Don’t Call Democrats’ Pork ‘Stimulus’
March 19, 2020

With much of the U.S. economy shut down to deal with the Wuhan coronavirus outbreak, Congress is putting together a $1 trillion stimulus package to prevent an economic meltdown, the third major bill to address the coronavirus pandemic. That’s a huge amount of money, but a question looms: How much of it will actually help the struggling economy, and how much of it will just be politically motivated pork?

Congress is moving on the massive stimulus fresh off of passing a multibillion-dollar aid package on Wednesday that provides paid sick and family leave for working Americans, free coronavirus testing, and expanded unemployment insurance.

“Right now, the plan around here is basically just to start shoveling money out of a helicopter, and the most important debate is whether Democrats or Republicans get to shovel the money first,” said Nebraska Sen. Ben Sasse.

Sasse isn’t just talking. He’s one of eight Republicans who voted against Wednesday’s package, the second in as many weeks. He’s worried, and so are we, that the emergency “stimulus” will be used as a goody bag for handing out treats to favored interest groups.

The fears of Sasse and at least seven other GOP senators aren’t unfounded. Before passing the second bill Wednesday, Democrats tried to force through a number of costly additions that had little to do with coronavirus. And they wanted to make them permanent. That might sound nice, but forcing small- and medium-sized businesses to foot the bill for expensive paid family leave and increased paid sick leave would bankrupt thousands of small businesses, which often have just a few workers and operate on the slimmest of margins. Fortunately, GOP negotiators got the “permanent” part removed.

Then there were proposed OSHA regulations that would have hit businesses with expensive new mandates that would do little or nothing to mitigate the current virus pandemic. Worse, Dems wanted to use Social Security to fund emergency employment aid — setting a horrible precedent of raiding the already-bankrupt Social Security fund, which has an estimated $34 trillion — that’s trillion, with a “t” — long-term funding deficit. If you’re over 65 or a Social Security recipient you should understand: This raid on Social Security ultimately would make you less financially secure, not more.

Nancy Pelosi & Co. also tried to expand the enhanced family and sick leave to include things that had nothing to do with coronavirus at all, including domestic violence and stalking, to name just two. Those are indeed problems, but not ones to be addressed in an emergency funding bill of this scope and urgency.

Finally, Democrats tried to sneak in a provision that could have essentially gone around the Hyde Amendment, which makes it illegal for the federal government to fund abortions, except to save a mother’s life or in cases of rape or incest. They might not like the law, but it is the law. And none of this, of course, has anything to do with COVID-19, the nasty coronavirus that China sent our way.

Spending money on political pork isn’t “stimulus.” And the last time we looked, pork doesn’t cure coronavirus. We would hope that the Democrats would understand the gravity of the current crisis, and move quickly to address actual needs related to the COVID-19 outbreak. And, yes, reasonable people can conclude that the sudden shutdown of our economy requires action by Congress.

We’re always wary of that word “stimulus,” ever since the Obama administration used a $800 billion package to “stimulate” the economy after the 2008-2009 financial crisis. The current bill is itself open to question. It would spend about half a trillion to give every adult $1,000. How long that’s supposed to last is anyone’s guess, but it won’t stimulate the economy. Meanwhile, Steve Mnuchin’s Treasury Department wants $250 billion for small businesses and $150 billion to help other troubled industries, including airlines. The best stimulus of all? Ending the economic shutdown as soon as possible.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell would like a bill by Thursday. Our advice: Better think this one through. If this stimulus does as little as President Obama’s did, voters likely won’t thank you for it later.

https://issuesinsights.com/202...crats-pork-stimulus/

quote:

Originally posted by oddball:
The movie theater industry, hit hard by the panic, is asking for a stimulus from the federal govt.

https://www.breitbart.com/ente...-due-to-coronavirus/

F that.

quote:

Originally posted by DSgrouse:

quote:

Originally posted by oddball:
The movie theater industry, hit hard by the panic, is asking for a stimulus from the federal govt.

https://www.breitbart.com/ente...-due-to-coronavirus/

F that.

