Firing Inspectors General

As a good government ("goo-goo") type, I'm perturbed by the president's removal of several IG's and acting IG"s.  But this piece  suggests there's not much Congress can do to stop such actions by a president.  IG's are executive branch employees and as such are subject to the president's authority.

I wonder: could we look to sports, the NFL, for a solution:  There the tension is between getting the call right and keeping the game flowing.  Could we give the president a couple get-out-of-jail cards per term--allow her to fire two IG's but no more?  Arguably this would permit the president flexibility but not too much.

I'm afraid what will happen when the administration changes: the new president will use the Trump precedent to fire the Trump-IG's and goo-goo norms will suffer further erosion.

CFAP--A Tip of the Hat

I remember the pains of trying to implement new legislation on a rush basis.  I could tell, and have told, stories about the experience. 

One thing I never experienced was trying to implement new legislation while working from home during a pandemic.  A tip of my hat to those working in DC and the field who are trying to navigate that morass.  (Post inspired by Brent Orr's picture of the training room in the South Building from which they did online training of the field on CFAP.)

What Will the Recovery Look Like?

I've no insight, but since when does that stop a true blogger?

Personally I think it will be slow-fast-slow. 

• the first slow will because the majority of people won't be risk-takers, they'll let others be the trailblazers.
• the fast will be as people realize that it is relatively safe--isolated incidents but nothing drastic enough to cause major political subdivisions to revert back to a lock-down.
• the second slow will be because of the drag on economic activity from the measures taken to minimize risk plus dealing with the economic damages of the pandemic--the closed restaurants, the half-empty nursing homes, etc.

We'll see.

A Test of Leadership

Back in the day I got bawled out by my deputy division director for cursing at an employee.  I deserved it.  I think it was that conversation where he discussed a fellow branch chief.  Lou was a WWII vet, whose ship IIRC had been sunk on D-Day.  He was a voluble guy, loud and boisterous with a temper.  But Bob pointed to him as a good leader, simply because he was consistently Lou.  His employees and those who dealt with him knew, at least after the initial getting-to-know-you, that what you saw was what you got, no surprises.  I needed that, to be consistent.  (Not sure I ever achieved that.)

I think of that lesson from time to time, never more these days when considering our President.  His approval rating on dealing with the pandemic has not been good.  Meanwhile some of our governors have very good ratings, particularly Gov. Cuomo. I don't follow him closely, but it seems to me his record of decision-making hasn't been all that great.  I account for the difference in ratings between him and Trump by consistency by the one and inconsistency by the other.

The Usefulness and Reuse of Masks

Early on in the pandemic, I think I was informed that masks would insulate the wearer from the world, particularly the viral particles floating around in the air from those already infected.  So it made sense that masks were one-time use--you go out wearing a mask, you meet someone infected and his virus particles get hung up in your mask. You then go home, and the mask represents a threat to anyone who contacts it.  Fine.

But now I'm getting the impression the main function of the mask is to protect the world from you, the wearer.  It captures your germs, your viral particles.  Is that true?  If it is, then the mask can be used more than once.  If you're infected, and the mask captures your virus, there's no new contamination in the home and no real downside to reusing it.

Anti-Trump Derangement Syndrome

Conservatives use TDS to paint liberals as so biased against the president that they're incapable of treating his positions fairly.

I'd suggest the Anti-TDS as applying when conservatives or independents (like Ann Althouse) lean over backwards to whitewash his tweets and news conferences using excuses like he's joking or he's being sarcastic. 

I think it's sometimes true that DJT says things he doesn't expect to be taken seriously, but I refuse to believe it's a joke or sarcasm, at least not as a normal thing.

A Man Who Cares: Joe Fore

Joe Fore on Twitter does something I love:  assess typoographical choices of the legal profession.

(Thread) There’s been a lot of #legalwriting typography content lately. After seeing @BobLoeb’s great graphic showing font choices by federal circuit, I wanted to explore each circuit’s formatting choices in more detail, and, hopefully, draw out some broader themes.

— Joe Fore (@Joe_Fore) May 18, 2020

He dings the First Circuit for their use of monospaced type, one of my pet peeves.

Suppose We Didn't Have Work From Home

There have been a lot of comparisons between the current pandemic and those in the past, particularly in terms of case numbers and deaths.

One thing which isn't accounted for in such comparisons is the existence of the Internet and the enabling of work from home. My point is that in 2020 we had the option of closing offices and working from home, of closing schools and going to remote learning, of moving to tele-medicine.

I don't know how much difference it makes; I don't know the extent to which shelter-in-place was implemented in past pandemics.  But I'm sure it makes a significant difference, which social scientists will be trying to figure out over the next years.

Suppose Trump Is Mostly Right?

Let's say the reopening of the US goes okay, some glitches, but on the whole the level of deaths keeps declining down to a low level, so Covid-19 is just the fourth or fifth most common cause of death.

And suppose that's low enough that businesses and schools reopen during the summer without major setbacks.

So now it's October 1 and things have been going pretty well.  And most important they have been going pretty well since May 15.

And the stories in the media are no longer the gloom of uncertainty but the resilience of the country.

And despite the impact on the economy, our "animal spirits" have revived and the majority of the country thinks things are improving, and we're on the right track.

What then will be the outlook for Trump's reelection?

A Note From the Store: Toilet Paper

I was intrigued yesterday by the toilet paper  shelf at Safeway.  Usually they have multi-roll packs of their own toilet paper, plus those of name brands.  There were a few such packs of their own brand yesterday, but the bulk of the shelves were filled with individual rolls of a couple of brands I'd never seen before. They were foreign, I think, but didn't linger to investigate further.