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TheFrontPageCover

~ Featuring ~

Coronavirus, Economics, and Elections

Gary Bauer

Trump Strikes Emergency Deal With

Health Insurance Companies, Media Silent

by wethepeopledaily.com ~ While the Democrats and the mainstream media continue to criticize President Trump and his administration for their coronavirus response efforts... the reality is that Trump’s team is doing a spectacular job and they’ve pulled off another impactful deal that will play a huge role in keeping Americans healthy. On Tuesday, Vice President Mike Pence announced that the Trump administration was able to get major insurance companies to agree to waive copays on coronavirus testing. “I’m pleased to report that as you requested, Mr. President, that all the insurance companies here, either today, or before today, have agreed to waive all copays on coronavirus testing, and extend coverage for coronavirus treatment in all of their benefit plans,” Pence announced during a meeting with President Donald Trump and insurance CEOs, according to The Hill. Mike Pence, who was tasked with leading the Trump admin’s efforts in combatting the coronavirus has done an excellent job. He also added that insurance companies further agreed to avoid any “surprise billing” by making prices for coronavirus-related treatments available to patients up front. As per Pence, the companies in agreement represent nearly 240 million American citizens. The health insurance companies that attended the meeting, and are seemingly onboard with waiving such copays, include UnitedHealth Group, Anthem, Cigna, Humana, Aetna and the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association. The coronavirus has infected more than 700 people in over 30 states and killed nearly 30 people, the Johns Hopkins University tracker estimates, The Washington Times noted Tuesday... https://wethepeopledaily.com/2020/03/11/trump-strikes-emergency-deal-with-health-insurance-companies-media-silent/

What The Rest Of The World Can Learn From Taiwan’s Success Containing Coronavirus

By Helen Raleigh

{ thefederalist.com } ~ By any measure, Taiwan should have been the second-hardest-hit area of the coronavirus outbreak outside mainland China. Taiwan is less than 100 miles away from mainland China and receives an estimated 3 million mainland tourists annually... Furthermore, more than 1 million Taiwanese travel to mainland China each year. The expansive travel volume across the Taiwan strait reached its peak during the recent lunar New Year celebration in January, as it always has. Yet this densely populated island of 23 million people has only 44 confirmed cases of the virus to date, and just one death so far. Taiwan hasn’t experienced the need to cancel schools nor lock down major cities. At this critical period when the publicly feared coronavirus is amplifying in numbers worldwide, it’s clear the Taiwanese government has done something right in its containment measures. How did Taiwan do it? The Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) published recent findings crediting the Taiwanese government with recognizing the crisis early. Taiwan took swift and decisive actions, while Beijing and the World Health Organization (WHO) were busy downplaying the risks. As we now know, Wuhan, the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak, recorded its first patient as early as Dec. 1, 2019. In the following days, Beijing coerced doctors in Wuhan and prevented them from alerting their peers and the general public. Medical professionals who sounded alarms were reprimanded by the government for “spreading rumors.” Beijing waited until Dec. 31 to notify the WHO about the coronavirus, while declaring nothing to the Chinese people. As soon as Taiwan officials heard the news Dec. 31, however, they refused to take any chances. Based on their past experiences of dealing with another deadly virus outbreak, SARS, they took action the same day. According to JAMA, “Taiwanese officials began to board planes and assess passengers on direct flights from Wuhan for fever and pneumonia symptoms before passengers could deplane.”... https://thefederalist.com/2020/03/11/what-the-rest-of-the-world-can-learn-from-taiwans-success-containing-coronavirus/?utm_source=The+Federalist+List&utm_campaign=b360c4b7ad-RSS_The_Federalist_Daily_Updates_w_Transom&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_cfcb868ceb-b360c4b7ad-83771801