Yeah, talk about an industry that needs to go.

quote:

Originally posted by Fenris:
Even relatively inaccurate tests offer statistical data that can be used to form confidence intervals for estimating case loads.

Well, yes, but it may be misleading statistical data. Speaking as someone once involved in designing and writing code to process statistical data: If the data is crap, the statistical analysis of that data is meaningless. This is why we use limits to remove outliers [1] and pay attention to the resulting distribution's skewness [2] and and kurtosis [3].

For the non-stats-geeks in the audience, a brief, if somewhat inaccurate, explanation of some of the terms used above:

[1] "outliers," simply stated, are data points that lie so far outside "most" data points so as to be regarded as anomalies. They are eliminated because they influence the results out-of-proportion to their meaningfulness.

[2] "skewness" is an expression of how far the data is skewed, or biased, to one side of the curve or the other [4].

[3] "kurtosis" is an expression of how peaked or flat a graph of the statistical representation of the data looks [4].

[4] Data that results in a distribution that's too skewed, peaked or flat generally, but not always, indicates poor statistical method, poor data, or both.

quote:

Originally posted by slosig:
Oh man, you actually paid attention to the comments. That was probably your first time dealing with someone else's code, right?

In fact: It was

quote:

Originally posted by slosig:
There is a reason why many prefer to just scrap someone else's not quite working code and start over if they can talk the boss into it...

Yeah, sometimes that is best.

Over the last couple weeks, this week in particular, I have received numerous emails from various companies describing the steps they are taking to address the covid-19 issues. Many have ramped up online sale capacity. Some like Dick's, struggling to begin with, have decided to close for the next two weeks. I'm sure it costs them more to keep the lights on for the tumbleweeds in their stores than the shutdown will.

I would like to share the email I received from Tractor Supply. This is how you do it.


"A message to our Neighbors from President and CEO, Hal Lawton

Dear Neighbor,

With the rapid changes across the nation due to the coronavirus (COVID‐19), I wanted to update you on the proactive steps we are taking at Tractor Supply to serve you, your family and your animals' needs today and in the longer term.

We know you view Tractor Supply as critical to feeding and caring for your animals and pets, just as the grocery store is to your family's needs. We feel a tremendous responsibility to you, and knowing this, we are taking the following steps:

We are adding Team Member hours in our stores to ensure we can provide legendary customer service.
We are adjusting our store hours to ensure our Team Members are available to help you. We continue to be humbled and proud of our Team Members across the country and thank you for the kindness and care you are showing them. Effective Sunday, March 22, our revised hours are:
Monday — Saturday: 8 a.m.‐6 p.m.
Sunday: 9 a.m.‐6 p.m. (Sunday hours vary by store ‐ check online for your store's Sunday hours)
We are increasing our inventory supply for essential products such as livestock feed, equine feed, pet food, water and propane.
We are extending two weeks of paid leave to our Team Members if they are experiencing any concerning symptoms in order to ensure their health and well‐being as well as yours.
To make shopping easier for you and to ensure your products will be waiting for you when you arrive, our website, TractorSupply.com is enabled with Buy Online Pickup In Store. Once you order, we will have the product waiting for you in an hour, and we can hold it for you for up to 2 days.

We are committed today, tomorrow and in the future to continue to be your most dependable retailer of choice so that you can continue living life on your terms. Thank you for your loyalty and support.

I hope you and your family remain safe and well."

quote:

Originally posted by oddball:
The movie theater industry, hit hard by the panic, is asking for a stimulus from the federal govt.

Please excuse my language, but fuck that!

Entertainment is important, but not critical. Taxpayer funds should be limited to critical relief.

quote:

Originally posted by ensigmatic:

quote:

Originally posted by oddball:
The movie theater industry, hit hard by the panic, is asking for a stimulus from the federal govt.

