Differentiating fact from opinion on COVID-19



  • I understand one of the key points of Bolton’s book coming out is that every single thing Trump does is motivated by how it will affect his reelection chances. Unfortunately, I think reopening early was a swing for the reelection fences @jayballer73 even if it was advised against.



  • I don’t think we should shut back down.

    I do think everyone should be Highly encouraged to wear a mask by all people in leadership positions. And I think we should do as much temperature taking as possible.

    I just don’t feel like we did enough logistically while we were shut down to handle reopening when we did. But too late now.

    I agree that you can’t cheer on protests and then criticize someone for going to a political rally without sounding hypocritical. Either it’s safe to gather or it isn’t.

    I’m glad I pushed my wedding back. I know people in Florida who went to a wedding that had an outbreak.

    I wonder if things would be different for Trumps polling if he had said to wear a mask and listen to professionals.



  • @Kcmatt7 I’m not a fan of Obama but he was at least a grown up and would have handled this so much better.



  • Health officials in Riley County/ Manhattan , are saying there are 2 Corona outbreaks in Manhattan - - - -The KSU Football team & Aggieville now CLOSED



  • We can snuff it out in two or three months… starting whenever people start to care.



  • @DanR I gave up on them.



  • Donald Trump is a businessman and that’s how he approaches being the president is running the US like a business. Some results are beneficial to this as I’ve generally liked the trade deals he’s put in place or attempted to put in place and to try and deregulate in areas because I believe those would benefit the US long term.

    Handling this pandemic from a business mindset is not beneficial because the mentality is to reopen as quickly as possible to minimize financial burdens on businesses to avoid bailing them out as much as possible, obviously some industries received bailouts and will likely be subsidized for the foreseeable future. Combine that mentality with not using federal power to regulate and enforce a shut down to and have everyone on the same page.

    I think Trump is costing himself the election with his handling of Covid as even many within the Republican Party (at all levels) have been hesitant to fully support Trump’s Covid policies.



  • All he had to do to win in a landslide was to start early on with emphasizing how important short term sacrifice was to long term success, and then follow through with quick and dramatic efforts to follow health officials advice. But that would have meant deferring to the judgment of others, and he is pathologically incapable of doing so.



  • @Texas-Hawk-10 said in Differentiating fact from opinion on COVID-19:

    Donald Trump is a businessman

    Bullshit. Compared to what other successful business man or woman? Who would be his peers? What company would have that guy as their CEO right now. Seriously. LOL. Even the worst bosses like the DeBartolo family would laugh at the idea that Trump is a “businessman.” unless you mean grifter. I thought we were past that laughable point.

    He’s a conman, second tier mafia wannabe, snake oil salesman, and, above all, malignant narcisist.



  • @DanR said in Differentiating fact from opinion on COVID-19:

    @Texas-Hawk-10 said in Differentiating fact from opinion on COVID-19:

    Donald Trump is a businessman

    Bullshit. Compared to what other successful business man or woman? Who would be his peers? What company would have that guy as their CEO right now. Seriously. LOL. Even the worst bosses like the DeBartolo family would laugh at the idea that Trump is a “businessman.” unless you mean grifter. I thought we were past that laughable point.

    He’s a conman, second tier mafia wannabe, snake oil salesman, and, above all, malignant narcisist.

    Just because you disagree with his morals and ethics doesn’t change the fact that Trump is a businessman. There’s plenty of businessmen out there who clawed their way to the top by doing a whole lot of illegal, unethical, and immoral deeds. This isn’t a trait exclusive to the right, it applies business leaders on both sides of the aisle unless you think noted liberal Mark Zuckerberg is a shining beacon or moral and ethics.

    The list of people who became very successful and very wealthy in business being immoral and unethical is much longer than the people who do things the “right way”.



  • @Texas-Hawk-10 I think the bigger disagreement is whether as a businessman Trump can be considered successful. His bankruptcies, the fraudulent “university”, the fact that his wealth may be all boast with no depth, the dozens of lawsuits against him… all of those do not seem marks of success. There are some calculations suggesting the money his dad loaned him and his inheritance would have grown in value far more if it had just been put in interest-bearing accounts.

    We might learn more if the Supreme Court decides his taxes must be produced.



  • @mayjay said in Differentiating fact from opinion on COVID-19:

    @Texas-Hawk-10 I think the bigger disagreement is whether as a businessman Trump can be considered successful. His bankruptcies, the fraudulent “university”, the fact that his wealth may be all boast with no depth, the dozens of lawsuits against him… all of those do not seem marks of success. There are some calculations suggesting the money his dad loaned him and his inheritance would have grown in value far more if it had just been put in interest-bearing accounts.

