Trump’s Great Success Story: A Fool’s Tale

I don’t pay too much attention to watching the news on television lately. I guess it is good because I would not have been subject to hearing Jared Kushner spell out what a resounding success the United State is having in dealing with the Coronavirus. I heard that Trump also has been saying something along those lines fitting them in somewhere between him telling us the United States has done more testing than anyone else in the world.

Last night I watched Bill Gates on the Anderson Cooper show. Wow is he impressive when it comes to having knowledge about these matters. One thing that struck me was he said at least two times that had we taken the matter more seriously in January and February then the numbers of positive cases would be infinitesimally smaller than what has happened.

Dr. Fauci was on before Gates. He’s predicting that if everything goes absolutely right that by January we could have a vaccine. Then he had a caveat that rarely does everything go right. Gates was more and less optimistic than Fauci. On the less side he doesn’t think we’ll have one anytime near that date; on the optimistic side he tells about the various types of vaccines that are being worked on some dealing with RNA, others with anti-bodies, and others similar to the flu vaccine indicating there is one in Oxford England that looks quite promising.

He mentioned that his group has already set aside a factory to manufacture the anti-body vaccine. But Gates reminded us that they are still working on an effective HIV  vaccine and you know how long that has been. So basically he suggested anyone talking about a time line is guessing.

But I’d like to get back to the idea that Trump is doing a successful job in dealing with the virus. I suppose you can only say that if you close your eyes to the countries that have had some success and only look at Italy, the UK, France and Spain. Certainly you can always find some country worse than you and point to that and say I did better than that country. That doesn’t mean you are a success.

It reminds me of the time when I was getting my sea legs at Boston Latin School in the seventh grade. I had not quite caught on to the idea of there being a relationship between school grades and homework. I thought my green school bag into which I loaded my books was not to be opened once I left school until I returned to it the next day. The lure of hanging around on the street was too, too much for me to resist.

When I brought my report card home which had a bit of red ink on it, yes, they did use red ink on your cards back then if you scored below 60. I’d show it to my father and watch him reading it and seeing he was about to blow a gasket. I’d suggest to him that if he thinks that my card is bad he should have seen another boy’s card. I couldn’t figure out why he didn’t care that I did better than some other sluggard. I will skip what my father did when the gasket actually blew off.

That’s what I think of when Trump tells us how good he is doing. Too bad my dad wasn’t around to smack a little sense into him and tell him we don’t care that the United States did not come in last, we expected more of it. We are the United States not some back alley country.

The United States has 1,067,000 positive cases. Yesterday there were 29,091 new positive cases. It has had 62,860 deaths. Yesterday there were 2,007 new deaths.The US is first in the world with cases and deaths.

China where the virus originated has five times our population. It has had 84,000 positive cases. That’s 983,000 less positive cases than the US. China has had 4,637 deaths. That is 58, 223 less deaths than the US.

South Korea  has had 10,744 positive cases and 248 deaths. Germany with one-fourth of our population has 163,000 (US equivalent 652,000) positive cases and 6,623 (US equivalent 26,492) deaths. Austria 6,766 (US equivalent 250,508) positive cases and 93 (US equivalent 3,443) deaths.  New Zealand with five million people has had 1,479 (US equivalent 97,022) positive cases and 19 (US equivalent 1246) deaths.

Successful Trump hasn’t been.

And don’t start telling me we could have had one, two or three or even more millions of deaths. To follow this logic China could have had ten, twenty or thirty plus millions of deaths. Everyone could have millions of deaths if, as Trump said, nothing was done about it. But even the most backward country did something about it and most did more than Trump.

 

38 Comments

  1. William M. Connolly

    To get the facts, please read the previously cited National Geographic Article, and this article from BUSINESS INSIDER: It constantly updates the facts on when countries around the world locked down and opened up.https://www.businessinsider.com/countries-on-lockdown-coronavirus-italy-2020-3

    Objective, non-partisan folks will read these articles before proclaiming that the Trump Administration did nothing.

    I also previously suggested a look at the Spring 2019 issue of the magazine of the Harvard School of Public Health, devoted entirely to EPIDEMICS, and especially read the brief Q&A about our, America’s and the World’s, UNPREPAREDNESS for the next PANDEMIC.

    THANK YOU FOR YOUR KIND CONSIDERATION OF THESE SUGGESTIONS.

