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Cory Doctorow: [The US is now the epicenter of the pandemic] a: “Trump wants the country to go back to work by Easter, because in his version of the Trolley Problem, the most important thing is saving the trolley.”

In cruel irony, the bulk of the people who die will be older Americans – the Trump and Fox news demographic, Cory notes.

But so many people will die because of this. Old people. Young people. People with disabilities. People who just had very bad luck. Kids.

And that’s before you get to all the people who have car wrecks or heart attacks or slip-and-falls and can’t get treatment in overloaded hospitals.

When Hoover fucked up by giving in to plutes and crashed the economy, he got tent cities, or “Hoovervilles.”

Trump’s fuckup will end with mass graves. Trump Mausoleums? Mar-a-Plague-Pits?

We will get through this. But Trump will have murdered so many of us before it’s over.

Andrew Sullivan uses his memories of the AIDS epidemic to cast light on coronavirus and society.

How to Survive a Plague

It’s quite possible that by the end of all this, almost every American will know of someone who has died. A relative, a friend, an old high-school classmate … the names will pop up and migrate through Facebook as the weeks go by, and in a year’s time, Facebook will duly remind you of the grief or shock you experienced. The names of the sick will appear to be randomly selected — the ones you expected and the ones you really didn’t, the famous and the obscure, the vile and the virtuous. And you will feel the same pang of shock each time someone you know turns out to have fallen ill.

You’ll wake up each morning and check to see if you have a persistent cough, or a headache, or a tightness in the lungs. This is plague living: witnessing the sickness and death of others, knowing that you too could be next, even as you feel fine. The distancing things we reflexively do — “oh, well, he was a smoker”; “she was diabetic, you know”; “they were in Italy in February” — become a little bit harder as time goes by, and the numbers mount, and the randomness of it all sinks in. No, this is not under control. And no, we are not in control. Because we never are.

And this will change us. It must. All plagues change society and culture, reversing some trends while accelerating others, shifting consciousness far and wide, with consequences we won’t discover for years or decades. The one thing we know about epidemics is that at some point they will end. The one thing we don’t know is who we will be then.

I know that I was a different man at the end of the plague of AIDS than I was at the beginning,

Sullivan says: The epidemic could bring out the best in us, and we could create a more fair and humane society. Or it could bring out our worst, and make us more socially isolated, xenophobic, and authoritarian.

I suspect that those who think COVID-19 all but kills Donald Trump’s reelection prospects are being, as usual, too optimistic. National crises, even when handled at this level of incompetence and deceit, can, over time, galvanize public support for a national leader. As Trump instinctually finds a way to identify the virus as “foreign,” he will draw on these lizard-brain impulses, and in a time of fear, offer the balm of certainty to his cult and beyond. It’s the final bonding: blind support for the leader even at the risk of your own sickness and death. And in emergencies, quibbling, persistent political opposition is always on the defense, and often unpopular. It requires pointing out bad news in desperate times; and that, though essential, is rarely popular.

Watching Fox News operate in real time in ways Orwell described so brilliantly in Nineteen Eighty-Four — compare “We had always been at war with Eastasia” with “I’ve felt that it was a pandemic long before it was called a pandemic” — you’d be a fool not to see the potential for the Republican right to use this plague for whatever end they want. If Trump moves to the left of the Democrats in handing out big non-means-tested cash payments, and provides a stimulus far bigger than Obama’s, no Republican will cavil. And since no sane person wants the war on COVID-19 to fail, we will have to wish that the president succeed. Pulling this off as an opposition party, while winning back the White House, will require a political deftness I don’t exactly see in abundance among today’s Democrats.

On the other hand, even further incompetence or failure on Trump’s part could finally, maybe, puncture the cult, and deliver the White House to Biden and the Congress to the Democrats. And the huge sums now being proposed by even the GOP to shore up the economy and the stock market at a time of massive debt, as well as the stark failures of our public-health planning, could make an activist government agenda much more politically palatable to Americans.

If we need to kill grandma and grandpa to save the economy, then fuck the economy.