    We might learn more if the Supreme Court decides his taxes must be produced.

    I never mentioned anything about his successes or failures though so that’s not really relevant. My initial post was Trump is a businessman and that’s the mentality he’s using to run the country and that I believe some of his decisions in regards to trade and regulation will be beneficial in the long term to the US.

    I also said that mentality is not good for a time like this with the pandemic because this is a situation where everyone needs to be on the same page and Trump’s mentality is counter to that. Trump is a capitalist and applying that mindset to the pandemic of letting each state handle it as they see fit and it’s not the right approach to take right now as there needs to clear direction from the top and he’s not doing that right now.



  • @Texas-Hawk-10 He’s not a “capitalist” either. Capitalists know which side of the bread the butter is on. Name one CEO who is going down Trump’s Covid million lives death march. He’s a malignant narcissist. Koolaid drinkers are still lined up for more of this? Still? I don’t get it. Wake up.

    What’s Zuckerberg have to do with this?



  • @DanR said in Differentiating fact from opinion on COVID-19:

    @Texas-Hawk-10 He’s not a “capitalist” either. Capitalists know which side of the bread the butter is on. Name one CEO who is going down Trump’s Covid million lives death march. He’s a malignant narcissist. Koolaid drinkers are still lined up for more of this? Still? I don’t get it. Wake up.

    What’s Zuckerberg have to do with this?

    If you bothered to take your blue colored glasses off, you would know that I’ve made quite a few posts of the past 3.5 years where I’ve specifically said I didn’t vote for Trump in 2016 and have recently said I have no desire to vote for him this year either. I usually vote Libertarian, so keep assuming I’m drinking the Trump Kool aid. I’m also not so blind with hatred that I don’t acknowledge areas where I believe Trump has done well, which is mostly in economic areas in regards to trade deals and attempting to deregulate different industries. I also gave Obama credit in regards to some of his foreign deals and trying to the US out of the Middle East. I don’t care which side of the aisle someone is on, if they do something I like, I’ll give them credit for it.

    This is my last response on the matter because you’re clearly too blinded by hatred to have rational and logical discussion on the matter.



  • My point was that he fails as a businessman, and so I do not think he acts like one in approaching the presidency. I admit he has made lots of pro-business decisions, but those short term advances for business will have huge costs to the country in environment, health care, job security, living conditions in the cities, rural education, and relationships with other countries. The tax cut left us with years of huge deficits, and threw billions to his wealthy backers. Not to mention his decisions to destroy accountability in government spending by firing numerous inspectors general and interfering with investigations by DOJ. Sure, Wall Street responded, which means only that borrowing and spending without restraint will keep investors happy and make stocks go up. No preparing for any problems has left us grasping for solutions when a big one has come along.

    And having looted American commerce as he did several companies, he will walk away while others have to pick up the pieces.



  • If we were in such a rush to open (and many were) there should have been mandatory mask requirements in public. That would have allowed lots of businesses to reopen, while cutting down on infection spread. But somehow, people wanted to reopen quickly and not wear masks.

    So we ended up here. Infection rates approaching the high of April, no vaccine and many businesses struggling to stay afloat because consumer confidence is low, so even though businesses are open, they are not getting enough customers to make things work. It was a bad strategy to begin with. You cannot reopen if people do not have basic confidence that they won’t get sick (or get someone close to them sick) just by going out into the world.

    Masks could have helped prevent that. But apparently wearing a mask (which I do whenever I go out) is a sign of weakness and fear.

    So prepare for many more waves until we get a vaccine because it won’t get any better until we take some serious proactive steps.



  • @justanotherfan said in Differentiating fact from opinion on COVID-19:

    If we were in such a rush to open (and many were) there should have been mandatory mask requirements in public. That would have allowed lots of businesses to reopen, while cutting down on infection spread. But somehow, people wanted to reopen quickly and not wear masks.

    So we ended up here. Infection rates approaching the high of April, no vaccine and many businesses struggling to stay afloat because consumer confidence is low, so even though businesses are open, they are not getting enough customers to make things work. It was a bad strategy to begin with. You cannot reopen if people do not have basic confidence that they won’t get sick (or get someone close to them sick) just by going out into the world.

    Masks could have helped prevent that. But apparently wearing a mask (which I do whenever I go out) is a sign of weakness and fear.

    So prepare for many more waves until we get a vaccine because it won’t get any better until we take some serious proactive steps.

    Couldn’t agree more. 1st , I’ve said this before & I’ll say it again. I fully get that we needed to get the economy re-opened quickly , but WHY could people not follow restrictions ? Sadly a lot of people once their State started to re-open just went full bore and threw all caution to the side. Some just to busy so they thought to be bothered with a mask.

