@maxdancona,
maxdancona wrote:
Here is the exact quote in context (emphasis added by me). He is without question calling the "hysteria" over the corona virus a "hoax". He goes on to compare it to the flu and "fake news".
Trump wrote:One of my people came up to me and said, “Mr. President, they tried to beat you on Russia, Russia, Russia.” That didn’t work out too well. They couldn’t do it. They tried the impeachment hoax. That was on a perfect conversation. They tried anything. They tried it over and over. They’d been doing it since you got in. It’s all turning. They lost. It’s all turning. Think of it. Think of it. And this is their new hoax. But we did something that’s been pretty amazing. We have 15 people in this massive country and because of the fact that we went early. We went early, we could have had a lot more than that. We’re doing great. Our country is doing so great. We are so unified. We are so unified. The Republican party has never ever been unified like it is now. There has never been a movement in the history of our country like we have now. Never been a movement. So a statistic that we want to talk about, go ahead. Say USA. It’s okay. USA. So a number that nobody heard of, that I heard of recently and I was shocked to hear it, 35,000 people on average die each year from the flu. Did anyone know that? 35,000, that’s a lot of people. It could go to 100,000, it could be 27,000. They say usually a minimum of 27, goes up to 100,000 people a year die. And so far we have lost nobody to coronavirus in the United States. Nobody. And it doesn’t mean we won’t and we are totally prepared. It doesn’t mean we won’t, but think of it. You hear 35 and 40,000 people and we’ve lost nobody and you wonder the press is in hysteria mode. CNN fake news and the camera just went off, the camera. The camera just went off.
All that Trump quote you posted is doing is turning the virus from an impetus for fear to a victory by comparing it to flu outbreaks that have also claimed a lot of lives.
If the media hoax surrounding COVID19 is a 'hoax,' it's not because the disease is fake but because they are using it as a public relations stunt for market manipulation where they crash stocks just to turn around and buy them back quickly at a low price and make a lot of money shorting them before the market comes back.
The high market, however, was ripe for correction as a result of being the product of such a long period of growth due to stimulus and regulatory tools developed throughout the Obama years.
Markets have to cycle to keep prices stable, but when government interventions are used to keep them growing without correcting, they get heavy like a sky filling and darkening with rain clouds.
Many people would probably like it if that dark, heavy sky could just burst and all the rain comes down and clears the sky so the markets can just go back to growing all the time, but that is like expecting the climate to just go back to normal despite a long pattern of unsustainable industrial waste-consumerism becoming the norm.
The economy can't just correct and go back to being productive and healthy because its patterns of productivity have deviated so far from what good healthy responsible economic practices would actually be like. It's an economy on crack, so when it crashes, it won't just be finished with its addiction. Rather, it should just be taken as a warning shot over the bow that economic reforms are sorely needed, reforms that reduce the need for stimulus interventions.
When the economy can successfully weather a pandemic quarantine or other cause for shutdown WITHOUT stimulus, that is evidence of a successful economy; not one that panics and crashes until the government and FED start talking about bailouts.
Basically, everyone including businesses need to be prepared for periods of low or no income, and be able to do so without borrowing. You can't do that just by saving up some extra operating cash; although that's part of weathering a crisis; it also requires structural adjustments that lower costs and allow businesses and households to operate independently in many ways, such as owning buildings, equipment, etc. instead of renting and/or owing monthly fees.
If a business or household runs out of money, it is because it spends it too fast and doesn't have enough saved to get through a period without income. There is so much interdependence between spending and revenue/income that the moment something happens where people have to stay home, all the interdependent businesses and households start looking at cutting expenses and/or losing revenues; but those that have managed their expenses know that there are simply certain basic necessities, like grocery shopping and utilities that have to be maintained and those costs have been managed in a way that they won't break the bank through a period of fallow economic times.
