By Lambert Strether of Corrente
Readers, I apologize as soon as extra for the thinness of the Covid protection, however there’s been a lot occurring in electoral politics I assumed I ought to clear my backlog there. Life’s wealthy pageant! –lambert
Chook Music of the Day
Horned Lark, California, United States.
Politics
“However what’s authorities itself, however the best of all reflections on human nature?” –James Madison, Federalist 51
“That they had discovered nothing, and forgotten nothing.” –Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord
“When the going will get bizarre, the bizarre flip professional.” –Hunter Thompson
Capitol Seizure
“Jan. 6 committee divided on Dem meddling in GOP primaries” [Axios]. “Members of the Home Jan. 6 committee are divided on whether or not to sentence the rising development of Democrats meddling in GOP primaries to spice up pro-Trump election deniers — a tactic designed to safe extra favorable matchups within the normal election. The committee has spent the final yr warning that former President Trump and his allies — together with candidates operating on this yr’s midterms — are endangering American democracy by casting doubt on the legitimacy of the 2020 election…. Public backlash intensified yesterday when it emerged that the Democratic Congressional Marketing campaign Committee is boosting an election denier in his main in opposition to Rep. Peter Meijer (R-Mich.) — one among 10 Home Republicans who voted to question Trump for his position within the Jan. 6 Capitol riot…. ‘The DCCC is taking part in with fireplace. It undercuts the nice work of the Jan. 6 committee and makes us appear to be hypocrites,’ one Democratic member of Congress informed Axios.” • The DCCC? Certainly not.
“‘Type of Wild/Artistic’: Emails Shed Gentle on Trump Pretend Electors Plan” [New York Times]. “Beforehand undisclosed emails present an inside have a look at the more and more determined and sometimes slapdash efforts by advisers to President Donald J. Trump to reverse his election defeat within the weeks earlier than the Jan. 6 assault, together with acknowledgments {that a} key ingredient of their plan was of doubtful legality and lived as much as its billing as ‘faux.’ The handfuls of emails amongst folks related to the Trump marketing campaign, outdoors advisers and shut associates of Mr. Trump present a selected deal with assembling lists of people that would declare — with no foundation — to be Electoral Faculty electors on his behalf in battleground states that he had misplaced. In emails reviewed by The New York Occasions and authenticated by individuals who had labored with the Trump marketing campaign on the time, one lawyer concerned within the detailed discussions repeatedly used the phrase ‘faux’ to seek advice from the so-called electors, who had been supposed to offer Vice President Mike Pence and Mr. Trump’s allies in Congress a rationale for derailing the congressional technique of certifying the result. And attorneys engaged on the proposal made clear they knew that the pro-Trump electors they had been placing ahead won’t maintain as much as authorized scrutiny. ‘We might simply be sending in ‘faux’ electoral votes to Pence in order that ‘somebody’ in Congress could make an objection after they begin counting votes, and begin arguing that the ‘faux’ votes must be counted,” Jack Wilenchik, a Phoenix-based lawyer who helped manage the pro-Trump electors in Arizona, wrote in a Dec. 8, 2020, e-mail to Boris Epshteyn, a strategic adviser for the Trump marketing campaign.” • It sounds just like the Committee would somewhat indict the entire Republican Occasion as a substitute of Trump, so why don’t they simply go forward and try this?
Biden Administration
“McConnell says Pelosi would hand China a win if she sacks Taiwan journey after complaints” [New York Post]. “The Kentucky Republican was requested in regards to the speaker touring to Taiwan amid China’s threats and mentioned there are different issues past the journey that must be mentioned. ‘If she doesn’t go now, she’s dealing with China a kind of a victory of types,’ McConnell mentioned at a Senate Republican management information convention on Tuesday.” • Oh, nice. Has there ever been a very unhealthy concept that wasn’t bipartisan?
