1-10-2022 - BinexNOW Covid-19 Testing

 

So You Want to Take an “At Home” Covid-19 Test – Read On!

Over the past weekend, I took advantage of Palm Beach County’s offer of two free home Covid19 testing kits and spent an hour in a line of cars in the new County Park on Atlantic Avenue in Delray Beach, way, way, way out west, beyond US 441, to get mine.  (An email from County Commissioner Mack Bernard clued me into their availability … even though we don’t live in his district.  Good man!)  I was handed two Abbott “BinaxNOW COVID-19 Ag Card Home Test” kits there, and using one, I found that I tested negatively. Within the next 48 hours, I used the second kit for a second test, which also was negative.  More about that later on though!  It's important.

These are not quite the same as the ”BinaxNOW COVID-19 Antigen Self Test” tests kits that sell in drug stores, when they have them, in a box containing two tests for about $20.  There are some significant differences.  A relative who purchased such a kit told me it contained full detailed instructions as to how to use its contents to test oneself, which she did.

The ‘free’ kit I received, it turned out, contained no instructions whatsoever, but screamed at me from its box, in red, not to open it until instructed to do so. On the front of the box, It instructed me to first download a free app, Navica, in order to create an account prior to “my appointment.”  I did this and was transferred to another site, eMed.com, where a ‘trained proctor’ took over and with the aid of an online audio and video connection, told me to finally open the box and then walked me through taking the test, after which the results were printed out for me on both eMed.com and the Navica app, the latter of which afforded me the opportunity to forward them to other organizations, such as employers or cruise lines.  (If you start off on eMed.com where the test card provided in the box does the actual testing, they ask you to go back and first download the Navica app, which is managed by Abbott, who manufactures the Binex tests.)

The ‘trained proctor,’ who sounded to me like he was in Manila was extremely helpful and if I had lacked the computer expertise to set up the necessary audio and video linkage, was apparently willing and able to guide me through the procedure via a ‘chat’ box.  (The ‘proctor’ on the second test I took automatically duplicated what she was saying in the ‘chat’ box.)  For example, both proctors asked me to display before my camera the QR block on the test’s box, and later on the test card itself, as well as my ID (drivers license).  If I hadn’t been able to do that, there was a lot number on the box, and my drivers license number, which I could have transmitted via the ‘chat’ screen I suppose.

The relative who took exactly the same test using her store-purchased kit did not have to get involved with either Navica or eMed.com, full instructions having come enclosed with her kit.  In fact, she did not even have to own a computer.  Both tests use the same linear graphics to indicate a positive or negative result which appear right on the test card, for any who take the test to see.  The downside of the ”BinaxNOW COVID-19 Antigen Self Test,” the one sold in drug stores, is that those linear graphics reporting a positive or negative result are the extent of what gets reported to her. (I am not sure, but it seems possible that the Navica app might be accessible subsequently, for those who do not start the testing process on it.)

BinexNOW test card provided in either of these kits

On the other hand, with the “BinaxNOW COVID-19 Ag Card Home Test,” the free one provided by the County, I was immediately able to print documents from both Navica and eMed, stating the test’s results, the latter even being signed by a physician.  The drug-store version not requiring use of a computer or mobile phone lacks the ‘virtual visit’ with a ‘trained proctor’ described above which enables someone (eMed.com) to ‘certify’ the digital test result for forwarding to other parties, such as an employer or cruise line, which is where the Navica app is used. 

Therefore, the “BinaxNOW COVID-19 Antigen Self Test,” bought in drug-stores, is useful only for one’s personal use and knowledge as to whether they might be infected, its result being displayed right on the test card but not otherwise documentable as is the “BinaxNOW COVID-19 Ag Card” Home Test’s result, which also, of course, is visible on its test card. One's personal behavior should be governed by the test result, however it may be obtained.

With tens of thousands of these free kits requiring signing on via one’s computer or mobile phone being distributed, it was understandable that the first few times I tried to get tested, I couldn’t get into the system’s network.  I kept getting a cryptic message saying, “Network connection failed.” I correctly assumed it was overloaded with testing requests.  However, after a few hours, I tried again and was then able to get on to their network and be tested.  With many tens of thousands of these free “BinaxNOW COVID-19 Ag Card Home Test” kits each requiring about twenty minutes of computer contact with a ‘trained proctor’ being distributed, the amount of human labor needed to administer them seems enormous.

Another friend of mine went to her personal physician who administered the more sophisticated PCR (Polymerase Chain Reaction) test, a molecular test that checks the upper respiratory specimen for genetic material (RNA) including the virus that causes Covid19.  He was able to report the results to her in about three days, after getting them back from a lab.  I saw my results on the test card in precisely fifteen minutes, as did the relative who had bought the same kit in a drug store, which came with an instruction sheet and did not even involve using a computer.  

