What Do You Do With Your 401(k) During the COVID-19 Crisis

As hard as it can be to look this far down the road, doing so is paramount. Too much focus on the short-term might help you for two or three months, but it could also cripple you for two or three decades. Practice discipline and play the long game*, regardless of what everyone else is doing.

*I'm eighty now; for me, the long game is 2021

Larry Alton  "Financially, things are tough right now. These aren’t words you thought you’d be reading eight or nine weeks ago, but it’s true. And before you go tapping into your 401(k) plan, it’s helpful to understand what’s at stake.

"What the New Coronavirus Stimulus Package Means for 401(k)s

"The recently enacted Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act is unprecedented in size, support, and reach. And while most people are talking about how the $2 trillion bill provides stimulus checks for millions of working Americans and forgivable loans for small businesses, there’s another element that has some buzzing.

"Under the CARES Act, people no longer have to wait until they reach a certain age (59½) to start pulling our retirement funds without penalty. For a limited time, you’re actually able to withdraw as much as $100,000 in retirement assets as qualified distributions if the withdrawal is linked to COVID-19 (such as a layoff or diagnosis). Investors are also able to take up to $100,000 as a loan against their 401(k), which is an increase from the previous maximum of $50,000.

"Under normal circumstances, savers face a 10 percent penalty when assets are prematurely withdrawn from a retirement plan (meaning prior to the age of 59½). This is no longer the case. This is one of those rare moments where investors can tap in and avoid getting hit with a massive fee. And though savers will still be required to pay taxes on the money they withdraw, the tax burden can be spread out over a period of three years.

"Timely Tips, Strategies, and Suggestions:"  . . .

More...

Gavin Newsom is the new Democrat heartthrob

Don Surber  "Cuomosexuality is so last week. The wet dreams about Fredo's brother, the governor, becoming president died fast and hard when people realized he is one big jerk. He is almost as bad as those women who cut office donuts in half. And it always is a cream-filled donut. The rule is you touch any of the donut, you eat the whole thing.
"It also dawned on people that under Andrew Cuomo's leadership, New York state became the epicenter of COVID-19 in the United States.
"Enter Gavin Newsom, the governor of California. He declared California a nation-state and liberals are swooning. Never mind how nationalistic the phrase is, Newsom is the new White Obama that Democrats seek.
'Francis Wilkinson of Bloomberg News declared Newsom this week's savior of the republic.

Wilkinson wrote, "California this week declared its independence from the federal government’s feeble efforts to fight COVID-19 — and perhaps from a bit more. The consequences for the fight against the pandemic are almost certainly positive. The implications for the brewing civil war between Trumpism and America’s budding 21st-century majority, embodied by California’s multiracial liberal electorate, are less clear."

"Newsom declared California a nation-state, which is problematic for liberals be they multiracial or lily white.
"First, nationalism is the anti-thesis of communism's globalism." . . .More...

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Sally Kohn, a professional leftist, attacks employers for COVID-19 layoffs.

Kohn is a cliched leftist: They all operate in a world entirely made up of theories untethered to facts. The loudest leftists have never held real jobs. Instead, they've spent their entire lives in leftist bubbles consisting of politics, academia, media, and funded organizations.

"I'm a good person, but beat me, I'm white!"

Andrea Widburg  "Sally Kohn is a professional leftist. Although she claims she’s been an employer (more on that later), a review of her career reveals that she’s spent almost her entire life working for leftist organizations, none of which ever rely on the free market for money. They all get funds from corporations, government grants, foundations, or wealthy individuals.

"When she hasn’t been working for these outfits, she’s been employed by or freelanced for media organizations. She is not someone who’s run a small, mid-sized, or even large business that’s dependent on the vagaries of the marketplace to pay for operations.

"The fact that Kohn knows nothing about the private sector hasn’t stopped her from having an opinion about those employers who have had to fire or temporarily suspend employees because of cash flow problems:" . . .

CNN hosts display own controversial 'hands up'  "CNN hosts Margaret Hoover, Sally Kohn, Sunny Hostin and Mel Robbins get the viral community talking with this gesture."

