WANTED: Rational Coronavirus Analysis
- Thread starter Nonlinear_Zero-Sum
- Start date
Another way of saying we need to concern ourselves with known unknowns, but don't really know how or why.
Reading articles on uncertainty in statistics can be really strange. You know there could be a problem, but you don't what it will be. Simulations seem to make sense. See how much your answer will change if the variables change.
The more difficult question is when they will change and for how long.
Reading articles on uncertainty in statistics can be really strange. You know there could be a problem, but you don't what it will be. Simulations seem to make sense. See how much your answer will change if the variables change.
The more difficult question is when they will change and for how long.
On the unfathomable ‘unknowableness’ of our strange new world … Are You Ready for the “No One Could Have Known” Routine? (8/22)
Par for the course in 2020...
Unknowableness also applies to our political process. Luckily, we have proven-reliable avenues to mitigate unknowableness, even with the pandemic shutdown and coinciding social-justice unrest now roiling our world...
--------[ WAIT ... THERE'S MORE!!! ]-------
Here's another topic that borders on unknowable ... please consider: Why Herd Immunity is a Distraction (9/11).
The intoxication of pandemic power: Fauci, Cuomo…and Jerome Powell (9/13). “A man’s gotta know his limitations…” [Dirty Harry].
Remember the imminent criticality of ventilators? These machines represent a turning point in medical history: keeping patients alive (9/14). But there are inevitably tradeoffs … “Futility is the most common ethical dilemma in the modern ICU. The question guiding care becomes not just how to save lives, but when to allow deaths.”
Expect more of this 'un-information' -- who really needs knowableness? -- as low COVID numbers trickle in, and government officials try to continue to rationalize their shutdown decisions: The Nashville mayor’s office avoids reporting the low incidence of COVID in the area’s bars and restaurant workforces and customers (9/16).
Considering what's known, let’s revisit the uncomfortable question of Cui bono? … or, who benefits from the pandemic-through-pandemonium: the China class, of course (9/15).
A study of COVID fatalities with (mild) ‘celebrity status’ -- as the control parameter -- has a similar median age of death as earlier studies: 83 years (9/23). Few passed away in the prime of their careers, nor conditioning (9/28). If only to give the COVID threat much needed public visibility, Tom Hanks and/or his wife would have been the perfect fatality ‘poster child’, but no such luck.
The “settled science” of Coronavirus is the new Marxism/Leninism … and if you question it, you can get a free one-way trip to the Gulag (9/28; the complex nuances of "settled science" are reviewed below). Another taboo topic for US media: China’s role in the pandemic (10/4).
What a surprise … NYT: Open Borders Spread the Pandemic (10/1)
SURPRISE..!!! Even as Trump and the First Lady suffer through COVID affliction, it seems that just the thought of him is still enough to destroy political norms and mainstream media’s standards (10/2, more here).
No surprise ... Although our Big Social Media overlords generally only allow thought in one pre-approved direction, fun ban-worthy conspiracy theorizing – like the #RoseGardenMassacre that seems to have infected President Trump and White House staff -- can still be considered in societal fringes (10/7).
No surprise, again ... Funny how things always seem to bounce their way, even this crazy pandemic/pandemonium: The 50 Richest Americans Are Worth as Much as the Poorest 165 Million (10/8, Bloomberg paywall) … lots of opportunities for rational analysis with depressing lopsided ratios.
Don't be surprised ... “Second act will be worse than the first … lockdowns are not the answer” (10/8).
Will surprises ever cease...?
More surprises here (scroll down).
Unsurprisingly ... ‘Listen to scientists’, as a punchline (10/19).
Surprise, another new punchline! ... With work done on Zoom during COVID, place it in the #MeTooBin (10/19).
This should come as absolutely NO surprise: China’s Economy Is Bouncing Back—And Gaining Ground on the U.S. (10/23, WSJ paywall) … Success in containing Covid-19 is bringing life back to normal and helping close the economic gap with a rival. This economic strength backs sabre-rattling and bellicose words of war.
Par for the course in 2020...
Unknowableness also applies to our political process. Luckily, we have proven-reliable avenues to mitigate unknowableness, even with the pandemic shutdown and coinciding social-justice unrest now roiling our world...
...In his mystical and divine way, Carnac the Magnificent will ascertain the answer to the question, without ever having seen the question…
Answer: "Duh"... (9/8)
You can play this fun Carnac the Magnificent game at home ... here's the first envelope: Answer: "Seven"... (9/9). Now, here's the second envelope: Answer: “Two hundred million”… (9/20).--------[ WAIT ... THERE'S MORE!!! ]-------
Here's another topic that borders on unknowable ... please consider: Why Herd Immunity is a Distraction (9/11).
The intoxication of pandemic power: Fauci, Cuomo…and Jerome Powell (9/13). “A man’s gotta know his limitations…” [Dirty Harry].
Remember the imminent criticality of ventilators? These machines represent a turning point in medical history: keeping patients alive (9/14). But there are inevitably tradeoffs … “Futility is the most common ethical dilemma in the modern ICU. The question guiding care becomes not just how to save lives, but when to allow deaths.”
Expect more of this 'un-information' -- who really needs knowableness? -- as low COVID numbers trickle in, and government officials try to continue to rationalize their shutdown decisions: The Nashville mayor’s office avoids reporting the low incidence of COVID in the area’s bars and restaurant workforces and customers (9/16).
Considering what's known, let’s revisit the uncomfortable question of Cui bono? … or, who benefits from the pandemic-through-pandemonium: the China class, of course (9/15).
A study of COVID fatalities with (mild) ‘celebrity status’ -- as the control parameter -- has a similar median age of death as earlier studies: 83 years (9/23). Few passed away in the prime of their careers, nor conditioning (9/28). If only to give the COVID threat much needed public visibility, Tom Hanks and/or his wife would have been the perfect fatality ‘poster child’, but no such luck.
The “settled science” of Coronavirus is the new Marxism/Leninism … and if you question it, you can get a free one-way trip to the Gulag (9/28; the complex nuances of "settled science" are reviewed below). Another taboo topic for US media: China’s role in the pandemic (10/4).
The Church of COVID (9/30), with its “plague of caring … that sense of communal salvation is still very strong among the great and good … only through [you] suffering can we find salvation.”What a surprise … NYT: Open Borders Spread the Pandemic (10/1)
SURPRISE..!!! Even as Trump and the First Lady suffer through COVID affliction, it seems that just the thought of him is still enough to destroy political norms and mainstream media’s standards (10/2, more here).
No surprise ... Although our Big Social Media overlords generally only allow thought in one pre-approved direction, fun ban-worthy conspiracy theorizing – like the #RoseGardenMassacre that seems to have infected President Trump and White House staff -- can still be considered in societal fringes (10/7).
UPDATE (10/15): Facebook and Twitter Cross a Line Far More Dangerous Than What They Censor … on a different-but-parallel topic, but you get the idea...
UPDATE (10/18): Amazon gets in on the book-burning censorship too (10/16).
No surprise, again ... Funny how things always seem to bounce their way, even this crazy pandemic/pandemonium: The 50 Richest Americans Are Worth as Much as the Poorest 165 Million (10/8, Bloomberg paywall) … lots of opportunities for rational analysis with depressing lopsided ratios.
Don't be surprised ... “Second act will be worse than the first … lockdowns are not the answer” (10/8).
Will surprises ever cease...?
Unsurprisingly ... ‘Listen to scientists’, as a punchline (10/19).
Surprise, another new punchline! ... With work done on Zoom during COVID, place it in the #MeTooBin (10/19).
This should come as absolutely NO surprise: China’s Economy Is Bouncing Back—And Gaining Ground on the U.S. (10/23, WSJ paywall) … Success in containing Covid-19 is bringing life back to normal and helping close the economic gap with a rival. This economic strength backs sabre-rattling and bellicose words of war.
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Can’t argue there … even abstractions like public opinions are changing dramatically, as your time series continues to work.