    Others just flat ass don’t give a dam thinking that the mask was a nuisance crimped their style or just thought that they were immune to contracting the Corona. Now just got through reading that where the Virus has came back/now spiking , the economy in this states are once again weakening / Like you say I think until we get a vaccine , this is a problem that we are going to CONTINUE to have issues with , sadly a lot of this could of been avoided if people would of used a little more caution, Still you have people like the Governor of Florida STILL refusing to put a mandatory order for masks even though the state hit a all time high of 5500 cases in one day - complete idiot.

    Now hearing the White house say that maybe they didn’t take these spikes as seriously as they should have. The President making a crazy statement saying that People were wearing masks because they DIDN’T LIKE HIM ? - - - -WHAT ? -what kind of a knee jerk statement is that. ? I’ wore my make and STILL wearing my mask , not because I don’t like him , but I’m wearing to try and prevent from getting this dam thing.

    24 States are now hitting all time highs with positive cases , and the WHO worried about big spikes/2nd waves coming in September & November, the bottom line is without a vaccine , it’s going to continue to get ugly.



  • @justanotherfan I watched the kobach, Marshall, lundstrohm(sp?) debate last night. Oh my! Why is wearing masks so political? Marshall is a Dr! They pretty much skipped right over the virus questions.



  • @jayballer73 the guy is a narcissistic idiot and can’t hide it any longer. He just can’t see the world without him in the center of the picture.



  • @Crimsonorblue22 Doc Marshall, as he seems to want to be called, was also taking Hydroxychloroquine and he certainly should have known it wasn’t a preventative/cure but I’m sure his idol Trump was pleased. @approxinfinity “He just can see the world without him in the center of the picture.” What a perfect way to describe Trump!



  • @justanotherfan we need more government intervention like other developed countries imo.



  • @bcjayhawk I know! He blew me away when he said that. I didn’t believe trump anyway. I won’t say more cause it’s not nice🤫



  • I would agree about not being able to shut back down. CNN ran a story about how the riots and protests didn’t lead to a rise in cases but ran an article about how a few thousand at a Trump rally caused a huge spike. The media thinks everyone is a potato at this point. Also if we are shutdown this winter millions will die because of the shut down not virus. The morality rate is less than 1% in this country still considerably less than the flu, pneumonia and other illnesses. Be smart and wash your hands. I’ll see if I can find the article about the hundreds of millions of dollars big businesses like amazon, Walmart, Menards etc made during shut down. Will never understand how standing apart in Walmart is different than any other store or local business. I’m just being as safe as I can, I have left my county once since early February and limited unneeded trips anywhere.



  • @kjayhawks said in Differentiating fact from opinion on COVID-19:

    The morality rate is less than 1% in this country still considerably less than the flu, pneumonia and other illnesses. Be smart and wash your hands.

    This is complete crazy talk. The mortality rate is 5.1% by current estimates for coronavirus in the US. Whatever source is telling you this has an agenda.

    https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/data/mortality

    Even if you don’t believe the rates, the estimates on total fatality count for flu in 2019 is 20k-62k according to CDC. And that’s without a quarantine! Imagine how much less it will be this year. Meanwhile coronavirus is around 120k and we aren’t near done.

    Please reevaluate.



  • @approxinfinity a 100 different sources say 100 different another problem in theses times.



  • @kjayhawks said in Differentiating fact from opinion on COVID-19:

    @approxinfinity a 100 different sources say 100 different another problem in theses times.

    Respectfully, it sounds like you’re sticking your head in the sand.

    The best we can do is to take the facts we have and interpret them to the best of our abilities. Throwing our hands in the air because of a few inconsistencies isn’t going to get us anywhere.











  • @approxinfinity the cdc and Fauci have been wrong in this several times, hospitals have admitted to inflating numbers to make more money 🤷🏻♂️. I refuse to believe 90% of the info on the stuff because it contradicts itself every 2 weeks.



  • @benshawks08 said in Differentiating fact from opinion on COVID-19:

    https://twitter.com/ljkawa/status/1275918235276279812?s=21

    And

    https://twitter.com/wendellpotter/status/1276158510955401216?s=21

    The Canadian picture is much more murky than old Wendell would like to admit. When it comes to timely access to care, the US beats Canada in most metrics. https://www.cihi.ca/sites/default/files/document/commonwealth-fund-2016-chartbook-en-web-rev.pptx

    And we do it while the rest of the world gets access to the staggering amount of R&D and innovation here in the US. https://www.forbes.com/sites/matthewherper/2011/03/23/the-most-innovative-countries-in-biology-and-medicine/



  • @FarmerJayhawk no it’s the social media age anything you find on Facebook or Twitter has to be 100% true…



  • @kjayhawks if you think that the flu is more deadly than coronavirus, you’re misinformed. The death counts are facts. Not opinions.



