WarGamer
WarGamer's JournalWhy doesn't anyone talk about a COVID-19 tax?
This thing cost us trillions.
Responsible people pay their bills.
After 9-11, airlines increased security measures and passed along the cost to the passenger.
Why don't we look at ways to recoup the costs?
Possible ways:
Temporary VAT tax, food excluded. Like the EU
Temporary re-alignment of the top tax brackets
Temporary "per transaction" Wall Street fee (after all, they got RICHER during C19)
Wealth Tax
I think we're up to $6-7T right now because of C19...
Maybe the best thing you'll read all day!
As a longtime Brookings donor, I can't recommend their work highly enough.
It's an amazing group of expert researchers.
Read Brookings and you'll be the most well informed person in the room 99/100 times.
No worries about correct data for arguing with your opposition... the Gold Standard.
https://www.brookings.edu/research/social-and-economic-impact-of-covid-19/
The link is to a summary, the entire paper can be d/l right there too.
This paper presents a succinct summary of the existing economic literature on the economic and fiscal impact of the pandemic, and a preliminary estimate of the associated economic cost. It documents the incidence of initial conditions (with a particular focus on the role of the labor market channel) on the transmission of the shock and the speed and extent of the expected recovery, summarizes how countries attempted to attenuate the economic consequences and the international financial institutions assisted countries, reports preliminary accounts of medium-term COVID-related losses, and concludes with some forward-looking considerations based on the lessons learned in 2020.
Every last DU'er should wake up in the morning and thank Heaven for Joe Manchin...
He's the fine BLUE line between Majority Leader Schumer and Majority Leader McConnell.
Think about the prospect of a McConnell Senate for the next 2 years the next time you want to shitpost about Manchin.
The history of the Filibuster on the chopping block... and the cost.
In the last 20 years, the filibuster has been targeted for destruction.
https://www.rollcall.com/2020/10/15/if-you-dont-like-the-supreme-court-blame-harry-reid/
Btw, roll call is rated at neutral bias for those about to call it a RW piece.
Let's start:
It's 2005. Majority leader Bill Frist (R) was frustrated by Democratic filibusters of 7 Federal Judge nominations. Frist considered "going nuclear" to break the gridlock but decided that doing so would damage the institution of the Senate, thus damaging the nation.
In 2013, Majority Leader Reid (D) was also frustrated by Republican efforts to block Federal Judge nominations. Reid decided that at least on the topic of Federal Court Judges, not including SCOTUS nominees to abolish the filibuster.
It was a good move for Reid. The Obama administration placed a tone of Judges in 8 years...
Fast forward to 2017... Majority Leader McConnell (R) gladly took the reins of Reids Federal Judge fast lane and began pushing Trump judges into courtrooms. In fact, Trump put nearly as many Federal Appellate Court judges on the bench as Obama in half the time in office.
Oh... and then McConnell recognized the move Reid had made on Federal Court Judges and killed the filibuster for SCOTUS nominations.
Say hello to GoodHair, Barf and Handmaiden.
Quick note: Congress has NEVER placed the "genie" back in the bottle after expanding its own power.
So today... some Democrats want to kill the filibuster again, albeit for seemingly good reasons.
But at what cost?
We DO NOT have one-party rule in this country. The White House changes hands, the Congress changes hands more frequently.
What will the GOP do with a filibuster-free Senate in '22, '24 or '26??
THIS is what the 5-7 DEM Senators against killing the filibuster are concerned with.
AND read this:
https://www.politico.com/story/2018/06/26/donald-trump-kill-the-filibuster-677151
President Donald Trump had a simple message for Senate Republicans during a meeting at the White House on Tuesday: "Kill the filibuster now, before Chuck Schumer and the Democrats do."
McConnell refused.
Seems to be a lot of confusion about Trump's blog going *poof*
If you read Axios and the WSJ and others...
Apparently, Trump and surrogates have reached out to those in the digital domain about the creation of a platform, possibly even quizzing Peter Thiel and others.
The answer has been "it takes time" and "you'll need to find people who won't plant Easter Eggs or sabotage the software".
So... they're turned to an acquisition or merger of an existing social media enterprise with little to no followers or app downloads.
Enter CloutHub and FreeSpace.
They have the platform, the app and infrastructure in place. They need users. Trump can bring users.
Trump has previously announced the desire to do a 4th of July rally and many have speculated that the new social media collaboration will be launched then.
There. Now you know more than 99% of the general public, beyond the news.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-considers-contenders-to-be-his-new-social-media-outlet-after-big-tech-crackdown-11621013567
Here we go again... China reports first H10N3 virus transmission to humans.
https://www.livescience.com/first-human-case-bird-flu-h10n3.htmlA man in China caught the first case of H10N3 bird flu ever reported in a human, China's National Health Commission (NHC) announced Tuesday (June 1).
The H10N3 strain of avian influenza normally causes mild disease in birds, and until now, no cases of the viral infection had been reported in humans, according to a statement on the NHC website, as translated by Reuters. But on April 23, a 41-year-old man in the city of Zhenjiang developed a fever that progressed over the following days, and on April 28, he went to a local hospital for treatment.
(Although H10N3 only causes mild disease in its natural hosts, that may not hold true when the strain jumps to people.)
fuck.
2012, Fauci defends the practice of "gain of function" experiments.
Saw a blurb on Twitter about this. Didn't like the source. Did my own research.
https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2012/07/us-infectious-disease-chief-urges-flu-scientists-engage-support-h5n1-research
Read the article, read it carefully.
Let me summarize.
This article was written in 2012 and it's chilling as you fast forward to 2020.
