From TPM Reader DW …

My eldest daughter (a French citizen) lives in Paris. When Paris locked down, she was only allowed to go out of her house – up to 1 kilometer- for exercise or to the store, twice a day, and for exercise- it had to be between specific hours. It was pretty drastic since she lives in a very tiny Parisian studio and was not allowed to do any exercise socially, such as walk with a friend. She was required to carry a written statement about why she was out should law enforcement stop her. They did allow people to return to their families before their shutdown and most of her Parisian apartment neighbors went to their parents’ regional homes. The only people she came in contact with were the grocery store clerks, who were behind plastic panels. Her hours at the university that employs her were reduced, but French unemployment made up the difference.

From TPM Reader CF …

I’m a US citizen in Australia – haven’t lived in the US since 2005 (was in Europe for a number of years and I’m married to a european), but all my family is in New England (specifically in an area with pretty low Covid rates). Reading the commentary on the editor’s blog from all the CA residents really brought home the dissonance between how Americans are experiencing this pandemic and how I am down here.

From TPM Reader SA …

I’m a long-time TPM reader (back to 2002 or something) and one of the original prime members and also a TPM insider. I live in NYC, most of the time. My wife and I are both professors at a university in New York City and we have small children (ages 6 and 4). We are overall extremely lucky: no one got sick and we are not in much danger of losing our jobs. But, the lack of child care, and the *uncertainty* around child care, has just been really tough.

About a month ago we were in a zoom meeting with the school where our smallest is registered for pre-K when we were blindsided by the sudden realization that ***they were really contemplating not opening the schools full time.***

As Summer Concepcion and I discussed how to cover President Trump’s press briefing last night, we were both utterly gaping at his behavior — that’s coming from two journalists who have been following the ins-and-outs of the Trump-era since Day 1.

TPM Reader PC nails it:

Longtime TPM reader in Canada. The other comments from abroad got me thinking about the alleged White House strategy of getting the public accustomed to living with a high level of outbreaks. It might seem delusional to expect people to accept mass illness and death – but there’s plenty of precedent.

As was reported yesterday, the White House has taken the collection of COVID data out of the hands of the CDC and given it over to a private medical data company in Pittsburgh. On its face the company doesn’t seem obviously scammy. It’s not some fly-by-night set up by Brad Parscale’s uncle. So we don’t know quite what the angle to this is, not the specifics. My best guess is that it is simply to maintain a tighter hold on information and keep it out of the hands of the CDC, which even under its stalwartly Trumpian current leadership has shown some recent signs of bucking the President’s demands for COVID denial and no-holds-barred school reopenings.

What we can say more definitively is that at the moment the full weight of the federal government appears harnessed toward covering up and denying the bad news about the resurgent epidemic and force-marching the economy and the nation’s schools into a dead cat bounce that will salvage the President’s flagging reelection prospects.

Let me direct your attention to this very important photo:

Congratulations to Dr Fauci on his @InStyle cover???? pic.twitter.com/eaoFzMf8Hx

— Priyanka Aribindi (@priaribi) July 16, 2020

You saw Gov. Kemp’s (R-GA) order prohibiting cities and counties in Georgia from requiring people to wear masks. Look at this chart – apologies in advance that it’s a bit messy.

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Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s remarks about human rights yesterday are among the most disturbing utterances I’ve heard come out of this administration thus far.