Hunting Narco-Terrorists in Afghanistan

By Jeffrey James Higgins

{ americanthinker.com } ~ It’s time for DEA to blitz Afghanistan. DEA should commit additional manpower and resources to fill the vacuum created by the U.S. military’s drawdown... It may seem strange to call for an expanded role after the Trump administration’s recent peace treaty with the Taliban and the public’s growing weariness with America’s longest war, but DEA’s real value is not in interdicting narcotics shipments or blowing up clandestine labs in the mountains. DEA’s forte is infiltrating criminal groups. An evil cabal thrives in Afghanistan and spreads the scourge of heroin around the world. Roughly the size of Texas, Afghanistan produces approximately 80% of the global heroin supply and boasts the most acreage under poppy cultivation -- the plant used to produce opium, morphine, and heroin. Afghanistan’s opiate sales surpass the value of its legal exports, and illicit drugs remain a significant percentage of the country’s GDP. Afghanistan has become the factory supplying the world’s heroin, but narcotics are not the biggest threat -- that is terrorism. Southwest Asia hosts the highest concentration of terrorist groups on earth. Drugs and terrorism is a lethal combination, and only DEA is equipped to counter narco-terrorism. Classical narco-terrorism involves trafficking groups engaged in violence to further their economic growth, but modern narco-terrorism has expanded to include terrorist groups funding violence with drugs, groups driven by both violent ideology and profit, and the symbiotic relationship between drug traffickers and terrorists. Terrorism requires funding, and illicit drug trafficking is extremely profitable, making these criminal enterprises natural partners. According to the Drug Enforcement Administration, 37% of designated terrorist groups have some connection to drug trafficking. The United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime estimates $150 million the Taliban’s income is derived from the opiate trade. Afghanistan has become the axis of evil forces, where terrorists and traffickers build fortunes by turning powder into blood. The Trump administration’s ill-advised peace treaty with the Taliban will fail, because negotiated peace is impossible with radical ideologues who believe they need to subjugate or murder anyone who disagrees with them. There is no substantial difference between ISIS and the Taliban, or with any other radical Islamic group which embraces violence. The only way to defeat terrorists is to imprison or kill them. As the U.S. disengages and withdraws troops from Afghanistan, the region will attract Islamists, traffickers, and other nefarious criminals like a black hole, and continue to be the frontline of the War on Terror. DEA is the answer...

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2020/03/hunting_narcoterrorists_in_afghanistan.html

Pompeo calls for humanitarian release of

wrongfully detained Americans in Iran

amid coronavirus outbreak

By Jennifer Hansler and Kylie Atwood

{ cnn.com } ~ Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Tuesday called for Iran to release Americans who are being wrongfully detained... and warned that the US would hold Tehran responsible if any of them died from the coronavirus. "Our response will be decisive," Pompeo warned in a statement. "Reports that COVID-19 has spread to Iranian prisons are deeply troubling and demand nothing less than the full and immediate release of all American citizens," Pompeo said. "Their detention amid increasingly deteriorating conditions defies basic human decency. At least four Americans are imprisoned in Iran, which has had more than 8,000 coronavirus cases and nearly 300 deaths. Courts across Iran have granted eligible inmates furlough as part of the measures to contain coronavirus in the country, said Judiciary Chief Hojatoleslam Ebrahim Raeisi, according to the semi-official Tasnim News Agency on Monday. Pompeo said the furlough of tens of thousands of prisoners demonstrated Iran's "ability to grant clemency and show mercy." "Any nation considering whether to provide Iran with humanitarian assistance because of COVID-19 should seek a reciprocal humanitarian gesture by the regime: release all wrongly detained dual and foreign national citizens. This request is well within the regime's power to grant," he added. "The United States will not rest until all Americans wrongfully detained abroad are returned home." Pompeo met earlier Tuesday with American former prisoner Xiyue Wang. Wang, who also went to the White House and Capitol Hill, brought up the other American prisoners during his meetings in Washington, according to a source familiar. Last week, the family of American prisoner Siamak Namazi put out a statement asking for help getting him a temporary furlough as a fellow prisoner had tested positive for the coronoavirus, countless others are sick and there are no medicines to treat the ill. Iran announced it would release 70,000 prisoners on furlough who had tested negative, but Namazi was not among them. The US has offered assistance to the Iranian people, and the State Department said it would consider assistance to Iranian officials if they asked for it.

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/03/10/politics/mike-pompeo-iran-release-detained-americans-coronavirus/index.html

How much will Saudi Arabia’s oil price

slash hurt its neighbors?

