White House Reportedly Orders Hospitals To Bypass CDC During COVID-19 Data Collection 189
The Trump administration is now ordering hospitals to send coronavirus patient data to a database in Washington, DC as part of a new initiative that may bypass the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), according to a report from The New York Times published on Tuesday. The Verge reports: As outlined in a document (PDF) posted to the website of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), hospitals are being ordered to send data directly to the administration, effective tomorrow, a move that has alarmed some within the CDC, according to The Times. The database that will collect and store the information is referred to in the document as HHS Protect, which was built in part by data mining and predictive analytics firm Palantir. The Silicon Valley company is known most for its controversial contract work with the US military and other clandestine government agencies as well as for being co-founded and initially funded by Trump ally Peter Thiel.
"A unique link will be sent to the hospital points of contact. This will direct the [point of care] to a hospital-specific secure form that can then be used to enter the necessary information. After completing the fields, click submit and confirm that the form has been successfully captured," reads the HHS instructions. "A confirmation email will be sent to you from the HHS Protect System. This method replaces the emailing of individual spreadsheets previously requested." While the White House's official reasoning is that this plan will help make data collection on the spread of COVID-19 more centralized and efficient, some current and former public health officials fear the bypassing of the CDC may be an effort to politicize the findings and cut experts out of the loop with regard to federal messaging and guidelines, The Times reports.
"A unique link will be sent to the hospital points of contact. This will direct the [point of care] to a hospital-specific secure form that can then be used to enter the necessary information. After completing the fields, click submit and confirm that the form has been successfully captured," reads the HHS instructions. "A confirmation email will be sent to you from the HHS Protect System. This method replaces the emailing of individual spreadsheets previously requested." While the White House's official reasoning is that this plan will help make data collection on the spread of COVID-19 more centralized and efficient, some current and former public health officials fear the bypassing of the CDC may be an effort to politicize the findings and cut experts out of the loop with regard to federal messaging and guidelines, The Times reports.
the great battle (Score:2)
Why can't patient data go to two places? (Score:4, Interesting)
If hospitals are emailing the figures as spreadsheets, why not just beam it to the CDC and CC the HHS?
Re: (Score:2)
Diff formats, and it's 2 copies to the same place (Score:3)
> data in a specific format that is different from what was used by the CDC, which would mean that whomever is responsible for it at the hospital would need to reformat the data to send it both places.
Yes, they've been needing to report the same data in two completely different formats.
Two different formats to send it two different offices within HHS. (CDC is part of HHS).
I believe it was toward the end of March that the COVID database was brought online. That's now THE database to enter covid cases, ra
Re: (Score:2)
and why would the CDC not have access to this data to present it to the public?
Yep, CDC still publishing it daily (Score:3, Interesting)
Yeah I don't know why anyone would think that.
CDC is still publishing it daily, as always:
https://www.cdc.gov/coronaviru... [cdc.gov]
I guess anything the administration does, someone has to use a breathless tone of voice to try to make it sound sinister. Gets them clicks, I guess.
Kinda like today the White House Press Secretary said:
--
The science should not stand in the way of this, as Dr. Scott Atlas said 'Of course, we can do it. Everyone else in the Western world, our peer nations are doing it. We are the outlier
Re: Yep, CDC still publishing it daily (Score:3)
Yes, because children can't infect their grandparents or antibody else. /sarcasm
Re: (Score:2)
The science doesn't support the infection spread from children to parents/grandparents, and besides, we've kept grandparents away from parents and grandchildren For several months - is there some reason we would suspend that precaution for our most-at-risk population when we open up elementary schools?
Re: (Score:2)
You are part of the problem, asshole
Re: (Score:2)
No to mention all the adults that work at or near schools -- everyone from teachers to school bus drivers. Let's hope Texas has the sense to cancel high school football games this fall. Although it would be interesting to see a football team -- or even a marching band -- practicing social distancing. . . .
Re: (Score:2)
The science is very clear on this.
Uh huh. No surprise that this administration would start lying about science instead of merely denying it.
Very little is "very clear" about COVID yet. For example: we know that a large number of infections have no visible symptoms, but we now have multiple studies showing a significant number of these asymptomatic patients with inflammation and lesions in their lungs. Including children. The long term effects of this lung damage are unknown, and so the declaration that COVID is less dangerous than the fl
This is why. (Score:2)
and why would the CDC not have access to this data to present it to the public?
