4 ms·

The writing on the wall was there when Trump was in office with how easily Europe scoffed at the idea that they were dependent on Russia. Turns out he was righ

The writing on the wall was there when Trump was in office with how easily Europe scoffed at the idea that they were dependent on Russia. Turns out he was right about that but it was cool to just do/think the opposite of whatever he said. The Germans laughed it off as if it "could never happen". Turns out it could and did all within a year.

warinukraine 4y ago
favflam 4y ago
- junofan 4y ago
  > Should I be cool and inject bleach into my veins? Because a guy asked a question? You’d rather a leader not ask questions? I don’t have a horse in this race, but this incident is not the slam dunk people paint it as.
  - mint2 4y ago
  - tadfisher 4y ago
    I would prefer the leader of my country to have a sense of which questions are stupid ones, yes.
- Vecr 4y ago
  UV light can in theory be used against infections in the blood (and I think has in the past, but who knows how well it worked, probably poorly), and intravenous monoclonal antibody injections do bind to viruses and help them to be "cleaned out" from the lungs. It is known to work in the case of COVID-19, see Evusheld currently, and older monoclonals that worked against earlier variants. It's possible he was talking more along the lines of hydroxycloroquine, a clear candidate for the treatment of SARS-like viruses (the virus that causes COVID-19 is SARS-like), but it's now thought that was a mistake on the part of the researchers who applied it to SARS, testing in the wrong tissue type (not lung cells like it needs to be tested in). It's likely most of Trump's suggested treatments would not really work in practice though either, as by the time you get to the hospital it's almost always way too late for any sort of anti-viral treatment, unless you are in the hospital for some other reason or gastrointestinal distress/a digestive problem caused by COVID-19. If you look at how well early IV remdesivier has been operationalized, I doubt most people would want to be confined to a hospital bed for hours with lights and HCQ injected into their bloodstream while they still feel like they just have a cold, no matter what the COVID-19 test says.
  - favflam 4y ago
    Respectfully speaking, if someone made those quotes while at a bar after drinking 4 tequila shots, we would laugh our buttocks off to share in the humor. If someone from Roche or some pharmaceutical company came to an investor call with a powerpoint with those quotes, that person would most assuredly be fired on the spot. I think we should have much higher expectations for someone who represents 1M+ employees of the US government with many thousands of loyal civil servants specializing in disease control. In the hard sciences, don’t people often say we stand on the shoulder of giants? If that is the best he can say in front of millions of Americans on prime time tv, then he must be standing on wet toilet paper.
mint2 4y ago
Quoting or citing trump as being right on Russia is very peculiar given that he deferred to Putin constantly over the US agencies and wanted to pull out of nato.
- parkingrift 4y ago
  Well his actual “speech” there said why should the US stay in NATO when the EU is dependent on Russian energy and also directly funding the Russian economy. https://youtu.be/1JpwkeTBwgs https://youtu.be/1JpwkeTBwgs Trump was not uniquely correct about this. Obama warned Europe about this same thing.
  - mint2 4y ago
    It’s correct trump was very critical of Germany for their gas deals, but trump had a record of attacking Europe and nato at any chance he got. But He simultaneously praised and fawned over Putin and deferred to him so much that even trump’s own top advisers considered they may have dirt on him. The criticisms of Germany really seemed to stem out of his antipathy to Germany, just one of about 29countries in nato. It doesn’t make sense to refer to that guy on Russia/nato when the only time he was right was when it happened to give him a way to criticize a country he hated, while turning around and fawning over the Russian leader when not talking about Germany. It doesn’t make sense to bring up trump here unless one simply can’t get over trump. There’s plenty of others who are far more appropriate like romney who got made fun of for being right on Russia, not someone who showed open appreciation of Russia hacking their political opponents and regularly showed admiration and deference to Putin.
    - parkingrift 4y ago
      I didn’t bring up Trump. A broken clock is right twice a day, but pretending Trump wasn’t right in this regard is just as disingenuous as all the people who think he’s never wrong.
tadfisher 4y ago
You're leaving out the context. Trump said that at a G7 summit, and the intent was to convince other world leaders that NATO is pointless and should be abolished. There's a nugget of truth in his statement, but ultimately it was made to benefit Russian interests and his isolationist platform.
warinukraine 4y ago
Dma54rhs 4y ago
Plenty of Europe said the same thing but Germany is stubborn and think it knows better than these uneducated Eastern Europeans.
imtringued 4y ago
The problem is that nobody expected the Russian Trump to be dumber than the American Trump.