  2. Two things we know that China sent us. Covid 19 and fentanyl. Together they killed hundreds of thousands of Americans. Yet some want to blame Trump not Red China.

    • You miss the point. China might have sent it but we did nothing about it like other nations. In a big race to protect their nations we came in near last in effectiveness. Closing in on 70,000 deaths – pretty disgraceful.

      • William M. Connolly

        Pathetic: “We did nothing about it!” Did you read the referenced National Geographic Article. Did you forget we Declared a National Health Emergency on Jan 31 and cut off immigration from China (except returning American citizens) on January 31? Did you forget the convening of a Task Force under Mike Pence?
        We banned immigration and the World was silent. We banned immigration from Europe and the European union cursed at us.

        He’s a second article to get your timelines straight. You’ll see we acted before most countries in the world in shutting down schools, shops, etc, and you’ll recall the CDC announced on February 25th that schools, shops, etcetera, “MAY” have to be closed.

        The U.S. was far ahead of the game in reacting, compared not just to Western and Eastern European Countries, but compared to the World. National Geographic said the #1 factor in saving lives was cutting off emigration.

        Just as China unleashed manufactured Fentanyl on the World, it unleashed the Coronovirus on the World.

        Thank God, President Trump was at the helm.

  3. William Connolly

    Incidentally, I receive in the mail the Harvard Public Health Magazine, and the entire magazine was dedicated to one issue in the Spring of 2019. Sorta a prescient thing:

    It was titled THE EPIDEMICS ISSUE (Spring 2019).
    On the cover were pictures of six microorganisms: Mycobacterium tuberculosis, Neisseria gonorrhoeae, Staphylococcus aureus, Ebola virus, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and Malaria-infected red blood cells.

    The main articles were: Seeking the Path of Least Resistance; Sex, Drugs & Mosquitoes; Flipping the Paradigm in Ebola Treatment; Breaking Breakbone Fever (about a dengue vaccine) and a from the Departments Section, some essays: Off the Cuff: Fighting Misinfodemics; Philanthropic Impact; and Q&A: PANDEMIC UNPREPAREDNESS!

    Some smart cookies in the universities, colleges and schools in the greater Boston area.

    Matt, here is a last criticism, sort of a low blow, but really just above the belt, to the lower mid-section. Instead of being a lawyer and prosecutor, try being a human being. A neighbor lawyer friend of mine for many years (Ed Mc)(retired) told me yesterday about a judge who was tired of lawyers from both sides acting like tricksters, jugglers, circus acts, trying to impress the judge and jury, with wit and sophistry, twisting and distorting applicable laws, facts and reason, to present only “their side” of the case and “to win” “the argument.” In divorce cases, that judge said from the outset, I don’t want to hear it; I’m splitting everything, 50-50.

    The point is, we live long enough, we see through all the lawyers’ tricks. Try not being a lawyer. Try to give equal weight to all sides.

    I try to do that; And I’ve still come out a conservative, politically. Some of my best friends who try to do that, still come out liberals, politically.

    Each man must decide for himself what is right and wrong, as Herman Hesse said.

    Let each man step to the music he hears however measured or far away, wrote Thoreau.

    In Savin Hill, growing up, particularly as rebellious youths, teenagers, even young men in our twenties, we had three sayings: “Says who?”, “So, what?” and “Make me!”

    In later years, we still oftentimes say the same things.

    I like Bob Dylan’s song, Wring That Bell . . .he mentions Saint Catherine . . .and the song concludes with the verse: “their breaking down the distance between right and wrong, ring that bell.” and Leonard Cohen’s great song Anthem, where he also sings about bells ringing.

    Ring the bells that still can ring
    Forget your perfect offering
    There is a crack in everything
    That’s how the light gets in
    We asked for signs
    The signs were sent
    The birth betrayed
    The marriage spent
    Yeah the widowhood
    Of every government
    Signs for all to see

    I can’t run no more
    With that lawless crowd
    While the killers in high places
    Say their prayers out loud
    But they’ve summoned, they’ve summoned up
    A thundercloud
    And they’re going to hear from me
    Ring the bells…

    • William:

      Judges like the one in probate who don’t want to do their jobs should retire. Not everything is 50/50. There often are people who are innocent victims and are abused in probate hearings and for the judge to just treat everything as 50/50 means he/she is brain dead or has forgotten the job. What do you do when a rich guy with the top lawyers in divorce court wants to deprive his wife of everything and comes in and lies about her? Do you give his lies the same weight as the woman’s?