Please excuse my language, but fuck that!

Entertainment is important, but not critical. Taxpayer funds should be limited to critical relief.

Hollyweird is a friend of the DNC, so they will probably get it.

quote:

Originally posted by ensigmatic:
Please excuse my language, but fuck that!

Entertainment is important, but not critical. Taxpayer funds should be limited to critical relief.

Yep, the number of whole industries in meltdown is staggering, and movie theaters are not essential to everyday life.

Hospitals are starting to feel the pinch on the supply chain for items like protective masks. Protecting health care workers is becoming a priority.

quote:

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell would like a bill by Thursday. Our advice: Better think this one through. If this stimulus does as little as President Obama’s did, voters likely won’t thank you for it later.

That's an understatement, we'll see if the massive losses in the market and shutdowns by large industries force Trump into signing whatever is put on his desk.

I'd like to see him get the bill, and send it back after listing the sponsor of the spending, the amount of anything that has zero to do with the situation...

quote:

Originally posted by Oz_Shadow:
Hospitals are starting to feel the pinch on the supply chain for items like protective masks. Protecting health care workers is becoming a priority.

My employer stated that they go through about 40 masks per COVID-19 patient per day. That adds up to a LOT of masks. That's the primary reason elective surgeries have been canceled - to reduce the demand for surgical and N95 masks.

quote:

Originally posted by WaterburyBob:

quote:

Originally posted by Oz_Shadow:
Hospitals are starting to feel the pinch on the supply chain for items like protective masks. Protecting health care workers is becoming a priority.

My employer stated that they go through about 40 masks per COVID-19 patient per day. That adds up to a LOT of masks. That's the primary reason elective surgeries have been canceled - to reduce the demand for surgical and N95 masks.

You may soon see a shift where gear is not changed but worn for hours. Improvised gear will be next.

quote:

Originally posted by Oz_Shadow:

quote:

Originally posted by WaterburyBob:

quote:

Originally posted by Oz_Shadow:
Hospitals are starting to feel the pinch on the supply chain for items like protective masks. Protecting health care workers is becoming a priority.

My employer stated that they go through about 40 masks per COVID-19 patient per day. That adds up to a LOT of masks. That's the primary reason elective surgeries have been canceled - to reduce the demand for surgical and N95 masks.

You may soon see a shift where gear is not changed but worn for hours. Improvised gear will be next.

Yes, they started figuring out ways to sterilize and reuse masks last week. Something they will do only as a very last resort.

In earlier posts I supported efforts to flatten the curve - i.e. 2 weeks off school, telework for employees. But now they have gone completely off the deep end. The MD governor just about threatened to close the whole state. Any gatherings of 10 or more are outlawed, however that works. Malls, restaurants, etc. all closed. What's next? I know a few business owners who will not make it more than a few months like this. We can debate their past financial decisions all we want, but the economic effects will become 10x worse with the Governor choosing to effectively shut everything down.

One person has died in the state so far. One. I just don't see what data they are using so make these decisions. Italy is not the U.S., not even close. Of course we will see a spike in positive tests because they are actually testing now, but even still we have just over a 100 cases.

https://www.ilpost.it/2020/03/...ucci-numero-contagi/

Translation via https://www.deepl.com/translator (Google translate mistakenly translates the Italian for "swab" as "tampon," which is amusing but not useful.)

In an interview with Repubblica, Professor of Systems Biology at Temple University in Philadelphia Enrico Bucci explained that his observations and studies on the coronavirus epidemic (SARS-CoV-2) in Italy are very complicated due to the unreliability of official data on the number of infections. The swabs in Italy are performed in different ways and with different criteria depending on the regions: in Lombardy - the region most affected - the numbers are totally disconnected from reality, said Bucci, and getting an idea of the evolution of the infection is very difficult.