A far-right rallying cry: Older Americans should volunteer to work

This article compares current conservative calls to sacrifice older Americans against the Obamacare “death panel” scare. But that’s rubbish because the death panels never existed, whereas this kill-the-olds movement is real.

Hillary was right. A good percentage of Trump supporters really are deplorable.

We do not sacrifice the weak and old to protect society. The reason we have society is to protect the weak and old.

Not even three weeks on lockdown and the people who were once sneering at this as being no worse than the flu are now wetting their pants and planning on turning old people into Soylent Green.

People who say cruel things on the internet are often not the cartoon villains we imagine them to be.

He urged saving the economy over protecting those who are ‘not productive’ from the coronavirus. Then he faced America’s wrath. - The Washington Post

Attorney Scott McMillan brought the wrath of the internet on himself when he tweeted: “The fundamental problem is whether we are going to tank the entire economy to save 2.5% of the population which is (1) generally expensive to maintain, and (2) not productive.”

Yes, it’s wrong and appalling but so what? Cut him some slack.

Internet shaming and death threats are never the answer.

I have a special interest in this because McMillan is in La Mesa, the San Diego, CA suburb where we live.

His statement is wrong and appalling because we do not measure the value of people by their productivity.

And the flood of deaths that will follow ending the quarantine prematurely, like Trump and McMillan suggest, will be a million times worst for the economy than extended quarantine.

Also, McMillan says he doesn’t want the younger generation to be like the generation that grew up in the Depression. That generation includes my parents. They turned out fine. They went without as kids, but sacrificing their grandparents’ generation would not have made them better off.

If people have to die to support the economy, then fuck the economy.

As part of our morning wake-up routine I’ve been giving Minnie three chicken-flavored treats every day. They’re infused with glucosamine, which is good for her joints.

This morning I dropped all three from waist height at the same time – and Minnie snatched all three from the air, simultaneously, before they hit the ground.

I was in awe.

The glucosamine is fantastic, btw. She’s a lot more active now.

How Triscuits got their name

It has nothing to do with the number “three.”

And it’s actually very cool, particularly if you’re a fan of retro-futurism — i.e., how people from past generations envisioned the future.

Cory Doctorow reviews Thomas Pikkety's new book, "Capital and Ideology."

The thesis of the new book is that “the ‘laws’ of economics are actually policies, created to ‘justify a society’s inequalities,’ providing a rationale to convince poor people not to start building guillotines.”

pluralistic.net/2020/03/2…

My $0.02: You see this in one of the main conservative and so-called moderate Democrat arguments against Medicaire-for-All: That we can’t afford it.

If society can’t afford to save lives, then we can’t afford to have that society.

There are other arguments against M4A, namely that it might suck. I do not necessarily share those arguments, but they are reasonable.

Cory:

The elites' indifference to working people is grounded in an alliance between the Brahmin Left (educated, well-paid liberals) and the Merchant Right (the finance sector). Notionally leftist parties, like the Democrats, are dominated by the Brahmin Left.

Me: This is one of the leading Republican criticisms of the national Democratic Party. And it has a lot of merit to it.

But more than any other, Macron epitomizes this alliance: proclaiming his liberal values while slashing taxes on the wealthy — punishing poor people for driving cars, exempting private jets from his “climate” bill.

Life in a “meritocracy” is especially cruel for poor people, because meritocracies, uniquely among ideologies, blame poor people for poverty. It’s right there in the name. French kings didn’t think God was punishing peons, rather, that the Lord had put them there to serve.

Who would you be willing to sacrifice – have them die – to keep the stock market up? Sullen teen offspring? Obnoxious neighbor who runs the lawnmower and/or snowblower at 7 am Saturdays? Coworker who never makes a fresh pot of coffee? Discuss.

A programmer switches gears – so to speak – and takes up a career as a bike courier. From 2005. I wonder what he’s doing today? web.archive.org/web/20050…

Highlights:

The most common sort of bike you will see couriers on is your standard street bike. Light frame, slick tires, no suspension and between 18 and 24 gears. Among veterans however, the favoured bikes are single speeds. There is a large variety among single speeds as well (fixed drive or freewheel, coaster brakes or hand brakes, etc.) but they all share the advantage of being mechanically simple machines. When you are riding eight hours a day, any part that can fail, eventually will. And probably dramatically. Thus, the simpler the mechanism, the lower the mechanic’s bill….

