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Post by canterbury on Jul 19, 2020 22:44:32 GMT
The swing is in the voters most vulnerable to COVID-19, the electoral data from '16 shows Trump won the over-65s demographic 53-44.
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Post by Mozzer on Jul 20, 2020 4:36:32 GMT
If Johnson or Trump had come out and said ‘To minimise the threat of the virus we’re going in to a total lockdown for 12 months’ everyone would be moaning that he’d made the wrong decision. Giving local authorities the power to decide what’s good for them is a positive thing. I don’t see it as a way of shifting the responsibility in the slightest. If a local authority can shut down a park for social distancing breaches for example, it will get done a lot quicker than if it had to go through Boris. There’s bugger all we can do to stop this virus. We can use common sense to try and reduce the risk but for every person that’s using common sense I bet there’s a dozen that aren’t. Right, if they'd done that then people would probably have been pissed off. I hope you're not suggesting it was either that or the way they have actually gone about it. Because there is evidence from much better run countries that you can protect both people and the economy in much better ways than we've seen in England and the USA. Those other countries' leaders appear to have a modicum of competence though, which might be a key factor. Blame will be laid anywhere but at the door of the government charged with running the country. You can be absolutely certain of that.
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Post by CB1883 on Jul 20, 2020 11:36:47 GMT
If Johnson or Trump had come out and said ‘To minimise the threat of the virus we’re going in to a total lockdown for 12 months’ everyone would be moaning that he’d made the wrong decision. Giving local authorities the power to decide what’s good for them is a positive thing. I don’t see it as a way of shifting the responsibility in the slightest. If a local authority can shut down a park for social distancing breaches for example, it will get done a lot quicker than if it had to go through Boris. There’s bugger all we can do to stop this virus. We can use common sense to try and reduce the risk but for every person that’s using common sense I bet there’s a dozen that aren’t. Right, if they'd done that then people would probably have been pissed off. I hope you're not suggesting it was either that or the way they have actually gone about it. Because there is evidence from much better run countries that you can protect both people and the economy in much better ways than we've seen in England and the USA. Those other countries' leaders appear to have a modicum of competence though, which might be a key factor. Blame will be laid anywhere but at the door of the government charged with running the country. You can be absolutely certain of that. I’ve seen people (limited, I’ll admit) saying we should have had a lockdown for the duration of 2020. Would this help in any way? Short term, yes it probably would. Longer term? I’d see a seriously extended lockdown as just kicking the can down the road. I don’t think anybody would be 100% satisfied with any governments handling of this once in a decade horror. There’s no COVID-19 For Dummies. I think it’s 100% right that the overall economy is high up the priority list when it comes to making decisions. There’s a fine line in all situations as to wether it goes right or wrong and it’s easy to criticise the wrongdoings afterwards but the quicker we can move along the path to an element of normality, the better the long term results will be. I don’t mean it to sound like I’m accepting of the higher death rate now by the way. It’s horrible seeing the death toll but this will have a massive loss of life through other issues such as depression if the economy isn’t protected.
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Post by Mozzer on Jul 20, 2020 11:40:29 GMT
The point being they've failed to protect the economy by failing to protect people well enough, early enough. This is no surprise because they value money more than people but are too myopic to see the crucial link between the two.
I don't think any serious politician had suggested we should have locked down for a year.
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Post by HTC on Jul 20, 2020 12:10:36 GMT
I’ve seen people (limited, I’ll admit) saying we should have had a lockdown for the duration of 2020. Would this help in any way? Short term, yes it probably would. Longer term? I’d see a seriously extended lockdown as just kicking the can down the road. I don’t think anybody would be 100% satisfied with any governments handling of this once in a decade horror. There’s no COVID-19 For Dummies. I think it’s 100% right that the overall economy is high up the priority list when it comes to making decisions. There’s a fine line in all situations as to wether it goes right or wrong and it’s easy to criticise the wrongdoings afterwards but the quicker we can move along the path to an element of normality, the better the long term results will be. I don’t mean it to sound like I’m accepting of the higher death rate now by the way. It’s horrible seeing the death toll but this will have a massive loss of life through other issues such as depression if the economy isn’t protected.
Interesting / Worrying thing I read about the 'higher death rate' the other day
The tentative figures for UK (I think UK, may have been England?) death rate through most of July have been a statistically significant amount lower than usual. This pattern is expected to continue through the summer (and beyond), as long as the virus remains under control.
If this is true, a possible interpretation is the people who died from Covid in April/May are the same people who would probably have died in July - October anyway, which tallies with the figures showing that the demographics hit hardest were the old and/or already unwell.
However, the same is not expected of long term death rates. Due to all the missed GP appointments picking up early stage cancer / cancelled hospital appointments for 'minor' ailments that actually reveal a bigger problem / mental health issued caused / exacerbated by lockdown, the 'excess death' rate for next year is expected to be far higher than normal, and hit demographics other than the very old / very ill much worse.
Again, no idea of any 'solution' to this, but I'm increasingly coming round to a view that the 'economy or health?' dichotomy is a false one.
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Post by CB1883 on Jul 20, 2020 12:38:19 GMT
I’ve seen people (limited, I’ll admit) saying we should have had a lockdown for the duration of 2020. Would this help in any way? Short term, yes it probably would. Longer term? I’d see a seriously extended lockdown as just kicking the can down the road. I don’t think anybody would be 100% satisfied with any governments handling of this once in a decade horror. There’s no COVID-19 For Dummies. I think it’s 100% right that the overall economy is high up the priority list when it comes to making decisions. There’s a fine line in all situations as to wether it goes right or wrong and it’s easy to criticise the wrongdoings afterwards but the quicker we can move along the path to an element of normality, the better the long term results will be. I don’t mean it to sound like I’m accepting of the higher death rate now by the way. It’s horrible seeing the death toll but this will have a massive loss of life through other issues such as depression if the economy isn’t protected.
