New Show: JBOTV Sea Bass 2020 plus new Virginia record Bluefin caught by Captain Jake Hiles. Be safe and well.
Northam extends non-essential business closure
RICHMOND—Governor Ralph Northam today announced that he will extend Executive Order Fifty-Three for two weeks, through Friday, May 8, 2020.
Executive Order Fifty-Three originally signed on March 24, bans crowds of more than 10 people; closes recreation, entertainment, and personal care businesses; and limits restaurants to offering takeout and delivery services only.
“As we have seen from our data and models, social distancing is working, and we are slowing the spread of this virus,” said Governor Northam. “But it is too early to let up. By extending this order to keep certain businesses closed or restricted, we can continue to evaluate the situation and plan for how to eventually ease restrictions so that our businesses may operate without endangering public health.”
Governor Northam’s Executive Order Fifty-Five, which directs Virginians to stay home unless they must leave for essential services, remains in effect until June 10. A Frequently Asked Questions guide about Virginia’s Stay at Home order can be found here.
Charles Landis: Lucky Me and My Pony
Special to the Mirror by Charles Landis
It is important to always be optimistic, positive, hope for the best of luck, and keep a sense of humor. I have had 4 cancers and, separately, 3 close encounters with my maker. At 85,with the Corona Virus lurking, I look forward to another 30 years in contented retirement.
Born in middle of the Great Depression and within the year got Scarlet Fever. My father, being an optimist, had 4 children during the Depression. Then his company failed and he went from being a millionaire to losing everything. With optimism and luck by 1938 all turned around. Then, I fell out of third story window at 3 and broke arms, legs, ribs, and 5 in. skull fracture. Year plus in hospital (no insurance). At age 5 all good. Lucky me.
At 6, Pearl Harbor, For 4 years family gathered around the radio, listened to news of the War, fireside chats of FDR and heard Kate Smith sing God Bless America. Watched sky filled with B-2 bombers ….headed for re-stage in England. Bundles for kin in Britain, ration stamps for food and wood wheels for car. Blackouts and subs off coast of Long Island. Everyone engaged in war effort and patriotic. Parents always optimistic. Lucky me.
Orphan at age 15. At 18 worked in steel mill and lived in closet sized room overlooking blast furnace on seventh floor (walk up) at YMCA. Graduated university with debt and then called to active duty in US Air Force. Lucky no wars. Recession in 1987 (S &L crisis), Dow dropped 24%, and lost job 40 hours short of eligible for early retirement with 2 children in college. Worked out separation package. 401K with company stock dropped from $33 to $13. Associates lost nest eggs but I had moved to other investment that secured principal (GIC). Dow at 7500 in1990 rose to 29,000 in 2019 then down to 20,000 and today 23,000 plus. Lucky me.
In 1956, while on training mission in F-86D over Gulf of Mexico, plane went into uncontrolled spin. Instructor talked me out. Lucky learning curve. In 1960 picked up rare virus in Casablanca, Morocco, carried to Geneva and left to die, lucky. In 1976 food poisoned at restaurant in Washington. Rushed to hospital and all vital signs going south and showed possible death. Lucky.
In 1978, at 43, hit by motorcycle doing 85 mph in 35 zone. Lucky hit broadside at rear door of large station wagon. He dead me some broken bones. Lucky. In 2003 arrived in Beijing day China confessed SARS was epidemic. They said flu like so travelled about for a month. Lucky me.
Today, all is good… lucky me and my pony.(Note. If you see a large pile of horse manure, start digging and if lucky will find your pony).
Farms and Food Logistics more important than ever
Farm to table, the US has the most productive food supply chain in the world. However, as our relationship to the source of our food has shifted, it has driven an increase in misinformation and fear.
The US produces more than 4,000 cal worth of food per person, per day. But, the USDA estimates that 37.5% (1,500 cal) of that production goes to waste.