But there’s a tradeoff involved.  These almost instant BinexNOW results were based on finding or not finding antigens in the sample, a less accurate testing method than the PCR lab test which checks RNA.  In fact, it is recommended that a negative test result on an antigen test (which the ‘BinaxNOW’ tests are) should be followed by a second test between 24 and 48 hours later, to more or less confirm its findings. Apparently, that is why the “BinaxNOW COVID-19 Antigen Self Test” is sold in drug stores in packages containing two tests and the County’s free test distribution consists of two individual one-test boxes of the “BinaxNOW COVID-19 Ag Card” Home test.  Unfortunately, when I received my first test’s negative result, there was no specific instruction to take the second test to confirm it.  You have to search around to find that recommendation, but it is there! Getting the result twice reinforces its validity to some extent.

In the future, I will periodically take whatever "at home antigen Covid19" test is available, aware that a positive result or any Covid19 symptoms should direct me to my personal physician who might consider more accurate PCR testing. I believe we all should act similarly.

If home testing is going to be the wave of the future in dealing with Covid19, and I believe it will be, along with vaccinations geared to emerging variants, some improvements will have to be made, as evidenced by the differing approaches mentioned above, bearing in mind that there are similar tests on the market from companies other than Abbott (maker of the Binex tests), adding to the confusion.

 JL

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1-9-2022 - Last Year’s Attempted Coup, Voting Rights, the Constitution, Covid19 and College Football

 

Thoughts on the January 6, 2021 Insurrection, One Year Later

The following comments were made to a joint session of Congress the evening of the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection:

"I want to say to the American people the United States Senate will not be intimidated. We will not be kept out of this chamber by thugs, mobs or threats. We will not bow to lawlessness or intimidation. We are back at our posts. We will discharge our duty under the Constitution and for our nation. And we're going to do it tonight.

This afternoon, Congress began the process of honoring the will of the American people and counting the Electoral College votes. We have fulfilled the solemn duty every four years for more than two centuries. Whether our nation has been at war or at peace, under all manner of threats, even during an ongoing armed rebellion and the Civil War, the clockwork of our democracy has carried on.

The United States and the United States Congress have faced down much greater threats than the unhinged crowd we saw today. We've never been deterred before, and we will not be deterred today. They tried to disrupt our democracy. They failed. They failed. They failed to attempt to obstruct the Congress. - This failed insurrection only underscores how crucial the task before us is for our republic. Our nation was founded precisely so that the free choice of the American people is what shapes our self-government and determines the destiny of our nation – not fear, not force, but the peaceful expression of the popular will.

Now, we assembled this afternoon to count our citizens' votes and to formalize their choice of the next president. Now we're going to finish exactly what we started. We'll complete the process the right way by the book. We'll follow our precedents, our laws and our Constitution to the letter. And we will certify the winner of the 2020 presidential election. Criminal behavior will never dominate the United States Congress. This institution is resilient. Our democratic republic is strong. - The American people deserve nothing less."

These were the words of Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell, who a year later, is strangely silent.  His refusal to continue to speak up leaves the Republican Party in the hands of liars and fascists.  Any Republican who doesn't join with Congresswoman Chaney in denouncing the defeated former president is an overt or covert ally of Gaetz, Greene, Boebert and the other right-wing nut-jobs now controlling the G.O.P.  They are, along with the January 6 insurrectionists, and those that inspired them, including the defeated former president, no less at fault than the Secessionists who fired on Fort Sumter in 1861.  Guantanamo Bay must be refurbished to house them all.

It is good, however, to see that President Biden at last seems to be giving up on the idea that he can be willing to compromise with, or at least talk to, those who oppose him and who even challenge his legitimacy as President.  If you hold a serpent to your breast, as the Aesop fable goes, you may be bitten fatally.  Better to not welcome it and possibly to even cage it.  And attempting to defang it can be dangerous.

Verbally, at least, Biden has started calling Republicans out for the un-democratic obstructionists they are.  He at last has started to blame his predecessor in office for his transgressions. Up to now, he has avoided mentioning him.  Now he does, as “the former president.”  I would prefer that he referred to him as “the defeated former president.”  In order to maintain majorities in both the Senate and the House, Biden must get much tougher and take off the gloves. As Maureen Dowd wrote the other day in the Times, “This is not a moment for punch-pulling.” 

And that goes for Kamala Harris as well.

 JL 

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Voting Rights, the Filibuster and the Constitution

I am certain that many Americans agree that first priority of Congress should be the passage of the John Lewis Voting Rights Act and the Freedom to Vote Act. They are the doors that must be opened, but the key to the lock on them is doing away with or modifying the filibuster. Without that, voting reform won't be passed. It is a poison pill to Republicans guaranteeing defeat for many of them so they universally oppose changing it. But the fact that the SCOTUS was able to weaken the 1965 Voting Act in 2013 in Shelby vs. Holder, strengthening States' ability to restrict voting, suggests that even such progressive legislation is not the final answer.

The "Founding Fathers," in order to get the Constitution ratified in 1789 bought the votes of Southern States by avoiding the slavery issue. Reversing that through the very demanding Amendment procedure was difficult (13th, 14th & 15th Amendments) and still allowed States to restrict voting in various ways throughout the ‘Jim Crow’ period even up to now.

Lurking behind this is the simmering need for a new Constitution to replace the patched-up 1789 document which gives far too much power to States, resulting from that trade-off regarding slavery. The existence of State laws regarding tax avoidance, guns and abortions are, for example, obvious results of this. It isn't just voting rights, but that's where it must start.

