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resident Donald Trump on Friday signed into law a federal relief bill that provides emergency liquidity, tax relief and additional support for small businesses, among other measures that could benefit the gaming industry amid the coronavirus impact. The $2 trillion Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act funds will be allocated to states then apportioned to individual industries based on economic figures like the number of workers and taxable revenue generated.

Essentially every commercial gaming establishment in the United States is closed, with no definitive timeline for a return. The American Gaming Association (AGA) estimates 650,000 direct gaming employees have had work stoppages and $43.5 billion in economic activity could be lost if the shutdown were to last two months.

Bill Miller, AGAs president and CEO explained in a statement that the CARES Act provides tax relief to help gaming companies keep workers on the payroll; opens access to critical capital through loans for all industry segments; provides direct economic support for millions of American workers and their families; and offers vital stabilization funding for tribal governments.

With the House vote and President Trump's signature, gaming employees, their families, and communities will see needed relief. Read @BillMillerAGA's latest update: https://t.co/LRQfFuPZ9w pic.twitter.com/UdnnlUI4Pi

— American Gaming Association (@AmericanGaming) March 27, 2020

We commend Congress and the administration for acting swiftly to provide needed relief. The gaming industry united to achieve a major first step that will help sustain us during the required shutdown and ensure Americas employees can return to their jobs as soon as its safe," Miller said. But our fight is not over. As the nations response to the pandemic evolves, we know gaming businesses, workers, and their families will continue to need support. We will keep fighting to help every aspect of the gaming industry as Congress and the administration consider additional economic relief measures.

Past federal responses to natural disasters and financial crises, such as Hurricane Katrina and the 2008-09 global crisis, excluded gaming companies from assistance available to the rest of the business community.

This financial aid would include the expanding legal sports betting market in the US. On Thursday, Washington became the 21st state to pass sports betting legislation in the past two years. Legal bookmakers were operating in 16 states, with more jurisdictions preparing to launch, before casinos around the nation began closing. While in-person sports betting has ceased, several online bookmakers in the U.S. remain open. Indiana, New Jersey, Nevada and Pennsylvania are among the states with active online sports betting, albeit with much smaller wagering menus.

Today, President @realDonaldTrump signed into the law the #CARESAct which will help small businesses stay open, help workers keep their jobs, and provide relief for distressed industries as our Country faces the threat of the Coronavirus together. pic.twitter.com/oXtg6RqS4o

— Mike Pence (@Mike_Pence) March 27, 2020

The pandemic has stopped all major American and international sports, leaving bookmakers scrambling to find betting offerings for customers. Table tennis and hockey from Belarus were among the highlighted events at sportsbooks this week. On Thursday, Nevada Gaming Control authorized its sportsbooks to take bets on an eSports tournament.

The new betting markets, however, are doing little to mitigate the loss of the NBA, the NHL and Major League Baseball. Multiple sportsbook operators told ESPN last week that they sometimes go hours without taking a single bet.

With people around the world encouraged to stay at home, other forms of online gambling have seen upticks, including poker. PokerStars, a leading international online cardroom, held its largest online tournament ever last week, with an $18.6 million prize pool that attracted a record 93,016 entries.

Continued here:
US President Donald Trump signs relief bill that could benefit the gaming industry - Yogonet International

On March 18th, researchers in France circulated a study about the promising experimental use of hydroxychloroquine, an anti-malaria drug, in combination with azithromycin, an antibiotic, as a treatment for the disease caused by the coronavirus. The study was neither randomized nor peer-reviewed, and other scientists soon criticized its methodology. But Tucker Carlson, on Fox News, highlighted the work. The next day, President Trump promoted hydroxychloroquines very, very encouraging early results. He added, mentioning another unproven therapy, I think it could be, based on what I see, it could be a game changer.

At a White House press briefing on March 20th, a reporter asked Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, whether hydroxychloroquine could be effective in treating covid-19. The answer is no, Fauci said, before yielding the microphone to Trump, who countered, May work, may not. I feel good about it. Thats all it is, just a feeling, you know, smart guy. A few days later, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director-general of the World Health Organization, said, Using untested drugs without the right evidence could raise false hope and even do more harm than good.

Trumps quackery was at once eccentric and terrifyinga reminder, if one was needed, of his scorn for rigorous science, even amid the worst pandemic to strike the country in a century. Yet his conduct typified his leadership as the crisis has intensified: his dependency on Fox News for ideas and message amplification, his unshakable belief in his own genius, and his understandable concern that his relection may be in danger if he does not soon discover a way to vanquish COVID-19 and reverse its devastation of the economy.