As a courier, you will get hit by cars. It is an occupational hazard…. A certain brash courier from another company who liked to refer to himself as “The Fastest Messenger in Toronto” (and he may well have been, arrogance aside) once told me that he didn’t wear a helmet because having a safety net makes you reckless and that if you are fast enough, you don’t fall. The next week, he went through the back window of an SUV that stopped suddenly and spent two weeks in the hospital. I don’t know a single courier who has worked the job for more than a year and not been hit at least once….

One thing I was surprised to discover is that pedestrians are almost as dangerous to the full-time cyclist as drivers are. Especially if you indulge in sidewalk riding, but frequently even if you stick to the road, people will dart in front of you or suddenly stop or change direction without even the most cursory glance or indication of intent. A car, at least, can’t change its direction of travel by a full 180 degrees in half a second.

My little experiment using micro.blog categories to automate selective syndication to Tumblr and Twitter failed. Posts were not showing up in either place, except for one post that showed up on Tumblr but formatting was screwy.

And even if that problem were resolved, it would drive me crazy to remember to check the little category boxes every time I post to micro.blog.

So for now I’m going back to my previous default: Automatically cross-post everything to Tumblr, which results in duplicate posts when reblogging from Tumblr. And manually post to Twitter.

I may revisit this another day. I expect I will.

@manton said yesterday that using micro.blog automation to cross-post multiple categories might result in problems, and he suggested IFTTT instead for that case. But did I listen? Noooooooo.

Today on Cory Doctorow's Pluralistic.net

  • The Internet Archive is supporting unlimited book-lending during the crisis. “… they buy and scan one copy of every book (pretty much every book, ever) and lend it out to one person at a time. They’ve just announced that during the crisis, they are lifting the one-borrower-at-a-time restriction and allowing unlimited borrowing, ‘to meet the needs of a global community of displaced learners’. They call it the ‘National Emergency Library.'”

  • Kaiser threatens to fire Oakland nurses who wear their own masks. “Nurses who report for work wearing their own N95 masks have been threatened with immediate dismissal for ‘insubordination.'” Those masks don’t just protect nurses; they protect patients too.

  • O’Reilly is getting out of the conference business. Not just now – forever. Can’t plan for the future when they don’t know when the emergency will end.

  • Trump’s bible study teacher, Ralph Drollinger, thinks coronavirus is God’s wrath for Chinese excess, women working outside the workplace, American tolerance for homosexuality, and environmentalism. (I’m a Jewish nonbeliever, but I had the distinct impression that Christ preached loving your neighbor, charity toward the least of us, and not judging others.)

  • The $3/month DoNot Pay service uses an chatbot to automatically petition companies for relief during the coronavirus crisis. “Using a chatbot, you determine which of your bills are eligible for relief. Then it generates a ‘compassionate and polite request’ seeking help. If the company does not comply, it follows up with a firmer letter citing relevant state/federal laws.”

  • “Xi’s enemies sense weakness: Autocracies are only as good as their last crisis-response.

  • Immigrants face infection in ICE lockups.

  • Doctors and dentists are hoarding chloroquine in case it turns out to be an effective Covid-19 treatment, thus depriving people who rely on the drug for conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis and lupus.

  • The Toilet Paper Splitter is “a DIY project to separate a single two-ply roll into two single-ply rolls.”

  • This year’s science fiction Worldcon has been cancelled. WorldCons began in 1939, and have been held every year since other than 1942-45 during World War II.

  • The United States Postal Service is crucial to emergency response; it’s the only federal agency that can knock on every door in America in a single day. “When (if?) effective covid meds are available, it’s likely a postal worker will deliver them to you. Now is a good time to remember that the GOP have been trying to dismantle the universal, self-funding, vital USPS for decades, so that private carriers like UPS and Fedex can cream off the most profitable parts of its business and leave rural Americans in the cold.”

