Politico just from their name makes it QUITE CLEAR that they are NOT NEWS.

They are a political far left mouthpiece so it's usually impossible to squeeze anything resembling facts or truth out of their stuff, fortunately I have 'a team of experts' that does the fact-checking and in the 1% of articles from politico that are facts based news i will see them on my feeds.

I will humor you though and read the article.

So the article was pretty amazingly 'news-ish' for Politico but it did not have any real facts to point the blame finger other than saying that the administration didn't want to throw under the bus whomever was responsible for not asking WHO for their test kits.

I stand by my assessment that it would not have made much difference that the damage was already done; there were probably 10,000 cases of covid-19 in the usa by the middle of January maybe many more; there were 100s of 1000s of cases of 'flu like symptoms' and about 20,000 'flu related pnemonia' deaths by the end of January

I did goof on my six-week mention of Europe i though the europe travel ban started mid Feb but it was Mid March. I just looked up some statistics of a normal month of travel between europe and usa and it's a shit-ton; they could have easily been a majority of the infections getting into the usa.

That actually helps explain how fast it got around to every state. (and why it kept growing after the china travel ban).

It doesn't change the origin nor the reason to give a virus a name.

Back to the original quote at the top:

My news feeds are unbiased; there is plenty of actual news to point out the missteps of the current administration but without the 95% bias against that specifically makes the legacy media 'non news'

It's pretty simple to pick out 'non news'; you should not be able to tell a reporters political bent and right or left they should piss you off some of the time; a good reporter should get negative feedback on the same exact article, that's the best way to judge if a reporter is a good one; they report the facts without any spin, but people left or right will spin it themselves to see bias that isn't there.

Back to the test kits.. in the 'real world' not the 'politico' world; The administration was certainly assured by the CDC their test kit would be delivered in a timely fashion and work; with the WHO basically being another wing of the CCP, it's not hard to understand why our government would rather do what they typically do and make their own.

The CDC first round of kits was a disaster of epic proportions in many ways. It did not help the cause at all, it also didn't make a big difference as i've said many times, and now with the new tidbit of how many people came from Europe before the Europe ban, that is likely where the majority of infections came into the usa. Based on daily averages it would not be unlikely that upwards of 2-3 million people came into the usa from europe in the timeframe between the china and europe travel ban.

That being said, 'nobody knew', literally nobody knew where infected people were and where to stop them. Trump got 'into a world of shit' for travel banning China, and he was supposed to prophetically ban Europe also ?

I still don't understand especially with the new news from CDC that covid-19 doesn't spread readily on hard surfaces, how the hell the majority of new cases in NYC are coming from people in self quarantine. Are they sharing MJ cigarettes or something? it's mind-blowing, but does put huge holes in the 'safer at home' concept.

I want to make something perfectly clear for members of xo; I'm having a PERFECT example of a FIRST AMENDMENT debate with a fellow human, for whom i have a TON of respect, I'm not in any way saying Don isn't one of the most awesome people i've ever met (and I have met him in person a few times). He's one of my favorite people to read on xo, and his brain is an encyclopedia of x5 and other cars, we just are on very opposite sides of the political spectrum and i don't have *any* problem with that.

Don and I have had apolitical spats before as well and it never had any ill-will in the very least. I would have a beer with Don any day, the world is a far better place with his (crazy as me) desire to deep dive into couch-potato car repair.

If i had to pick 5 people on earth to start a business fixing cars, he'd be on the list.

I apologize if the word 'ignorant' or 'moronic' is misinterpreted, often people see those as insults when they are not and will get a 'flame session' started.

Ignorant: lacking knowledge or information as to a particular subject or fact:
ignorant of quantum physics.

When i use the word ignorant is just means 'the guy didn't know' I'm not sure why that is a 'hot button' word for people but often it is. (almost certainly somebody that gets upset from my use of ignorant is ignorant of the actual meaning; somehow it got turned into a derogatory word vs just factual)

When i use the word 'moronic' it doesn't mean the person is a moron, it means they are *acting like one*, i do it myself plenty so i 'know all the signs'.

I forgot what i used the term moronic to describe but it was most certainly meant so say 'if you did that you are acting stupidly'. That is an *opinion* folks it doesn't mean i know through my psychic powers that the guy actually is a moron.

I call people out on 'moronity' plenty. People give plenty of examples. Do something I consider 'stupid is as stupid does' and I will say; 'dude that was pretty moronic of you'. I will rarely if ever use the word 'moron' as a noun in conversation, I rarely know a person enough that it would be fair to apply that judgment. I would probably land on 'asshole' long before 'moron' ; must easier to objectively determine.

