EPTDanglars: No it’s not.
This topic surely is a Mecca of political ideas and discourse. I don’t know what we’d do without this kind of debate.
US Politics Mega-thread - Page 2923
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KwarK
United States44450 Posts
Danglars: No it’s not. This topic surely is a Mecca of political ideas and discourse. I don’t know what we’d do without this kind of debate. | ||
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Slydie
2030 Posts
On January 04 2021 14:57 pmh wrote: How was it bad? It wasnt great but he didnt do worse then many other western nations. Many countries in eu got worse numbers per captiva then the usa yet here the governments kept the support. I am pretty sure even boris still has the majority behind him,now that he got brexit done. Considering population density and how cities are built, the US should have done considerably better than Europe. That the US is so large draws the averages down. As mentioned before, there are areas in the US which should have had the same benefits of dealing with the virus as Norway and Finland, but are doing WAAAY worse. It isn't only about the numbers either. He showed a baffeling ignorace and abandoned national leadership, leaving the problem to the states. | ||
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JimmiC
Canada22817 Posts
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pmh
1416 Posts
You would think that would be impossible but seeing how 10 former secretarys of defence felt the need to speaks out against it (including republicans like rumsfeld) there might be something in the air still. It would be unprecedented and i doubt the population and the democratic states would accept it but you never know i guess. And yes what you all say about the handling of the pandemic might be true but in the end he didnt handle it that much different from how most of europe did handle it and the numbers,for whatever reason,are better. The polarization of the epidemic in all honestly was mostly done by the media who critizied every single step no matter what (justified or not). In europe we handled it pretty much the same but our governments didnt even get 10% of the critizism that trump did get. | ||
Liquid`Drone
Norway28929 Posts
It doesn't really matter if the advice given and policies recommended are largely the same when leading politicians undermine the message. The Benelux region isn't really comparable to 'all of the US' - the Netherlands is more densely populated than the state of New York. The UK was the most comparable country to the US in terms of not taking it seriously (prior to Bojo catching it and getting so ill that he might have died if not for medical treatment), italy was hit first, spain and france had less time to prepare, Sweden has been getting lambasted a whole lot for their response, other countries either performed much better than the US, or are significantly poorer countries who could be expected to perform worse. Well honestly I dunno too much about the situation in austria and switzerland, maybe that was driven by incompetence too.  | ||
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Slydie
2030 Posts
In europe we handled it pretty much the same but our governments didnt even get 10% of the critizism that trump did get. What? Those were some awfully broad brush strokes... Are you really suggesting that Europan countries handled the pandemic even remotely in the same way and trying to out a % number on criticism? It would have been very easy for Trump to do a lot better. Just some fluff about "standing together against the invisible enemy during this times of hardships", and he would have been fine, even with the same death toll. He failed. | ||
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RenSC2
United States1102 Posts
Belgium 1725 Italy 1247 United Kingdom 1128 United States 1101 Spain 1088 France 971 Switzerland 910 Sweden 857 Poland 767 Austria 715 Portugal 692 Netherlands 674 Ireland 465 Greece 462 Ukraine 424 Germany 423 Denmark 237 Finland 102 Norway 82 Just picked a a bunch of major European countries and the US ( https://www.realclearpolitics.com/coronavirus/ ). We (the US) have the advantage of a much more sparsely populated country (87 people/ square mile) than most on the list, like Germany (603 people/ square mile) ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_dependencies_by_population_density ). Finland and Norway crush the US in ability to handle it while being 2 of the 3 on the list with less population density. Even the heavily criticized Sweden did better than the US (being the other less dense country). The United Kingdom was terrible about handling it at first, but eventually their PM realized it was serious (after getting it himself) and actually started taking it seriously. Meanwhile, the president of the United States did everything in his power to muck up the response. He pushed against masks and mocked them. He pushed against social distancing. Even as some states tried to handle the pandemic responsibly, he undercut them at every turn and helped create an anti-mask movement in the United States. When you look at how sparsely populated our country is, handling a pandemic should have been easy, especially outside of major cities. There's no way places like the Dakotas should have been hit so hard. Our numbers should look better than Germany's, but are instead one of the worst. Perhaps the only country that handled it worse when accounting for population density was Sweden. All Trump had to do was act responsibly. Tell people that Coronavirus is serious, that they're working on a vaccine. Tell people to social distance whenever possible and wear a mask and we'll get through this together. He could have come out of this thing looking like an actual leader and probably gained in popularity and won the election. Instead he came out looking like the damn fool that he is. There's more that he screwed up, Last Week Tonight did a nice rundown of those screwups (+ Show Spoiler + Overall Trump was a disaster on coronavirus, good riddance in 16 days. | ||