  • Volante Design is making stylish masks for covid responders – they can protect N95 masks from contamination, prevent you from touching your face, and partly contain coughs when medical masks are unavailable. They’re looking for donations to make and shop more. docs.google.com/spreadshe…

pluralistic.net/2020/03/2…

The travel, conference and tourism industry are going to be in recession for a long time after coronavirus is a distant memory.

As Charles Stross notes here in another context, people are going to be reluctant to gather in big groups with other people who’ve come from far away.

www.antipope.org/charlie/b…

He says he doesn’t expect to see much activity in science fiction conventions in 2021 or 2022. I agree and see this going far beyond science fiction conventions.

Most of my career has been closely tied with professional conferences. I’ve gone to one or two a month, mostly traveling by plane to get there. And the companies I work for have been primarily in the conference business, with editorial operations – my work – as a sideline. Those companies are going to be struggling for years.

Yet another reason why I see a career change in my short-term future.

Shopping run: I went to the supermarket yesterday – for the benefit of my local friends, the Vons on University in La Mesa. The crowd seemed about typical for a weekday afternoon, which is to say moderate. Neither heavy nor light. Most people were not wearing masks or gloves. I wore latex gloves – surprisingly light and comfortable, and blue, which made me think of the bad guys on the TV show “Firefly.” I did see a few other gloves-wearers, and a couple of people wearing masks. None of the staff were wearing gloves or masks.

The shelves for toilet paper, sanitizer and wipes were bare. Slim pickings on soup. My favorite pea soup with ham was in, Julie’s tortilla soup was out. Our favorite brand of cat littler had only one box in stock, but I was able to load up on an alternative. Everything else seemed pretty well stocked up, including meats, dairy and produce.

There was a box of hand sanitizers at the front entrance of the supermarket for public use. I think it’s there all the time, not just during the pandemic. Usually I don’t bother. Yesterday I took one and used it to quickly wipe down the handle of the shopping cart, even though I was wearing gloves and my hands wouldn’t be touching the handle.

We mostly kept a six-foot distance. Although we did get closer when we passed each other, we didn’t linger. We kept our distance at the shelves; if one person was taking something, the other hung back until the first was done. No reacharound.

When I got to the cashier, there was one woman in line, behind the person being checked out. She took two steps back and I realized I had been standing too close, and did the same. When it was her turn, and I stepped up to the on-deck position, the cashier said I should load my groceries on the conveyer belt like usual, and then stand at the end of the checkout counter until it was my turn.

I asked when toilet paper would be in stock. She said likely Wednesday, but I should be sure to get there early. When the store opens at 7 am there’s a line of 150 people waiting to get in.

I am slightly concerned as we are legit running low on TP. Got about a week’s supply. Got plenty of facial tissues and paper towels so that’s not a cause for concern. Likewise, while I am running low on my favorite hand soap, we have plenty of other soap.

Our pending possible shortages are like inaudible whispers compared with the jet engine roar of what may be coming in a few weeks.

So like I said, I ordered a new iPad Pro last night. I am a confessed Apple fanboy, so I’m excited to get it and feel like I can barely wait the 2-2.5 weeks until it’s due to arrive.

Last night as I was falling asleep, I found myself wondering what kind of world we’ll be in when the iPad gets here. Things are moving awfully fast.

I excavated my briefcase from where it was buried under cardboard boxes in my office. I thought I had packets of hand sanitizer wipes in there, but it turned out to be Coffee-Mate, which is not a substitute, I think.

"Julia Roberts’ performance is the magic spell that makes Pretty Woman work."

Appreciating “Pretty Woman,” 30 years later www.refinery29.com/en-ca/202…

I didn’t see “Pretty Woman” until years after it came out because chick flick. It’s a delightful movie. Julia Roberts yes but also Laura San Giacomo, who is an underappreciated national treasure. Jason Alexander is the perfect d-bag. And Richard Gere is Richard Gere and Hector Elizondo is Hector Elizondo, two things that are excellent to be.

I see a few social media darwinists saying we should be willing to sacrifice lives in the short term to restart the economy. But nobody’s willing to lead by example.

