Althouse: If you're sitting around watching TV news commentary about our coronavirus predicament...

April 15, 2020

If you're sitting around watching TV news commentary about our coronavirus predicament...

... and I don't recommend that you do... here's a drinking game you can play... not that I recommend drinking... either seriously or in a game... maybe just pay attention and — like us — exclaim in delighted outrage whenever this happens:

Somebody who means to say "open the economy" says "open the government."

It's telling! And it happens a lot!

48 comments:

Ken B said...: Watch that stuff? I'd rather fuck a 92 year old lamp.; 4/15/20, 10:05 AM
Shouting Thomas said...: You haven't commented on Trump's Monday night presser. It must have overwhelmed you. Did me.

Not one patient denied a bed or vent. Fatality stats a fraction of the model predictions.

The media is going to have to walk away from this panic they generated because there's nothing left to use in it to beat up Trump.

The only question now is: What will be the next Get Trump! media generated panic? They're going to have to do a hell of a job to get us to do something more radical than shutting down the economy and agreeing to house arrest.; 4/15/20, 10:07 AM
Leland said...: Just can't bring myself to do it. However, I thought early on that we'd open up sooner if Trump started shutting down non-essential parts of the government.; 4/15/20, 10:10 AM
Mark O said...: On both sides? Now, like a tune stuck in my mind, I'll have to watch.; 4/15/20, 10:11 AM
Dave Begley said...: Ken B

And you might actually do that.; 4/15/20, 10:11 AM
Shouting Thomas said...: We won't get fooled again!

Or maybe we will.; 4/15/20, 10:14 AM
daskol said...: Also telling: at one point in a CV task force update, Trump slipped and said we've got to "re-open the company" when referring to the country. I like what that reveals about his thinking more than the "open the govt" types.; 4/15/20, 10:17 AM
Ken B said...: Dave Begley
Well I’d rather do that than wish Lou Gehrig’s Disease on someone, like you did.; 4/15/20, 10:18 AM
Nonapod said...: It's certainly true that there's a lot of people who believe that all wealth and prosperity is somehow generated by the government. The Bernie Sander's and AOC supporters all seem to think that. Some of them may even believe that if we just raised the minimum wage to a million dollars an hour everyone would be rich.; 4/15/20, 10:19 AM
narciso said...: I think the standard refrain has been jar jar binks 'people going to die'; 4/15/20, 10:19 AM
J. Farmer said...: Better yet, turn off the TV and just enjoy a cocktail.; 4/15/20, 10:20 AM
bagoh20 said...: We'd be open now if the right people lost their income instead of who did. What if the media were the ones getting no paycheck right now, and forced to stay home. Hey, now that I think of it, that actually has a lot of benefits, one being it would reduce the spread of the fake news sickness.; 4/15/20, 10:25 AM
bagoh20 said...: You would have to have the accuracy of your reporting tested before you could return to work.; 4/15/20, 10:26 AM
Shouting Thomas said...: The Democrats and their media buddies generated a panic designed (successfully) to crash the economy to try to bring down Trump. This, after 3 years of Russia collusion hoax.

The Dems and their allies even bragged for three years that trashing the economy and undermining the markets was going to be their strategy.

Who's going to vote for these shits?

(I know.); 4/15/20, 10:26 AM
MadTownGuy said...: Opening the government isn't necessarily a bad thing. Someone I know applied for SocSec benefits from her deceased ex-husband and right in mid-process the offices in CA, where she lives, abruptly closed. She needed some court documents to finalize the process and the county recorder's office is also closed.

Criminal courts are also closed in LA County so trials are delayed. Not sure if folks awaiting hearings are still being held until courts reopen but I saw that inmates who were on short time on sentences were released early. The Sheriff's office has been requested to make fewer arrests in the interim. Wonder if that applies to renegade surfers on lonely beaches.; 4/15/20, 10:28 AM
wendybar said...: I watch the actual presser so I don't have to watch the liars spin what was actually said.; 4/15/20, 10:28 AM
doctrev said...: It might be due to the presence of Math, but I saw relatively little ink devoted to the 3700 deaths mysteriously added to the New York tolls, bumping things up past 10000. It can't be forgotten that coronavirus deaths already included presumed deaths, without even making tests. Now numbers have to be added out of whole cloth.

