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[Iduno]

In a press conference, Trump said that it will be seriously investigated in what way China can be held responsible for the spread of the corona virus.
He said "I am not happy with China", and he "believes that the outbreak could have been stopped at the source".
"Perhaps it was inabilty to do something, or maybe it was something else. We are going to find out".
He alluded to financial compensation by China as well.
 "Germany is talking about 130 billion euros. You can count on it that our damages are even higher".

I wonder what he'll say when Chinese nukes fly towards the US.  Probably "hey I was just being sarcastic".

The US government wants a war with China. Both halves of the party are arguing for it. Next year is shaping up to be the bad kind of interesting.

I doubt Xi Jinping would respond with nukes even if the fine was carried out.

Some punitive action is overdue for China at this point anyway, even if not directly for their coronavirus response.

Based on what, inaccurate number of dead?
They'll turn around and point that no country with a major outbreak is keeping accurate counts regarding cases.  I doubt there's a case.

I was thinking more broadly, along the lines of the Muslim concentration camps, brutal oppression in Hong Kong, etc. Some punitive action is long overdue for that. If it comes along under the coronavirus banner it's fine by me.

Sorry, should have made that more clear.

Bring that to the US next. Our government is as bad, if not worse.

Actually I think the US already knew it was SARS-2 back in December but decided themselves to not do anything about it or alert any of the American population because they didn't want to tank the economy through panic. American officials reportedly already knew there was an outbreak way back in November. This is idea that China only gave vague hand-wavy information to the WHO in January, therefore the USA was completely blindsided is complete nonsense. People who could merely read Chinese already knew more than the WHO was reporting back in December. And they expect us to believe the USA with their vast intelligence networks didn't know what was going on.

Our congresspeople were also using that time to sell off stocks, because profit is more important than lives. Although here there does seem to be an effort to push certain groups of people into higher risk of dying. I would be unsurprised to learn that it's being used here to kill off unwanted people.

[Reelya]

https://news.slashdot.org/story/20/04/28/0438252/us-deaths-soared-in-early-weeks-of-pandemic-far-exceeding-number-attributed-to-covid-19

They've got a number on "excess" deaths above normal for the USA in March. It's 15000, which is double the official Covid-19 death toll from that period. So only 1/3 Covid deaths were officially counted. If that continued for April it would mean the real death toll would now be 150000.

[bloop_bleep]

I'm sorry, but I really disagree. The situation in the US is bad, but it's bad in different ways than how China is bad, and overall it's far less bad.

In China there is complete totalitarian autocracy. There is not a menagerie of corporate powers in China, there is only the state. There is rapid destruction of all dissent, no matter how small or insignificant. Many workers there are living on $1 a day. 12+ hour shifts. Abysmal working conditions everywhere. Abysmal living conditions everywhere. Extremely zealous information filtering. Zero accountability, since what you're trying to hold accountable is the state and all that exists is the completely centralized and self-serving state in China; there is nowhere for one to turn to.

In America the problem is that there is too much ability for certain people to act like antisocial oppressive saboteurs; there is not enough overarching egalitarian, supportive social organization. This is really bad, but it doesn't create extreme centralized, concentrated badness.

[misko27]

Also if it hasn't been made as clear here as it should have been, there were plenty of US officials who knew exactly what was coming and argued strongly to take decisive action to stop it. We even have some of their emails. As far back as January and February in many cases, from fields as diverse as the head of Virus response at HHS and college researchers who work with the government, to Veterans Affairs officials and a former homeland security adviser to Trump.

It wasn't like this information was hidden, or kept by only a single department. People knew what was happening, knew the risks, and actively pressured the policymakers to make decisions that would save lives. And despaired when they saw it not happening.

It didn't need to be like this. Not just in some hypothetical universe where everyone is a decent human being and politicians aren't selfish, but in a world quite similar to our own.

[Frumple]

I'm sorry, but I really disagree. The situation in the US is bad, but it's bad in different ways than how China is bad, and overall it's far less bad.

You're very much in the wrong thread to be talking general differences. China has pretty much hands down handled their pandemic response better than the US has, as have some other countries. In relation to the crow plague the situation in the US abso-fucking-lutely isn't "overall far less bad". It's been significantly worse.

[bloop_bleep]

It was in response to Iduno's:

Bring that to the US next. Our government is as bad, if not worse.

And no, the government doesn't want a war with China. That's where all our precious corporations do their manufacturing. Even if POTUS was dumb enough to declare war on China, this is one of the things where no one would let him. He is not a strong leader that people pander to because they trust him, he's a useful idiot that people pander to because it's convenient. He stops being useful if he tries to declare war on China. Though I don't think he would do that.

[mko]

The US government wants a war with China. Both halves of the party are arguing for it.

[citation needed]

This is stupidity beyond inject disinfectant random comments.