warinukraine 4y ago

favflam 4y ago

junofan 4y ago
> Should I be cool and inject bleach into my veins? Because a guy asked a question? You’d rather a leader not ask questions? I don’t have a horse in this race, but this incident is not the slam dunk people paint it as.
- mint2 4y ago
- tadfisher 4y ago
  I would prefer the leader of my country to have a sense of which questions are stupid ones, yes.
Vecr 4y ago
UV light can in theory be used against infections in the blood (and I think has in the past, but who knows how well it worked, probably poorly), and intravenous monoclonal antibody injections do bind to viruses and help them to be "cleaned out" from the lungs. It is known to work in the case of COVID-19, see Evusheld currently, and older monoclonals that worked against earlier variants. It's possible he was talking more along the lines of hydroxycloroquine, a clear candidate for the treatment of SARS-like viruses (the virus that causes COVID-19 is SARS-like), but it's now thought that was a mistake on the part of the researchers who applied it to SARS, testing in the wrong tissue type (not lung cells like it needs to be tested in). It's likely most of Trump's suggested treatments would not really work in practice though either, as by the time you get to the hospital it's almost always way too late for any sort of anti-viral treatment, unless you are in the hospital for some other reason or gastrointestinal distress/a digestive problem caused by COVID-19. If you look at how well early IV remdesivier has been operationalized, I doubt most people would want to be confined to a hospital bed for hours with lights and HCQ injected into their bloodstream while they still feel like they just have a cold, no matter what the COVID-19 test says.
- favflam 4y ago
  Respectfully speaking, if someone made those quotes while at a bar after drinking 4 tequila shots, we would laugh our buttocks off to share in the humor. If someone from Roche or some pharmaceutical company came to an investor call with a powerpoint with those quotes, that person would most assuredly be fired on the spot. I think we should have much higher expectations for someone who represents 1M+ employees of the US government with many thousands of loyal civil servants specializing in disease control. In the hard sciences, don’t people often say we stand on the shoulder of giants? If that is the best he can say in front of millions of Americans on prime time tv, then he must be standing on wet toilet paper.

mint2 4y ago

Quoting or citing trump as being right on Russia is very peculiar given that he deferred to Putin constantly over the US agencies and wanted to pull out of nato.

parkingrift 4y ago
Well his actual “speech” there said why should the US stay in NATO when the EU is dependent on Russian energy and also directly funding the Russian economy. https://youtu.be/1JpwkeTBwgs https://youtu.be/1JpwkeTBwgs Trump was not uniquely correct about this. Obama warned Europe about this same thing.
- mint2 4y ago
  It’s correct trump was very critical of Germany for their gas deals, but trump had a record of attacking Europe and nato at any chance he got. But He simultaneously praised and fawned over Putin and deferred to him so much that even trump’s own top advisers considered they may have dirt on him. The criticisms of Germany really seemed to stem out of his antipathy to Germany, just one of about 29countries in nato. It doesn’t make sense to refer to that guy on Russia/nato when the only time he was right was when it happened to give him a way to criticize a country he hated, while turning around and fawning over the Russian leader when not talking about Germany. It doesn’t make sense to bring up trump here unless one simply can’t get over trump. There’s plenty of others who are far more appropriate like romney who got made fun of for being right on Russia, not someone who showed open appreciation of Russia hacking their political opponents and regularly showed admiration and deference to Putin.
  - parkingrift 4y ago
    I didn’t bring up Trump. A broken clock is right twice a day, but pretending Trump wasn’t right in this regard is just as disingenuous as all the people who think he’s never wrong.

tadfisher 4y ago

You're leaving out the context. Trump said that at a G7 summit, and the intent was to convince other world leaders that NATO is pointless and should be abolished. There's a nugget of truth in his statement, but ultimately it was made to benefit Russian interests and his isolationist platform.

warinukraine 4y ago

Dma54rhs 4y ago

Plenty of Europe said the same thing but Germany is stubborn and think it knows better than these uneducated Eastern Europeans.

imtringued 4y ago

The problem is that nobody expected the Russian Trump to be dumber than the American Trump.