Syrmax

he's right about those things. This isn't a Dem/GOP observation, but I hope that he internalizes the fact that Government at all levels but especially federal, were warned by 10 separate internal reports over the past 16 years about the US being woefully unprepared for a pandemic...and basically nothing was done. Which ensured a late and panicked response when a serious pandemic did happen. We were lucky that in 2009 H1N1 Swine flu and the previous SARS outbreaks weren't as virulent or transmissible as this thing is.

I'm going to try the Lysol next. Been looking for a way to shoot UV light inside my body.

Yes you are correct! I couldn't think of her name but it was Tanta. It was a real eye opener blog.

Spot on @cleetussnow I would just add, for posterity: During the run-up to the 2008 crisis i followed a blog - Calculated Risk - that was run by (IIRC) a couple of individuals that were well experienced in the R/E financial field. It was shocking to read about how the entire residential mortgage loan system was shot through with corruption, greed, and ignorance, from the people agreeing to mortgages with preposterous terms, to the mortgage companies arranging the loans, to the Appraisers (the f@cking appraisers even), who were matching home appraisals to whatever the loan was going to be as they were incentivized to support loans because they were paid per appraisal...by the mortgage companies (or lenders). Then you get to the Wall Street financial "engineering" and it was even worse. Sure enough, it all blew up. The only other thing i'd add as a backstory to 2008 (and this has been missed / forgotten by vapid Democrats and Republicans), is that pressure for the Financial Crisis stemmed back to what were thought to be good ideas in the 1990s. It's a sordid story full of players that are still cited as "experts" (looking at you Larry Summers and Alan Greenspan), but basically there was political pressure from the Left to expand Home Ownership. The Right, (and Libertarian Greenspan) rationalized this with the noble lie that expanding home ownership to lower income people would make more of the population "invested" in the economy, jobs, supporting the status quo...neither of which were wrong ideas. But...then the Banks were deregulated in the late 1990s because they were crying they couldn't make money and compete globally with new Investment Banking. So...Congress (a bipartisan effort) sh!tcanned the last of the 1930s Glass-Steagall rules that were still in effect from the heinous excesses that helped trigger the Great Depression (reckless lending, excessive leverage, etc.). So then the banks did what banks do...create new financial products to maximize gains and a derivative "insurance" system that promised to distribute losses should an R/E downturn occur. Except that it too was shot through with fraud and corruption from top to bottom...all while Regulators (SEC, etc) were asleep at the wheel kissing the asses of the likes of Bernie Madoff and surfing internet porn at the office (SEC staffers were fired over this, for real). End rant.

I think you are quite right with the above. It's hard to definitively know exactly what has, and what is, transpiring with the virus and its spread as there are different strains apparently and other variables exist: social distancing has been implemented to varying degrees of compliance, there appears to be a difference in R0 (if that's the right use of the term) between high density and low density population areas, inadequate testing, etc etc.. I don't think we'll have an accurate gauge of covid-19 mortality for quite a while as a lot of data has to be sorted and analyzed. Its clearly worse than seasonal flu but by exactly how much is TBD.

Wow. o:O

I did read it but didn't pick up on that. I'm kind of ok with my Delta credit - assuming they are still in business of course - because i plan on travelling/flying as soon as the coast is clear...

Delta only offered a similar flight credit for my flight from SYR-ORL. And did the same for my SYR-JFK flight, 1st leg to Italy. However, one of the people i was travelling with to Italy (who actually booked the flight on her CC) called Delta and bitched and supposedly managed to get a full refund for us. That ticket was only $256 R/T though. The ORL flt was $425 IIRC. Alitalia is providing a full refund of our ticket though. I had to apply via email and then when i didn't hear anything back, i called last week and was able to get straight thru to Customer Service (was impossible a month ago). Of course, with both of these, i'll believe it when i actually see it. Expedia has refunded virtually all of my Italy hotel reservations and i've received those. I put in for those back in mid March when the whole thing got locked down. They are trying to screw me out of the cost of our last night in Rome reservation refund, although it was only $61 per room. I thought i had put in to cancel it a month ago but either i missed it (there were 4 other reservations i was doing) or their website never registered it. When i went to cancel the res the other day it stated no refund available. I'm going to follow up but if that's the total of refund screwjobs, i'll consider myself lucky as I didn't purchase "travel insurance" on any of it.

this plan makes sense, in its general organization. Glad to hear this. IMO Cuomo has generally done pretty well with covid-19. His brother is a bit of a histrionic lunatic but he's not Gov.

Those transition plans, at least in NY, will likely have to be lengthened out as the plan is basically for the State to subsidize "green" energy to the tune of Billions per year...which will have to be rethought with State budgets about to be blown out. Sadly, the Gov, being influenced by radical environmentalists, has turned his back on natural gas and downstate nuclear (Indian Point). That also has a long term jobs impact as the "green jobs" are largely small contractor behind the meter installations (rooftop solar). Wind and Solar provide virtually no long term employment in state, to generate electricity, and are minimal / no carbon emissions.

