COVID19 Update - Day 49

US Tests: 5,795,728
US Cases: 1,005,592
US Deaths: 52,525
Worldwide Cases: 3,094,829
Worldwide Deaths: 216,160

I'm going to start with the personal side today, and just let all of my readers know (yes, both of you), that I enjoy eating meat.  As soon as I finish writing this, I'm going to start making dinner for my kids and myself, which will feature chicken.  During the summer, we often grill hamburgers, and a year ago I absolutely fell in love with a good ribeye steak.

And don't even get me started on bacon.  I once worked with a woman who flat-out didn't like bacon.  She didn't have any dietary restrictions for medical, religious or ethical reasons --- she just didn't like the way it tastes.  Which I absolutely cannot comprehend.  If you're a Jew, or a vegan, or otherwise have some reason why you CHOOSE not to eat bacon, that I can understand.

But I just cannot fathom how someone can dislike it on the merits.

The reason I'm boring you with this is to make it clear that my objections to the latest Republican idiocy is wholly on the basis of workers' rights, and not in any way based on a dislike of meat:

President Donald Trump will sign an executive order Tuesday meant to stave off a shortage of chicken, pork and other meat on American supermarket shelves because of the coronavirus.

The order will use the Defense Production Act to classify meat processing as critical infrastructure to keep production plants open.

The order comes after industry leaders warned that consumers could see meat shortages in a matter of days after workers at major facilities tested positive for the virus. A senior White House official said the administration was working to prevent a situation in which a majority of processing plants shut down for a period of time, which could lead to an 80% drop in the availability of meat in supermarkets. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the order before its release.

Sure, Trump had to be badgered into using the Defense Production Act to make sure hospitals have enough PPE, but when America's meat supply is in danger, he rushes in!

It's worth emphasizing the reason WHY meat production is threatened (from the same story):

Tyson ran a full-page advertisement in The New York Times and other newspapers Sunday outlining the difficulty of producing meat while keeping more than 100,000 workers safe and shutting some plants.

“As pork, beef and chicken plants are being forced to close, even for short periods of time, millions of pounds of meat will disappear from the supply chain,” it read.

The United Food and Commercial Workers International Union, which represents 1.3 million food and retail workers, said Tuesday that 20 U.S. food-processing and meatpacking union workers in the U.S. have died and that an estimated 6,500 are sick or have been exposed to the virus while working near someone who tested positive.

Trump has no intention of solving the underlying problem, because (as he has spent the past 2 months amply demonstrating) he can't.  Workers will continue to get sick --- only now, even if a company like Tyson wants to do the responsible thing and keep workers safe, they won't be allowed to.

Which means, more meat-packaging workers will get infected, and those infected workers will be supplying the meat to your dining room table.  You might think the Republicans would be concerned about the possibility that someone might decide to sue over this, and you'd be right.  They've already come up with a plan to deal with potential litigation:

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Monday the next coronavirus relief legislation must include liability protections for business owners who reopen and indicated he would be open to some aid for beleaguered states.

The House and Senate both plan to convene in Washington on May 4 and resume business with the expectation of additional action to respond to the novel coronavirus pandemic that has shut down businesses and thrown millions of people out of work.

As some states begin gradually lifting stay-at-home orders and other restrictions, McConnell said that without protection from lawsuits, business owners could end up with years of legal claims over their efforts to restart the economy.

And what if some worker decides it's not worth the risk, to him, to his family, or to the people eating the meat he packs?  Well, he could always quit his job as a matter of principle.  Although, since 26 million Americans have lost their jobs in the last 5 weeks, he'd probably have to depend on unemployment benefits in order to survive.  But --- oh, wait:

The $2 trillion coronavirus rescue package hit a minor snag on Wednesday afternoon when four Republican senators gave a press conference objecting to its unemployment insurance provisions, noting that in some cases the $600-per-week enhancement to unemployment benefits in the package would mean workers who become unemployed could collect benefits that exceed the wages they used to earn. Senators Lindsay Graham, Ben Sasse, Rick Scott, and Tim Scott are concerned that such a high level of benefits would encourage people to stay out of work and collect benefits instead.

So, in summary, the GOP wants:

• To require meat-processing businesses to remain open.
• To give the workers no alternative but to work during a pandemic, no matter the risks to them, their families or society.
• To prevent anyone from suing over subsequent sickness or death resulting from this setup.

This is exactly the kind of government tyrrany that the folks in the MAGA hats claim to oppose.  But since Trump is the one pulling the levers, they'll probably call it 'freedom'.