Gallup recently polled Americans on their viewpoints on a wide range of industries in 2020 (9/8), tracking the percentages of favorable, neutral or unfavorable opinions. Gallup uses the metric of relative favorability (% very/somewhat positive) of twenty disparate industry, and compares 2020 to 2019 for the industries that are the most impacted by the COVID crisis:
Healthcare and farming had the biggest boost in favorability, due to their ongoing essentialness.
The discretionary industries of travel and sports fared the worst in their drop in public opinion. Travel probably sagged in support since it’s basically irrelevant until further notice. Perhaps sports industry favorability is eroding due to the kabuki-theater-with-no-audience nature of televised games and the social-justice campaigns of the various US professional leagues. The article notes that the biggest drops in sports viewer-favorability -- find detailed charts with demographic breakdown on previous link -- were Republicans (-46% drop, year-minus-year) and the mid-range age group (35 to 54, -44%).
Does trolling
-- with no one noticing --
still constitute 'trolling'..???
The industry-favorability data developed and presented by Gallup is done on a percentage basis, and then those percentages are used in subsequent calculations, like with the above year-to-year changes by demographic. In an earlier TalkStats post (which actually spurred this thread), the following was proposed, in reference to percentage characterization used in calculations:
Instead of just subtracting same-basis numbers, like Gallup does, to show the linear magnitude of change, let’s look at their industry-favorability study from a nonlinear ratio standpoint for the five industries highlighted for their changes 2019 to 2020. The relevant metric here will be ratio of the positive- to the negative-impression percentages. (The neutral-impression percentages are assumed to be constant year-to-year, allowing for the calculation of the negative-impression percentages in 2019 for the industries.)
The chart below includes the favorability ratio for years 2020 and 2019, as well as the relative change in that metric from 2019 to 2020, for each industry. While the Positive/Negative-ratio data allows the same basic observations as the Gallup tables (above, and at link) of which industries are viewed favorably, this study also facilitates a better understanding of the system dynamics:
Embracing the nonlinear nature of phenomena -- in this case, public opinion -- and so describing them with rational numbers (i.e., ratios) allows for optimal analyses. It's safe to say that much of the Coronavirus analyses out there have been irrational and sub-optimal.
--------[ WAIT ... THERE'S MORE!!! ]-------
Gallup recently polled Americans on their viewpoints on a wide range of industries in 2020 (9/8), tracking the percentages of favorable, neutral or unfavorable opinions. Gallup uses the metric of relative favorability (% very/somewhat positive) of twenty disparate industry, and compares 2020 to 2019 for the industries that are the most impacted by the COVID crisis:
Healthcare and farming had the biggest boost in favorability, due to their ongoing essentialness.
The discretionary industries of travel and sports fared the worst in their drop in public opinion. Travel probably sagged in support since it’s basically irrelevant until further notice. Perhaps sports industry favorability is eroding due to the kabuki-theater-with-no-audience nature of televised games and the social-justice campaigns of the various US professional leagues. The article notes that the biggest drops in sports viewer-favorability -- find detailed charts with demographic breakdown on previous link -- were Republicans (-46% drop, year-minus-year) and the mid-range age group (35 to 54, -44%).
Does trolling
-- with no one noticing --
still constitute 'trolling'..???
The industry-favorability data developed and presented by Gallup is done on a percentage basis, and then those percentages are used in subsequent calculations, like with the above year-to-year changes by demographic. In an earlier TalkStats post (which actually spurred this thread), the following was proposed, in reference to percentage characterization used in calculations:
THEORY: Linear characterization of nonlinear functionality convolutes calculations, at best, and, at worst, corrupts capability and understanding, greatly increasing the probability of error and misprojection when utilizing that linear data in subsequent operations.
Instead of just subtracting same-basis numbers, like Gallup does, to show the linear magnitude of change, let’s look at their industry-favorability study from a nonlinear ratio standpoint for the five industries highlighted for their changes 2019 to 2020. The relevant metric here will be ratio of the positive- to the negative-impression percentages. (The neutral-impression percentages are assumed to be constant year-to-year, allowing for the calculation of the negative-impression percentages in 2019 for the industries.)
The chart below includes the favorability ratio for years 2020 and 2019, as well as the relative change in that metric from 2019 to 2020, for each industry. While the Positive/Negative-ratio data allows the same basic observations as the Gallup tables (above, and at link) of which industries are viewed favorably, this study also facilitates a better understanding of the system dynamics:
Embracing the nonlinear nature of phenomena -- in this case, public opinion -- and so describing them with rational numbers (i.e., ratios) allows for optimal analyses. It's safe to say that much of the Coronavirus analyses out there have been irrational and sub-optimal.
--------[ WAIT ... THERE'S MORE!!! ]-------
On the topic of irrational and sub-optimal, Trump claims hospitals lie about COVID deaths for financial reasons, gets rebuffed (10/30). How dare he criticize such an essential industry that is so well liked, as one can see above. With the 'median COVID death' around 80 years old with more than two pre-existing conditions, it's obvious that the death was caused by COVID in over 90% of the cases ... not the old age, heart disease, cancer, diabetes, traumatic head injury, etc etc.
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The Wall Street Journal asks, probably rhetorically…
Not that academic and professional credentials are the answer, as some amateurs were recommending these prudent steps from the beginning. but the WSJ highlights the Great Barrington Declaration by leading health scientists and medical practitioners, which firmly notes that those “who are not vulnerable should immediately be allowed to resume life as normal, including attending schools, going to restaurants, participating in sports and even gathering at public events. Meanwhile attention should be focused on protecting those most at risk.”
[The 'General Public' can sign the Declaration too, unless they're still riven with doubt about the uncertainty and unknowableness of this mystical disease that has shutdown and devastated the world.]
Not surprisingly, critics to the GBD project have quickly emerged (10/7), but…
SURPRISE(s)..!!!
In a flip-flop, the WHO urges world leaders to stop using lockdowns to fight COVID contagion (10/12; more here):
CDC study: 85% of COVID-19 cases in July were people who often or always wear masks (10/12, study here; more here).
Perhaps the good people that conscientiously wear masks also get COVID-tested more often than those asymptomatic Neanderthals with poor PPE skills, which might somewhat explain these numbers ... one would hate to think that masks actually increase the frequency of COVID affliction. Leaving one to wonder: will they soon debunk hand-washing?
Did you get the memo?
Perhaps internal communication within the CDC needs to be improved, beyond the new TPS coversheet. Paradoxically, just a month ago, the CDC Director Dr Robert Redfield (above) claimed that masks are more effective than vaccines (9/17), and also noted that early strict adherence to mask-wearing would have shut down this pandemic in a matter of months (9/28). Reacting to President Trump adding Dr Scott Atlas, a fresh perspective, to his Coronavirus Task Force, Redfield chastised Trump for “sharing incorrect information about the pandemic with the public”, regarding these and other preventative measures ... how projectingly ironic.
This could explain a few things … Brain Damage From Masks CANNOT BE REVERSED (10/9). Oxygen deprivation is especially damaging to children, the demographic least at risk from COVID-19.
And then there's this microbial nuance: Medical Doctor Warns that “Bacterial Pneumonias Are on the Rise” from Mask Wearing (10/6), and he also notes that “New research is showing that cloth masks may be increasing the aerosolization of the SARS-COV-2 virus into the environment causing an increased transmission of the disease…”.
WHO (Accidentally) Confirms Covid is No More Dangerous Than Flu (10/8)
CDC ... WHO ...why not YOU?!? Everyone’s an Expert (10/16)
Conspiracy Alert / Follow-the-Money Category (10/18):
Q: Why doesn’t the media listen to these [prize-winning] scientists? (10/6, WSJ paywall; more here)
A: Because their message conflicts with the media’s Compelling Narrative, which is sacred.
Not that academic and professional credentials are the answer, as some amateurs were recommending these prudent steps from the beginning. but the WSJ highlights the Great Barrington Declaration by leading health scientists and medical practitioners, which firmly notes that those “who are not vulnerable should immediately be allowed to resume life as normal, including attending schools, going to restaurants, participating in sports and even gathering at public events. Meanwhile attention should be focused on protecting those most at risk.”
