A Coronavirus End Game That Avoids A Depression Laurence Kotlikoff

https://www.forbes.com/sites/kotlikoff/2020/03/21/a-coronavirus-end-game-that-avoids-a-depression/#9543e1f5798f

The federal government is playing tragic catchup with the Coronavirus, which is now quickly turning into economic and health Armageddon. Absent immediate articulation of a clear and effective national health and economic policy, our governors need to step in to guide federal policy with a clear and single voice.

Short of the Trump Administration immediately taking appropriate steps (discussed below) to control the spread of Coronavirus or the discovery of a miraculous cure, we’re heading toward a full-scale depression. Goldman Sachs is forecasting a 24% drop in second quarter GDP. To put this figure in perspective, the maximum GDP-decline in the Great Depression (GD) was 26% and this took three years, not three months. The unemployment rate peaked during the GD at 25%.

In today’s economy, unemployment at such a rate would entail 36 million people out of work. The process has started. Over the past week, claims for unemployment jumped 70,000 — the biggest increase since the Great Recession. Kevin Hassett, former Chairman of the President’s Council of Economic Advisor, believes we could see 1 million people lose their jobs over the next month. Secretary Mnunchin recently raised the specter of a 20% unemployment rate if congress doesn’t pass a fiscal relief package. Since such a package will likely have very little impact on employment, he’s actually simply predicting one in five working Americans will be tossed to the street.

Tom Cotton Slams Democrats’ Delay on Coronavirus Relief: ‘Disgraceful’ By Zachary Evans

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/coronavirus-relief-tom-cotton-slams-democrats-for-delaying-vote-on-coronavirus-relief-package/

Senator Tom Cotton (R., Ark.) on Monday afternoon slammed Democrats for delaying a vote on a massive coronavirus-relief package, accusing them of holding up the bill in an attempt to check of items on their “ideological wish-list.”

“There is a good bill, a bill that was negotiated in good faith over the weekend with many Democrats . . . that they are now blocking, that they will not even start debate on because of ideological wish-list items,” Cotton said on the Senate floor. “It is disgraceful, and it is dangerous to the lives of our people and their economic well-being.”

The competing bill promoted by House speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) includes measures to cap carbon emissions for airlines, mandate “diversity” initiatives for corporate boards, and forgive student-loan debt.

“Democrats want to impose quotas for race and sex on corporate boards,” Cotton said. “Is that going to stop anyone from getting sick from coronavirus?”

Dems Drag Out Senate Coronavirus Response Sacrificing humans on the altar of progressivism. Lloyd Billingsley

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2020/03/dems-drag-out-senate-coronavirus-response-lloyd-billingsley/

“America will soon be open for business,” president Trump said in his Monday press conference. The nation was not going to “let the cure be worse than the problem,” so Congress needed to “stop playing games,” and pass the coronavirus response bill now in the Senate.

On Saturday, the president said it could be a done deal. On Sunday, Senate minority leader Charles Schumer announced that Democrats wanted to move forward with bipartisan agreement, but as it turned out they didn’t.

Schumer called the package “a large corporate bailout provision with no protections for workers and virtually no oversight.” Failed presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren, still in the Senate despite decades of fraudulently claiming to be Cherokee, explained, “this is not a bipartisan proposal. This is a Republican proposal.” 

Also on Sunday House Speaker Nancy Pelosi warned that she may not support the stimulus bill, which has grown to approximately $2 trillion. Pelosi said there was no agreement and the House would introduce its own bill.

Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell noted that Pelosi was “the speaker of the House, not the speaker of the Senate,” and until her intervention the process was moving forward. The vote came in 47-47, 13 short of the 60 votes Republicans needed.

New York Imam Finds the Key: Coronavirus Comes from Women Showing Too Much Ankle By Robert Spencer

https://pjmedia.com/trending/new-york-imam-finds-the-key-coronavirus-comes-from-women-showing-too-much-ankle/

Amid all the controversy over where the coronavirus comes from (don’t you dare call it the “Chinese Virus,” a la “Spanish Flu,” that would be racist, and to be racist is worse than the virus itself) and what should be done about it, a Muslim cleric in Syracuse, NY., has found the key; thousands of people are being infected, many are dying, and America is teetering on the edge of economic collapse because American women are showing too much ankle.

With shortages plaguing medical treatment, will American ingenuity save the day? By Andrea Widburg

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/03/with_shortages_plaguing_medical_treatment_will_american_ingenuity_save_the_day.html

An American hallmark is that Americans take the initiative, creating for themselves whatever is necessary to get the job done. Indeed, back in the late 19th century, when Thomas Alva Edison was a whirlwind of inventions, Americans began to view themselves as a nation of inventors. The inspiration for Rube Goldberg’s fantastic, crazy cartoon ideas was the fact that invention was in the air.

People from all 50 states and every educational and ethnic background flooded the newspapers and the patent office with their ideas. It was from that intellectual ferment that we got assembly lines, adding machines, shredded wheat, smoke detectors, Ferris wheels, rotary dials, bottle caps, zippers, modern mousetraps, medical gloves, mufflers, ice cream scoops, and no end of other clever and useful things that are still part of our world today.

American ingenuity may once again come to the fore with coronavirus. One of the biggest concerns about the virus is that hospitals are worried that they will not have enough ventilators for all the people who need them.