[Ibid Straydrink]

He is not a strong leader that people pander to because they trust him, he's a useful idiot that people pander to because it's convenient.

Bingo.

China has pretty much hands down handled their pandemic response better than the US has, as have some other countries. In relation to the crow plague the situation in the US abso-fucking-lutely isn't "overall far less bad". It's been significantly worse.

Why don't you describe to us less informed from this perspective as to how?

[MetalSlimeHunt]

The US and China are already at war and have been for a while, it's just a war of shadows, proxy, and trade. The whole thing is a lot more complicated than the Cold War thanks to the massive artery of economic activity between the US and China as well as a lack of desire to report on it by either side's media, but it's there.

That said, these comments that China is some 1984 hellscape are plain propaganda. China is just a place, and not even a particularly interesting place. The government does little there that the US does not do to its own population, which is admittedly not saying much, but not anything out of the ordinary either.

[Ibid Straydrink]

The US and China are already at war and have been for a while, it's just a war of shadows, proxy, and trade. The whole thing is a lot more complicated than the Cold War thanks to the massive artery of economic activity between the US and China as well as a lack of desire to report on it by either side's media, but it's there.

That said, these comments that China is some 1984 hellscape are plain propaganda. China is just a place, and not even a particularly interesting place. The government does little there that the US does not do to its own population, which is admittedly not saying much, but not anything out of the ordinary either.

Are you arguing that the US censors its media and arrests and imprisons or disappears non-violent political and religious dissidents, or that the CCP doesn't do these things?

[bloop_bleep]

You do realize that the US has no Great Firewall, right? That we can still sit here throwing rocks at the POTUS and spreading dissent without being disappeared from our homes?

EDIT: Ninja'd.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

In general, that the US does those things. Of course, there is no need for dissaperances in the US - such wrenched criminals are surely guilty.

People who post things that the US government actually cares about suppressing will find out just how quickly they can respond. I mean, it's literally a running joke that the NSA is reading all your emails and texts, let alone public posting.

All this anti-China sentiment is itself a perfect example of how the US government keeps control, by manufacturing consent. Who needs a Great Firewall when the real Great Firewall is inside the minds of Americans instead of our computer screens? It doesn't even matter that I say this, because you've been well trained not to listen to it and instead fear the dread influence of "The CCP".

[Ibid Straydrink]

In general, that the US does those things. Of course, there is no need for dissaperances in the US - such wrenched criminals are surely guilty.

People who post things that the US government actually cares about suppressing will find out just how quickly they can respond. I mean, it's literally a running joke that the NSA is reading all your emails and texts, let alone public posting.

All this anti-China sentiment is itself a perfect example of how the US government keeps control, by manufacturing consent. Who needs a Great Firewall when the real Great Firewall is inside the minds of Americans instead of our computer screens? It doesn't even matter that I say this, because you've been well trained not to listen to it and instead fear the dread influence of "The CCP".

You'll have to excuse my skepticism. What would you consider instances of the US Federal or State gov'ts using force to quell political dissidence (modern, of course)?

Of course the NSA is monitoring everything, but I've never met someone who thought that was an inherent good and wouldn't want to stop it if they believed they could, or who felt threatened or endangered for saying as much.

[nenjin]

Semi-related: https://worldnewsdailyreport.com/fbi-raid-at-nsa-employees-home-reveals-over-16000000-dick-pics/

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Literally any mass protest in the US gets confronted by militarized riot cops, unless they're neo-Nazis in which case the cops tend to protect them. Police forces in the US are donated equipment directly from the military, up and to including tanks. Look up the Standing Rock protests or the murders of Ferguson protest leaders for an example of how that escalates even further if the protestors aren't majority white.

Of course, that's what happens when the system fails to keep obedience. Mass media conglomeration in the US allows easy control over what is and is not reported, and how. All the major media corporations have admitted to cooperation with the security state in one form or another, and don't speak on things that might "threaten national security". But even that much is manufactured to the extent that it's a light touch - the ideology of the media is so fervently pro-US that they don't need to be told 90% of the time what to do, and regardless those with stake in the government and stake in the media are often synonymous. Obviously they have little desire to report against their own interests.

If everyone hates NSA monitoring, why does it continue? You're allowed to hate it, you're just not allowed to stop it. That is a dimension of consent manufacturing, and in fact one that China uses as well. Bitch and moan all you like, but stay off the street. Something I like to say is that the big reason we can't repeal the Patriot Act is that we never enacted the Patriot Act - its passage was with small debate and smaller dissent, an act of power rousing to move openly. Of course, true acts of state power have consequences, and so are kept to the minimum necessary.

The truth of the matter is that the Chinese government is just somewhat less elegant with consent manufacturing...or are they? How would you know, seeing as what you know about China is sieved through the US media apparatus before you learn it?