  • @approxinfinity until you read the hospitals have been falsifying cases. I’m not saying it isn’t deadly I can share twitter posts as well of licensed nurses saying it’s all bs. I trust no one and nothing.



  • Flu is 8 months, COVID 4 months



  • @kjayhawks I don’t know what to say man. Do you honestly think that the whole world is making coronavirus up?





  • And OF COURSE we all know that Twitter is 100 % gospel right ?



  • @approxinfinity not at all, just don’t believe its as deadly. I trust no numbers that I didn’t calculate, sorry the world has lead me down this path with false information repeatedly.



  • @kjayhawks Do you realize how hard it would be to fake 126k US deaths?

    Do you know people who have died from it? I do.



  • @approxinfinity right no where I have stated that people aren’t dying. No where have I stated we should do nothing. The reading comprehension on the site is very low. I simply stated I don’t trust the numbers, that is all sir. You’re a grown man my friend, you are free to believe whatever you choose. Have a good evening



  • @kjayhawks But how do you get any information if you trust nothing? How can you trust a claim that hospitals fudge death stats? How can you verify anything? I seriously want to know, because you are making contentions that have to be based on something you rely on. How do you choose?



  • @mayjay very true but y’all are the same taking one doctors video or post on Twitter to the bank tho others in the profession are saying it’s not true. I’m not doctor but I don’t trust people and I’m not saying I’m a 100% right about it being less deadly. I know facts are hard to come by buddy.



  • The people who think this is fake need to put themselves in my shoes. I have an 8 year old diabetic son, a 73 year old dad who has COPD and other health issues, a mother-in-law who has RA and a wife who has asthma.

    Why not waive on the side of caution? I’m not treating this as if I’m scared or too prideful to treat this serious. I treat this as I’d rather be uncomfortable (donning a mask) and have this be less serious than previously expected than be careless and danger my loved ones.

    Same goes for strangers who argue this point. They, in a way, are putting them in danger too. It’s not like we can stay home 100% of the time.

    Another one of view point in this is, and I’m not at all saying this is anyone here.
    This generation is a bunch of pu$$ies, pardon my French. Just think about it. People who think this is fake or are protesting the restrictions set in place would have never lasted in previous generations. From getting drafted in wars at the age of 18 or even going on a country wide ration during WWII. It would have impeded on their freedoms, right? I bet the kids storming the beaches in Normandy thought the same.

    All people have to do is wear a mask and wash their hands a little more often than they normally would. Not hard people.



  • Side note: I have a homemade KU mask so that’s pretty cool I guess.



  • @kjayhawks said in Differentiating fact from opinion on COVID-19:

    I would agree about not being able to shut back down. CNN ran a story about how the riots and protests didn’t lead to a rise in cases but ran an article about how a few thousand at a Trump rally caused a huge spike. The media thinks everyone is a potato at this point. Also if we are shutdown this winter millions will die because of the shut down not virus. The morality rate is less than 1% in this country still considerably less than the flu, pneumonia and other illnesses. Be smart and wash your hands. I’ll see if I can find the article about the hundreds of millions of dollars big businesses like amazon, Walmart, Menards etc made during shut down. Will never understand how standing apart in Walmart is different than any other store or local business. I’m just being as safe as I can, I have left my county once since early February and limited unneeded trips anywhere.

    One big difference between the protests and the rally is that the protests were all outside, where sunlight and air/humidity/wind all drive the spread of the virus down. Inside the arena, you don’t have those factors, so there’s a greater chance for spread in a large crowd.

    Another factor is mask use, as many protesters wore masks even outside, which further cuts down on spread, while the rally had lots of attendees not wearing masks, which, again, increases the chance of transmission.

    Those two factors (outside vs. inside and masks vs. no masks) are things that could have easily been predicted based on the science we have, which told us months ago that sunlight/humidity and air temperature could help slow the spread, and that wearing masks can cut person to person transmission.

    So the result is really no surprise.



  • @justanotherfan right I’m not saying that the trump rally didn’t increase cases but if you’re telling me folks not following the social distance guidelines and standing side by side in groups, several of which were not wearing mask didn’t increase cases. I’m not dignifying it with a response.



  • @kjayhawks I haven’t seen any stats on CNN saying the Trump rally increased cases. There have been articles about campaign staffers testing positive. There were articles on CNN expecting increases from both the protests and the rally.

    What gets you so bent out of shape when people attempt to discuss things with you, especially someone as non-provocative as @justanotherfan? Very odd response.



  • Also contact tracers have been instructed not to ask about attending protests, so we may never be able to really get the causal effect there.


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