The Left Took Over the Churches, and the Right Never Fought Back

Other motives drove the left, too.  The left's slavish obedience to the shifting standards of peer convention combined with the left's refusal to hold any time-honored standards as sacred does not offer people strong odds for fulfillment.

Robert Oscar Lopez   "Amid so many historic aspects to the 2020 election, one bit of important history may be getting lost.  While Trump has ushered in a whole new era in politics, changes to American church life during the last four years have been sweeping.  This essay will provide an introduction to the church's present battles, for readers who may not have been following Christian media or who find the situation confusing.

Toon added by TD

"Church, state, and culture

"In my first academic book, Colorful Conservative: American Conversations with the Ancients from Wheatley to Whitman, I examined the origin of the present-day "conservative" mind.  I did not follow the familiar methodology of Russell Kirk, but tried to look at literature.

"I see increasingly that the core of American conservatism blends traditional and unconventional thinking.  (I went over this in detail in this column.)  While many conservative writers like to trace everything back to Burke, I argue that Burke was both traditional and conventional; this left out a huge bloc of the American right that was irreverent, pugnacious, or defiant to everything that came with contemporary conventions: peer pressure, intellectual fads, condescending pronouncements from experts, arrogant social experiments.  Burke took peer pressure seriously but wanted to balance it with longstanding cultural prejudices (he did not see prejudices as a bad thing).  Burke could explain the existence of the National Review, but he could not explain phenomena like MassResistance moms risking their safety to blockade drag queen story hour.

"The heart and soul of American conservatism consisted of two powerful elements: the preference for ancient social mores and bold resistance to peer pressure.  In three waves, the traditional-unconventional conservatism of America evolved to become a societal mainstay." . . .

"Israeli minister humiliates Muslim activists "The only thing you invented is suicide bombers and terrorism"

Rich Terrell

List of Israeli inventions and discoveries includes:

• ReWalk a bionic walking assistance system that enables paraplegics to stand upright, walk and climb stairs.
• Development of robotic guidance system for spine surgery by Mazor Robotics.

• Waze, a GPS-based geographical navigation application program for smartphones with GPS support and display screens, which provides turn-by-turn information and user-submitted travel times and route details, downloading location-dependent information over the mobile telephone network.^[47] Waze Ltd., which was founded in 2008 in Israel by Uri Levine, software engineer Ehud Shabtai and Amir Shinar, and is now available in over 100 countries, was acquired by Google for a reported $1.1 billion.
• 
  

• USB flash drive – a flash memory data storage device integrated with a USB interface. The Israeli company M-Systems (in partnership with IBM) developed and manufactured the first USB flash drives available in North America.^[32] This claim is challenged by multiple companies in the following four countries who also independently developed USB technology: Singapore (Trek Technology), the People's Republic of China (PRC) (Netac Technology) and the Republic of China (Taiwan). See USB Flash drive § Patent controversy.
• The Intel 8088 – the first PC CPU from IBM that was designed in Israel, at Intel's Haifa laboratory.

• 
  

The REAL News  . . . "Unlike the Jewish left in the United States, proud Jews such as Naftali Bennett will not allow a Jew-hating BDS activist get away with slandering Israel. Bennett responds to this hater with the truth, and the truth is this: in 71 years, Israel has built a strong and miraculous country, that makes the world a better place every day. In that same period of time, the “Palestinians” have done two things: invent modern terrorism and spread hatred of Jews.

"Israel is the only place in the Middle East where women are free and Christians are safe.

"Israel is the only democratic state in the entire Middle East, the only place in the Middle East where women are free, Christians and other minorities are safe and Jews exist.

"On the other hand Hamas, Islamic Jihad and PLO (Palestinian leadership) are all Islamic terrorist organizations calling for the genocide of Jews.

"The Palestinian President (PLO) Is paying salaries to terrorists who murdered Jews." . . .

[Some] "hotels have donated food and rooms for emergency personnel except for one:Trump"

Not "all". Some.

Las Vegas Review-Journal  "As hotel rooms across the country sit empty amid the COVID-19 pandemic, some operators are offering their properties to health care workers and first responders looking for a place to rest away from home.

