Analysis Topic: Politics & Social Trends
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.
Monday, April 13, 2020
The Society will Strike Back, or are the Swedish too Dumb? / Politics / Social Issues
By: Submissions
I first wrote about a contact tracing surveillance app on mobile phones on 6th April 2020. Six days later, on the 12th April Apple and Google announce their cooperation to develop such app. Apart from the fact the authorities will never let a tech company to store such sensitive information the fundamental problem with Google and Apple plan is the fact that a government will not accept a disease carrier individual to freely and anonymously pass a disease to others in society. It is against the fundamental responsibility of each sovereign state to keep health and well being of society. It is highly naive if Apple or Google thinks that the state will not get involved and will have a closed eye on the control of such sensitive information. As I stated before we will move eventually more to a full implementation of a state contact tracing (surveillance) plan.Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, April 13, 2020
Covid-19: Who, what, when, where and Why? / Politics / Pandemic
By: Richard_Mills
If there is one thing we know about the coronavirus, it’s that getting a jump on it helps to limit the number of infections. Clearly the best time to stop this, and all outbreaks, is in its early stages.
Both China and the United States have been accused of suppressing information and delaying acting on knowledge that could have significantly limited the spread of covid-19.
Some may argue this is no time for armchair quarterbacking, as the virus continues to ravage the United States, Canada and several nations in Western Europe including the UK, France, Germany, Italy and Spain.
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Monday, April 13, 2020
Coronavirus Socialism / Politics / Coronavirus Depression
By: Patrick_Watson
When (hopefully soon) we all get out of coronavirus lockdown and try to resume normal life, we will probably find a different “normal.”
The best-case outcome: scientists discover a “magic bullet” treatment that quickly restores the most serious cases to health. We could then ease restrictions and get on with business.
But more likely, any such treatment is months away and a vaccine probably a year away, so many precautions will have to stay in place. We won’t see large gatherings and crowded restaurants anytime soon.
But we’ll see something else: a radically different economic structure.
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Sunday, April 12, 2020
UK Coronavirus Trend Trajectory Current State - Video / Politics / Pandemic
By: Nadeem_Walayat
At times it can be difficult not to be swept along with the NHS wave that has gripped Britain, the clapping and cheering, and stories of Nightingale hospitals coming on stream with thousands of beds. But the same dynamics are at work here, i.e. a high percentage of people on ventilators eventually dying and a surge in the number of patients, so one should take media stories focused on the 15,000 or so of extra beds across Britain's Nightingale hospitals with a pinch of salt, as likely they will not turn out to be anywhere near as effective as people believe them to be should they end up in a Nightingale hospital. So more a publicity stunt than building effective extra capacity.
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Saturday, April 11, 2020
US Coronavirus Trend Trajectory Forecast Update - Video / Politics / Pandemic
By: Nadeem_Walayat
My forecast as of 22nd of March is for the US to trend towards 531,000 tested as infected by the end of April coupled with 26,550 deaths, for a Case Fatality Rate (CFR) of 5%, as it was hoped that valuable time would not be squandered on political bickering during this escalating national emergency, where every day counts.
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Wednesday, April 08, 2020
When Will UK Coronavirus Crisis Imrpove - Infections and Deaths Trend Trajectory Analysis / Politics / Pandemic
By: Nadeem_Walayat
UK Coronavirus Trend Trajectory Current State
At times it can be difficult not to be swept along with the NHS wave that has gripped Britain, the clapping and cheering, and stories of Nightingale hospitals coming on stream with thousands of beds. But the same dynamics are at work here, i.e. a high percentage of people on ventilators eventually dying and a surge in the number of patients, so one should take media stories focused on the 15,000 or so of extra beds across Britain's Nightingale hospitals with a pinch of salt, as likely they will not turn out to be anywhere near as effective as people believe them to be should they end up in a Nightingale hospital. So more a publicity stunt than building effective extra capacity.
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Wednesday, April 08, 2020
BBC Newsnight Focuses on Tory Leadership Whilst Boris Johnson Fights for his Life! / Politics / UK Politics
By: N_Walayat
At a time of unprecedented national emergency, with thousands dieing each week and our Prime Minister fighting for his life, what does BBC Newsnight focus on? Potential divisions within the Tory party and its leadership! So watch the following that was broadcast a few hours ago on the 7th of April and make your own minds up if BBC Newsnight crossed the line or not!
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Wednesday, April 08, 2020
The Post CoronaVirus New Normal / Politics / Coronavirus Depression
By: John_Mauldin
I don’t think anyone believes we will go to back to anything like January 2020 normalcy anytime soon. We have no idea, even if restaurants and everything open, what shopping patterns will look like.
Are we learning to live on less in our isolation? Seeing your 401(k) become a 201(k) may postpone a car-buying decision or two.
