Clown Car V: 2020 version!

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https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-disrupting-red-light-camera-company-revenue-2020-4


Americans are driving less because of the coronavirus. That's hurting red-light camera revenue.
Graham Rapier
Apr 1, 2020, 10:22 AM


As Americans stay home to help slow the spread of the coronavirus, they're driving fewer miles.

That's great news for everyone: Air pollution is falling, crashes are down, and there's no blood-pressure inducing congestion.

Well, almost everyone. For the companies that operate drivers' most-hated devices — red light cameras — it's causing a headache.

Redflex, an Australian company that operates "traffic safety programs" in roughly 100 US and Canadian cities, warned that less traffic and suspended construction amid the pandemic will be a stress on its balance sheet.

"Approximately 15% of group revenue is dependent on volume-based contracts," the companysaid in a regulatory filingMonday first spotted by The Wall Street Journal, hinting at its business line that includes enforcement cameras. "We anticipate our revenue from these contracts will be impacted broadly in line with the reduction in traffic volumes as well as the duration of the disruption."

Shares of Redflex, which trade in Australia, are down 46% since the beginning of the year.

On a call with investors Monday, Redflex CEO Mark Talbot warned that further travel restrictions could delay new installations and therefore impact revenues.

"So far, there have been no terminations to contracts," he said, according to a transcript compiled by Sentieo. "We are, of course, undertaking cost initiatives where possible to mitigate the impact of reductions or risk of delay. In addition, the Board and executive team will be taking a reduction in compensation effective April 1 for the duration of the disruption."


Crocodile tears incoming.
 
there has been a bomber gap that created huge business . There has been a missile gap that created huge business in addition to putting the only Catholic to the White House . If you get an atmosphere of distrust stuff it will be huge business . Not that it was anything that good , the Open Skies thing , but it was something and when some person says Russia is arming ducks with 500 kilogram bombs , it is the truth unless verified otherwise . And anyone is overflying the US these days anyhow ; no treaty , no UFOs citing some obscure treaty from the 1990s and smallprint therein .
 
https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-disrupting-red-light-camera-company-revenue-2020-4

Americans are driving less because of the coronavirus. That's hurting red-light camera revenue.
Graham Rapier
Apr 1, 2020, 10:22 AM

Crocodile tears incoming.
Concerns over money/revenue loss has been and remains one of the main factors weakening the coronavirus response.

Did not someone get one for castrating themselves?
Your guess is as good as mine. I hadn't heard that.
 
I think I lived the urinal scene a while back. >.<
 
There is a treaty between the US and Russia called the open skies treaty which facilitates overflights to monitor weapons deployment and the like. Russia has signaled they want out of it and Trump is using the pandemic as his cover to pull out. He tried last year but had to back down due to the backlash. There are legitimate issues with the treaty from both sides but pulling out disproportionately helps Russia as it would not limit their overflights of American allies in Europe but would curtail overflights of Russia.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/apr/05/trump-administration-treaty-war-russia-withdraw

ftfy
 
On the CDC's new guidelines

By asymptomatics it's passed,
So to cover our mouths we've been asked.
Then we see, to our grief,
Of the Sick'ner-in-Chief
His depraved indifference unmasked.
 
‘It's a sh-- sandwich': Republicans rage as Florida becomes a nightmare for Trump

By GARY FINEOUT and MARC CAPUTO

04/03/2020 05:02 AM EDT


TALLAHASSEE — The staggering unemployment exploding on President Donald Trump’s watch would worry any incumbent running for reelection, but troubles in Florida are injecting an added dose of fear into a jittery GOP.

Already anxious about Trump’s chances in the nation’s biggest swing state, Republicans now are dealing with thousands of unemployed workers unable to navigate the Florida system to apply for help. And the blowback is directed straight at Trump’s top allies in the state, Gov. Ron DeSantis and Sen. Rick Scott.


Privately, Republicans admit that the $77.9 million system that is now failing Florida workers is doing exactly what Scott designed it to do — lower the state’s reported number of jobless claims after the great recession.

“It’s a sh-- sandwich, and it was designed that way by Scott,” said one DeSantis advisor. “It wasn’t about saving money. It was about making it harder for people to get benefits or keep benefits so that the unemployment numbers were low to give the governor something to brag about.”

Republican Party of Florida chairman Joe Gruters was more succinct: “$77 million? Someone should go to jail over that.”

With hundreds of thousands of Floridians out of work, the state’s overwhelmed system is making it nearly impossible for many people to even get in line for benefits.

After a record number of claims were reported Thursday, DeSantis said the state would resort to paper applications, build a mobile app to handle the flood of traffic and deploy hundreds, even thousands, of state workers to provide stopgap help.

Congress last week delivered relief in the form of a $2 trillion stimulus package that directs cash to the unemployed. But to get that money into the pockets of Floridians, the state will have to duct-tape the rickety web-based unemployment system to deliver it.

It’s a monumental task. The system has had problems from its very start in 2013, and was one reason state senators refused in 2015 to confirm Scott’s pick to run the agency that manages unemployment benefits.

The new online system was part of a series of changes designed to limit benefits. The ultimate goal — which it delivered on — was to lower unemployment taxes paid by Florida businesses. A 2011 analysis done by the Florida Legislature estimated that the changes pushed by Scott would save businesses more than $2.3 billion between 2011 and 2020.

