President Trump and First Lady test positive for COVID-19

[Dave Gray]

Democratic governors sending sick patients back to nursing homes? 

I've not heard this.  What is the claim?

[CF DolFan]

I've not heard this.  What is the claim?

https://www.modernhealthcare.com/post-acute-care/doj-seeks-data-nursing-home-deaths-four-democratic-led-states

Long-term care facilities represent less than 1% of the U.S. population, but they account for 42% of the COVID-19 deaths, with more than 70,000 fatalities reported by the COVID Tracking Project."

Sweden is killing any lockdown argument. They are doing just fine and yet have never locked down or crashed their economy.

[Fau Teixeira]

Sweden is killing any lockdown argument. They are doing just fine and yet have never locked down or crashed their economy.

They've suffered exactly the same economic drop-off as Denmark did (closest neighbor) with much higher mortality rate.

Also, Sweden has 100% covered public healthcare for everyone. So they can take care of their own.

[Spider-Dan]

This thread is instructive at highlighting the conservative approach to COVID.  To recap:

- COVID is no more dangerous than the seasonal flu
- the number of COVID deaths reported by the media is wildly misleading fake news

AND YET

- Democrat governors irresponsibly sent patients with this extremely dangerous (?!) disease back to nursing homes
- This extremely dangerous (?!) disease then spread in nursing homes, causing tens of thousands of COVID deaths which are totally real

These contradictory positions are part and parcel of being an American conservative in the 21st century.  Let's cover a couple of these issues.

Nursing homes:
Early on in this outbreak, with hospitals being stretched beyond capacity and severely insufficient availability of tests (and, of course, grossly inadequate help from the federal government), some Democratic governors in states with major outbreaks made the decision to free up hospital beds for the sickest COVID patients by sending elderly patients who were not currently exhibiting COVID symptoms to a nursing home if they had medical issues able to be treated there.

With proper assistance by a competent federal government - say, by the Army Corps of Engineers being fully deployed to build multiple hospitals in outbreak sites across the nation, or by rapid testing being made available to everyone who needs it (as South Korea did) - making the difficult choice of who gets a hospital bed would not have been necessary.  But our federal gov't is completely incompetent, so the unenviable choice was "Who gets this hospital bed?" without the testing necessary to make sure those not currently asymptomatic were not carriers.

Masks:
Again, early on in this pandemic, we faced huge shortages of PPE across the country.  Medical personnel was forced to use-and-reuse the few masks that they had available, while the Trump Administration insisted that the federal stockpile of medical supplies "isn't for states to use".  So, faced with this shortage of PPE, medical experts advised everyday citizens NOT to start hoarding masks, and to refrain from buying up this PPE so that medical personnel could have the supplies they desperately needed to do their jobs.

Now, months later, conservatives claim that liberals were "against masks" before they were for them.  Liberals were never "against masks"; we said that if you're a layman, you should forego buying up masks so that the professionals who need them can get them during a widespread shortage.

---

In order to have a productive discussion, it is first fundamentally necessary for both sides to have good-faith intellectual honesty in their positions.  So to the conservatives here, I ask you three simple questions:

1) Does COVID present an exceptional and noteworthy danger?
2) Are lockdowns effective at reducing the danger COVID presents?
3) Are masks effective at reducing the danger COVID presents?

Without a definitive answer to these questions, further discussion is pointless.  It cannot be true that Trump is to be praised for his bold lockdown of the country that was opposed by the Democrats AND lockdowns do nothing and are a waste of time.

[Dolphster]

Like just about every other topic, both here and everywhere else in life, there is so much misinformation from both ends of the spectrum that it is practically impossible to weed through the incorrect "facts", the feelings proposed as "facts", the embellishments, etc.   

[CF DolFan]

Like just about every other topic, both here and everywhere else in life, there is so much misinformation from both ends of the spectrum that it is practically impossible to weed through the incorrect "facts", the feelings proposed as "facts", the embellishments, etc.   

I agree.

My philosophy, and as I see the conservative movement, is that covid can be really bad but for most people that just isn't the case. No reason to throw the baby out with the bathwater. We just want to live our lives because it isn't going anywhere and is just another player in the roulette of viruses and diseases out there. I could die from the flu or even faster on my Harley and I accept those risks and use my judgment to protect myself. For those who are high risk and don't want to subject themselves to the rest of us there are plenty of options for you ... as you guys have been mentioning. 

[Pappy13]

My philosophy, and as I see the conservative movement, is that covid can be really bad but for most people that just isn't the case.

Go ask some people who've had "mild" cases of Covid and see just exactly what they thought of the experience. Even "mild" cases are nothing to sneeze at. Now a lot of people have turned out to be asymptomatic and yes for those people getting Covid has been no big deal, but not everyone is so lucky. It's very cavalier of you to say for most people it isn't the case when it's not you that has it. Most of the people who've experienced it first hand don't seem to share your opinion. Sure your chances of dieing from it are low, but that doesn't mean that it's like having a cold and you move on. For many it's a rough couple of days unless they happen to be asymptomatic.

