Category: Current Events

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Are We There Yet?

Carl Sagan, "The Demon-Haunted World," 1995.

THE DEMON-HAUNTED WORLD

I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time – when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the key manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness. The dumbing down of America is most evident in the slow decay of substantive content in the enormously influential media, the 30-second sound bites (now down to 10 seconds or less), lowest common denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance.

Are we there yet?

[Source]

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This is Heartbreaking

And bordering on genocide.

From arstechnica:

COVID-19 cases in children have risen 30-fold since late June and are now at record highs, with nearly 500,000 new child cases reported in the past two weeks, according to the latest data released by the American Academy of Pediatrics on Monday. Pediatric cases have "increased exponentially," the AAP said in a statement.

The rise coincides with a dramatic surge in overall COVID-19 transmission driven by the hypertransmissible delta variant. But with more adults vaccinated, children are getting hit harder in this wave than ever before, and they make up a larger and larger share of the cases.

At this point, the US has recorded 5.3 million cumulative cases in children, accounting for 15.5 percent of total cases in the pandemic. That percentage has risen steadily during the current surge, up from 14.2 percent at the end of June.

By late June, child cases had steeply declined and reached a low point, with children making up just about 10 percent of the total cases during the week ending on June 24. Amid the delta surge, that weekly percentage shot up. In the week ending on September 9, children made up 29 percent of cases. For context, children (those under age 18) only make up 22.2 percent of the US population.

With the growing share of cases, raw totals in children are now at their highest levels ever in the pandemic. In the week ending on September 9, the US tallied 243,373 pediatric cases (from 49 states, plus New York City, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and Guam). That weekly tally is second only to the previous week, ending on September 2, in which states reported 251,781 pediatric cases.

Protecting children

Before the delta surge, the highest weekly tally was set in the week ending on January 14, in which there were 211,466 cases in children. From there, cases fell to a low of 8,447 in the week ending on June 24. The current weekly cases are a 30-fold jump from that point.

About half of the country's pediatric cases reported in the past two weeks have been tallied in Southern states, where many areas are undervaccinated and transmission has been extremely high.

Children under the age of 12 are not yet eligible for vaccination. However, data continues to show that vaccinating older children and adults around young children can protect them from infection. States with higher vaccination coverage overall have generally seen fewer cases, emergency visits, and hospitalizations involving children during the current surge.

US officials expect that vaccines will become available for children ages 5 to 11 sometime between the end of October and the end of the year. Vaccines for children ages 6 months to 5 years will follow.

One bright spot among the current data is that child hospitalizations and deaths from COVID-19 remain relatively low. Among the 24 states that report pediatric hospitalizations, pediatric hospitalizations ranged from 1.6 percent to 4 percent of total COVID hospitalizations over the entire pandemic. And according to mortality data from 45 states, children have made up zero percent to 0.27 percent of all COVID-19 deaths during the pandemic. Seven states have reported no deaths in children throughout the pandemic.

"At this time, it appears that severe illness due to COVID-19 is uncommon among children," the AAP notes. "However, there is an urgent need to collect more data on longer-term impacts of the pandemic on children, including ways the virus may harm the long-term physical health of infected children, as well as its emotional and mental health effects."

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This is What We're Dealing With in This Country

And WHY it is so important that Biden did what he did yesterday (even though it won't affect this particular company because it is apparently so small).

From fuck-customers:

Manager – "With the way things are going it looks like we'll have to have another shut down in the fall."

Our senior supervisor- "No … we can't. If we shut down I'll lose my house! It's selfish that you would do that."

Manager- "Well … 3 staff members have tested positive with covid. We either plan a shut down or we lose our entire staff."

Senior Supervisor- "We haven't caught covid, that means we can still work!"

Manager- "So you want us to work until we catch covid? Are you realizing that would endanger their lives? We're down to a staff of 10 people. 3 of them are over the age of 65, 3 of them are asthmatics and 2 are prone to sickness. You're our senior supervisor, show some respect and compassion for your team."

Senior Supervisor- "FUCK THE TEAM! Im concerned about not losing my house!"

So the manager put her on leave. He said she needed to cool down and they would assess her position when she got back. I understand being scared of losing your home, but maybe don't say "fuck the team" in front of the man that hired you to help and support the team. Also, when we shut down we still get paid by our workplace. During the first shut down they payed us through most of it. We only had to do 1 month of unemployment. Being a little worried financially is worlds better than watching your coworkers die.

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Cut Texas Off

Businesses need to pull out of Texas. Entertainers need to cancel concerts and tours. A clear message needs to be sent to those elected officials that their ban on abortion is not acceptable. Hit those asshole legislators where it hurts—in their wallets.

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Quote of the Day

All empires die. The end is usually unpleasant. The American empire, humiliated in Afghanistan, as it was in Syria, Iraq, and Libya, as it was at the Bay of Pigs and in Vietnam, is blind to its own declining strength, ineptitude, and savagery. Its entire economy, a "military Keynesianism," revolves around the war industry. Military spending and war are the engine behind the nation's economic survival and identity. It does not matter that with each new debacle the United States turns larger and larger parts of the globe against it and all it claims to represent. It has no mechanism to stop itself, despite its numerous defeats, fiascos, blunders and diminishing power, from striking out irrationally like a wounded animal. The mandarins who oversee our collective suicide, despite repeated failure, doggedly insist we can reshape the world in our own image. This myopia creates the very conditions that accelerate the empire's demise." ~ Chris Hedges (via azspot)