Utopia Talk / Politics / The upside to Corona

jergul rank	Thu Mar 12 13:00:25 2020 Lets see. Silver lining. In no particular order. 1. Enhanced likelihood of regime change in the US. 2. Downscaled and consolidated air travel 3. Lower maximum oil production globally 4. Mainstreaming remote working. 5. Lower CO2 emission this year give green energy time to catch up (a year without significant growth globally is a godsend) 6. Better animal husbandry practices. Better food handling practices. This time batpoop over an open market was probably to blame. The swine flu did however come directly from the agroindustry. 7. Improved healthcare redundancy and surge capacity. 8. Better containment strategies. The pandemic is not as bad as they can potentially be (re Spanish influenza targetting young people). 9. Unrolling excessive stock appreciation. Corona was a black swan, but something was definitely going to happen anyway. 10. Is 12.5 by 2020 still within reach? Perhaps not, but it stands a better chance than Sanders becoming president.
The Children rank	Thu Mar 12 13:46:59 2020 so some pangolin ate some batpoop and got sick and a human than ate it and thats how we all gettin snotty noses and shaky chickenlegs? god damn.
jergul rank	Thu Mar 12 13:51:08 2020 Far more likely than someone handling a bat and getting infected. I think it more a bat shitting onto something moist that humans thereafter touched, then touched their faces. Bats shit their weight every day according to Patom.
Dukhat rank	Thu Mar 12 14:35:56 2020 I can't believe I stayed on here to see Jergul's stupid projection of 12.5 by 2020 fail. If the US goes down, everyone's going down with us. But to add. 1) Some deradicalization of our politics a bit as older reactionary people die. 2) Really cheap tickets out there. Tourist hotzones no longer crowded. If you are young, now's the time to go see the world though you will be in mandatory quarantine in some places. So read the news. 3) Trump might die of coronavirus which would be the best plot twist since The Sixth Sense.
Dukhat rank	Thu Mar 12 14:38:12 2020 4) Some relief for endangered species as dumbass Chinese people maybe rethink their stupid alternative medicine bullshit.
The Children rank	Thu Mar 12 14:39:57 2020 cukoldhat thinks he is safe if he just eatin beef. like the dumbass cuckold he is, he never heard of madcow disease before. a disease that creates HOLES inside ur brain. thats like 100000x worse than corona.
jergul rank	Thu Mar 12 14:40:14 2020 Dukhat Its a nominal prediction, so a currency adjustment would do it easily. The forecast has not failed yet :).
Dukhat rank	Thu Mar 12 14:43:40 2020 Our debt load is way better than I thought it would be due to Obama being a good president. Some depreciation would be good too and allowable since it would fuck up Russia and Iran even more to sell even cheaper oil. We can always produce fracked oil if OPEC ever tries to mess with us again.
Dukhat rank	Thu Mar 12 14:45:29 2020 Also underestimated the growth of other countries their Jerugl. South America growth remains retarded. India I don't think will weather climate change well. Europe has been shambling along due to continuing to service debt ala Germany's wishes. If the US was to get to 12.5; Europe and Japan needed to do a better job keeping up. Only China has kept relative pace.
jergul rank	Thu Mar 12 14:56:56 2020 Dukhat All that would have been needed is the US not globalizing its sub-prime lending crisis. Or that some semblance of normal reactions to excessive debt accumulation was in play. Its fine that the US has until now been above normal currency and trade deficit rules, but suggesting that its currency value has to wind down by some point is hardly unreasonable. The PPP revolution revolves around the unwinding excessive USD purchasing power. It will happen eventually. Perhaps not by the end of 2020, but that remains to be seen.
Dukhat rank	Thu Mar 12 15:03:12 2020 I agree with you that the US has gone too far but other countries have also become addicted to US spending. No consumer in the world can take up the slack for the US consumer. The demographics just aren't there. So better or worse, it's the economy that can take in young immigrants and make them productive that will retain economic power in the future and that's the US.
jergul rank	Thu Mar 12 15:15:35 2020 The median age in China is lower than in the US and there sure a lot more of them. Its middle class numbers far more people than the US middle class does. China's problem is that it rarely has a trade deficit, so has to recycle trade revenue.
jergul rank	Thu Mar 12 15:26:30 2020 One possible scenario is China managing its outbreak and the US failing to manage its own. Look at what is being hit. Services, not goods. And it will take China a while to fill up order shortfalls created by its factory closings.