"Las Vegas-based Diamond Resorts announced late last month that all open, Diamond-managed properties would offer complimentary accommodations to medical personnel and first responders. That offer includes Polo Towers, Cancun Resort and Desert Paradise Resort in Las Vegas."
. . . 
"Caesars spokesman Richard Broome said the company is not offering housing because it does not have staff working at any of its properties to service guests. Representatives of MGM Resorts International, Las Vegas Sands Corp., Boyd Gaming Corp. and Red Rock Resorts did not comment."
In the comments to this post:

The fake was to claim that Trump Hotel was the only not participating. I could not contain myself and decided to call another hotel in LV, Tuscany Suites and Casino, to inquire.and was advised that their management is considering but is not providing rooms at this time. Thus, Trump is not the only. I would have challenged similarly if Tuscany had been used instead of Trump in the original post. Just a false suggestion.

PnSfromLA  Los Angeles, Destination Expert for Las Vegas" commented:

"As an FYI the Trump campaign has been placing large food orders in many cities at locally owned restaurants and donating the food to hospitals, first responders in the area. That was leaked out about a week ago."

 "Aside from Polo, no Strip resorts, and I am being generous including it in that category, are providing rooms. One, that is a logistical and security nightmare. Two for most properties it doesn't make sense since the rooms have no kitchens (yes I know Trump does). Three, Vegas is compact with a great freeway system. It isn't like the hospitals are right on The Strip or the city is huge. Why is this even needed? These first responders are still getting paid and have homes. It isn't like NYC where most people don't have cars and EMS or hospital personnel have to travel a long distance on filthy subways."

At the above link there are many comments, pro and con. I chose these to stand by a president who donates his salary to charities and has no desire to enrich himself through his international connections, unlike popular Democrats who both held and sought the office of President. And rented out rooms in the White House. Tunnel Dweller.

Mitt Romney: A weathervane in a hurricane

Mitt’s “Bipartisan” Threat To President  

. . . But seeing as the Dems did EXACTLY what Trump said they would do by weaponizing the pandemic, these idiots are now trying to investigate Trump for his response to the Wuhan virus… And Mitt’s letter is meant to get him to comply with their investigation.

Mitt can come through for the right cause if the wind blows just right, but how will anyone know?  Romney Speaks Out Against Democrats Who Shot Down Coronavirus Relief Bill

Mitt Romney went off on Senate Dems as “irresponsible and reckless” 
"Senator Mitt Romney usually sides with Democrats on anything important but today he unleashed on Senate Democrats for shutting down the virus relief package, calling their actions “irresponsible and reckless.”
“Nothing in the Senate has shocked me, until today,” Romney tweeted. “Standing in the way of a critically needed rescue package is irresponsible and reckless. Dems say not enough money to state: nearly $200 billion isn’t chump change. Hospitals get at least $75 billion.”
He said emphatically that they had a complete lack of understanding of economics.
"“As for funds for companies,” Romney said while referring to the money that companies would get from the government so they can stay in business; “it’s to keep entities that employ millions of Americans from folding—it’s to save jobs. Keep this up a little longer and we will go from social distancing to social destruction.' ” . . .

For years, Romney has been known for his lack of convictions:  
Mitt Romney: A weathervane in a hurricane  . . . "His problem going into 2012 is much different. This is not the case of someone who changed his positions or evolved or was being politically expedient.  
"It is much worse than that. The real question now, after more and more continuous flip-flops, is whether Mitt Romney stands for much of anything, other than a burning desire to get elected president of the United States. Does he have a core? Does he have anything that he truly believes in? Is he only interested in “being there,” to quote the title from the Peter Sellers movie?
"The flip-flops go beyond a series of social issues or stands from his Massachusetts days — he is a serial flip-flopper. Immigration, healthcare, the stimulus, flat taxes, the recent Ohio initiatives — the propensity to change his positions appears to be part and parcel of who Mitt Romney is as a person.
"He is very much in the moment. He wants to please the audience he is speaking to, no matter what, just like a salesman. But, in today’s world, this stuff goes viral." . . . '

What about the aspirational president, Joe Biden, man?

Democrats Likely to Dump Biden   "As Democrat power brokers survey the constantly shifting ground in the lead-up to the national election, it is not hard to guess the candidate strategy discussions going on in their super-secret supervillain lairs.