Because the HHS document released on 15 July has a line (p. 10, at the end of the Answer to "Question 2: Capacity and utilization data: where/how to submit?") that says:
As of July 15,, [sic] 2020, hospitals should no longer report the Covid-19 information in this document to the National Healthcare Safety Network site. Please select one of the above methods to use instead. (The original is underlined.)
The National Healthcare Safety Network [cdc.gov] (NHSN) has been the nation’s most widely used healthcare-associated infection tracking system for decades, receiving data from more than 25,000 hospitals, dialysis centers, long care centers, etc., and is the standard method by which health care institutions report public health information. T
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
If you wanted the same data in both databases, one could simply bulk export/import the data, which will take a DB admin several minutes to do the whole thing, rather than having hospitals apend hours typing it up redundantly.
And as a bonus, any edits ordered by the White House would be made before the export, preventing any troubling inconsistencies in the data!
MUCH more efficient that way.
It's probably not the case that this is the reason. It may not even happen. It's also very sad that the scenario I describe is entirely plausible. IMO, politically-sensitive data should always be sent to at least two places, and one of them should be a non-governmental watchdog organization. Of course, who would have thought that hospita
Re: (Score:2)
Since the data is anonymized, That would require passing legislation to prohibit giving the CDC the data.
And that would be an incredibly ugly look politically, particularly in an environment where lawyers are scratching around wondering why the CDC's advice hasn't been followed by lawmakers.
Re:Why can't patient data go to two places? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's still published daily on the CDC site (Score:2)
It's still published daily on the CDC site.
https://www.cdc.gov/coronaviru... [cdc.gov]
Hospitals just don't have to type it in twice and send it to HHS twice, using two different forms for two offices in HHS.
I'm not sure how " if you don't control the information you don't want the public to see" applies to data that it still openly published every day as always. It's just being pulled from one database instead of being duplicated in two different databases that are probably in the same HHS datacenter.
Re: (Score:2)
What in the world could possibly make you think that?
Your butthole came up with a thought, so it's therefore fact?
Re: (Score:3)
If some information is sent directly to your database (as it has been since March), but you noonger get a summary emailed to your personal email, does that mean you can't read your database anymore?
The announcement states CDC has *already* been using the HHS covid database, because it has the important covid-related information, instead of using their generic "diseases" database.
It's click bait, my friend. Apparently pretty good click bait, since it got you.
Re: (Score:2)
> instead they will get it indirectly via the HHS
They've ALREADY been using the HHS covid database for several months rather than the cdc-specific generic "diseases" database, because that's where the important covid-related information is.
So yeah they'll pull covid information from the covid database, like they've been doing, rather than from the "diseases" database.
It's like you've never even heard of click bait before.
Using breathless words to indicate you should get excited doesn't actually make some
One question (Score:2)
Why make the switch now?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Likely because this was the fastest the Feds could stand-up a brand new database and portal system designed specifically to collect COVID data. They aren't exactly known for turning on a dime. A couple of months is lightning speed in government IT.
Re: (Score:2)
That couple months is lightning speed in commercial venues as well. It also typically produces shit as a product.
Re: (Score:2)
Except that it isn't government IT.
It's a private company (Palantir) owned by a billionaire who (with the Russians) helped to fund Trump's campaign in 2016.
Re: (Score:3)
Right, they should wait until the pandemic is over, then roll out the new pandemic reporting tool.
Perhaps they just finished Getting authorization, drafted specifications, wrote the code, documented it, tested it, and are now ready to make it live?
FFS, I realize a true coding wizard Like yourself could slap something together in an afternoon, but these are government workers, the stakes are high, and perhaps, just perhaps, they felt they wanted something they could trust, since they will be making policy de
Re:Why can't patient data go to two places? (Score:4, Informative)
Yeah... look at who exactly you're citing. From Wikipedia: [wikipedia.org]
With his resume, anything he says, and anything derived from anything he says, is less than worthless... especially with regard to anything to do with science or medicine. I wouldn't trust his lot any further than I could spit a rat.
The Verge clickbait (Score:2)
Speaking of sources -
You're interested in this because The VERGE used a breathless tone of voice to report that COVID data will be stored in the covid database, as it has since March. Still with the data published publicly each day on CDC.gov - only now healthcare workers don't have to fill out redundant forms to send the same information to HHS twice.
Seriously think about it. Why exactly is "nurses won't have to fill out duplicate forms anymore" something that caught your eye? It's because the Verge, fu
Re: (Score:3)
The CDC is a department of the HHS. The HHS Director is already the CDC Director's direct boss. You can't have something be "with the CDC" without it also being with "the HHS".