Rugian rank	Thu Mar 12 17:22:14 2020 Lol Dukhat's messaging is so hopelessly schizophrenic. Here he was right after Trump's speech last night: Dukhat Member Wed Mar 11 "This is not a political issue when it affects you and your families. Stay safe, slow the spread to help all the healthcare workers who will be swamped in the coming weeks." And now here he is not 24 hours later in this thread, rooting for the death of the elderly because he thinks it will allow far-left socialists to ascend to political power. He has less consistency than Joe Biden's mental acuity these days.
patom rank	Thu Mar 12 17:41:42 2020 OK now that we have everyone washing their hands it's time to start washing asses and armpits.
Dukhat rank	Thu Mar 12 18:09:15 2020 Irony is lost on the stupid eh Rugian? But critical thinking was never your strong suit.
patom rank	Thu Mar 12 18:10:51 2020 TRUMP: I like this stuff. I really get it… every one of these doctors said, 'how do you know so much about this?' Maybe I have a natural ability.
swordtail rank	Thu Mar 12 18:17:57 2020 Brazilian Official Who Took Photo With Trump, Dined At Mar-a-Lago, Tests Positive For The Coronavirus http://www...ago-tests-positive-coronavirus
CrownRoyal rank	Thu Mar 12 18:33:07 2020 I'm starting to worry they won't let me back home from mexico.
swordtail rank	Thu Mar 12 18:36:09 2020 did you stop off at Mar-a-Lago?
Average Ameriacn rank	Thu Mar 12 18:40:14 2020 CR are you stranded at the wall? Don't try to climb over it! I repeat don't try to climb over it! I know persons who will shoot you if you try it. It won't matter if you show your Canadian passport when you're on top of it, they will snipe you from the distance.
CrownRoyal rank	Thu Mar 12 18:44:43 2020 I'm in Cancun, I'm kind of wary of reading the news in the morning. This is really looking like a feast in time of plague. Hotels are full, people are drinking, partying hard, nobody seems to give a fuck, no disinfection measures of any kind, no isolation
Nimatzo rank	Thu Mar 12 18:58:23 2020 What do you want CR, I already said RIP when you told us you were going!
CrownRoyal rank	Thu Mar 12 18:59:47 2020 You did display good manners, indeed. I noticed the RIP.
swordtail rank	Thu Mar 12 19:01:16 2020 just double up on the maple syrup intake when you get back. meanwhile,when in rome....
CrownRoyal rank	Thu Mar 12 19:02:24 2020 Good advice
CrownRoyal rank	Thu Mar 12 19:05:31 2020 So, my wife has an acquaintance who was supposed to bring us weed in Cancun, she shows up with this minuscule amount, maybe one joint, not even rolled, I gave her $50US, I'm pretty sure she's been laughing her ass off. Gringo idioto
CrownRoyal rank	Thu Mar 12 19:06:07 2020 I'm not going to haggle for weed, I mean
jergul rank	Thu Mar 12 19:12:21 2020 CR Don't feel sad. Good quality oregano can be pricy.
CrownRoyal rank	Thu Mar 12 19:20:25 2020 My thoughts exactly, I have no idea wtf that girl sold me. I was drinking last night, so I thought I'll try the weed tomorrow. Might be oregano, for all I know. Will find out shortly
Nimatzo rank	Thu Mar 12 19:39:27 2020 Well CR atleast it was grade A Mexican weed, in Brazil this the only thing you can buy for 60 dollars. At first glance it look like hashish, but then you realize, no this is what is the left overs from when you make hasish. That is my best guess for what this is. https://images.app.goo.gl/bQykYrFGwc43w8YV8
Average Ameriacn rank	Thu Mar 12 19:47:02 2020 I'll call the Mexican cyber police.
Nekran rank	Thu Mar 12 19:53:50 2020 "in Brazil this the only thing you can buy for 60 dollars. At first glance it look like hashish, but then you realize, no this is what is the left overs from when you make hasish. That is my best guess for what this is." I was in Brazil in 2002 and I'd have to correct you on that. The weed did look weird, as it is extremely dried and packed incredibly densely for transport. Apparently it is almost all imported from Paraguay for reasons I don't know. It was way weaker than what I'm used to of course, as I live a few kilometers from the dutch border, but you could smoke it pure, which was very nice (flavour wise as well) and also back then I paid 50 cents per gram for it. I was there with a local though... that probably helped. Also hash is made from the resin. Leftovers would be nothing like that.