 JL 

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We Cannot Forget About Covid19 – Even in Florida

My layman’s approach to Covid19 testing, based on newspaper reports of a  Palm Beach County “positivity rate” ranging from 17% to 20%, is as follows: 

1.      In my opinion, those testing positive should maintain a quarantine period (five days is the latest CDC recommendation but ten is better, especially if Covid19 symptoms are present) and afterwards, should observe social distancing, avoid crowded public places, wear a mask and schedule a future test.  

2.      In my opinion, those untested should do the same, on the chance that they would be among that significant percentage which would have tested positive if they had been tested, but without the necessity of a quarantine period unless they had been in contact with an individual known to be infected or are manifesting symptoms. A test to confirm their status would be reassuring, but not an immediate necessity so long as they behave as if they were positive.  

3.       In my opinion, testing negatively should not be taken as a license to return to pre-pandemic behavior patterns, which would make one vulnerable to infection. 

4.  Florida Gov. DeSantis’ feels that the more people who are tested, the more will be found to be ‘positive,’ increasing the number of cases and justifying the arguments for masking mandates and vaccinations, both of which he does not support, preferring antibody treatments for those already sick. I liken this to discarding fire prevention measures and replacing them with more fire engines. Governor DeSantis and his Surgeon General are politically motivated educated imbeciles. Take pride in ignoring whatever they say.  And of course, in my opinion, the governor should be voted out of office in November.

 And if you are among those who like to cruise ...   

I wouldn’t vacation on a cruise ship at this time.  All the cruise lines are reporting positive Covid19 tests among passengers and crew  (all of whom are supposedly vaccinated or recently tested negatively) although the number of those infected is really miniscule compared to the number of people on the ship.  (The numbers in the letter below translate to about eight tenths of one percent.)  Nevertheless, so long as such susceptibility, however tiny, is present, masking and social distancing is being practiced on board these vessels.  Frankly, I wouldn’t enjoy being on a cruise ship and having to wear a mask when out of my stateroom. Takes all the fun out of it.  Here’s my letter to Palm Beach Post on this subject published about a week ago.

"COVID testing, masks and vaccines needed  -  -  - 

From what I have read, It is clear that vaccinations, while reducing the chance of COVID-19 infections and minimizing the disease’s severity for those infected, are not the equivalent of a negative COVID-19 test. The Dec. 21 Post article reports that 98% of the 48 passengers and crew who tested positive on a recent cruise ship, a minuscule number considering that there were over 6,000 passengers, and crew on board, were fully vaccinated. So long as vaccination is not 100% protective, wearing masks and social distancing in public places should still be practiced. Until frequent, inexpensive, self-administered COVID-19 testing becomes the rule, vaccinations are the best safeguard we have."

 

JL 

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Close the Portal

Local sports pages recently indicated that football players have transferred to Florida State University from the following colleges: Wisconsin, Illinois, Arizona State, Louisville, Oregon and Lamar (part of the Texas University System). It should make FSU alumni proud that these students felt that they could receive a better education at the Tallahassee college than they apparently were getting at the schools where they had been studying and chose to transfer.  

Of course, this is nonsense.  Academics have nothing whatsoever to do with it.  All colleges do it, but that doesn’t make it right. Colleges must abolish the “transfer portal” for athletic purposes, allowing “students” to switch schools.  Otherwise, all that we’ll have left will be the SEC, the Big Ten and the ACC, the only conferences which play to full stadiums, while the athletes they don’t hire, oops, I mean ‘need,’ find lesser ‘second choice’ schools to attend and play for.  The Big Twelve and the PAC12 are already stumbling.  Closing the portal would spread the top level ‘talent’ more widely and create more equality among college football teams.  True, it enables lesser schools to  pick up players originally drafted by the top schools, but who didn't work out well there, but the real benefit is in enabling better athletes, like the cream in the days before homogenized milk, to rise to the top.

Really, when one checks the colleges many NFL players attended, there are many from such lesser schools whom the NFL spots and drafts.  All the “transfer portal” accomplishes is enriching the already rich schools.  Rutgers quarterback Noah Vedral is a good example.  His one year at the University of Central Florida, two years at the University of Nebraska and two years at Rutgers illustrate the situation where the gridiron takes precedence over the library.  Adding to this tragedy is the presence of a similar “transfer portal” among high school athletes, particularly in backward parts of the country such as Florida.

 JL 

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1-6-2022 - Garland Speaks Out, Aaron Burr, James Madison and the Need for Urgency

Attorney General Garland to the Rescue ... We Hope

In a speech to Justice Department personnel on Wednesday, Attorney General Merrick Garland vowed to hold all those responsible for the Jan. 6 riot accountable — whether they were at the Capitol or committed other crimes surrounding the day’s events — saying investigators are methodically building more complicated and serious cases and would prosecute people “at any level.” 

 “The actions we have taken thus far will not be our last,” Garland said, speaking in the Justice Department’s Great Hall in an address that was broadcast live online and by cable news channels. “The Justice Department remains committed to holding all January 6th perpetrators, at any level, accountable under law — whether they were present that day or were otherwise criminally responsible for the assault on our democracy. We will follow the facts wherever they lead.”