By Karen E. Young

{ washingtonpost.com } ~ Saudi Arabia’s decision to increase production and sell oil at sharply discounted prices at a time of declining oil demand has sent shock waves through oil markets and stock markets... Increased production comes at a moment when the covid-19 outbreak has seized business and tourism activity globally — essentially creating a simultaneous demand and supply shock. There will probably be severe economic effects on both sides of the Persian Gulf, as well as in Pakistan and countries in the Middle East and Horn of Africa that rely on the Gulf Arab states for financial support. Other Middle East oil producers will be forced to sell their crude at the Saudi price, posing a heavy blow to fiscal plans. Here’s how this may play out across the region. Few producers will be able to bear the pain until either Russia agrees to production cuts — which looks unlikely for now — or a political crisis threatens the availability of oil transferring through the Strait of Hormuz or Bab al-Mandeb, bumping up oil prices. Neither is a longer-term solution to get back to steady, if low, growth. This is the biggest oil price crash in decades. That may not be great for the U.S. economy. For Iraq, without a new government in place, the timing is terrible. For Iran, there appears to be no bottom to the list of problems. Iran’s capacity for oil production and export is crippled by sanctions, and basic governance is halted by internal turmoil related to covid-19. With oil prices forecast by the Energy Information Administration in February to stay in the $60-per-barrel range, 2020 was already a difficult year across the gulf. Depending on the country, fiscal break-even prices ranged from $40 a barrel to over $100 a barrel. Many oil exporters faced low growth projections around 1 percent of gross domestic product, just hovering above recession levels. The Saudi government’s own budget forecast a fiscal deficit at 6.5 percent of GDP for 2020, to be filled with reserves, loans or bond issues. S&P Global has estimated that the Gulf Cooperation Council states will need as much as $300 billion in external funding to meet 2018-2022 spending needs. New funding needs may dwarf those estimates, should the price war drag out through the year. Access to debt capital markets has been good for the six members of the GCC — Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain and Oman – even those with less than perfect credit ratings such as Oman and Bahrain. The issue is not the ability to borrow but the ability to repay, given other demands on government budgets...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/03/10/how-much-will-saudi-arabias-oil-price-slash-hurt-its-neighbors/

FEMA Seeking Contractors to Deliver Portable Toilets, Showers Within 24 Hours Notice as Coronavirus Spreads

By Alana Goodman

{ freebeacon.com } ~ The U.S. government's disaster response agency placed an urgent request last week seeking contractors who can deliver portable toilets, showers, and hand-washing stations... throughout the United States within 24 hours notice, a potential sign of how the administration could be preparing to respond to a coronavirus pandemic. The Federal Emergency Management Agency said it was looking for vendors who are able to provide "portable facilities, to include toilets, showers, and handwash stations during a FEMA disaster response to all U.S. state, local, tribal, and territorial government locations," according to a "sources sought notice" the agency posted on the federal public solicitation database on March 3. Federal agencies publish "sources sought notices" to collect information on potential vendors in a market and they often precede a formal solicitation notice for contractors. Responses were requested by March 26, 2020. A spokeswoman for FEMA told the Washington Free Beacon that it is "promoting preparedness activities" related to the global spread of coronavirus, which topped 800 confirmed cases in the United States on Tuesday. The agency declined to say directly whether the vendor notice was part of this response effort. "The federal government is taking aggressive and proactive steps to mitigate the spread and effects of the coronavirus (COVID-19)," said FEMA spokeswoman Janet Montesi. "Consistent with its mission, FEMA has also been promoting preparedness activities and is currently a supporting agency to HHS delivering crisis action planning, situational awareness, reporting, interagency coordination, course of action development, and logistics supply chain analysis through a Crisis Action Task Force located at the HHS Secretary’s Operations Center." The spread of the virus has prompted mandatory quarantines in New York and other states. New York governor Andrew Cuomo also announced the formation of a one-mile containment zone in Westchester County this week. Contractors "must be able to deliver to designated disaster locations within the appointed time period, typically 24 hours after award, to any location within the United States, including Alaska and Hawaii to the U.S. Territories," according to the notice. The handwashing stations "must be available to meet the health and sanitation needs of the shelter population" and "should be located near toilet areas and equipped with soap, disposable towels, and warm water if possible."...

https://freebeacon.com/national-security/fema-seeking-contractors-to-deliver-portable-toilets-showers-within-24-hours-notice-as-coronavirus-spreads/?utm_source=actengage&utm_campaign=FreedomMail&utm_medium=email

Coronavirus, Economics, and Elections

Gary Bauer

Given the mass hysteria that we’re getting from the media, I want to provide some thoughts and analysis on the coronavirus, the economy, and how both may impact the elections.

But first, I want to offer my condolences to those who have lost family members and loved ones to this new virus. More people will be infected and additional lives will be lost. Those impacted are in our prayers.

The Economy

Yesterday, the government reported that 273,000 new jobs were created in February.That smashed predictions of 175,000 new jobs. And there was more good news. The jobs figures from December and January were revised upwards by 85,000.

Within minutes, the stock market rallied 2,000 points — not. The pre-market was down 780 points and it remained down 780 points. What in the world could explain that?

The answer is not that complex. There were several new coronavirus cases reported in the United States in the last 24 hours, and to frightened investors that cancelled out the fact that 273,000 more Americans were working last month than before.