Pillz rank	Thu Mar 12 20:03:34 2020 Looks like some super shitty super wet super sticky herb. Also possible it's left overs from bubble hash that's been sorta dried out.
Nimatzo rank	Thu Mar 12 20:39:58 2020 It looked like cow shit with hay in it. I have no idea!
CrownRoyal rank	Thu Mar 12 21:23:55 2020 Ok, that was real shit, not mexican oregano. Short high though, I developed tolerance over the past year or so. But, not bad. My wife rolled the ugliest joint I've ever seen.
CrownRoyal rank	Thu Mar 12 21:27:48 2020 So, I bought myself some new swimwear, and I wore a shorter shorts today, not speedos mind you, just not the knee length. Both of my sons were looking at my wife with pity, like "dad likes it in the ass now?". How quickly they forgot Crimea and OAE where every proud russian and ukrainian tourist wears real speedos
Nimatzo rank	Thu Mar 12 21:36:46 2020 Haha. My wife asked for the biggest bikini they had, which was very small, but not tiny. So, she still asked for something bigger. They guy looked at her with huge eyes, o_0 BIGGER?! This is Braoziiiil! It was the Brazilian version of the scene from 300. But he didn’t kick her down a bottomless pit obviously.
CrownRoyal rank	Thu Mar 12 21:53:44 2020 One-piece?
hood rank	Thu Mar 12 22:05:52 2020 Doesn't one's wife count as the bottomless pit?
patom rank	Thu Mar 12 22:20:33 2020 This may be and probably is a stupid question but, What the fuck is it with toilet paper??? I mean if you run out you can always wash your ass with a soapy cloth and wash that cloth out. Yesterday the shelves were bare of TP at Wallmart also cleaning products. Our local grocery store was was out of TP. What the hell are they going to do with the TP if they are quarantined and they have no food. They won't need TP if they have nothing to shit.
Nimatzo rank	Thu Mar 12 22:44:30 2020 Two-piece.
Forwyn rank	Thu Mar 12 22:47:32 2020 TP isn't even a high-value trade good. For that, stock up on gas, booze, and cigarettes, probably the last for weight/space issues
jergul rank	Thu Mar 12 23:27:03 2020 Just booze. If future society does not appreciate it enough for barter, then it is not worth surviving anyway.
Habebe rank	Thu Mar 12 23:34:36 2020 I feel like it could be a good time for looting
jergul rank	Thu Mar 12 23:51:26 2020 Or gloating. Are you still pleased with how Opus is handling this? Do you still trust him to do the right thing? Or would you rather name me a river in Egypt with as many words as you like?
Habebe rank	Fri Mar 13 00:25:53 2020 Meh, are we any worse off than the rest of the world?
Habebe rank	Fri Mar 13 00:30:34 2020 In all fairness the EU is way worse.
jergul rank	Fri Mar 13 01:03:48 2020 hmmm, whataboutism...would that be the 3rd stage of Kübler-Ross model?
jergul rank	Fri Mar 13 01:04:25 2020 I would have run with Yemen. They are definitely way worse in all fairness.
jergul rank	Fri Mar 13 01:09:42 2020 Whataboutism is pretty passive-agressive. I think we will put it in stage two.
Habebe rank	Fri Mar 13 01:10:25 2020 Seriously, how doesnthe US compare with other first World powers?
jergul rank	Fri Mar 13 01:12:32 2020 The Shanghai composite index is currently down 5% from its all-time highs. Lei gong mah ye wah?
jergul rank	Fri Mar 13 01:13:51 2020 Look at me speaking more chinese (cantonese) than TC :).
Habebe rank	Fri Mar 13 01:19:22 2020 Meh, I'll see if it lasts. If it gets real bad I'll disown Trump and move in with you.
Habebe rank	Fri Mar 13 01:24:50 2020 Didnt Europe and the fax drop even more? So again its shitting everywhere, doesnt seem much worse here than elsewhere.
Habebe rank	Fri Mar 13 01:25:06 2020 Dax*
jergul rank	Fri Mar 13 01:39:18 2020 Its much worse there than elsewhere. The US has the advantage of being a safe haven, so should do relatively better than absolutely everywhere else in times of crisis. Trump is fucking that up. So you are seeing money flow to the new safe haven China. He will probably sanction them of something stupid relatively soon.
jergul rank	Fri Mar 13 01:39:51 2020 or something else stupid*
Habebe rank	Fri Mar 13 02:04:00 2020 So Europe is expected to fuck up, if the US is on par with them its a failure of Trump?
