2:00PM Water Cooler 5/25/2023 | bare capitalism

By Lambert Strether of Corrente.

Hen Music of the Day

Monotonous Lark, Omaruru; at railroad crossing simply earlier than Paula’s Cave, Namibia. “Species Sound: Fixed… These birds sing day and evening for six weeks when the rains come. In flat arid space calling from music perch on high of small tree.” Heaps occurring!

Politics

“So lots of the social reactions that strike us as psychological are the truth is a rational administration of symbolic capital.” –Pierre Bourdieu, Classification Struggles

Capitol Seizure

“Arkansas man sentenced to 4.5 years in jail for function in US Capitol riot” [Anadolu Agency]. • That is the dude who put his ft up on Pelosi’s desk. I do suppose giving him a medal would have been a bridge too far. Perhaps he can run for the Senate or one thing from jail?

Biden Administration

“Lawmakers are leaving Washington with no debt restrict deal as danger of default grows” [CNN]. “A debt restrict deal continues to be not but shut at hand for Home Republicans and the White Home as lawmakers depart the nation’s capital and the danger of a first-ever default grows. With no invoice to vote on, Home lawmakers are leaving for the Memorial Day weekend, although they are going to be given 24 hours’ discover to return if and when a deal is reached.”

2024

I assume it’s time for the Countdown Clock!

* * *

“Elon Musk’s Twitter Occasion With Ron DeSantis Hits Technical Points” [Wall Street Journal]. “Twitter suffered technical issues at a high-profile second Wednesday, throughout an occasion the place proprietor Elon Musk deliberate to host Republican Ron DeSantis’s presidential marketing campaign announcement on the platform. The announcement was scheduled to happen utilizing Twitter Areas, a stay audio function. However the occasion shortly faltered, with many customers saying the expertise wasn’t working for them and that the audio was going out and in. After a number of minutes, with greater than 600,000 viewers tuned in in accordance with the platform, the occasion was transferred to the Twitter account of David Sacks, a expertise investor and affiliate of Musk’s… As soon as the web dialog acquired beneath approach, the dialogue with DeSantis lasted about an hour. The platform confirmed roughly 300,000 listeners tuning in close to the shut of the occasion.” • I don’t suppose that’s such a nasty quantity. Readers, did any of you attend?

“Florida Man runs for president” [Politico]. “Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis filed his paperwork to run for president in the present day and kicked off his marketing campaign tonight on Twitter’s audio platform, Twitter Areas (after some technical difficulties), alongside proprietor Elon Musk. It’s an indication his 2024 marketing campaign will likely be waged as a lot on-line as within the city halls of Iowa or on cable TV. However the odds are stacked in opposition to him. No Florida politician has ever been elected president. A half-dozen have run within the final 50 years — basically the interval through which the state developed from political backwater to electoral powerhouse — however all have ended up in the identical place, useless within the water lengthy earlier than the nominating conference. Most by no means even made it previous New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation major. The curse of Florida Man — and to this point, each Florida presidential candidate has been male — lingers even though the state is a perfect proving floor for a White Home bid. Successful statewide workplace requires campaigning in two time zones, 10 TV markets, and throughout 66,000 sq. miles. It’s house to greater than 22 million folks — lots of them arrivals from different states, which supplies Florida politicians publicity to a variety of political customs and types. It’s a curious predicament for the nation’s third-largest state. Florida does have some White Home connections, after all. Presidents have retired there. They’ve owned trip properties there. Trump himself moved there halfway by way of his first time period as president, altering his official residence from Manhattan to Palm Seaside. However within the practically 180 years since Florida was admitted to the Union, it has neither produced a president nor had one born inside its borders. (No, Andrew Jackson’s pre-statehood stint doesn’t depend.) It’s the lone state among the many nation’s 10 most populous that has by no means despatched anybody to the White Home.

“US elections 2024: Who’s the Republican contender Ron DeSantis?” [Al Jazeera]. “DeSantis efficiently translated his right-wing rhetoric into coverage, analysts mentioned. ‘Everytime you’re totally different, everytime you break together with your occasion, you’re on the market by yourself. And if there aren’t any drastic penalties, then it might make you appear like you’re forward of the curve,’ mentioned David Ramsey, who teaches constitutional legislation and political philosophy on the College of West Florida. He added that the governor helped rebuild the Republican Get together in Florida, a standard swing state that’s now more and more trying like a conservative stronghold. ‘He’s put plenty of factors on the board for his occasion,’ Ramsey informed Al Jazeera.”