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Broetchenholer
Germany1970 Posts
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Furikawari
France2522 Posts
On January 04 2021 18:22 Broetchenholer wrote: The US did do worse then all the countries on Rens list for demographic reasons, the question is, did the do better then brasil, Russia or maybe India? Seriously? You want to compare US to those country to justify they didn't do that badly? | ||
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evilfatsh1t
Australia8943 Posts
On January 04 2021 18:31 Furikawari wrote: Seriously? You want to compare US to those country to justify they didn't do that badly? look at it from the opposite perspective. if the us did worse then it probably emphasises even more how badly the us fucked up | ||
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StasisField
United States1086 Posts
On January 04 2021 18:22 Broetchenholer wrote: I am not disputing that he fucked up royally in his Corona response, but the US is so uniquely challenged in it's health care system and rampant wealth distribution gap that its hard to compare the states with any European country. The level of medical therapy and science available to the upper class in a pandemic really means nothing if it's not available to the poor. Same time, if the poor can't afford to socially distance, those measures can't work either. The US did do worse then all the countries on Rens list for demographic reasons, the question is, did the do better then brasil, Russia or maybe India? The US is 3x larger than India and India has nearly 1 billion more people than the US. When it comes to minimizing the deaths per million in a pandemic, the US should do better than India. Also, the deaths per million for Russia, Brazil, and India are: Russia: 408 Brazil: 936 India: 111 And, as a reminder, the US's is 1101. Oh wow, look at that. The US did worse than all 3 of the countries you listed. Maybe the US's pandemic response really was just dog shit and we should stop wasting our time defending a man whose response to covid-19 included demonizing his own public health officials, pushing bleach as a cure, and openly mocking the use of masks. I grabbed the data from the link RenSC2 provided earlier: https://www.realclearpolitics.com/coronavirus/ | ||
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Biff The Understudy
France8226 Posts
Also you can't compare Russia, that lies about everything, with anyone. We know Belgium counts in a way that tends to inflate numbers, and that Russia is just giving propaganda numbers. That the Trump administration absolutely butchered this crisis and that he is responsible for thousands of deaths is self evident. We know what works against the virus, and the POTUS has systematically politicized his moronic fanbase against everything that works. There is no universe in which that doesn't have incidence on the death toll. In fact one thing that comes up is that the oooonly thing Trump has worried about in this pandemic is how it would affect him. But what else did we expect. | ||
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WombaT
Northern Ireland27478 Posts
Covid just exposed, ruthlessly every flaw of Trump and his enablers. I mean I can’t imagine many were that on the fence prior to the pandemic in this regard, but I guess the pandemic brought forth many problems that were abstract to many people’s daily experience and made them a companion for more people. People’s views on government cheques tend to soften somewhat when they themselves are on the breadline. His simultaneous incompetence wedded to a desire to inject himself into everything was really writ large. I’m sure most of us have worked under a boss who is that unholy combination of incompetent, who tries to badly micromanage what you’d be better off doing yourself and who takes all the credit when things are going well and dodges responsibility when it doesn’t. As for comparing country’s responses via results I find it a relatively futile exercise, there are so many additional variables to factor in. Did x country make good moves given the available resources to them and the information available at the time? Was there a coordinated and well-executed plan that had buy-in from the public? Deaths are tragic don’t get me wrong, I feel they’re overshadowing lurking issues underneath, namely that the younger generations are absolutely fucked. The wealth and asset gap was already huge and has been growing steadily, what’s that going to look like at the other side of this? In this regard the States seems especially bad given how limited its stimulus was compared to other places, not to mention other structural problems it had preceding the pandemic that are unique to it amongst wealthy Western nations. | ||
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BerserkSword
United States2123 Posts
