bad news just won't go away

I seriously thought a corner would be turned by now.
Then again, I have a hard time believing 250,000-440,000 Americans die each year from MEDICAL ERRORS.
Seriously, how is the covid-19 death tally considered off the charts if the MEDICAL ERRORS cause roughly the same amount of the deaths, supposedly.
Google medical error deaths if you don't believe me.
Seriously, the idiot riots seem to be what caused the surge in cases. Economy opens up in May, the Riots happen... then surse galore of new cases.

Angry Mob violence

Whenever I see random acts of violence of a mob against one or two people, I often find myself wondering why do they fight the way they do. 

Then there's the random sucker punch followed by awkward punching. 

Hockey fights are only real fights I've seen, and they never punch like they show angry mob types. I doubt they mob types have never been shown how to throw a punch. They just rely on their size rather than technique. If the the sucker punching type picks the wrong person, they'd be in trouble.

new norrmal

Pay phones and record stores have died out. Cable and movie threaters are seeing the future running the same natural course as evidenced by Trolls World Tour and Tiger King doing well during the Wuhan Flu pandemic (COVID-19).
With everyone practicing social distancing, the streaming of meetings has taking a new leap as essential has been defined as a bunch of schmucks who have to be exposed to the potential carrier of the varient of SARS.
No sports.
No school.
No restaurant meals.
Boredom.
Joe Biden lingers in his basement. Reporters don't ask him about credible accusations of sexual assault. He flubs words. Question why Joe, only get the ORANGE MAN BAD response.
What's Trump doing anyway? First there was the ventilator shortage, then the PPE shortage... all the while a testing shortage. He delegates to the departments to work with the states. States each have their own way of doing things. People hating on Georgia and Florida... ignore epicenter NYC.
I found the outrage about testing dumb... what difference does it make aside from quaranteeing people and tracing their contacts to further quarantee people while we are already supposedly sheter-in-place?
No cure is going to come anytime soon, so the economy being shutdown forever seems like a stupid solution.
Harsh to think of people who are at risk of dying are already at risk of dying. COVID-19 is a bit of a grim reaper tipping point.
Perhaps culling the uber ill will free up resourses for a basic health care system.
Furloughing people just sucks.

fire

We're all going to die

Being stuck with my family since the end of March until May is better than being dead, though the latter will occur one day.

by invoking the visuals of "lynching," Trump dog whistles road map to a landslide victory.

Imagine being a minority, angry at Trump for reasons beyond words, yet unable to articular the anger into words. Trump has called the process used against him "lynching."
Will you be more likely to express anger at Trump? How will the anger be depicted now that it's been framed as "lynching?"
Halloween is coming. How many reports of "Trump hanging from a display" will there be?
The news cycle has been easily 90% negative towards Trump from the day he announced running in '15. He had vastly poor polling numbers, yet he won the general election.
Here we are in 2019. What has changed?

Impeachment means infamy,right?

Donald Trump doesn't seem to feel shame as long as whatever it is gains him fame. The trivial impeachment of Bill Clinton probably enhanced his place in American History. The latter being able to leave office on his own while having a booming economy, despite a hostile congress.
I'm not here to judge Clinton, but the Lewinsky scandal was something bizarre considering Kennedy had an affair with Monroe... so Clinton definitely cheapened the presidency.
So far, the matter regarding Ukraine certainly seems to be a bust as much as Russia was a bust.
The advocates for impeaching Trump aren't going to lose him any votes. Seriously, they're all disgustingly corrupt, deranged or vile compared to those who went after Clinton. They're feeding derangement. All one needs to do is put together truthful dossiers of each of them to highlight minor aspects of their lives that be construed as being the antithesis of what they claim to represent.
For example: Elizabeth Warren made a small fortune buying and flipping foreclosed homes. Kamala Harris put petty criminals behind bars. Mayor Pete has a corrupt police force.
Bigotry exists. I was open-minded towards Obamas until I was made aware of their hospital connection. Given my background, I find hospitals to be very corrupt institutions. Going negative won't win votes, but it will poison the well for those you attack if you hit upon a single issue that strikes someone in a way that cannot be overlooked.
Trump is a very shrewd politician. His attack style is a subtle rope-a-dope. Sure he punches those that don't directly punch him, but he tends to egg on and let those attacking him to choke on their own words until their initial message gets lost in the weeds.
Trump's failed campaign promises can be dismissed if he's impeached trying to fulfill them.
There's a whole year+ until the 2020 election, so a lot can be done between now and then... the Access Hollywood tape leaked too early for the faux outrage waned before election day.
HRC chimed in regarding the impeachment... she must feel free to do so since she survived scrutiny of the supposed "quid-pro-Joe" relating to the Clinton Foundation along with the fallout of the Benghazi timeline.
Notice the Bushes and Obamas have been quiet regarding the recent "scandal?" Are they avoiding the spotlight?