A truly heartless cynic would point out that if the process of "assuming" deaths were applied to historical atrocities like the Holocaust, that would do more to burnish the obvious lies of denialism more than any number of neo-Nazis.; 4/15/20, 10:34 AM
gspencer said...: So odd, since the Founders/Framers set before themselves the task of restricting the government.; 4/15/20, 10:35 AM
Original Mike said...: I'm opening up some; watching a little news, wading back into the comments sections here. It's depressing me. I liked it better when I was curled up with my books.; 4/15/20, 10:36 AM
Yancey Ward said...: I have read that error in a couple of transcrips over the last month, but it is probably there more than I have noticed. Might be a residue of the budget battle from early 2019.; 4/15/20, 10:37 AM
bagoh20 said...: I have never watched less news in my life, as I have the last month. I can't stand to hear it. Everything is delivered with this intense voice of disaster. Every story sounds like the Hindenburg coming down.

I finally talked my woman into avoiding it after it terrified her to the point that she's running around the house cleaning and sanitizing like she has OCD. She is afraid to leave the house even though the risk is half of that when you drive to work every day. That fact has no bearing on her fear. It should, but I gave up trying. Until the "experts" tell her on TV it's OK, she won't be normal. She thinks I'm just a "denier", which I am, but the one thing that helped a little was when she talked to a couple of our friends, a nurse and a doctor who runs an infectious disease department at a hospital in California who mostly agreed with my view. That helped for about a day until she watch the news again.
The OCD is back. Once I let it go and stopped trying to change her mind, I just have a nice clean house now. I can live with that.; 4/15/20, 10:37 AM
Yancey Ward said...: "Well I’d rather do that than wish Lou Gehrig’s Disease on someone, like you did."

Yes, that is a lot worse than blood libeling people who didn't agree with shutting down every part of the country in response to this virus. Much worse.; 4/15/20, 10:39 AM
JRoberts said...: Speaking of drinking games, how about a swig every time Dr. Birx uses the term "granular"

I like Dr. Birx, but she really loves the word granular.; 4/15/20, 10:39 AM
JRoberts said...: If anything, this pandemic has caused me to seek out more local (County and Atlanta metro) news and less national news.

Also I wonder what the news coverage would be if the major "hot spots" were places like Atlanta, Dallas or Kansas City instead of New York City, Los Angeles or San Francisco. I bet as soon as things calm down in NYC, news coverage will shift to other "pressing" issues.; 4/15/20, 10:46 AM
Nonapod said...: I like Dr. Birx, but she really loves the word granular.

Brings to mind that old Kids in the Hall sketch about the guy with a fixation on the word "Ascertain" and his boss chiding him about it. Sadly I can't find it on Youtube.; 4/15/20, 10:46 AM
Sam L. said...: I don't watch TV news. Don't trust it.; 4/15/20, 10:47 AM
JohnAnnArbor said...: Some parts of the government never closed. The Michigan Lottery was judged "vital" and is still open. Pot and alcohol, too.

But cutting someone's lawn for them is verboten.; 4/15/20, 10:53 AM
Fernandinande said...: It's telling! And it happens a lot!

What does it tell? How much is a lot?

google returns 36 million (~fake) hits for ["open the government" -"covid-19" -coronavirus], like this one:

"Open The Government is an inclusive, nonpartisan coalition that works to strengthen our democracy and empower the public by advancing policies that create a more open, accountable, and responsive government."; 4/15/20, 10:54 AM
JohnAnnArbor said...: Government has its priorities, is my point, here in Michigan. It's revenue from taxation, first and foremost.; 4/15/20, 10:55 AM
Shouting Thomas said...: So, what’s going to be the next Get Trump! media panic?

