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Charlie Baker, Robert Kraft team up to get 1.2 million N95 masks from China
By adamg on Thu, 04/02/2020 - 8:23am
Gov. Baker posted this photo of 1.2 million N95 masks being loaded onto the Patriots plane, after several days of negotiations with a Chinese company and the Chinese government - and a $2 million payment by the Patriots owner. ABC News reports 300,000 masks will go to New York - and that 500,000 more masks are waiting for us in China.
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Comments
Because the president just can't seem to get it done...
It's a sad state of affairs when private citizens have to step up to fill a huge hole
What a stupid statement
Almost EVERY major event in our nations history includes private citizens stepping up.
Yeah and
The best Presidents and other government officials have risen to the occasion, unlike Trump.
I don't like most of Baker's policies but I think he's done a pretty good job in this crisis. He's doing the right thing: listen to experts and use his authority to put their advice into action.
Meanwhile Trump won't listen to anyone and the country is far worse right now as a result. Never forget we wouldn't be so far in the shit right now if he had acted months earlier.
Did you miss the part where MA orders got taken by FEMA
No?
Or where FEMA was outbidding states and giving everything to states that weren't preparing?
Maybe you should wake the eff up.
Not even close
You're not even close, there's a huge difference.
People had to step up this time because the president refused to do his job. Trump should be doing what he can to get the resources needed. But, no. Around 3 weeks ago, he literally said that the states were on their own for obtaining masks. Is that your idea of leadership? We're in the middle of a national emergency and the prez says "not my job"?
But wait, there's more.
Now, he's politicizing the distribution of resources. His gov buddy in FL got all he wanted while NYC is a mess.
Yet
yet I have asshole followers on twitter who say something like
"Nurses and doctors need to blame cheap hospital administrators for not ordering enough gear and not blame @RealDonaldTrump for their short comings"
Its's also good to note this same person is a MBTA driver and works out of the same garage that a person has died from C19 worked also.
Maybe asshole follower should look at his own employer and say that to them.
Maybe asshole follower should stop driving a bus.
Really.
Actually
I had someone else who is a bus driver friend come @ me one day last week trying to get me to get behind the movement to shut down the T cuz drivers were unsafe.
My reply was this:
"I have a job. I'm still employed. I have to work at home. I don't like that I have to work from home but I do it because I have a job. You work with the public, you drive a bus, you are in contact with people everyday. It is apart of your job. You knew the risks when you became a bus driver. Now you're deemed as essential, and are forced to work in these conditions. You have a choice.. walk away or shut up and drive"
I'm not having it with people these days with their petty arguments.
Its also good to note that asshole driver from post above as very Pro Union. Amazing how quick these union boys change their tune and say comments like that against fellow brothers and sisters in a neighboring union when their shit is on the line.
And they get paid a hell of a
And they get paid a hell of a lot more than my son who shows up at Stop&Shop 6 days a week without complaining.
It is much harder than you realize
Bus drivers work with their back to a bunch of random strangers. There seems to be a report of someone spitting on them like once a week. I can understand why a driver would be very concerned about their safety.
I am sure your son works extremely hard. I am surprised that you haven't mentioned his union. I hope Stop & Shop takes care of him and appreciates his work.
Stop&Shop does not take care
Stop&Shop does not take care of him or his coworkers as well as I think it should. I feel that rules should be in place that customers need to follow. The contact is way too close and they are not supplied with masks or protective coverings. I thought I heard that commuters can no longer enter front door or sit behind MBTA bus drivers in order to keep social distancing. Supermarkets have nothing like that in place to protect their workers. It’s very concerning.
But his union does care
Here is a link for your son to report safety issues
http://www.ufcw.org/coronavirus/reportanissue/
Thank you! I will pass it on
Thank you! I will pass it on to him. It is very upsetting to know he has nothing protecting him from getting sick.
bus driving is not supposed to be dangerous
I agree that the T cannot shut down but more steps need to be taken to ensure that it is being used to make us safer, instead of creating more infections. Protecting T employees from infection protects all of us.
We need to get a handle on testing. The post infection serology testing needs to start as soon as possible. A priority schedule needs to established for current infection testing. If the state requires an employee to work, then they need to make realistic plan for testing them.