New York City now faces a troubling and astronomical increase in cases, according to Governor Andrew Cuomo, and the emergency is overwhelming hospitals, straining drug and equipment supplies, and threatening to cause a shortage of ventilators. The grim course of events in the city is a canary in the coal mine for the rest of the country, Cuomo said, and leaders elsewhere must take decisive action lest they, too, become inundated. Trump, though, spent much of last week promoting a contrarian gambit that has been percolating in the right-wing media. He said that, to revitalize the economy, he would like to lift travel restrictions and reopen workplaces across the country within weeks, perhaps by Easter, which is on April 12th, because, as he put it repeatedly, we cant let the cure be worse than the problem.

Public-health experts immediately warned against such a reversal of social-distancing rules. The virus will surge, many will fall ill, and there will be more deaths, William Schaffner, a specialist in preventive medicine at Vanderbilt University, told the Times. When a reporter asked the President whether any of the doctors on your team had advised him that a hasty reopening was the right path to pursue, he replied, If it were up to the doctors, they may say, Lets keep it shut down... lets keep it shut for a couple of years. Public-health specialists have said no such thing; they have spoken of a conditions-based approach (You dont make the timeline, the virus makes the timeline, Fauci has said), while advising that, to save the most lives, local leaders must wait to lift restrictions in their areas until the data show that the virus has stopped spreading. Trump said that any loosening of rules he might seek around the countryhe mentioned Nebraska and Idaho as possible siteswould be based on hard facts and data, but he also said that he chose Easter as a target date because he just thought it was a beautiful time.

It is true, as Trump also argued, that enormous job losses and an all but certain recession caused by the pandemic will harm many vulnerable Americans, and claim lives, as ill people without health insurance, for example, forgo care or struggle to get it at stressed clinics and hospitals. Yet, at least in the short term, over-all mortality rates fall during recessions; the reasons for this arent fully clear, but social scientists think they may include the public-health benefits of a decrease in pollution, as a result of the slowing economy. In any event, the case the President made for hurrying an economic revival against the advice of scientists was morally odious; it suggested that large numbers of otherwise avoidable deaths might have to be accepted as the price of job creation.

Public-health officials spoke frankly to the press about the catastrophic prospects of the Presidents Easter folly. (President Trump will have blood on his hands, Keith Martin, the director of the Consortium of Universities for Global Health, told the Times.) Trump responded on Twitter by lashing out at the LameStream Media for reporting such forecasts, calling the press the dominant force in trying to get me to keep our Country closed as long as possible in the hope that it will be detrimental to my election success. Last Wednesday, after Mitt Romney, the only Republican who voted to convict the President, on a charge of abuse of power, during the Senate impeachment trial, announced that he had tested negative for COVID-19, Trump tweeted mockingly, Im so happy I can barely speak. At the White House briefings, surrounded by the sorts of civil servants and experts he habitually disdains, Trump has adapted awkwardly to the role of solemn unifier. When he leaves the podium to tweet nonsense at his perceived enemies, he at least provides his opponents among the countrys homebound, screen-addled, and anxious citizenry with a galvanizing dose of his immutable obnoxiousnessa splash of the old new normal.

The journal Science asked Fauci why he doesnt step in when the President makes false statements in the briefings. I cant jump in front of the microphone and push him down, he said. Americas public-health system is fragmented and market-driven, conditions that only compound the challenge of quashing COVID-19. In the Trump era, however, decentralization has a benefit: the President is not solely in charge, and in the months ahead governors and mayors will continue to shape the odds of life or death for great numbers of Americans. Last week, Trump reviewed the possibilities for quarantine in New York City, his ravaged home town. He rambled about the stock exchange (Its incredible what they can do), before going on to pledge, If we open up, and when we open up... were giving the governors a lot of leeway to decide how this should be done. We can only hope so.

The rest is here:
The Meaning of Donald Trumps Coronavirus Quackery - The New Yorker

Political fact-checkers have flourished under Donald Trump, a president who according to one count uttered more than 16,000 misleading or false claims during his first three years in the White House.

The coronavirus outbreak has seen Trump add to that total. Here are some of his most misleading and most often repeated claims about Covid-19, his administrations response to the outbreak and what might lie ahead.

Trump has repeatedly expressed his surprise at the scale of the coronavirus as it spread around the world and raced across the US.

I would view it as something that just surprised the whole world, he said in a press conference earlier this month. Nobody knew there would be a pandemic or epidemic of this proportion.

In a separate briefing, Trump said: I just think this is something that you can never really think is going to happen.

There is evidence, however, that not only was the Trump administration warned about the potential of a pandemic and its dangers to Americans, it was given a plan on how to deal with it, which it promptly shelved.