Habebe rank	Fri Mar 13 02:11:08 2020 Would another potus have changed anything dramatically? This isnt a partisan issue, its not like Seattle or NY are protected by there democratic leaders policies. I mean we will see how this plays out but as of now we dont seem any worse off than other places.
tumbleweed rank	Fri Mar 13 02:14:25 2020 our testing is awful
tumbleweed rank	Fri Mar 13 02:15:37 2020 ...and Trump keeps lying about it as that's all he does on everything
Habebe rank	Fri Mar 13 02:21:22 2020 I hear this, but what are the numbers, i couldnt find any comparison stats.
tumbleweed rank	Fri Mar 13 02:29:34 2020 well our govt has no idea how many tested... they can't even ballpark it whenever asked but from anecdotal reporting, testing is weak
Habebe rank	Fri Mar 13 02:37:27 2020 So CNN and politico say Trump jas destroyed nthe country.... Meh
Habebe rank	Fri Mar 13 02:46:30 2020 http://ourworldindata.org/covid-testing-10march This is the best source I could find.
Habebe rank	Fri Mar 13 02:47:48 2020 What do we know about COVID-19 test coverage right now? Ideally, we would want to know how many people in the world are being tested for COVID-19 every day, and how the available tests are being allocated. Unfortunately there is no centralized WHO data on COVID-19 testing and most countries do not provide official reports on tests performed. This is different from official records on confirmed cases and deaths, which we report in our article here. Some countries do provide aggregate estimates on the total number of tests performed up to a specific date, but these are published across individual websites, statistical reports and press releases – often in multiple languages and updated with different periodicity. Given the large problems with data availability, we did a manual review of data across national reports, and included the most recent estimates that we could find as of 10 March 2020, 19.00 GMT.3 Here we list estimates country by country, including only figures from official sources (i.e. excluding social media posts and quotes from newspaper articles). The available data shows that South Korea is clearly doing much better than other countries – and this seems to be paying off, because we know that daily confirmed cases in South Korea are going down. The US, on the other hand, has had big problems rolling out their testing strategy. The total number of tests conducted in South Korea is nearly 25-times larger than in the US. In the UK, the total number of tests is 3-times larger than in the US, even though the UK today has a lower number of confirmed cases (373 confirmed cases in the UK vs 472 confirmed cases in the US). The fact that South Korea has managed to expand testing so quickly shows that it is possible. It is important that in the coming days other countries follow rapidly.
Wrath of Orion rank	Fri Mar 13 02:49:13 2020 Btw, it's not about containment now, it's about mitigation. We crossed that threshold a ways back. Sadly, this is something the Trump administration still doesn't get.
Habebe rank	Fri Mar 13 02:50:20 2020 South Korea Source: Report from the Korean Center for Disease Control, 10 March 20:28 local time, online here. Number of tests: 210,144 tests performed. Remarks: South Korea is the country that has done the largest number of tests. As a share of the population, they have done 3,800 tests per million people. The statistical reports from the Korean Center for Disease Control, including confirmed cases and tests conducted, are always published in the same repository (online here) and are updated daily. This repository allows inferring daily tests for the last couple of weeks. Italy Source: Report from Ministry of Health, 10 March 15:00 local time, online here. Number of tests: 60,761 tests performed. Remarks: The statistical updates from the Italian government including confirmed cases and tests conducted, are reported in the “News and Media” section of the website from the Italian Ministry of Health, online here. These are issued regularly but not necessarily every day. United Kingdom Source: Department of Health and Social Care and Public Health England, figures from 10 March 9:00 local time, reported on the official website “Number of coronavirus (COVID-19) cases and risk in the UK”, online here. Number of tests: 26,261 tests performed. Remarks: These figures are updated daily. Using historical records from web.archive.org it’s possible to reconstruct estimates of daily tests in the UK for the last couple of weeks. Japan Source: Press release dated 10 March 2020, published in Japanese by the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare here. Number of tests: 21,174 tests performed. Remarks: The estimate of 21,174 tests comes from a side note on the main table in the press release. The translation of the note via Google Translate is as follows: “From February 18 to March 8, the number of PCR tests for new coronavirus in Japan (National Institute for Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of Health, etc.) was 21,174. Data for today is currently being compiled”.4 An earlier report from a press release dated 6 March, published by the Japanese Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare in English here, states a much lower number (9,600 tests conducted). United States Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, report from 9 March noon, published here. Number of tests: 8,554 tests performed. Remarks: The total number of tests in the report from 9 March includes tests conducted in CDC labs (N=3,698) and US public health laboratories (N=4,856). The chart here includes the number of tests by laboratory type and date. Earlier CDC reports, from before 9 March, are not available from the source. The report from 9 March includes a note that reads: “This page will be updated regularly at noon Mondays through Fridays. Data close out at 4 p.m. the day before reporting.” Number of COVID-19 Tests in the US – Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (9 March report)
Habebe rank	Fri Mar 13 02:51:04 2020 My last two posts btw were pasted from the link above.