      Lawyers are supposed to advocate for their clients. Some people are grievously injured and the party that injured them doesn’t care. What is to be done to make the victim whole if the lawyer does not aggressively pursue their client’s claim. Often the party doing the injury has hired the best lawyers in town like the two brothers in the Triangle Shirtwaist Company case.

      What does it mean to give weight to equal sides? If someone robs a jewelry store what do you do for him other than give him a lawyer, prosecute him, and let the fact finder decide. It seems your argument is to do nothing.

      • William M. Connolly

        Matt, once again, you miss the point and embellish with red herrings. This great, esteemed judge obviously considered disparities, but his caveat was to the average divorce case. “Skip the sophistries. I’m splitting things 50-50.” Yesterday, I was told by a retired lawyer (actually three retired lawyers were there) about the same or a similar judge who warned the warring factions of his inclination to split things 50-50 . . . .the parties ignored his warning, and insisted on a costly protracted trial, and both brought in witnesses, psychologists, psychiatrists, criminologists, sociologists, ministers, et alia, and at the end of the protracted trial, the WISE OLD JUDGE split it 50-50: wife got the house; husband got the summer cottage; wife got primary custody of the kids; husband got frequent visiting priveleges.

        The broader point is that the many lawyers wring every penny possible out of their clients, and put on a charade, a show, and good experienced judges see through their shenannigans.

        • William:

          Why have judges if everything is split 50/50. We can just put a machine there to do the job. Your WISE OLD JUDGE should have done what the three lawyers lawyers did – retired.

          Good judges, and I’ve been before many, take each case seriously and try to adjust the equities in them. I never had a judge suggest he was not going to listen to the evidence and just split things 50/50. Never. I don’t know who these lawyers are but they probably never practiced in a court in Massachusetts.

          • WILLIAM CONNOLLY

            Too bad, Matt, because you have “never” experienced something, how does that shed light on those who have experienced it. I have appeared before (as co-counsel) excellent jurists, including nine on the Supreme Court, and corrupt jurists including many in Massachusetts (as co-counsel, and in court as a researcher/writer for the lead counsel.)

            You’r inexperience does not negate those whose experience includes appearing before Excellent Judges who see through lawyers, especially divorce lawyers’, TRICKERATIONS, SHENNANIGANS AND SOPHISTRIES.

            How many corrupt judges and corrupt lawyers have you worked with?

            I’ve seen plenty, and documented them in several books, most notably the FIX, Character Assassins I and II, Three Billboards, and From Trial Court.

            I’ve also seen excellent judges and excellent lawyers of integrity. the Judge I cited was an excellent judge, held in esteem by all, I’m told. Too bad you have not encountered him or his like. A judge who cuts to the quick; a judge not fooled by lawyers’ tricks.

            We can debate forever. We simply view things differently. We’ve had different experiences. One person’s experiences does not invalidate another’s. One person’s opinion, does not invalidate another’s.

            Two lawyers independently told me a similar story about the same or similar judges . . .good judges . . . .You admit you’ve never met such judges. So what?

  4. William Connolly

    Matt, it is sad. You are blinded by your hatred of Trump, or to put it mildly, you distort the facts because of your political biases.
    Here is an unbiased report from NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC: Compare the timelines of shutting down schools, shops, stopping open gatherings with the USA. You’ll see that all countries citied (Norway, Sweden, Germany, Italy, Spain, South Korea, Australia, et cetera) began shutting down schools about the second week of March. You’ll see that Australia “early on” at the beginning of March stopped migrants and public gatherings.
    Joe Biden’s last rally was on March 10.

    You’ll see National Geographic conclude that the most effective control was the early shutting down of immigrants.

    Anyway, read the whole report.

    Draw your own conclusions: And don’t pick one stray data point, and say AHA.

    EVERY COUNTRY IN THE WORLD ACTED SIMILARLY: THE WHO DID NOT DECLARE A PANDEMIC UNTIL MARCH 11, 2020. THE CDC, NIH EXPERTS , DOCTOR FAUCI, FOR EXAMPLE, SAID “LOW RISK”.

    I CAREFULLY READ ALL YOUR POSTS. THEIR BIASED AND BORDER ON THE PARANOID WHEN YOU SAY THE GOVERNOR OF FLORIDA IS WHITE-WASHING DATA, AND OTHERS IN REPUBLICAN STATES ARE HIDDING DATA.