Franken/Stein 2020

Disgraced "comedian" Al Franken is back?
Given the re-emergence of eco-warriors need to make their cause seem dire, and the fact that current DEMOCRAT leadership cares more about impeaching a sitting president, I don't see Franken's return to "airwaves" as insignificant.
If you read anything about AF of late, you know he is/was very bitter about being forced to leave the Senate for groping women as a comedic figure.
He cannot return to the party. There's no place for him when you consider those running for POTUS are primarily former Senate colleagues who at best washed their hands of him.
The logical place for him to end up is in the GREEN PARTY, though Jill Stein will probably be a 3 time loser for the party but has name recognition from the Russia inquiry and such... thus her logical place would be VP, just as Weld thinks he can be POTUS for "never trump" republicans after failing as Libertarian VP candidate.
Joe Biden is toast. Warren and Sanders are anti-science...according to Booker, but Booker is running out of money. Booker probably just trying to get scared people to donate to him.
Warren and Sanders scare people like Howard of Starbucks.
Franken being from a state that Trump could potentially win would be enough reason to thumb his nose at everyone and get Trump re-elected.
I think the Franken/Stein ticket would be cool to see.

I actually support "nanny state," sometimes.

Bicycles sharing the roads with cars should mean bicycles having same rules as cars, or at least motorcycles.
I usually don't agree with the mayor of NYC, but I think there may be something to licenses for bikes.
Whenever I'm driving my work truck, I notice roughly 1 out of 10 drivers of cars NOT wearing a seat belt. I think they're idiots. People drive so poorly, and seat belts save lives by preventing people from flying through the air and landing with great impact... just as any accident with a motorcycle seems to be fatal due to such instances.
I've noticed almost every time I encounter a bicycle on the road, the rider is just asking to be it hit by veering into the whole road rather than staying close to the shoulder/bike lane.

Trump should initiate laws for Home Health Care Workers

Back when I was a career center director, I became aware of Home Instead. One of the medical assistant grads I was assisting with her job search let me know I didn't have to call her much like a parole officer does, for she had a job paying MINIMUM WAGE that essentially was "field related."

One of our sales reps said she'd worked weekends for Home Instead. She said it was easy money, for she refused to do clients with incontinence. She got paid to be available for them when they were sleeping, so she slept as well.

Sad to think that Vox.com blames slavery for the low wages. People are only willing to pay for services they can afford. Unfortunately, 24 hour care, even at minimum wage, is costly to the average person. There's an unskilled labor force willing to work for "slave wages."

Throwing out cliches about women and people of color being valued less only re-enforces the notion they are worth less.

We spend tons of money on housing prisoners. Google the numbers and you'd think we were paying for a Ivy League education rather than confining someone away from society.

No one knows how much illegal immigration actually costs.

The big China trade war "problem" is the decline in soybeans being sold there, yet we still have 40 million Americans struggling with hunger?

How much does it cost to ship soybeans to China? How much does the US Government pay to feed its hungry poor?

Think of the environmental costs involved when immigrants come to the U.S. from countries without washing machines or A/C in every house.

Trump could propose his own "Green New Deal" which infuses an "America First" agenda, but unfortunately could be embraced by Environmental wackos like the dude who shot up the El Paso Walmart. 

Is Charlie Sheen still alive?

I started to think about a movie in which Charlie Sheen appeared... so I wondered if he's still alive.
I was thinking about Richard Dawson  randomly one day only to hear of his death the next. Same goes for the fellow on M.A.S.H. who was replaced by the guy with a moustache.
Meh. Life being a simulation would explain a lot.

recession?

