It is revealed today that the first death in the U.S. due to COVID-19 was not in late Feb. in Washington state but on Feb. 6 in California.  The person did not travel to China and so had to get it from the community.  This means the virus was present in the U.S. in January for sure.  The patient would have to get it and got sick days later and then died days later.

So this patient was not diagnosed at that time with the virus even though it is well known by that time that this disease was a possible diagnosis.  Yet this was missed.  So how do you blame China for missing the diagnosis in November when nobody in the world knew about this virus?  I have seen many cases during my career of atypical pneumonia.  Many times we see cases of "fever of unknown origin" (FUO).  It took days or weeks to find the real origin of the fever.  Sometimes it turns to be not even an infection that caused the fever but other illnesses such as cancer. 

There are many who accuses China of cover up or slow in reacting to the disease.  But to declare a new infection among us without thorough investigation would be irresponsible.  You can see now that even when every health organization in the world knew about this virus and the genome was already identified, we missed this case in February.  So maybe we know how difficult it is to respond quickly and inform the rest of the world correctly.  We should also realize that our response to the pandemic was slow and inadequate.

There is a TED talk on YouTube featuring Gary Liu, CEO of the South China Morning Post.  The SCMP is the most prominent of the English language papers of Hong Kong.  It has been under attack from all sides since it was bought out by Alibaba.  Western leaning people believe that SCMP has become the puppet of China.  On the other hand, those who are pro China are accusing the paper of being pro western because the top executives are all western educated.

The same accusations are leveled at Gary Liu.  In this TED talk, he gave an excellent timeline regarding COVID-19.  His criticism and praise for China were balance, in my opinion.  Yet when I checked the like and dislike hits, they were almost even.  Most of time, there are way more likes than dislikes on YouTube because the people who tune in to a particular video usually like the content in the first place.  So to me, Liu must be hit from both sides, just like his paper.  To the pro Chinese faction, this U.S. born person who grew up in Taiwan, New Zealand, went to Harvard, worked in the U.S. for 20 years, must be biased against China.  To those against China, working for Alibaba must mean that he will be soft on China.

There were protests in several states regarding lock downs.  Most of the people involved were Trump supporters so Trump has told certain states (with Democratic governors) they should liberate the people.  He even threw in Second Amendment right issues in it.  Once again, Trump is doing his best to divide the country for his own political gain.  If Trump and his supporters have their way, we will end up like Italy or worse.

I think there is an attitude difference between most of the western countries and those of Asia that transcend democracy and communism.  In most of the west, it seems to me individual rights and freedom trump community rights and freedom.  So while South Korea, Taiwan and Singapore are not communist like China, they had the discipline of doing what they perceived as best for the community.  Germany is one big western country that has demonstrated this type of discipline.  But most other western countries were late in lock downs and faced protests over less draconian restrictions than those in Asian countries.

I will end with something from Hong Kong I read:  Quarantine and you have no human right.  No quarantine and you have no human left.  

Recently Andrew Yang in an op-ed said that Asian Americans, in the face of discrimination due to COVID-19, should do more to show that they are good Americans.  While I agree that we should do good things, I don't think we should do so because we are trying to prove our American worthiness.  It would be great in this time of crisis that we step up and do more charity or volunteer work.  But that is true of all Americans, not just Asian Americans. 

No matter what we do, it is not going to convince the racists not to discriminate or attack us.  Asian Americans are already stereotyped as the "model immigrants or minority" but that hasn't stop certain people from considering us not as Americans, but as foreigners.  As Yang himself pointed out, Asians comprise 17% of the physicians in the country.  Many of these doctors along with tens of thousands of healthcare workers of Asian descent are on the front line of defense against this pandemic.  But the racists will still attack us anyway.