“Pelosi has invited senior lawmakers to affix Taiwan journey, high Republican says” [NBC]. Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has invited a small group of lawmakers on her official journey to Taiwan, together with the highest Democrat and Republican on the Home Overseas Affairs Committee, Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, informed NBC Information on Wednesday. McCaul, the rating member on the overseas affairs panel, mentioned each he and Chairman Gregory Meeks, D-N.Y., have been invited by the speaker on an upcoming journey to the self-ruling island that China sees as underneath its management. The Texas Republican mentioned he declined the invitation on account of a private obligation that conflicts with the go to. The journey is slated to happen in the course of the congressional August recess, although McCaul didn’t present the precise dates. ‘Any member that wishes to go, ought to. It exhibits political deterrence to President Xi,’ McCaul, a China hawk, mentioned in a quick interview within the Capitol. ‘However she also needs to take note of the army if it’s going to trigger a blowback and escalate issues.’” • McCaul’s place is definitely extra accountable than Pelosi’s.
“Home Democrats Urge Extra Vegetarian Meals in US Buildings” [Bloomberg]. “US authorities cafeterias ought to add vegetarian meal choices to all menus, a gaggle of 32 Democrats from the Home of Representatives mentioned in a letter to President Joe Biden on Tuesday….. Plant-based meals can produce “dramatic” enhancements for people’ well being, and serving them in federal amenities would scale back the federal government’s carbon footprint, the group mentioned. Agriculture accounted for 11% of US greenhouse fuel emissions in 2020, in keeping with the US Environmental Safety Company.” • All true, however is “small ball” politics actually what we want proper now?
2022
* * * PA: “Gen Z mobilizes for midterm elections as examine emphasizes younger voters’ outsize impression on Pa. politics” [Post-Gazette]. “Earlier this summer season, the political division at Tufts College in Massachusetts launched a examine rating Pennsylvania as the highest state the place youth are poised to have a disproportionately excessive electoral impression within the 2022 elections. Partly, that’s on account of Pennsylvania’s excessive price of youth voter registration, which sits at 69% — to not point out the substantial 54% of youth that really voted within the 2020 elections, giving President Joe Biden a internet benefit of 150,000 votes from that demographic.”
PA: “John Fetterman Isn’t Doing What He Thinks He Is With His Meme Roasts of Dr. Oz” [Slate]. Key level: “[T]right here is little proof that social media resonance has a tangible impact on electoral success.” • I view the social media effort as a holding motion (and in addition a technique to distract the vicious youngsters within the political class with memes, which is each enjoyable and the fitting factor to do). As long as Fetterman’s numbers hoild up, I gained’t fear an excessive amount of. (I’m much more anxious about Fetterman’s efficiency in debate, if there’s one. Possibly they may make issues simple for Oz, and maintain it at Rutgers?)
PA: All people hates a vacationer:
My mother shopped there as we speak and complained that there have been extra vacationers than regular. https://t.co/J7La0tKZbK
— John Fetterman (@JohnFetterman) July 26, 2022
(Good concept for a Fetterman theme track, really.)
TX: “If sufficient Texas Democrats vote, Beto O’Rourke might be governor, Dallas county decide says” [Dallas Morning-News]. “The prospects for Democrats in Texas are “ever-improving,” Dallas County Choose Clay Jenkins informed the group on the Texas Democratic Conference in Dallas on Friday. He mentioned the get together can win by reaching out to new voters and those that sometimes don’t vote for Democrats. Beto O’Rourke, who’s difficult Gov. Greg Abbott, is working to enchantment to disaffected Republicans and independents, along with Democrats. ‘If sufficient Democrats in Texas vote, Beto O’Rourke might be our governor,’ he informed the fired-up crowd.
2024
“Trump tiptoes nearer to new White Home run in DC tackle” [The Hill]. “Trump’s viability as a frontrunner of the get together has been thrown into query not less than for the second as a Home committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the Capitol spotlights the previous president’s position in spreading falsehoods in regards to the 2020 election, encouraging his supporters to come back to the Capitol after which doing nothing for hours to quell the violence. Polling has proven majorities imagine Trump bears duty for the Jan. 6 assault. And newer polls have indicated not less than a number of the Republican Occasion is keen to maneuver on from Trump in favor of another candidate in 2024.” • Response to Trump’s America First Agenda Summit in Washington, DC.