The department in the HHS responsible for Medicare (and thus paying for all of this COVID treatment, testing, and other stuff under the laws Congress recently passed to pay for the pandemic) is actually the department running this new database (and who was already previously collecting COVID data, just less efficiently).
The Director o
Re: Why can't patient data go to two places? (Score:2)
Just about beat that strawman to death, didn't you?
Re: Why can't patient data go to two places? (Score:2)
It was a question. It was rhetorical. The answer was plain to see. Thank you for playing the "spot the hypocrisy" game.
Re:Why can't patient data go to two places? (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
Ask the white house who said only one place.
Re: (Score:2)
It IS being sent to multiple agencies, but by way of a data collection at Health and Human Services (CDC's parent agency) first. Here's a data-scientist view summary of the changes [statnews.com].
The part that you aren't seeing in these headlines is that hospitals are generally happy with this, because instead of being required to send data to three different agencies (CDC, HHS, state), using different formats and protocols, they only have to submit once - in a format explicitly designed for COVID tracking - and then all
Re: (Score:2)
Having control of this data is one step in doing so.
The White House doesn't have the staff to handle additional data, much less specialized data. That's why the CDC was created in the 1st freaking place!
Am i going mad? (Score:4, Informative)
Or is this the third time I've seen this particular news item posted here?
Re:Am i going mad? No /. is broken (Score:5, Funny)
/. is currently broken.
I imagine there is some code monkey trying to understand commander tacos 15 year old crusty code, currently posting on stackoverflow for help.
Re: (Score:2)
/. is currently broken.
Actually, my guess is it got hacked - and this is the result of restoring the latest good backup.
The timing is interesting, what with Twitter getting pwned at the same time...
Re: (Score:3)
Actually, my guess is it got hacked - and this is the result of restoring the latest good backup.
They must have done more than that. Last good backup for stories would look to be maybe 2-3 days old. But today, ... I see replies to my comments in the box on the right. That functionality hasn't worked for me for a solid 2 years despite having been enabled in my profile. Unless the last backup they took from the Slashcode was when they last changed the UI 6 years ago.
Re: (Score:2)
It died the death it deserved!
Re: (Score:2)
What happens in life to make one give off such cantankerous rat turd vibes?
As a card-carrying member of the curmudgeonly-old geek crowd, I could tell you, but then we'd have to make you eat Cheese Whiz and liverwurst on Ritz Crackers until you barf up yesterday's breakfast.
Re: (Score:2)
A lot of comments disappeared. Some of the misattributed comments were pretty weird too. Making one think Slashdot had gotten owned.
Re: (Score:2)
Look at the date. /. lost recent stories like yesterday!
Re: (Score:2)
De Ja Vu (Score:2)
alternative numbers coming soon! (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I imagine the transition to good numbers will be more gradual, so as not to appeaer too obviously ham-handed.
But I wonder how long it will be before hospitals are ordered not to talk to the press...
Re: (Score:2)
Sure, there do seem to be some sycophants stupid enough to believe that, but the majority of this country aren't that stupid.
Can't manipulate (Score:3)
There's no reportedly about it (Score:3)
He doesn't care about you or me. I don't know what to say anymore to his supporters when they're seeing stuff like this and still love the guy. His poll numbers have barely budged and there's every likelihood he'll be re-elected.
There's no bridge too far. He was right about one thing, he's shooting 1000 Americans a day in Main Street USA and he's getting away with it.
Trump controlling the numbers? (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
You don't need to count to control the numbers. Just employ someone who can count and then repeatedly fire them and replace them over and over until someone who can count gives you the answer you're looking for.
Basically what Trump has done with every position in the White House.
Wait, so a portal just appeared? (Score:3, Insightful)
So here's my question. This wondrous portal just appears? I mean, let's look at who we are talking about. The Government. So does anything think this "portal" is actually going to be better code than the ETL scripts that the CDC has spent at least a decade or better tweaking? Really? The Government suddenly write perfect code?
That's also overlooking the fact that the White House has been using Excel's cubic approximation charting tool [businessinsider.com] to do COVID numbers. No real mathematical model, a fucking Excel function...
If anything, this is more than likely some dumb ass LAMP toss together by Jared after reading "Learn PHP in 24 Hours", with the backing database fucking Excel and the reporting done in...well, Excel actually. I'm betting that if someone popped the letter "A" into one of the number entry forms the entire "database" would just read that day as zero COVID cases.