I have committed iPad Pro 13"

My brain has been tempting me with the new iPad Pro, about how nice it will be to have that big screen when I’m sitting and reading or doing social media. Or whatever. I’ve been replying to my brain that hey I just got laid off two months ago and I need to focus on building an income stream or finding another job.

My brain said to me this morning, well, if you had a new iPad Pro it would be a backup computer if the MacBook Pro goes belly-up and needs to spend time in the shop. You’ll be able to continue working. And until then you’ll be able to enjoy the iPad Pro – it won’t just sit on a shelf collecting dust.

I said to myself, ha ha foolish brain you are tempting me again with your ridiculous– wait, that actually makes sense.

So I talked it over with Julie. The iPad Pro arrives in 2-2.5 weeks.

How Biscoff Cookies Became the Snack We Crave on Planes www.cntraveler.com/story/how…

I never eat ‘em on the ground but I love them on planes.

It’s crazy how great it is when the flight attendant comes by with Biscoff or other favorite airplane treats. Same for the Amtrak snack boxes. I’m a grown-ass adult who can afford to buy this stuff for myself if I want it.

It’s time to track people’s smartphones to ensure they self-isolate during this global pandemic, says WHO boffin.

Professor Marylouise McLaws, a technical adviser to the World Health Organization’s Infection Prevention and Control Global Unit, praises Singapore, which has a system where the government sends an SMS to citizens, who click a link which uses the phone’s location services to report their location.

www.theregister.co.uk/2020/03/2…

It’s an intriguing system, with the advantage that citizens can easily opt out after the crisis, by simply refusing to participate.

We may need to allow government to track everybody’s locations during the duration of the pandemic. But we need to roll back surveillance when the emergency is over. And once government has been given power, it’s really, really hard to roll that back.

Video: Italian mayors berate citizens for breaking quarantine.

“Getting in your mobile hairdressers?! What the fuck is that for? Don’t you understand that the casket will be CLOSED?”

twitter.com/GiuliaRoz…

My first multi-person Zoom coffee break this morning. We discussed bronies and the catechism. I don’t think I’ve ever been to a meeting where either was discussed, let alone both.


I saw this excellent sidewalk art near the house. “Just keep walking” can be seen as inspirational or a threat.📷

. Minnie practices her reading comprehension skills.

Law firm warns work-from-home employees against eavesdropping by Alexa, baby monitors, etc.

Locked-Down Lawyers Warned Alexa Is Hearing Confidential Calls - Bloomberg

Mishcon de Reya LLP, the U.K. law firm that famously advised Princess Diana on her divorce and also does corporate law, issued advice to staff to mute or shut off listening devices like Amazon’s Alexa or Google’s voice assistant when they talk about client matters at home, according to a partner at the firm. It suggested not to have any of the devices near their work space at all.

Mishcon’s warning covers any kind of visual or voice enabled device, like Amazon and Google’s speakers. But video products such as Ring, which is also owned by Amazon, and even baby monitors and closed-circuit TVs, are also a concern, said Mishcon de Reya partner Joe Hancock, who also heads the firm’s cybersecurity efforts.

We don’t have them in the house. The risk seems high, and the potential benefit seems low.

Today on Cory Doctorow's Pluralistic

A law firm is telling employees to switch off smart speakers and similar devices while working from home.

We don’t have any in the house. The payoff seems low in the potential risk seems high.

A Florida city sent power disconnection notices to its poorest residents during the pandemic crisis. The mayor is ducking accountability.

Rashida Tlaib proposes meeting trillion dollar coins, and then using those to send “every person in the USA a $2K prepaid credit card that would receive $1K/month until a year after the crisis’s end."

Each person – children, adults, documented, undocumented, rich, poor – would get the card and the deposits, and progressive taxation would rake it back from those who don’t need it (far more reliable than means-testing, which is a persistent failure).

How “concierge doctors” supply the “worried well” with masks, respirators and tests

One big difference I observed between my life under Canadian medicare (30 years), and UK NHS (13 years) is that in the former, there is no private option, so rich people have to advocate for everyone’s care in order to improve their own. I think the relative fortunes of the NHS and OHIP can be largely explained by this difference. Allowing the rich to opt into a private system reduces the political costs of slashing the public system.

