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Surfer

Coronavirus and the Media

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Thought this deserved its own thread rather than drag the main Covid-19 thread off in a tangent. 

It’s always fun to joke about “the daily fail” but is this just gross editorial incompetence or is it a deliberate attempt to conflate 2 deaths within a church with 28 deaths in the West Midlands? 

   https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8137445/amp/Coronavirus-outbreak-killed-28-West-Midlands-linked-church.html?__twitter_impression=true

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That is a terribly misleading headline. Thankfully they haven't named the church or it could have been dangerous as well.

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Thought this piece from Unherd (I know) was interesting:

Our political identities continue to shape how we see the world around  us. When asked this week whether Johnson’s government is underreacting, overreacting or reacted about right only 38% of all voters felt it was underreacting. But look under the bonnet and you find that while 60% of Conservatives think that the government has reacted ‘about right’, 55% of Labour voters think it has ‘underreacted’.

Similarly, when asked how much confidence they have in the new government to handle the outbreak 77% of Conservatives have a ‘a lot’ or ‘fair amount’ while 60% of Labour voters have ‘very little’ or ‘no’ confidence. Even coronavirus is filtered, at least partly, through our partisan eyes. 

The 24-hour rolling news media (really only BBC & Sky) seems to reflect this innate bias - neither channel are friends of the Government and seem to focus on gaps in policy rather than the overwhelming fiscal and monetary expansion that is going on.  In fairness Sky's in -house economist, Ed Conway, was blown away by the scale of Sunak's last announcement of government support for wages and was somewhat mystified by McDonnell's somewhat grudging and even churlish reaction to the announcement - even when trade union leaders are delighted. 

 

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Of course bias exists. Anyone who says it does not is an idiot or a liar. 

But there is bias, and then there is propaganda and outright incompetence in news reporting.

The public deserves to be free from either one of those. 

Edited by Surfer
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You could probably say that Tesco has caused it because 60% of the people who have it shopped there. The only stat really relevant is that it is getting worse in the UK.

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one needs to put all this fearmongering under a microscope. Some say that this is a welcome diversion from the dire state of the worlds financial system. If it is, we have another 10 years of austerity before us, to pay for the rich offshore billionaires that don't want to pay their employees out of their own pockets, as well as play the wretched system we are under.

https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2020/03/its-not-socialism-its-another-mega-wealth-transfer/

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Be prepared for a major shift in US policy towards stay in place recommendations. 

Typically whatever gets said on Fox, the President reflects within 24 hours..... 

 

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Steve feckin Hilton. One of the main architects of Britain's austerity project. Why  that clown is allowed anywhere near humanity is anyone's guess.

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America will be most hit by this outbreak and Trumps attempt to buy an excellent lab working on a serum and other stuff was an outrageous undertaking. He was told that they are making medicine for all countries not just America.

Since then, the German government announced that no company will be sold or taken over at this crucial time.

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Unfortunately not. We have this little thing called the Electoral College and Republicans desperate to maintain power at all costs, so some strategically target election interference here and there, and he could lose the popular vote by 10 million (he lost the last one by 3 million) and still get re-elected with narrow and unauditable "wins" in the swing States. 

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Fox News not running hard with the "open the economy and lie those who will die, die" 

 

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And this is Anne Coulter. She is truly a despicable person. And usually wrong. 

But her shtick is to "own the libs" i.e. everything is a partisan attack from her.

In this case, in the first graph what she states is clearly wrong. In the second it's O.K if only old people die.... however in US a big % of those hospitalized are 18-45, perhaps because a significant % of Americans are obese, so not as fit as Italians.

Coulter.jpg

Coulter 2.jpg

Edited by Surfer

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The issue of what is right re deaths and the economy, is a government issue for sure. So I'm not saying that it should not be discussed, but it's clear Fox News and Trump allies have new instructions. 

Liberty.jpg

Falwell.jpg

Korea.jpg

Edited by Surfer

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Compare to what is a quite reasonable set of questions reported out by the Daily Mail. Until we have tests for viral load and for antibodies readily available we are all guessing.... 

Coronavirus could have infected HALF of the British population and been spreading here since January say Oxford University experts

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8148529/Coronavirus-infected-half-British-population-say-Oxford-University-experts.html?ito=social-twitter_dailymailUK

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Same Fox show .... NY death toll and historic unemployment claims .... and she really said that.

"all my friends are saying you know, this is not a priority, people are dying and i realize that, but they can't get their nails done"

 

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Meanwhile, not "mainstream" or "major non-mainstream" media, but he has a White House Press Pass and he has a radio show..

 

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The media must stop these silly questions such as  "when will it peak Prime Ministe?".

I couldn't believe in an era of stay at home isolation, that SKY sent a reporter to stand outside Balmoral to tell us about Charlie. How different would the news have been if he had reported it from SKY's Scottish studio?

Edited by keelansgrandad
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Indeed. But then would fall foul of the first rule of "live reporting" 

Cut to reporter, looking very serious in front of a door / police car / fire truck - in fact anything that looks "important" 

"I'm standing here, where, if you had been here several hours ago, something actually happened, and we have some tape that we want to roll of when we got here, after that very important thing happened, and I want to tell you about this tape that you are looking at that doesn't have the thing that happened here several hours ago, because we were not here several hours ago, but it's very important. So back to you in the studio" 

"Well thank you Brian / Melanie. That's great reporting there. What did you learn from the people who were there?" 

"Yes John, I spoke with several people who were not here here when the very important thing that happened, but they saw our live broadcast and came here to say that there though that whatever it was that happened, they were surprised by that and it's very important to them. 

"Wow thank you again Brian / Melanie. Now - let's see what the traffic looks like for tonight commute home" 

 

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Daily Mail.

Alternative headline - 95% of those who have died from CoronaVirus had an underlying health condition. But I guess that does not sell newspapers as efficiently.... 

DM.jpg

Edited by Surfer

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The Mail has been pretty disgusting today, highly irresposible and i long the day that it is out of business.

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This is The Mail as well right?  Blame Europe.... who cares who he got it from?

Fact is he has it. End of story. The REAL Story is what is being done or NOT done?

 

Where are the testing kits (i.e. you have it, so we need to isolate you)  

Where are the "all clear" kits (i.e you have recovered, so you can go back to work) 

Where is the protective gear for our NHS staff (so they don't also get infected?) 

Where are the additional beds and ventilators that will be needed. 

What are you doing to protect the economy? (on this issue Sunik is doing OK) 

Where is the briefing about how many have recovered after falling ill.

- Can we use their blood plasma to treat others while waiting for a vaccine?

Why don't we know what % of the country may have already been infected? 

- Are we randomly testing to understand the spread of the virus? 

 

Mail.jpg

Edited by Surfer
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There was that and also the Trumpist "blame China" angle on the main pages. More disgraceful xenophobic distractions from a disgraceful xenophobic paper.

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