The COVID-19 aka coronavirus has taken over the world. Since our last blog on Tuesday, a mere two days ago, events have definitely ratcheted up.
…Israel has told all its citizens to stay put. Don’t travel anywhere unless you absolutely have to. …Saudi Arabia cut travel to Islam’s holiest sites …Japan closed all its schools for a month …The Dominican Republic turned back a cruise ship carrying 1,500 people because eight of those aboard showed potential symptoms of the virus …Facebook says it is canceling F8, its annual conference for developers. The show is usually held in late April or early May in the San Francisco area. …Stock markets the world over are dropping like a stone …Frankfurt Airport is offering staff unpaid leave or temporary reductions in work hours as a way to manage the costs of a sharp drop in air traffic. …Canada’s Public Health Minister said that people should start stocking up on durable foodstuffs that won’t spoil or can be frozen and on prescription drugs.
And our personal favourite: In Iran officials loosened rules barring the import of many foreign-made items to allow in sanitizers, face masks and other necessities, and removed overhead handles on Tehran’s subways to eliminate another source of germs.
As for being sensible here’s the main rule: If you are sick stay home. Nobody needs or wants to share your illness.
The blockage of the railways and other tactics by native Canadians is still going on. Quebec’s Premier Legault, who seems to continuously put his foot very deeply into his mouth, did it again yesterday.
He said that the presence of dangerous assault rifles in Kahnawake is a reason for caution in enforcing an injunction to end a rail blockade in the Mohawk community. To make sure his foot was firmly planted in his mouth, he then went on to say that the government has information from what he called “good sources” that there are AK-47s in Kahnawake.
Can we talk here? While the chiefs of Kahnawake said those blockading the tracks are not armed he never said the rest of the people were not armed. One has to be living under a rock to think they don’t have guns there. Of course they do. But nothing is gained by saying so.
All Legault did was get their backs up forcing them to take a firmer stance in what they are doing. Not the brightest move to put it mildly.
The Democratic fight for presidential nominee is becoming rather ugly. While Bernie Sanders is now the front-runner, it appears that Joe Biden is going to win South Carolina on Saturday and get himself quite a few delegates. The biggest problem for them right now is Michael Bloomberg. If he keeps running, he will split the vote and allow Bernie to slide right up the middle. If he quits – after spending a couple of billion dollars on ads for Super Tuesday (this Tuesday), and tells his delegates to go over to Biden, Sanders could be left out in the cold. Given Bloomberg’s personality, the chances of that happening are like a snowstorm in July.
The other huge problem facing the democrats is that their Centrist voters and “the establishment” are panicking about Sanders, but they can’t seem to rally around anyone else for the simple fact that all of the alternatives face their own serious questions about character, record, and electability.
If Bernie Sanders wins the nomination, Donald Trump will be president for another four years as no one wants a left-leaning socialist, who thinks Castro did a good job in Cuba. And those are his good points.
Here’s a late-breaking tidbit: Michael Bloomberg courted Andrew Yang’s supporters, offering him the vice-presidency.
The stock market dropped 1,100 points, the biggest one-day decline in history. Blame the coronavirus and…the severe decline in Chinese economic activity in the first quarter of the year, lower end-demand for US exporters, disruption to the supply chain for many US firms, a slowdown in US economic activity, and elevated business uncertainty.
There are three ways to look at this: Panic. Sit tight. Buy.
If you’re a panic person, shut down your computer. If you are a bit calmer, check the markets once a day. And if you have a stomach made of iron, now’s the time to buy.
Harvey Weinstein would do best to listen to his prison coach and shut his big mouth. He’s going to prison, kicking and screaming or quietly. Continuously saying that he is innocent is asinine at best, showing a disgusting sense of entitlement at worst. Feh. Feh. Feh.
If you have some spare change we have a place where you can spend it. In the 1930s, King Edward VIII abdicated the throne to marry Wallis Simpson, an American divorcée. He was made Governor of the Bahamas and the two youts moved to Nassau. They also had a gorgeous apartment in Paris, but we are not speaking of that here.
The existing Governor’s Mansion was not up to the couple’s standards and the house went under extensive renovations. While the Duke and Duchess waited, they moved somewhere a bit more comfortable, to the Sigrist House which is now on the market for $8.5 million.
The home contains fifteen bedrooms and thirteen full baths. Blanche, we’re guessing whoever buys said house will need some help keeping those bathrooms up to snuff. Thirteen bathrooms? Wait, there’s more.
There are two four-bedroom guesthouses, and a three-bedroom apartment. Hey, maybe Harry and Meghan can buy it. At least when Harry married Meghan, he wasn’t disowned. He left of his own free will.
Good Shabbos We’ll talk…
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