More: Pluralistic: 22 Mar 2020

ME

THERMOMETER: Your temperature is “don’t be such a hypochondriac you don’t have the rona” degrees.

ME (before the rona): <Bleeding profusely, skin inflamed, boils, hacking wheezing cough, seizures, occasional blindness> Probably nothing. It’ll go away on its own in a couple of days.

ME (now): <coughs once, softly, slight headache> OMG I got the rona I’m gonna die!

We’re “taking our temperature with a mercury thermometer” years old.

ME (before the rona): I haven’t been out except to walk the dog and run essential errands. All my communications, except with Julie, are online. I’m ok with that.

ME (after the rona): Same, but now I’m going nuts with claustrophobia.

From the comments: She is holding the floppy in the one spot you’re not supposed to touch it. via

I saw this hopeful sign while walking the dog. 📷 🎉

I just ordered clippers for a home haircut. I am prepared for the apocalypse.

Jungle Comics #93 (1947), cover by Joe Doolin Via

There is a lot going on here.

We need a moonshot program to build a first-class healthcare system in the US in the next year or so.

This will certainly be difficult but it will benefit in so many ways.

I saw Lake Murray looking spectacular this afternoon. 📸

Beijing fears Covid-19 is a turning point for China and globalization

China didn’t start coronavirus, but Chinese incompetence and authoritarianism is a big part of the reason why it’s now a global pandemic, rather than a local problem.

The same Chinese government that mishandled the crisis at first is now telling us that everything’s fine in China now; they’ve got it under control. Seriously?

Michael Auslin:

While the world fights the coronavirus pandemic, China is fighting a propaganda war. Beijing’s war aim is simple: shift away from China all blame for the outbreak, the botched initial response, and its early spread into the broader world. At stake is China’s global reputation, as well as the potential of a fundamental shift away from China for trade and manufacturing. Also at risk is the personal legacy of General Secretary Xi Jinping, who has staked his legitimacy on his technocratic competence. After dealing with the first great global crisis of the 21st century, the world must fundamentally rethink its dependence on China.

… no one knows if Beijing’s claims that new indigenous cases are slowing down are true or not, given long-standing doubt about the veracity of any official Chinese statistics, and the party’s failure to act in the early days of the coronavirus.

Auslin goes on to say that the coronavirus pandemic is making globalization downsides apparent, particularly the reliance on China for so much manufacturing, particularly essential drugs.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/…

Dr. Fabiano Di Marco, a doctor in a hospital in Bergamo, Italy, shares his story: “It’s like a war,” he says. “We cry every day.” The US may be headed the same way. www.nytimes.com/2020/03/1…

The origin stories of the peace sign, smiley face and power button symbol.

There are symbols all around us that we take for granted, like the lightning strike icon, which indicates that something is high voltage. Or a little campfire to indicate that something is flammable. Those icons are pretty obvious, but there are others that aren’t so straightforward. Like, why do a triangle and a stick in a circle indicate “peace”? Where does the smiley face actually come from?"

99percentinvisible.org/episode/u…

Cory Doctorow: Plague precautions from 1665.

A comprehensive list, resembling extreme measures we might see today – both virtues and flaws (tippling in public houses STILL permitted).

Science was just getting started then, but people had plenty of experience with plague.

Among the precautions: Public entertainments, including bear-baiting, are banned. The bears must have been pleased.

pluralistic.net/2020/03/1…

Cory Doctorow: "Bigoted Republican Congressjerk votes against coronavirus relief because it might cover same-sex partnerships."

Cory: “The Republican Party, folks. The party of death and poverty and tragedy and hate. Remember that in November.”

pluralistic.net/2020/03/1…

In reality, the law that hateful moron Andy Biggs (R-Az) objects to makes no change to US policy regarding same-sex partnerships. None.

Also, the way infectious disease works is that for any of us to be protected, all of us need protection. Even people we find contemptible, like Andy Biggs.

John Green on coronavirus: “Togetherness is the superpower of our species. Like, yeah, we as individuals are very smart, as animals go, but it is our collective knowledge that has made us so successful.”

youtu.be/dh23nwxpf…