This will probably cause many to lose sleep wondering if the facts would lead to them.  The trail goes through Steve Bannon and Marc Meadows and as the small-fry who invaded the Capitol, and also those who committed other acts, are apprehended, it will ultimately reach higher and higher.  This might cause some to "flip" and incriminate others or cause some to hunker down behind a wall of silence bolstered by legal maneuvers.  Democracy hangs in the balance, and it is but ten months until Election Day ... but Garland will be in office until 2024.

JL

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Treason Trial of a Former Vice President

Burr

Aaron Burr, Thomas Jefferson's former Vice President (and also the untried murderer of Alexander Hamilton, dueling being illegal in both NY and NJ at the time), was tried for treason in 1807 for doing less than what our defeated former president instigated on January 6, 2021 in an effort to remain in office.  Burr was merely training "troops" and planning an insurrection to set up a separate republic in the Southwest, but no one was killed and the Capitol wasn't invaded. Burr was acquitted since there was no 'overt act' comparable to what happened on January 6, 2021.  It would appear the Select Committee's seeking information on what happened in the White House that day is aimed at determining whether the defeated former president's behavior on that day did amount to an 'overt act.'

JL

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Think We Live in a Democracy? We Don't. 

At Least One 'Founding Father' Wanted it That Way

An opinion piece in the New York Times on January 3 was titled "The Republican Party Is Succeeding Because We Are Not a True Democracy."  Written by Jedediah Britton-Purdy, a professor of constitutional law at Columbia University, it points out the elitist aspect, historically, of American democracy.  An excerpt follows:

"James Madison boasted that the Constitution achieved “the total exclusion of the people, in their collective capacity.” Its elaborate political mechanics reflect the elite dislike and mistrust of majority rule that Madison voiced when he wrote, “Had every Athenian citizen been a Socrates, every Athenian assembly would still have been a mob.” Madison’s condescension has never gone away. 

Walter Lippmann, perhaps the most prominent intellectual of the short American Century, reckoned that citizens were ignorant, confused and emotional. Democracy brought “an intensification of feeling and a degradation of significance” to whatever it touched. If Madison and Lippmann could have seen the “QAnon Shaman” break into the Capitol, then meander around like a tourist whose phone has lost its signal, they would have muttered, “This is what democracy looks like.”

Democracy receded from the popular imagination during the blandly optimistic decades that followed the Cold War’s end around 1989. American leaders predicted that the world would inevitably come to embrace some combination of elections, capitalism and personal freedom. Serious thinking about what democracy meant, and what could threaten it, seemed more like intellectual history than practical politics. We live in the shipwreck of that unearned optimism."

Science fiction writer Isaac Asimov observed many years ago that there has always been a strong anti-scientific, anti-intellectual strain in this country, a "celebration of ignorance" as he put it, and that "democracy means that my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge." If that is what democracy means, would you opt out for some other form of government?  Is that why James Madison and Walter Lippmann felt the way they did?  

JL

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In Short Supply - Urgency

The many important issues occupying Congress all serve to divert the Democratic Party from doing TODAY what they should have done from DAY ONE, and that is figuring out how to maintain their control of both Houses of Congress and the White House.  And that requires legislation to guarantee voting rights of all citizens!  (The mail I get from my Congressperson deals with mundane, business-as-usual, matters and goes nowhere near that.)

Why must Shumer wait until January 17 to act? Every week counts. Even if voter rights legislation is passed tomorrow, it will take months to put it into effect and battle the lawsuits against it Republican-dominated States will surely initiate. Election Day is ten months away! The good things Americans have gained from Democratic legislation are not sufficiently dramatic to win votes. (Even Republicans who voted against them confuse the voters by claiming credit for them.)

There is only one job on the workbench for Democrats and those who wish to preserve democracy in America. Regardless of whether voting rights legislation is passed, it must be the mobilization of the votes needed to keep control of both Houses of Congress in November. As I have repeatedly said, that can be done only with a massive turn-out of voters, motivated by consistent Republican opposition to anything which might be of benefit to women and persons of color. These are the specific voters whom the Democratic Party must target to mobilize now! Not tomorrow. Now. Otherwise, democracy loses.

 

JL

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Prerequisites of Nationhood

I have always felt that there are certain prerequisites of nationhood which ought to be met if a country is to survive as a legitimate nation.  There is some flexibility in them but they are: (1) logical borders such as large bodies of water, deserts or mountain ranges (rivers do not qualify), (2) at least one language or ethnicity common to its inhabitants, (3) an economic base provided by plentiful natural resources, manufacturing, trading or financial acumen and finally, (4) a workable governmental structure to manage its operation. The failure of a nation to survive can sometimes be attributed to any one of the first three prerequisites, but the absence of the fourth makes failure a certainty. Whether it be autocratic or democratic, that structure must exist. It is the glue that holds any nation together, the alternative to anarchy. Our present crisis involves testing that fourth prerequisite in the United States.