“Trump-DeSantis rivalry heats up after Florida governor’s marketing campaign launch” [Axios]. “[T]he new Trump marketing campaign video advert options a picture of DeSantis seated subsequent to President Biden as commentary performs about ‘Washington-established politicians’ and says ‘Why would we ever accept Trump imposters?’ It additionally contains a clip of DeSantis from his 2018 advert studying aloud the Trump marketing campaign signal ‘Make America Nice Once more’ to a baby.” • Ouch! I do not forget that the late, nice New York Spy journal had one “Angela Crackstaff” on the masthead. Maybe she’s joined the Trump marketing campaign? It might be a welcome change. Or possibly not–

“Trump’s weird response to DeSantis’ announcement sparks confusion on-line” [FOX]. “Former President Donald Trump took to Reality Social on Wednesday to blast Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis in a weird submit that instantly sparked confusion. “‘Rob,’ My Crimson Button is larger, higher, stronger, and is working (TRUTH!), yours doesn’t! (per my dialog with Kim Jung Un, of North Korea, quickly to turn out to be my pal!),’ Trump mentioned within the submit. The remark got here after DeSantis formally introduced his presidential marketing campaign on the Twitter ‘Areas’ platform.” • What.

“Trump’s Grip on the GOP Tightens because the Discipline Widens” [Bloomberg]. “Republican voters simply aren’t able to give up Donald Trump, even when the occasion’s donors and political strategists would like virtually another candidate. That a lot was evident in mid-April in Manchester, New Hampshire, the place a small crowd of Trump die-hards stood throughout the road from a downtown resort the place Florida Governor Ron DeSantis was slated to talk. They waved oversize Trump 2024 flags, whereas some automobiles drove by and honked in solidarity. They professed their devotion to the previous president, whose indictment by the Manhattan district lawyer weeks earlier on expenses of falsifying enterprise information solely served to extend his reputation. ‘Trump is a businessman, not a politician. He’s not within the deep state, and that’s the reason they hate him a lot,’ mentioned Paula Johnson, an actual property agent in close by Nashua. ‘That indictment was the largest joke on the planet.’ Trump was nonetheless the one these voters wished within the White Home regardless of his mishandling of the pandemic and categorised paperwork, the Jan. 6 tried coup and that dinner at Mar-a-Lago with a widely known White supremacist. ‘He has created a motion and has proven the willingness to combat as soiled as crucial for each piece in each combat,’ says Jennifer Horn, former chair of the New Hampshire Republican Get together from 2013 to 2017, who’s now registered as an impartial and plans to vote for President Joe Biden. ‘The occasion infrastructure has turn out to be so depending on Trump for fundraising and activating the bottom that it can’t let go of him.’ To the amazement of liberals—and the consternation of quite a lot of institution Republicans—Trump stays the front-runner for the GOP nomination by a large margin, outpacing DeSantis, his closest rival, by round 36 proportion factors, in accordance with a RealClearPolitics common of major polls. Everybody else within the GOP subject, together with his former vp, is polling within the single digits. Similar to in 2016, Trump is sucking up the political oxygen on the Republican aspect. He’s already coined nicknames reminiscent of “Ron DeSanctimonius” and outfoxed CNN throughout a city corridor earlier than a fawning viewers.”

“Trump attorneys search assembly with Garland as Mar-a-Lago investigation exhibits indicators of winding down” [Associated Press]. ” Legal professionals for Donald Trump on Tuesday requested for a gathering with Legal professional Common Merrick Garland as a Justice Division investigation into the previous president’s dealing with of categorised paperwork exhibits indicators of winding down. Within the letter, which Trump posted on his Reality Social platform, attorneys John Rowley and James Trusty asserted that Trump is ‘being handled unfairly’ and requested for a gathering to debate ‘the continuing injustice that’s being perpetrated by your Particular Counsel and his prosecutors.’… It isn’t unusual for protection attorneys to hunt conferences with senior Justice Division officers to argue in opposition to potential indictments of their purchasers, although it’s uncommon for such conferences to incorporate the lawyer normal.”