There are three issues that contribute to food fear in the US:
- Consumption habits
- Distribution of demand for US ag products
- Transportation/infrastructure
The US leads the world in agriculture innovation – from more efficient equipment to precision agronomy to scientific breakthroughs, the average farm in the US leverages more high-tech each year.
Based on the relative amount of inputs per acre (seed, chem, fertilizer, fuel, land, and labor), the US has remained static since 1948, but with better practices, equipment, and technology, output has tripled.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EVPiZr9UEAEiuqF?format=png&name=360×360
Yield is higher, but overall, fewer families are farming than ever.
US farms peaked in 1935 at 6.8 million against a total US pop of 127.3 million. A huge percentage of the US was involved in AG in some way.
By 2017, there were only 2.05 million farms to feed 325.7 million people. The US is producing more food than ever, with fewer growers than ever.
The type of grower has shifted as well. Farming is still a family business, but the trend is towards much larger, corporate-style farms.
And at this point, the trends are likely irreversible.
When corn prices decoupled from reality in 2006 thanks to an explosion in demand for ethanol, it started an upswing in market, input, and land prices. Everything got more expensive, even as crop prices came back down.
Likewise, the US enjoyed a strong uptick in exports of not just the crops themselves, but co-products of refining such as DDGS and soybean meal (SBM). These became cheap, high-demand protein sources for Asia to feed their growing poultry flocks and herds of swine and beef.
At the end of 2013, China decided to address its own food insecurity. China’s enormous population demands massive amounts of protein. Separate from the US staple crops of grains and soy, the news is no better for the livestock, produce, and dairy sectors. The major distinction is that the primary markets for corn and soy are processors who convert them into food ingredients, biofuel, or animal feed.
The supply chains for these are fairly static. Grains and soy tend to move in bulk once or twice, then be turned into a new product.
X qty to become animal feed.
X qty to become food ingredients.
X qty to become biofuels.
They are less unstable.
The other products are more sensitive to demand disruptions (such as economic slowdown or COVID-19) because they are much closer to the consumer’s table. Meat is butchered and sold. Dairy is processed once, then sold. Produce is processed not at all, or once, then sold.
Thus, US consumer behavior is closely tied to these more-sensitive food items. So too are the supply chains to move these products from farm to table more specialized. Produce must be segregated by quality. Liquids move in expensive tankers. Meat must stay cold.
If restaurants and schools have reduced consumption, they’re buying less from suppliers, who buy less at the farm level. Hence the stories we’re now seeing about massive spoilage on-farm. The risk has been transferred from the end of the supply chain to the front of it.
Another disruption is that of transport capacity, especially for perishable items. Refrigerated trucks (“reefers”) carry much of the dry/packaged goods, and specialty tankers carry bulk liquids like milk. Change in demand increases prices and dislocates assets.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EVQLY0dXYAIdyqQ?format=png&name=small
The more specialized the transport, the less capacity can “flex”. A regular dry van trailer can move nearly any cargo. A tanker can only move a few products. The assets depend on reliable volumes. Carriers who can’t make money will change trailers and carry something else.
An issue affecting meat is the stoppage of in-person livestock auctions, where a good portion of business occurs in that sector. Reduction in meatpacking capacity is also an issue.
However, these are temporary issues – unless the economy stays shut down.
For people newly facing food insecurity, it’s more a result of less money to buy food because of reduced (or eliminated) income. For farmers, it’s an emergent revenue crisis that is doubly galling after seeing $6 trillion go to a variety of political interests.
Farms are hardest-hit right now, even as shelves remain mostly full. A continued slowdown during planting season will have a long-term impact for the rest of the year, even if the economy recovers somewhat.
Farmers are beginning their spring crop cycle in the greatest economic uncertainty most have ever faced. The USDA needs to take all measures to financially protect producers for the ’20-21 marketing cycle, especially with robust direct payments at the farm level. Second, waive all hours of service and weight limit restrictions for drivers carrying food or food-adjacent goods (packaging, for example).