    SO, PLEASE SUBSCRIBE TO NATIONAL GEOGRPAHIC, SCIENTIFICA AMERICA, SCIENCE NEWS, THE HARVARD MEDICAL NEWS LETTER, THE HARVARD SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH’S MAGAZINE, et alia, and then tell me I’m not looking at the data.

    https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2020/05/coronavirus-how-to-measure-your-nation-response-cvd/?cmpid=org=ngp::mc=crm-email::src=ngp::cmp=editorial::add=SpecialEdition_20200501&rid=3A319ACCBB4F5302E05E2E7185C0F6E9

    “By the time they detected the tip of the iceberg, unfortunately, there were thousands of infections in several cities,” says Alessandro Vespignani, director of the Network Science Institute at Northeastern University in Boston.

    “In early February, his institute was among several projecting that the coronavirus had escaped China before Wuhan was locked down on January 23. Subsequent research has now backed those early models, as data published last week in Nature shows 11.5 million people left Wuhan between January 1 and January 24, mostly as part of the large migrations for the Lunar New Year. These travel restrictions also failed because most countries focused on incoming foreign nationals, and the earliest known cases in several countries have since been traced to citizens returning home from overseas.”

    “When the World Health Organization convened on January 22 to discuss whether to declare a public health emergency and ostensibly shut down travel to China, there were only 82 cases and no deaths reported outside of the Asian nation. Yet it was already too late.”

    STOP CHERRY-PICKING. LOOK AT ALL THE DATA.

    IT’S NICE THAT A FAMILY MEMBER SHOWED YOU A MARCH 3 ARTICLE, BUT REMEMBER MAYOR BILL DIBLASIO ON THAT DATE WAS ENCOURAGING NEW YORKERS TO FLOCK INTO TIMES SQUARE AND HE ACTUALLY RECOMMENDED SEVERAL MOVIES TO SEE ON MARCH 5TH AND LATER.

    STOP CHERRY-PICKING!!!! WE KNOW YOU ARE OPPOSED TO TRUMP. SO, WHAT? SO, STOP SPREADING DISINFORMATION.

    • William:

      You still miss the point. Trump says the US response was a success. It wasn’t. Most countries of the world have done much better than the United State. If you are in a race with 180 people and you come in 150th, you may think it is a success that you beat thirty but you’d, and your acolytes, would be the only ones to think so.

      • William M. Connolly

        Matt, some countries were hit hardest from the get-go. I’ve mentioned the epi-centers that you ignore. Western Europe and the United States were hit hardest, because that’s where many of the one million migrants(tourists, students) from Wuhan Province travelled to (many on LUNAR NEW YEAR); Italy was hit hardest first (Lombardy Region, northern Italy) and then a second surge of infected Italians and other Europeans hit New York City.

        Now, if you’re considering WWII, you don’t say look at how poorly the U.S. did compared to Argentina; U.S. suffered 400,000 killed, Argentina X. You compare Apples with Apples. You don’t compare the U.S. and Western Europe with the Falkland Islands.

        I’ll say this generally: The Judge said it earlier; the logical fallacy: Because something occurs after the fact, does not mean it occurred because of the fact. In Statistics Classes (Biostatistics, Epidemiology) students are taught to distinction associations, correlations from causation.

        Some folks want to say the fact that President Trump stopped migration from China on January 31, that’s what caused the epidemic in the U.S. He should have acted earlier. What if he acted before nearly every other country in the world in cutting off emigration? (except for returning Americans.) What if the U.S. acted before or at the same time as most countries in the world in declaring a National Health Emergency (January 31, NIH chief AZUR) and in shutting down schools, shops, arenas. What if President Trump held his last campaign rally on March 3rd, and Joe Biden was still campaigning on March 10th.

        You know liberals always deceptively claim “facts matter” and “science matters” except when the facts and sciences of epidemiology and biostatistics weigh against them. We all know, too, on another note, the science of embryology; No, it’s not your body, radical feminists! It is the body of another human being that grows inside a women’s womb: You know zygote, morula, blastula, implantation in the uterus, the womb, all within a week or so.

        Facts are Facts.

        The Virus came from China and spread around the world. The WHO declared a pandemic on March 11. By that time almost all U.S. schools, shops, arenas were actively planning to close.