They’ve all flopped. Russia collusion. Impeachment. COVID-19. Tanking the markets. House arrest.

Is there any doubt remaining that the Democratic Party is allied with the CCP?; 4/15/20, 10:55 AM
MadisonMan said...: But cutting someone's lawn for them is verboten.

Are lawns growing there? I've seen two people -- last weekend -- in Madison cutting their grass, and it looked dormant to me. Maybe they were just mulching the remaining leaves. I thought them crazy for working on a lawn.; 4/15/20, 10:58 AM
narciso said...: sounds like another lawfare outfit ot, how about this weird new dune reboot; 4/15/20, 10:58 AM
Drago said...: ST: "Is there any doubt remaining that the Democratic Party is allied with the CCP?"

Not after reading dem Sen Murphy and Schumer, amongst many other dems, going ballistic in defense of China and the ChiCom lapdog WHO, all on top of the entire establishment media basically running ChiCom propaganda 24/7 now and even inviting in ChiCom propaganda "reporters" to question Trump in front of the world.; 4/15/20, 11:01 AM
doctrev said...: Shouting Thomas said...
So, what’s going to be the next Get Trump! media panic?

They’ve all flopped. Russia collusion. Impeachment. COVID-19. Tanking the markets. House arrest.

Is there any doubt remaining that the Democratic Party is allied with the CCP?

4/15/20, 10:55 AM

Arguably the China Flu panic has done more to justify President Trump's most nationalist pronouncements than anything he could possibly have done himself. Merely letting Bloomberg News continue its pattern of deceiving the American people, never mind keeping China as a Most Favored trading partner, is becoming less feasible by the day. Despite Joe Biden being a talentless senile rapist, it's clear the Democrats really dodged a bullet by rejecting the Michael Bloomberg nomination.

Actually, the current situation is so advantageous for American nationalists that it's possible that the Chinese are right and the virus really was cooked up by America- nah, still not likely. If Donald Trump had the stomach for that kind of brinksmanship, he would have simply ordered the Treasury Department to operate as normal and bypass Congress entirely during government shutdowns, especially when planes started crashing.; 4/15/20, 11:02 AM
MayBee said...: MadMan- this week we've had a lot of rains/snow/sleet/snow/hail. And by "this week", I mean those all happened on Friday. But...the lawns are greening up. I noticed in my neighborhood a lot of mole tunnels, and a lot of maple seedlings growing. If our landscapers could work right now, I think they'd be trimming back the dead stuff from winter and taking care of the other things I mentioned.; 4/15/20, 11:04 AM
bagoh20 said...: It's unfortunate that if a news outlet delivered fair factual news with a calm voice, it wouldn't last a week. So instead we get this contest to see who can hype the bad news with the most gusto, and good news just doesn't deliver the same audience.

Fear is self-perpetrating. When we are scared, we are already in fight or flight mode, and we don't have time for assessing risk, or thinking things through. Our mind is concentrated on fleeing risk and fighting any attempt to slow us down. Our attention is instantly attracted to scary information. Good news or a calm voice serves no purpose to the scared mind. That's why when you try to calm someone down who is really scared, or even an animal, you need to grab them and hold them still until they slowly give up the natural program running in their head. We cannot think rationally when we are running from a threat. We are only looking for information about where the threat is, and how to get away.; 4/15/20, 11:10 AM
JohnAnnArbor said...: NYTimes, May 13, 2017:

"Candidate to Lead the W.H.O. Accused of Covering Up Epidemics"

Link.