[The 'General Public' can sign the Declaration too, unless they're still riven with doubt about the uncertainty and unknowableness of this mystical disease that has shutdown and devastated the world.]
Not surprisingly, critics to the GBD project have quickly emerged (10/7), but…
"…the critics’ position drastically underestimates the harm lockdowns inflict on a society.
Oxfam recently published a report concluding that 130 million more people will probably die of starvation due to supply chain disruptions resulting from lockdowns around the world. As Time magazine explains, that is exponentially more people than will succumb to the virus itself. The CDC has estimated the probable occurrence of more than 93,000 “non-Covid ‘excess deaths’ this year, including 42,427 from cardiovascular conditions, 10,686 from diabetes and 3,646 from cancer. Many are due to government shutdowns of non-essential medical care.” That is in this country alone.
Likewise, mental health is deteriorating; substance, child and domestic abuse are increasing; and children, especially those who come from families without means, are falling behind in school. Countless businesses have closed, many for good, spelling financial disaster for their owners and hardship for employees. All of this is due to lockdowns, despite the common misattributions in headlines to the 'coronavirus' itself."
--------[ WAIT ... THERE'S MORE!!! ]-------SURPRISE(s)..!!!
In a flip-flop, the WHO urges world leaders to stop using lockdowns to fight COVID contagion (10/12; more here):
“The only time we believe a lockdown is justified is to buy you time to reorganize, regroup, rebalance your resources, protect your health workers who are exhausted, but by and large, we’d rather not do it.” [Heck, where was this wisdom seven months ago?]
UPDATE (10/13): Trump exercises his told-you-so.
UPDATE (10/14): China’s WHO buddy -- Director-General Tedros -- subsequently contradicts his one-time intra-WHO rival on the criticality of more lockdowns, but his motivation and track record can be questioned.
And now we’re supposed to believe that masks are NOT the be-all/end-all of this pandemic..?!?CDC study: 85% of COVID-19 cases in July were people who often or always wear masks (10/12, study here; more here).
Perhaps the good people that conscientiously wear masks also get COVID-tested more often than those asymptomatic Neanderthals with poor PPE skills, which might somewhat explain these numbers ... one would hate to think that masks actually increase the frequency of COVID affliction. Leaving one to wonder: will they soon debunk hand-washing?
Did you get the memo?
Perhaps internal communication within the CDC needs to be improved, beyond the new TPS coversheet. Paradoxically, just a month ago, the CDC Director Dr Robert Redfield (above) claimed that masks are more effective than vaccines (9/17), and also noted that early strict adherence to mask-wearing would have shut down this pandemic in a matter of months (9/28). Reacting to President Trump adding Dr Scott Atlas, a fresh perspective, to his Coronavirus Task Force, Redfield chastised Trump for “sharing incorrect information about the pandemic with the public”, regarding these and other preventative measures ... how projectingly ironic.
This could explain a few things … Brain Damage From Masks CANNOT BE REVERSED (10/9). Oxygen deprivation is especially damaging to children, the demographic least at risk from COVID-19.
And then there's this microbial nuance: Medical Doctor Warns that “Bacterial Pneumonias Are on the Rise” from Mask Wearing (10/6), and he also notes that “New research is showing that cloth masks may be increasing the aerosolization of the SARS-COV-2 virus into the environment causing an increased transmission of the disease…”.
Another memo misstep?WHO (Accidentally) Confirms Covid is No More Dangerous Than Flu (10/8)
CDC ... WHO ...why not YOU?!? Everyone’s an Expert (10/16)
Conspiracy Alert / Follow-the-Money Category (10/18):
Q: Why the ongoing intensity of the ‘mask debate’ (despite their ineffectiveness) and widespread frantic reporting of new cases (often from false positives or too-sensitive tests)?
A: Fear must be kept alive... until Big Pharma has a vax … oh, yeah, and then there’s that other messy 'unfinished business', right, Joe?
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If only we’d preemptively adopted African administration and health-care systems…
Coronavirus in Africa: Five reasons why Covid-19 has been less deadly than elsewhere (10/8; lots more here, 3/31)...
As the Middle East is also significantly lower in caseload ... perhaps the lack of COVID cases in remote regions has something to do with the lack of testing for COVID in remote regions ... but we'll leave that for the health-care professionals and scientists to assess.
--------[ WAIT ... THERE'S MORE!!! ]-------
The Economist pumps up the volume on worldwide excess deaths during the pandemic (5/15), presumably mainly among the vulnerable: the elderly and those with pre-existing conditions. While the antonyms of ‘excess’ are awkward, it will be interesting to see if the death rate drops below ‘normal’ after the pandemic dissipates, as had happened after the Spanish Flu.
Presumably using the same body-count methodology, University of Washington's Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation estimates that more than 900K Americans have died of COVID-19 (5/6).
Meanwhile, using the CDC's official body-count methodology as the metric…
Weighing in on a range of pandemic topics, the Statistician to the Stars notes that 1) “COVID IS NO LONGER A MAJOR DISEASE”, and 2) deaths due to ALL the various causes drop significantly after April 2021 (see CDC chart below, 5/18). This wry stats guy has been a COVID skeptic from the beginning -- warning about the tendency to ‘panic’ -- and he postulates that the societal disruption from the lockdowns has caused a significant portion of COVID’s ‘excess death’ count.
Coronavirus in Africa: Five reasons why Covid-19 has been less deadly than elsewhere (10/8; lots more here, 3/31)...
- Quick action
- Public support
- Young population - and few old-age homes
- Favorable climate
- Good community health systems
UPDATE (5/26): Reason #6? In underdeveloped regions, perhaps time-tested ‘Plague Magic’ is bolstering mental hygiene and health … “During the previous millennium, the biggest boom in the practice of magic coincided with the Black Death in the mid-14th century.”
As the Middle East is also significantly lower in caseload ... perhaps the lack of COVID cases in remote regions has something to do with the lack of testing for COVID in remote regions ... but we'll leave that for the health-care professionals and scientists to assess.
--------[ WAIT ... THERE'S MORE!!! ]-------
The Economist pumps up the volume on worldwide excess deaths during the pandemic (5/15), presumably mainly among the vulnerable: the elderly and those with pre-existing conditions. While the antonyms of ‘excess’ are awkward, it will be interesting to see if the death rate drops below ‘normal’ after the pandemic dissipates, as had happened after the Spanish Flu.
Presumably using the same body-count methodology, University of Washington's Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation estimates that more than 900K Americans have died of COVID-19 (5/6).
Meanwhile, using the CDC's official body-count methodology as the metric…
Weighing in on a range of pandemic topics, the Statistician to the Stars notes that 1) “COVID IS NO LONGER A MAJOR DISEASE”, and 2) deaths due to ALL the various causes drop significantly after April 2021 (see CDC chart below, 5/18). This wry stats guy has been a COVID skeptic from the beginning -- warning about the tendency to ‘panic’ -- and he postulates that the societal disruption from the lockdowns has caused a significant portion of COVID’s ‘excess death’ count.
NOTE: This could the same phenomenon as seen after the Spanish flu, a hundred years ago, when the death rate dropped below normal after the pandemic dissipated. Perhaps one should have a sanguine perspective on life and death, and not panic (see next post).
On a case-count basis, he also points out that the badass COVID-19 virus seems to have eradicated influenza worldwide. WHO’s flu reports-by-week show virtually NO positive specimens after the 15th week of 2020 (see WHO chart below; 2021: blue line, 2020: red line, 2009: green line, presumably the Swine flu).
Disparate impacts … disease vs ‘cure’: While the risk of death from COVID-19 rises rapidly with age, adverse effects from the vaccines drop with age (6/6).
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This is a continuation of post (scroll down).
hysteria [noun]: a highly-communicable affliction, transmitted by the airwaves, when this metric explodes in the epicenter of American media … the (self-proclaimed) Greatest City on Earth.