During our county Chinese New Year celebration, I was honored to introduce World War II veterans of Chinese descent from our county.  I spoke about the fact that during World War II, over 20,000 men and women of Chinese descent served in our military.  This was 20% of the total population of Chinese in America at that time.  This high percentage of service occurred despite the fact that these heroes faced discrimination before, during and after the war.  These heroes sacrificed despite not being considered by many to be Americans.  They did not have to prove their American worthiness, they just did what was right.  Today, we should do the right things, not because we need to prove our American worthiness, but because they are the right things.

Dr. Ming Lin, an emergency physician was fired by his hospital because he was speaking out in social media about the lack of safety measures for patients and staff during this pandemic.  He had gone to executives of the hospital first and only went public when he saw the response was inadequate.  He is not an isolated case, according to the American College of Emergency Physicians.  It is incredible to me that in this time of crisis, that physicians on the front line, are being dismissed for speaking up.  Isn't it similar  to the reprimand the government in Wuhan gave to Dr. Li when he spoke up? 

I don't think that Dr. Lin's firing is race related.  But there are news of more Asian Americans being attacked as the casualties of the COVID-19 increase.  As the number of deaths increases here in the U.S.  and the conditions in China return to normal, you can bet that attacks on Asian American will increase even more.  Right now, I am sure the attacks are perpetuated by racists or people who have little knowledge of the world.  But that is changing.

Tim Pool, who has a big following on Youtube, ranted about this whole thing was China trying to kill Americans and become number one in the world.  You would not label him as a racist or some babbling idiot.  He came to fame when he covered Occupying Wall Street and used a drone which produced a video showing a cop attacking a protester.  The video contradicted what the cop reported afterward.  Pool became a darling of the left and was a Sanders supporter in 2016.  He has sided with refugees in Europe in the past.  He also has fans on the right since recently he claims that the mainstream media is biased against conservative.

So agree or not agree with him, Pool does not seem to be one who rants without thinking.  But his attack on China is backed by no fact or false narratives.  The idea that China lied about this whole thing to kill Americans and become dominant is nonsense.  As I have pointed out, maybe be the local government in Wuhan made mistakes and delayed things.  But even if a medical genius was running this whole thing from day one, it would not have sped up the warning sent out to the world by more than couple of weeks.  Pool said that the lies from China were intentional so Trump is not responsible for what happens in the U.S.

So China started this outbreak, killing thousands of its own people, so that the virus will spread to the U.S. and kill many more thousands Americans so China can be dominant?  Who in China or anywhere else would think this is great plan?   Even if China lied in the beginning, the U.S. and the rest of the world had 2 months head start on China to fight this virus.  There are countries whose casualty is minimum compare to the U.S.  South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong have done well.  They were affected way earlier than the U.S.  Does Pool think that China believe that the U.S. is less competent than these Asian countries?

I don't know what possesses Pool to rant like this.  But as I mentioned in the last blog, the mainstream media is subtly pointing the finger at China.  Jake Tapper of CNN said this week that Xi Jinping has blood on his hand for China's slow response.  This type of reporting show either a bias agenda or lack of research on how possible infection outbreaks are handled. 

Trump has said that Asian Americans should not be targeted because of this pandemic.  But he didn't just called this "China virus" at his briefings.  He also insisted that the G7 nations use this name instead of COVID-19 in their joint statement after their virtual summit. When the other nations refused, the U.S. didn't sign. Is there any doubt that when things get worse here, Trump will try to shift blame to China?  When that happens, Asian Americans will be in even greater danger.

In LA Times three days ago there was an article about novelist Fang Fang who lives in Wuhan,  China.  She is described as an authentic voice of truth for Wuhan.  She is 65 years old and had gone through the Cultural Revolution and still has a big mistrust of the communist government.  I can understand the frustration of what she witnessed in the past 3 months as Wuhan was the epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic.  I also share her anger of Mao and what the communist government did in the Cultural Revolution.  But if she is the authentic voice today as the Times state, I wonder what her voice would say if she lives in America today.

Fang said that the government was slow in reacting to the virus.  It took the government about 6 weeks to act decisively and to acknowledge the problem at hand.  What would she say about the U.S. response 2 months after China had acted and given the world the genome of the virus?