I once got into a big verbal battle with another of my solid favorites on xo; bcredliner; i have no idea what the fight was about but I made it very clear there were no bad intentions on my part, and will take his side proactively in most cases if somebody gives him a difficult time on the forum especially a newbie that doesn't know how to check a start date or post count. I've never met @bc in person, but wouldn't turn down the option (goes for most people on xo; my hyper-extended family)

Families fight; doesn't mean we don't care about each other. We are supposed to be ALLOWED to speak our mind without 'the google thought police' preventing free thought (or sadly most educational institutions especially higher education (i think that's an oxymoron)).

I'm not always right, but it 'rounds'. I have no problem being shown when i make a misstep like above; where i had a date wrong by a significant amount and will change how i discuss the injection of sars-cov-19 into the USA; it's an eye opener; now it makes more sense how fast it spread, because rather than 500,000 people from china it was also 2-3Million from Europe as well, so with my initial 'seed' estimate of 10,000 people that's 2% of 500,000 a number that was probably a bit to high to be realistic but 'within the realm of possibility.

Bump the denominator up to 3M and it's only 1/3 of 1%.

So; say if 1% of the travelers from China in Dec-Jan and Europe from Jan-March were infected that would mean 30,000 infections *all over* the entire USA. This is the injection I believed happened. I don't think that *anybody* could have stopped it because the incubation period is too long and they *just didn't know*.. They were ignorant of the facts that could have stopped it. They did NOT act moronically they in most cases did the best anybody could expect of them, so stop trying to blame people and as i said earlier "lift each other up" Negativity is as contagious as cv-19.

@upallnight; once more; great job on picking out the solution to the #5 cylinder, I would have taken a couple more iterations of diagnostics before i got that far, you were two chess moves ahead of me and your 'one in a billion' comment was spot-on and clever use of powerball money to replace.

That said; re-read that thread about the wheel shimmy giving up; you thought you had correct but did not. I think there was a missing 'not' somewhere that caused you to think the guy replaced the front facing tension struts whereas what was really replaced was the inward facing control arms. There was a very confusing photo of tension strut bushing, but it was to say literally 'it wasn't this thing mine are ok'. Not trying to axe your back, just trying to explain in *that case* you got it wrong, and I got it right. (it can happen either way).

If *I* read the thread wrong and the guy replaced the tension struts mia culpa I think you thought it ended up being the tension struts because he said too late in reference to buying yours, but there was confusion in that yours were the wrong part anyhow. I will definitely post a correction if it turns out they were the tension stuts not the control arms. (however having driven x5 for a couple months with completely shot tension struts that never caused the slightest wheel shimmy, I am quite confident that was a case of control arms (inward not forward facing).

Back from two or three tangents back to the thread topic now:

Everclear (the real one not the Illionis watered down one) is perfect to mix with pure aloe gel to make your own hand sanitizer just make sure the ratio is over 74% ever clear to get to 70% alcohol by volume. I put in a spray bottle to spray the inside of my mask that i leave in my car (or when low on gloves, spray them before i take them off). Great to spray things like a key or a phone; how many people use their phone *with their gloves* when in a store in a hot zone? My poor phone gets slimed regularly with hand sanitizer when i don't have my spray bottle handy.

Praise God with the notice that cv-19 doesn't spread readily on hard surfaces (also that sunlight will kill it).

Vitamin D deficiency is supposed to be problematic; my doc said i'm low on 'vitamin D' (quotes to make it funny for those dirty minds).

I take 2000 IU of D and double the normal daily rec. of C every day i remember.

Get outside, get some sun, for most people that's all the 'vitamin d' required. 'play along' with social distancing because if it's proven to not help at all in the end, it's pretty harmless and 'thought that counts' does matter still; it's kind of like chivalry.

Will i go to a restaurant when they open? hell yes i will, i would do it in downtown chicago. NYC; maybe in Fall; see; common sense; go with your gut and stay safe *for you* don't inject your limitations of self preservation on others; the USA is almost a free country still. I got the 'death stare' a month ago when i cleared my throat and spit from a woman not closer than 150ft from me; you'd have thought i kicked her baby. I *have to* clear my throat occasionally I was sick for THREE WEEKS (like literally in bed sick) expressly from not clearing my nose expressly from wearing a mask due to cv19.

Peace, and yes i mean it. positivity can be contagious as well.

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2011 E70 • N55 (me)
2012 E70 • N63 (wife)