I am a pro union state worker that is currently the only line worker in my section. I am grateful to get my paycheck on time. I am grateful that when I forced to be at home from 3/16 to 3/27, I was not required to use time. I am grateful that I could afford to pick better health insurance because the state pays 80%. As an essential worker, I do have tasks that require community contact for public safety reasons. I am happy to do these tasks as long as the decision makers have seriously evaluated the risks in light of these new circumstances. I am not accepting risks just because i am grateful. Every person that gets infected exponentially increases the risk. For that reason I will also set limits in situation where the risks out weigh the benefit to the public. My job is making the community safer and spreading infection is not a "petty" concern.
I agree. I also think grocery
I agree. I also think grocery story workers need better protection and better pay during this crisis. I am scrambling to find safety supplies online for my son. His position doesn’t protect him behind a plastic shield. He is expected to be out on the floor with people coming at him in all directions. I hate it but he won’t quit because people depend on him.
Ooookaaayyy..... taking this
Ooookaaayyy..... taking this line-by-line:
yet I have asshole followers on twitter who say something like
If they're following you, you might want to evaluate what you're doing to attract them...
"Nurses and doctors need to blame cheap hospital administrators for not ordering enough gear and not blame @RealDonaldTrump for their short comings"
False binary - there's grounds for reasonable criticism of hospital admins in their sphere of responsibility and POTUS in his.
Its's also good to note this same person is a MBTA driver and works out of the same garage that a person has died from C19 worked also. Maybe asshole follower should look at his own employer and say that to them.
What's to say he hasn't? Many employers in many fields are being criticized from within and without for what they expect their people to do with inadequate support.
"I have a job. I'm still employed. I have to work at home. I don't like that I have to work from home but I do it because I have a job.
So... In the current crisis, you still have a paycheck and you don't need leave the safety of home to earn it. My heart bleeds for you.
You work with the public, you drive a bus, you are in contact with people everyday. It is apart of your job. You knew the risks when you became a bus driver. Now you're deemed as essential, and are forced to work in these conditions. You have a choice.. walk away or shut up and drive"
It is not "their job" to work in a safety crapshoot if their employer isn't holding up their end - Just the same as it's not "their job" to drive a bus that's 6000 miles overdue for a PM on brakes.
I'm not having it with people these days with their petty arguments.
Yeah, people concerned about their own safety are a pain, aren't they?
Its also good to note that asshole driver from post above as very Pro Union. Amazing how quick these union boys change their tune and say comments like that against fellow brothers and sisters in a neighboring union
Urging other unions to speak up isn't inconsistent or changing their tune or against the others - it's recognizing parallels to your own situation and urging response that doesn't set bad precedent for your situation.
...when their shit is on the line.
So you agree that their shit is on the line and still said all that? You ARE a stain.
Just doesn't feel like a clever retort...
...to provide that sort of false choice here.
If I can expand on that
It is absolutely great what Charlie Baker and Robert Kraft pulled off.
It is absolutely depressing that they have to because our national government has proven unable to respond to a national emergency. Let's not forget the three prior shipments of PPE stuff that Massachusetts thought it had but had them grabbed by the federal government.
Pretty sure this is the system working as designed
Isn't this the Republican ideal - defund the government, and then we're all dependent on the munificence of the wealthy elite to generously donate the goods we need?
(And if that doesn't happen, because they decide that they'd rather buy another yacht or something instead, well, you should have tugged on those bootstraps a little harder, bucko).
I view it differently
I'm very happy they did because if anything, this pandemic has proven we need to empower decentralized responses far more than we have thus far. Too many regulations and centralized control has catastrophically failed us, and there's no mirror universe to see how it would have gone with a different president in charge.
I am guessing it would definitely go better, but look around the globe -- almost every country has failed at responding to this and I am also guessing it would still be pretty disastrous with your enlightened leader of choice as well. The CDC and FDA protecting their regulatory turf would not likely be very different.
The cognitive dissonance between how incapable Trump is at performing the duties of what we've ceded to the Presidency, and yet demanding the federal government have yet more control -- it truly boggles the mind.
The reason for more decentralized control, is that rather than one entity failing for everyone, the right thing is to empower private and state actors to step up, whether the wealthy donating masks or the doctors in Seattle telling the FDA to go screw earlier on than they did.
Additionally, what is appropriate response in Boston is not necessarily what is appropriate in Ohio, or NY or Florida.