“Mike Pence squares as much as Donald Trump as former operating mates eye 2024 bids” [Financial Times]. “On Tuesday morning, Mike Pence stood earlier than a crowd of younger Republicans in Washington DC, outlining his imaginative and prescient for the way forward for the get together and calling on its supporters to keep away from ‘the temptation to look again’. Six hours later and a mile down the highway, the previous vice-president’s erstwhile boss, Donald Trump, made his personal pitch for the get together’s future at a convention for the America First Coverage Institute, repeating his disproved claims of fraud within the 2020 election and teasing the potential for one other presidential run. ‘If I renounced my beliefs, if I agreed to remain silent . . . the persecution of Donald Trump would cease instantly,’ he informed the group. ‘However that’s not what I’ll do . . . I’ve to save lots of our nation.’ The back-to-back speeches within the US capital had been the most recent proof of the simmering feud between the previous operating mates turned political foes and of their competing political ambitions, with each eyeing a bid for the White Home in 2024. In his speech on the Younger America’s Basis’s Nationwide Conservative Pupil Convention, Pence attacked the ‘aggressive liberalism’ [lol] of the Biden administration and Democrats and mentioned this yr’s midterm elections supplied Republicans ‘the most effective likelihood we’ll ever should construct an enduring majority.’ However he additionally made a thinly veiled plea for the get together to interrupt with Trump, urging Republicans to deal with profitable Congress after which the White Home somewhat than combating historic battles. ‘Now some folks could select to deal with the previous,’ he mentioned. ‘However elections . . . are in regards to the future. And I imagine conservatives should deal with the long run to win again America.’ Pence is hoping he can overcome anger amongst Republican voters — a lot of whom fault him for certifying Joe Biden’s election victory in 2020 — by taking credit score for financial, immigration and commerce insurance policies applied in the course of the Trump administration.” • I’d speculate that many Republican voters are of the thoughts of Baron Harkonnen: “The person should die. He tried to assist my enemies.” Actually one future to stay up for! One among life’s little ironies is that Pence, as the person who didn’t “get into the automotive,” is probably greatest positioned to articulate a “idea of the case” in opposition to Trump’s actions or inactions in the course of the Capitol seizure. I don’t see Pence because the grasp communicator who might carry out that plot reversal, nevertheless.
“Buttigieg edges out Biden amongst Democrats in New Hampshire ballot” [The Hill]. “The College of New Hampshire (UNH) Survey Middle Granite Ballot discovered that 17 % of doubtless 2024 Democratic main voters within the state would select Buttigieg amongst an inventory of Democrats, or those that caucus with Democrats, who’re thought of doable 2024 presidential contenders. Biden obtained 16 % help, adopted by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D), who every got here in at 10 %. A handful of different Democrats, as well as Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), obtained lower than 10 %. The margin of error for among the many Democrats polled particularly is plus or minus 4.7 factors, which means Buttgieg and Biden are statistically tied amongst voters. However the polling additional demonstrates that Democrats should not wedded to the thought of selecting Biden as their nominee within the subsequent presidential cycle. The White Home has mentioned Biden intends to run in 2024, although Buttigieg has not made any bulletins on the matter.” • One would possibly suppose that treatring protection of “our democracy” as a core worth after which nominating a candidate who declared himself (falsely) the winner of a main earlier than a single vote was formally counted* would someway be at odds, however then these are Democrats, who’re notably versatile of their considering. NOTE * Iowa 2020.
Republican Funhouse
“Telling the Fact in regards to the 2020 Election” [By Thomas B. Griffith, J. Michael Luttig, Michael W. Mcconnell, Theodore B. Olson, Benjamin L. Ginsberg, and Dave Hoppe, National Review]. “Persevering with allegations that the 2020 election was ‘stolen’ are roiling our politics and dividing our nation. Certainly, now a big share of the American public doubts the legitimacy of our system. That brought about us, political conservatives who’ve spent most of our careers working to uphold the Structure and the conservative rules upon which it’s primarily based, to delve deeply into these prices and gauge their accuracy. All of us have both labored in Republican Occasion politics at a number of ranges and in varied capacities or labored within the authorities on account of Republican appointments. Certainly, one among us, Theodore B. Olson, efficiently represented George W. Bush in a Supreme Courtroom case that ended Al Gore’s unmerited problem to the outcomes of the 2000 presidential election. We’ve no affiliation with the Democratic Occasion…. As a result of allegations of fraudulent and rigged elections are so critically affecting public opinion, particularly amongst Republicans, we performed an open-minded examination of the numerous claims by former president Trump and his supporters and allies who agree with him in regards to the 2020 election and tried to behave on their beliefs. We take such claims critically…. Due to this fact, we painstakingly surveyed every of the 187 counts within the 64 courtroom instances introduced on Trump’s behalf contesting the outcomes of the 2020 election, the state recounts and contests introduced within the title of the previous president, and the post-election critiques undertaken within the six key battleground states (Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin) to find out whether or not there’s any fireplace amidst all of the smoke. Our overview has led us to conclude that there’s merely no proof of fraud within the 2020 presidential election of the magnitude essential to shift the end in any state, not to mention the nation as an entire. In truth, not even a single precinct’s end result was reversed.” • Their report. It isn’t, nevertheless, clear that the Republican Occasion through which these people had been grandees even exists anymore.