 

JL

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Quoting Bari Weiss

Bari Weiss, in her blog “Common Sense,” said the following after mentioning Jonah Goldberg’s and Liz Cheney’s alienation from the rest of the G.O.P., now afraid to lose the votes of the followers of the loud-mouth, defeated, and soon to be disgraced, former president:

"What does it say about the state of the conservative movement and the Republican Party that these two conservative Republicans now find themselves at the periphery rather than at the center? Just as old-school liberals find themselves on the outs with the new, riotous left, so too classic conservatives are finding themselves out of step with a right-wing that seeks revolution rather than conservation."

Weiss is not too far right nor too far left.  

JL

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Coming Up Next Time Around

More about Covid19 and More about College Football's problems.

JL

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1-3-2022 New York Times Editorial

The following was published in the New York Times on January 1, 2022.  It was written by their Editorial Board.  It should be read by all Americans.  I have highlighted what I feel is the crux of its message.

JL

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One year after the smoke and broken glass, the mock gallows and the very real bloodshed of that awful day, it is tempting to look back and imagine that we can, in fact, simply look back. To imagine that what happened on Jan. 6, 2021 — a deadly riot at the seat of American government, incited by a defeated president amid a last-ditch effort to thwart the transfer of power to his successor — was horrifying but that it is in the past and that we as a nation have moved on.

This is an understandable impulse. After four years of chaos, cruelty and incompetence, culminating in a pandemic and the once-unthinkable trauma of Jan. 6, most Americans were desperate for some peace and quiet.

On the surface, we have achieved that. Our political life seems more or less normal these days, as the president pardons turkeys and Congress quarrels over spending bills. But peel back a layer, and things are far from normal. Jan. 6 is not in the past; it is every day.

It is regular citizens who threaten election officials and other public servants, who ask, “When can we use the guns?” and who vow to murder politicians who dare to vote their conscience. It is Republican lawmakers scrambling to make it harder for people to vote and easier to subvert their will if they do. It is Donald Trump who continues to stoke the flames of conflict with his rampant lies and limitless resentments and whose twisted version of reality still dominates one of the nation’s two major political parties.

In short, the Republic faces an existential threat from a movement that is openly contemptuous of democracy and has shown that it is willing to use violence to achieve its ends. No self-governing society can survive such a threat by denying that it exists. Rather, survival depends on looking back and forward at the same time.

Truly grappling with the threat ahead means taking full account of the terror of that day a year ago. Thanks largely to the dogged work of a bipartisan committee in the House of Representatives, this reckoning is underway. We know now that the violence and mayhem broadcast live around the world was only the most visible and visceral part of the effort to overturn the election. The effort extended all the way into the Oval Office, where Mr. Trump and his allies plotted a constitutional self-coup.

We know now that top Republican lawmakers and right-wing media figures privately understood how dangerous the riot was and pleaded with Mr. Trump to call a halt to it, even as they publicly pretended otherwise. We know now that those who may have critical information about the planning and execution of the attack are refusing to cooperate with Congress, even if it means being charged with criminal contempt.

For now, the committee’s work continues. It has scheduled a series of public hearings in the new year to lay out these and other details, and it plans to release a full report of its findings before the midterm elections — after which, should Republicans regain control of the House as expected, the committee will undoubtedly be dissolved.

This is where looking forward comes in. Over the past year, Republican lawmakers in 41 states have been trying to advance the goals of the Jan. 6 rioters — not by breaking laws but by making them. Hundreds of bills have been proposed and nearly three dozen laws have been passed that empower state legislatures to sabotage their own elections and overturn the will of their voters, according to a running tally by a nonpartisan consortium of pro-democracy organizations. 

Some bills would change the rules to make it easier for lawmakers to reject the votes of their citizens if they don’t like the outcome. Others replace professional election officials with partisan actors who have a vested interest in seeing their preferred candidate win. Yet more attempt to criminalize human errors by election officials, in some cases even threatening prison.

Many of these laws are being proposed and passed in crucial battleground states like Arizona, Wisconsin, Georgia and Pennsylvania. In the aftermath of the 2020 election, the Trump campaign targeted voting results in all these states, suing for recounts or trying to intimidate officials into finding “missing” votes. The effort failed, thanks primarily to the professionalism and integrity of election officials. Many of those officials have since been stripped of their power or pushed out of office and replaced by people who openly say the last election was fraudulent.

Thus the Capitol riot continues in statehouses across the country, in a bloodless, legalized form that no police officer can arrest and that no prosecutor can try in court.

This isn’t the first time state legislatures have tried to wrest control of electoral votes from their own people, nor is it the first time that the dangers of such a ploy have been pointed out. In 1891, President Benjamin Harrison warned Congress of the risk that such a “trick” could determine the outcome of a presidential election.

The Constitution guarantees to all Americans a republican form of government, Harrison said. “The essential features of such a government are the right of the people to choose their own officers” and to have their votes counted equally in making that choice. “Our chief national danger,” he continued, is “the overthrow of majority control by the suppression or perversion of popular suffrage.” If a state legislature were to succeed in substituting its own will for that of its voters, “it is not too much to say that the public peace might be seriously and widely endangered.”

A healthy, functioning political party faces its electoral losses by assessing what went wrong and redoubling its efforts to appeal to more voters the next time. The Republican Party, like authoritarian movements the world over, has shown itself recently to be incapable of doing this. Party leaders’ rhetoric suggests they see it as the only legitimate governing power and thus portrays anyone else’s victory as the result of fraud — hence the foundational falsehood that spurred the Jan. 6 attack, that Joe Biden didn’t win the election.