* * *

“Who’s operating for president in 2024? Meet the candidates — and certain candidates — vying on your vote” [CBS News]. • Biden, Trump, Haley, Ramaswamy, Elder, Hutchinson, Scott, DeSantis, Williamson, Kennedy. Not within the race but: Pence, Sununu, Youngkin, Burgum. Not operating: Hogan, Pompeo.

Democrats en Déshabillé

Affected person readers, evidently individuals are truly studying the back-dated submit! However I’ve not up to date it, and there are various updates. So I must try this. –lambert

I’ve moved my standing remarks on the Democrat Get together (“the Democrat Get together is a rotting corpse that may’t bury itself”) to a separate, back-dated submit, to which I’ll periodically add materials, summarizing the addition right here in a “stay” Water Cooler. (Hopefully, some Bourdieu.) It seems that defining the Democrat Get together is, the truth is, a tough drawback. I do suppose the paragraph that follows is on level all the way in which again to 2016, if not earlier than:

The Democrat Get together is the political expression of the category energy of PMC, their base (lucidly defined by Thomas Frank in Hear, Liberal!). ; if the Democrat Get together didn’t exist, the PMC must invent it. . (“PMC” modulo “class expatriates,” after all.) Second, all of the working elements of the Get together reinforce one another. Depart apart characterizing the relationships between components of the Get together (ka-ching, however not fully) these components comprise a community — a Flex Internet? An iron octagon? — of funders, distributors, apparatchiks, electeds, NGOs, and miscellaneous mercenaries, with belongings within the press and the intelligence group.

Observe, after all, that the category energy of the PMC each expresses and is proscribed by different lessons; oligarchs and American gentry (see ‘industrial mannequin’ of Ferguson, Jorgensen, and Jie) and the working class spring to thoughts. Suck up, kick down.

* * *

Collapse of the putative left, half a million and one:

With a number of exceptions, socialist actions don’t appear to care a rattling about the truth that in the event that they collect in stuffy rooms with out face masks throughout a pandemic, they exclude lots of their comrades.

I am not going to level fingers, however examples abound. We have to study. 🧵1/13 pic.twitter.com/kBAQ2o5VnN

— Maarten Steenhagen (@msteenhagen) Could 24, 2023

Not on flimsy “social justice” grounds, however as a result of the stochastic eugenicism of Biden’s marketing campaign of mass an infection with out mitigation hits the working class — supposedly socialism’s base — particularly exhausting. And DSA has the identical drawback.

Obama Legacy

Not less than he didn’t hop a freight prepare in the course of the rail strike that by no means was:

mister president (@BarackObama) i perceive you might be selling a documentary and supporting your personal exemplary crew, however should you actually do promotion for an organization topic to a major labor motion? for a documentary in regards to the worth of labor? https://t.co/qEXZqSLBgN

— javier grillo-marxuach (@OKBJGM) Could 24, 2023

Realignment and Legitimacy

“Pandemics Change Cities: Municipal Spending and Voter Extremis in Germany, 1918-1933” [Federal Reserve Bank of New York]. From Could-June 2020. “This paper paperwork a number of attention-grabbing and novel findings. First, areas which skilled a higher relative inhabitants decline as a result of unfold of influenza spend much less, per-capita, on their inhabitants within the following decade. This holds particularly for spending on facilities extra prone to be consumed by the younger, for instance faculty funding.1 Second, influenza deaths of 1918 are correlated with a rise within the share of votes gained by right-wing extremists, such because the Nationwide Socialist Employees Get together (the Nazi Get together), within the essential elections of 1932 and 1933. This correlation holds even when controlling for a metropolis’s non secular make-up, metropolis wages, regional unemployment, city-level publicity to the “hyperinflation” of 1923, the share of right-wing votes earlier than the primary world battle, and different native traits related to extremist vote share. A one std. deviation enhance within the proportion of the inhabitants killed by influenza was related to an round 0.8%-pt greater share of votes gained by the nationwide socialist occasion. The correlation between influenza mortality and vote share was damaging for left-leaning events additionally thought of “extremist”, such because the communists.” • Hmm. And in 2020. Hmm.