        Finally, if you want to blame one man, President Trump, then you must, to be fair (equal justice) blame the Presidents, Prime Ministers, et cetera, of all the Western European Countries, the Presidents of all the Universities in the Western World, the Deans of all the Medical Schools in the Western World, the leaders of the CDC and N.I.H., the heads of all the Sports Organizations, all the Governors and Mayors (who had independent authority in the U.S.’s federal system) and Joe Biden himself who continued to rally up until March 10.

        • William:

          Trump admitted he was briefed on January 23 about the virus but said it was insufficient to make him want to act on it. That why he kept telling us that it would not be serious, it would disappear, there was nothing to worry about throughout the rest of that month and for a month or so afterward. He said he cut travel from China but did nothing else except tell us the virus was not going to hit here. If he paid attention to what was told to him in January – if he knew that people could fly into the United States from outside of China like from Italy – almost everyone agrees that he could have prevented most of the deaths – that seems to me to be beyond doubt.

          As far as blaming others, I live in America and I blame the guy in America who kept giving us happy talk even after it was obvious to everyone that he was lying.

  5. Yeah-that SOB Gates is scamming for more dough so he can give it away.
    USA Hill spread is now almost impossible test and trace out of existence. Americans knew how to trace and control via telephone tracking, but,typically, that would involve the loss of a privacy that doesn’t exist. No, No No. My precious privacy! ( As soon as you hit that first key-stroke on the internet kiss your privacy goodbye–including and especially HIPPA. But it makes you feel secure, so keep up illusion.

    We have a son living in Verona, Italy, and his safety has been uppermost on our mind foe some time. He is grateful for the skills he honed in Savin Hill when he sneaks a run by the Italian cops. He never saw Station 11 and he has avoided the local hoosgow so far.

    • William Connolly

      Greatness!

    • WILLIAM CONNOLLY

      Recommended book: Mark Sullivan’s Beneath a Scarlet Sky. It starts in Milan Italy on June 9, 1943.

      On the page for the Preface, it quotes VIRGIL: “Love conquers all things.”

  6. I’m with JRC, HAPPY BIRTHDAY !!!

  7. And as for Bill Gates, he is in the pocket of big pharma (and vice versa) trying to enforce mandatory vaccines globally and requiring us all to have mandatory vaccine ID cards in order to travel any where – all of which will benefit the big pharma companies in which he is heavily invested.

    Check out this shocking article:

    https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2020/04/21/bill-gates-political-power.aspx?cid_source=dnl&cid_medium=email&cid_content=art1HL&cid=20200421Z1&et_cid=DM514875&et_rid=855567198

    • JPC:

      Donald J. Trump
      @realDonaldTrump
      · 6h
      The Governor of Michigan should give a little, and put out the fire. These are very good people, but they are angry. They want their lives back again, safely! See them, talk to them, make a deal.

    • WILLIAM CONNOLLY

      JPC, an excellent article and I quote a bit from it. (Poetry: I writ a bit from it.)

      “A foundation giving a charitable grant to a company that it partly owns — and stands to benefit from financially — would seem like an obvious conflict of interest …

      “Tax scholars like Ray Madoff, a law professor at Boston College, indicate that multibillionaires see tax savings of at least 40 percent — which, for Bill Gates, would amount to $14 billion …

      “Madoff, like many tax experts, stresses that these billions of dollars in tax savings have to be seen as a public subsidy — money that otherwise would have gone to the U.S. Treasury to help build bridges, do medical research, or close the funding gap at the IRS …

      “If Bill and Melinda Gates don’t pay their full freight in taxes, the public has to make up the difference or simply live in a world where governments do less and less (educating, vaccinating, and researching) and super-rich philanthropists do more and more.

      ‘I think people often confuse what wealthy people are doing on their own dime and what [they’re] doing on our dime, and that’s one of the big problems about this debate,’ Madoff notes.”

      why does not the IRS zero in on this SCAM?

  8. How can you say other countries have done better than the U.S. in dealing with the coronavirus? There are NINE European countries that have done far worse. The rate per million cases in the U.S. stands at 186, while the rates in Spain, Italy, France, and the U.K. are 486, 446, 354 and 401, respectively.

    Looks like you are still “Monday morning quarterbacking” the issue.