Democrats en Déshabillé
I’ve moved my standing remarks on the Democrat Occasion (“the Democrat Occasion is a rotting corpse that may’t bury itself”) to a separate, back-dated publish, to which I’ll periodically add materials, summarizing the addition right here in a “dwell” Water Cooler. (Hopefully, some Bourdieu.) It seems that defining the Democrat Occasion is, in truth, a tough downside. I do suppose the paragraph that follows is on level all the way in which again to 2016, if not earlier than:
The Democrat Occasion is the political expression of the category energy of PMC, their base (lucidly defined by Thomas Frank in Pay attention, Liberal!). ; if the Democrat Occasion didn’t exist, the PMC must invent it. . (“PMC” modulo “class expatriates,” in fact.) Second, all of the working components of the Occasion reinforce one another. Depart apart characterizing the relationships between components of the Occasion (ka-ching, however not fully) these components comprise a community — a Flex Web? An iron octagon? — of funders, distributors, apparatchiks, electeds, NGOs, and miscellaneous mercenaries, with property within the press and the intelligence group.
Observe, in fact, that the category energy of the PMC each expresses and is proscribed by different courses; oligarchs and American gentry (see ‘industrial mannequin’ of Ferguson, Jorgensen, and Jie) and the working class spring to thoughts. Suck up, kick down.
* * * “‘There was nearly no debate’: How Dems’ protection spending spree went from shocker to snoozer” [Politico]. “Final yr, Democrats on Capitol Hill shocked observers after they voted to ladle tens of billions of additional {dollars} onto President Joe Biden’s first Pentagon finances. Wielding management of the Home, Senate and White Home for the primary time in a decade, Democrats had been anticipated to carry the road on Pentagon spending that ballooned underneath Republicans and the Trump administration. Now, Congress is poised to do it once more — with much more cash at stake — and it’s something however stunning.” • That’s as a result of Democrats are the Warfare Occasion.
Invoice Kristol as not a part of the Republican Institution….
For the Republican institution, there aren’t any actual limits or pink traces. Bigotry, conspiracy, anti-democracy–all are to be ignored within the service of victory for the Occasion.
First ignored. Then rationalized. Then justified. Finally…embraced.
https://t.co/a4e9U4U9es— Invoice Kristol (@BillKristol) July 26, 2022
The thoughts reels. It’s like, say, Cromwell morphing right into a Royalist.
Obama Legacy
Thanks, Obama!
I take into consideration this 2009 story so much.
A Dem governor of a pink state touting single-payer & then this from the Dem president (who had beforehand mentioned he supported M4A).
“Minutes later, Obama made it clear he doesn’t favor adopting such a system within the US” https://t.co/71j73P29Zp
— David Sirota (@davidsirota) July 26, 2022
And undercutting a Crimson State advocate!
“Biden’s Issues Go Again To 2009” [Seeing the Forest]. Remaining sentence: “When you consider ALL the issues Democrats might have executed after the general public DEMANDED change, placing Obama into the presidency and delivering HUGE majorities within the Home and Senate – however selected to not – you possibly can see why issues are the way in which they’re as we speak.” • Precisely.