“Ron Unz Confronts the Far Proper” [Richard Hanania’s Newsletter]. Unz: “I see no purpose why there’s some not possible barrier to beat between Mestizos and white Individuals. I imply have a look at this room… [In addition to the clearly swarthy Romero and Brahmin, at least a third of the room looks to be of either Hispanic or South Asian descent.] You doubt that you would be able to have a multiracial nation? You all have constructed a multiracial motion primarily based on the thought of sustaining racial purity. Don’t examine your telephones, you would possibly see one other alert of a Neo-Nazi Mexican mass shooter, there have been a number of of these these days, and a right-wing Indian simply tried to kill Biden I consider. Keep in mind not that way back when there was a mass taking pictures, and everybody would both hope it was a right-wing white male or a Muslim, relying on their politics? Effectively, now we’ve the brown white supremacist, which right-wingers on Twitter inform me can’t probably exist, although it’s like half their motion now.” • Attention-grabbing…

#COVID19

“I’m in earnest — I cannot equivocate — I cannot excuse — I cannot retreat a single inch — AND I WILL BE HEARD.” –William Lloyd Garrison

Sources, United States (Nationwide): Transmission (CDC); Wastewater (CDC, Biobot; contains many counties); Variants (CDC; Walgreens); “Iowa COVID-19 Tracker” (in IA, however nationwide knowledge).

Lambert right here: Readers, thanks for the collective effort. We are actually as much as 50/50 states (100%). That is actually nice! (It happens to me that there are makes use of to which this knowledge could be put, past serving to folks with “private danger assessments” acceptable to their state. For instance, considering pessimistically, we’d preserve the record and see which states go darkish and when. We would additionally tabulate the properties of every website and search for variations and commonalities, for instance using GIS (an train in Federalism). I don’t that CA stays a bit of sketchy; it feels a bit of odd that there’s no statewide website, however I’ve by no means been capable of finding one. Additionally, my working assumption was that every state would have one website. That’s turned out to not be true; see e.g. ID. Trivially, it means I must punctuate this record correctly. Much less trivially, there could also be extra native websites that ought to be added. NY metropolis in NY state springs to thoughts, however I’m certain there are others. FL additionally springs to thoughts as a particular case, as a result of DeSantis will most likely be a Presidental candidate, and IIRC there was some foofra about their state dashboard. Thanks once more!

Sources, United States (Native): AK (dashboard); AL (dashboard); AR (dashboard); AZ (dashboard); CA (dashboard; Marin); CO (dashboard; wastewater); CT (dashboard); DE (dashboard); FL (wastewater); GA (wastewater); HI (dashboard); IA (wastewater studies); ID (dashboard, Boise; dashboard, wastewater, Central Idaho; wastewater, Coeur d’Alene; dashboard, Spokane County); IL (wastewater); IN (dashboard); KS (dashboard; wastewater, Lawrence); KY (dashboard, Louisville); LA (dashboard); MA (wastewater); MD (dashboard); ME (dashboard); MI (wastewater; wastewater); MN (dashboard); MO (wastewater); MS (dashboard); MT (dashboard); NC (dashboard); ND (dashboard; wastewater); NE (dashboard); NH (wastewater); NJ (dashboard); NM (dashboard); NV (dashboard; wastewater, Southern NV); NY (dashboard); OH (dashboard); OK (dashboard); OR (dashboard); PA (dashboard); RI (dashboard); SC (dashboard); SD (dashboard); TN (dashboard); TX (dashboard); UT (wastewater); VA (dashboard); VT (dashboard); WA (dashboard; dashboard); WI (wastewater); WV (wastewater); WY (wastewater).

Sources, Canada (Nationwide): Wastewater (Authorities of Canada).

Sources, Canada (Provincial): ON (wastewater); QC (les eaux usées); BC, Vancouver (wastewater).