Our population, generally speaking, is significantly higher risk for mortality than Europe's Sure the US has advantages in some areas but we also have tons of overweight/obese people, diabetics, the NY metropolitan area (by far the biggest metropolitan area among the US and europe), the LA metropolitan area, the tri-state area (NY, NJ, CT), the i-95 corridor cities (philly-nyc-boston) etc etc | ||
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Liquid`Drone
Norway28929 Posts
I mean, Norway is a very sparsely populated country, and I think this is a considerable part of the explanation for why our deaths are so low. Wyoming is like.. 1/6th of the population density of Norway, but with something like 9x the deaths per capita. That's absurd. | ||
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Blitzkrieg0
United States13132 Posts
On January 04 2021 22:16 BerserkSword wrote: Not saying the US response was good but 5 atlantic 1-95 states (NY, NJ, CT, MA, and PA) accounted for a quarter of the deaths in the US. Our population, generally speaking, is significantly higher risk for mortality than Europe's Sure the US has advantages in some areas but we also have tons of overweight/obese people, diabetics, the NY metropolitan area (by far the biggest metropolitan area among the US and europe), the LA metropolitan area, the tri-state area (NY, NJ, CT), the i-95 corridor cities (philly-nyc-boston) etc etc Considering a government official named Jared Kushner is on record saying let those people die people they vote democrat and want to make the democrats look bad I wouldn't bother analyzing comorbidity factors like obesity. | ||
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BerserkSword
United States2123 Posts
I was honestly surprised by low population density states' numbers as well though. It's interesting to note that deaths in places like Wyoming didnt start skyrocketing until the 2nd wave. Prior to that the uS numbers were carried by a handful of states. I think it has less to do with US government response than other factors though. For example, I'm assuming Norway had strict travel restrictions and closely monitored their borders. Interstate travel wasnt really controlled here, at least in my neck of the woods. The US is also full of people who don't wear masks or wear them incorrectly. Social distancing was non-existent over the summer even here in NYC - I can't imagine social distancing being practiced or masks being worn in low population density middle america where people have a more cavalier attitude about everything. Trump shouldn't have done thing like downplay wearing masks and hold rallies imo, but I don't think it wouldve changed much | ||
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BerserkSword
United States2123 Posts
On January 04 2021 22:26 Liquid`Drone wrote: You do have more obese people, but you also have a younger population. (The average age in the US is 9 years younger than Italy. ) And while the populous eastern states comprise most of your deaths, there are like.. three states at most with 'decent numbers'. (Vermont looks good - no surprise there, Hawaii too - also no surprise with it being an island, and Maine is 'ok'. ) I mean, Norway is a very sparsely populated country, and I think this is a considerable part of the explanation for why our deaths are so low. Wyoming is like.. 1/6th of the population density of Norway, but with something like 9x the deaths per capita. That's absurd. Unless the average age dramatically puts a European country into a significantly higher risk group, even a difference in mean age of 9 years isn't a huge impact compared to the fact that over 40% of the adult population in the U.S. is obese, and more than 2/3'rds of the adult population is overweight. Extra weight has a significant impact on ICU patient management as well thanks to the changes in cardiac function and pulmonary reserve in obese and overweight patients. I was honestly surprised by low population density states' numbers as well though. It's interesting to note that deaths in places like Wyoming didnt start skyrocketing until the 2nd wave. Prior to that the uS numbers were carried by a handful of states. I think it has less to do with US government response than other factors though. For example, I'm assuming Norway had strict travel restrictions and closely monitored their borders. Interstate travel wasnt really controlled here, at least in my neck of the woods. The US is also full of people who don't wear masks or wear them incorrectly. Social distancing was non-existent over the summer even here in NYC - I can't imagine social distancing being practiced or masks being worn in low population density middle america where people have a more cavalier attitude about everything. Trump shouldn't have done thing like downplay wearing masks and hold rallies imo, but I don't think it wouldve changed much | ||
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pmh
1416 Posts
