center in 2001, several shows will not be able to recover.