Home Economy 2:00PM Water Cooler 2/21/2023 | bare capitalism

2:00PM Water Cooler 2/21/2023 | bare capitalism

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By Lambert Strether of Corrente.

Hen Track of the Day

I considered jackdaws due to Konrad Lorenz’s fantastic King Solomon’s Ring, which I learn after I was fairly younger (and unaware of Lorenz’s views on “social decline”).

Daurian Jackdaw, Bei Zha Forest Reserve Nangqian Qinghai, Qinghai, China. “Rain.” So much occurring right here, together with different birds and a barking canine. The clopping sound jogs my memory a horse’s hooves, however now I believe it’s simply raindrops beating on… What? The mike?

* * *

Politics

“However what’s authorities itself, however the best of all reflections on human nature?” –James Madison, Federalist 51

“Right here’s meals for thought, had Ahab time to suppose; however Ahab by no means thinks; he solely feels, feels, feels.” –Herman Melville, Moby Dick

“So most of the social reactions that strike us as psychological are in actual fact a rational administration of symbolic capital.” –Pierre Bourdieu, Classification Struggles

Biden Administration

“U.S. alerted Russia to Biden’s Ukraine go to for “deconfliction functions,” White Home says” [CBS]. • So I assume the air raid sirens had been a part of the photograph op? It will appear so:

And talking of photograph ops:

In the meantime, Dad’s pupils are the dimensions of dinner plates due to what they juiced him up with. Therefore the sun shades. So father and son share a bond.

* * *

Why is the Surgeon Basic of the USA utilizing his public workplace to shill for a personal firm?

Effectively, cash, in fact. So I assume I don’t imply “why.” I imply “how?”

2024

“Buttigieg unveils freight rail reforms in wake of East Palestine derailment” [The Hill]. • Nothing about Precision Scheduled Railroading. Or empowering unions. I’m shocked.

Republican Funhouse

“Unique: McCarthy offers Tucker Carlson entry to trove of Jan. 6 riot tape” [Axios]. “Home Speaker Kevin McCarthy has given Fox Information’ Tucker Carlson unique entry to 41,000 hours of Capitol surveillance footage from the Jan. 6 riot, McCarthy sources inform me. Carlson TV producers had been on Capitol Hill final week to start digging by way of the trove, which incorporates a number of digicam angles from throughout Capitol grounds. Excerpts will start airing within the coming weeks. Carlson has repeatedly questioned official accounts of 1/6 [the idea!!!] , downplaying the revolt as ‘vandalism.’” Was anyone really charged with revolt, a Federal crime? Did I not get the memo? Extra: “Now his exhibits — ‘Tucker Carlson Tonight’ on Fox Information, and “Tucker Carlson In the present day” and “Tucker Carlson Originals” on the streaming service Fox Nation — have an enormous trove of uncooked materials. Carlson informed me: ‘[T]right here was by no means any legit purpose for this footage to stay secret.’ ‘If there was ever a query that’s within the public’s curiosity to know, it’s what really occurred on January 6. . It’s unattainable for me to know why any sincere individual can be bothered by that.” • There’s no “by definition.” Digital proof is just not proof. Here’s a chart on the 1/6 costs:

I don’t see “revolt.”

Democrats en Déshabillé

Affected person readers, plainly persons are really studying the back-dated put up! 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 Occasion (“the Democrat Occasion is a rotting corpse that may’t bury itself”) to a separate, back-dated put up, 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 Occasion is, in actual fact, a tough drawback. I do suppose the paragraph that follows is on level all the best way 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 Hear, 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 solely) these components comprise a community — a Flex Web? An iron octagon? — of funders, distributors, apparatchiks, electeds, NGOs, and miscellaneous mercenaries, with belongings within the press and the intelligence group.

Notice, in fact, that the category energy of the PMC each expresses and is restricted 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.

* * *

“Sanders targets drug firms over COVID-19 vaccine worth hikes, excessive prescription prices” [CBS]. • Most cancers surgeon goes into the bandaid enterprise. It’s pathetic.