 
Plan A: Hide a Biden

"The first strategy is to run nobody at all, which is another way of saying they stick with Joe Biden.  The idea here is to use the current COVID-19 environment to keep Joe Biden safely tucked away and quiet while the media and surrogates do the heavy reinvention.

"This is not an altogether bad strategy and probably the best one they have if Biden remains the candidate since it is becoming obvious to everyone not named Joe Biden that Biden's sharpest days are long behind him.  Let's be honest: he was never that sharp even in his glory days, but he was certainly a lot more lucid when he helped spearhead the despicable character assassination of Robert Bork." . . .

. . . 

"For the Democrats, it is vital to drive Bernie Sanders from the race.  Otherwise, he will have a compelling argument to inherit the candidate mantle when Biden is forced to drop out.  This is why Democrats are Whooping like banshees for him to get out.  Even today, the media are giving off a pungent odor of desperation as they fill the airwaves, screeching that it is time for Sanders to drop out of the race.

"This has far less to do with his presence harming Biden than with setting the ground for the Cuomo shuffle.  Driving out Sanders is practically a prerequisite before completing Plan B.

"While nobody should doubt that Democrat power brokers lack the ruthlessness to replace Biden with whoever they want, it would be far messier if Sanders was still sticking around.  So the man of the people and three homes will drop out.  The only question is the favorable terms of the surrender."' . . .

. . . So which will it be?  It's a tough call, but I look for Democrats to try to make the switch after finally deciding that old electable Joe is actually an albatross in confused clothing.  Biden's real problem is that the Democrats would run Lucifer if they thought he was the candidate most likely to win.  A canceled convention will make the chicanery all the easier.  Look for Biden to drop out and Cuomo to be drafted into the race by August, if not sooner."   Emphasis added, TD

Joe Biden Praises His ‘Dear Friend’ Bernie Sanders for Creating a Progressive ‘Movement,’ Calling It a ‘Good Thing’…   Video

Bernie Sanders: I Will Work With Joe Biden To Move Our Progressive Ideas Forward
"Keyword: Our."

Poll finds Biden with 11-point national lead on Trump   " . . .53 percent support against 42 percent support for Trump. That’s the largest margin for any poll released this month.
"A Monmouth University survey released on Thursday found Biden with a 4-point national lead. Most other recent surveys put Biden’s advantage between 3 points and 8 points.
"Trump has a clear advantage in enthusiasm — 70 percent of the president’s supporters say they’re very excited to cast a ballot for him, compared to 50 percent of Biden’s supporters.
"Both Trump and Biden have more than 90 percent support from voters within their own parties, but independents broke for Biden in the poll by 12 points. Biden also has a massive 30-point lead over Trump among women, while Trump’s lead among men is only at 7 points." . . .

Biden Loses Train Of Thought, Corrects Himself Several Times In One Sentence

Trump’s Leadership in Pandemic Paves Way to Reelection

Will decent Democrats finally realize the shame that has shrouded them by the actions of those on public display? That includes, but is not limited to, flag stomping women athletes, obscene TV hosts, showoff Hollywood personalities, propagandist "news" sources with their publicity-hungry reporters and school systems that promote them? Have they not heard of #WalkAway?

Conrad Black

The president has admirably mobilized the natural desire of Americans to rise to a national challenge, part of which is generally a rallying behind the leader, as long as the leader knows how to lead.  

"One of the characteristics of the coronavirus pandemic in the United States is its unique political explosiveness. In order to deal effectively with it, President Trump has had to show a good deal of dexterity, which his always numerous and vocal critics have assailed as incoherence, or insincerity.

. . . 

"At the outset, the president was roasted for being anti-science, for ignoring scientists and experts, epidemiologists, and just winging it on his own intuition. He dealt with that by effectively taking over the public relations part of what is officially Vice President Pence’s task force, and becoming virtually joined at the hip to its two leading and uniformly respected specialists, Drs. Deborah Birx and Anthony Fauci.

"Both have praised the president’s executive decisions and have assured the press that President Trump listens to them and follows their advice.