Hat tricks to useful readers: Art_DogCT, B24S, CanCyn, ChiGal, Chuck L, Festoonic, FM, FreeMarketApologist (4), Gumbo, hop2it, JB, JEHR, JF, JL Joe, John, JM (9), JustAnotherVolunteer, JW, KatieBird, LL, Michael King, KF, LaRuse, mrsyk, MT, MT_Wild, otisyves, Petal (5), RK (2), RL, RM, Rod, sq. coats (11), tennesseewaltzer, Utah, Bob White (3).

Keep secure on the market!

Covid Is Airborne

“Covid might do for air flow what cholera did for cleaner water techniques” [Quartz]. “The metrics of air flow—circulate charges, 09uop, filtration—could also be sophisticated. However within the easiest of phrases, mentioned Joey Fox, a heating, air flow and air-con techniques (HVAC) engineer primarily based in Canada, ‘the answer to the whole lot is making the indoors extra like the outside.’ Recent air disperses viruses and different particulate matter, making them much less dangerous to people. Three years into the pandemic, we all know that almost all covid transmission occurs indoors, notably in poorly ventilated areas. Enhancing indoor air will cut back the unfold of covid, with main implications for public well being in all places.”

Vocabulary time:

That is an attention-grabbing thought.
Does the time period ‘airborne’ have a stigma?
We see descriptions of transmission reminiscent of ‘born by droplets suspended in air’ which to us imply airborne, however to the individuals who use them don’t.
Are you able to enhance on this concept?
Tell us what you suppose. https://t.co/SbSJZsA8rw

— The Corsi-Rosenthal Basis (@CRBoxFoundation) Could 23, 2023

That is an attention-grabbing thought and really dangerous (and I come from a running a blog custom that regarded le mot juste as essential tactically. The resistance to “Covid is Airborne” in, say Hospital An infection Management, comes as a result of they don’t settle for the paradigm and are participating in large resistance to it out {of professional} and sophistication curiosity. Their establishments should be nuked from orbit, not catered to. Observe Curran’s bio: IPC (An infection prevention and management). The place the heck have been these folks within the notorious second the place Mike Ryan acquired Tedros to retract and erase the phrase “airborne”? Nowhere, that’s the place, and really comfortable to be so. Observe additionally the reversal of valance: Usually, it’s good to share, not dangerous. So Curran’s proposal requires one other layer of clarification — no no, this sharing is dangerous — and weakens the urgency.

“Decreasing aerosol transmission of SARS‐CoV‐2 in hospital elevators” [Indoor Air] From 2020 (!). “We examine aerosol droplet persistence contained in the confined house of hospital elevators and suggest particular measures to scale back the related danger of SARS‐CoV‐2 transmission…. We discovered that it sometimes takes 12‐18 minutes earlier than the variety of aerosol particles decreased 100‐fold throughout regular operation of each medium‐ and enormous‐sized elevator cabins. … A rise of the elevator’s mechanical air flow capability can be really helpful. Present requirements for the air change price by mechanical air flow in hospital elevators could fluctuate between 6 and 20 air adjustments per hour. If we assume that aerosol particles will likely be constantly blended with provide air, with out taking into consideration particle deposition, re‐suspension, and stagnant flows, an air change price of 10 instances per hour implies a 100‐fold discount in aerosol particles in about 28 minutes. From the experiments, we discover a 100‐fold discount in 24‐half-hour (cf. ACH = 10) with closed doorways, 12‐18 minutes throughout operation, and three‐5 minutes with open doorways (Determine 1). A outstanding discovering was that the air flow inside all studied elevators in idle place routinely shuts off after 1‐2 minutes, which after all can simply be extended by reprogramming the motion management software program. In most hospital elevators, the ventilator is current within the ceiling and exhausts air from the cabin towards the elevator shaft. A attainable measure is reversing the circulate course of the ventilator, herewith making a unidirectional downflow of recent (eg, HEPA filtered) air from the ceiling in the direction of the ground of the elevator cabin, a measure that’s normal in most working rooms to create and preserve an airborne microbial free atmosphere.” • I’m wondering if any of those measures have been taken?

