So Bill had an AMA on Reddit. As much as I like ol' Bill and what he has been doing (young Bill was a giant asshole), his answer here showed that he is still doesn't understand American society: thisisbillgates[S] 265 points 8 hours ago "I think people in the US will be able to largely isolate for 2-3 months." Holy Fuck! There was tremendous disagreement with him and rightfully so. Something like 15% of families can't come up with $400 emergency funds if needed. And Bill thinks that these families without a paycheck can stay home for 2-3 months. And it isn't just poor families. I bet half of the small businesses can't afford 2-3 months of not running. That is some serious disconnect on Bill's part. And this is a seriously intelligent man...
Well, he did help to get Tom Brady to sign with Tampa Bay. So he must have some sort of snake-oil IQ up there in his slimy, geeked-out brain, which of course means nothing because after he founded the company, he became a businessman and not an engineer, and fucked Netscape out of the world with his lying to congress. But I digress.
If the following is true, I think Bill Gates MISSED a huge opportunity back in December: "Coincidentally, Bill hosted a coronavirus pandemic simulation in October 2019 with lots of bright minds. In their simulation, the virus started in China and spread all over the world. The simulation revealed that despite the best efforts of his think-tank gathering, they were unable to stop the coronavirus from killing millions. Bill knew something was up in October 2019. And even his people couldn't stop a simulation. " I don't get it. 2 months later China has a huge virus locking down 60 million people and Gates didn't buy full page ads bringing attention to the danger??? He has the money. He could have hired experts, come up with a contingency plan and presented it to the President or at least to the governors. Hell, he could have ordered 10K ventilators. I am not saying we would have awakened earlier, but at least he could have tried. Or his experts. I am disappointed in Gates....
When simulations can't stop it... What would you expect him to do? If you facts are correct Gates just showed us what smart people do... He is smart enough to know when he can't predict his work will have beneficial results. I applaud him for know his limitations. Notions and edicts are all we have... Again... I thank Gates for not acting as "expert" for the sake of being an expert.
eh...it's not on him to be a hero all the time. Hindsight's always 20/20 and he strikes me as the type that would over analyze things before taking action.
Why not, is he busy with something else? He has the money. Let's say I saw what would happen back in December, who is going to listen to me?? He could have written a book with his experts how to handle an epidemic. He had a Tedtalk, then a few months ago a simulation and when the BIG THING came, he did nothing, except giving bad advice to poor people.
Come up with a plan (or pay experts to do so) to MITIGATE the epidemic. Sure we are going to take a hit, but will it be 10K people or 2 million? Will the economy go down or just have a spring break? And after his TedTalk he was kind of an expert on epidemics. This was a giant fail on his behalf... He had the resources and if he wants to talk to the Prez or a governor, they answer his call. Mine, not so much... Oh one more thing, the first outbreak happened in his fucking backyard, Seattle. From that moment he should have been actively raising hell.