Coronavirus

[Brant Gaede]

This will negatively impact US equity markets.

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

2 hours ago, Brant Gaede said:

This will negatively impact US equity markets.

--Brant

Brant,

It should become a time of upheaval for sure, but I'm not so sure about the negative part.

I don't do equities, which I intend to correct, but if I were in a position to play the stock market, I would be studying up on companies with major factories and supply chains in China, then evaluating how sound they are and if I felt they would withstand the upcoming shake-up (presuming this is how it plays out), then watching as their stock plummeted and at one point, I would start buying. Good companies recover and getting a chunk of one at a cheap price seems to me one way to play this game well.

Note that this upcoming shakeup will not be due to a pandemic (or hopefully not). It will be due to the press going apeshit over a new contagious disease that was ill-managed in China when it started to spread. Rush Limbaugh said the Chinese now seem to have reversed the direction of new cases and is trying to get workers back into the factories, but the workers are too afraid to leave their houses. If this is true, which I think it is, the Chinese  did too good a job with propaganda, scare tactics and heavy-handed bullying measures.

In my (mostly uninformed) market wisdom, I think the equities market is going to undergo a period of great transfer of wealth, but the money is not going to disappear. It will just change hands. It may sound corny, but the trick, as I see it, is to become one of those who bets on America.

Michael

[Jon Letendre]

Iger is out at Disney and it’s open season on Hollywood and California. By the time we’re done in eight months the House will go Republican and the Senate 60+ phillibuster-proof supermajority.

The next five years are going to be so glorious.

But right now they need distractions from, even two-week prevention/delay of, the next Epstein/Weinstein–level revelation, which will hopefully involve this creep:

[Peter]

Once again with the Michael Kelly quote, “Do not allow the mainstream news to get into your head about this.”

All right, already said George to Jerry! Maybe the mainstream media will eventually report the unvarnished truth. Check my edited blurb below for accuracy.

There is a reunion coming up for Radford High, my old school in Honolulu, just outside Pearl Harbor. I wonder if that trip will be “affected” by the coronavirus? Or is the correct word “infected”?

from below. Bats or pangolins (scaly, long-snouted anteaters)? Those two are the main “suspected” culprits at this time. Here is some of the latest from “The Mainstream.” Peter

Edited for brevity. NBC News. Where did the new coronavirus come from? Past outbreaks provide hints. Denise Chow 4 hrs ago. . . . . Early research suggests that the virus closely resembles a known coronavirus harbored in horseshoe bats, according to Ian Jones, a professor of virology at the University of Reading in England. "What is not clear is the steps that moved the virus out of the bat, into some intermediate source or sources, and then finally into man," Jones said . . . . But scientists say the virus' similarities to known coronaviruses in animals — particularly bats — rule out the idea that it was created in a lab.

. . . . "This would have taken us six months to a year to do before," said Gene Olinger, a Maryland-based virologist at MRIGlobal, a scientific research organization that is helping to develop diagnostic tools for the coronavirus. "We had those first sequences almost immediately — that's unheard of." The virus' genome can't tell scientists everything about its source, but the string of DNA sequences functions almost like a blueprint for this type of detective work.

"The closest bat virus that we've seen is not able to infect human cells, so there had to be some intermediate animal," said Carolyn Machamer, a professor of cell biology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore. "The bat virus can infect an intermediate animal, and during that replication, mutations arise that could promote infection in humans if they are in close contact."

. . . . An outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, in 2003 is thought to have spread from bats to civet cats before the first human patient was infected. And Middle East respiratory syndrome, or MERS, another type of coronavirus that was first reported in Saudi Arabia in 2012, most likely passed from bats into dromedary camels before spilling over into humans.

Public health officials suspect that the current outbreak may have originated at a live-animal market in Wuhan, where dozens of workers were infected at the outset. The market has been shut down, but tests on samples from the area have been inconclusive.

In early February, a group of Chinese scientists suggested that genetic analyses pointed to pangolins — scaly, long-snouted anteaters — as a likely source of the outbreak. Their research showed that genetic sequences of coronaviruses isolated from pangolins are 99 percent similar to those of the current variant. Jones said the pangolin theory is plausible, but he cautioned that the findings haven't yet been confirmed by independent scientific research.

. . . . "SARS was really the first human coronavirus to cause severe diseases," said Timothy Sheahan, an epidemiologist at the Gillings School of Global Public Health at the University of North Carolina. "Prior to that, coronavirus was only known to cause the common cold in people. Then MERS was discovered in 2012 and this virus emerges in 2019. So the fact that a new SARS-like virus has emerged to cause severe respiratory disease in people tells me this is likely going to happen again in the future." Sheahan is working on possible antiviral drugs to fight the coronavirus, but he said the current outbreak demonstrates the importance of tracing the virus to its origin. "Understanding the source of the virus will help us prevent spillovers in the future," he said. "From a public health perspective, it's important to flesh that out."