Vaccines

“Lengthy COVID danger and pre-COVID vaccination in an EHR-based cohort examine from the RECOVER program” [Nature]. “Our 4 analyses yielded constant outcomes. We see protecting associations of vaccination with lengthy COVID prognosis in each logistic and time-to-event fashions, and in each clinic-based and model-based outcomes. Whereas these findings are much like these of different massive observational studies16,17,18,19, earlier sources have solely seemed for proof of COVID-associated signs as proof of lengthy COVID. A significant discovering of our evaluation is that the protecting affiliation stays constant in outcomes requiring a medical prognosis, and amongst those that contracted COVID-19 in a later interval that features Omicron infections.”

Maskstravaganza

Folks can change:

Discovered in the present day that 2 individuals who gave me shit & made enjoyable of me prior to now for masking now put on KN95s/n95s. I requested “Why?” as a result of they have been so die exhausting anti masks. One mentioned it’s as a result of they acquired covid and it was “truly actually dangerous” they usually have been “scared”. Effectively, issues change.

— ✨ (@bumblebuzz6) Could 25, 2023

If one should admit being “scared” — as opposed having a totally rational apprehension — that takes some braveness, in in the present day’s ambiance.

The masks you may smile with:

NEW N95 RESPIRATOR MASK WITH ANTI-FOG CLEAR VISION WINDOW – STEALTH CLARITY

Hey everyone, we’ve simply added this to our merchandise. TGA authorised. Now in use by WA Well being. Comfy. Wonderful for folks whose mouth must be seen.

Purchase it right here👇https://t.co/9ELG0jldns pic.twitter.com/tcAwJP9kzV

— CO2 Radical (@CO2RadicalAus) Could 24, 2023

Perhaps this masks works to convey empathy and for lip studying, I don’t know. (For myself, I discover the clear plastic a bit of creepy). If it does, I’m certain we’ll discover the anti-maskers lining up to verify each hospital makes use of them!

If sneaker artwork, why not masks artwork (as I recommended right here):

The Stan Smith, the best-selling sneaker from Adidas. (You possibly can make masks collectible, too! Signed and numbered….)

A protracted thread of fit-testing:

THREAD: 19 Suggestions for a DIY masks match check to scale back your danger of #COVID19.

H/t @amandalhu & @__philipn__

What did I miss? pic.twitter.com/Pp1bM8zMur

— Mike Hoerger, PhD MSCR MBA (@michael_hoerger) December 17, 2022

(After all, if we had normal sizes, match testing could be loads simpler.) A further tip:

I stroll via the material softener aisle as a examine.

— PelicanNurse🪬✌️😷✌️😷☮️🌈💛💙❄️🌊vegan/she/her (@pelicannurse) Could 24, 2023

Readers, what do you suppose?

“One thing Terrible”

“SARS-CoV-2, lengthy COVID, prion illness and neurodegeneration” [Frontiers of Neuroscience]. “It has been simply over ~30 months since SARS-CoV-2 viral an infection and COVID-19 illness have been first described…. Over this comparatively transient time period about 40–60% of all ‘recovered’ COVID-19 sufferers have skilled some sort of ill-defined, wide-ranging and extremely variable neurological complication and exhibit the symptomology of ‘lengthy COVID.’ Simply as is the case for different incompletely characterised neurotrophic viral infections there are sudden, unpredicted and typically alarming neurological and different sequelae to SARS-CoV-2-based viral an infection…. These embrace…. the popularity of self-associating prion-like viral domains within the SARS-CoV-2 ‘S1′ spike protein driving amyloidogenesis and neurotoxic combination formation….. As in international pandemic infections of the previous it’s our opinion that we must always anticipate extra sudden associations of mind and CNS disease-linked mechanisms and pathways between SARS-CoV-2-mediated viral an infection and different classes of age-related, immune-evasive pro-inflammatory types of neurodegeneration. Importantly, the SARS-CoV-2 ‘S1′ spike proteins include each self-associating “prion-like” areas, amyloid peptide-binding and different domains that seem to play roles in pathological “seeding,” amyloidogenesis and/or spreading that helps the formation of pathogenic lesions within the mind and CNS which contribute to pro-inflammatory neurodegeneration, neural cell atrophy and/or neuronal cell dying.”