Fang said that Wuhan was not transparent with the numbers and downplayed the situation.  We have no idea what the numbers are here but we can agree that it is not a hoax nor that we have tremendous control over it.  We certainly are not going to see the virus miraculously disappear one day soon.

Fang was despondent when the dead were taken out in body bags out of hospitals and love ones had no chance to say good-bye.  In New York, Chicago and other cities, make shift morgues are preparing to bring out bodies soon that the morgues cannot hold.  Love ones are not able to say good-bye here as well.

Fang said that the government refuses to apologize for ignoring the healthcare professionals who sounded the alarm, only to be chastised.  I don't hear a certain president who had refused to listen to warnings, apologize.

Fang said that the government is now calling the healthcare professionals heroes and putting them in propaganda videos.  I am sure when we beat the virus, our healthcare professionals will be called heroes.  But a certain president will claim all the credit in propaganda videos for reelection.

Fang said the measure of a nation's civilization is not how tall its buildings are, how strong its military is, or how great is its technology.  Rather the measure of a nation's civilization is how it treats its weakest and most vulnerable.  I can't agree more but if she said that here in the U.S., I suspect that she would be called a socialist or worse, a communist.

There are those who would say to Fang that after going through the Cultural Revolution era, she should be thankful that China is so much better today.  If this epidemic had occurred 50 years ago, millions would probably have died in China.  These people would be right.  But an efficient nation is not necessary a great nation.  Fang's writings are constantly being removed from the internet.  A great nation would not be afraid of criticism.  China has not learned this lesson yet.  There are those in our government who does not know this lesson as well.  Just like Chinese leaders who use the New China News Agency as their mouthpieces, our president uses a certain cable news channel as his mouthpiece.  He is too thin skin for criticism.

I thought that I would be writing about the economic stimulus/relief bill but as we near midnight in D.C., no bill has passed.  Apparently the GOP bill is not satisfactory to the Democrats.  I imagine that the hang up is that the Democrats don't want to see what happened after the last bailout of companies in 2008-2009.  After things got better then, the companies that benefited from the bailout immediately gave executives bonuses, the same executives who got them into the mess in the first place.

Also the Democrats are not happy to bailout industries that should have been able to stay liquid except for stock buybacks.  Some industries have done well in recent years.  Instead of pumping the excess cash they had on hand back to research and development or put into a rainy day reserve, some of these companies bought their own stocks from the financial market.  The result of these buybacks is that the stock prices went up because there was less shares in the open market.  When there is less supply without less demand, the prices naturally go up.  When the price of these stocks go up, the executives earn higher bonuses.  Also the stock options these executives get as compensation, also increase in value.  But using the cash for buybacks means these companies have little or no reserve.  So now they need bailout or they will go out of business.  Yes, the virus maybe the dagger, but not having cash reserve is certainly the fault of the leadership of these companies.

So if we are to bailout companies, I think we should only give out loan which they must pay back before they are allowed to give bonuses to higher ups in the companies.  Also no stock buybacks until all the loans are repaid.   The interest rates should be lowest to small businesses and highest to those who are big.  If the Democrats are holding out for some of these rules, I support them.  But the GOP will frame it as irresponsible for the Democrats to not vote for relief to the American people.

Rand Paul is tested positive.  Hope he has a speedy recovery.  But I am disappointed in Paul, who as a doctor, did not do what he very well should have known.  After he took the test, he should have isolated himself.  Instead he went to the Senate and even went to swim in the Congressional gym!  He only went home and quarantined himself after he found out about his positive test.  This is very irresponsible for anyone, especially a senator and a physician!  And why the hack was the gym open?  Gyms in major cities are closed as per government.  Why is Congress not following suit?  And don't forget many, if not most, Congressmen are elderly.  It just shows the arrogance.