Interesting / Worrying thing I read about the 'higher death rate' the other day
The tentative figures for UK (I think UK, may have been England?) death rate through most of July have been a statistically significant amount lower than usual. This pattern is expected to continue through the summer (and beyond), as long as the virus remains under control.
If this is true, a possible interpretation is the people who died from Covid in April/May are the same people who would probably have died in July - October anyway, which tallies with the figures showing that the demographics hit hardest were the old and/or already unwell.
However, the same is not expected of long term death rates. Due to all the missed GP appointments picking up early stage cancer / cancelled hospital appointments for 'minor' ailments that actually reveal a bigger problem / mental health issued caused / exacerbated by lockdown, the 'excess death' rate for next year is expected to be far higher than normal, and hit demographics other than the very old / very ill much worse.
Again, no idea of any 'solution' to this, but I'm increasingly coming round to a view that the 'economy or health?' dichotomy is a false one.
If COVID-19 was a contributing factor to a person dying earlier then it should be listed as COVID-19 on the death certificate. Saying they would probably have died anyway is not going to be of any comfort to anyone. Thankfully I’ve never suffered from mental health but the same can’t be said for a high percentage of the population. Having people staring at the same four walls and not having the ability to socialise for any longer than we did would have had a major impact on the mental health figures. Fully appreciate your comment about the doctors. I found a lump after some restrictions were lifted and was put on antibiotics for a week to see if that would clear it up. Under normal circumstances they’d have got me straight in for a check and I’d have probably had a scan before I had my initial appointment which was almost a month later. It seemed to be a risk vs risk decision made by the doctor.
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Post by HTC on Jul 20, 2020 13:56:44 GMT
I know some preliminary research last week suggested that Covid deaths may have been overcounted - essentially someone who had Covid in March, recovered, but was then run over in July was being counted as a Covid death under one of the models. Equally, that's probably more than balanced out by the care home 'died of old age' deaths in March/April before testing was being done outside of hospitals.
My broader point is that the whole pandemic healthcare in this country has been run almost as a triage system on a national level, and I'm just beginning to wonder whether was has actually happened is that the triage has failed.
In my worst case scenario, what's actually ended up happening is that the effort/resources that have gone into saving people from Covid has ended up being focused on people who didn't have long to live anyway, and the effort that has gone into that has taken those resources away from people who might have survived.
As you say, that doesn't make it any easier for those the families of who have died 4 months 'earlier' though, and I suspect as well as being glass half empty, I'm looking back in hindsight, as many decisions were taken on the basis of a model we now know was flawed, predicting as many as 500k deaths.
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Post by badgersc on Jul 20, 2020 18:27:18 GMT
The point being they've failed to protect the economy by failing to protect people well enough, early enough. This is no surprise because they value money more than people but are too myopic to see the crucial link between the two. I don't think any serious politician had suggested we should have locked down for a year. Didn't see any serious politicians - but amazingly I think the most popular option on a poll n here was a lockdown to December!
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Post by Mozzer on Jul 20, 2020 21:37:53 GMT
Didn't see that one. In fairness, that's a bit mad, but at least if this country was being run by opinion polls on a County message board it wouldn't be being run by Dominic f*cking Cummings.
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Fez
Frequenter
Posts: 464
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Post by Fez on Oct 10, 2020 2:52:31 GMT
3 years ago American Comedian/Political Host Jimmy Dore said "Trump will not leave the White House EVER, he will get his '2nd Amendment friends' to dig in and go full on Dictator" Sounded bonkers at the time... Not so bonkers now though Absolute bollocks. I didn't think it was bollocks in July. It's looking even less like bollocks right now, I'd say. Not that this tactic will succeed necessarily but he is certainly encouraging his goons in that direction. It will get very ugly and probably violent both at the polls and afterwards, whatever the result. And the GOP remains disgracefully complicit. I look forward to him condemning the terrorists who have just been arrested for plotting to kidnap, try and execute the Governor of Michigan. Given that several of them were those that responded to his "LIBERATE MICHIGAN!" plea by invading the State House with weapons in April, I think we'll have a long wait.
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Post by mattyovrio on Oct 10, 2020 6:13:36 GMT
It is easy to see why Putin likes him so much and the feeling seems to be mutual.
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Post by bigmartin on Oct 10, 2020 12:06:54 GMT
It is easy to see why Putin likes him so much and the feeling seems to be mutual. I don't know whether I admire Putin because of the way he manages to win the game (US and Europe/UK). Or whether I despair at how easy it is for him to do so.
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Post by mattyovrio on Oct 10, 2020 14:54:43 GMT
Too easy. No wonder he is pro-Brexit, Pro-Trump and pro-Johnson. Anything that makes us weaker.
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Post by Ngard on Oct 10, 2020 17:14:52 GMT
Trump has no intention to concede.
Whether the GOP establishment go along with that is another matter entirely.
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Post by HTC on Oct 10, 2020 17:25:37 GMT
From what I’ve read, it’s more complicated than usual because the higher than usual number of postal votes, which means the count will take much longer than usual, particularly in key states.
As the US media calls the victor well before they’ve finished counting (very unlike our system where the winners are reported as they happen), there is scope for shenanigans there, particularly given the partisan nature of the US media, and lack of a BBC equivalent.
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