During the Obama administration, the national security council drew up a 69-page playbook on fighting pandemics, Politico has reported. The document, crafted in the wake of the 2016 Ebola outbreak, contained advice on tracking the spread of a new virus, how to ensure testing was conducted effectively and the need to stockpile emergency resources.

The incoming Trump administration was briefed on the playbook but it was was thrown on to a shelf, according to an anonymous official quoted by Politico.

This wasnt the administrations only insight into the threat posed by a pandemic. In October, an internal federal government report warned how underprepared and underfunded the US would be in terms of tackling a virus without a cure.

Trumps reaction to coronavirus has spanned disbelief, a severe understating of the problem and an optimism that appears unmoored from reality.

In February, Trump said the virus could maybe go away. Well see what happens. Nobody really knows. He predicted it is going to disappear. One day its like a miracle it will disappear.

This position has been repeatedly contradicted by public health experts who predicted the sharp increase in Covid-19 infections, blunted only by social distancing measures and the shut down of large gatherings.

Even in China, which instituted the most severe crackdown on the movement of people, it has taken several months for cases to start tapering off.

Youve got to be realistic, and youve got to understand that you dont make the timeline, the virus makes the timeline, Dr Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said recently.

Without basis, Trump has claimed the US has done an excellent job in testing people for the coronavirus. As early as January, the president said the situation was totally under control. Just six weeks later the US had emerged as the new global center of the pandemic.

In reality, healthcare providers faced a severe shortage of testing kits as coronavirus hit the US, with the situation exacerbated by faults in the testing system and restrictions on who could actually take a test. A big disparity opened up whereby rich or famous people were able to get tests while others struggled to do so.

Mike Pence, the vice-president, has admitted we dont have enough tests today to meet what we anticipate will be the demand. Dr Fauci told a congressional hearing the US system was not really geared to what we need right now regarding the test kits. He added: That is a failing. Lets admit it.

As is the case with many of Trumps statements, his claim he has always taken the pandemic seriously deviates wildly from his previous comments. Perhaps most infamously, Trump said I dont take responsibility at all when asked about the faltering US response.

The president has repeatedly downplayed the threat posed by Covid-19, criticising concern over the crisis as a hoax, fretting that letting infected Americans off a cruise ship would increase the number of confirmed cases and claiming that only a couple of Americans had it as cases began to soar across the country.

He has compounded this by suggesting social distancing restrictions be lifted around Easter a timeline wildly out of kilter with public health experts who warn this would cause hospitals to overflow with sick and dying patients.

In a White House meeting with pharmaceutical company bosses and public health officials, Trump suggested a vaccine for Covid-19 will be available over the next few months.

He was contradicted by Alex Azar, the health and human services secretary, who pointed out: You wont have a vaccine. Youll have a vaccine to go into testing.

Dr Fauci and others at the meeting confirmed that clinical trials standard for any new vaccine would have to take place first. A vaccine is more likely to be a year or 18 months away.

Despite being told this, Trump told a rally in North Carolina on 2 March that there will be a vaccine relatively soon.

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Five of Donald Trump's most misleading coronavirus claims - The Guardian

It's been an historic week for the U.S. with president Donald Trump signing a record $2.2 trillion coronavirus-induced emergency stimulus package.

The massive cross-party rescue deal is designed to help Americans and businesses cope with the economic shutdown caused by the coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic.

The U.S. dollar has taken a beating, however, dropping almost 4% against a basket of currencies this weekits biggest weekly loss since the height of the global financial crisis over 10 years ago.

The U.S. dollar has sunk against a basket of major currencies this week after posting record gains ... [+] earlier this month. Some think the massive stimulus offered by the Trump administration and the Federal Reserve will undermine the dollar and open the door to alternatives such as bitcoin.

This week's losses come on the back of the dollar index's biggest weekly gain since the financial crisis, with the dollar surging as investors scrambled for the worlds most liquid currency amid crashing stock and debt markets.

"In short-term, huge dollar demand because short-covering, but it won't last," Wall Street veteran and founder of Wyoming-based crypto bank Avanti, Caitlin Long, said via Twitter, adding she expects the U.S. Federal Reserve's balance sheet to top $10 trillion before the coronavirus crisis is over and predicting the dollar's eventual crash.

On top the of the massive economic aid package, the Fed has been working hard to prop up plunging marketswith mixed results despite its shock-and-awe firepower.

Potential risks of the combined cross-party rescue bill and Fed's biggest-ever bazooka include out-of-control inflation, the dollar's displacement as the world's funding currency, and the complete destabilization of the U.S. financial system.

The Fed has pumped over $1 trillion to the system in recent weeks, with its chair Jerome Powell promising never before seen levels of money printing and so-called quantitative easing to infinity through an unlimited bond-buying program.

