Supermodels

Model Contest:  In February Trump said that the coronavirus situation would turn out fine, then he said that it would be gone by April and anyway “only” 60,000 people would perish; he upped that number again to 100,000 during his bizarre Lincoln Memorial Fox moment on Sunday, justifying the increase by saying that it was far better than the million or two deaths that would have happened  if he hadn’t kind of sorta closed the US border to those Chinese hordes while leaving it open to those infected Europeans.  Just a week ago VP Pence, who now admits he should have worn a mask during his visit to the Mayo Clinic, said that the virus problem would be over by Memorial Day.  Sadly, both of them were and continue to be both delusional and far off the mark.  The model from the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington, the one that the White House virus taskforce cites and that Dr. Debbie uses for her fancy colorful slides, is now projecting 134,000 virus-related deaths, up from a previous prediction of 72,000 which makes sense since we’re on the verge of hitting 70,000.  That’s the good news, another model prepared by Johns Hopkins for internal use by the CDC, predicts that by June 1, the mortality count will be 2000 per day, far higher than the  890 daily count predicted by the University of Washington modelers.  Not surprisingly, Trump claims he’s unaware of that second model, saying it’s just more fake news.  For its part the CDC says that the Hopkins model is only a draft and it wasn’t meant for public consumption.  Draft or not both the Hopkins model and the Washington model share one significant assumption, that the “premature lifting of social distancing” restrictions, particularly in those states opening for business even though they’ve failed to meet the White House’s very own phase one guidelines for reopening, will result in significantly higher morbidity and mortality.  Though much of Trump’s base and many Fox viewers continue to believe that the virus is a coastal problem mostly affecting those left wing New Yorkers, super old people, inner city African Americans and immigrant workers and who cares about them anyway, things are actually improving in the New York area, illness and deaths are down, those extra hospitals are being dismantled and Governor Cuomo is talking about his opening plans, albeit ones that he plans to implement slowly and by region and only after he’s satisfied that virus testing levels, already the highest in the world, and tracing capability are in place.  New York’s progress is notable because when those models talk about higher mortality predictions, they’re referring to the rest of the country, including those under resourced rural areas, the spread in and around meat processing plants, and those states opening up too soon. For his part Dr Fauci, who the White House has banned from testifying before the House and now appear also to be barring from appearing before the Republican run Senate, says that leapfrogging the guidelines invites virus rebounds, and by rebounds we’re not talking basketball. 

McConnell Hijinks:   As to the Senate, it’s back in session, but Majority Leader McConnell isn’t focusing on the country’s health, he’s all in on confirmations particularly focused on his favorite judicial pick, family friend Judge Walker, the very conservative, very inexperienced judge who has openly criticized Chief Justice Roberts for voting to uphold Obamacare.  The Senate also plans to take up the nomination of Texas Congressman John Ratcliffe who is Trump’s pick to serve as the Director of National Intelligence.  If Ratcliffe’s name sounds familiar, that’s because the last time his name was floated for the position a number of Republicans concurred with their Democratic colleagues, agreeing that the conspiracy mongering Ratcliffe was woefully unsuited and unqualified for the position.  Unfortunately, despite the current situation, those naysayers, most notably Senate Intelligence Chairman Richard Burr have developed an inexplicable affinity for Ratcliffe, and expectations are that he’ll be confirmed, which is extraordinarily frightening but fits right in with Secretary of State Pompeo and Trump insisting without providing proof that the coronavirus originated nefariously in a Chinese research lab even though Dr Fauci dismisses that saying instead that he believes that it most likely comes from a random bat.    

Et Cetera:  Trump’s newest Press Secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, actually held a press conference on Friday.  She vowed to always tell the truth, which was her first lie, because during that press conference she lied multiple times which is of course what she was hired to do.  She’s also denied that Dr Fauci was being prevented from testifying before the House, of course almost immediately after she said that, the White House that no one from the virus task force would be allowed to testify before Congress without signoff from new Chief of Staff Meadows and as of now he’s not signing off on anyone.  Joe Biden got another endorsement yesterday, this one from Indivisible, the very progressive group that previously leaned towards either Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren.  As for Warren, she has now joined the chorus of female politicians, VP wannabees and women’s groups calling Biden’s sexual assault denial credible.  By the way, Trump who knows a lot about denying sexual assault says that Biden flubbed his, probably because he hasn’t had as much practice.  He also believes that Biden should select Warren as his running mate which probably means that he thinks she’d be a horrible choice and really wants to get more opportunities to use that old Pocahontas nickname more than anything else. On the virus front, a lot of experts are throwing water on Trump’s assertion that there will be a vaccination by year end.  However, it is looking more likely that having virus antibodies in your system provides some protection, South Korean medical experts now say that incidences of people retesting positive after recovery were due to overly sensitive tests picking up dead virus fragments rather than reinfections, or so they now believe. On the antibody test front, the FDA is raising the standards for those test kits that it previously allowed to be rushed to market so if you manage to get a test, check that your provider’s machines meet the new standards.  Internationally, it looks like Russia is being hit hard by COVID 19, we know that because three of its more outspoken doctors have recently fallen out of windows.