"The only thing that is certain is that the data coming from Lombardy are now unusable. There is a saturation effect that distorts them. For those who, like me, do this kind of analysis, it is better not to take them into consideration and concentrate on other areas of Italy. (…)

From what we know, hospitals in Lombardy, now on the verge of collapse, send back many people with symptoms without swabbing them. And so the number of infected people is greatly underestimated. But as the mayors of Bergamo denounce, there is a wrong estimate of deaths too. Many now die at home without a swab and not in intensive therapy, so they are not counted as deaths for Covid-19 in official reports".

quote:

Originally posted by kkina:
On #3, vaccines are usually inactivated strains of the virus in question. In theory, this will stimulate your own immune system to begin producing anti-bodies so it is up and running should you be exposed to the active virus. Since the vaccine has been made inert in some way, it won't cause the disease itself.

There is another strategy for more modern vaccines, which are know as sub-unit vaccines. A key viral protein or sequence of proteins is identified. These are usually a critical component of infectivity or viral function. This sub-unit is isolated and potentially altered to make it more immunogenic.

The sub-unit is then given to patients with an adjuvant to enhance immune presentation and processing. Sub-unit vaccines have the advantage of not requiring intact viral material but they have to be purified and sometimes altered in order to use them as a vaccine.

Here is a link to a NIH publication on a potential target in COVID-19: https://www.nih.gov/news-event...ine-covid-19-begins/

The protein in the article is the "Spike Protein" which is found on the viral envelope. This protein is used to bind to target cells and undergoes a conformational change after cell binding to allow viral entry. The pre-binding confirmation of the spike protein is one of the current vaccine targets for COVID-19. Interestingly, this protein is an antibody target for patients with the original SARS, but SARS antibodies from the original virus do not recognize the COVID-19 (SAR-CoV-2) spike protein.

I used to work in vaccine research for a long time. I am current working in advanced cancer and disease therapeutics, so I have not been able to follow everything that is being done for this virus. The NIH website (www.nih.gov) has some very good information is you choose to read it.

Best regards,

Mike (Molecular Biologist/Immunologist)

quote:

Originally posted by bubbatime:
You guys expecting a market recovery are in for a wild ride. It’s headed to 20,000 , maybe even 18,000.

I posted the above in this thread on Feb 24th. Only 3 weeks later, the DJIA is under 20,000 points.

quote:

Originally posted by AirmanJeff:
One person has died in the state so far. One. I just don't see what data they are using so make these decisions.

What I don't understand is why this keeps needing to be explained.

It's not mortality, alone, or even primarily, that's driving these decisions. It's the threat of the health care system being overwhelmed. Even with the measures being taken to slow the spread, hospital administrators, other health care industry experts, the government, etc. are still expressing concern the system will be overwhelmed.

quote:

Originally posted by AirmanJeff:
Italy is not the U.S., not even close.

And, again: It's been demonstrated numerous times the shape of the curve reflecting the advance of the disease in the U.S. is the same as what was seen in Italy.

quote:

Originally posted by AirmanJeff:
Of course we will see a spike in positive tests because they are actually testing now, but even still we have just over a 100 cases.

Please see: Covid-19 in US and Canada: Real Time Updates With Credible Sources

Until that daily cumulative cases curve starts flattening-out they'll keep having to clamp-down harder.

quote:

Originally posted by bubbatime:

quote:

Originally posted by bubbatime:
You guys expecting a market recovery are in for a wild ride. It’s headed to 20,000 , maybe even 18,000.

I posted the above in this thread on Feb 24th. Only 3 weeks later, the DJIA is under 20,000 points.

Yup. I recall.

quote:

Italy is not the U.S., not even close.

And, again: It's been demonstrated numerous times the shape of the curve reflecting the advance of the disease in the U.S. is the same as what was seen in Italy.

Ensigmatic,

Care to share your data analysis?

Got my test results back.

Phew! That's a relief. Now I can report back to the ship.