Realignment and Legitimacy
“America’s Self-Obsession Is Killing Its Democracy” [The Atlantic]. “American democracy is dying. There are many medicines that will remedy it. Sadly, our political dysfunction means we’re selecting to not use them, and as time passes, fewer remedies develop into out there to us, regardless that the illness is changing into terminal. No main prodemocracy reforms have handed Congress. No key political figures who tried to overturn an American election have confronted actual accountability. The president who orchestrated the best risk to our democracy in fashionable occasions is free to run for reelection, and will properly return to workplace. Our present state of affairs began with a botched prognosis. When Trump first rose to political prominence, a lot of the American political class reacted with amusement, seeing him as a sideshow. Even when he gained, they thought, he’d tweet like a populist firebrand whereas governing like a Romney Republican, constrained by the system. However for many who had watched Trump-like authoritarian strongmen rise in Turkey, India, Hungary, Poland, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Venezuela, Trump was by no means entertaining. He was ominously acquainted. At situation was a traditional frame-of-reference downside. America’s political tradition is astonishingly insular. Activate cable information and it’s all America, on a regular basis. Different nations often make cameos, however the story remains to be about us… Our self-obsession implies that every time authoritarianism rises overseas, it’s talked about briefly, if in any respect. Have you ever ever noticed a breathless octobox of speaking heads on CNN or Fox Information debating the loss of life of democracy in Turkey, Sri Lanka, or the Philippines? That’s why most American pundits and journalists used an ‘outsider involves Washington’ framework to course of Trump’s marketing campaign and his presidency, when they need to have been becoming each recent reality into an ‘authoritarian populist’ framework or a ‘democratic loss of life spiral’ framework. Whereas debates raged over tax cuts and offensive tweets, the most important story was usually obscured: The system itself was in danger.” • In truth, America, though deeply provincial, is certainly distinctive:
I’m again within the USA to say that the American coverage debate ought to most likely focus extra on the truth that we’re continuously dying. https://t.co/92djCTYsaQ pic.twitter.com/8IbbP7ezX0
— Matthew Yglesias (@mattyglesias) July 26, 2022
We’re engaged in a large social experiment to see whether or not an elite (ruling + governing courses) can “cull the herd” in six-figure portions, and nonetheless retain hegemony (TINA); the Covid pandemic is simply the most recent and most blatant instance. Thus far, the reply appears to be sure, and even “Hell, yeah!” Seen in that gentle, is “the system” “in danger” in any respect?
“On the marketing campaign path, many Republicans discuss of violence” [WaPo]. “Each candidates described a rustic that was not merely in bother, however being destroyed by leaders who despise most Individuals — successfully a part of a civil struggle. In each swing states and protected seats, many Republicans say that liberals hate them personally[1] and will flip rioters or a police state[2] on individuals who disobey them.” • NOTES [1] Are they mistaken? [2] A police state? Democrats?! Commentary:
to be clear, “attempt” is the operative phrase right here https://t.co/zd9VjOUpPH
— ryan cooper (@ryanlcooper) July 26, 2022
“Is Democracy Constitutional?” [Adam Serwer, The Atlantic]. “In Moore v. Harper, North Carolina Republicans are arguing that no different state physique, together with the state supreme courtroom, has the facility to limit the legislature’s capability to set voting guidelines—particularly ones permitting legislators to gerrymander the state, in defiance of a ruling by the state supreme courtroom discovering that their plan violated the state constitutional modification guaranteeing the fitting to vote. This perception relies on a crank authorized premise referred to as the ‘independent-state-legislature idea.” Seems like one thing John C. Calhoun would love. Extra: “The independent-state-legislature idea has drawn an excessive amount of consideration for its most radical potential software, the potential for a legislature voting to throw out its state’s presidential-election outcomes and appointing electors to favor the candidate of its alternative…. If the Supreme Courtroom upholds the independent-state-legislature idea, it is going to deprive the general public of yet one more technique of defending itself. For the get together that appoMinted nearly all of the justices, that will be supreme.”