“The thing that’s most concerning is that it has endured in the face of all evidence,” said Representative Adam Kinzinger, one of the vanishingly few Republicans in Congress who remain committed to empirical reality and representative democracy. “And I’ve gotten to wonder if there is actually any evidence that would ever change certain people’s minds.”

The answer, for now, appears to be no. Polling finds that the overwhelming majority of Republicans believe that President Biden was not legitimately elected and that about one-third approve of using violence to achieve political goals. Put those two numbers together, and you have a recipe for extreme danger.

Political violence is not an inevitable outcome. Republican leaders could help by being honest with their voters and combating the extremists in their midst. Throughout American history, party leaders, from Abraham Lincoln to Margaret Chase Smith to John McCain, have stood up for the union and democracy first, to their everlasting credit.

Democrats aren’t helpless, either. They hold unified power in Washington, for the last time in what may be a long time. Yet they have so far failed to confront the urgency of this moment — unwilling or unable to take action to protect elections from subversion and sabotage. Blame Senator Joe Manchin or Senator Kyrsten Sinema, but the only thing that matters in the end is whether you get it done. For that reason, Mr. Biden and other leading Democrats should make use of what remaining power they have to end the filibuster for voting rights legislation, even if nothing else.

Whatever happens in Washington, in the months and years to come, Americans of all stripes who value their self-government must mobilize at every level — not simply once every four years but today and tomorrow and the next day — to win elections and help protect the basic functions of democracy. If people who believe in conspiracy theories can win, so can those who live in the reality-based world.

Above all, we should stop underestimating the threat facing the country. Countless times over the past six years, up to and including the events of Jan. 6, Mr. Trump and his allies openly projected their intent to do something outrageous or illegal or destructive. Every time, the common response was that they weren’t serious or that they would never succeed. How many times will we have to be proved wrong before we take it seriously? The sooner we do, the sooner we might hope to salvage a democracy that is in grave danger.

 

JL

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12-31-2021 - College Football, Covid19 Testing and Getting the DOJ and a Grand Jury Involved in the January 6 Insurrection

DOJ and a Grand Jury Needed

Professor Heather Cox Richardson recently pointed out in her blog, “Letters From an American,” that "Since the 1990s, Republicans have used violence and the news coverage it gets to gain through pressure what they could not gain through votes."

Democrats should have gotten the message in 2000 when Roger Stone (later a convicted and pardoned criminal) engineered the theft of Florida's electoral votes. They didn't, and still don't get it that Republicans don't play by the rules. For the sake of democracy, Democrats still do. They should start playing hardball by turning the whole investigation of what happened on January 6, 2021, over to the Department of Justice and a grand jury to speed criminal indictments where justified.

Attorney-General Garland

Why? Democrats will still control the DOJ until 2024, but they may lose the House (and the Select Committee investigating Jan. 6) in about ten months. A Congressional committee is not the best venue in which to bring about justice in regard to the possible traitors like Bannon, Navarro and ultimately, the former president. Such committees "investigate" with the aim of developing legislation, not bringing criminals to justice. The whole investigation must be moved to the DOJ quickly and that grand jury must be impaneled.

  JL

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Saving College Football and Some Dreaming

To keep college football from turning into little more than a farm system for the NFL, the first step must be to close the “transfer portal” which enables student-athletes to switch colleges with minimal, if any, waiting periods before they can play for their new school.  Any recipient of an athletic scholarship, or educational funding from any source supporting that college, must commit to staying there for at least four years and not playing football for any other school to which he transfers for any reason whatsoever or attends thereafter for graduate studies.

The NFL, in addition to looking to colleges for promising talent, should organize and subsidize semi-professional leagues with teams composed of talented former high school football players who would rather be paid to play immediately instead of enrolling in a college in order to continue playing football.  College players who give up their scholarships would be able to transfer to such semi-professional leagues, as would players after having attended a college for four years with an athletic scholarship.  Players in such semi-professional leagues, however, would not be eligible to play football if they later decide to enroll in a college.

Ideally, college football should be a sport in which college students compete with students from other colleges, with whoever wants to watch them play sitting in a venue enjoying the game.  It should not be a million-dollar business throughout the country, with coaches sometimes paid more than college presidents.  One side effect of this is the predominance of immigrant students, and children of immigrants, among our top academic achievers.  They, like the rest of the world’s students, don’t give a damn about competitive college sports … and it is showing up in our scientific and engineering communities where who wins the Toilet Bowl game this year doesn’t have any significance whatsoever.  

And while I'm on a football kick, let me complain about another thing besides the 'transfer portal' which is killing the sport, and this even extends to the NFL.  It's about tackling and fumbling.  The purpose of a tackle is to stop a runner from running or to stop a passer from passing.  A fumble is when for one reason or another, a runner or passer (or even a punter) loses control of the ball and drops it resulting in a pile-up to see who recovered it. The problem arises when the defending team loses sight of what tackling is all about. It seems that there is just as much emphasis on dislodging the ball as there is in stopping the runner or passer.  To me, it borders on playing 'dirty' and is more like street fighting than a competitive sport.  Striking at the ball instead of trying to stop the ball carrier or passer is worth a fifteen yard penalty in my book.  (They did it with head-butting with the steel-hard plastic of the helmet, intended as a protective device, not a weapon.  They call that 'targetting.')  But this is more 'dreaming' too, isn't it.