“Blueing Kansas” [The American Conservative]. “The left believes that mass voter registration campaigns improve election turnout and that top turnout results in Democratic victories. The trick is getting hundreds of thousands of disengaged eligible voters on the voter rolls in key states, a feat requiring a military of activists and an ocean of cash. The left has each. The highest 24 leftist voter registration nonprofits spent an estimated $434 million in 2020 alone, a lot of which got here from foundations of ‘progressive’ mega donors sharing the final identify ‘basis.’… However that’s simply the tip of the iceberg. The left excels at working within the shadows, using refined speaking factors and mobilization methods to deceive voters into believing these causes are grassroots. The reality is that it’s the identical drained, cynical politics People are sick to dying of.” • I believe these guys have the NGOs confused with the left. Are they actually that dumb?

#COVID19

Seems to be like “leveling off to a excessive plateau” throughout the board. (I nonetheless suppose “One thing Terrible” is coming, nonetheless. I imply, apart from what we already find out about.) Keep secure on the market!

• Readers, because the nationwide information techniques in the USA are being vandalized, let’s begin accumulating hyperlinks to state information, too. If readers would ship me hyperlinks (see Plant under) to their favourite State and native dashboards/wastewater websites, that might be nice. Canadians, too! Or depart a hyperlink in Feedback.

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

Sources, United States (Native): CA (dashboard); CO (wastewater); CT (dashboard); IL (wastewater); IN (dashboard); MA (wastewater); MD (dashboard); ME (dashboard); MI (wastewater; wastewater); MT (dashboard); NC (dashboard); NH (wastewater); NY (dashboard); OH (dashboard); SC (dashboard); TX (dashboard); VA (dashboard); VT (dashboard); WA (dashboard; dashboard); WI (wastewater).

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

Hat tricks to useful readers: Art_DogCT, CanCyn, ChiGal, Gumbo, hop2it, JB, Joe, John, JM (2), JW, Michael King, LaRuse, mrsyk, otisyves, Petal (5), RK, nRL, RM, Rod. (Readers, I’m not placing your deal with subsequent to your contribution as a result of I hope and anticipate the listing will probably be lengthy, and I would like it to be straightforward to scan. (Should you depart your hyperlink in feedback, I take advantage of your deal with. Should you ship it to me by way of electronic mail, I take advantage of your initials (within the absence of a deal with.)

• Extra like this, please! Whole: 1 6 11 18 20/50 (40%). Can anybody discover RI? Additionally, we should always listing states that don’t have Covid sources, so others don’t look fruitlessly. Thanks!

* * *

Search for the Helpers

I ought to do that extra typically:

Though I do advocate for sprays, and present them to folks.

* * *

“Covid Meetups” [COVID MEETUPS (JM)]. “A free service to search out people, households and native companies/providers who take COVID precautions in your space.” • I performed round with it some. It appears to be Fb-driven, sadly, however you need to use the Listing with out logging in. I get rational hits from the U.S., however not from London, UK, FWIW.

Covid Is Airborne

Many individuals appear to have actual issues grokking the concept of a number of layers of safety:

Perhaps this one factor doesn’t must be — can’t be — the entire reply? The place does this mentality come from? (Any New Englander is aware of you layer up within the winter, and never all days demand the identical quantity or sort of layers. However certainly precept is normal?)

Far UV unboxing:

However:

That’s a protracted wait and some huge cash.

Variants

Variant soup:

Sequelae

“Lengthy COVID charges fall by half nationwide, New England charges amongst lowest” [Connecticut Public Radio]. “The variety of folks reporting lengthy COVID signs fell by roughly half from final summer time to 1 in 10, in line with new information from the Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention’s (CDC) Family Pulse Survey, analyzed by Kaiser Household Basis (KFF)…. Researchers couldn’t pinpoint whether or not lengthy COVID charges had been definitively linked to the variant, vaccination and boosters or fewer exterior pandemic pressures – social isolation and loneliness. Venkatesh theorized that it’s most definitely a mix… ‘It’s constructive findings that the odds are reducing,’ [Dr. Ulysses Wu, an infectious disease expert at Hartford Hospital] mentioned. ‘However we nonetheless wish to stop folks from getting COVID. And one of the best ways to assist along with your lengthy COVID is to not get COVID to start with.’ Wu expects lengthy COVID charges to extend if COVID charges begin to climb.”