[MyGodWearsAHoodie]

Like just about every other topic, both here and everywhere else in life, there is so much misinformation from both ends of the spectrum that it is practically impossible to weed through the incorrect "facts", the feelings proposed as "facts", the embellishments, etc.   

No, there isn’t misinformation on both sides.  There is science on one side and bullshit on the other and a claim we need to give both science and bullshit an equal hearing. The bullshit side lives on the attitude of well it is just complicated.  There is two sides to the abortion debate, but there is no debate wearing masks reduces transmissions.  Just like there isn’t two sides to what temperature water freezes at.

[CF DolFan]

No, there isn’t misinformation on both sides.  There is science on one side and bullshit on the other and a claim we need to give both science and bullshit an equal hearing. The bullshit side lives on the attitude of well it is just complicated.  There is two sides to the abortion debate, but there is no debate wearing masks reduces transmissions.  Just like there isn’t two sides to what temperature water freezes at.

LOL .. I agree. Science says it's a baby once it is conceived but Planned Parenthood says it's "just a fetus" until right after birth so it's ok to kill it.  Kind of odd they referred to Chrissy Teagan's miscarriage as a baby boy when it was only about 19 weeks.  

BTW ... in no way am I making fun of Chrissy and John. Even though I actually can't stand either of them I prayed for them immediately after hearing this. We thought we had lost our babies and I have genuine sympathy for them.


Planned Parenthood
@PPFA
·
Oct 1
We're so sorry to hear that Chrissy Teigen and John Legend lost their son, and we admire them for sharing their story.

[Dolphster]

No, there isn’t misinformation on both sides.  There is science on one side and bullshit on the other and a claim we need to give both science and bullshit an equal hearing. The bullshit side lives on the attitude of well it is just complicated.  There is two sides to the abortion debate, but there is no debate wearing masks reduces transmissions.  Just like there isn’t two sides to what temperature water freezes at.

Christ almighty you have to be spoon fed like a child.  Of course there is science on one side.  There is always science on one side.  My post was regarding all the crap that people spew from BOTH sides of this issue.  A person can have science on their side and yet they still say erroneous and stupid things.  If I say, "Science supports the theory of evolution because ice cream sundaes are delicious" then yes, science supports my belief in evolution but my additional comment of "because ice cream sundaes are delicious" is stupid.  I am stating a scientifically correct fact about evolution, but I'm adding bullshit to it.  That is simply all that my post was about.  You are so eager to argue with people that you don't even take the time to freaking read what they wrote.  God damn you must be a laugh riot to hang out with. 

[Phishfan]

Go ask some people who've had "mild" cases of Covid and see just exactly what they thought of the experience. Even "mild" cases are nothing to sneeze at. Now a lot of people have turned out to be asymptomatic and yes for those people getting Covid has been no big deal, but not everyone is so lucky. It's very cavalier of you to say for most people it isn't the case when it's not you that has it. Most of the people who've experienced it first hand don't seem to share your opinion. Sure your chances of dieing from it are low, but that doesn't mean that it's like having a cold and you move on. For many it's a rough couple of days unless they happen to be asymptomatic.

Our own member's words

Feeling better, and my test from yesterday came back negative.  If everyone's symptoms were as mild as mine have been, this virus would be a non-issue.

mod edit: fixed broken formatting

[Spider-Dan]

While I stand behind that statement, Phishfan, there's slightly more to it than that.  It's not exactly fun to swallow a bit of saliva down the wrong pipe and be terrified that you're not going to be able to stop coughing and will be put on a ventilator.  My symptoms were mild, but it was still a very scary experience.

I think it's important to point out that if everyone's symptoms were as mild as mine were, this virus would not be the incredibly deadly pandemic that it is. And if it wasn't incredibly deadly, and the symptoms were always mild, then sure: this wouldn't be a big deal. But that's not the case.

[Spider-Dan]

Science says it's a baby once it is conceived but Planned Parenthood says it's "just a fetus" until right after birth so it's ok to kill it.  Kind of odd they referred to Chrissy Teagan's miscarriage as a baby boy when it was only about 19 weeks.

First of all, science has different words for "baby" and "fetus" because those words don't mean the same thing.

Second... even pro-life advocates don't believe that fertilized eggs are "babies."  If they did, they would have to believe that fertility clinics that store hundreds of frozen fertilized eggs are actually mass prisons that are incarcerating innocent babies indefinitely.  Why wouldn't those "babies" have a constitutional right to grow up and be free?

Abortion isn't about "babies."  It's about women, and it always has been.  As an Alabama lawmaker said in defense of a fertility clinic exemption in their recent anti-abortion law, "The egg in the lab doesn’t apply. It’s not in a woman. She’s not pregnant."