I mean seriously everyone. Does anyone think this portal wasn't some half ass job done up? When did everyone on Slashdot suddenly start thinking that the Government could do anything right? Especially technical in nature? I mean here you go. This new portal is literally the systemd of disease reporting. It's some new shiny thing, hasn't been well tested, will more than likely break a 100 times, and it's by people who want everyone to use it by hook or crook no matter what you liked before. Why are some of you cheering it on?
Re:Wait, so a portal just appeared? (Score:4, Informative)
The new system was built by TeleTracking and Palantir after following the proper procurement processes. TeleTracking specializes in patient data flows. They have the medical expertise, AKA hospital integration knowledge. Palantir is a multi-billion dollar maker of big data analytics, with a bunch of successful government contracts, and whom Biden has previously praised in public for their great work for various agencies. They have some of the best large scale database expertise in the world.
So uh, you're totally wrong in your made-up suppositions?
Some hospitals used to email spreadsheets to report data to the CDC and HHS. The CDC hasn't been able to keep up, being at best a week behind. This system replaces all that crap in order to provide real-time data. Yeah, it's better. It's also been running fine collecting data from hospitals for the HHS since April, so it's not as brand-new as people seem to think. After the CDC said they couldn't provide daily data and hospitals complained about the duplication of efforts they recently stopped requiring them to provide a duplicate subset of data to the CDC. Now the CDC can just get a data feed instead.
It's all perfectly normal and logical, until people inject their TDS into it and start injecting their conspiracy theories and conjectures like yours without even looking at the facts available.
Re: (Score:2)
99% of this article's threads.
Trust issues (Score:2)
The facts available (Score:2)
Some hospitals used to email spreadsheets to report data to the CDC and HHS. The CDC hasn't been able to keep up, being at best a week behind. This system replaces all that crap in order to provide real-time data. Yeah, it's better.
Please stop spreading this nonsense. It damages the public health of the nation, something that is unpatriotic and un-American.
The CDC's National Healthcare Safety Network [cdc.gov] has been the nation’s most widely used healthcare-associated infection tracking system for decades, receiving data from more than 25,000 hospitals, dialysis centers, long care centers, etc., and is the standard method by which health care institutions report public health information of all types.
"Some hospitals used to email spr
Re: (Score:2)
I'll try to enjoy it while it lasts, which probably won't be very long at all.
So, is anyone going to speculate on what version of *nix they are or should be running?
Obvious solution (Score:5, Interesting)
Obvious solution: Ignore the idiots in the white house. Keep sending the data to the CDC.
By the time anything even gets to court Biden will be president.
Re: (Score:3)
You're laboring under a bunch of misconceptions.
The hospitals have always been sending data to HHS (Specifically, the Medicare division, who pays for all the covid-related stuff and runs this database). They just also sent a subset to the other HHS division called the CDC as well. The CDC couldn't keep up with it, being at best a week behind. Once CDC admitted that they couldn't improve that without redoing their system while the hospitals kept complaining about the extra duplication and work, they agreed t
Re: (Score:3)
Hey idiot, isn't the CDC part of HHS?
Re: (Score:3)
By the time anything even gets to court Biden will be president.
Really? You think it will take 5 years to work its way through the courts?
BTW, have you heard Biden's commercials? He swears to stand by our side and help us get through the current crisis... He forgets to mention he can't do jack for about 6 more months! I guess Biden is hoping the pandemic stays around killing Americans for six more months, just so he can show us how he would handle it.
Re: (Score:2)
I guess Biden is hoping the pandemic stays around killing Americans for six more months, just so he can show us how he would handle it.
Biden is dumb as a stump, but he's still smarter than Trump. He's smart enough to listen to experts, who told him that Covid would still be a problem in six months because Trump and "My face my right" dumbshits are collaborating to fuck up America.
Obvious managment. (Score:2)
Marks of a good manager. Knows how to delegate, and how to listen.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I guess Biden is expecting the pandemic stays around killing Americans for six more months, just so he can show us how he would handle it.
FTFY.
And if that's what Biden is expecting, he's completely right. No way the pandemic has ended in six months.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Sadly, that still ranks him leagues above trump.
Yes, the pandemic will still be raging in the US in 6 months due to the incompetence of the douche canoes in the upper reaches of the government now, especially considering the orange buffoon in the WH.