Perhaps America needs to adjust its perspective and priorities, since ... The City is Killing America (10/21, refers to large metropolises in general, not just NYC) … “The cities are running out of money, but population growth made them political powerhouses.”
--------[ WAIT ... THERE'S MORE!!! ]-------
Now, let's synergistically combine hysteria and rationality...
Groucho Marx famously said, "I would refuse to join any cult club that would have me as a member." But that was before the inclusive, worldwide career-protecting benevolence of ... The Covidian Cult (10/13). An interesting cult/cultural inversion has taken place, right before our eyes:
WANTED: Compliance! … “normalization of censorship has been a long-term goal of the tech oligarchs and the Church of Covid now legitimizes it. Another goal of our oligarchs has been to force science to comply with their beliefs” (10/28).
....
WANTED: Rational Coronavirus Analysis Scapegoats (10/17):
....
While the media and his opponents state, matter-of-factly over and over and over, that President Trump is responsible for over 200,000 American deaths* ... perhaps the folks who’s ONLY BASIC RESPONSIBILITY is to protect the public against disease outbreaks – public health administrators, like the CDC and WHO -- should shoulder some responsibility (10/22, more here ... and look here).
The heck with 'health authorities'...
hysteria [noun]: a highly-communicable affliction, transmitted by the airwaves, when this metric explodes in the epicenter of American media … the (self-proclaimed) Greatest City on Earth.
Seen the lights go out on Broadway … too bad they couldn't manage African- and Middle Eastern-level COVID results (previous post).
Perhaps America needs to adjust its perspective and priorities, since ... The City is Killing America (10/21, refers to large metropolises in general, not just NYC) … “The cities are running out of money, but population growth made them political powerhouses.”
--------[ WAIT ... THERE'S MORE!!! ]-------
Now, let's synergistically combine hysteria and rationality...
Groucho Marx famously said, "I would refuse to join any cult club that would have me as a member." But that was before the inclusive, worldwide career-protecting benevolence of ... The Covidian Cult (10/13). An interesting cult/cultural inversion has taken place, right before our eyes:
"It isn’t national totalitarianism, because we’re living in a global capitalist empire, which isn’t ruled by nation-states, but rather, by supranational entities and the global capitalist system itself. And thus, the cult/culture paradigm has been inverted. Instead of the cult existing as an island within the dominant culture, the cult has become the dominant culture, and those of us who have not joined the cult have become the isolated islands within it."
Then again, looking at this cynically, the Covidian Cult could be one of those cults where the members don’t even believe it, but play along and speak the cult’s language (10/13), assuming that this compliance will bring personal benefit, if only temporary:"People—good people—can be pressured into denouncing a friend because they do the math in their head and decide that it’s justifiable in the long run to sacrifice one innocent person (or group) to save a cause."
UK pandemic restrictions as BDSM cult: The Cult of the Brave New Normal (10/23). You’re supposed to like that it hurts, on your path to cognitive-dissonant salvation…“There will be no end to this nightmare; there never is an end when one is in an abusive relationship. The goalposts always keep moving. The victim is broken down until they can offer no resistance.”
In times like these, authoritarian shelter from the chaos is highly valued.WANTED: Compliance! … “normalization of censorship has been a long-term goal of the tech oligarchs and the Church of Covid now legitimizes it. Another goal of our oligarchs has been to force science to comply with their beliefs” (10/28).
....
WANTED: Rational Coronavirus Analysis Scapegoats (10/17):
"The lockdown and the rule of the public health experts has become too big to fail … Lockdown culture needs patsies to take the fall for why it didn’t work … Like every leftist social and economic experiment, its defenders are left to argue that it was never properly tried … But what the system failed to accomplish in battling the virus, it made up for by providing the leadership that had enacted it with a wonderful opportunity to settle its political scores … The 'rule of the experts' isn’t fighting the virus. It has become the virus."
UPDATE (10/20): Gov Cuomo’s pretzel illogic on the practices of Brooklyn Orthodox Jews trends Nazi-esque (10/20) ... which is a bad look, since Nazis are bad like the KKK, but with better haircuts. The Cuomo-illogic article morphs into a legal dissertation about tacit approval of mob violence by government authorities and the nuances of police protection or not.
Strong authority figures are what New Yorkers crave.
Leadership (non-Superspreader Category): BIDEN-HARRIS 2020 rallies are ideal for COVID protocols (10/19, more here, and here).....
While the media and his opponents state, matter-of-factly over and over and over, that President Trump is responsible for over 200,000 American deaths* ... perhaps the folks who’s ONLY BASIC RESPONSIBILITY is to protect the public against disease outbreaks – public health administrators, like the CDC and WHO -- should shoulder some responsibility (10/22, more here ... and look here).
* And it looks like there’s a coordinated effort by the Democratic challengers – Joe Biden and Kamala Harris -- to pump up that 200K+fatality figure a few orders of magnitude.
Follow the Science!!! (10/27) … deconstructing the alleged global 1.2-million COVID fatality toll, from a high-level perspective (10/24). How ‘high-level’, you ask? Well, this guy suggests that if you’re really interested in 'saving lives', you’d ban alcohol. He asserts that our biggest risk now -- beyond alcohol and its consequences -- is "Second Wave Hysteria".The heck with 'health authorities'...
- A financial advisor tries to make sense of this nonsense, especially with potential COVID treatments (10/30), from the Sherlock Holmes abductive perspective of “the case of the dog that didn’t bark”. He also weighs in on our ongoing“Great Reset” (enrollment required).
- WHO: Pandemic ‘diversion’ set to cause 400K Tuberculosis deaths worldwide (11/8, Guardian paywall), unexpectedly apparently.
- Dr Fauci prefers belt-and-suspenders ... then staples his shirt to his pants (11/15): Social distancing, masks still necessary after getting COVID-19 vaccine.
- Creative Coronavirus-prevention in-store improv (2/24).
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This is a continuation of post (scroll down)…
Here’s a retrospective critique of Sweden’s casual response to the pandemic (10/6): ‘It’s been so, so surreal.’ Critics of Sweden’s lax pandemic policies face fierce backlash. In an inversion of the dynamics in most countries, Swedish skeptics of Sweden's Coronavirus-skeptical health administrators feel embattled ... stay strong, you brave Nordic contrarians.
“People have suffered enough” … with a second COVID-case wave hitting Europe, Sweden refuses to impose lockdown measures on its public (10/23).
--------[ WAIT ... THERE'S MORE!!! ]-------
Nature magazine throws together an in-depth word-and-number-salad study that projects US fatalities with from COVID-19 for various levels of personal-protection measures/mandates (10/23). A worst-case fatality scenario – with all mandates lifted – tops 1 MILLION deaths by February 2021! Fancy analysis has been applied to projections for each state, while the existing hard data from real-world experience of countries with different COVID-mandate strategies (see above) is completely ignored.
problem → reaction → solution (the Hegelian dialectic):
An academic from Kings College London sees “that right-wing politicians pushed many into embracing measures that one thought were only possible in authoritarian regimes”, and fingers the United States, the United Kingdom and Brazil. While it’s safe to say that here in the US, the left-wing politicians are the most interested in embracing authoritarian pandemic measures, why quibble … he provides an excellent extensive overview of the impact of the pandemic responses of governments worldwide on their societies (MEDICAL ANTHROPOLOGY QUARTERLY, Sept 2020). His treatise starts with a philosopher's quote that mankind has divided itself between 1) believers in human omnipotence and 2) those that feel powerless … um, don’t know about that either, as that might suggest a monatomic relationship.
You should be shocked, SHOCKED … Lockdowns Much More Expensive Than Advertised (10/30, WSJ paywall; more here) … here’s “hoping that after the political panic of the shutdown spring, government officials had learned that setting fire to the economy doesn’t correlate with medical success.”