“The English Vocabulary and the Way forward for Capitalism” [Capital as Power]. “Blair [Fix] compares [here] using financial versus biblical vocabularies. He exhibits (1) that, within the English language, the ‘jargons’ of the 2 vocabularies are nearly mutually unique; (2) that, traditionally, the relative significance of those two jargons moved roughly inversely to one another; and (3) and most surprisingly, that within the late twentieth century, the significance of biblical jargon began to rise whereas that of economics started to say no (first determine). If this newest inflection is a harbinger of future traits, Blair argues, we’d have already handed ‘peak capitalism’. Commentary:
8/ If this newest inflection is a harbinger of future traits, Blair argues, we’d have already handed ‘peak capitalism’.
— Bichler & Nitzan (@BichlerNitzan) July 25, 2022
Seems to be like yet one more instance of a “What the heck occurred within the mid-70s?” chart….
* * * “Proper-wing group is quietly conducting overview of 300,000 Tarrant County ballots from 2020 main” [Texas Tribune]. “Round 40 volunteers with a conservative group questioning the integrity of Texas election outcomes, in addition to that of some election directors, have begun a overview of hundreds of ballots from Tarrant County’s March 2020 GOP main election…. Members are particularly counting votes within the Republican main for U.S. Senate, through which Sen. John Cornyn gained with 73% of the vote in Tarrant County over his closest challenger, who gained 13% of the county’s votes. The group additionally alleges a variety of fraudulent actions associated to the 2020 November normal election in Tarrant and different counties throughout the state however has supplied no proof to help the allegations.” • It’s good that ballots are public information in Texas. However observe that if the ballots had been hand-marked and hand-counted in public, the adminstrative burden Tarrant County complains of can be eradicated. So would any doubt about election outcomes.
#COVID19
• I’ll have extra to say about airplane air sooner or later. Right here’s a teaser:
Passenger reveals shockingly soiled air in Air New Zealand cabin, by way of @nzherald https://t.co/VItSuv7E00
— CO2Review (@Co2Review) July 26, 2022
• Your library might do that:
Wanting to take a look at an Aranet4 CO2 monitor?
Your native library could possibly assist. Now out there in Toronto, Hamilton, Guelph, Peterborough & Excessive River.
Thx @CAVI_CO2 @Prescientx1 @AranetIoT !!
👏@ptbolibrary @torontolibrary @HamiltonLibrary @GuelphLibrary @HighRiverLib pic.twitter.com/7pzDXbtUtC— Barry Hunt #COVIDisAirborne 🌬 😷🪟 (@BarryHunt008) July 26, 2022
In case you missed it, right here’s a publish on my queasiness with CDC numbers, particularly case depend, which I (nonetheless) think about most essential, regardless of what Walensky’s psychos at CDC who invented “group ranges” suppose. However these are the numbers we have now.
Case Depend
Case depend for america:
The prepare remains to be rolling. There was a bizarre, plateau-like “fiddling and diddling” stage earlier than the Omicron explosion, too. This conjuncture feels the identical. Below the hood the BA.4/BA.5 are making up a larger and larger proportion of instances. Keep in mind that instances are undercounted, one supply saying by an element of six, Gottlieb considering we solely choose up one in seven or eight.) Therefore, I take the case depend and multiply it by six to approximate the actual degree of instances, and draw the DNC-blue “Biden Line” at that time. The earlier depend was ~122,150. At the moment, it’s ~129,000 and 129,000 * 6 = a Biden line at 774,000 per day. That’s somewhat a variety of instances per day, when you consider it. No less than we have now affirmation that the extraordinary mass of case anecdotes we’ve seen have a foundation in actuality. (Bear in mind these information factors are weekly averages, so each day fluctuations are smoothed out.) The black “Fauci Line” is a counter to triumphalism, because it compares present ranges to previous crises.
Regional case depend for 4 weeks:
The South:
A sluggish upswing in the remainder of the south, beneath the Florida and Texas gyrations.
The West:
Positivity
NOT UPDATED From the Walgreen’s take a look at positivity tracker, July 19:
1.1%. Up. (I ponder if there’s a Keynesian Magnificence Contest impact, right here; that’s, if folks encounter a sympotomatic particular person, whether or not of their social circle or in regular exercise, they’re extra prone to get a take a look at, as a result of they imagine, appropriately, that it’s extra doubtless they are going to be contaminated.) What we’re seeing right here is the steepest and largest acceleration of positivity on Walgreen’s chart.
Lambert right here: I’m depressed. Walgreens has been so nice, and now this information isn’t updating. What provides?
