Trump softens promise of coronavirus vaccine by end of year

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/05/05/trump-coronavirus-vaccine-239271

 

President Donald Trump on Tuesday softened his ambitious pledge from just days earlier that there could be a coronavirus vaccine by year’s end.

“You can never be convinced,” Trump, during a trip to Arizona, told ABC News’ David Muir in an interview when asked whether he was still firm in that declaration, contending that “we have a really good shot of having something very, very substantial.”

The backpedaling from the president came 48 hours after Trump said during a Fox News town hall that “we think we’ll have a vaccine by the end of this year and we’re pushing very hard,” a statement that contradicts his own health officials as well as companies developing and testing potential vaccines.

 Asked why, at the end of February, he asserted that the 15 known cases of coronavirus in the U.S. would quickly go down to zero, the president again fell back on his usual defenses of touting his decision to restrict travel from China a month earlier. He noted that those comments came while flights were still allowed into the country from Europe, another hot spot for the pandemic.

And Trump reiterated his wish to be a “cheerleader” for the country.

“I don’t want to be Mr. Gloom-and-Doom. It’s a very bad subject,” he said on ABC, though he acknowledged that his administration was still unsure of the severity of the outbreak. “I’m not looking to tell the American people when nobody really knows what’s happening yet, ‘Oh, this is going to be so tragic.’

Top US general: Unknown if coronavirus came from China lab

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/279750

The top US general said on Tuesday it was still unknown whether the coronavirus emerged from a wet market in China, a laboratory or some other location.

“Did it come out of the virology lab in Wuhan? Did it occur in a wet market there in Wuhan? Did it occur somewhere else? And the answer to that is: We don’t know,” Army General Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told a news conference, according to Reuters.

 

How Kushner’s Volunteer Force Led a Fumbling Hunt for Medical Supplies

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/05/us/jared-kushner-fema-coronavirus.html

The fumbling search for new supplies — heralded by Mr. Trump and Mr. Kushner as a way to pipe private-sector hustle and accountability into the hidebound federal bureaucracy — became a case study of Mr. Trump’s style of governing, in which personal relationships and loyalty are often prized over governmental expertise, and private interests are granted extraordinary access and deference.

 Federal officials who had spent years devising emergency plans were layered over by Kushner allies, working with and within the White House coronavirus task force, who believed their private-sector experience could solve the country’s looming supply shortage. The young volunteers — drawn from venture capital and private equity firms — were expected to apply their deal-making experience to quickly weed out good leads from the mountain of bad ones, administration officials said in an interview. FEMA and other agencies, despite years of emergency preparation, were not equipped for the unprecedented task of a pandemic that impacted all 50 states, they said.

 But the officials acknowledged it was difficult to identify specific contracts the volunteers had successfully sourced.

At least one tip the volunteers forwarded turned into an expensive debacle. In late March, according to emails obtained by The Times, two of the volunteers passed along procurement forms submitted by Yaron Oren-Pines, a Silicon Valley engineer who said he could provide more than 1,000 ventilators.

“There’s an old saying in emergency management — disaster is the wrong time to exchange business cards,” said Tim Manning, a former deputy administrator at FEMA. “And it’s absolutely the wrong time to make up new procedures.”

White House coronavirus task force to be wound down around Memorial Day

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/05/05/politics/white-house-coronavirus-task-force-winding-down/index.html

The White House coronavirus task force will start to wind down later this month, a senior White House official told CNN on Tuesday.

The official said the task force "will be phased down around Memorial Day. We will continue to have key medical experts advising (President Donald Trump) daily and accessible to press throughout the coming months ahead."

How did coronavirus break out? Theories abound as researchers race to solve genetic detective story

https://www.wdrb.com/news/coronavirus/how-did-coronavirus-break-out-theories-abound-as-researchers-race-to-solve-genetic-detective-story/article_79c2190c-787b-11ea-994a-e33e39161b57.html

Another potentially explosive theory -- first posed by two Chinese researchers in early February and amplified by Fox News host Tucker Carlson on March 31 -- holds that the origin traces back to an accident in one of two labs near the Wuhan market that work with bats.

Most of the experts interviewed for this story discounted the theory -- whose progenitors reportedly withdrew their paper -- saying it wasn't supported by evidence.