Elite Maleficence

“Covid silence and the way the media works” [Nate Bear, ¡Do Not Panic!]. “If I hadn’t spent the final 15 years working in media and public relations, I too would interpret the media silence round covid and new covid analysis/science as an indication that there’s nothing to fret about. However I’ve. So there’s some issues you could know. The very first thing to know is that the quantity of protection on the whole mass media about a problem will not be an goal indication of its significance. Perhaps I’m telling you one thing you already know as a result of everyone seems to be pretty media savvy today, however it wants saying. Simply since you’re not seeing covid analysis within the headlines, doesn’t imply covid has turn out to be a non-story in relation to its potential impacts in your well being, your future, our societies or economies. However don’t get me unsuitable. I’m not saying that there’s some type of conspiracy to actively cover covid tales or different large tales. It’s simply the way in which the mass media works Which is like this: A press launch will get written for a shopper, it will get despatched out to an enormous record of journalists, the PR agent then telephones across the journalists in no matter sector they’re working in to try to get them to have a look at the story, providing interviews with the important thing gamers. Most tales you see within the headlines are the results of a PR company. . … And the larger the PR company, the extra possible you might be to get a journalist to chew in your story. And it is a main drawback. As a result of the larger the company = the dearer the company. So the largest, richest purchasers rent the largest, richest companies with essentially the most model recognition and media connections, and these companies are responded to most favourably by editors and reporters. And naturally, the larger the company, the larger the finances it’s a must to entertain journalists, exit for lunches/dinners, even organise issues like PR brokers vs journalist soccer tournaments (sure this occurs). Which permits the fostering of human connections that imply the journalist will reply favourably to your subsequent press launch/name pitching a shopper story. Along with this, many PR company bosses will likely be members of the identical non-public members golf equipment because the media bosses, with plenty of casual “work” executed throughout these evenings.” • Bourdieu would love this.

Lambert right here: I’m getting the sensation that the “One thing Terrible” could be a sawtooth sample — variant after variant — that averages out to a completely excessive plateau. Plenty of exceptionally nasty sequelae, almost definitely deriving from immune dysregulation (says this layperson).

Case Information

NOT UPDATED From BioBot wastewater knowledge from Could 22:

Lambert right here: Except the USA is totally, er, distinctive, we ought to be seeing a rise right here quickly. UPDATE Nonetheless on the excessive plateau. Are we’re the purpose within the international pandemic the place nationwide experiences actually diverge?

For now, I’m going to make use of this nationwide wastewater knowledge as the very best proxy for case knowledge (ignoring the medical case knowledge portion of this chart, which for my part “goes dangerous” after March 2022, for causes as but unexplained). Not less than we are able to spot developments, and examine present ranges to equal previous ranges.

Variants

NOT UPDATED From CDC, Could 13, 2023:

CDC: “As of Could 11, genomic surveillance knowledge will likely be reported biweekly, primarily based on the supply of constructive check specimens.” “Biweeekly: 1. occurring each two weeks. 2. occurring twice per week; semiweekly.” Seems like CDC has chosen sense #1. In essence, they’re telling us variants are nothing to fret about. Time will inform. Seems like the Walgreens variants web page isn’t updating.

Covid Emergency Room Visits

NOT UPDATED From CDC NCIRD Surveillance, from Could 20:

NOTE “Charts and knowledge supplied by CDC, updates Wednesday by 8am. For the previous yr, utilizing a rolling 52-week interval.” So not the whole pandemic, FFS (the implicit message right here being that Covid is “identical to the flu,” which is why the seasonal “rolling 52-week interval” is suitable for each_{MR SUBLIMINAL I hate these folks a lot}. Discover additionally that this chart exhibits, a minimum of for its time interval, that Covid is not seasonal, although CDC is making an attempt to get us to consider that it’s, presumably to allow them to piggyback on the present institutional equipment for injections.

Positivity

NOT UPDATED From Walgreens, Could 22:

-1.1%. Frequency all the way down to as soon as per week? UPDATE Apparently so!

Deaths

Demise price (Our World in Information), from Could 22:

Lambert right here: One other fall to zero, virtually actually a knowledge artifact. Thanks, Johns Hopkins of the $9.32 endowment, for abandoning this knowledge feed and passing duty on to WHO.