WHO: "LOCKDOWNS = BAD" ... What would the international community do without ‘backflipping’ WHO? (11/12)
--------[ WAIT ... THERE'S MORE!!! ]-------
A South Park summary of Covidian 2020 and beyond … though a Johns Hopkins doc suggests that the virus may be running out of (infectious) steam within a few months, due to good ol’ herd immunity (2/19).
Afraid that COVID nursing-home deaths could spell trouble for your Party’s governors, nationwide? Well then, just #MeToo away the most notorious offender with a 'safe seat', and #MoveOn! (3/3; more here)
Hey, you 'Neanderthal thinkers' out there … “Come on, man, follow the science!” (3/10)
What is going on in Israel? … the apparent “close correlation between mass vaccination, cases and deaths” (3/10).
The Biden administration will bring us a vaccine fit for a queen (3/9), so that we can explore the New Normal out yonder. The process is expected to be well received and, of course, humorless (more here).
'Trust Government' … Pick one: Biden vs Noem (3/14).
The orange ghost of the ‘disinfectant proposal’ still continues to haunt ... “every day" (3/16).
Revisiting the viral ghost of Wuhan: Was COVID-19 a “weapons vector gone awry” … which “turned out to be the greatest weapon in history"..? (3/16)
Here’s a retrospective critique of Sweden’s casual response to the pandemic (10/6): ‘It’s been so, so surreal.’ Critics of Sweden’s lax pandemic policies face fierce backlash. In an inversion of the dynamics in most countries, Swedish skeptics of Sweden's Coronavirus-skeptical health administrators feel embattled ... stay strong, you brave Nordic contrarians.
“People have suffered enough” … with a second COVID-case wave hitting Europe, Sweden refuses to impose lockdown measures on its public (10/23).
--------[ WAIT ... THERE'S MORE!!! ]-------
Nature magazine throws together an in-depth word-and-number-salad study that projects US fatalities with from COVID-19 for various levels of personal-protection measures/mandates (10/23). A worst-case fatality scenario – with all mandates lifted – tops 1 MILLION deaths by February 2021! Fancy analysis has been applied to projections for each state, while the existing hard data from real-world experience of countries with different COVID-mandate strategies (see above) is completely ignored.
[Chart annotated for clarity]
Flashback (July 2020) … a sensible perspective, perhaps?problem → reaction → solution (the Hegelian dialectic):
An academic from Kings College London sees “that right-wing politicians pushed many into embracing measures that one thought were only possible in authoritarian regimes”, and fingers the United States, the United Kingdom and Brazil. While it’s safe to say that here in the US, the left-wing politicians are the most interested in embracing authoritarian pandemic measures, why quibble … he provides an excellent extensive overview of the impact of the pandemic responses of governments worldwide on their societies (MEDICAL ANTHROPOLOGY QUARTERLY, Sept 2020). His treatise starts with a philosopher's quote that mankind has divided itself between 1) believers in human omnipotence and 2) those that feel powerless … um, don’t know about that either, as that might suggest a monatomic relationship.
UPDATE (11/11): Perhaps this US government research actually produced results, impacting this chain-of-events?
Biden 2020 <> Mail-In Voting! <> Pandemic! <> Dr Fauci <> GOF … or “gain of function” in optimizing viral transmission (11/11). GOF research from Fauci’s NIH/NIAID labs was transferred to Wuhan, China, of all places, and continued to get US funding.
You should be shocked, SHOCKED … Lockdowns Much More Expensive Than Advertised (10/30, WSJ paywall; more here) … here’s “hoping that after the political panic of the shutdown spring, government officials had learned that setting fire to the economy doesn’t correlate with medical success.”
UPDATE (11/12): Lockdowns haven’t been effective in bringing down COVID mortality, but pretty effectively killed millions of jobs, mostly of the working class, who can’t work-from-home.
Here's a new WTF international twist: Researchers in Italy claimed to have found COVID traces in lung-cancer screening tests, performed as far back as September 2019, about the same time as the suspicious circumstantial Wuhan activity reviewed here and especially here on this thread (11/17; more detail here).WHO: "LOCKDOWNS = BAD" ... What would the international community do without ‘backflipping’ WHO? (11/12)
Dr Nabarro is advocating for a new approach to containing the virus. “And so, we really do appeal to all world leaders: stop using lockdown as your primary control method. Develop better systems for doing it. Work together and learn from each other.”
"Only three randomized studies have looked at masks, all found they don't work" (11/19).--------[ WAIT ... THERE'S MORE!!! ]-------
A South Park summary of Covidian 2020 and beyond … though a Johns Hopkins doc suggests that the virus may be running out of (infectious) steam within a few months, due to good ol’ herd immunity (2/19).
Afraid that COVID nursing-home deaths could spell trouble for your Party’s governors, nationwide? Well then, just #MeToo away the most notorious offender with a 'safe seat', and #MoveOn! (3/3; more here)
Hey, you 'Neanderthal thinkers' out there … “Come on, man, follow the science!” (3/10)
What is going on in Israel? … the apparent “close correlation between mass vaccination, cases and deaths” (3/10).
The Biden administration will bring us a vaccine fit for a queen (3/9), so that we can explore the New Normal out yonder. The process is expected to be well received and, of course, humorless (more here).
'Trust Government' … Pick one: Biden vs Noem (3/14).
The orange ghost of the ‘disinfectant proposal’ still continues to haunt ... “every day" (3/16).
Revisiting the viral ghost of Wuhan: Was COVID-19 a “weapons vector gone awry” … which “turned out to be the greatest weapon in history"..? (3/16)
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Progressive elite as Nero, an alleged arsonist: The Myth of ‘Build Back Better’ (10/26). But, at least Nero had a solid (pre-existing!) rebuilding plan and made it happen, capped with an immense bronze statue of himself. Today’s globalist elites’ core-competencies are more along the lines of financial wizardry, software, streaming content, consensus-management, and package-delivery.
Like a virus, what goes around comes around ... and that applies to our buddy, Klaus Schwab and his grand ‘Great Reset’ plans. The supreme globalist now declares that “the world will never return to normal after COVID” (11/10), despite him admitting that coronavirus “doesn’t pose a new existential threat.” But it sure was convenient, wasn't it, Klaus..?
Are we nearing the end-game? Own Nothing, Be Happy (11/12).
Wondering about the status of ‘The Great Reset’..? Well, don’t …that’s already happened, way back in 2008-09 (11/12) … “the key economic dynamic was the decline of labor's share of the economy in favor of capital.” While the COVID pandemic has devastated the working class, it certainly allowed the ‘capital class’ to clean up loose ends and optimize returns.
The Orwellian Pandemic (11/13) … “Here, then, is the next step in our catastrophic battle against the pandemic: empty words spoken to a stranger, wishing the virus away. May the force be with you.”
Luckily, we do still have some contrarian Elite out there...
The alliance of Big Biz and Big Guv plots against small businesses (12/3), very successfully: The systematic transfer of wealth and market space from small businesses to large corporations is entirely the result of government policy.
Early on, it seemed to skeptics that the ‘WE BELIEVE IN SCIENCE’ folks wanted to use COVID as an excuse to derail the Trump Train in an election year (mission: accomplished; 12/7) … and that theory continues to hold up. Of course, the tricky process of unwinding the hysteria has to be done in a way that doesn’t damage the credibility of government administrators and the media, nor the globalists’ interests, so it will take some time and effort. Be patient. Stay safe.
--------[ WAIT ... THERE'S MORE!!! ]-------
Early on, it also became apparent that this pesky virus could be used intentionally as a catalyst for ‘change’ in both domestic and international realms, including shutting down economies and realigning political power. Not letting a crisis go to waste, globalists are pushing hard on the Great Reset of societies the world over. On the inter-national front, in a parallel with city-states in ancient Greece, our rival China is becoming authoritarian Sparta and United States becoming the subjugated democratic Athens, after their Peloponnesian War … The Thirty Tyrants (2/3) were elite anti-democratic Athenians that ran the joint for the Spartans:
Then again, applying rationality to any of these current facts or historical parallels is now inadvisable (2/18; NYTimes paywall). After all...