On January 04 2021 17:35 Liquid`Drone wrote: What european countries had leaders refusing to wear masks due to personal vanity and had the president or prime minister squabbling with the most prominent health experts? My impression is that most european countries (at least western european) went full technocrat. It doesn't really matter if the advice given and policies recommended are largely the same when leading politicians undermine the message. The Benelux region isn't really comparable to 'all of the US' - the Netherlands is more densely populated than the state of New York. The UK was the most comparable country to the US in terms of not taking it seriously (prior to Bojo catching it and getting so ill that he might have died if not for medical treatment), italy was hit first, spain and france had less time to prepare, Sweden has been getting lambasted a whole lot for their response, other countries either performed much better than the US, or are significantly poorer countries who could be expected to perform worse. Well honestly I dunno too much about the situation in austria and switzerland, maybe that was driven by incompetence too. The dutch cdc said till very recently that masks didnt really work (though we dont use n95 masks here which is a small difference). Masks have been obligated in public transport for a few months now and only very recently (like 1 month ago) they became obligated in other public indoor spaces. Sweden as you said didnt take any meassures till they recently turned around their whole strategy (and their government didnt get backlash from it from the populations). None of the scandinavian countrys has been big on masks in general. Its not that the leaders didnt speak out against the use of masks,its that it took ages to get them implemented in the first place. Trump came around with masks pretty early in the pandemic,i remember him seeing a mask at some visit for the first time 6 months ago or so which was far earlier then any of the northern european countries. All the statistics are a bit misleading,they dont account for differences in reporting,under reporting,over reporting (belgium). Most reliable is still excess death i think and then the us is on the same level or somewhat better then the uk,the netherlands etcetera. Germany is still doing better i have to admit that but you cant compare the usa to a well organized country like germany. The uk would be the most fair comparison. Now the uk didnt do better then the usa yet boris still has a lot of support (i dont know the actual polls btw but i asume he does). Anyway this went way of from my starting point that the handling of the pandemic can not be the only thing and maybe not even the most important thing that did cost trump the election,since despite all the complaints if you look at it objectively the usa didnt do (significantly) worse then many other more or less comparable western (european) nations. | ||
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Neneu
Norway492 Posts
On January 04 2021 23:01 Blitzkrieg0 wrote: Considering a government official named Jared Kushner is on record saying let those people die people they vote democrat and want to make the democrats look bad I wouldn't bother analyzing comorbidity factors like obesity. Oh you mean the guy who said stuff like The notion of the federal stockpile is that it’s supposed to be our stockpile. It’s not supposed to be states’ stockpiles that they then use. when states were reporting shortages of medical supplies in April, in order to combat covid? Imo he should be charged for murder.EDIT: On January 04 2021 23:25 BerserkSword wrote: Unless the average age dramatically puts a European country into a significantly higher risk group, even a difference in mean age of 9 years isn't a huge impact compared to the fact that over 40% of the adult population in the U.S. is obese, and more than 2/3'rds of the adult population is overweight. Extra weight has a significant impact on ICU patient management as well thanks to the changes in cardiac function and pulmonary reserve in obese and overweight patients. I was honestly surprised by low population density states' numbers as well though. It's interesting to note that deaths in places like Wyoming didnt start skyrocketing until the 2nd wave. Prior to that the uS numbers were carried by a handful of states. I think it has less to do with US government response than other factors though. For example, I'm assuming Norway had strict travel restrictions and closely monitored their borders. Interstate travel wasnt really controlled here, at least in my neck of the woods. The US is also full of people who don't wear masks or wear them incorrectly. Social distancing was non-existent over the summer even here in NYC - I can't imagine social distancing being practiced or masks being worn in low population density middle america where people have a more cavalier attitude about everything. Trump shouldn't have done thing like downplay wearing masks and hold rallies imo, but I don't think it wouldve changed much Well it quite likely would have saved at least about 700 people as discussed in the following paper by a group at Stanford, published back in October. I think that is something. 700 lives is a lot. 700 more family members to be around when this is over. People are used to move heaven and earth just to save a single one, why should one not expect a minimum of the same of your president? He knew well what the consequences of his rallies would be, yet he decided that it was more important that he got reelected than kids getting to see their grandparents alive again. We explore a total of 24 procedures for identifying sets of matched counties. For the vast majority of these variants, our estimate of the average treatment effect across the eighteen events implies that they increased subsequent confirmed cases of COVID-19 by more than 250 per 100,000 residents. Extrapolating this figure to the entire sample, we conclude that these eighteen rallies ultimately resulted in more than 30,000 incremental confirmed cases of COVID-19. Applying countyspecific post-event death rates, we conclude that the rallies likely led to more than 700 deaths (not necessarily among attendees). https://sebotero.github.io/papers/COVIDrallies_10_30_2000.pdf | ||
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