Gasoline pretty much is there, if you account for inflation and NY's increased fuel taxes since the 1990s... Gas locally at BJs was selling for $1.89/gal last week. The other non-member Stop n Robs are around $2.10-$2.20 still because they are all in cahoots to keep local prices (and store /distributor profits) elevated.

I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that our Bear Market rally in Equities has about spent itself, almost right at the Fibonacci 0.618 retracement, depending on the index. Uncanny.

BREAKING: USO Exchange traded ETF may be in process of blowing up right now. Much like the Inverse Volatility ETF (XIV) did a year or so ago. Trading Halted in USO. More to follow but looks like institutions can't deliver/create new shares in derivatives.

The May WTI Futures contract expires today, so if you are dumb enough to have NOT sold the contract (and there are a few), you have to take physical delivery. Today. Cushing, Oklahoma. 1,000 barrel contracts. So...at 42 gals/barrel, I say we "buy" a May contract today (actually you would get paid to buy the oil at negative prices), rent about five 8,000 gallon tanker trucks (and drivers) and road trip it to Cushing! We all are going to have unused vacation, right? We get paid to take the oil. #cantlose. Just have to find a market to sell that oil into...and of course keep the tanker trucks and drivers available as temporary storage.

Other than NYC area...there aren't many COVID cases actually in hospitals, relative to capacity. And since many hospitals are now going broke due to deferral of non-COVID cases, we probably won't need new MD's. Its perfect!

I can believe NYC and environs may need to stay with existing restrictions into June but here in CNY and many other counties...not so much. As of this past weekend, Oswego county had something like 54 cases and a population of ~ 117,000. The lockdown is now officially absurd there. Even my county, Onondaga, has 263 active cases as of yesterday and a total population of 450,000. Even if active cases are undercounted by a factor of 2 or 3 its still statistically almost round off error.

I would def pass on the Cruise ship.

I'm in the same boat. I actually "bought" an extra week of vacation this year but not only have i had to cancel an Orlando golf trip in March, and 2 week Italy trip (starting tommorrow - not)...no idea what int'l travel will be available. I'd like to get over to Germany and catch some of my soccer team if possible (did that last fall). Plus, doing some travelling post-covid has got to be less crowded as i don't think everyone will immediately feel up to int'l travel right away. i've been thinking of something out in western US or Western Canada for "domestic" alternatives.

I don't know if it was a protest...but yesterday, returning home from dodging the virus at Home Depot, i spotted a guy sort of jogging alongside the road, on his own. Seemed a bit oddly dressed for jogging (compared to what you usually see) but what was really odd was that he was holding up a decent sized American Flag on a pole as he jogged. It was also raining. I wonder if this was some sort of protest thing or just a guy feeling super patriotic.

Bl*w me!

One thing that i haven't run across a good explanation for...is that Fauci, etal have been saying a vaccine is usually a 12-18 month effort to get it developed, tested, approved, deployed. Which i get. However, and i could be off here a bit, the 2009 H1N1 vaccine was apparently developed within about 4-6 months. What gives? Is there something special about corona virus vaccines? In fact, even with what i believe was a shorter vaccine timeline, by the time it was rolled out in Nov 2009, the virus had pretty much run its course and the mass quantities of vaccine weren't needed (or wanted by that point...$$).

Those are vanishingly small numbers of cases. Probably in line with seasonal flu caseloads. The one size fits all responses have been excessive IMO. Hotspot areas downstate, makes sense. Not in the boonies. Cuomo should significantly relax requirements in places like Oswego County.

Will the asteroid be required to wear a mask also?

Well, Onondaga County (Syracuse area) now has more recovered cases then active (301 vs 271, respectively)...so that's a step in the right direction. Thus far 17 deaths in the County attributed to covid-19. I'm seeing more and more "out there" stuff from my Trumpist contacts. Its like conspiracy season on steroids. I just learned this morning that coronavirus testing is a Democrat plot! Who knew? I'm a fairly constant observer of politics and current events...and i have to say that I had "sympathy" for the Trumpist complaints about various Democrat conspiracies to get Trump, mainly because there was credibility to them (Russia , Ukraine nonsense, a thousand other ones played out by the MSM daily). However, I've long since passed the point of having any sympathy for them after the complete whitewash the Rumpists are perpetrating over the Feb-Mid March "Rumplestilskin" period and now questioning whether "lockdowns" were ever needed, anywhere. It's uneducated idiocy. And now, there's the Liberate the States nonsense, the cozying up to quacks like Dr. Oz, Dr. Phil, Dr. Drew, while Dr. Fauci gets roasted (they hate that he was involved with and a major advocate in Public Health in the AIDS research and cure...herd immunity was the solution for the gays per the Rumpist loons...). Sigh.

That's a rhetorical question, right?