"Gain of function" research. Prepare to hear that phrase a lot. It means, researchers in a laboratory engineering a pathogen to make it more deadly. They give the pathogen, a virus in this case, characteristics that make it more deadly, more contagious, more mutations... (*speculation) where do you think the "Spike Protein" unique to the C19 came from? Natural mutation or engineered enhancement?
Indeed the spike protein itself, even without the virus has been proven to attack the heart and lungs.
https://www.salk.edu/news-release/the-novel-coronavirus-spike-protein-plays-additional-key-role-in-illness/
Fauci argued in 2012 that this research was important, as it allowed researchers to study "what-if" scenarios. He continued to argue that it was "worth the risk" in case of accidental release.
Scientists, he said, often "answer that the benefit outweighs the risk. … However, it is essential we respect the concern of the public domestically or globally, and not ask them to take the word of the influenza scientist."
In a chilling flash-forward, Fauci said "Accidental release is what the world is really worried about".
Hear people talk about a connection between Fauci and the American NIH and the Wuhan Lab?
Here's the facts (from politifact, debunking a WND article but explaining the re;ationship):
In 2014, the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease, the part of the NIH headed by Fauci, awarded a $3.4 million grant to the New York-based EcoHealth Alliance, which aims to protect people from viruses that jump from species to species.
The group hired the virology lab in Wuhan to conduct genetic analyses of bat coronaviruses collected in Yunnan province, about 800 miles southwest of Wuhan. EcoHealth Alliance paid the lab $598,500 over five years. The lab had secured approval from both the U.S. State Department and the NIH.
That the NIAID funded the project is not in question. However, the WorldNetDaily article goes further than that, claiming that the grant covered "gain of function" research on a bat coronavirus, which "created" SARS-CoV-2.
Gain-of-function research is a controversial form of study that involves boosting the infectivity and lethality of a pathogen. Proponents of gain-of-function say it helps researchers spot potential threats to human health and allows them to figure out ways to tackle a new virus. Fauci has advocated for gain-of-function research in the past. In a 2011 article he co-wrote for the Washington Post, he promoted it as a means to study influenza viruses.
Up to a few moths ago, it was almost a certainty that C19 came from animals, spread to humans naturally.
But recently:
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/27/health/wuhan-coronavirus-lab-leak.html
Now, in a letter in the journal Science, 18 prominent biologists—including the world’s foremost coronavirus researcher—are lending their weight to calls for a new investigation of all possible origins of the virus, and calling on China’s laboratories and agencies to “open their records” to independent analysis.
“We must take hypotheses about both natural and laboratory spillovers seriously until we have sufficient data,” the scientists write.
So... my friends, this is just the start of the story and it's going to make ONE HELL OF a movie someday.
Used car price observation and a recommendation.
Last year I made the plunge into EV's.
Did I spend $40k on a Bolt or $60k for a Tesla?
No!!
I can afford those cars, but I just wanted to put a toe in the water so to speak.
My wife bought a 3 year old BMW a couple years ago, off lease.
BMW's depreciate horribly, her car was $50k new and she bought it for $25k, 3 years old with 26k miles.
So I've had my eye on the BMW i3, specifically the REX model which has a little gas powered generator and 2 gallon gas tank to power the motors/charge the battery when your battery die. Technically you can keep fueling the generator and have unlimited range, 150 miles EV only. The engine does NOT drive the wheels, it's purely a generator producing juice for the electric motor.
So... $45k new for a 2018 and I got mine, fresh off a 24 month lease for $18k with 32k miles.
So I keep a look out on the local BMW dealers websites and have noticed that the same car runs $22-24k now.
Anyway, wanted to give the highest recommendation for the i3. It's going out of production this year so I think you'll see more of them at a good price once this bubble bursts.
Also, they're made with sustainable materials, the door panels are made of recycled bottles and non-endangered sustainable wood trim.
Here's a stock pic
Oh and they're super quick, agile and roomy inside. Park onenext to a Mini Cooper and it dwarfs the Mini, it's not a tiny car!!
EDIT: another note, only buy the post 2017 model with the 94aH battery... much better range than the pre-2017. Also available without the little 650cc engine/generator... as a pure EV.
President Joe is nailing this shit...
Listening to his remarks today...
He's going after the Trump Democrats talking about Made in the USA and making wind generator blades in the USA rather than Beijing...
It was a mistake to lose focus on the traditional heart of the Democratic Party and Joe is EXPANDING the party today...
Strategically flawless... not ceding an inch to the "Populist" elements of the opposition.
Democrats ARE populists. Bezos, Gates and Hollywood may be Democrat leaning but they're NOT the heart of the Party.
It's "Trump Democrats" who watched cargo ships offload containers full of Chinese made equipment while they're driving for Uber after their local mfg job shut down a few years ago.
NEVER give them an excuse to vote GOP again.
Every inch of this Earth has been fought over ad infinitum.
There's NO SUCH THING as "Their land or my land or what used to be their land, etc"
For thousands of years the ownership of land has been determined by brute force.
Yes, every inch.
North America, you ask? Yeah, the NA tribes fought each other, stole each others land and moved on. Rinse and repeat.
The Middle East? Particularly frequently fought over.
Europe? Kidding, right? Europe has been a conveyor belt of conquest.
Ask the ethnic Germans living East of Germany post WW2 how things went. Oh, never mind... many of them were killed by USSR ethnic cleansing.
Ask the ethnic Germans who lived in Konigsberg for centuries what happened after WW2.
The human race isn't a fair or equitable pack of animals.
That's just reality.
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Name: JGender: Male
Hometown: SoCal
Home country: USA
Current location: Socal
Member since: Mon Feb 1, 2021, 09:27 PM
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