    • JPC:

      Read the blog. You don’t compare yourself to the worst. You compare yourself to all. How about South Korea, New Zealand, Norway, Denmark, Germany. Read the comparisons.

  9. Happy Birthday. Glad to hear JRC is safe at home. Biden is a career politician, a fifty year DC hack and a sex predator. Tara Read’s story rings true. She worked with him in the Senate. She made a fresh complaint. She has credibility. She has corroborating witnesses. Her case is similar to the woman Crablegs raped. A timely complaint. A college student etc. Unlike the Duke lacrosse case where the woman was a psycho killer in the sex trade who had no credibility. America is not going to elect a rapist. 2. Compare covid 19 to other epidemics. The Spanish flu of 1918 took 600 thousand american lives. Mostly young healthy people. The Asian flu of 1958 took 100 thousand American lives and a million worldwide. The Hong Kong flu of 1968 took 100 thousand American lives. Almost all covid 19 deaths are elderly with co morbidities. People under 50 have suffered very little. Less than two thousand deaths. The sector at risk are the old timers. Why punish two thirds of the country who aren’t at risk. Isolate the elderly. particularly the nursing home population who are most at risk. In Florida they protected the old age homes and have far fewer deaths than the incompetent governors in NY, NJ, Conn, and Massachusetts who neglected to. Open the country for business. Let the vast majority who are at low risk live their lives. Collective punishment is an alien concept in America. 3. Should we reduce or eliminate foreign students. Save the spaces for Americans. Australia prevented it’s foreign students from returning and thus had few covid 19 deaths. We let them come back with the resulting disaster. A new approach is needed.

    • NC:

      Ever wonder why there’s a statute of limitations. Timely complaint to whom? Thirty years later is hardly timely.
      The Black Death killed lots of people too. What’s your point? Don’t they have elderly people in other countries that have done much better than the US under Trump. You won’t face the issue but tell stories about other things. Trump claims there’s a great success in the US. It isn’t. It a miserable failure compared to most other countries outside of a few in Europe.
      Florida won’t let its medical examiners issue reports on deaths in the counties. They have to send the reports to the Republican governor who washes them – people from out of state aren’t counted – so no one really know what is happening in Florida.
      The incompetent governors brought the virus under some type of control – imagine what it would have been if they didn’t ask people to stay in their homes? Since when is preventing people from getting sick punishment? In fact in Massachusetts you don’t have to stay home, anyone can go out. Where’s the punishment there? As far as collective punishment being an alien concept in America – tell that to the Japanese confined during WWII.

      You want to eliminate those foreign students who have come here and founded great American countries, who have become doctors, educators, engineers and scientists advancing America? We used to be proud that America had so many students coming here, learning our way of life, and spreading our values throughout the world. Now we are afraid of them? Why? what has changed? America always welcomed immigrants especially those who sought education. You now object to it. What is your reason? Oh, you blame them for the virus. Never heard that one before.

      • William Connolly

        Well, Matt: you should do more reading if you never heard foreigners were the source of the Covid Epidemic in the USA. Ever hear of Little Italy.
        And you’re a lawyer, you know NC meant contemporaneous: Tara Reid timely, contemporaneously reported the digital penetration to friends, who even today back up her story.
        Unlike the Mentally-Ill Accuser of Kavanaugh, who told no one for 20 or 30 years and did not name Kavanaugh for 30 or more years.
        Finally, and I could go on rebutting, Covid-19 disproportionately affects the elderly throughout the World, unlike other viruses that have struck children and young adults.

        It’s funny, that you condemn folks who make comparisons that disagree with your “opinions” but your rely heavily on only negative comparisons.

        When a boy brings his report card home and has one D and four As, he can rightfully say, “I did worse than some, and better than some.”

        The USA has done far better than other Western European Countries, on a par with most others (even Germany is within an order of magnitude), less well than Eastern European Countries, and less well than Asian Countries.

        Why won’t you acknowledge the simple fact that Trump’s travel ban saved hundreds of thousands of lives?

  10. Hi Matt,
    JRC has an interesting story to tell. My wife and I are struggling through the pandemic at our apartment in Manhattan. Life in this part of the epicenter is relatively easy. The bank, drug store, supermarket, liquor store, laundry and Riverside Park are all within two blocks of our place.
    I fear that Trump’s supporters are hitting the Lysol a little too hard. The current health crisis calls for a president who is a unifier, not a divider. The times call for a man with a calm, reassuring presence and a message that appeals to all Americans. For all his flaws, I’m happy that the Democrats settled on Joe Biden. Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren would have been a disaster. I think Trump is likely a one-term president.