What exactly has Congress done to stave off a recession? Feels like 2007 all over again in the sense that Speaker Pelosi is meh about everything but taking out the President.
Most people will blame whomever they feel like blaming as long as they are on the other side, which is why having a split government actually favors Trump's re-election.
What has Pelosi and Co. done since being in charge of the purse strings?
I expect Trump to change a little, but enough to make opposition to his narrative to seem deranged or simply too"un-American."
He can highlight the trade war on American products espoused by deranged members of the "resistance" who think boycotting xyz and threatening violence against supporters of those brands as being more problematic that troll farms buying dubious ads on Facebook during the '16 campaign.
Having a recession now is too soon to swing an election against Trump, he has the means to fight back by pointing to a "do nothing"congress.

predicting events 2 months in advance

Back in June, I threw out the idea that my gold mutual fund could easily increase in value by $5... to $24.59. I said other things, but I'm a hedger more than a gambler, so I made trades before my target price was met.
It's impossible to time the market. I sold off 95 shares prematurely, it seems, but I still made a profit... just not as much. I moved the goal posts to what my break even amount would be to $29.67. I feel it's a lofty amount considering Brexit in 2016 didn't push it that high, though it had been $43.10 back on 9/27/2012.
Do I see another 20% jump within the year as possible? Yes.
The "trade war" with China hasn't really hurt the economy, yet interest rates were cut last week. Meanwhile, Boris Johnson will be in charge of the UK government as it navigates the Brexit stuff that May never completed.
If you don't remember 2012, well, the economy was doing fair... but the fiscal cliff was looming.
I've been tempted to sell, almost daily. I've not succeeded in stopping myself enough, but I have been good of late.
My gut tell me that I could hold out for $29.67, but my brain says the market can bounce back. and kill off the gold rally. The hedge has cut my potential losses by accepting actual gains of 20%, and hoard cash in case it dips or invest it in a mostly stable monthly dividend yielding fund. The latter makes more sense since I can't do a quick re-buy after selling without paying a penalty fee.

patience is hard

I've been very active with my 401(k) and IRA... and I know I should not be. I should tweek quarterly at most, yet I monitor ups and downs daily.
I really want to unload the mutual fund I bought back when I thought the world was coming to an end, but I don't want to take a true loss. It's a hedge to keep since I know it once was double or nearly triple its current value, but I really don't want to hold on for another 6 years when I have other options that are growing via dividend and capital gains regardless of what the markets says the mutual fund itself is worth.

$2K incease in Fidelity IRA in last 12 months

Gold is doing something while the markets are being randomly good and bad.
Gold can go up a lot from where it is now (doubling isn't too crazy, considering my mutual fund is way under the $43.10 I once bought it), while the market the fund is within is at it's top.
I have watch lists of mutual funds that give reliable dividends and capital gains. I'm shifting towards quarterly yielding ones from a single monthly. There are a few monthly yielding funds I'm testing to see which is the best long term.
I have also researched a few semi annual dividend yielding ones that interestingly fills in the June gap missed by the  April-July-October-December funds, but gives a certain dilemma in December. 
I am hopeful of adding $2k in my IRA by the end of the year. A 10% gain in 6 months is beyond my control, but I'm watching. I'm tired of holding gold that can vary too frequently without any guarantee of growth.

gold

I have a bad hobby of following my IRA. I have been looking toward diversifying my account into multiple dividend yielding mutual funds, but I'm still mostly invested in a gold related mutual fund. I am not the sort of person who looks at sunk costs easily. Gold was doing well when I first got into it at bargain $43.10 a share. It jumped to above $55 before sinking to $15.90 a couple years later. A couple years later, Brexit bumped the fund above $27, so I was above break even due to my buying and holding throughout the dive.  I got greedy and didn't sell it all off to break even, only to see the dip of $15.37 last year. I bought up the same amount of shares I sold in 2016 and sold off gradually after it hit upper $19. I was selling at 5 shares a day so I'm not making big returns beyond 30%, but I'm seeding my diversification towards year-round growth. Current break even amount seems to be roughly $23.50, but I'm thinking done selling until it hits $24.59. I'll hold, I've held on for nearly 7 years, I can wait out another 7, I reckon... but the chance for growth by converted to growth funds makes me want to cut chunks now that will grow quicker without having to hope for market flukes.
I read last week that tariffs have been blamed for loss of earnings made from the tax cut. Of course, the market crashed a bit a few days straight only to bounce back.
I doubt a $5 jump will come, but interest rate cuts seem to suggest gold will be  increasing in value throughout the summer.