We could have a long discussion as to why this is, or you can just look at the status and steps taken by various other countries and their current pandemic status for comparison, or you can always just keep screaming incohere
Re: (Score:3)
You go right ahead running that pre-victory lap. I'm pretty sure you'll see Hillary out there still chugging away.
Re: (Score:2)
I just want this country to start working much better as soon as fucking possible. I'm so tired of all of this shit.
I can understand the move (Score:2)
What I'm hoping to see is the same number. But if the number does happen to be different by a high margin, I want to see heads roll beause this is the lives of our Americans we're talking about. It's not something to be used
Re: (Score:2)
Interesting... What do you think should be done in response to Russia putting bounties on American troops? Ignore it? Maybe call the evidence a hoax?
Re: (Score:2)
The medical profession isn't lying to us, medicine isn't political.
You should really try to open your eyes and look at facts.
I say that, but I know it's probably futile. You are so wrapped up in your 'side' that you can't think rationally anymore.
The reason: Follow the money (Score:2)
It is all to funnel tax dollars to a couple of Trump's mega-donors:
https://www.facebook.com/heath... [facebook.com]
Re: (Score:2)
Re: Damn Trump (Score:2)
Yes.
Re: (Score:2)
after 20-30 days of the same day you get the gun all kill the town. Death by swat is fun after killing your self 10 times.
Re: (Score:2)
Basically, Trump wants to fap over the data before he decides it's ready for you to see. (Or not see.)
More like he wants to shit on it. I doubt there's anything in that data that gives him the kind of pleasure you're implying.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
You figure that making health care workers type everything up twice, in two different HHS forms, to send it to HHS twice, somehow makes the data more transparent than filling out one HHS form?
Perhaps you can explain how exactly you think that Trump controls HHS, yet doesn't control the parts of HHS, such as CDC.
> Conspiracy Mindset
Indeed.
Re:Conspiracy Mindset, and Narrative Control (Score:4, Insightful)
Trump sees loyalty to anything other than himself (principles, science, empiricism) as a personal betrayal. Earlier this week, Trump retweeted a game-show host's baseless assertion that the doctors in the CDC were lying about coronavirus. This is a good example of the conspiracy mindset that controls the WhiteHouse
Perhaps you can explain how exactly you think that Trump controls HHS, yet doesn't control the parts of HHS, such as CDC.
First, Trump seems to agree with the OP, in that he thinks that the CDC is lying to hurt him and he can do nothing about it. But I don't think it is a mystery why incompetent political lackeys are more pliant than career civil servants. The MD who heads the CDC, and the highly visible and popular Dr. Fauci have thusfar continued to give advice that does not jibe with the President's statements and wishes-- which is why the administration's inflatable doll mouthpiece today boldly declared that "science should not stand in the way" of President Trump's policies. Trump's inability to control the CDC also explains why the Whitehouse started a smear campaign against Dr. Fauci, and the CDC. In addition to the stupid retweet, one of the President's most trusted advisors published an anti-Fauci op-ed in USA Today---the President says he did not know about it. Then the CDC hospitalization database went offline (apparently the CDC isn't well-enough funded to do what the President wants as fast as he now wants it) https://www.politico.com/news/... [politico.com]
There is no conspiracy by the Trump administration, but there is a pattern: if you fail to demonstrate sufficient loyalty to Trump, you become the enemy. Jeff Sessions knows this, and soon enough Dr. Fauci will too.
Re:Bad news, I'm afraid (Score:5, Informative)
Yes, the woman who said that Trump is the most informed person on the planet also said that we can reopen schools "in full" and "every day" just like countries that are in much better shape, and that science should not get in the way of this. The Trumpish lie before the Trumpish absurdity is that schools are not open in full or every day in most of these countries (half-days and staggered days) https://www.nbcnews.com/news/w... [nbcnews.com] https://abcnews.go.com/Interna... [go.com]
So she claims we should do something that other countries really aren't doing they way Trump claims, and then claims that science shouldn't stand in the way of this on the same day we learn that the CDC will not release guidelines regarding schools for another month. https://www.npr.org/sections/c... [npr.org]
So the Trump administration really isn't going to let science stand in the way!
But good for you, holding Jim Acosta's feet to the fire for not quoting her lies in full.
Re: (Score:2)
Holy crap dude. You need to get back on your meds ASAP.
Re: Conspiracy Mindset, and Narrative Control (Score:2)
If you had kept up you'd know he's walked back on travel shutdowns, on mask usage, on person to person transmission for a start. How much more does he need to walk back for you to get it?