The Fed has also cut its benchmark interest rate to near zero and made sure commercial banks will continue lending to companies, cities and statesall told the extraordinary measures are expected to grow the Fed's balance sheet by $4.5 trillion this year.

Throughout and in the aftermath of the global financial crisis the Fed grew its balance sheet by a paltry $3.7 trillion.

"The beautiful thing about our country is $6.2 trillionbecause it is 2.2 plus four [combining the Fed's action and the cross-party rescue bill]its $6.2 trillion, and we can handle that easily because of who we are, what we are," Trump said, speaking after the bill's historic White House signing ceremony, and boasting the package was "twice as large" as any prior relief bill.

The bill will see individuals and companies whose livelihoods and businesses have been affected by the coronavirus pandemic receive direct payments, with every American earning less than $75,000 per year picking up a one off payment of $1,200, as well as $500 per child.

"Its our money; we are the ones, its our currency," Trump said.

U.S. President Donald Trump signed the historic $2.2 trillion stimulus bill in the White House's ... [+] Oval Office, marking the country's biggest-ever rescue package.

Critics of the historic stimulus measures have warned about the possibility of inflation, with many in the bitcoin and cryptocurrency community urging people to explore scarce digital assets.

"Fiat money is getting more plentiful. Bitcoin is getting more scarce," Anthony Pompliano, a well-known bitcoin advocate and partner at bitcoin and crypto-focused hedge fund Morgan Creek Digital, said via Twitter, alluding to bitcoin's upcoming May halving event where the supply of new bitcoin being created will be cut by half overnight and putting bitcoin directly at odds with the Fed's money printing program.

Meanwhile, Trump has said he expects the U.S. to be open for business again by April 12, Easter Sundaya goal that's been widely derided as impossible.

Regardless of when the country opens up again, it will against a wildly different economic landscape.

Read more from the original source:
Donald Trump And The Fed Are Destroying The U.S. Dollar - Forbes

In January the world watched in horror as Wuhan, China battled coronavirus. People criticized Beijing, they blamed Chinese culture and they debated how to properly manage such an outbreak.

Fast forward two months and the U.S. has found itself dealing with more cases than China as the virus spreads across the nation at a faster pace than anywhere else in the world.

When the virus spread from Wuhan to other parts of Asia it became clear coronavirus was a global problem. Covid-19 had ravaged Italy, France and Spain before cases started to spike in New York and California. The U.S. had the benefit of time and experience on its side, so how did we get here?

A short-sighted focus on economic growth is the answer to that question.

Governments around the world demanded social distancing and urged their populations to protect each other. Meanwhile, Donald Trump and politicians in Washington debated how to minimize the economic impact of coronavirus with little regard to slowing its spread. Instead they looked for ways to minimize the threat in the eyes of voters.

The stock market and economy were where the U.S. placed its focus, and it shows. Even as medics in New York City donned trash bags and pleaded for more medical supplies, President Trump continued to focus on the economy.

As the number of cases rose exponentially, he refused to consider a nationwide lockdown. He continued to push to reopen businesses and schools by Easter. He encouraged people to believe coronavirus was no worse than the flu.

Mr. Trump congratulated himself and Congress upon passing a coronavirus relief package that did very little to stop the virus spread or help hospitals in dire need of medical supplies.

He commended the governments efforts to support New York City hospitals by sending 400 ventilators to the regions worst-hit hospitals. But the city was in need of 15,000 of the life-saving devices, making Trumps generous donation too little too late.

As the rest of the world worked to flatten the curve, the U.S. continued to question the severity of coronavirus. Despite scientific evidence showing that social distancing is the most powerful tool in the fight against coronavirus, the U.S. waited and watched. Even as health experts warned that millions would likely die if the U.S. allowed its healthcare system to become overwhelmed, the government did nothing.

And now as the number of coronavirus cases continues to climb, Donald Trump is still looking for ways to hide the truth. Increased testing was cited as a reason for the rising numbers. Some pointed to a low mortality rate among U.S. coronavirus patientsbut all of that masks a grim reality: things are already out of control.

The lack of federal intervention means travel between U.S. cities and states is unrestricted. Those living in places like New York where the outbreaks are most serious have traveled to other parts of the country, likely bringing the infection with them.

It remains to be seen whether the staggering number of cases will be enough to push Trump into action. Unlikely, considering his track record of blaming the media and spewing lies to the American public. But at some point the impact of coronavirus in America will become undeniablesomething that touches everyones life in some way.

But by then it will be too late to slow the spread and save the healthcare system.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect the views of CCN.com.

This article was edited by Sam Bourgi.

Last modified: March 28, 2020 11:31 AM UTC

Here is the original post:
U.S. Has the Most Coronavirus Cases in the World, But Donald Trump Still Wont Act - CCN.com