My daughter (see below) works for a cheerleading gymnastics company. Nationwide this is a multi-hundred-million-dollar industry. Will they just open back up and expect all the girls go back on day one? Will their parents be able to afford it? We’re talking many tens of thousands of jobs. Personal trainers? Many jobs will be under pressure.
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Tuesday, April 07, 2020
US Coronavirus Trend Trajectory Forecast Current State / Politics / Pandemic
By: Nadeem_Walayat
My forecast as of 22nd of March is for the US to trend towards 531,000 tested as infected by the end of April coupled with 26,550 deaths, for a Case Fatality Rate (CFR) of 5%, as it was hoped that valuable time would not be squandered on political bickering during this escalating national emergency, where every day counts.
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Tuesday, April 07, 2020
Boris Johnson Fighting for his Life In Intensive Care - UK Coronavirus Crisis / Politics / Pandemic
By: N_Walayat
Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson is said to be fighting for his life after being moved to Intensive Care a few hours ago. After having contracted Coronavirus about 2 weeks ago, and diagnosed some 10 days ago with the symptoms rapidly worsening over the past couple of days prompting being admitted to St Thomas's hospital on Sunday having received oxygen Monday before being moved to intensive care.
At this point in time it is not clear if he has been put onto a ventilator or not, which unfortunately carries a high mortality rate of over 80% as most of those put on ventilators don't tend to make it.
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Tuesday, April 07, 2020
Was the Fed Just Nationalized? / Politics / US Federal Reserve Bank
By: Ellen_Brown
Did Congress just nationalize the Fed? No. But the door to that result has been cracked open.
Mainstream politicians have long insisted that Medicare for all, a universal basic income, student debt relief and a slew of other much-needed public programs are off the table because the federal government cannot afford them. But that was before Wall Street and the stock market were driven onto life-support by a virus. Congress has now suddenly discovered the magic money tree. It took only a few days for Congress to unanimously pass the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, which will be doling out $2.2 trillion in crisis relief, most of it going to Corporate America with few strings attached. Beyond that, the Federal Reserve is making over $4 trillion available to banks, hedge funds and other financial entities of all stripes; it has dropped the fed funds rate (the rate at which banks borrow from each other) effectively to zero; and it has made $1.5 trillion available to the repo market.
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Tuesday, April 07, 2020
US Coronavirus Blacktop Politics / Politics / US Politics
By: Richard_Mills
Benjamin Franklin once said; “Out of adversity comes opportunity.”
The adversity the United States now faces with the coronavirus pandemic is the worst national emergency the country has faced since World War II, more serious, far more deadly, than any natural disaster, 9/11, the War on Terrorism, the Korean War, maybe even Vietnam.
As of this writing, there are 211,143 cases and 4,713 deaths. More coronavirus patients have now died in the United States than in China, the pandemic epicenter, where extraordinary measures were taken to successfully contain it, including locking down entire cities (pop. 50 million), and contact tracing tens of thousands of people connected to those infected, so they could self-quarantine.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, said he believes the virus could kill 100,000 to 200,000 before it is done ravaging the US population. That “middle of the road” estimate is at least double the 58,200 American soldiers killed in the Vietnam War.
Depending how long this goes on, the economic fallout from covid-19 could be twice as bad as the Great Recession. A record 3.3 million Americans applied for unemployment insurance last week. If that keep up, one in three will be jobless by summer - more than during the Great Depression.
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Monday, April 06, 2020
Coronavirus is America's "Pearl Harbour" Moment, There Will be a Reckoning With China / Politics / China US Conflict
By: Nadeem_Walayat
The Coronavirus catastrophe continues to unfold which makes a mockery of all those from the President downwards who used to peddle the line that it was not much worse than the flu. Well whilst many including the President have since changed their tune, however a significant number of people continue to not take it seriously stating that the high death rate is as a consequence of lack of testing..
However, if the coronavirus was little worse than the flu then as the US has now increased testing to over 100,000 per day then the case fatality rate should be falling. But that's not what's happening as the more the US tests then the higher the death rate climbs each day and each week.
So the problem with the not much worse than the flu assumption is that the Case Fatality Rates are INCREASING WITH MORE TESTING!
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Friday, April 03, 2020
US Between Scylla and Charybdis Covid-19 / Politics / Pandemic
By: Richard_Mills
I’m just going to come right out and say it: The United States is not equipped to deal with a pandemic. The nation of 327 million, despite having the number one economy in the world, and by far the most powerful military, is shockingly ill-prepared, not only in terms of having the proper supplies to fight the hard-to-kill coronavirus, but also regarding its lack of focus, its dearth of leadership, and perhaps most failingly, its inability to mobilize a population against a common viral enemy.