Price caps on inputs and taxes, as well as subsidies for freight payors moving food products, need to be instituted.
We also need to institute some form of national food stockpile program under the guidance of a National Quartermaster.
An effort to replace missing migrant workers on-farm with paid prison laborers – qualified by good behavior and nature of the offense should be looked at.
The fact is that whatever happens with COVID-19, the most essential link in our food supply chain is already being crushed, especially after years of struggle. Our future depends on saving our farms.
NYC adds fake numbers to Covid tally
New York added 3,700 victims on Tuesday, after officials said they were now including people who had never tested positive for the virus but were presumed to have died of it.
The rationale: New York says while these so-called excess deaths were not explicitly linked to the virus, they might not have happened had the outbreak not occurred, in part because it overwhelmed the normal health care system.
So, basically if you are in a car accident, and too many resources are wasted on a weak virus, Covid-19 will be considered the cause of death.
So it goes.
America’s economic crisis is going to get worse
America’s economic crisis soon may expand to its states, cities, and towns.
State and local tax revenue are both falling, particularly in areas heavily reliant on sales taxes and tourist dollars. Meanwhile spending is up due to added unemployment and medical obligations.
In Arizona, which had been projecting a $1 billion surplus by the end of its fiscal year in June, now is looking at a $1.1 billion deficit.
The most critical cases may be Florida and Louisiana, which both are in the top 10 for sales tax dependency and have rainy day funds that represent less than 5% of annual expenditures.
Both have been hit hard by the coronavirus. Louisiana is believed to have peaked last week, but Florida isn’t expected to peak for a couple more weeks.
They also have large tourism and oil industries and are at particular risk for hurricanes — opening the possibility of simultaneous state emergencies.
There also will be shortfalls in cities, counties, and towns — many of which haven’t yet debated or approved fiscal 2021 budgets because of bylaws that didn’t anticipate governance-via-Zoom.
Bankruptcies are a very real possibility.
Retail Sales Tank in March
(AP) Retail sales plunged 8.7 percent in March, marking the largest monthly decline ever as the coronavirus pandemic guts consumer spending, yanks millions out of the workforce and forces people to stay home.
The figures stand in stark comparison to February’s revised 0.4 percent decline and sent U.S. stock futures southward. Dow futures dropped 650 points, or 2.7 percent, shortly before the open. Futures of the Standard & Poor’s 500 index and Nasdaq composites were also deep in the red off the economic data.
Wednesday’s retail report offered another lens into just how quickly the outbreak seized the American economy. The drop blew past economist expectations of about 8 percent.
American consumers drive 70 percent of the country’s economy. But now, spending at restaurants, retail stores, malls and the like is essentially gone.
U.S. consumer sentiment suffers record decline
U.S. consumer sentiment suffered a record decline in April, according to the latest poll from the University of Michigan, but respondents are still irrationally confident about the future, the survey’s director says.
The survey’s gauge of preliminary consumer sentiment sank 18 points to 71, its lowest since 2011.
A measure of current conditions plunged by more than 31 index-points, nearly twice the previous record, while a measure of future expectations dropped by just under 10 points.
“Anticipating a quick and sustained economic expansion is likely to be a failed expectation, resulting in a renewed and deeper slump in confidence,” Richard Curtin, Michigan’s surveys of consumers chief economist, said in a statement.
“Consumers need to be prepared for a longer and deeper recession rather than the now discredited message that pent-up demand will spark a quick, robust, and sustained economic recovery.”
“Continued declines in the seven-day average Sentiment Index can be expected in the weeks ahead. Sharp additional declines may occur when consumers adjust their views to a slower expected pace of the economic recovery.”
IMF predicts another Great Depression
According to the latest from the IMF’s World Economic Outlook , the coronavirus pandemic will bring about the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression.
That is its optimistic outlook.