tumbleweed rank	Fri Mar 13 03:53:28 2020 another article on it http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-51860529 seems like in the 10,000 range total while S Korea doing twice that per day Faucet saying it's been a failure Trump saying going great (including today... for anyone stupidly thinking his teleprompter reading shows he's now serious about it)
Habebe rank	Fri Mar 13 04:03:14 2020 Auto correct on Fauci?
tumbleweed rank	Fri Mar 13 04:24:44 2020 yeah :p
Dukhat rank	Fri Mar 13 04:35:23 2020 Fauci the only sane person anywhere near leadership. Rest are all Trump toadies. Bet he gets fired in a few days.
hood rank	Fri Mar 13 04:55:01 2020 The fact that this was raging in early to mid January and we saw cases of it outside of China before February is a pretty clear sign that the US had at least a full 40 days to do something before yesterday. This is a failure by any measure.
sam adams rank	Fri Mar 13 05:52:40 2020 "This is a failure by any measure." Agreed. Who failed? Trump? The normal failures of incompetetent bereaucrats? The CDC? The medical research community as a whole? Probably some combination thereof.
Seb rank	Fri Mar 13 09:39:20 2020 The US society and culture, for allowing such an incompetent leadership. You can blame bureaucrats all you like, but all those other countries are just as bureaucratic or more so than yours. The difference is their state systems work, whereas your public health sector and civil service has completely failed. If you've hollowed out your public sector in pursuit of an ideological goal, that's a failing of your backward, reductionist culture of which, Sam, you are a prime example.
Seb rank	Fri Mar 13 09:42:07 2020 It took Chernobyl to expose that the soviet system couldn't work and couldn't keep pretending to work by silencing critics and brutal suppression of opposition. We shall see if Corona virus does the same, or whether the Sam's of this world will continue down a path of wilful incompetence.
jergul rank	Fri Mar 13 09:49:13 2020 Sammy Remember the 3 pillars of US foreign policy? "If we can't have it, we will break it Be reasonable, or we will have to destroy you Now look what you made us do" Trump has employed that systematically domestically. The CDC and public labs have been chronically underfunded. I doubt we will see much improvement relative to other countries. Its in the regime's interest to not test too much and thus understate the number of infected. Stupid, stupid if you understand exponential growth. Any reason to think Trump understands exponential growth?
Nimatzo rank	Fri Mar 13 10:23:36 2020 He doesn't even understand that the gases in his hairspray can escape his office. "No way folks" -Trump
jergul rank	Fri Mar 13 23:25:33 2020 I just saw a Norwegian evening talk show without its usual studio audience and no audience. The lack of laughter after punchlines was surreal. But they powered through. Interesting.
Wrath of Orion rank	Sat Mar 14 00:14:16 2020 Imagine trying to play sports where there are usually good sized, loud crowds with no audience. I've done it, and it's exceedingly strange.
hood rank	Sat Mar 14 00:18:08 2020 "Imagine trying to play sports where there are usually good sized, loud crowds with no audience" Personally, I loved when cross country courses were less open and accommodating to the public spectators. My teammates yelling? Cool. Random people (including family)? Nah, fuck off.
Wrath of Orion rank	Sat Mar 14 00:23:41 2020 I can see that. Maybe that's a different situation than mine, which was stadiums where the crowd noise was usually pretty non-specific.
Dukhat rank	Sat Mar 14 05:15:36 2020 I hope that this virus will teach us all to love each other more and value the time we spend together as a community. But it won't. Back to shitposting on here, discord, and facebook to fill up the time.
hood rank	Sat Mar 14 06:27:36 2020 Yeah, non-specific crowd noise would be easy to block out but creepy when it disappears.
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