In Italy, ventilators make the difference between living and dying. An Israeli doctor who has been working in Italy said that the current triage is to deny the available ventilators to any patients over 60:

Israeli M.D. Gai Peleg, who is currently working to save lives in Parma, Italy, told Channel 12 that things are only getting worse as the number of patients keeps growing. 

Senate Democrats block the coronavirus relief package that they helped write By Andrea Widburg

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/03/senate_democrats_block_the_coronavirus_relief_package_that_they_helped_write.html

“You never let a serious crisis go to waste. And what I mean by that it’s an opportunity to do things you think you could not do before.” – Rahm Emanuel (actual quotation)

“This is a tremendous opportunity to restructure things to fit our vision.” – Rep. James Clyburn (actual quotation)

“Nice little country you’ve got here. It would be a shame if something happened to it.” – Congressional Democrats (fake but accurate quotation)

Over the past week, a bipartisan group of Senators hammered out the details of a phase-three coronavirus stimulus bill. On Sunday, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer that he’d had “two good meetings  . . . with Secretary Mnuchin . . . and I’m very optimistic that we can get something done.” He emphasized that it was important to “allow these businesses that are now closed to quickly re-establish themselves.” He boasted about “having good bipartisan agreements.”

And the bill was indeed a good enough bill, with straightforward help for people negatively affected by coronavirus:

Then, Nancy Pelosoi blew into D.C., cracked her whip, and everything changed. The narrative was no longer about saving American businesses to ensure that, after this panic is over, Americans will still have jobs. Nor was it about immediate financial relief for individuals who have already lost their livelihoods, cannot meet bills, or have rising medical costs.

Republicans want a lifeline; Democrats want to remake the country By David Harsanyi 

https://nypost.com/2020/03/23/republicans-want-a-lifeline-democrats-want-to-remake-the-country/

The cynical partisan opportunism of Democrats exhibited during the coronavirus economic crisis has been breathtaking.

Rather than move forward with quick, no-frills, massive $1.8 trillion dollar rescue plan, Democrats decided to hold the country hostage by trying to cram through a slew of lefty goodies that have absolutely nothing to do with the pending economic crisis.

As corporate boards struggle to figure out ways to keep their companies afloat, Nancy Pelosi is demanding that they spend time filling gender and racial quotas, down to “subcommittee assignments.”

As the transportation sector wrestles with a once-in-a-century economic disaster, Democrats are trying to compel airlines — who have seen a 90 percent drop in customers — to cut greenhouse gas emissions every year until they hit a 50 percent reduction.

AMAZING ISRAEL DEALS WITH CORONAVIRUS

THANKS TO NURIT GREENGER FOR THIS…..RSK

Dear Friends…
In view of the fact that COVID-19 has impacted everyone around the world, Sheba would like to provide you with critical insights and expert advice based on our experiences with coronavirus patients at Sheba Medical Center. Using a variety of advanced medical technologies, Sheba has been on the frontline of the battle against this insidious disease. I invite you to read the important information contained in this special coronavirus bulletin and share it with family and friends.

Chinese Lies and Chinese Food By J. Christian Adams

https://pjmedia.com/jchristianadams/chinese-lies-and-chinese-food/

A few decades ago, the conventional wisdom was that trade with China will democratize and soften the communist regime. The coronavirus pandemic has killed that myth, except perhaps among the malignant American media.

NBC News reporters like Kelly O’Donnell grow incensed about Sean Spicer asking a question as a credentialed member of the media. If you call this Chinese virus a Chinese virus, the malignant American media remain fully attached to the pre-Corona world where anyone cares.

The truth is that this virus originated in China.  Worse, decisions by the Chinese communist regime after the virus appeared accelerated the problem.

Like the malignant American media, the Chinese communists can’t help it either.  Communism is a system built on lies. Keeping the shiny polish on the regime is more important than the truth. That’s why the Chinese communists downplayed the threat of the coronavirus for months.  This is how communists behave.

When another communist regime faced a nuclear cataclysm at Chernobyl in 1986, they were also hardwired to lie.

At first, the Soviets portrayed the meltdown of Chernobyl’s reactor core as a minor incident fully under control.  Early efforts to clear debris from the blown reactor core included turning to West Germany.  The Soviets wanted a robot called “Joker” to help clear debris.  But Soviet lies extended even to the amount of radiation that Joker was expected to encounter.  The Soviets lied to the West Germans, underplaying the radioactive carnage in order to keep the truth about Chernobyl from the world.

‘What the Hell Do We Have to Lose?’—Trump Sent Malaria Meds to NY to Begin Trials on COVID-19 Patients By Victoria Taft

https://pjmedia.com/trending/what-the-hell-do-we-have-to-lose-trump-to-send-malaria-meds-to-ny-to-begin-trials-on-covid-19-patients/

President Trump says that New York State will begin testing the anti-malaria medicine, chloroquine, on patients who are “very sick” with COVID-19 beginning on Tuesday.

Though he was chided by the media for giving “false hope” about the drug’s usefulness, Trump’s FDA has allowed special use of the medication by those suffering from COVID-19. As Trump put it last week, “what the hell do we have to lose?”

An NBC reporter last week challenged the president that he was giving “false hope” and “misrepresenting” the impact of the drug.  Trump wheeled back and let him have it, saying, “The American people are looking for answers and they’re looking for hope and you’re doing sensationalism … And you ought to get back to reporting instead of sensationalism. Let’s see if it works. It might and it might not. I happen to feel good about it, but who knows. I’ve been right a lot. Let’s see what happens.