Another one of these “we’re safe because we’re on Team God” fools:

Seriously? #Pakistan #Coronavirus https://t.co/dpZTW3E3CJ

— beena sarwar (@beenasarwar) March 16, 2020

Asif Ashraf Jilali is failing to take into account that God could very well want people to do the right thing, pay attention to medical advice, have a care for other people, and the like. The Koran is full of a whole lot of instructions for how people are to act, right? So the God in question seems to pay attention to what people do, and to judge them for it. Isn’t it blasphemous to think God wants people to be so stubborn and reckless that they insist on gathering in crowds to talk about God instead … Read the rest

One issue:

Source: https://t.co/ZSBuWsPsVF pic.twitter.com/3TBXGutAyT

— Public Citizen (@Public_Citizen) March 16, 2020

Another issue: prisons.… Read the rest

Why Trump’s lies matter:

It’s bad enough that President Trump has relentlessly minimized the coronavirus threat for nakedly political reasons, disastrously hampering the federal government response to the crisis, with untold consequences that we can only guess at.

Determined not to be outdone by his own malice and depravity, Trump is taking new steps that threaten to make all of it worse. He’s telling millions of Americans to entirely shut out any and all correctives to his falsehoods. He’s insisting they must plug their ears to any criticism designed to hold his government accountable for the failures we’re seeing, even though such criticism could nudge the response in a more constructive direction.

And even though getting it wrong means … Read the rest

Jesus won’t let you get the COVID-19 because you’re not pansies.

Right-wing pastor Rodney Howard-Browne is not about to cancel church or prevent congregants from shaking hands because they are not a bunch of "pansies." pic.twitter.com/C36kBIEWqF

— Right Wing Watch (@RightWingWatch) March 15, 2020

… Read the rest

Oh look, now Chase Strangio is just plain grooming kids.

Back in the real world, if you find your child is having private video chats with any random adult on the internet, you should definitely take steps to stop that. This not normal, or safe, and all efforts to normalise it should be resisted https://t.co/zKggYQSDHH

— Ben (@BenWlv) March 15, 2020

… Read the rest

The quarantined people of Italy are singing to each other from balconies or windows.

Tenor Maurizio Marchini did just this, taking to his balcony to serenade the rooftops of his hometown, Florence.

Marchini sings Puccini’s impassioned aria from his opera Turandot, ‘Nessun Dorma’, or ‘None shall sleep’. After the aria’s climax with a high B, Maurizio picks up his son and repeats the line Vincerò!, or ‘I will be victorious.’

At full from-the-rooftops volume, which makes the little guy try to cover his ears, but it’s great for the rest of us.

Pandemic? What pandemic?

Meanwhile, Jeff Bezos…

When progressives like Sen. Bernie Sanders say “now is the time for solidarity” amid the coronavirus outbreak, they likely do not mean that employees of Whole Foods—owned by the world’s richest man, Jeff Bezos—should be asked to give their own accrued paid sick days to their co-workers who have either contracted the deadly virus or been forced to take time out of work because of what is now a global pandemic.

But that is exactly what executives with the grocery chain are asking its employers to do, even though Bezos could effectively give them unlimited paid sick leave during the current national emergency without barely a scratch in his bank account.

In a

Meanwhile Devin Nunes is going on Fox News to tell people to go out and mingle with crowds.

“If you’re healthy, you and your family, it’s a great time to go out and go to a local restaurant, likely you can get in easy. Let’s not hurt the working people in this country…go to your local pub” pic.twitter.com/jXdhOfwe9R

— Acyn (@Acyn) March 15, 2020

… Read the rest

Reuters has more:

Berlin is trying to stop Washington from persuading a German company seeking a coronavirus vaccine to move its research to the United States, prompting German politicians to insist no country should have a monopoly on any future vaccine.

Germany’s Health Ministry confirmed a report in newspaper Welt am Sonntag, which said President Donald Trump had offered funds to lure the company CureVac to the United States, and the German government was making counter-offers to tempt it to stay.

“The German government is very interested in ensuring that vaccines and active substances against the new coronavirus are also developed in Germany and Europe,” the newspaper quoted a Health Ministry official as saying. “In this regard, the

Trump has been trying to monopolize a COVID-19 vaccine.

The Trump administration has offered a German medical company “large sums of money” for exclusive access to a Covid-19 vaccine, German media have reported.

As one might offer the officer in charge of the lifeboat “large sums of money” to push everyone but the briber and the briber’s friends over the side. If one were a festering piece of shit.

The German government is trying to fight off what it sees as an aggressive takeover bid by the US, the broadsheet Die Welt reports, citing German government circles. The US president had offered the Tübingen-based biopharmaceutical company CureVac “large sums of money” to gain exclusive access to their work, wrote

Of course they did.