    • Dan:

      I’m surprised anyone survives in Manhattan. My daughter lived there for years and the traffic in and out of her building was constant and her little studio did not impress me as a place one could stay in for days on end. I agree with you about Biden. We do need a little calming in the country especially with the virus floating around. I can’t believe Trump tweeted that the thugs at the Michigan legislature were “very good people” who were carrying automatic weapons, not socially distancing or wearing masks, and shouting at the top of their lungs. It’s almost like he wants an overthrow of the government by these hoodlums. I’m hoping he’s a one-term president. Thee won’t be much left of the country if he gets a second term.

      • I read your story about Boston Latin. I grew up in Dorchester and went to St. Matthew’s school. In the 7th grade, a kid named Lee Dunn left to attend Boston Latin. He might as well have transferred to the planet Jupiter for all I knew of Boston Latin. I now know, of course, that his parents and your parents were striving to get their kids the best possible education. That said, I think my parochial school education was really pretty good. After St. Matthew’s, I went to Christopher Columbus, the now-defunct Catholic high school that counts John Connolly as a graduate, from what I’ve read. (I never met the man whom I now believe should be released from prison immediately.)

        • Dan:

          It seems that John Connolly as put Christopher Columbus on the map. My time at Latin was limited. I was promoted into the the 9th grade, my friends were going to BC High, I asked my parents to let me go there, they did, my friends all dropped out in the first year.

          • I wanted to go to BC High, but my parents said the tuition was too high. I worked summers as a stock boy at a Starr supermarket to earn the tuition money for Columbus, a school my parents also viewed as a tad too upscale. Who knows, if I’d wound up at Dorchester High, I might be a big Holllywood star today … or not.

    • William Connolly

      Dan, written like a true liberal Democrat. I have best friends who are liberal Democrats, and we agree on much, although we vote differently.

  11. Happy Birthday Matt, This Pandemic became frightening on Tuesday when we flew home from Florida. The plane was packed, most wore masks but a person sitting at my row window coughed and sneezed for the entire return trip. Although she had a mask on it still made for a stressful return. Then when the plane landed at Logan everyone jammed the isle waiting to disembark. It was now 9:30pm and not a cab in sight unless you take a 15 minute walk to Central Parking where we found no Cabs or Uber Service present. We finally entered our “South Boston by the Sea” residence at 10:30pm only now to be quarantined for two weeks. We’re not complaining and are thankful to be alive and sad to see all those who haven’t made it. May they all Rest In Peace. Matt, I fear this the new normal! Namaste

    • JRC:

      Thanks. Wow! That was quite a trip. It sounds like you walked home through the Ted Williams tunnel to you safe home. I think you are right about the new normal. I’ve pretty much been quarantined here but do get to go on a walk almost every day to the beach. They’ve blocked off the parking lots so most times no one is around. Hard to think that would be the same walking up Castle Island. Wear your masks, keep your distance, and stay safe. Glad you are back home even though the temperatures are like the middle of March. Matt

    • William Connolly

      Glad you and yours are well, JRC.

      You are not supposed to go outside when you are sneezing and coughing, even with a mask on, under N.I.H., C.D.C., Public Health directives. The lady on the window seat endangered everyone on that plane. I don’t know why they let her on. They should have isolation places for folks who show symptoms while on the plane.

      If you experience a dry cough and high temperature, immediately contact an M.D., to be on the safe side. Although, it sounds like she had the common cold. Anyway be safe. Relief and sunshine and better days are on the way. There’s a package in the mail that should arrive Monday or so, with best wishes . . .hint: not from the President, but from a former local L-Street guy, a Noontime Nut.

  12. WILLIAM CONNOLLY

    Ah, yes, the stories ring true. The statistics, however, do not. American is the third largest country in the world (330,000,000) behind India and China (a billion-plus, each.) Of course, we are going to have more deaths than Bermuda.

    But what is really going on? (China’s data is questionable, but even if believed, China immediately isolated the epicenter, except it let its infected citizens travel abroad: the U.S. would be a favorite destination, but President Trump nixxed travel from there on January 31. So, the Chinese went to Italy (Lombardy) and the rest of Western Europe (their second favorite tourist locations.) Italy was the second EPICENTER, from which the virus hit Western Europe.