Who needs to be ‘rational’ these days? (3/2): “It turns out that the post-scarcity world is like a giant carnival tent. The only thing holding people together is a desire for attention.”
Avoiding rationality? ... Why were lockdowns adopted -- rather than ‘focused protection’ of the vulnerable -- despite scientists’ skepticism? (3/2)
Who needs rationality? ... We’ve reached GloboCap’s endgame, with their new set of rules, for our benefit (3/8), along with the economy’s divorce of wealth from production. While we're at it...
Who needs 'free speech'? And … it’s gone (3/12).
All, HAIL!!! ... Ah, hell...
UPDATE (11/18): In all probability, it’s gonna be … ‘Build Back Dumber’.
When GloboCap finally triumphs over the Trumpian Reich (10/27)...
As usual, the differing worldviews among our elites are the main source of social conflict (11/1).Like a virus, what goes around comes around ... and that applies to our buddy, Klaus Schwab and his grand ‘Great Reset’ plans. The supreme globalist now declares that “the world will never return to normal after COVID” (11/10), despite him admitting that coronavirus “doesn’t pose a new existential threat.” But it sure was convenient, wasn't it, Klaus..?
Are we nearing the end-game? Own Nothing, Be Happy (11/12).
Wondering about the status of ‘The Great Reset’..? Well, don’t …that’s already happened, way back in 2008-09 (11/12) … “the key economic dynamic was the decline of labor's share of the economy in favor of capital.” While the COVID pandemic has devastated the working class, it certainly allowed the ‘capital class’ to clean up loose ends and optimize returns.
The Orwellian Pandemic (11/13) … “Here, then, is the next step in our catastrophic battle against the pandemic: empty words spoken to a stranger, wishing the virus away. May the force be with you.”
Luckily, we do still have some contrarian Elite out there...
- "Elon Musk has said that the embrace of mass hysteria has 'diminished his faith in humanity'" … compliantly accepting mandates based on the cases! the cases! (11/17) He was COVID-tested four times on the same day in a very controlled setting, and got two positives and two negatives with a fancy expensive test. But despite the incoherent test results, the corresponding “revenues from (these) tests are likely not bogus and very consistent”. Granted, this is a very limited sample size, but the guy is a billionaire, and his cars and spaceships are cool (subsidized or not).
- Biden chooses Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, Rahm’s bro, to serve on his COVID task force (11/16), a controversial pick since Emanuel has been critical in the past of investing too much resources in the unproductive elderly ... always a controversial, if very quantifiable, subject. An ironic pick too, since Biden is no spring chicken with a mental capacity that some question. Perhaps Joe meant to nominate Rahm.
The alliance of Big Biz and Big Guv plots against small businesses (12/3), very successfully: The systematic transfer of wealth and market space from small businesses to large corporations is entirely the result of government policy.
Early on, it seemed to skeptics that the ‘WE BELIEVE IN SCIENCE’ folks wanted to use COVID as an excuse to derail the Trump Train in an election year (mission: accomplished; 12/7) … and that theory continues to hold up. Of course, the tricky process of unwinding the hysteria has to be done in a way that doesn’t damage the credibility of government administrators and the media, nor the globalists’ interests, so it will take some time and effort. Be patient. Stay safe.
--------[ WAIT ... THERE'S MORE!!! ]-------
Early on, it also became apparent that this pesky virus could be used intentionally as a catalyst for ‘change’ in both domestic and international realms, including shutting down economies and realigning political power. Not letting a crisis go to waste, globalists are pushing hard on the Great Reset of societies the world over. On the inter-national front, in a parallel with city-states in ancient Greece, our rival China is becoming authoritarian Sparta and United States becoming the subjugated democratic Athens, after their Peloponnesian War … The Thirty Tyrants (2/3) were elite anti-democratic Athenians that ran the joint for the Spartans:
For the upper caste of an Athenian elite already contemptuous of democracy, the city’s defeat in the Peloponnesian War confirmed that Sparta’s system was preferable. It was a high-spirited military aristocracy ruling over a permanent servant class, the helots, who were periodically slaughtered to condition them to accept their subhuman status. Athenian democracy by contrast gave too much power to the low-born. The pro-Sparta oligarchy used their patrons’ victory to undo the rights of citizens, and settle scores with their domestic rivals, exiling and executing them and confiscating their wealth.
…
What does history teach us about this moment? The bad news is that the Thirty Tyrants exiled notable Athenian democrats and confiscated their property while murdering an estimated 5% of the Athenian population. The good news is that their rule lasted less than a year.
Perhaps this is the path of our own ‘China Class’, now solidly in power all the way up to … well, you know where.UPDATE (3/11): Not such a fan of today’s Woke tyrants..? An intransigent vocal minority of a mere 3-4% of the population is perhaps enough “to change the direction of entire societies”. Of course, that applies to either direction ... bummer about the whole ‘Silent Majority’ thing.
Then again, applying rationality to any of these current facts or historical parallels is now inadvisable (2/18; NYTimes paywall). After all...
Who needs to be ‘rational’ these days? (3/2): “It turns out that the post-scarcity world is like a giant carnival tent. The only thing holding people together is a desire for attention.”
Avoiding rationality? ... Why were lockdowns adopted -- rather than ‘focused protection’ of the vulnerable -- despite scientists’ skepticism? (3/2)
Who needs rationality? ... We’ve reached GloboCap’s endgame, with their new set of rules, for our benefit (3/8), along with the economy’s divorce of wealth from production. While we're at it...
Who needs 'free speech'? And … it’s gone (3/12).
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WANTED: A Medical Community with Average Performance
Dr Fauci and the CDC stand by the official US COVID toll … which would mean that Americans are dying from the disease at a rate almost 6X that of the rest of the world.
If this wasn't 2020, you'd think that this hard data would be an indictment of the performance of our CDC during this horrific pandemic, which is their #1 priority, after all. But America needs heroes now, not finger-pointing, let alone squabbling about accounting methods...
Perhaps, as a next step, we need to send Dr Fauci and his team on a fact-finding mission of alternate approaches to pandemics.
And -- in a totally unrelated coincidence, but totally related topic -- this PSA emergency announcement just blared loudly onto my phone...
VIRAL LOADS MATTER: Preemptively searching for ‘cases’ among the asymptomatic certainly keeps the COVID numbers scary … with ‘cases’ being defined as the mere detectable presence of the virus after doubling it through culturing the sample up to 40 times (Cycle times = Ct). A blurb, with The New York Times chiming in (italics, 9/17):
Moderna piles on, with more post-Election good news on vaccines ... and once again, STAT News is all over it (11/16).
Meanwhile, the FDA has transformed its efficacy-approval process from Operation Warp Speed to Operation Turtle Speed (12/4).
If you test ‘positive’ for COVID, make sure that you ask: “What’s the Cycle Threshold (CT) value for that test?” (12/6) High CTs lead to high false-positives, and the CT-levels used in current COVID-test protocols are unprecedented. Florida Department of Health officials are now requiring that labs report the CT number used in DNA detection (12/5).
Here’s the problem with the highly anticipated “COVID vaccines” (12/9):
And don't get this rational Rabbi started on COVID vaccinations ... he compiles a thorough list of 31 reasons why not to be vaccinated (2/23), including Reason #11 ... humanity's BFF, Bill Gates:
China, to WHO investigators: "Sit on it and rotate" ... Curious about the origin of the COVID-19 virus in Wuhan? Uh, umm … well, we should have something on that minutiae "within a few years" or so… (3/13, WSJ paywall; more here)
Dr Fauci and the CDC stand by the official US COVID toll … which would mean that Americans are dying from the disease at a rate almost 6X that of the rest of the world.
In population-per-COVID-death (updated 3/4):
United States (330M/532K) = 620 people/death.
Rest of World (7520M/2.04M) = 3680 people/death.
[RoW = World - US]
If this wasn't 2020, you'd think that this hard data would be an indictment of the performance of our CDC during this horrific pandemic, which is their #1 priority, after all. But America needs heroes now, not finger-pointing, let alone squabbling about accounting methods...