Yet when it comes to the virus itself, there are reasons to feel cautiously optimistic.

The spread of the coronavirus in China is slowing.
Key economic activity is returning to normal.
In countries with better healthcare systems, like South Korea, the death rate is much, much lower than the 3% figure that has been widely reported.
Children are not at great risk.
Thousands of people are recovering every day, but those numbers are not being reported by the media.
People over 65 are at greater risk, particularly if you have heart disease, lung disorders, diabetes, or other physical ailments.

But along with that good news is the reality that as tens of thousands of people in the United States get tested in the next few weeks, the number of reported cases is going to go up. (And I believe, as a result, the death rate will go down.) We will see the proof that for most people this is the equivalent of the normal seasonal flu or severe cold.

Thank God that Donald Trump, Mike Pence, and their team of free-market experts have been running the U.S. economy for the past three years. The result is that we are going into this health crisis in an incredibly strong position as yesterday’s report of 273,000 new jobs shows.

If this had happened during the scumbag/liar-nObama/loose lips liar-Biden years, I shudder to think of the economic pain that would have ensued.

The Elections

In a democratic society, what people tend to ask is, “What did you do for me today?” And the coronavirus could have profound effects on the standing of the administration and, whether we care to acknowledge it or not, on the November elections.

In spite of the obscene efforts of liar-Pelosi, scumbag-Schumer, and their media allies to blame the Trump/Pence administration for the spread of this virus, the fact is they have done virtually everything correctly to date.

In fact, the head of the World Health Organization on Thursday praised President Trump's leadership and handling of the crisis.

The one area where there was a lag was in testing kits. That was due to an scumbag/liar-nObama/loose lips liar-Biden-era regulation that permitted only the Food and Drug Administration to develop tests for new viral agents. The president quickly repealed this regulation to speed up the development of new test kits.

Sadly, even in a best-case scenario, it is going to take at least another 30 to 45 days to fully know with greater certainty the degree of damage done to the economy and to those infected by this virus.

Like many viruses, it should die out when temperatures get above 75 degrees for a prolonged period of time. By May and June, the worst should be over.

In the meantime, virtually every economic report is likely to show a slowing economy, and the election will be only five months away.

My hope is that the administration can make the case that because of its policies America entered this crisis in a strong position and that the suffering was significantly limited compared to what happened in China.

I hope the American people would realize that because the economy is fragile, they should want the Trump/Pence team growing us out of this, not loose lips liar-Biden and his socialist gang. They are demanding big tax hikes (twice as much as scumbag/liar-Hillary proposed!), the worst possible thing you could do to a nation recovering from a shock.

What Else?

Under this administration’s direction, work on a vaccine is quickly advancing. But what else can be done?

There is a lot of talk about the need for an economic stimulus program. The president has hinted at tax cuts. But before the virus, the thinking was that they would introduce that idea during the campaign. I think they need to move forward now.

One possibility would be a payroll tax cut so that millions of Americans would immediately have larger paychecks. Under George W. Bush, taxpayers and families received stimulus checks in 2008. It’s not clear whether that actually worked.

This idea may annoy fiscal conservatives, but you can make a case for setting up a $1 trillion emergency fund right now and getting that passed through Congress to deploy in whatever area makes the most sense.

The 10-year Treasury bond is at 0.77%. The inflation rate is 2.5%. In other words, the federal government today can borrow billions of dollars at an interest rate lower than inflation.

There is no better time to borrow the money to help the economy recover more quickly so that revenues come in more quickly so we can manage the debt.

Trump’s Town Hall

Did you catch President Trump's town hall event in Pennsylvania Thursday night? It was terrific!

One question posed to the president is something I am frequently asked about — his aggressive style. Asked whether he could take it down a notch or two, the president replied, “When they hit us, we have to hit back. I really feel that … I wouldn’t be here if I had turned the other cheek.”

He’s absolutely right!

As I have written before, it does us no good to lose gracefully. In 2008, rino-John McCain refused to make an issue of Jeremiah Wright. rino-Mitt Romney is a decent man, but the left mercilessly smeared him.

And something else I often hear about is the “lack of fight” in the GOP. Well, Trump is changing that too. The best example is Sen. Lindsey Graham.

I have big differences with Sen. Graham over certain issues. But just imagine how the Kavanaugh hearings would have turned out if Lindsey Graham hadn’t fought back so effectively!

My friends, there’s simply too much at stake for us not to fight for the values we cherish and the country we love! ~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/opinion/69081?mailing_id=4911&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4911&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body

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