It's also an argument for state budgets to get under control. Reading the story about how California scrapped their mobile pandemic response (which was ~ $5.8M / year) because their budget is out of control (largely consumed by decades of overly generous public sector pensions, which are crowding out other useful spending)
I am not at all optimistic about how the $2-4T bailout is going to go, and I have deep concerns for the tax bill we're bringing home to roost on the younger generations (including myself). Truly money has lost all meaning.
My highschool-era boss used to say "do something, even if its wrong!" That's funny when you are 16 and there are 8 workers, not so funny when that is the sad, failing response by Congress (which otherwise governs like 538 Helen Lovejoy's)
"Too many regulations and centralized control..."
I stopped reading after that.
The mirror universe is called WW 2
The world of WW 2 lasted as long as it did because the US - in its spirit of populism and "to h..." with Europe played the role of isolationist. Once the war directly hit the US via Pearl Harbor everyone went, "Oh gosh, they attacked us! How dare they!"
If the portion of WW 2 where the US responded had been fought on the basis of private individuals, private corporations and states we would have made little to no contribution to defeating the Nazis.
Coronavirus doesn't perceive state boundaries. It does not ask governors whether it may enter. It was obvious that this is a national crisis. But the Koch brothers, Grover Norquist mantra "All government is bad" is a lie and coronavirus proves it is a lie.
There are domains that belong to state goverments; there are domains that belong to the Federal government. There are places and times where non-government resources can help and can even be necessary.
In this case the Federal government under Trump chose to fail the challenge of a pandemic before the pandemic began. The Trump administration is playing death and life games with medical supplies.
State budgets have been grossly deficient for what is needed. One example: the insurance commission for the state is a failure. Learned from personal experience.
At a moment when all hands need to be on deck the Trump and company jumped ship before the ship sailed. They were forced back on board but now where lives are concerned they have mutinied.
Some other countries are not failing at responding to C19
Germany, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Vietnam. And they are not countries that are known for decentralized control, quite the opposite.
https://www.webmd.com/lung/news/20200327/how-three-countries-have-kept-c...
Needs federal orchestration
Individuals and companies and states stepping up is great, but national coordination is essential.
Without it, we can't take advantage of the fact that different regions are being hit at different times. We can't move supplies to where they are needed.
And most importantly, we can't assure hospitals that more is on the way. Every hospital is going to buy up every piece of PPE and every ventilator they can now because they don't know if they will be able to get more later. It is institutional hoarding, and they have to do it absent supply chain guarantees.
Everyone loses, but poor regions and poor hospitals really lose.
Another National Level Fail
We would not be in this dire situation had a certain incompetent golfing demogogue not disbanded 1) our early warning systems in china that were there precisely because the Chinese Government isn't trustworthy; 2) the Pandemic Response team and 3) hadn't ignored the fucking pandemic playbook that outlined key responses and actions until it finally got through is dense orange ego that there was a problem.
Are we really sure we can
Are we really sure we can trust products made in China? European countries have recently noted a significant problem with hundreds of thousands of defective masks, testing kits, and the like being purchased from China.
The last thing we need is our front-line healthcare workers getting sick because they had a false sense of security from fake masks which offered no protection.
It would be better to be buying everything from Tiawan or other more reputable countries than China now if domestic production can't keep up with demand.
Well
I'll trust any mask over no mask at all at this point.
If you have a domestic source for millions of N95 masks please give our Governor a call.
Hospitals can't
Hospitals need to know what they've got. If they think they have N95s but they have fake ones, it is a major risk. Partners is screening all masks and other PPE for this reason.
See here for what's really happening on the ground:
https://www.chinalawblog.com/2020/03/buying-face-masks-and-other-ppe-fro...
Honest question
If they are out of domestic/trusted masks are they going to use no mask at all over one from a questionable source?
we aren't quite there yet
Hospitals are still trying to get the real stuff. The surge hasn't hit quite yet in this state, and certainty is better than uncertainty.
It's a really big step to decide to take a random counterfeit, or even worse buy a large number of them knowing you don't know how effective they are and knowing you're spending down your account by doing it.
Happy I don't have to make that choice.
Chinese Product?
Hope you didn't post that from an iPhone. Then again, you couldn't spell Taiwan correctly, so something else might be defective.
domestic production COULD keep up
but Orange Julius hasn't enacted the Defense Production Act yet
Im sure its only because The Kush is now running the CORONA show (after creating peace in the Mid-East) and has an even bigger, better plan.
