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by Lowell
Here are a few national and Virginia news headlines, political and otherwise (e.g., COVID-19), for Saturday, April 18.
- Iran Deaths Pass 5,000; German Cases Increase: Virus Update
- What we can learn from the “second wave” of coronavirus cases in Asia (“Hong Kong, Singapore, and Taiwan show the challenges of fighting this pandemic.”)
- Milan’s Alarming Virus Trend Threatens Plan to Restart Italy
- Africa’s most vulnerable countries have few ventilators — or none at all
- New Wave of Infections Threatens to Collapse Japan Hospitals (Which is what will happen if we “reopen” things too soon, without enough testing, etc.)
- Seoul’s Full Cafes, Apple Store Lines Show Mass Testing Success
- Putin leverages coronavirus chaos to make a direct play to Trump (Ugh, this can’t be good.)
- Seoul’s Radical Experiment in Digital Contact Tracing (“In South Korea, the government is disseminating detailed tracking data on people with COVID-19.”)
- ‘Biological Chernobyl’: How China’s secrecy fueled virus suspicions (“U.S. officials are still debating whether the virus emerged from a Chinese lab. But that’s not stopping Fox News.”)
- Coronavirus Testing Needs to Triple Before the U.S. Can Reopen, Experts Say
- Experts Think The U.S. COVID-19 Death Toll Will Hit 50,000 By The End Of April (“Over the past week, the number of deaths thought to be caused by COVID-19 has nearly doubled, from about 16,000 to 30,000.”)
- Trump’s dangerous “LIBERATE” tweets represent the views of a small minority (“Don’t let Fox News and the president fool you.”)
- In Trump’s ‘LIBERATE’ tweets, extremists see a call to arms
- Trump tweets praise of right-wing protests against social distancing measures after Fox segment
- Covid-19’s devastating toll on black and Latino Americans, in one chart
- Rallies against stay-at-home orders grow as Trump sides with protesters
- Trump Foments Protests Against Governors; Experts Warn of Testing Shortages
- Trump Leads Pro-Plague States of America to a COVID Civil War (“He is telling us plainly that he will stoke civil unrest and further harm public health to find a political pathway out of a galactic-scale fuck-up of his own making.”)
- The 25th Amendment Exists for a Reason (“It’s not every Friday that the president* takes to the electric Twitter machine to foment insurrection.”)
- Trump calls protesters against stay-at-home orders ‘very responsible’ (Yep, that’s Trump’s “base” – and he’s appealing directly to it.)
- Trump breaks with his own guidelines to back conservative anti-quarantine protesters
- We’re not overreacting to the coronavirus(“With the coronavirus, the right action looks like an overreaction as it’s happening.”)
- The Memo: Culture war hits coronavirus crisis
- Trump tells a damnable and murderous lie
- Trump Plays to His Base on State Restrictions (“In a series of all-caps tweets, the president departed from his more bipartisan tone a day before.”)
- Operation reopen America: are we about to witness a second historic failure of leadership from Trump? (“Without mass testing, contact tracing, and protective equipment for health workers – all in critically short supply – the president’s plan could be disastrous”)
- With this president, the buck always stops somewhere else
- Trump’s reopening guidance has a glaring gap
- Thousands of Americans backed by rightwing donors gear up for protests (“Conservative activists to demand governors lift stay-home orders – and movement has been driven by wealthy conservative groups” The same types who funded the “Tea Party” movement.)
- GOP’s growing ‘open it up’ caucus urges fewer virus restrictions amid warnings from fellow Republicans
- Advisers warn Trump his push to reopen economy carries political risks
- Trump Calls For Reopening America’s Gyms Day After Call With SoulCycle’s Owner
- Democrats confront Pence: ‘I have never been so mad about a phone call in my life’
- Tensions flare as Democrats press Pence over coronavirus testing
- Donald Trump Keeps Trying to Make Reality Disappear (“POTUS still thinks he can spin the virus, putting 60,000 deaths on the house. But he can’t get us to Splash Mountain without Mickey.”)
- Republicans Fret as Mnuchin Bargains With Democrats to Break Funding Impasse
- Top House Republican Backs Adding Hospital Funding to Small-Business Package
- Even after ‘flattening the curve,’ Americans face a long road back to pre-coronavirus normalcy (“Experts say aggressive testing and continued social distancing will have major impact on day-to-day life until a vaccine is developed.”)
- Michael Cohen Is Writing a Secret Tell-All to ‘Spill the Beans’ on Trump
- Trump and His Allies Are Worried About More Than November (“The temporary imposition of popular relief programs in response to the coronavirus makes Republicans nervous.”)
- Antibody research indicates coronavirus may be far more widespread than known
- Trump doesn’t do much other than create chaos
- What Trump’s Plan to Reopen America Gets Right, and Wrong
- Sunlight destroys virus quickly, new govt. tests find, but experts say pandemic could last through summer
- Swing-state Democratic governors under duress over stay-at-home orders (“Republican state legislators are demanding that their economies reopen sooner than later — fights with big implications for Trump’s reelection.”)
- ‘They’re Death Pits’: Virus Claims at Least 7,000 Lives in U.S. Nursing Homes
- Number Of Trump Campaign Donors On Back-To-Work Council Raises Ethics Alarm: Report (“Businesses may press to lift coronavirus restrictions too early, and Trump has millions of reasons to listen to them.”)