Interesting that an antimalarial drug, Chloroquine and an antibiotic Azithromycin are being tested in combination to treat COVID-19.  I hope it works but it is a strange combination to me as antibiotics are not supposed to work against viruses.  Also the combination to me can cause a big side effect called prolonged qt intervals which means it can lead to dangerous irregular heart beats.  But since I am not in research, I will led to experts determine what to try.  Hopefully I am wrong and they are right and we find something that would help.

Watched part of the debate tonight.  It was boring, to be honest.  The only interesting part, which I missed, was that Biden committed to name a woman running mate.  I don't think the debate changed anything and unless something happens dramatically in Ohio or Illinois on Tuesday, I think Biden is going to be the nominee.  So the talk will turn to who his running mate will be.

Obviously Warren, Harris and Klobuchar will be considered.  I don't see any of them helping Biden in the general election.  Klobuchar may solidify Minnesota but that was in the Democratic column anyway.  Stacey Abrams may help with the black vote and maybe put Georgia in play but is doubtful.  A pundit mentioned Tammy Baldwin, senator from Wisconsin.  I don't know anything about her.  According to the internet she is in her second term as senator and did win reelection in 2018 by a big margin.  She is gay.  So the question is, can she flip Wisconsin.  If she can, then all Biden has to do is flip Michigan and Pennsylvania, which he has a good chance of doing.  It is an interesting choice if Biden makes it.

Another day and worsening of the pandemic in Europe and the U.S. as China stabilizes.   As experts say things will get worse before getting better, Trump announces that we have tremendous control over the virus.  How can anyone believe his lies?  He is happy that the Fed decreased interest rate to practically 0.  He thinks that will bring back the stock market and the economy.  His administration's response to the pandemic is still incoherent, like his speech last week.  You would think we should be be more prepared after learning from China, Italy and South Korea.  But we are not!

With at least 4 victories out of possible 6 tonight including the all important one in Michigan, Biden is on the verge of becoming the Democratic nominee.  I think if Biden wins in Ohio next week, there will be no chance for Sanders to make a comeback.

The hard part now is to beat Trump.  With the coronavirus crisis and the falling of the stock market, it would seem that Trump is in trouble.  So far Trump has not inspire any confidence in the American people that the country will be safe from the pandemic.  He told people that everyone wants to get tested for the virus can have it.  In reality the number of tests available is far short of what is needed.  He also said that the tests are perfect, almost as perfect as his Ukraine phone call transcript.  If the test kits are worse than the transcript, it is basically worthless!

Trump also said that he understands science because he has an uncle who is a MIT professor!  (Longer tenure ever, according to Trump!)  I am a great cook because my father is a great chef.  Those who know me would not want to eat my cooking.  That is how absurd Trump's statement is.  Even in times of crisis, Trump just wants to promote himself.

Given that several Congressmen who had contact with Trump has self quarantined, you would think it is time for Trump to get tested.  This is true especially since he continues to greet people and have rallies.  Since he has no symptoms, most likely he is not infected.  But given the large number of people he comes into contact with and his position, it would be wise for him to be tested since one can be a carrier without symptoms.  Unless he has no confidence in the "perfect" test.

If the virus is controlled and the stock market rebounds, it is possible that Trump will actually get a boost for his reelection.  For this to happen, Trump is going to have to listen to the experts and follow their advice.  Following his own hunch, like declaring that the virus will disappear soon, will not do it.

Well, super Tuesday was super for Biden only.  He used the momentum from South Carolina to surge back to front runner status.  It looks like the moderates are rallying around him with Pete, Amy and Mike all dropping out and endorsing him.  But don't count out Sanders.  He still has a big war chest and a lot of rabid supporters.  If Warren drops out and endorses him, he will be almost even with Biden.  Since Biden is prone to gaffe, Sanders can be in the driver's seat again very soon.

A lot will depend on Michigan next week and Ohio the week after.  Sanders had said that he wants all internal combustion engines in cars be gone by 2030.  Biden will likely hammer him on that in those two states.  If that tactic is effective and the black vote is overwhelming for Biden again, that would be very bad for Sanders.  If, on the other hand, Sanders does better than expected with the white blue collar workers in the industrial Midwest, it would be a boost for him.