Transmission
Here is CDC’s interactive map by county set to community transmission. This is the map CDC wants only hospitals to look at, not you. For July 21, 2020:
Establishment, i.e. it’s a very not-over pandemic.
Lambert right here: After the transfer from the CDC to the laughingly named ‘https://healthdata.gov,” this discover appeared: “Efficient June 22, 2022, the Neighborhood Profile Report will solely be up to date twice per week, on Wednesdays and Fridays.” So now the administration has belatedly come to the conclusion that we’re in a BA.5 surge, and but important information for making our private threat evaluation is simply out there twice per week. What’s the over/underneath on whether or not they really ship tomorrow?
Speedy Riser information, by county (CDC), July 26:
Worse in California and Upstate New York (what’s up with that). Higher in Texas. Establishment elsewere.
Earlier Speedy Riser information:
Hospitalization information, by state (CDC), July 26:
Plenty of yellow. Haven’t seen so little inexperienced (good) in fairly a while.
Variants
Lambert right here: It’s past irritating how sluggish the variant information is. I regarded for extra charts: California doesn’t to a BA.4/BA.5 breakdown. New York does nevertheless it, too, is on a molasses-like two-week cycle. Does no person within the public well being institution get a promotion for monitoring variants? Are there no grants? Is there a single lab that does this work, and all people will get the outcomes from them? Further sources from readers welcome [grinds teeth, bangs head on desk].
NOT UPDATED Variant information, nationwide (Walgreens), July 10:
NOT UPDATED Variant information, nationwide (CDC), July 9 (Nowcast off):
BA.5 shifting alongside properly.
Wastewater
Wastewater information (CDC), Jul 23:
I discovered this chart laborious to learn, so I filtered the output to the very best ranges (considerably like Speedy Riser Counties, see on right here). What’s seen is that a variety of cities are in bother; however that protection is basically patchy. Illinois, for instance, has at all times had a variety of protection, however the dots cease on the Illinois border. This chart works a bit like speedy riser counties: “This metric exhibits whether or not SARS-CoV-2 ranges at a website are at the moment increased or decrease than previous historic ranges on the identical website. 0% means ranges are the bottom they’ve been on the website; 100% means ranges are the very best they’ve been on the website.” So, there’s a bunch of pink dots on the West Coast. That’s 100%, so meaning “ranges are the very best they’ve ever been.” Not damaged down by variant, CDC, good job.
Deaths
Dying price (Our World in Knowledge):
Whole: 1,052,935 1,052,467. I’ve added an anti-triumphalist Fauci Line. It’s good that for deaths I’ve a pleasant, easy, each day chart that simply retains chugging alongside, in contrast to all the pieces else CDC and the White Home are screwing up or letting go darkish, good job.
Stats Watch
Manufacturing: “United States Sturdy Items Orders” [Trading Economics]. “New orders for US-made capital items rose 1.9 % from a month earlier in June of 2022, probably the most since January and the fourth consecutive month-to-month improve. Figures beat market forecasts for a 0.5 % lower in an indication that enterprise spending plans stay robust thus far regardless of increased rates of interest and inflation.”
The Bezzle: “Dashcam repo” [Cory Doctorow, Pluralistic]. If you’d like a motto for the present financial state of affairs, a touchstone to examine in on everytime you hear a couple of new enterprise mannequin or a brand new depredation, I counsel Michael Hudson’s bedrock declare: “Money owed that may’t be paid, gained’t be paid.” 40 years of wage stagnation, mixed with spiraling well being, housing and training prices have produced a mountain of unpayable money owed. Our society is organized round a small variety of collectors extracting rents from an ever-growing pool of debtors whose capability to pay is eroded by each penalty and each emergency triggered by the shortage of a cushion: Enter the digital arm-breaker. Networked, digital objects make arm-breaking cheaper and simpler than ever, remodeling the artisinal, private craft of terrorizing debtors right into a mass-scale industrial exercise. Miss a automotive fee? Possibly that automotive has a second, remote-controlled stereo that blares offended calls for at you wherever you go: https://version.cnn.com/2009/LIVING/wayoflife/04/17/aa.payments.shut.engine.down/index.html Or possibly the supplier can immobilize it, disabling the ignition system: https://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/09/24/miss-a-payment-good-luck-moving-that-car/ Or possibly it’s a Tesla, which can lock and immobilize itself and sign the supplier, then, when the repo man arrives, will flash its lights, honk its horn and again out of its parking place to ease repossession: https://tiremeetsroad.com/2021/03/18/tesla-allegedly-remotely-unlocks-model-3-owners-car-uses-smart-summon-to-help-repo-agent/ Algorithms can automate the arm-breaker’s inventive sadism.” • A must-read.