The theory has also been strenuously denied by the Chinese government and one of the labs.

But one expert, a chemical biology professor and bioweapons expert at Rutgers University, has suggested to several media outlets that the lab-accident theory has credence.

"The possibility that the virus entered humans through a laboratory accident cannot and should not be dismissed," Dr. Richard Ebright told CNN in an email Sunday.

 

Wait, Donald Trump's approval is up again?

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/05/05/politics/donald-trump-approval-rating-coronavirus/index.html

 The narrative seemed set: After a brief surge of public support for President Donald Trump in the early days of America's fight against the coronavirus, his approval numbers had settled back into the low 40s.

Right? Right. 

Except that in Gallup's latest two-week tracking poll, Trump's job approval is back to 49% -- matching the highest it's ever been -- while his disapproval is at 47%.

 

Mitch McConnell Wants to Stop Blue State Bailouts, But Red States Need Help Too

https://www.newsweek.com/mitch-mcconnell-wants-stop-blue-state-bailouts-red-states-need-help-too-1501877

But whether or not states receive more aid from the federal government remains up in the air. McConnell, the Senate's top Republican, has positioned himself against passing another half-trillion-dollar relief package and even floated the idea of letting states go bankrupt.

"I think this whole business of additional assistance for state and local governments needs to be thoroughly evaluated," McConnell told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt last month. "There's not going to be any desire on the Republican side to bail out state pensions by borrowing money from future generations."

Heads of state from both sides of the aisle slammed McConnell's remarks. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo called the suggestion "one of the really dumb ideas of all time." Maryland Governor Larry Hogan said that the Senate leader would "regret" making those comments and that bankruptcy was the "the last thing we need" during this global health crisis.

 

Donald Trump just broke the most basic rule of politics

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/05/05/politics/lincoln-project-ad-donald-trump/index.html

On Monday, the Lincoln Project released an ad entitled "Mourning in America" -- playing off the famed "Morning in America" ad by President Ronald Reagan in 1984.

"Under the leadership of Donald Trump our country is weaker and sicker and poorer," says the ad's narrator. "If we have another four years like this, will there even be an America?"

Its message is dark, foreboding and harsh. And it's very likely that almost no one would have even seen that message had it not been for Donald Trump.

Trump's inability to ignore renegade voices within his party is a violation of the most basic of campaign rules. The more he talks about the Lincoln Project -- no matter how negatively -- the better for the group's profile and ability to raise money to oppose his reelection.

meir kin calling for dismantling of rabbanut

Study: Nearly a third of Americans believe a conspiracy theory about the origins of the coronavirus

https://www.vox.com/covid-19-coronavirus-us-response-trump/2020/4/12/21217646/pew-study-coronavirus-origins-conspiracy-theory-media

 A new Pew study finds 30 percent of Americans believe scientists created Covid-19. That isn’t what happened.

 

COVID: Top 10 current conspiracy theories

https://allianceforscience.cornell.edu/blog/2020/04/covid-top-10-current-conspiracy-theories/

 As the COVID-19 crisis worsens, the world also faces a global misinformation pandemic. Conspiracy theories that behave like viruses themselves are spreading just as rapidly online as SARS-CoV-2 does offline. Here are the top 10 conspiracy theories making the rounds.

 

Coronavirus: The seven types of people who start and spread viral misinformation

https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-52474347

Conspiracy theories, misinformation and speculation about coronavirus have flooded social media. But who starts these rumours? And who spreads them?

We've investigated hundreds of misleading stories during the pandemic. It's given us an idea about who is behind misinformation - and what motivates them. Here are seven types of people who start and spread falsehoods:

 

Trump Responds to Project Lincoln Ad by Conservatives Who Want Him Out of Office: 'They're All LOSERS'

https://www.newsweek.com/trump-ad-coronavirus-project-lincoln-george-conway-1501942

President Donald Trump called a group of prominent conservatives who oppose him "losers" and defended his record from the right after they launched an advert attacking his response to the coronavirus crisis.

The new ad was paid for by The Lincoln Project, a campaign by former Republicans who split with the party because of Trump and which seeks to thwart the president's re-election, and is called "Mourning in America."

 

Mourning in America