I am sorry you are simply ignorant, AC.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
As you say, "Deep State" is just a code phrase for people who've made a career out of government service, many of whom actually know how to do their jobs competently.
As opposed to the sycophantic toadies who are given positions of leadership over those civil servants whenever the government changes hands. Some of those folks do take their role seriously (e.g. Tom Wheeler, Jeff Sessions - to pick one from either side), while on the other side you have the Bill Barrs and the Ajit Pais.
But let me disagree with
Re: Conspiracy Mindset, and Narrative Control (Score:2)
Facts hurt.
Re: /. broken? (Score:3)
You think slashdot has the budget for a team of experienced high quality people? There's only about 100 active users to show ads to and 98 of them have effective ad blockers.
Re: /. broken? (Score:2)
It's just you and me clicking on all the ads, buddy!
And how do I know? There are so few people posting we all know each other's aliases. If this place had tens of thousands of active users there'd be so much activity you couldn't keep up. And having run an ad network before, I know the math and you can look up numbers on,one yourself, 50k users doesn't generate enough ad money to hire that many people. It's simply not enough activity.
And finally, no, your grammar correction is incorrect but I hope you f
Re: /. broken? (Score:2)
Users is not plural in this case despite what your 3rd grade teacher told you. It is a singular entity when used in this context. They are not individuals or counted as such. Unless you think the entire advertising world is just wrong and should not be allowed their own internal lingo like every other field.
Do you write CPU or CPUs or CPU's when referring to multiple chips? Why?
Think about it.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
A proprietary and closed database vs documents using an openly accessible standard. Public information should be public, that's the issue here. Basically they've made their own privately-sourced Trump Covid database and are trying to bypass the independent national health system.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
If that's true, I hope charges are brought against them.
On a side note about this, the White House isn't equipped or capable of understanding much less using this data for the purpose it is intended. Even if they are intending to do the right thing, which I highly doubt, they are incapable of doing so and have shown incompetence in nearly every field, trebly so with anything related to the pandemic.
We'll see what happens with regards to all accounts. As w
Re:Trump bad man! (Score:5, Insightful)
Except that comparison is clearly stupid, because Obama didn't make his own personal database system and direct the information into it, which is what the white house is doing here. The white house has no business hoovering up all the data like that, which basically prevents anyone accessing the data. Trump has been repeatedly obsessed with "the numbers", and now he has his way of controlling the numbers, by forcing everything into an entity that he directly controls. This is outside of CDC, Congressional, Senate oversight now.
Re: (Score:2)
The white house has no business hoovering up all the data like that
The WH is the highest administrative authority in this country. What makes you say they don't have any business? The President has every reason to believe the current numbers are cooked and he wants to see actual reports. Understandable. Even so, the CDC, HHS, or any other federal agencies are under direct supervision of the President. When his office issues an order, they will have to follow. This is not something you vote about.
Re: Trump bad man! (Score:2)
Trump has no reason to believe the numbers are significantly in error. He just believes they make him look bad.
Trump made it very clear that he wants to reduce the numbers artificially. Then his staff tried to save face by saying âoewhat he really meant was...â. But Trump doubled down.
He wants to cook the books. It is very clear. You really have to be ignorant and/or malicious to suggest he has that right.
Re: (Score:2)
The white house has no business hoovering up all the data like that
The WH is the highest administrative authority in this country. What makes you say they don't have any business? The President has every reason to believe the current numbers are cooked and he wants to see actual reports. Understandable. Even so, the CDC, HHS, or any other federal agencies are under direct supervision of the President. When his office issues an order, they will have to follow. This is not something you vote about.
How would you feel if the White house insisted that the Census data go through them first, instead of through the Census Bureau/Department of Commerce?
How about if the White House insisted that information about federal-relief programs go through them first, instead of FEMA?
You can't let data like that be controlled by people who would play politics with it.
Re: Trump bad man! (Score:2)
Youâ(TM)re not wrong of course, but itâ(TM)s not like the CDC was doing a great job, largely due to Trump and other ideological operativesâ(TM) efforts.
Re: Trump bad man! (Score:2)
Youâ(TM)re not wrong, but itâ(TM)s not like the CDC was doing a great job. Of course many of its difficulties were externally imposed by Trump amd other ideological operatives.
Re: Trump bad man! (Score:2)
You mean PaaS, politics as a service.