Virgos

I don't believe horoscopes to be anything significant, but I can usually spot a Virgo.
A guy at work seems a bit like me in various ways... ways that are generic Virgo qualities, so I figured he was a Virgo. So I  asked him. He is a Virgo, barely.
I once worked at a library where 9 of 12 staff members were Virgos.
Seems too weird to be a mere coincidence...

66%

It would be funny if the KKK staged protests in Georgia over the new heart-beat law. Supposedly, 2/3 of abortions are performed on black women, which probably makes the KKK pro-choice given only 28% of abortions involved white women.

Would Alyssa Milano march with Nazis?

9 showed up for KKK rally?

I saw a few anti-hate posts on FB relating to Dayton. Evidently it was in response to a KKK rally.  The city of Dayton spent $650,000 towards the rally, though 9 showed. Seems like a lot of money for so few. Part of me wonders if the whole matter was a ruse to create a means to take funds.

when does life begin?

I have a complicated view on abortion.
My parents actually went to have my brother aborted but there was a line so they went to get lunch during which my dad talked my mom into marrying him. I heard this story for the first time while eating at the bar they choose for that lunch while my parents were visiting me at college. My brother never knew until then as well.
Three of my cousins were adopted. My aunt couldn't have kids. Two of my cousins aren't the brightest but they all have college degrees.
Before I was married, I was fully intent on marrying my wife. There was a moment when she thought she was possibly pregnant though she was on a form of birth control. I didn't think she was pregnant, but the idea was there. She wasn't ready for a child, so I would have supported her decision. Obviously she wasn't pregnant, but rather she felt weird due to the birth control affecting her. Regardless, I was willing to turn a blind eye to my feelings of pro-life.
I've been reading a lot of angst about the heart-beat bills passed in Ohio and such. Everyone seems fixated on an 11 year old in Ohio who was "raped" by a 26 year old. I use the quotes because it seems she willfully ran away to be with the guy. Not to take away from her being raped but to put context that abortion my not have been her first inclination...
My older daughter turned 11 today. If I had found out she was with a 26 year old... I would be inclined to end his heart-beat. Regardless, back when she was a heart-beat in her mom's belly, ultrasounds were sketchy and suggested she may have Down's. We met with a genetic counselor and he tried to scare us. We would have loved our daughter regardless, so we shrugged at their suggesting to terminating her heart beat.
The argument in favor of abortion is the reproductive rights of a woman are being infringed upon.
Not sure how many abortions are of planned pregnancies, but there's surely a reason for the pregnancy occurring in the first place.  I imagine alcohol may be to blame for a good number of unplanned pregnancies. Given that an intoxicated person may lack the ability to give consent, so technically, those pregnancies would be due to rape, right? Wasn't rape almost always an exception in the past? The problem then lies in that fact that the guy probably does not consider himself a rapist and the woman probably blames herself for being drunk.  The woman shouldn't be forced to have a guy's baby just because he didn't use protection, nor should she need his permission to abort his unwanted seed. Unless there's a notarized letter stating the unprotected sexual encounter was consensual, then the DNA from the aborted fetus should be ample evidence of a rape. The guy could be guilty of rape and murder thus locked up indefinitely to never cause another unplanned pregnancy again.
The threat of being charged with rape and murder should deter a guy from suggesting the pull-out method in lieu of a trusty condom.
If a woman is worried she'd be forced to charge he BF with rape... pregnency testing could be made free, and done before a heart-beat is detected.

I've never tried the "pull-out" method, I am a Trojan Man. I have yet to have an unplanned pregnancy thanks to Trojan. I think back to when we used the other means of birth control, and I find myself with more peace of mind.