I think Obama will wait till there is a clear victor before inserting himself into the election.  The party will need to lick the self inflicted wounds from the primaries.  Obama will need to be the healer, convincing the losing side to support the winning side vigorously.  It will be harder for him to do so if he had supported one or the other, especially if he endorses Biden and he wins.  The Sanders faction will not listen to Obama since they would think he had influence in their candidate's defeat.  After the nomination, look for him to go to the swing states to try to bring out the black votes.  He will be much more aggressive this time as he is no longer the president.

I don't buy that Trump is throwing Pence under the bus by giving this corona virus job so that he can fail and he can name Haley as VP candidate.  If Pence fails, it will make Trump look bad as well.  And what makes Trump think that Haley will bring in more votes than Pence?  I doubt she will be more popular than Pence in Michigan and Pennsylvania.  Pence has been very loyal to Trump while Haley has mostly been loyal, she had occasionally said something different than what Trump wanted while she was in the UN.  So I don't see a change in VP happening.

Now if Haley is picked and the Democrats pick Harris, then it will be interesting.  Who would Indian Americans come out for?  Both are of Indian descent but one identify herself as black most of the time and the other acts like she is white most of the time.  Neither has an Indian sounding name.  So it may not make much a difference in the Indian community.

Served as the emcee of our county Chinese New Year festival this past Saturday.  The crowd was about half of what it was last year.  It is disappointing but not surprising.  The Covid-19 scare is real and prejudice about Chinese is alive even in Southern California.

The local newspaper had called our association president three times to know we were cancelling the event.  They asked the same question three times even though we said that we were going ahead as planned each time.  Apparently one of our neighboring city had cancelled their Chinese new year festival a couple of weeks ago.  I don't know the reason they were canceling .   I tried to spread the word that  unless you are willing to boycott Lakers or Clippers games, there is no reason not to come out to an outdoor event like ours. 

Apparently not too many people took my advice.  I guess I can't compete with scary news coming out of the media.  It doesn't help that Trump does not inspire confidence, saying things like someday the virus will miraculously stop.  Appointing the great science expert Pence to be in charge does not alleviate any fear.  Apparently people see Wall Street panicking and figure things must be going south.

The thing that disappoint me about the smaller crowd is that we were honoring Chinese American WWII veterans from our county at the festival.  Trump had signed into law the Chinese American WWII Veterans Congressional Gold Medal ACT in 2018.  There were 20,000 people of Chinese descent serving in U.S. military branches in WWII.  That would be about 20% of the total Chinese population in the U.S. at that time.  Congress decided to give gold medals to these veterans in appreciation of the great percentage of service despite the discrimination they faced before and after the war.  The bill passed with bipartisan support.

But Congress has yet to commission the gold medals and to decide when to give them out.  So we decided to hand out certificates to all the veterans from our county who are scheduled to receive the gold medals.  Only one veteran is still alive and he is 96 years old.  We invited all the families for the festival.  Local politicians showed up to give the awards.  The emotional one was when the mayor from the city that the lone surviving veteran came to hand the award to that veteran.  The mayor revealed that he actually grew up 100 feet from the veteran.  The veteran had inspired him to go to college and becoming a lawyer.  So he was thrilled to come out to present the award and say thank you to his old neighbor!

It was great to meet the families of these veterans.  I wished we had a much bigger crowd to greet them.  More people need to see that the Chinese have contributed in many ways to this country.  I was inspired about the sacrifices some of these men made and how many of their descendants are now in professions that were not open to the Chinese veterans of WWII.

I was also encouraged by  some audience members who came up to us afterward to thank us for holding the event.  Some of the performers also thanked us to allow them the opportunity to perform even as some other cities had cancelled events.  I told them, we are thankful to THEM,  for coming out since there would be no show without them!