Death Works 24 Hours A Day

I was born and raised in Vermont. I lived the first 42 of my 56 years in Vermont and New York. The majority of readers of this blog live in the United States. What happens in the United States remains an interest and a concern of mine.

The Covid-19 pandemic has plunged the entire world into something no one alive has ever experienced. The end of the influenza pandemic that occurred at the end of World War I is generally accepted as December 1920. A seven-year-old child at that time would be now 112 years old.

On March 25, the United States suffered 14,024 new Covid-19 cases, the most in any single day by any country during this pandemic. On March 26, the United States broke that record, with 17,224 new cases. Update: The United States had 18,691 new cases today, a new high for a single day (and 401 deaths, raising the total to 1,696). The US saw two grim milestones today: cases topped 100,000 and the deaths topped 1,500. (New York City may not hit its peak in new cases for another 21 days, which is almost too horrific to contemplate. The city needs roughly 100,000 additional hospital beds and 37,000 additional ICU beds.)

While this blog centers on the Boston Red Sox, and major league baseball more generally, things that happen in the United States affecting professional baseball, in a broad sense, are reasonable subject matters. This pandemic is affecting everyone. It's hard to see how looking at the actions of the people charged with overseeing the health and safety of Americans at this time is off-topic to anyone. But if my words are offensive, or if you actually support the Sociopath-in-Chief (how that is possible at this late date, I'm at a loss to comprehend), please go away and never come back. I don't want you as a reader.

"Stick To Sports!" is a phrase shouted by conservatives (the shouters are invariably conservative). It is a ridiculous and impossible mandate. The people who play and watch sports are humans. Humans are affected every day by what politicians do and don't do. Sticking to sports is why Jackie Robinson's Hall of Fame plaque did not mention, until 2008, that he was the first black man allowed to play baseball in the modern era. Sticking to sports is one reason why franchises are still named Indians and Braves (and Redskins and Blackhawks and Chiefs and Apaches and Mohawks and Redmen and Savage and Tomahawks and Squaws).

And what does "stick to sports" really mean? At its core, it means: "Stop sharing political opinions I disagree with". It is the bitter, whiny cry of people who live in fear that "libtards" are taking over and imposing their views on society. (If only ...) Oddly, when I post pictures of my dogs, no one ever yells: "Stick to sports!" Even though both dogs are ardent socialists.

During the height of Colin Kaepernick's protests against police brutality, when public address announcers across MLB and other sports instructed fans to stand for the national anthem and to have any attending veterans salute, I wonder if any of those same people complained that those teams should "stick to sports"?

Some people claim to focus on sports as a reprieve from the "outside" world. I understand that, but it's an irrelevant concern in this case. To use my blog as a tiny example, you have to make an effort to see it. No one is mandated to read it. You can control how much of it you want in your life. It's okay if you want zero. (Most people do!) My first political post on The Joy of Sox is dated September 2, 2003. Please don't act surprised to see political words. (Also, you did not create this blog and you are not my editor. This blog is a dictatorship, but it has open borders.)

Something else happened on March 25, as the U-S-A, U-S-A, U-S-A became the world's #1 Covid-19 hotspot, Donald Trump bragged:

It's hard not to be happy with the job we're doing, that I can tell you.

I don't think anyone would disagree if I said that most of Trump's statements over the last two months have been at odds with medical experts and scientists both within the US government and around the world. That's is probably the most objective, and nicest way, to put it.

(And as far as subjective: The far-too-often stenographic media needs to actually grow a fucking spine and remember a lesson or two from Journalism 101. Hammer this lying, craven motherfucker every. fucking. day. on every single one of his countless lies and happy talk about the airlines and cruise ships and oil and the fucking stock market. Drive this obscene orange asshole into self-isolation because he's terrified of the relentless demand for accountability of his actions. ... By the way, there is nothing stopping Trump from being impeached a second time. And this is far more damning and damaging than what he was impeached for the first time.)

Trump's comments have evolved through several phases.

1 - The problem does not exist

2 - The problem exists, but its effects are exaggerated by my enemies

3 - I have always said the problem existed (and I said so before anyone else)

4 - I am trying to solve the problem, but my enemies are trying to stop me

5 - I am successfully solving the problem (despite hundreds of news stories each day (written by my enemies) proving the exact opposite)

6 - We have circled back to the beginning. This is a combination of 1 & 2: no problems exist with supplies and people are demanding equipment they do not need

Last night, Trump told Fox's Sean Hannity:

A lot of equipment is being asked for that I don't think they will need. ... You know, you go into major hospitals, sometimes they'll have two ventilators and now, all of a sudden, they're saying, "Can we order 30,000 ventilators?" I don't believe you need 40,000 or 30,000 ventilators.

Would a state really request more ventilators that it thought it would need in the coming weeks and months solely to make Trump look bad, to sabotage his chances at re-election? Trump believes that. He believes it to the very core of his being. But Trump also suffers from severe, untreated mental illness.

In further evidence of that point, during that same town meeting last night, Trump suggested that he is happy to let thousands of New Yorkers die because Governor Andrew Cuomo has not sucked up to him to Trump's satisfaction. On Friday, Cuomo said: "If he got it from Fox, you know the old expression, garbage in, garbage out? That's what I would say about that."

Jared Kushner, an expert in nothing except kissing his father-in-law's ass, is in charge of the country's ventilator gap. (Trump has previously put him in charge of negotiating peace in the Middle East (Kushner boasted about having read 25 books on the subject), recommending and vetting candidates for future pardons, and researching the coronavirus. Kushner also helped write Trump's March 11, 2020 Oval Office address (which was such a disaster, numerous statements had to be immediately retracted and corrected).)