[Peter]

Michael wrote: If this is true, which I think it is, the Chinese did too good a job with propaganda, scare tactics and heavy-handed bullying measures. end quote

This is too big, to set up camps like they did for leprosy. The people who rounded up the ‘contagious people” would likely come down with the coronavirus. I hope I am not in a Walmart or food market when someone coughs, moans or sneezes and the other shoppers go bat crazy! What will it be like inside hospitals? It may look like a movie "hazmat" scene. 

Seriously, how will the readers here respond to this crisis in their private lives? Food Lion has wet wipes if I remember correctly near where the shopping carts are stored. I may start using those. Peter

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Here's Fox showing how it's done.

Good God!

That's comforting, huh?

You can't make this up.

If there ever was a gilded turkey prize in journalism, Fox just won it.

LOL...

Michael

[Peter]

50 minutes ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

If there ever was a gilded turkey prize in journalism, Fox just won it.

Fox just mentioned but didn't show any footage of people angrily reacting to a sick person on the New York City subway, or it might have been at a terminal. Stocks are entering fastest correction ever. Dow Down to 25,287 at 1:05. It may hit 24,000 today. Will it be another black Friday? They are speculated which stocks to get out of because of the virus. 

[Jon Letendre]

Peter, Everyone, focus on being able to stay in longer than you can now. Imagine in a week you don’t like what you see and hear and you would rather not have to go out but you have to go out, that’s what you don’t want. So, what will make you go out this weekend? A Rx refill? What would “force” you to go out sometime next week? Go get those things now and stay ahead of them, don’t buy the minimum.

Everyone should always have cases of water bottles and some canned food. Food is good for comfort and diversion but don’t put much into it. Starting good, we don’t die until about 3 weeks without food, if we don’t need to work. But we are gone in just 3 days without water. 3 days. Funny as it sounds, you can forget about food until you are prepared to stay indoors for weeks on your own water. But you probably have a day and a half of water if service failed today.

The threes:

3 minutes without air

3 days without water

3 weeks without food

[Jon Letendre]

The MSR International stove is a great multi-fuel stove that can use unleaded gasoline from the tank of any car, almost fits in your pocket, under $100.

With that and cases of water and stacks of 25lb bags of rice in a closet, you can stay in week after week after week, if that continues to be preferable to what you hear and see outside.

And to the preping poo-poo’ers: It is not about wallowing in anxiety and anyway, remaining a sitting duck does not work well at resolving anxiety for those who notice how dependent and ill-supplied they are. It is about responding to an unhealthy, risky condition with rational actions. It alleviates anxiety.

[Peter]

My wife and I were just talking about stocking up on “the basics.” I am thinking about going to Walmart, but I will try and do as recommended and never touch my hands to my face until I get home and wash. It’s 46 degrees F. here, but just a simple temperature change can make me want to honk my nose. That simple thing, reaching for a tissue, might scare people into yelling at you.

And how will the homeless be affected? They eat old food touched by other people and sleep where others may have slept. Some of them may be not so sane but still be healthy. Will we see medics hauling off sick people involuntarily and dead bodies in the street? Gruesome. 

I bet the DOW will go below 25,000. It's 2 1/2 hours  before closing and just dipped to 25,086. Many of us may have retirement funds in the stock market even if we don't actively trade. In a minute it has dipped to 25,067.  

[Jon Letendre]

I have read people’s accounts of being holed up for months to a year and a half during Serbia/Bosnia in the nineties. One lady says that the money of monies, the thing with which you could directly trade to obtain anything else available, was ... toilet paper. Not booze or cigarettes or any drug or food. If you had toilet paper, you were King. She also said everyone stayed inside especially at night, because you got shot if you went outside. So clean alcohol and passable gauze was the other gold, she said, because so many were dealing with gunshot wounds the whole time. I think that enough food was getting in where she was because she didn’t talk about it as a crisis in a long account of her strongest memories.

What I appreciate in these firsthand accounts of crises throughout history is that we tell each other a lot of fantasies about what we are, I think. The truth comes out during a crisis. Truths about us that are hard to discover academically or with a study in a lab.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Look at this idiot, John Garamendi, trying to play macho with Don Trump Jr. because Don Jr. said the Democrats hope the coronavirus comes to the US and kills millions of people and ends President Trump's winning streak. (Apropos, that's not just hyperbole, it  sounds about right going from the press coverage.)