"A leading candidate to head the World Health Organization was accused this week of covering up three cholera epidemics in his home country, Ethiopia, when he was health minister...During earlier outbreaks, various news organizations, including The Guardian and The Washington Post, reported that unnamed Ethiopian officials were pressuring aid agencies to avoid using the word 'cholera' and not to report the number of people affected....The regulations were strengthened after China denied for months in 2003 that it had a serious outbreak of lethal respiratory disease in its southern cities. That outbreak ultimately became known as SARS, for severe acute respiratory syndrome, and spread to several other countries, including Canada. Dr. Margaret Chan, the current W.H.O. director general, is from China, but was never accused of participating in China’s cover-up. She was the director of health in Hong Kong at the time and led effective responses to both avian flu and SARS. China has since changed its policy and now is often praised for acknowledging outbreaks promptly, fighting them aggressively and cooperating with other health agencies."

Last sentence: Yeah, right.; 4/15/20, 11:15 AM
Narr said...: We've already had weeks of lawn-cutting. The local rules are fairly mild and there's lots of gardening and home improvement projects going on.

Between winter and Whitmer, Michigan sounds like hell.

As for money, please consult the 15 page article s.v. in the Britannica of 1781. There's a very helpful chart on page 268, which lists no less than 13 English, 8 French, 7 German, and 2 Dutch coins, about half being gold and half silver, "Shewing the Quantity of Fine Metal contained in them," with conversions for different grain measures (Troy, Paris, Colonia, and Holland).

So in the worldwide trade of the period there were almost 30 different coins in common use.

Narr
I haven't found anything about amounts in circulation.; 4/15/20, 11:28 AM
Freeman Hunt said...: "But cutting someone's lawn for them is verboten."

They're not letting people cut other people's lawns in Michigan? That's insane.

If they did that here, the city would be full of snakes. Lawn services are abundant and inexpensive. A great number of people, including me, don't even own lawn equipment.; 4/15/20, 11:32 AM
tcrosse said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 4/15/20, 11:53 AM
tcrosse said...: OT, but here's a guide to
International Covid19 Slang; 4/15/20, 11:55 AM
Ken B said...: A guy came by, from several yards away negotiated a fair price to aerate our lawn, and did. Paid with cash put under a weight.; 4/15/20, 11:55 AM
Ann Althouse said...: "Speaking of drinking games, how about a swig every time Dr. Birx uses the term "granular""

Yeah, that's a good one. I've been remarking on that in off-blog life.; 4/15/20, 12:08 PM
exiledonmainstreet, green-eyed devil said...: "They're not letting people cut other people's lawns in Michigan? That's insane."

Also insane: you can take a canoe out on a lake, but not a motorized boat. Who knew that Evinrude outboard motors spread Wuhan flu?

Michigan's restrictions are so bizarre, it's as if the governor is issuing them to spite a specific person. Maybe her MIL likes gardening, and enjoys relaxing on the pontoon boat after a day spent painting and remodeling the lake cabin. Ha,ha, take that you old biddy.; 4/15/20, 12:16 PM
ALP said...: LOL I have suggested a similar game when watching "This is Us". Either a shot of hard booze or bong hit is taken every time a character says "We need to talk..." or "Do you need to talk..."

Wasted before the first commercial break!; 4/15/20, 2:11 PM
ALP said...: bagoh20: "The OCD is back. Once I let it go and stopped trying to change her mind, I just have a nice clean house now. I can live with that."

Can sympathize, living with a person I've described as 'one head injury away from Howard Hughes level germaphobia.' The nanosecond after I heard it had landed in our state in January I thought to myself: 'sigh....here we go....' The frustrating part is that he is an engineer science geek type but that is combined with very strong risk adversion.; 4/15/20, 2:18 PM
Birkel said...: Dave Begley,
Now that Ken B has made up a lie about you too, I would like to invite you to join the club.
It's a concern troll here in bad faith.; 4/15/20, 5:39 PM
HistoryDoc said...: As I said on this blog a week ago, if you are playing the presser drinking game and want to get drunk quickly, take Trump saying "incredible", Birx saying "granular", and Fauci saying "mitigation"; 4/15/20, 7:30 PM