Now, as thousands of people try to get help, the system crashes or denies them access. Nearly 400,000 people have managed to file claims in the last two and half weeks. It’s not known how many have tried and failed.

Most of those who do submit applications won’t qualify for aid, and the benefits that are paid out are among the most meager in the country — a maximum of $275 a week.

“This is horrible for people. I don’t want to minimize that,” one DeSantis adviser told POLITICO. “But if we have to look past the crisis, it’s bad for the president and it’s bad for the governor.”

“Everyone we talk to in that office when we ask them what happened tells us, ‘the system was designed to fail,’” the adviser said. “That’s not a problem when unemployment is 2.8 percent, but it’s a problem now. And no system we have can handle 25,000 people a day.”

State auditors have routinely chronicled shortcomings with the CONNECT system, most recently in a report issued in March 2019, two months after DeSantis took office.

Scott spokesperson Chris Hartline did not directly address complaints about the CONNECT system. But he said Scott acted to ensure the state helped only those “who truly needed the assistance.”

“His goal was to make sure every Floridian who wanted a job could get one, and turned the program into a re-employment system so people could find employment,” Hartline said in an email. “As governor, he made investments to ensure the system worked and Florida’s unemployment insurance program is funded at record levels thanks to reforms under Governor Scott, meaning more Florida families can receive the help they need.”

Rep. Charlie Crist, a Democrat who as a Republican governor led Florida through the last downturn, said the state’s current economic catastrophe could doom Trump in the state the president needs if he wants to win reelection.

“If unemployment continues to go up, and if so many people stay unemployed, it’s a nightmare for the president in this state,” Crist said. “I should know. When I was governor and I was running for the Senate in the Great Recession — and there was nothing great about it — it was a nightmare.”

An adviser to Marco Rubio’s 2010 Senate campaign didn’t argue.

“We’ve got unemployed, pissed-off people. They can’t get benefits. And when they get them, it’s not going to be enough,” he said. “They’re there for the taking by the Democrats. We killed Charlie with the bad economy in 2010. Democrats are gonna repay the favor.”

Gruters downplayed the idea that a “flawed system that predates the DeSantis administration” would hurt the president or DeSantis. The governor and his team are “working around the clock to address its shortcomings,” he said.

Republicans in the Legislature share the blame, said Rep. Jose Javier Rodriguez, a Miami Democrat.

“Rick Scott is the most culpable human being when we look at who’s responsible for the failed system,” Rodriguez said. “But I don’t know of any Republican who resisted these efforts to make Florida the most Scrooge-like state in the nation.”


https://www.politico.com/states/flo...florida-becomes-a-nightmare-for-trump-1271172

So having designed a system to screw people over in good times, it's screwing over so many people in bad times that it may come back to haunt them.
 
As I said I'm confident of a blue wave now including the Senate.
I remain skeptical. I think support for Trump goes deeper than personal economics and/or suffering. Im guessing that Trump has plenty of supporters actively willing to sacrifice and suffer in order to remain loyal, maybe partly because they view his Presidency as a cause, their cause.
 
I remain skeptical. I think support for Trump goes deeper than personal economics and/or suffering. Im guessing that Trump has plenty of supporters actively willing to sacrifice and suffer in order to remain loyal, maybe partly because they view his Presidency as a cause, their cause.

Toilet paper bet?

I think 20-25% are that committed to Trump.

40000 people change their votes in 3 stats Trump's gone.

Also gone if he loses Florida.
 
Also gone if he loses Florida.

These are the people that elected GWBush twice.
All Trump has to do to lie, cheat and gaslight just enough for a short period to get him over the line
 
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every election in Turkey since 2002 has been defined as the one that will break the back of this Political Islam . Except of course there was the whole might of US Military if one was to investigate that deep into voter fraud . Just be prepared to tear your own hair out , if you are too keen as a Trump opponent .
 
Toilet paper bet?

I think 20-25% are that committed to Trump.

40000 people change their votes in 3 stats Trump's gone.

Also gone if he loses Florida.
Toilet paper? Why not bet our children? :mischief:

Joking aside, I think this is probably right, but keep in mind the likelihood that he will successfully claim credit for ending the pandemic if it ends... and postpone the election if it doesn't end. It is seeming like we are approaching a catch-22 that makes him remaining in office even more likely.
 
Toilet paper? Why not bet our children? :mischief:

Joking aside, I think this is probably right, but keep in mind the likelihood that he will successfully claim credit for ending the pandemic if it ends... and postpone the election if it doesn't end. It is seeming like we are approaching a catch-22 that makes him remaining in office even more likely.

why am I so certain people in the US are actually dumb enough for this to be true.
 
because they are?
 
because they are?

Because a certain percentage of people pretty much everywhere is. For every leader in history, however corrupt, inept, or just generally gag- or facepalm-worthy, there have been a percentage of people that really did cheer on that leader because they believed in the leader, not necessarily due to any ulterior motive.
 
Yeah, I guess it's about a third of the population. I'm working from their appearance on Booknotes, but the authors of "How Democracies Die" say that about a third of the population of any democracy would actually prefer an authoritarian leader. No small percentage of people want to be led.

Scared me to learn.

What scared me even more was one answer they give to the question in their title: very quickly, when they do.
 
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