- ‘Just plain garbage,’ FERC’s Glick says as commission largely upholds its PJM MOPR decision
- Public Ownership of Fossil Fuels a Potential Solution to Multiple Crises, Says New Report
- Trump Campaign Secretly Paying $180,000 A Year To His Sons’ Significant Others
- Heartland hotspots: A sudden rise in coronavirus cases is hitting rural states without stay-at-home orders
- Epidemiologist Delivers Blunt Reality Check On Current Phase Of Coronavirus Pandemic (“‘The pandemic is only just getting started,’ warned William Hanage, a professor of epidemiology and infectious diseases at Harvard.”)
- Voting by mail in the spotlight as U.S. Congress debates how to secure November elections
- Biden looks to placate Sanders by letting him keep delegates
- Trump attacks Pelosi as ‘political hack’ over late-show appearance (Trump isn’t one millionth the person Pelosi is.)
- What the People Organizing “Reopen the Businesses” Protests Are Thinking (“A movement started in part by small-business owners hoping to save their shops has spiraled into something much different.”)
- Fox News keeps inviting TV doctors on air who say crazy things
- Reminder: Don’t get on Andrew Cuomo’s bad side
- Jacksonville beaches reopen in Florida as states begin easing stay-at-home restrictions
- How Facebook Works for Trump
- Stimulus checks and other relief hindered by 1960s technology and rocky rollout (“The Trump administration’s promise of swift and effective action is colliding with a federal and state apparatus ill-equipped to deliver so much money so fast.”)
- Republicans should worry about the Senate (“The map is expanding for Democrats.”)
- Biden could create a Cabinet of qualified men and women. What a concept. (“He might make expertise fashionable again.”)
- Smugglers sawed into Trump’s border wall 18 times in one month in San Diego area, records show
- Landlords are targeting vulnerable tenants to solicit sex in exchange for rent, advocates say
- As Growing Season Ramps Up, “Essential” Farmworkers Are Still Largely Unprotected (“Members of Florida’s Coalition of Immokalee Workers sound the alarm on coronavirus risk”)
- Zoos Look For Ways To Offset An Elephant-Sized Plunge In Revenues
- With Virginia colleges facing budget crisis, McEachin, others call for $47 billion influx
- To Everyone Who Wants America “Re-opened” Immediately, Damn the Costs: Stop Asking Us to Die for Your Convenience.
- Video: GOP Frontrunner for U.S. Senate Nomination in Virginia Goes Off the Rails, Praises Michigan Anti-“Lockdown” Protests, Encourages Them in Virginia (Gade: “It just feels like tyranny to me and I’m worried about that”)
- VA Dems: “Do Virginia Republicans agree with Trump’s call for rebellion?”
- Trump Says Virginia’s Democratic Governor “Should Be Under Siege” (“They want to take their guns away.” That’s both false *AND* has nothing to do with COVID-19)
- Live Video, Highlights: Gov. Ralph Northam’s Friday (4/17) Virginia COVID-19 Briefing
- Friday (4/17) Virginia Data on COVID-19 Finds +602 Cases (to 7,491), +107 Hospitalizations (to 1,221), +23 Deaths (to 231) From Yesterday
- Trump’s Tweet About Virginia’s Gun Safety Laws Is Flat-Out False (“The gun safety laws passed in Virginia have been on the books in dozens of states” Also, the gun laws have *nothing whatsoever* to do with COVID-19.)
- ‘Not there yet:’ Northam outlines future plans for reopening the state
- Calls to ‘reopen Virginia’ are growing louder. But Northam and health officials say we’re not ready.
- Work-Sharing: A Powerful Tool to Save Jobs in Virginia
- VHHA Releases Video of Celebrities, Prominent Virginians Thanking Frontline Hospital and Health Care Workers Amid COVID-19 Pandemic
- Assembly Reconvenes, Potential Adjustments, and Northam’s Approval Ratings: Political Analysis for Friday, April 17, 2020
- Some public safety agencies won’t say if workers have coronavirus
- Altria’s CEO retires; names William F Gifford Jr. as chief executive and Dominion Energy’s CEO as its chairman (Two fine, fine companies – lol.)
- Perrigan: Legislators should back Northam’s school construction proposal
- Editorial: Will the virus save ‘electronic skill games’?
- Fewer inmates in Virginia as state reduces jail population by 17% amid pandemic
- Virginia Dramatically Decreases Jail Population Following Guidance from Governor Northam (“Virginia sees 67 percent decline in new commitments for misdemeanors, 17 percent decrease in jail population”)
- Johns Hopkins University Coronavirus Tracking Maps for Virginia Counties, Cities
- Survey indicates few Va. police agencies have issued citations for violating governor’s assembly ban
- Two employees of Liberty University test positive for the coronavirus
- 25 residents — an eighth of the population — at youth prison in Chesterfield have COVID-19
- Video: Fairfax County School Board Discusses “Disastrous Rollout of Online Education,” What to Do About It (“We were assured that Blackboard was the way to go.”; “If Blackboard can’t handle it, let’s try Google.”; “It is our duty to protect the students who are engaging in learning on our platform”)
- Richmond health officials pivoting away from emergency field hospital plans at convention center
- Pharrell teams with World Central Kitchen to feed needy in Virginia Beach during pandemic (“Pharrell Williams says he’s funneling the energy from the canceled Something in the Water festival into feeding the vulnerable in Virginia Beach during the coronavirus pandemic”)
- Virginia Tech sued by three more former cadets over blood pinning punishments
- Jerry Givens, former chief executioner of Virginia who became a death penalty critic, dies of COVID-19
- University of Richmond President Presents Cello Concert on Facebook
- After some morning rain, turning sunnier and windy today ahead of a warmer Sunday