Kushner wants to wait on production of ventilators, even as people die, because he is concerned that states will be left with a surplus when the present crisis is over. As Tom Sullivan notes:

The country spent at least half a trillion bailing out Wall Street after the financial crisis. The U.S. abandoned over $1 billion in military equipment in Vietnam, $7 billion in equipment in Afghanistan, lost track of over a billion dollars worth of weapons in Iraq in addition to losing nearly $9 billion in $100 bills shipped in on pallets by the ton. Jared is holding up delivery of life-saving equipment over worries about leftovers.

Trump has rejected pleas that New York State needs tens of thousands of new ventilators. He doesn't believe the states numbers are accurate. And Trump knows more about everything than anyone else who ever lived. (Just ask him!) More than a few people are worried because a classic Trumpian move would be to send existing equipment to Florida, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin, which (coincidence!) are key swing states in this November's election.

But ... wait! Mere hours after scoffing and ridiculing the request for 40,000 ventilators, Trump is now stamping his feet and yelling that 40,000 ventilators are ESSENTIAL!! NOW!!!! Trump also insulted General Motors, a company he praised to the skies only days ago, saying how amazing it was that GM was willing to help out.

As usual with “this” General Motors, things just never seem to work out. They said they were going to give us 40,000 much needed Ventilators, “very quickly”. Now they are saying it will only be 6000, in late April, and they want top dollar. Always a mess with Mary B. Invoke “P”.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 27, 2020

General Motors MUST immediately open their stupidly abandoned Lordstown plant in Ohio, or some other plant, and START MAKING VENTILATORS, NOW!!!!!! FORD, GET GOING ON VENTILATORS, FAST!!!!!! @GeneralMotors @Ford

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 27, 2020

GENERAL MOTORS MUST START MAKING VENTILATORS, NOW!!!!!! FORD, GET GOING ON VENTILATORS, FAST!!!!!!

Trump will soon be blaming GM and other companies for the blood that is dripping from his hands by ignoring this crisis for so many weeks and months. He's nothing if not completely predictable. You'll be able to set your watch by it.

Trump is also letting 1.5 million N95 respirator masks gather dust in a US government warehouse in Indiana. The masks are past their expiration date, but the CDC has issued guidelines for their safe use. It does not seem to matter.

Trump's hiring of loyalists without experience (or not hiring anyone at all, if a Yes Man cannot be found) has made the US's response to the pandemic erratic and incompetent at every level of government. Workers in the Department of Veterans Affairs have been forced to order medical supplies from Amazon, because their clueless superiors had no idea what to do for patients at VA hospitals.

A recent survey of the United States Conference of Mayors found that, of 213 participating cities:

91.5% do not have an adequate supply of face masks for their first responders (including police, fire, EMTs) and medical personnel

88.2% do not have an adequate supply of personal protective equipment other than face masks to protect these workers

92.1% do not have an adequate supply of test kits

85.0% do not have an adequate supply of ventilators for use by health facilities in their city or area

62.4% have not received emergency equipment or supplies from their State

84.6% have received help from their State, but it is not adequate

If Covid-19 doesn't get you, perhaps the increased pollution will:

The Environmental Protection Agency on Thursday announced a sweeping relaxation of environmental rules in response to the coronavirus pandemic, allowing power plants, factories and other facilities to determine for themselves if they are able to meet legal requirements on reporting air and water pollution. ... The order asks companies to "act responsibly" ...

Well, okay. As long as the companies have been asked ...

Heather Digby Parton:

Trump has insisted over and over again that no one could have predicted that something like this, which of course is complete nonsense. The Obama administration had set up a pandemic team within the National Security Council, which ran potential scenarios for the incoming administration in January of 2017 as part of a legally required transition exercise. Roughly two-thirds of the Trump representatives who attended that meeting are no longer serving in the administration anyway, another example of how the huge turnover has contributed to the botched response. In any case, former national security adviser John Bolton disbanded the team when he joined the White House, so there is hardly anyone around who would have benefited from those briefings anyway.

But according to Politico, the Obama folks left a "playbook" behind that outlined everything the new administration needed to know to begin the coordination of the various agencies and distribution of materials as well as other helpful guidance. Apparently, that guidance was thrown onto a shelf somewhere, and has been gathering dust ever since.

None of that is surprising. When Trump was asked at one of his White House coronavirus campaign rallies if he'd called any of the former presidents for advice, he replied that he thinks he's doing an incredible job and said, "I don't think I'm going to learn much."

It's one of the few times Trump has been honest.

Through all of this, Trump, the man ostensibly in charge of everyone, the person with the final say about each and every step, who decided what gets done and what does not get done, who in a crisis like this is deciding who lives and who dies, insists he is not to blame. He cannot be bothered to care. He states publicly, with no shame, or seeming realization to what he is admitting, that he takes no responsibility for anything that has gone wrong (though he's always first in line to accept (and to expect) praise for everything that goes right).

The Defense Production Act enables the government "to expedite and expand the supply of resources from the U.S. industrial base to support military, energy, space, and homeland security programs". It enables the president to "ensure timely procurement of resources to save lives and property under emergency conditions".

In this emergency condition, despite thousands of Americans sick and dying right now, Trump refuses to use the DPA. He does not believe an emergency exists. He believes it is adequate to let private industry decide what is needed and then voluntarily produce it on their own schedule, and then the fifty states fight with each other to get however many supplies are available. It's survival of the fittest, a fight to the death, and Trump can watch over it all like a Roman emperor at the Colosseum.

Trump offers no guidance, no coordination. After he holds his daily press briefing, during which he lies, insults the media, and basks in the praise from underlings (the briefings serve the ego-enriching purpose of the cult rallies Trump can no longer hold), his "work" for the day done.

But Death works 24 hours a day.