UPDATE (2/22): In the control of this pandemic domestically, Dr Fauci of the Center of Disease Control notes that the US has done worse than other countries, and stands by the 500K deaths under his disease-control watch, which only happened since “we didn’t start with a unified approach”.
UPDATE (3/5): Too bad Dr Fauci and the CDC couldn’t mitigate obesity in America, another one of the health agency’s sundry ‘responsibilities’: COVID-19 death rates 10 times higher in countries where most adults are overweight, report finds (3/5; see chart below on adult overweight prevalence vs COVID-19 mortality rate, by country). It would be fun to watch Dr Fauci lecturing Americans about their expanding spare tires, rather than wearing double masks or somesuch … after all, ol’ Tony is a respected fount of wisdom.
Yikes ... bad things happen when over half the population is overweight.
Perhaps, as a next step, we need to send Dr Fauci and his team on a fact-finding mission of alternate approaches to pandemics.
And -- in a totally unrelated coincidence, but totally related topic -- this PSA emergency announcement just blared loudly onto my phone...
SUMMARY: Let's keep the hysteria dialed up to 11, people!
--------[ WAIT ... THERE'S MORE!!! ]-------VIRAL LOADS MATTER: Preemptively searching for ‘cases’ among the asymptomatic certainly keeps the COVID numbers scary … with ‘cases’ being defined as the mere detectable presence of the virus after doubling it through culturing the sample up to 40 times (Cycle times = Ct). A blurb, with The New York Times chiming in (italics, 9/17):
'In Massachusetts, between 85 and 90% of people who tested positive in July with a Ct of 40* would have been considered negative with a [more conventional] Ct of 30.' And yet, all these people had to isolate themselves, with all the dramatic psychological and economic consequences, while they were not sick and probably not contagious at all.
[* The process difference from Ct 30 to Ct 40 would be an application of ten incremental cultures, which would increase the detectable concentration by 2^10, or over 1000X.]
American journalism that you can trust, yet again: STAT News reveals that Pfizer and the FDA -- despite protocol -- didn’t release the vax news until after Election 2020 (11/10). Why muddy the waters with good news, during a referendum?UPDATE (11/18): For STAT News, the hits just keep on coming ... Pfizer Releases Final Vaccine Stats: 162/170th Effective.
Moderna piles on, with more post-Election good news on vaccines ... and once again, STAT News is all over it (11/16).
Meanwhile, the FDA has transformed its efficacy-approval process from Operation Warp Speed to Operation Turtle Speed (12/4).
If you test ‘positive’ for COVID, make sure that you ask: “What’s the Cycle Threshold (CT) value for that test?” (12/6) High CTs lead to high false-positives, and the CT-levels used in current COVID-test protocols are unprecedented. Florida Department of Health officials are now requiring that labs report the CT number used in DNA detection (12/5).
Here’s the problem with the highly anticipated “COVID vaccines” (12/9):
Since “the Virus” has never been isolated, purified, and extracted from the bio-chemical soup in which scientists claim to have found it; since, that is, COVID-19 has never been identified with the exactness and rigor demanded by the scientific method, it’s anyone’s guess as to what would be included in an alleged vaccine.
And don't get him started on PCR testing...And don't get this rational Rabbi started on COVID vaccinations ... he compiles a thorough list of 31 reasons why not to be vaccinated (2/23), including Reason #11 ... humanity's BFF, Bill Gates:
Bill Gates is touting these vaccines as essential to the survival of the human race.
Bill Gates believes the world has too many people and needs to be “depopulated”.
Bill Gates, perhaps the richest man in the world, has also not been injected. No rush.
China, to foreign visitors: "Sit on it and rotate" (3/3), but just don’t … um, uhh … ah, heck … never mind.China, to WHO investigators: "Sit on it and rotate" ... Curious about the origin of the COVID-19 virus in Wuhan? Uh, umm … well, we should have something on that minutiae "within a few years" or so… (3/13, WSJ paywall; more here)
Has a WHO virologist ever even laid eyes on this building, let alone conducted an investigation within?
But, of course, like everything else these days, the virus is 'transitioning', well beyond its Wuhan roots: COVID-19 variants (3/11).x
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Hindsight 20/20 on Lockdowns: “Single worst public health mistake in the last 100 years”..?
A Stanford doc tells us so, via Newsweek (3/8):
Hold on there, Dr Fauci … ‘six feet of social distancing’ is bull****..?!? (3/15, more here) Well, then we need to open the schools now, among many many other things. [Kudos to the courageous Massachusetts high schools that were 1) open and 2) conducted these 3'-vs-6' test comparisons (see below); full study here.] UPDATE (4/24): Also in the Bay State, an MIT study maintains that social-distancing indoors doesn’t make any sense, if folks are masked and not ‘exerting themselves’.
With all the COVID-plague gloom-and-doom broadcast daily, there’s now a ‘Fear factor’ among our young adults, the group most nervous about social interaction, while being the least at risk (see chart below, 4/1).
The Nobel-winning biochemist that invented the PCR procedure used for virus detection challenged Dr Fauci – “who doesn’t know anything, about anything..” -- to a debate (undated video, pre-COVID; too bad the dude died in 2019, they could have debated this or maybe this).
Who needs WHO? "After a joint investigation between China and the World Health Organization (WHO) failed to produce a legitimate explanation for the origins of COVID-19", perhaps it’s time to “revert to plan B” (4/8, more here).
For those who don’t savor constant fear, a recent CDC update reflects that “there’s really no evidence that anyone has ever gotten Covid-19 by touching a contaminated surface…” (4/10)
For those who savor constant fear ... watch CNN. A CNN techie confesses that his network just loves stoking fear in its viewership – the death count boosts ratings, baby! -- including hyping nonstop doom-and-gloom on COVID (4/14). But since pandemics do tend to run their course, unfortunately for CNN, expect a smooth transition to climate-change gloom-and-doom, a reliable source of hysteria.
Expertly inexplicable: Lockdown states have worse COVID affliction than states that are open (4/21). Dr Fauci stumped, while having his delicate feathers ruffled.
Expertly explicable: Blessed Are The Covidians, who seek structure and purpose in life (4/22).
‘Fake News’ updates:
A Stanford doc tells us so, via Newsweek (3/8):
"[Lockdowns] have not served to control the epidemic in the places where they have been most vigorously imposed. In the US, they have – at best – protected the "non-essential" class from COVID, while exposing the essential working class to the disease. The lockdowns are trickle down epidemiology.
…
The other idea is that the lockdowns themselves impose great harm on people. Lockdowns are not a natural normal way to live.
…
It's also not very equal. People who are poor face much more hardship from the lockdowns than people who are rich."
* [counterpoint, to “beat the virus … tell the truth … follow the scientists”, as President Biden maintains; more here]
Q: When will this pandemic end? How’s never work for you..? (3/12)
Q: Have government diktats for this dreaded disease doomed democracy, worldwide? "Since the pandemic started, the condition of democracy and human rights has worsened in 80 countries … governments’ responses to the pandemic are eroding the pillars of democracy around the world. Abuses of power have been propelled by a presumption that government officials are entitled to all the power they claim to need to keep people safe.
…
Almost a hundred nations have imposed new restrictions on freedom of speech and freedom of the press since the pandemic began." (3/10)
UPDATE (4/11): Vaxing our way to an Orwellian future.
WSJ concludes: Lockdowns weren’t worth it (3/15). The expected unprecedented COVID-19 fatalities, projected by Scientists, encouraged unprecedented measures by Governments ... resulting in austere restrictions they now can't seem to unwind for the benefit of their citizens.Hold on there, Dr Fauci … ‘six feet of social distancing’ is bull****..?!? (3/15, more here) Well, then we need to open the schools now, among many many other things. [Kudos to the courageous Massachusetts high schools that were 1) open and 2) conducted these 3'-vs-6' test comparisons (see below); full study here.] UPDATE (4/24): Also in the Bay State, an MIT study maintains that social-distancing indoors doesn’t make any sense, if folks are masked and not ‘exerting themselves’.
