Justin Trudeau is not the one who infected his wife Sophie Grégoire. She got infected during a trip to the UK for a speaking engagement. He was not with her.

I don't live in every other country, but there were plenty of other countries that were far better prepared. But I do live in a country that was given a two month preview of what the virus would do if and when it got to the U.S. But the country is being run by an incompetent Baby Boomer jackass who would rather lie to us about the severity of the problem than to take proper precautions to mitigate the damage. It is unforgivable that we aren't even able to do something as basic as test people for it. This was not an unavoidable situation.

You guys have hot leadership. A good looking prime minister, and his wife, also good looking. :cheers:

Oh yea... I'm sure she got infected. ;)


https://img-s-msn-com.akamaized.net/...pg&x=376&y=202
Credit: https://www.msn.com/en-ca/money/tops...gue/ar-AAHDKI0

I haven’t lost my job but I’ve lost enough money to buy a very large McMansion in Houston. But I have to trust that this too will pass. The main difference from a couple of previous experiences in my life is that this thing, should I get it, could deprive me of being around when it does pass.

He let her go at such a time. But my point wasn’t to blame him. It was to say young and old have all done things in these times we may regret. It’s not a function of age.

Name one and tell me how it was better prepared. None in Europe, surely. Not Japan which is still trying to hold the Olympics. South Korea did get things together admirably when they were the first country outside China that was overwhelmed but the fact remains they wrre overwhelmed for a time and we still don’t have it as bad as they did in spite of all the yelling.

I'm not even a Boomer and I thought the 'Blame Boomers for everything' shtick was pretty stupid the moment it started. I don't recall my parents (Boomers) blaming my grandparents generation (War Generation) for all the crap that went on in their formative years (Vietnam, Civil Rights, AIDS, etc, etc)

Well we did have the “Don’t trust anybody over 30” thing but we were being DRAFTED and sent to war and killed. Friends of mine were killed. Nobody in the younger generations was ever drafted and forced to do anything at risk of their lives (maybe until now if they’re in a healthcare field).

South Korea was light years better prepared than us. Japan, Taiwan, Singapore, hell, even China and they didn't have the luxury of a warning. There is absolutely no excuse for the United States to have been so unprepared. I don't care what Europe is doing.

You are just wrong and suffering from an extreme case of “grass is greener on the other side of the fence” syndrome.

Japan messed up bigtime keeping everybody aboard the Princess cruise ship and their own epidemiologists admit it. They have still not enforced any form of lockdown beyond their societal customs and have held onto the illusion they can hold the Olympics in July.

China notoriously hid the problem and failed to respond for at least 2 months, partly contributing to our slow start by refusing to let CDC people in to see what was going on. Singapore, I recently read is now having a second wave of infections but they have always been a more regimented society than we have.

I’ll let you tell me in what way you think Taiwan has done a better job—I don’t see the point in researching their situation.

Finally, things were bad in South Korea before they started getting better. They are a smaller country but still one with a large manufacturing base. In many respects it was easier for them to produce things like masks on short notice but still they were putting patients in tents at the worst. I don’t see how they were better prepared.

I don't know. I always thought blaming everyone else for the world's problems pretty apt from my point of view. It makes me feel better. The only problem I have with it is when somebody else does it. That drives me up the wall.

It's a waste of my time detailing the obvious ways that those countries handled it much better than what's happening here. A quick Google search could answer that for you. And these are countries that didn't have a two month head start like we did. The people most responsible for our lack of preparation are in Washington, D.C., not Beijing.

We did have plenty of time to prepare. On a side note, some can't even be tested unless one is really sick.

My GF couldn't be tested because she was not really sick (she has some odd symptoms at the moment, so she is quarantining). And this is over at Robert Wood in New Brunswick NJ. The doctor told her unless she is admitted. Doing tests if one is only admitted.

Still some issues with testing going on.

I don’t need a Google search. Stuck at home like everyone, I spend hours a day reading what everyone around the world is doing and they are all, without exception, having stumbling starts and making mistakes. As a general rule, the smaller more homogeneous countries are getting it together faster but Japan, which you mentioned, is actually a standout on the “bad” side of things.

For a developed western country, especially a very large one, we seem about average. One problem we are having is our form of government. Parliamentary systems, in which the head of government has a majority in the legislature, can pass stimulus measures and so forth a lot more quickly and with less mess than we can.

But when it comes to things like having enough ventillators, we do have an emergency stock (13,000 I read which is more than in sll of the UK total) and we have some spare hospital capacity—the 2 hospital ships—which only a few other countries (the UK has one I think) have.

Just got laid off.

Whole firm (architecture) packing it in.

Our three biggest clients all said they have no ability to pay us their debts and all current and future projects are immediately dead in the water.



Great Depression 2.0 here we come.

Odd they aren’t waiting to see if Congress makes “groans” (loans that turn into grants for firms that don’t lay off workers) become available.

Sorry to hear Steely.

Sadly we are going to see a lot of this. And then it will be interesting to see whether people think I was right initially that governments have set their implicit targets for “acceptable deaths” far too low, and are doing too much harm to the economy and lives of everyone else as a result.

Really sorry to hear the news from SSPers losing their jobs.

Hopefully we can get this behind us as soon as possible (I know, but one can always hope) and that things can get back to normal.

Hopefully your wife still has a job. At least you can go out and bike a lot more now.

Wow, really sorry to hear that! This is a scary time.


My company is forcing us to come into the office, albeit on different day shifts, despite being non-essential (marketing) and having the ability to work from home (we all have work laptops, access to network, etc). A little frustrating, at this point I think it's incredibly irresponsible to not do everything we can to end this as quickly as possible.