The Fund admitted that damage could be far worse than its projections and that while there’s some chance they could be positively surprised, “downside risks prevail.”
The organization’s baseline expectation is for a recession “far worse” than the 2008 financial crisis, with global GDP contracting by 3% this year. That’s a drastic downgrade from its forecast of 6.3% growth in January, and 30 times worse than the economic decline in 2008.
Global GDP is expected to face a cumulative loss of about $9 trillion — larger than the economies of Japan and Germany combined.
More confidence COVID-19 originated in Wuhan laboratory
It is becoming more apparent that the COVID-19 outbreak likely originated in a Wuhan laboratory.
Intelligence sources believe the initial transmission of the virus – a naturally occurring strain that was being studied there – was bat-to-human and that “patient zero” worked at the laboratory, then went into the population in Wuhan.
Despite “increasing confidence” some inside the administration and the intelligence and epidemiological communities are more skeptical, and the investigation is continuing.
What all of the sources agree about is the extensive cover-up of data and information about COVID-19 orchestrated by the Chinese government.
Documents detail early efforts by doctors at the lab and early efforts at containment. The Wuhan wet market initially identified as a possible point of origin never sold bats–blaming the wet market was an effort by China to deflect blame from the laboratory, along with the country’s propaganda efforts targeting the U.S. and Italy.
The Washington Post reported this week that U.S. Embassy officials warned in January 2018 about inadequate safety at the Wuhan Institute of Virology lab and passed on information about scientists conducting risky research on coronavirus from bats.
State Department cables about the Wuhan laboratory, said the lab “contained highly contagious materials.
On Thursday, China’s foreign ministry pushed back on the suspicion that the virus escaped from the facility, by citing statements from the World Health Organization that there is no evidence the coronavirus came from a laboratory.
China “100 percent” suppressed data and changed data, the sources told Fox News. Samples were destroyed, contaminated areas scrubbed, some early reports erased, and academic articles stifled.
Additionally, the sources tell Fox News the World Health Organization (WHO) was complicit from the beginning in helping China cover its tracks.
At this time, it is widely believed that Patient Zero was infected in Wuhan, China with SARS-CoV-2. What is not so certain is where exactly in Wuhan Patient Zero was infected, and how he/she was infected. The competing theories are:
- From eating wild animals at the Huanan Seafood Market
- From doing work at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which performed gain-of-function research on the original SARS virus
- From doing work at the Wuhan Centre for Disease Control, which performed experiments on and housed many bats known for carrying coronaviruses
- From somewhere elsewhere entirely; they were not in Wuhan at all
Patient Zero would then go on to spread the infection, likely asymptomatically, to many people before any defensive measures were taken. This would eventually cause the pandemic now known as COVID-19 and resulting worldwide lockdown.
Because 34% of cases did not have exposure to the market yet were exposed to the virus, it is highly unlikely the market is the origin point of SARS-CoV-2. Indeed, the study confirms “No epidemiological link was found between the first patient and later cases” – meaning that the first patient at the market was not responsible for spreading the virus to other cases.
What is clear is that the spread of the virus began to rise exponentially after it arrived at the Huanan Seafood Market. According to the Wall Street Journal quoting the Chinese Center for Disease Control, the virus was present in “environmental samples” at the market.
The first calls to examine the laboratories began when it emerged that the Wuhan Institute of Virology, China’s only BSL-4 bio-laboratory, was only 8.6 miles away from the seafood market. Additionally, the Wuhan Centre for Disease Prevention & Control is located a mere 2.6 miles away. We can easily confirm this with Google Maps:
Directions from Huanan Seafood Market to Wuhan Institute of Virology, CAS
While the simple existence of these laboratories does not make them suspects, their proximity to the Huanan Seafood Market does.
Note that both of these labs have conducted experiments on the SARS-CoV-1 virus, some of which have resulted in variants of the virus, and may still be holding such viruses today. Bboth labs have conducted experiments involving SARS-CoV-1 on live animals.
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