“Lengthy Covid Is a Incapacity. Right here’s The way to Ask for Office Lodging.” [Wall Street Journal]. “Many individuals with lengthy Covid are legally entitled to lodging at work to assist them do their jobs. Nonetheless, some are discovering it arduous to ask for assist…. [T]he onus is often on staff to make the case for assist. However coming clear on the restrictions posed by lengthy Covid is tough for a lot of…. In 2021, the federal authorities clarified that lengthy Covid could possibly be thought-about a incapacity beneath the People with Disabilities Act (ADA). Lengthy-Covid signs and severity can differ drastically. Individuals with lengthy Covid incessantly expertise extraordinary ranges of fatigue, which could be worsened by exertion, cognitive impairment, nervous-system dysfunction, in addition to vascular, respiratory and immune-system points. Between 7.7 million and 23 million People have lengthy Covid, in line with a November report by the U.S. Division of Well being and Human Companies. In circumstances the place the circumstances restrict not less than one main life exercise, the required lodging may be momentary or everlasting, relying on every employee’s case.”

Elite Malfeasance

What an act of civic vandalism:

Plainly elites don’t actually wish to return to the Eighteen Nineties:

Extra just like the 1490s.

* * *

Case Knowledge

BioBot wastewater information from February 21:

For now, I’m going to make use of this nationwide wastewater information as the very best proxy for case information (ignoring the medical case information portion of this chart, which in my opinion “goes dangerous” after March 2022, for causes as but unexplained). At the very least we will spot tendencies, and examine present ranges to equal previous ranges.

Positivity

From the Walgreen’s take a look at positivity tracker, printed February 21:

-0.5%. Nonetheless on the excessive plateau, equal to earlier peaks.

Deaths

Demise price (Our World in Knowledge):

Whole: 1,142,704 – 1,142,595 = 109 (109 * 365 = 39,785 deaths per yr, at present’s YouGenicist™ quantity for “residing with” Covid (fairly a bit increased than the minimizers would love, although they will discuss themselves into something. If the YouGenicist™ metric retains chugging alongside like this, I may must resolve that is what the powers-that-be think about “mission achieved” for this specific tranche of dying and illness). Effectively, the overall wasn’t 192 once more. Not that I really feel higher about it.

It’s good that for deaths I’ve a easy, every day chart that simply retains chugging alongside, in contrast to every little thing else CDC and the White Home are screwing up or letting go darkish, good job. (Although CDC could also be jiggering the numbers quickly. Decrease, naturally.)

Lambert right here: Lowest stage in awhile. Though we’ve seen this earlier than.

• I confess I’ve not mastered the surplus deaths statistics. Then once more, the chart above begins at zero. And it’s not at zero now, is it? Take Germany for instance:

And so:

Effectively, maybe not the inhabitants stage. Some are fairly happy, making good cash, constructing their bunker, and so on.

• And mortality charges. Take the UK for instance:

Stats Watch

There aren’t any official statistics of curiosity at present.

* * *

The Bezzle: “Chatbots set off subsequent misinformation nightmare” [Axios]. “New generative AI instruments like OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Microsoft’s BingGPT and Google’s Bard which have stoked a tech-industry frenzy are additionally able to releasing an unlimited flood of on-line misinformation.” You say that prefer it’s a foul factor. Extra: “Generative AI applications like ChatGPT don’t have a transparent sense of the boundary between truth and fiction. They’re additionally inclined to creating issues up as they attempt to fulfill human customers’ inquiries…. At Microsoft, person suggestions is taken into account a key part to creating ChatGPT work higher…. ‘The problem for an finish person is that they might not know which reply is right, and which one is totally inaccurate,’ Chirag Shah, a professor on the Data Faculty on the College of Washington, informed Axios.” • If certainly there may be one right reply. A lot of the vital questions in life aren’t answerable (What’s love? What’s consciousness? Why will we sleep? Why will we die?).

Tech: Syntax vs. semantics:


* * *

In the present day’s Concern & Greed Index: 64 Greed (earlier shut: 67 Greed) [CNN]. One week in the past: 72 (Greed). (0 is Excessive Concern; 100 is Excessive Greed). Final up to date Feb 21 at 12:36 PM ET.

Feral Hog Watch

I simply bought Neal Stephenson’s newest doorstop of a e-book, Termination Shock, as a result of within the first few passages the Queen of the Netherlands, who’s piloting her non-public airplane, is diverted from Houston to Waco as a result of the air is a too scorching, and crashes right into a sounder of feral hogs who’re crossing the ACT runway as she’s touchdown. I rejected the choice, Kim Stanley Robinson’s The Ministry of The Future, even when it does point out MMT, as a result of after I opened it and skim a couple of random paragraphs, the central bankers had been good guys doing the fitting factor. I’ve a giant pile of books to assessment, and Stephenson’s is considered one of them. Perhaps he regained his Snow Crash contact?