Tech: “Google’s Nest Will Present Knowledge to Police With out a Warrant” [PetaPixel]. • That’s good.
At the moment’s Concern & Greed Index: 37 Concern (earlier shut: 38 Concern) [CNN]. One week in the past: 27 (Concern). (0 is Excessive Concern; 100 is Excessive Greed). Final up to date Jul 27 at 1:20 PM EDT.
Zeitgeist Watch
“Pretend Canine for Residence Safety” [Tanner]. “I arrange a faux canine that barks if my surveillance cameras are triggered whereas I’m out of city on trip. It’s a pair of laptop audio system plugged right into a Raspberry Pi, which is a reasonable single-board laptop. One speaker faces the entrance door and the opposite faces the aspect door. When the entrance door digicam is triggered my surveillance digicam system sends a message to the Raspberry Pi. A easy program performs an audio clip of an enormous canine barking by the aspect speaker after which the entrance speaker. The change in audio system simulates a canine shifting in direction of the entrance door. The alternative occurs if the aspect door digicam is triggered….”
Guillotine Watch
“Brooklyn pastor says he and his spouse had been robbed of greater than $1 million in jewellery whereas preaching” [CNN]. “A flashy Brooklyn pastor recognized for carrying designer outfits and lavish jewellery says he was robbed alongside along with his spouse of greater than $1 million whereas he was preaching at church Sunday. Police say they obtained a report that three folks entered the Leaders of Tomorrow church Sunday with firearms and eliminated the jewellery pastor Lamor Miller-Whitehead, who goes by Bishop, and his spouse had been carrying.” • I believe Jesus would have accepted.
Information of the Wired
“Assist choose a syntax for CSS nesting” [Chrome Developers]. Not only for Chrome! Seems to be to me like the unique CSS is extra clear. However builders love them their squiggly brackets… Any CSS experts within the readership with views?
Contact data for vegetation: Readers, be at liberty to contact me at lambert [UNDERSCORE] strether [DOT] corrente [AT] yahoo [DOT] com, to (a) learn how to ship me a examine in case you are allergic to PayPal and (b) to learn how to ship me photos of vegetation. Greens are superb! Fungi and coral are deemed to be honorary vegetation! If you’d like your deal with to look as a credit score, please place it firstly of your mail in parentheses: (thus). In any other case, I’ll anonymize by utilizing your initials. See the earlier Water Cooler (with plant) right here. From Beez:
Beez writes: “2 in 1. Fungi and coral are deemed to be honorary vegetation!” And: “Lambert! We’re in luck. Hooked up is a Coral Fungi! Not as vivid as some photos but encapsulates fungi & coral in a single. Clavarioid fungi, colloquially Coral Fungi. Eucalyptus Ironbark flower in foreground amongst leaf litter. NSW Australia.”
Readers: Water Cooler is a standalone entity not lined by the just lately concluded and — thanks! — profitable annual NC fundraiser. So in case you see a hyperlink you particularly like, or an merchandise you wouldn’t see wherever else, please don’t hesitate to specific your appreciation in tangible type. Bear in mind, a tip jar is for tipping! Common constructive suggestions each makes me really feel good and lets me know I’m heading in the right direction with protection. Once I get no donations for 5 or ten days I get anxious. Extra tangibly, a continuing trickle of donations helps me with bills, and I consider that trickle when setting fundraising objectives:
Right here is the display that may seem, which I’ve helpfully annotated:
In case you hate PayPal, you possibly can e-mail me at lambert [UNDERSCORE] strether [DOT] corrente [AT] yahoo [DOT] com, and I will provide you with instructions on methods to ship a examine. Thanks!