    The infected Italians and Spanish etcetera, then traveled to the U.S., many to little Italy in New York City, and NYC became the THIRD EPICENTER. In fact, as you know, New York and New Jersey account for over half the deaths and cases in the U.S. If you subtract these two states, which are 8% of the U.S. population accounting for about 55% of deaths/cases, the rest of America is doing very well.

    Comparing the U.S. with South Korea is idiotic. S. Korea never was an epicenter. Nor was Australia. All nipped the infection in the bud, luckily.

    Comparing the U.S. to the rest of the Western World, the U.S. has done well. And it is true, indisputable, that if Trump had not stopped China’s infected citizens from traveling here in January, the U.S. would have looked like Spain and Italy with four times the cases and deaths.

    The bigger issue is this: Why did China which prohibited Wuhan residents from traveling to other parts of China, allow them to travel abroad?

    2. As for Bill Gates’ idiotic statement, what did he propose in writing in January, February 2020. What did all the most brilliant minds in medicine and epidemiology and public health propose in January and February? What did you propose? On February 29th, Doctor Fauci, the NIH,the CDC were describing the risk as “low.” All the best minds in the Western World were downplaying the risk. But Bill Gates supposedly had pre-cognition, special insight, based on astrology, or a hunch, or a gut reaction. Sheer sophistry!

    3. As I’ve written before until I’m blue in the face. Doctor Birx said she and most experts thought Covid-19 was like SARS (a limited, confined virus.) All the experts at all the Medical Schools, Universities, Public Health Departments, et cetera, throughout America and the Western World assessed the risk as low. The World Health Organization did not declare a PANDEMIC until March 11. Only then did the Western World start to react with Governors, Mayors, Presidents of Universities, Deans of Medical Schools, the NCAA, NBA, NFL, Disney, et alia, start to act. WHY? BECAUSE UNTIL THAT TIME, NO ONE KNEW. EVEN THE BOSTON GLOBE ON FEBRUARY 29TH, IT’S BEST SCIENCE WRITER, AFTER SURVEYING ALL THE EXPERTS IN THE BOSTON AREA CONCLUDED: “we don’t know” if Coronovirus-19 will be low risk, have little affect, be confined to only a few cases in a few discrete places, or if it will spread and fill up the morgues.

    4. Bill Gates did not know on February 29th, because the Western World’s most brilliant scientists and medical personnel and infectious disease experts and public health experts did not know, because THEY DID NOT HAVE THE DATA. But the stone-throwers, the smear artists, the Monday Morning Quarterbacks say, “Well me and bill gates and nancy pelosi and mayor dibiaso and governor cuomo and mayor walsh, WE ALL KNEW BECAUSE WE LOOKED INTO OUR CRYSTAL BALLS, CONSULTED OUR ASTROLOGERS, AND MIXED POTENT PORTENDING BREW WITH THREE WITCHES FROM SALEM WHO TOLD US EXACTLY WHAT WAS GOING TO HAPPEN. BURN THE MEDICAL ADVISERS AT THE STAKE!

    • WILLIAM CONNOLLY

      And yes, if we had acted earlier we could have prevented World War I and World War II, and I blame Harry Truman, because instead of fiddling around with that piano when he was a boy and young man, he should have foreseen what would happen and taken immediate action to prevent it.

    • William:

      The point is that most other countries have done a much better job at managing the virus than the United States. No one is Monday morning quarterbacking the issue. Are you suggesting these other countries possessed knowledge that was not available to the United States? That seems a little far fetched.

      Trump has called his handling of the virus pandemic a success. It can hardly be construed as being that. If it were a success we would be doing better than the other countries which we are surely not. Read the post again. Look at the figures.

      And I’d hardly call Bill Gates’s statements idiotic. As far as knowing the danger of the pandemic, I know little about them but I was certainly aware at the end of February that there was a dangerous virus. Matt, Tatiana and I were discussing it constantly. Here’s a March 2 email to me from Matt: “Be very careful!! I thought the heat and humidity would keep it away. Home Depot has masks periodically so I’ll get them for you if I can at the next shipment.”

      There was no crystal ball. There was just reading what was happening. Italy was having a lot of cases and some deaths.Deaths were happening in Florida – I was already social distancing – Bottom line – the US did a poor job under Trump – other nations did much, much better.