The Gallery

Little cubes besides in wallpaper, in 1902:

Cloisonnism, however not in Tahiti.

Healthcare

“Third affected person freed from HIV after receiving virus-resistant cells” [Nature]. “A 53-year-old man in Germany has turn out to be not less than the third individual with HIV to be declared cleared of the virus after a process that changed his bone marrow cells with HIV-resistant stem cells from a donor. For years, antiretroviral remedy (ART) has been given to folks with HIV with the purpose of reducing the virus to virtually undetectable ranges and stopping it from being transmitted to different folks. However the immune system retains the virus locked up in reservoirs within the physique, and if a person stops taking ART the virus can start replicating and spreading. A real remedy would remove this reservoir, and that is what appears to have occurred for the newest affected person, whose identify has not been launched. The person, who’s being known as the ‘Düsseldorf affected person’, stopped taking ART in 2018 and has remained HIV-free since. The stem-cell method concerned was first used to deal with Timothy Ray Brown, sometimes called the Berlin affected person. In 2007, he had a bone marrow transplant, through which these cells had been destroyed and changed with stem cells from a wholesome donor, to deal with acute myeloid leukaemia. The crew treating Brown chosen a donor with a genetic mutation known as CCR5Δ32/Δ32, which prevents the CCR5 cell-surface protein from being expressed on the cell floor. HIV makes use of that protein to enter immune cells, so the mutation makes the cells successfully immune to the virus. After the process, Brown was capable of cease taking ART and remained HIV-free till his dying in 2020. In 2019, researchers revealed that the identical process appeared to have cured the London affected person, Adam Castillejo. And, in 2022, scientists introduced that they thought a New York affected person who had remained HIV-free for 14 months may additionally be cured, though researchers cautioned that it was too early to make sure.” • Bone marrow transplants aren’t for everybody….

Our Famously Free Press

“The Supreme Court docket might change the legal responsibility recreation for web companies. Right here’s how” [Yahoo Finance]. “A 1996 regulation that’s credited and criticized for legally immunizing interactive web sites — like YouTube (GOOG) (GOOGL), Fb, Instagram (META), and Twitter — that average, and chorus from moderating, posts made by third events, is about to face a problem earlier than the U.S. Supreme Court docket. The underside line: the case, relying on the result, might overhaul the dangers of recommending on-line social content material. On Tuesday, the excessive court docket is scheduled to listen to arguments in Gonzalez v. Google, which questions conflicting appellate court docket interpretations of Part 230 of the 1996 Communications Decency Act. The regulation, typically cited as containing the ’26 phrases that created the web,’ supported fast proliferation of interactive web sites by shielding them from obligation for harms third get together content material could trigger. In Gonzalez, relations and the property of Nohemi Gonzalez, a 23-year-old U.S. citizen killed in a December 2015 ISIS capturing at Paris’ La Belle Equipe bistro, argue that Google must be held not less than partially chargeable for her dying. That’s as a result of, they allege, the corporate’s YouTube service knowingly permitted and really helpful, by way of algorithms, inflammatory ISIS-created movies that allegedly performed a key function in recruiting the attackers.” • I believe outlawing advice algorithms can be swell. Then my timeline can be solely from accounts I subscribe to, in reverse chronological order, like God meant (and the way it was within the blogosphere). By some means, nonetheless, I doubt that the Court docket will come to such a rational choice when there are such a lot of different alternatives to make new regulation.

Class Warfare

“LABOR ACTION TRACKER 2022” [ILR Worker Institute]. “We have now created a complete database of strikes throughout the USA as a result of official information sources solely report a small fraction of this exercise. Since funding cuts by the Reagan administration within the early-Nineteen Eighties, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) excludes work stoppages of lower than 1,000 staff from its database. As this report demonstrates, solely recording very massive work stoppages excludes the overwhelming majority of strike exercise and leaves practitioners, policymakers, and students misinformed concerning the true stage of office battle. Strikes stay an vital supply of labor activism and, not less than compared to 2021, have elevated in salience. On this report, we comply with the lead of the BLS and doc work stoppages, which embrace each strikes and lockouts.” • Useful, interactive map:

“The reply to the East Palestine catastrophe: Railroad staff’ management over security and dealing circumstances” [WSWS]. “Railroaders have been warning concerning the circumstances that resulted within the derailment for years. They embrace the influence of Precision Scheduled Railroading and related attendance schemes, infinite cost-cutting by the railroads, an enormous discount within the dimension of the nationwide workforce, and a rest of inspection and upkeep. These have made the trains ticking time bombs. All of us knew that one thing like this was certain to occur. The truth is, it occurs on daily basis, the place on common there are three derailments in the USA…. The catastrophe is a direct consequence of Congress’ ban on our hanging. The circumstances on the railroads have been decaying for years. We wished to battle for higher and safer circumstances, satisfactory staffing and upkeep. However the authorities determined that the revenue pursuits of the railroads are extra sacred than our democratic proper to strike and even the fitting of the general public to a secure and wholesome surroundings.” • Actually odd that that Lever Information and a refrain of liberals instantly centered on technical options….

“America’s afternoon afterthought” [Vox]. After-school care. “A nationwide survey of suppliers carried out by Edge Analysis on the finish of 2021 discovered half of respondents had been ‘extraordinarily involved’ about hiring employees and staffing shortages. One other nationwide survey led in the summertime of 2022 by the EdWeek Analysis Heart discovered related outcomes: Recruiting and retaining employees had been by far the highest challenges college principals and after-school leaders reported. Many say throughout the Covid-19 pandemic and hasn’t returned.” • Perhaps the “pool” “evaporated” as a result of the employees died. Or bought lengthy Covid. Or determined that they didn’t wish to work in an surroundings saturated with deadly pathogens. Or — one hopes — went on to earn more money at higher jobs (unhappy to say. Hey, perhaps we might use jail labor. Or ex-military. Perhaps cops who bought fired?

From The Black Swan, apparently:

I don’t suppose Marx sees class as pushed by psychological elements, and that on the society stage, so-called “luck” is a operate of 1’s class place — i.e., the sources one has to acknowledge and benefit from luck — looks as if an unexceptionable proposition. Nevertheless, this quote does throw a sidelight on catastrophe capitalism.

“Suppose Ambitiously on Behalf of the Poor” [Peste]. “After I completed medical college, I made a decision I wished to dedicate myself to supporting the poor in my nation. I selected to remain in Sierra Leone, and I’m grateful that I did, as a result of in 2014, I used to be capable of work carefully with Dr. Paul Farmer throughout the Ebola outbreak. And all through our time working collectively, I discovered a lot from him. I partnered with PIH as a result of I believed of their mission: to supply a preferential possibility for the poor in well being care. We spent years slowly rising our work and offering extra entry to look after the poorest folks in Kono. Paul taught me early in our relationship to suppose ambitiously on behalf of the poor folks I used to be serving. …. Paul as soon as informed me that not being bold means not contemplating the poor. He provides that when you ask the poor and weak about what sort of healthcare they need, they may all say they need the very best well being care doable for anybody on the planet. It’s the identical I’d need for my household. Due to this fact, prime quality healthcare must be out there for all on the planet, no matter the place you reside or how a lot cash you’ve got.”

Information of the Wired

“The way to Begin Your Weblog in 2023” [Yury Molodtsov]. ” Having your personal platform allows flexibility and portability, so your content material could be stored on-line virtually perpetually. There are a lot of choices on the market, starting from WordPress and Ghost to static blogs to managed on-line platforms and Micro.weblog. How do you select between them?” • For some, the blogosphere by no means went away. Perhaps it’ll revive once more?

“DYEP? (Do You Even Philosophy?” [SENTENTIAE ANTIQUAE]. Seneca, Ethical Epistle 15.2-3: “The thoughts is sick with out philosophy. The physique too, even when it possesses nice power, stays no completely different from the power of a person in rage or insanity. So, look after the well being of the primary particularly, after which the second, which won’t be arduous for you, if you wish to be properly.”

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Contact info for crops: Readers, be at liberty to contact me at lambert [UNDERSCORE] strether [DOT] corrente [AT] yahoo [DOT] com, to (a) learn the way to ship me a examine in case you are allergic to PayPal and (b) to learn the way to ship me pictures of crops. Greens are advantageous! Fungi and coral are deemed to be honorary crops! If you’d like your deal with to seem 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 ChiGal:

ChiGal writes: “Yay, snow drops!” Life is skittles, and life is beer…

Including, I hope this hasn’t occurred to any readers:


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