In hindsight, could Florida Governor DEATHsantis have been right, after all? (3/16, more here)With all the COVID-plague gloom-and-doom broadcast daily, there’s now a ‘Fear factor’ among our young adults, the group most nervous about social interaction, while being the least at risk (see chart below, 4/1).
Then again, ‘herd immunity’ to COVID pessimism may work its magic: 11X more Americans think the Coronavirus situation is ‘getting better’ than ‘getting worse’ (77% better, 7% worse; 4/6). As a comparison, pre-Election 2020, the better/worse ratio was a mere 0.16X (12% better, 73% worse), or 6X more worse than better.The Nobel-winning biochemist that invented the PCR procedure used for virus detection challenged Dr Fauci – “who doesn’t know anything, about anything..” -- to a debate (undated video, pre-COVID; too bad the dude died in 2019, they could have debated this or maybe this).
Who needs WHO? "After a joint investigation between China and the World Health Organization (WHO) failed to produce a legitimate explanation for the origins of COVID-19", perhaps it’s time to “revert to plan B” (4/8, more here).
For those who don’t savor constant fear, a recent CDC update reflects that “there’s really no evidence that anyone has ever gotten Covid-19 by touching a contaminated surface…” (4/10)
For those who savor constant fear ... watch CNN. A CNN techie confesses that his network just loves stoking fear in its viewership – the death count boosts ratings, baby! -- including hyping nonstop doom-and-gloom on COVID (4/14). But since pandemics do tend to run their course, unfortunately for CNN, expect a smooth transition to climate-change gloom-and-doom, a reliable source of hysteria.
Expertly inexplicable: Lockdown states have worse COVID affliction than states that are open (4/21). Dr Fauci stumped, while having his delicate feathers ruffled.
Expertly explicable: Blessed Are The Covidians, who seek structure and purpose in life (4/22).
‘Fake News’ updates:
- Flashback: The NYTimes projected in April 2020 that the COVID vax would require a 13-year development cycle (4/26).
- What would we do without ‘health experts’..? (4/27; satire here, flashback here)
- Vaccinated people can now administer social justice to unvaccinated people.
- 'Top 10' absurdities of the COVID pandemic (5/3)
- Totalitarian Teutonic pretzel logic: German authorities call for forbidding COVID anti-vaxxers from comparing themselves to pre-Holocaust Jews – by wearing the ‘Jude yellow star’ -- as that would make said authorities virtual ‘Nazis’ (5/7).
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@Nonlinear_Zero-Sum - I don't imagine anyone uses the links you provide! You can probably save some minutes on your life by just posting rants without them. I have not clicked on them but imagine the veracity is dubious. I am not the type of person that watches the news or that is suck in by shock headlines and all caps.
Side note, I am all for masks. Was vaccinated months ago and still wear one. You should look at the calculation for vaccine efficacy. I would imagine if you have to where one all day it would be tiresome!
Side note, I am all for masks. Was vaccinated months ago and still wear one. You should look at the calculation for vaccine efficacy. I would imagine if you have to where one all day it would be tiresome!
Thanks for the reductionist Coronavirus analyses. It is all quite simple:
Some daring reductionist rationality with CDC's mask guidelines: Fully vaccinated people don’t need masks outdoors (4/27). But then how can folks properly virtue-signal their compliance?
One would think that our political leaders could at least virtue-signal that things can approach normality with vaccination (4/29). Then again, the new CDC guidelines are bit confusing ... and ‘timid’.
“Allowing elites to dictate mass acceptance of vaccines before they'll allow a return to normal affords them a lucrative extension of the lockdowns,” (5/5)
Here’s some ironic hypocrisy, chummed up by Tucker Carlson: Since early in the pandemic, the Establishment has insisted on categorizing practically all US deaths with COVID as being from COVID -- so a dire total death-count could be broadcast across TV screens every night -- but they are now hysterical about categorizing deaths with the COVID-vaccine as being from the COVID-vaccine (5/5; more here and here).
Trevor Noah (5/5): ‘Why Are People Who Get the Vaccine Still Being Made to Wear Masks?’ Leftist comedian didn’t get the “new normal” memo.
On the reductionist front, there's Big Pharma profitability ... the Biden administration endorses a WHO plan waiving patent rights for vaccines developed under Operation Warp Speed (5/6). One could “conclude that there will never again be another Operation Warp Speed if this plan goes through” … after all, profit margins save lives.
CDC mandates that you wear a mask while outside and 6-foot social-distanced … at a pool, in the middle of the ocean (5/7, not sure how this might apply in international waters).
On the CDC mandate front, Dr Fauci admits that 40-50% of CDC employees have NOT yet been vaccinated (5/14; more Fauci insight here).
On the 'Fourth Estate' front: Even just reporting on the devastation from COVID-19 can be a danger to one’s (mental) health (5/6).
On the reporting front, you’d think that there would be better tracking, not only of the population vaxxed, but also those that had already been infected, and especially what the herd immunity might be … perhaps we could be there already? (5/22)
On the being-distrustful-of-fellow-Americans front: Masked-up forever? (5/18) … “It’s just that they’re terribly comfortable. I think everyone will be wearing them in the future,” as a goofy comedy film had so presciently predicted. As we have seen, the donning of a mask is a handy virtue-signal (5/19), avoiding confusion about the wearer’s innate goodness.
- Viruses are bad and contagious, and should be avoided (along with weirdos).
- Vaccines are good and virtuous, and should be encouraged.
Some daring reductionist rationality with CDC's mask guidelines: Fully vaccinated people don’t need masks outdoors (4/27). But then how can folks properly virtue-signal their compliance?
One would think that our political leaders could at least virtue-signal that things can approach normality with vaccination (4/29). Then again, the new CDC guidelines are bit confusing ... and ‘timid’.
“Allowing elites to dictate mass acceptance of vaccines before they'll allow a return to normal affords them a lucrative extension of the lockdowns,” (5/5)
Here’s some ironic hypocrisy, chummed up by Tucker Carlson: Since early in the pandemic, the Establishment has insisted on categorizing practically all US deaths with COVID as being from COVID -- so a dire total death-count could be broadcast across TV screens every night -- but they are now hysterical about categorizing deaths with the COVID-vaccine as being from the COVID-vaccine (5/5; more here and here).
Trevor Noah (5/5): ‘Why Are People Who Get the Vaccine Still Being Made to Wear Masks?’ Leftist comedian didn’t get the “new normal” memo.
On the reductionist front, there's Big Pharma profitability ... the Biden administration endorses a WHO plan waiving patent rights for vaccines developed under Operation Warp Speed (5/6). One could “conclude that there will never again be another Operation Warp Speed if this plan goes through” … after all, profit margins save lives.
CDC mandates that you wear a mask while outside and 6-foot social-distanced … at a pool, in the middle of the ocean (5/7, not sure how this might apply in international waters).
On the CDC mandate front, Dr Fauci admits that 40-50% of CDC employees have NOT yet been vaccinated (5/14; more Fauci insight here).
On the 'Fourth Estate' front: Even just reporting on the devastation from COVID-19 can be a danger to one’s (mental) health (5/6).
On the reporting front, you’d think that there would be better tracking, not only of the population vaxxed, but also those that had already been infected, and especially what the herd immunity might be … perhaps we could be there already? (5/22)
On the being-distrustful-of-fellow-Americans front: Masked-up forever? (5/18) … “It’s just that they’re terribly comfortable. I think everyone will be wearing them in the future,” as a goofy comedy film had so presciently predicted. As we have seen, the donning of a mask is a handy virtue-signal (5/19), avoiding confusion about the wearer’s innate goodness.
Prototypical anti-masker, at left
Then again, on the libertarian-aviary front...
On the 'Man's best friend' front: Canine-detection of COVID, at an airport near you? “Dogs that screened arrivals at airport terminals could even detect 91% of cases … [including] mild or asymptomatic COVID-19 infections” (5/24).
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