I bet Don Jr. is cowering under his bed right now, quaking in fear of this bozo.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Here's Rush Limbaugh earlier today:

Dr. Drew Pinsky Debunks the Fake Coronavirus News

Quote

PINSKY: We have in the United States 24 million cases of flu-like illness, 180,000 hospitalizations, 16,000 dead from influenza. We have zero deaths from coronavirus. We have almost no cases. There are people walking around out there with the virus that don’t even know they have it, it’s so mild. So it’s going to be much more widespread than we knew. It’s going to be much milder than we knew. The 1.7% fatality rate is going to fall. Where was the press during the Mediterranean Corona outbreak, where the fatality rate was 41%? Why didn’t they get crazed about MERS or SARS? This is an overblown press-created hysteria. This thing is well in hand. President Trump is absolutely correct.

RUSH: I guess it’s not just me out there saying this stuff. I guess there are some voices of reason all over. And when Drew Pinsky or this guy, C. Douglas Golden, when they write and say this stuff, they are attacked. They are beat up as irresponsible, not taking it seriously enough. They may even have an indirect hand in the fatality rate because they are telling people there’s nothing to worry about.

That’s not what they are saying. What they are saying is believe half of what you hear from the media because there’s so much hype here for all kinds of reasons. Look it, when I heard somebody in the Drive-By Media say, “This could be an opening for the Democrats,” then that’s when they started politicizing. You people in the media get mad at me all you want. All I do is listen to you. “This could be an opening for the Democrats.”

What does that mean? People getting sick to the degree you say it’s going to happen is a good thing for the Democrats? Is that really what the Democrat Party wants to be known for right now, as profiting from people getting sick? That’s how we’re going to get rid of Donald Trump? It’s not me saying it. I’m not the one saying this could be an opening for the Democrats. It’s the media saying it.

Here Pinsky is in his own words.

Look.

I can get just as afraid as the next person about a deadly disease, but when I hear warnings from the fake news toadies and those warnings are nothing more than political propaganda of the "muh Russians!" stripe, and I see people freaking out about their warnings, I want to leave the human race.

I never realized how easy it was to manipulate masses of people through panic. I knew fear was a great tool for mass manipulation, but I never knew how easy it was to wield it. All you need is a small hook and, if the hook is real even though it is tiny, you can blow it up to spread panic worldwide if you know how.

Those fake news people know how and they are despicable.

They don't care about you and they don't care about the coronavirus.

They want their power and they love seeing people run around in circles with them cracking the whip.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

10 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Here's Rush Limbaugh earlier today...

Rush also said something about Apple.

He said that since Apple's stock has gone down due to the scare, Apple is buying its own stock, and why not? They are getting their own stock on the cheap. They know that this coronavirus scare can't last and they are setting the stage to come roaring back when the propaganda fizzles out. So why not make some extra money investing in themselves?

The lesson is don't listen to what people say during a mainstream press panic. Especially don't listen to the mainstream press, at least not these days. Look at what they do. Then you will see what is really happening.

On another point on what they do, in the mainstream press accounts of the Democratic primaries, Rush said that the coronavirus is not to be found. The press is talking about Bernie and socialism, Biden, polls, the black vote, and so forth. For their business, the coronavirus is way down in importance. It is only important to them when they talk about President Trump.

That is what they are doing, using the issue as a doomsday scenario for Trump, but ignoring completely it for their own stuff.

Michael

 

 

[Brant Gaede]

This virus kills smokers over the age of 70 with compromised health. Chinese are most susceptible because the men smoke a hell of a lot and for genetic reasons. The problem is not that a deadly pandemic is going to sweep the world, but  that the world's economy is going to take a major hit.

--Brant

[Peter]

3 hours ago, Brant Gaede said:

This virus kills smokers over the age of 70 with compromised health. Chinese are most susceptible because the men smoke a hell of a lot and for genetic reasons. The problem is not that a deadly pandemic is going to sweep the world, but  that the world's economy is going to take a major hit.

--Brant

In the Berlin MD Walmart yesterday there were a lot of older people blocking the isles. Didn't they teach them in kindergarten to not "stand in the doorways or block up the halls?" How hard is it to stop and look for a product and not turn your shopping card sideways? Idiots. I went to the birdseed aisle and selected a product and an old fart started lecturing me about the store brand being just as good as Pennington.

I think one kid coughed the whole time. I washed my hands twice when I got home. Now the TV docs are saying the only reason to wear a mask is to keep your sneezes and coughs to yourself. It doesn't protect the healthy.  I remember being in Japan years ago and the people were wearing paper masks.

Fox. WA two new cases and new cases in Oregon and California. 4 total.

[Peter]

Just about all products are handled by other people. I have enough supplies to last a while. And gas for my 5000 watt generator, but I think people working at the power plants may live through this.