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/04/01/jared-kushner-coronavirus-respo...
"A beautiful plan that some are saying (many in fact) that it's maybe the best plan ever created. I said is this true? Is this really that great? And they said, yes Mr. President this plan is probably one of the best ever. So maybe I could've done that too. Who knows? I'm a genius, so. It's possible."
Gee!
Were those some of the masks that the pals of Tom and Bob's in the Trump administration shipped out to China recently? "
Providing
Aid to the epicenter of a pandemic, the horror.
It’s not like helping to slow the spread in the viruses starting place could help it from spreading.
Maybe we should cut all foreign aid which I’m cool with.
Brian - Let It Go
Kraft knows winners and losers. He realized that he was wrong and is now trying to make amends. Please for the love of Christ accept that someone went out of there way to help New England and New York with their own money.
You can tell that Baker knows that Steven Miller and others are directing aid to swing states and Red States and can't say it enough without facing additional backlash from the Federal Government.
Let it go for now please. This is going to save lives. Thanks.
Maybe when you've
listened to literally hundreds of PR people talk about actions like this and how they translate into fawning coverage, you'd have my attitude.
Which Bridge?
I just want to know the one you are self isolating under so you won't yell at me as a try to go over it.
Accept a gracious action for once. A silver lining is sometimes a silver lining.
They can both be true
It can simultaneously be true that Kraft’s role in obtaining the masks was a good thing, and that it was virtue signaling done for bullshit PR reasons.
Living in a glass house?
John: You offered a criticism about the spelling of Taiwan. Did you notice that you used the term there when their is the correct word?
Before criticizing a person for an error perhaps it would be good to make sure you don't commit an even more obvious error.
I guess everyone has been
I guess everyone has been missing the news regarding the quality control from there. Several other nations have purchased vast amounts from China and only like 50% have been usable.
Glad we are getting some
Glad we are getting some masks, particularly after the President:
- Said states are on their own to get them
- Has been outbidding or intercepting MA's mask orders
- Is not giving states the equipment they are asking for if he doesn't think the governors are being nice to him
He's such an dick. I hate him so much.
We need to have greater manufacturing capacity
In the U.S. We should not have to basically beg China, the country where this virus originated, to sell us masks.
And the Chinese government needs to pay a heavy price the incredible damage this virus has caused around the world. They are using propaganda to project the image that they're victims. It's unacceptable.
How many for Massachusetts?
I see a number of 300k for New York, and it says "500,000 more masks are waiting for us" - is that 500k for MA?
i took that as in "there are
i took that as in "there are 500k more masks to be flown over" bringing the total to 1.5mm masks.
also, fwiw, stephon marbury is supposedly paying for 25 million masks to be sent to ny state (he is currently living in china coaching one of their pro basketball teams)
It's like this
1.2M masks delivered from China - 300K masks for NY
= 900K masks for MA, + 500K masks waiting to fly
Once the deniers in the South
Once the deniers in the South come to grips with the fact that this is no laughing matter, ten bucks says you'll see red MAGA masks.
Because the masks aren"t made
Because the masks aren"t made in the USA?
"We all will solve this problem” -- President Trump
--
Bob Kraft still maintains a close friendship with President Trump, even though cutting ties years ago would have been the easier path. So it's no surprise that Kraft would step up after the president asked us all to help out. The president even cut the "red tape" that threatened to derail the mission. A great example of business helping community by Kraft organizing the shipping for the hapless Baker crowd. Charlie, ebay has taught grandmothers around the world that when outbid, raise your bid. Great to see the critics suddenly adoring Trump's friend Kraft, even if temporary. “In times of crisis, we must all decide again and again whom we love.” ― Frank O'Hara, Meditations in an Emergency
True colors
A free press - with a continuous roll of "letters to the Editor" is valuable. It allows us to show our true colors. Fishy: Thank you for once again showing your true colors. Good luck when you meet St. Peter at the Pearly Gates. You probably will not understand why he is laughing at you so hard.
And what has eBay taught
And what has eBay taught grandmothers to do when the item they won at auction is seized in the Port of New York by a vindictive government looking to settle political scores and co-opt the spending, preparation, and hard work of others to cover up their own huge failures?
So Trump kept taking the
So Trump, as a good friend, kept taking the masks we ordered so that Baker and Kraft would get creative and send a private plane to China to get them ourselves?!