 JL

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Covid19 Testing

Covid19 isnt't going away so fast.

From a layman’s viewpoint, it appears to me that the increase in the number of the nation’s Covid19 “cases” is the result of an increased number of symptom-free people being tested and found to be infected.  Without such testing, they would not have been counted as a “case” and we wouldn’t be seeing such a big increase. 

From testing’s positivity rate, it would appear that in some parts of the country, at least 20% of the population (based on Florida's statistics), whether they know it or not, have been infected by the coronavirus.  All of them are contagious for a while, capable of spreading the virus to others, including the vaccinated to some extent.  

Those testing positive, after a brief quarantine period, (five days is the latest CDC recommendation) should observe social distancing, avoid crowded public places, wear a mask and schedule a future test.  Those untested should do the same, on the chance that they would be among that 20% which would have tested positive if they had been tested. 

Testing negatively should not be taken as a license to return to pre-pandemic behavior patterns, making one vulnerable to infection. Those politicians who oppose local and business masking mandates are allies of Covid19 and should be shunned and voted out of office.  They are contemptible.

 JL

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HAPPY NEW YEAR, EVERYONE!

 

  Jack

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12-29-21 - Three Quotes, Enid and Why Covid19 is Going into Extra Innings

 

Three Quotes Worth Reading

Gerson

A recent Washington Post carried a column by conservative columnist Michael Gerson headlined “If Report from January 6 is True, Will it Matter?”  You can read it by visiting https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/12/16/capitol-riot-committee-relevance-trump-voters/ or BY CLICKING HERE.

Knowing that some of you won’t do that, here are two salient quotes from the column, which points out that Trump’s G.O.P. support remains strong.

“In some ways, the GOP’s rank and file still holds the proxy for America.  The votes of Trump-alienated Republicans will eventually be required to deny him the 2024 G.O.P. presidential nomination or to seriously damage his reelection effort.  It is Republican tolerance for the intolerable that threatens American democracy.”

And further on in his column, Gerson quotes Congressman Jamie Raskin (D-MD) who in turn quoted Benjamin Franklin as saying “I have observed that wrong is always growing more wrong until there is no bearing it anymore.  And that right, however opposed, comes right at last.”

(Permit me to add that what Franklin observed can take a very, very long time to happen.  For it to occur sooner, there must be a massive Democratic turnout in 2022, despite Republican efforts to restrict voting opportunities.  This is made more difficult because Republicans in Congress are now proudly telling their constituents about the benefits Congress in now providing for them through the 'For the People' Act and at the same time, keeping quiet about the fact that every one of them voted against them!  But voters dumb enough to elect Republicans in the first place seem susceptible to such deceit.  That is the problem.)

Finally, here is a quote posted by me on Professor Heather Cox Richardson’s “Letters from an American,” in response to a complainer who thought Attorney General Garland was moving too slowly.  I wrote that: It is becoming more clear with each passing day that the former president is deserving of blame for the January 6 attack on the Capitol and the related efforts to affect the Constitutional process of confirming the electoral vote. The Attorney General is aware that taking action against those whose evidence might elevate the former president's apparent culpability to full responsibility would risk more violence, and that is why the DOJ is proceeding on tiptoes. I do not see how this can end well for the nation.

 JL

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Democracy Miscarries in Enid, Oklahoma

A New York Times piece published Dec. 26 carried the headline “First They Fought Over Masks, Then Over the Soul of a City.” It dealt with what is tearing America apart, using the example what happened in  Enid, Oklahoma, as an example.  You can read the article at https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/26/us/oklahoma-masks.html OR BY CLICKING HERE.

What struck me most about it was the close relationship between one side, the anti-maskers (who won out) and Protestant Christianity as practiced in the United States, and particularly in places like Enid, Oklahoma. These Americans fought for their beliefs with the violent fervor of the Crusaders who in other times trekked across Europe to free Jerusalem from Muslim control, who during the Reformation, resented a Church which took orders from a Pope in Rome, or even earlier, despised Jews for not accepting Jesus as the Messiah, instituting the Inquisition. Simply, they were unable to separate politics from religion.

This is the way they, and millions of Americans, seem to look not only at masking but also at every other change which has taken place in our country over the past century and earlier.  The pandemic only served as a focus for their fervor and brought it to a head.  It didn’t take long for Enid’s anti-masking vendetta to spread to other areas such as same sex-marriage, what books were read in the public schools and a resentment of the supposed equality which came to the nation after the Civil War.  Unsurprisingly, the antii-maskers were subsequently elected to a majority on the city's council.

That is not the way America works. That is why the Constitution forbids the establishment of a church in our nation and allows for change to occur through its Amendment process.  Those who are against change seem to forget than failure to change, when necessary, can be a greater failure than what they see as undesirable change.  But when the citizenry is incapable of separating the fervor which only religious beliefs can muster from their approach to social and political change as manifested in issues such as abortion and the teaching of American history in public schools, we are in trouble. 