After it was widely reported that Tom Hanks and his wife were able to simply walk into a clinic in Australia with the symptoms of a common cold and instantly get a coronavirus test – which was positive – Americans are beginning to ask out loud, “Why can’t we get tested?“

Because $$$, that’s why. Which is more important, people’s survival or more money for Trump and his goons?

Silly question.

According to President Obama‘s Ebola Czar (last night on Rachel Maddow‘s show), Ron Klain, Trump “privatized“ the testing here in the United States. Instead of taking the World Health Organization (WHO) test kits which are cheap and widely available all over the planet, and

Cool, this is helpful – the Surgeon General of the US tells us to stop bickering and focus on this health crisis problem.

The Surgeon General calls for no more bickering, no more partisanship, no more criticism or finger pointing, and less stories about what happened in the past pic.twitter.com/CpM4vzCWaf

— Acyn (@Acyn) March 14, 2020

Right, because we’re the ones who’ve been doing all that, as opposed to the bloated ignorant orange menace he works for.

The surgeon general is giving journalists “straight talk from the nation’s doctor” and instructing the press to have “no more bickering, no more partisanship, no more criticism or finger-pointing” in news coverage.

He did not mention the president’s twitter feed.

— Philip Rucker

The White House doctor also says Trump doesn’t need to quarantine…which is even more bonkers.

On Friday evening, Conley said the White House became aware that another individual who Trump had contact with had tested positive for coronavirus. That individual is Nestor Forster, Brazil’s chargé d’affaires in Washington, who tested positive on Friday, according to the Brazilian Embassy.

Conley said Trump had spent more time in closer proximity to Forster, but “all interactions occurred before any symptom onset.”

But the virus can be spread before symptom onset.

“These interactions would be categorized as LOW risk for transmission per CDC guidelines, and as such, there is no indication for home quarantine at this time,” Conley wrote.

Which, again, is exactly … Read the rest

Nothing hinky about this, not at all. Trump’s doctor says No Need For A Test, nosirree.

The president does not need to take a test to determine if he’s positive for coronavirus because two interactions he had with known patients were “low risk,” a White House doctor said in a memo released Friday.

That’s not a thing. Interactions with people known to have the virus are not “low risk.” That doctor must have a gun to his head.

Physician to the president, Sean P. Conley, argued that because Trump’s interaction was minimal, including a handshake, and because Wajngarten and another patient were not exhibiting symptoms at the time they socialized with the president, Trump’s unlikely to get the virus.

Because Saturday, and pandemic, and toilet paper is sold out everywhere, and Wegmans is promoting homeopathic “meds,” and the US president can’t read.

Children’s excellent fine not at all bonkers reasons for crying.

There are many more. I can’t read them all at once because my abs start to hurt.… Read the rest

The White House has a transcript of yesterday’s car crash in the rose garden, the one where Trump was unable to read a particular word in his prepared Remarks. Here is that passage:

To unleash the full power of the federal government in this effort, today I am officially declaring a national emergency.  Two very big words.  The action I am taking will open up access to up to $50 billion of very importantly — very important and a large amount of money for states and territories and localities in our shared fight against this disease.

The glitch is clear but the transcript still tidies it up a little. How it actually went was:

of…very importantly…very important anttf…a very

He’s a virus bomb.

He fingered the microphone and put his lips up close. He shook hands with everyone he could. Donald Trump, who promised you’re going to win so much you’ll get sick of winning, might also just make you sick.

In the White House rose garden on Friday, the US president defied the advice of medical experts standing behind him and behaved like a one-man coronavirus cannon.

Reporters wanted to know whether this 73-year-old man with a [bad] diet – his former doctor reportedly hid cauliflower in his mashed potatoes – is putting himself and others at risk. Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro’s press secretary tested positive for coronavirus days after taking part in meetings with Trump

And then there’s Yamiche Alcindor’s question, and his rude and stupid and mendacious response.

Video of my question to @realDonaldTrump today on his administration's disbanding of the White House team responsible for coordinating responses to pandemics.

He called my question nasty & said he knew nothing about it.

I call it a relevant, fair, and truth-seeking question. https://t.co/ncYwqZ0Xtp

— Yamiche Alcindor (@Yamiche) March 13, 2020

He actually turns to Anthony Fauci to ask if he knows about this disbanding of the White House team responsible for dealing with epidemics.… Read the rest

But even worse…at 15 seconds he gets to a word he can’t read.

Trump says the words national emergency are "two very big words." pic.twitter.com/T78Lx57FZq

— Sarah Reese Jones (@PoliticusSarah) March 13, 2020

“Of…very importantlee…very important anttf…a very large amount…”

I’m wondering what the word was. Substantial? Significant? Unprecedented?

It’s pretty unprecedented having a presssident who can’t read “unprecedented” when he encounters it.… Read the rest