My wife was just looking at the latest about the virus. Hand sanitizers contain alcohol which is good against bacteria and maybe against the coronavirus if used frequently and vigorously. Few people under 35 get it and even fewer children, unless they have a compromised immune system. Getting a mild case of it may give you immunity. Most who get it have a mild case.85 percent are mild cases. The fewer viruses that “touch you” the better because it will give you a milder case. You may have it if your forehead is burning up. Dogs catch it but cat’s don’t.  Peter

 “I don't know if mama was right, that we each have a destiny, or if if was Lt Dan, that we are all just floating around, accidental, like on a breeze, but I think... I think... maybe... it's both happening at the same time.” Forrest Gump.

edit. 

Worry, worry. If I was exposed at Walmart on Friday at 3pm I could have symptoms on Sunday. Although I have a fourth grade teaching daughter who visits regularly I have only had two mild, mild colds in the last six years which I attribute to the use of night time sleep and breathing equipment. And kids might spread the coronavirus disease but they don’t readily come down with it. If I get it I am anticipating an easy recovery. Whew! Now I will stop yakking about it for a while.   

I am sure this has been quoted earlier but not much is changing from Web MD. Symptoms can show up anywhere from 2 to 14 days after exposure. Early on, they're a lot like the common cold. You might notice: Fever, Cough, Shortness of breath. Infections range from mild to serious. The virus can turn deadly if it leads to pneumonia, respiratory failure, or septic shock. Those most at risk of death are the elderly and people with weakened immune systems. end quote 

[Peter]

I suggest using CV as initials for the coronavirus, but I will wait to see if a shorter version catches on, and nothing else kills it. (Joke. version, catches. Get it?)

From Fox at 12:17 pm March 1^st. U.S. health officials concerned about community transmission. First confirmed U.S. death from the coronavirus. Washington State investigates potential coronavirus outbreak at nursing home. Staff concerned for their wellbeing. V.P. Pence bringing gov’t to bear. Doc on Fox: seeking clinical testing in 5 or 6 clinical tests, but we may not have vaccine available soon. Production of generic anti-virus serums being increased.     

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

16 hours ago, Peter said:

I suggest using CV as initials for the coronavirus, but I will wait to see if a shorter version catches on, and nothing else kills it. (Joke. version, catches. Get it?)

Peter,

(groan to the lame-ass joke...  )

As to the initials, this is the correct one.

COVID-19.

Michael

[Peter]

Worst “mean joke” ever. Is your computer infected with a virus?  . . . . The Apple co-founder had hinted in a tweet that he and Janet Wozniak, who was seeking care Monday for a bad cough, might have been infected. “Checking out Janet’s bad cough. Started Jan. 4. We had just returned from China and may have both been patient zero in U.S. (@ West Coast Sports Institute in Santa Clara, CA),” Woz tweeted from his verified Twitter account . . . .

I wish them well. Peter

[Peter]

Currently the DOW is at 25,907 at 3:39

Why stocks are tumbling despite the Fed's surprise rate cut William Watts 37 mins ago. Stock-market investors weren’t taking comfort Tuesday in the Federal Reserve’s decision to cut its benchmark rate by half a percentage point in a rare, inter-meeting move aimed at cushioning the economy from disruptions from the global spread of COVID-19. Stocks initially jumped after the announcement, but gains proved short-lived. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) was down nearly 950 points, or 3.5%, while the S&P 500 (SPX) and Nasdaq Composite (COMP) also fell more than 3%. Stocks had bounced back sharply on Monday, taking back a chunk of the previous week’s steep losses that were tied to growing fears the spread of the coronavirus would deliver a global economic shock . . . . 

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Does anybody see the possibility of dirty tricks here?

Nearly 10% of Iranian lawmakers infected with coronavirus, state media reports

Hmmmmm?...

I do.

I sincerely hope I am tickling my conspiracy theory muscle with this one and that's all.

Biological warfare of this nature by covert agents is not a genie we should ever let out of the bottle--for the good of humanity at large.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Then there's this:

Iranians licking religious shrines in defiance of coronavirus spread

So that might explain it.

Ugh...

Michael

[Peter]

5 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Then there's this:

Iranians licking religious shrines in defiance of coronavirus spread

So that might explain it.

Ugh...

Michael

I rewatched that 60 Minutes show about the Navy Seal who was exonerated about killing the Muslim fighter. The Seal who confessed to putting his finger over the inserted breathing tube to put him out of his misery said the fighter was being handed over to the coalition forces. As is usual in their culture they will then torture and anally rape the guy. Apparently in the Muslim culture it is normal to anally rape captives. Normal. Maybe there should be a Hollywood award for the lowest, vilest, most disgusting, monstrous culture in the history of mankind. The Muslims would win hands down. What would the award be called?  

[Peter]

Barbara Ferrer, director of Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, said at a press conference with other county officials that leaders should expecting new cases in the days ahead. “If you’re sick with anything, we need people to stay home,” she said. end quote

Is she the director of health or “the funeral director?” If I am sick enough to be in the hospital I am going to the hospital. Will she next be directing ambulance drivers to not respond to a sick person, only auto accidents?