Benjamin Franklin’s quote directly above, hits the nail on the head, but by the time right dominates over wrong, there may not be a United States any longer, merely a disunited bunch of States. And to the threat to democracy posed by Republican tolerance for the intolerable, pointed out by Michael Gerson (also reproduced above), I wonder if  we should be adding the fervent quasi-religious support these zealots bring to non-theological matters such as masking.

  JL

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The Headlines in Today’s (Dec. 28) Palm Beach Post, Say it All.  “COVID Skyrockets over Holiday – Palm Beach County Saw Almost 12,000 New Cases, Positivity Close to 21%, Test Lines Grow.”

Well, if 21% of the tests are positive, with even those without symptoms being counted among the new cases, that explains the big increase.  More testing ends up with more cases being reported.  

Nevertheless, a five-day quarantine (sufficient according to the CDC’s latest announcement) for all of them is suggested, along with masking and stricter social distancing.  In my opinion, that 21% number applies to the untested population as well, so my advice in the last posting of this blog (“The best way for those without symptoms to deal with the spreading variants of the coronavirus is to behave as if they had tested positive for them even though they weren’t tested!) still holds true. 

Looking at the other side of the coin, could it be that many of those without symptoms who are being tested are doing so to confirm that they are NOT infected, giving them some license to revert to pre-pandemic behavior, which could get them infected!  Would it be better for them to remain untested and behaving as if they were indeed infected?

Nevertheless, testing seems to be the key to curbing the spread of infection. Quoting from the Post’s article (by Jane Musgrave with contributions by Kimberly Miller):

“The demand for testing has increased, in part, because infections caused by the Omicron variant closely mirror symptoms of the common cold, *Bush said.  That is making even more people worry they may have contracted the deadly coronavirus that has already killed more than 813,000 people nationwide, including 62,389 in Florida.  Few people are now reporting loss of smell and taste, one of the hallmarks of the earlier variants, such as delta, Bush said. Instead, people are experiencing runny noses, sore throats, headaches and coughs – all symptoms of he common cold, he said.

Those with symptoms who are unwilling to wait in line or are unable to find a home testing kit should assume e they have COVID-19 and quarantine for at least ten days, *Bush said.

(This blog recommended that, acting as if they were ‘positive,’ two days ago, before the CDC’s reduction of the suggested quarantine to five days. The article went on to suggest that those who actually test positive should get monoclonal antibody treatment, but then added that two readily available approved therapies, including that antibody treatment, are not effective against the Omicron variant.  In fact, for that reason, some hospitals in the area have even stopped administering it.  There still is a lot of confusion regarding Covid19, even among professionals.)

*Dr. Larry Bush, an infectious disease specialist and a former president of the Palm Beach County Medical Society.

 

  JL

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 Why the Covid19 Pandemic is Going into Extra Innings?

Who's to Blame?

When I exchange Emails with an unvaccinated, unmasked neighbor, he frequently brings up evidence “proving” that the pandemic is a hoax, that the vaccine manufacturers are dishonest, that the vaccines themselves are dangerous, and so forth. This purported evidence includes opinions of faculty members at Harvard, Stanford and even at the University of Florida’s medical school. These “experts” are outliers, exceptions to the vast preponderance of the medical and scientific community and sometimes tied to libertarian political movements. An MD or PhD after their names doesn’t make what they say the truth.  But many people believe them.  Even some physicians.

Some attack vaccination because of the ability of the latest variants of Covid19 to bypass vaccinations to some extent. They claim this proves their point, even though infections of the vaccinated are milder than those infecting the unvaccinated.  

Many of these “scientists” gathered in 2020 in Barrington, Massachusetts, to produce the Barrington Declaration, expounding their ideas. Most scientific and medical organizations, including the World Health Organization, roundly denounced the Declaration’s views as fallacious and in fact, dangerous.  But that doesn’t stop all too many Americans from believing them.  

Magellan's Voyage of Discovery

For a long time after Magellan circumnavigated the earth, many still believed the earth was flat.  There are even a few, very few, even today who believe that it is.  Similarly, it cannot be denied that there is a body of research, condemned by most scientists, which is taken as the real truth by those who doubt the realities of the Covid19 pandemic and who do not trust the remedies science and medicine have developed to battle it. Occasionally when one is dying, he or she, or their families, experience a last-minute change of mind regarding vaccination and ask for it, too late.

That is why the Covid19 pandemic will be around for a long time, going into “overtime,” continuing to spread, and producing variants complicating the work of those developing vaccines.  Chiefly, it will be the fault of those who are unvaccinated, or who do not believe the pandemic exists, or if they do, believe in remedies which real scientists have found to be worthless such as Ivermectin, a 'de-wormer' used on horses and cattle.  

The contagion they will spread will be enough to keep Covid19 around a long time and will result in many hundreds of thousands of unnecessary deaths in the United States.  Most of them will be among the unvaccinated, a large percentage of whom might turn out to be Republicans. (The percentage of those not vaccinated is much higher in States that voted for the former president in 2020 than it is in States that voted for President Biden.)  I am not so cruel as to point out the political implications of this.

JL

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