"The president has done an excellent job of mobilizing the private sector, kicking around companies that he thought were being sluggish (General Motors) or were profiteering abroad at the expense of the safety of Americans (3M), and he invoked the National Emergencies Act and ignored silly tweets from the Democratic hecklers on the sidelines such as Hillary Clinton, and explained the law generally only needed to be referred to for targeted companies to comply; not to be specifically enforced." . . . 

Thank you, Bernie, for forcing us to learn about socialism

Image by Mike Harris

Are You Enjoying Your 30 Free Trial of Communism?:  In keeping with the " national ‘Day of Satire". Hat tip to Exavier Saskagoochie

POLL: Most people unimpressed with their 30-day free trial of Communism

"A poll conducted by the Pew Pew Institute shows that a majority of Americans are unimpressed with their 30-day free trial of Communism.

“ 'It kinda sucks,” 19-year-old San Diegan Britta Fowler said of the trial. “I was expecting all this free stuff, which I guess we’re getting, but I also didn’t expect empty store shelves and house arrest for everyone. It’s really lame!' ” . . .

Liberal Nonsense Is Looking Dumber Than Ever Now

Townhall

Sure, AOC is still nitwiting about it on the interwebs, but is anyone listening to her? She’s gone from center stage, revealed as what she always was – a trivial indulgence who was vaguely amusing in a time of safety and prosperity and who is a bad joke in a time where normal people are literally putting themselves at risk to help fellow Americans. We have no time for her ilk and their sophomore seminar obsessions. We have lives to save and an economy to rebuild.

"Remember the heady days of six weeks ago when the earnest wailing of liberal sissies about some imagined thoughtcrime drew respectful attention? Well, it never did from us, because we always knew these people we idiots deserving only of mockery, but some people – nice, friendly people who could not imagine the malignancy in the hearts of these fascists dipwads – took them seriously and actually cared.
"And then a disease came along that is impoverishing the people it isn’t killing. It’s time to put away childish things, folks, and America seems to be doing that. Well, at least the people who aren’t liberal blue checks. The rest of us have no time for such frivolous nonsense. And when we beat this pandemic, which we will, maybe we as a culture will put away childish things for good.
"Things like promiscuous racism whining. Ah, those were the days, back when blocking off travel into the US from that festering petri dish of disease that is China was RACIST! and probably SEXIST! and certainly a violation of the Logan Act to boot. Yeah, it turns out that keeping out inhabitants of the Land of the Commie Bat Gobblers wasn’t racist – it was prudent." . . . 

I'll Have the Bat Soup - Hold the Deadly Virus. (Also titled: I'LL HAVE THE CHICKEN TESTICLE SOUP - HOLD THE DEADLY VIRUS"

Although, it occurs to me that, despite America’s terrible toxic whiteness, one way our culture is superior to others is that we don’t believe lunatic nonsense that wipes out entire species or launches viral pandemics on the world. Now back to Chris Cuomo’s riveting battle with the coronavirus.

Yummy!  What's a wet market?

Ann Coulter  "It’s probably a coincidence, but I notice that as businesses go under, jobs are lost, careers are ended and trillions of dollars are drained from the economy, the people most avidly pushing the coronavirus panic are doing quite well.
"No politician or government official has taken a salary cut. To the contrary, dusty bureaucrats now find the entire country transfixed by their every utterance. Cable news hosts still make millions of dollars -- and now they get to work from home!
"Annoyingly, though, journalists can’t seem to relay the basic elements of a news story: who, what, where and why.
"First, who’s dying? It appears to be mostly the old, people with specific medical conditions and vapers.
"To be sure, that’s not as important as daily updates on Chris Cuomo’s personal battle with the coronavirus, but it might be kind of important to the 17 million Americans who’ve been thrown out of work, many of whom are not elderly, immunocompromised or vapers.
. . . 
"Second, the “what.” What exactly constitutes a “coronavirus death”?

"It turns out a person with Stage 4 lung cancer and a bullet through the heart will be counted as a “coronavirus death” if he also tested positive for the disease, OR merely exhibited symptoms associated with it (symptoms that are coextensive with the flu and pneumonia)."
. . . 
"Notice a pattern? While it’s true that “viruses don’t have nationalities!” -- and thank you very much for pointing that out, media! -- the carriers of viruses do have nationalities." . . .

Ian Macfarlane