On Monday, US stocks rallied, due to traders optimistic over efforts to deliver rapid testing of the coronavirus, and multinational Johnson & Johnson announcing a potential vaccine candidate.
Prompt and widespread testing in other countries, like South Korea, has been effective in curbing the spread of covid-19. But the US testing regime has proved woefully inadequate. There are not nearly enough test kits available, it took too long to start testing, and the kits have been slow to deliver results to an anxious population.
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Friday, April 03, 2020
Covid19 What's Your Risk of Death Analysis by Age, Gender, Comorbidities and BMI / Politics / Pandemic
By: Nadeem_Walayat
The Coronavirus Infections and deaths trend trajectories for the UK and US continue to go parabolic, far beyond anything anyone could have imagined even 2 weeks ago when the US had just 170 deaths and the UK 100, since which time they have continued to follow catastrophic trajectories recently prompting dire warnings out of the UK and US to expect as many as 20,000 UK deaths and 200,000 US deaths.
The focus of this analysis will be on the probability of dieing if one contracts Covid19 over the coming weeks, analysis which is based on data from the Journal of American Medical Association and the Lancet's analysis of Italian and Chinese deaths.
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Thursday, April 02, 2020
US Coronavirus Infections & Deaths Trend Trajectory - How Bad Will it Get? / Politics / Pandemic
By: Nadeem_Walayat
The only adult in the White House Dr Fauci has started stating what sort of death toll to expect for the Untied States over the coming months of between 100,000 to 200,000 deaths as a consequence of the Coronavirus pandemic.
Trump implemented the Defence Production act mobilising US industry into producing tens of thousands of ventilators, which whilst good is however TOO LATE as the actions the US is taking today should have been taken a month ago!
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Thursday, April 02, 2020
COVID-19 FINANCIAL LOCKDOWN: Can PAYPAL Be Trusted to Handle US $1200 Stimulus Payments? / Politics / Coronavirus Depression
By: N_Walayat
Paypal are seeing an opportunity in a crisis, one of wanting to manage the US Governments distribution of $1200 Coronavirus stimulus to every adult American who earns under $75,000 per year and $500 for each child.
However, there is a fly in the ointment as $360 billion would be a lot of money to be potentially parked in Paypal's coffers! That's before any transaction fees are applied. Therefore, there is a high risk of corporations such as Paypal seeing such a vast sums of funds as an opportunity to capitalise upon through limiting account holders access to stimulus funds.
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Wednesday, April 01, 2020
UK Coronavirus Infections and Deaths Trend Trajectory - Deviation Against Forecast / Politics / Pandemic
By: Nadeem_Walayat
So Boris Johnson is infected and self isolating, Matt Hancock the Health Minster is infected and self isolating, Chris Whitty the Chief Medical officer is infected and self isolating. Westminister is now turning into a hottest of UK hotspots as the officials and MP's failed to practice that which they preached. Maybe with these idiots out of the picture the nation can act more competently in containing the pandemic. Meanwhile the government representative at the daily briefings has started mentioning that if the UK can keep deaths below 20,000 than that would be a good thing! What's South Korea's number? 150! CRIMINAL! That's what the governments response to Coronavirus has been CRIMINAL! Now there are even reports that the government is under reporting the number of deaths perhaps in attempts to average out the numbers over a month rather than to post spikes that would panic healthcare workers and the general public.
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Wednesday, April 01, 2020
US Coronavirus Infections and Deaths Projections Trend Forecast - Video / Politics / Pandemic
By: Nadeem_Walayat
The US has had a major advantage over the rest of the western world, which is that it has had a LOT MORE TIME TO PRPARE FOR THE PANDEMIC, Unfortunately the US only really started to actually act in any significant manner when the stock prices started to collapse early March. However, that still gave the US a good head start on the likes of the UK, which is reflected in the US's low CFR rate of 1.3%.
Which suggests that the US DOES have a chance to get a grip on the pandemic and veer more towards South Korea then Italy or Britain where the pandemic is more less now baked in.
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Wednesday, April 01, 2020
From Global Virus Acceleration to Global Debt Explosion / Politics / Pandemic
By: Dan_Steinbock
The novel coronavirus is exploding in the US and Europe, due to complacency and inadequate preparedness. The escalation will translate to debt explosion, which will further complicate and prolong the fight against the virus globally.
As the COVID-19 challenge moved from imported cases to local transmissions, I warned in the briefing of March 9 that the rise of local transmissions was a game-changer in the coronavirus escalation. Here's what I projected then:
“Even though many observers expected virus challenges to ease toward April, the acceleration of new cases outside China is only beginning and likely grossly under-reported. The number of confirmed cases worldwide is set to climb in the future – even faster as tests are broadened in major affected countries.”
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