[Genuine Realist]

Germany's response since everyone got religion since March 10th (or thereabouts) has indeed been interesting, and possibly exemplary, though its demographic and homogenous population makes it questionable whether the protocols could be exported to the US. We have a totally different culture.



What gets old is the notion that in the first two months of this year ANY nation (including Germany) successfully evaluated the risk and responded effectively to it. German mobilization began approximately the same date as the US. Check the Wikipedia link and you'll find that Germany was also short of some essential medical supplies at the outset.

Actually, what gets old is your constant repeating of the false claim that no country was able to control the virus.  The trajectories of the various countries show exactly the opposite.  Go look at this graph and tell me how all those countries with case loads far below ours did not get the virus under control.  Certainly they did relative to us: https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus-d...rSort=desc

And I'm not even including the Asian countries that did far better than we did in my graph.

As for homogeneous populations, what do you even mean by that?  I have looked at the numbers for mask usage, etc., and the only distinction that really matters in surveys of mask wearing is political party.  Republicans, taking their cues from Trump, are far less likely to use masks: https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/20..._masks_02/

If you're going to keep repeating the same claims over and over, can you please cite some sources in the future?

I continue to point out the obvious reality in with respect to January February 2020. you continue to post data from March 1st on, and somehow think the data is apposite.

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Germany's response since everyone got religion since March 10th (or thereabouts) has indeed been interesting, and possibly exemplary, though its demographic and homogenous population makes it questionable whether the protocols could be exported to the US. We have a totally different culture.

We do have a totally different culture. While not having a homogeneous population contributes to this difference in culture, it is not the driving factor IMHO. I believe that the culture in the USA proceeds from the notion that the individual owes society only minimal adherence to the law and nothing else, period. Your "fellow man" gets help from you only in so far as you freely chose to provide it. That is true regardless of your "fellow man's" race, sex, religion, national origin or political affiliation. Not quite the same in Germany. Several of my European/Australian friends/customers have commented on this. That doesn't mean Americans are not generous, but it does mean it is at will.

What gets old is the notion that in the first two months of this year ANY nation (including Germany) successfully evaluated the risk and responded effectively to it. German mobilization began approximately the same date as the US. Check the Wikipedia link and you'll find that Germany was also short of some essential medical supplies at the outset.

Depends on what you mean by "effectively". As I have pointed out many times to those who wonder why the US couldn't do what Korea did, you can only respond with what you have, not what you wish you had. Shortages of PPE that you didn't order in October can't be repaired in March. I think Germany responded as well as was possible (played the hand they had). The difference from France was that the states had provided compelling data that this was for real. France was kind of like the US, where there were hot spots but it was unclear (at least to the public) it was actually a general problem for everyone to deal with. Thus poor compliance.

There are so many reasons - cultural, political, social, legal [the use of social media, far more intensive policing, etc.] why the US  could not emulate Korea that dialog is useless. There was also the fact that Korea was able to isolate a zero cluster.

To be blunt, there is no way on earth that the US could adopt South Korean practice, then or now. And that is probably a good thing in the larger cultural context.

[Genuine Realist]

Germany's response since everyone got religion since March 10th (or thereabouts) has indeed been interesting, and possibly exemplary, though its demographic and homogenous population makes it questionable whether the protocols could be exported to the US. We have a totally different culture.



What gets old is the notion that in the first two months of this year ANY nation (including Germany) successfully evaluated the risk and responded effectively to it. German mobilization began approximately the same date as the US. Check the Wikipedia link and you'll find that Germany was also short of some essential medical supplies at the outset.

Actually, what gets old is your constant repeating of the false claim that no country was able to control the virus.  The trajectories of the various countries show exactly the opposite.  Go look at this graph and tell me how all those countries with case loads far below ours did not get the virus under control.  Certainly they did relative to us: https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus-d...rSort=desc

And I'm not even including the Asian countries that did far better than we did in my graph.

As for homogeneous populations, what do you even mean by that?  I have looked at the numbers for mask usage, etc., and the only distinction that really matters in surveys of mask wearing is political party.  Republicans, taking their cues from Trump, are far less likely to use masks: https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/20..._masks_02/

If you're going to keep repeating the same claims over and over, can you please cite some sources in the future?

I continue to point out the obvious reality in with respect to January February 2020. you continue to post data from March 1st on, and somehow think the data is apposite.

---

Germany's response since everyone got religion since March 10th (or thereabouts) has indeed been interesting, and possibly exemplary, though its demographic and homogenous population makes it questionable whether the protocols could be exported to the US. We have a totally different culture.

We do have a totally different culture. While not having a homogeneous population contributes to this difference in culture, it is not the driving factor IMHO. I believe that the culture in the USA proceeds from the notion that the individual owes society only minimal adherence to the law and nothing else, period. Your "fellow man" gets help from you only in so far as you freely chose to provide it. That is true regardless of your "fellow man's" race, sex, religion, national origin or political affiliation. Not quite the same in Germany. Several of my European/Australian friends/customers have commented on this. That doesn't mean Americans are not generous, but it does mean it is at will.

What gets old is the notion that in the first two months of this year ANY nation (including Germany) successfully evaluated the risk and responded effectively to it. German mobilization began approximately the same date as the US. Check the Wikipedia link and you'll find that Germany was also short of some essential medical supplies at the outset.

Depends on what you mean by "effectively". As I have pointed out many times to those who wonder why the US couldn't do what Korea did, you can only respond with what you have, not what you wish you had. Shortages of PPE that you didn't order in October can't be repaired in March. I think Germany responded as well as was possible (played the hand they had). The difference from France was that the states had provided compelling data that this was for real. France was kind of like the US, where there were hot spots but it was unclear (at least to the public) it was actually a general problem for everyone to deal with. Thus poor compliance.

There are so many reasons - cultural, political, social, legal [the use of social media, far more intensive policing, etc.] why the US  could not emulate Korea that dialog is useless. There was also the fact that Korea was able to isolate a zero cluster.

To be blunt, there is no way on earth that the US could adopt South Korean practice, then or now. And that is probably a good thing in the larger cultural context.