Complete: 1,164,718 – 1,164,564 = 154 (154 * 365 = 56,210 deaths per yr, in the present day’s YouGenicist™ quantity for “residing with” Covid (fairly a bit greater than the minimizers would love, although they’ll speak themselves into something. If the YouGenicist™ metric retains chugging alongside like this, I could must resolve that is what the powers-that-be take into account “mission completed” for this specific tranche of dying and illness).

Extra Deaths

NOT UPDATED Extra deaths (The Economist), printed Could 21:

Lambert right here: Primarily based on a machine-learning mannequin. (The CDC has an extra estimate too, however because it ran eternally with a large typo within the Legend, I figured no one was actually it, so I acquired rid it. )

Stats Watch

Employment Scenario: “United States Preliminary Jobless Claims” [Trading Economics]. “The variety of Individuals submitting for unemployment advantages rose to 229 thousand within the week ending Could twentieth, barely up from an over two-month low of 225 thousand the week earlier than however properly beneath market expectations of 245 thousand. The most recent knowledge recommended that the labor market in the USA stays comparatively strong and constrained, which might doubtlessly lead to upward strain on wages and current for the Federal Reserve to contemplate extra rate of interest hikes as a part of its measures to handle inflation.” • The beatings will proceed…

Banking: “Banking Disaster Is Over, High Executives Say” [Wall Street Journal]. “‘I believe as a systemic danger, it’s over,’ UBS Chairman Colm Kelleher mentioned at The Wall Avenue Journal CEO Council Summit in London. ‘What’s not been solved but is what’s the funding mannequin that may work going ahead.’ Barclays Chief Government Officer C.S. Venkatakrishnan added that the acute disaster has handed however that many banks will likely be pressured to vary their enterprise fashions—together with probably by curbing lending. ‘I believe the part of preliminary discovery is over and I believe there’s going to be a bit of little bit of a longer-term discovery and adjustment,’ he mentioned.” • Banks don’t have a funding mannequin? Actually?

Tech: “How U.S. adults on Twitter use the positioning within the Elon Musk period” [Pew Research Center].

Right this moment’s Concern & Greed Index: 62 Greed (earlier shut: 60 Impartial) [CNN]. One week in the past: 67 (Greed). (0 is Excessive Concern; 100 is Excessive Greed). Final up to date Could 25 at 1:42 PM ET.

The 420

“State to fund medical trials on “entire mushroom” psilocybin analysis” [Axios Phoenix]. “Arizona will quickly award $5 million in grants for researchers to conduct medical research on hallucinogenic psilocybin mushrooms. The not too long ago authorised finances for fiscal yr 2024 features a aggressive grant program overseen by the Arizona Division of Well being Providers (ADHS). Grant recipients will conduct medical trials to review the results of “entire mushroom psilocybin” on post-traumatic stress dysfunction, lengthy COVID signs, melancholy, anxiousness, continual ache and different maladies. Trials should prioritize veterans, first responders, frontline well being care employees and other people from underserved communities. An rising physique of analysis signifies that psilocybin is an efficient therapy for quite a lot of medical issues.” • On the one hand, I believe thiis is sweet. On the opposite, Soma for the traumatized means it’s OK for the trauma to proceed.

Zeitgeist Watch

Not the ’80’s, the mid-’70s:

One more impact of the neoliberal flip?

Class Warfare

Misconstruing the Bearded One (1). Click on “Present Extra”:

No matter Marx was about, it wasn’t id politics.

Misconstruing the Bearded One (2)

Regardless of the Bolsheviks have been about, they have been Marxists. Putin’s thesis (given on the at all times attention-grabbing Valdai Dialogue Membership) is both vacuous (“Revolutions result in main social adjustments”) or unsuitable (like he’s been studying an excessive amount of James Lindsay on “cultural Marxism” — the bucket Lindsay invented to throw id politics in — which isn’t a factor, or relatively is a factor solely within the minds of conservative fever swamp dwellers, although I suppose you may barely make a case for the Frankfurt Faculty). In any case, it’s amusing to see Briones and Putin find yourself kind of in the identical place with respect to id politics.

Information of the Wired

A genuinely horrifying film (for my part, too strongly-premised as science fiction, therefore reasonable, to be horror):

I do know that is from one other film within the Alien franchise, however it applies in so, so many circumstances:

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