COVID-19 Archives - Page 8 of 9 - Ramblin' with Roger

May rambling: Mount St. Helens + 40

Many per capitas

U.S’s oldest living WWII veteran celebrates his 110th birthday. Sometimes, when people talk to Lawrence Brooks, he has to tell them “there’s no need to yell, I can hear you just fine.”

Conservative victimhood complex has made America impossible to govern.

John Pavlovitz Official YouTube channel, including An Honest Conversation About Disciples of the MAGAChurch.

You Can Have A Black Friend, Partner, Or Child And Still Be Racist.

Leonard Pitts: When a child goes missing, you call the police. You don’t grab a gun and try to push your way into the wrong house.

Larry Kramer obituary: American playwright, author and Aids activist best known for The Normal Heart.

Jelle’s Marble Runs, sponsored by LastWeekTonight with John Oliver, starts again June 21.

Ken Osmond & Eddie Haskell & Insincerity As an American Art Form.

I was aware that Phyllis George, who recently died at age 70, had been crowned Miss America in September 1970. The pageant was a whole lot more culturally relevant then than it’s been this century. Still, I was surprised when she became a sportscaster in 1974, and joined the cast of The NFL Today a year later. She was a trailblazer, and many women now cover major sports in the United States.

Mount St. Helens, 40 years later.

Messed up things you never noticed in your favorite ’80s movies by Mick Martin.

Mark Evanier is now interviewing tons of his friends on his YouTube channel, including Cheri Steinkellner, Scott Shaw!, Paul Levitz, and a Cartoon Voices Panel.

Catherine O’Hara: The Queen of Schitt’s Creek.

Top TV ratings from 1951-2019.

Former White House employee who served 11 presidents dies of coronavirus at 91. Wilson Roosevelt Jerman, who began working at the White House in 1957.

Trevor Noah and The Daily Show Aren’t Just Surviving—They’re Thriving.

COVID-19

100,000 dead in America and Earlier Lockdowns Could Have Saved 36,000 Lives.

Universal Testing Is the Answer to Social Distancing.

Inflamed brains, toe rashes, strokes: Why the weirdest symptoms are only emerging now.

Huge Study Throws Cold Water on Antimalarials such as hydroxychloroquine; Remdesivir Data — “Not a panacea” or a “cure-all”, seems more effective when given to patients who weren’t as severely ill.

Masks, Men, and the Exhausting Pursuit of Desperate Masculinity.

JESUS IS MY VACCINE has a millennum-long history rooted in anti-Semitism.

Amy Biancolli: faith, fear of death, and fatheads.

Me and we: Individual rights, common good, and coronavirus.

I Think You May Be Wasting Freedom.

Getting richer during the pandemic.

Double bubble buddies: How to choose the first household you’ll socialize with. SO Canadian.

New Zealand went from Level 4 to Level 2 lockdown, and Arthur reports it all.

Alas, the last of the posts from Notes From The Pandemic.

Donnybrook

Running America ‘Like A Business’ Is A Road To Ruin.

How he became the GOP’s ‘new normal’

Many per capitas.

He tried to troll Michigan’s Secretary of State on voting laws. It didn’t end well for him.

Nine Questions For The White House Physician On His Use Of Hydroxychloroquine.

He Has No Endgame.

Promoting Posts From Racist and Sexist Twitter Feed.

It Shouldn’t Take A Disaster For Us to Recognize a Disaster.

Fortunately, there is the Environmental Protection Network.

Distraction – Randy Rainbow.

Now I Know

The Poison Squad and The Silvonze Medalists and Music in the Key of K and The Speed Trap That Trapped Itself and Les Gardiens de Zoo Accidentels and The Big Brick Loophole.

MUSIC

This Too Shall Pass – Mike Love with John Stamos.

You Can Close Your Eyes – James Taylor and family.

At Times Like These – Live Lounge Allstars.

Mother – Roger Waters.

Symphony No. 50, Mount St. Helens, by Alan Hovhaness.

Coverville 1309: Tributes to Kraftwerk and Little Richard and 1310: The Devo Cover Story III.

Overture and incidental music from Rosamunde, by Franz Schubert.

Shakespeare In Love composed by Stephen Warbeck.

RIP: JIMMY COBB, LEGENDARY JAZZ DRUMMER (1929-2020).

Wrong Hands: This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 3.0 Unported License.

Open up houses of worship?

some church music

open the church doors Catbird asked me a question:

I just saw da prez say he’d overrule governors if they didn’t open up houses of worship this weekend. A legal analyst in the same BBC broadcast said he had no constitutional or legal authority to do this.

I suppose said houses of worship will decide for themselves.

I know you’re actively involved in your church, so I’m interested in your opinion on whether God cares WHERE people pray.

My understanding is that even in the strictest of interpretations it doesn’t matter more THAT one prays than where one does it.

What do you think?

My first response, I’m afraid, was lacking in Christian charity.

I will say that whoever has been advising “da prez” on these things has picked the confluence of several religious traditions. Shavuot, the Feast of Weeks or Pentecost in the Jewish tradition, is May 28-30. The Christian iteration of Pentecost is May 31. Ramadan ended the evening of May 23 for Muslims. And of course, Memorial Day begins the secular religion of the barbecue.

But, of course, it is false piety on his part. He can’t mandate it, but that’s not the point. He’s stirred up the base. “These are places that hold our society together and keep our people united. “The people are demanding to go to church and synagogue, go to their mosque,” he said.

Sure you can theoretically bring churches/synagogues/mosques back, with 10 people, socially distant, masks. Maybe more people in cathedrals and larger structures. No way you safely have a traditional choir. At my church, online services even offer the opportunity for communion.

Connecting remotely

I found this posted by a choir director of mine from a quarter-century ago. He quoted Tom Trenney, Minister of Music at First-Plymouth Congregational Church in Lincoln, NE. “Our church is open. Open to patience and wisdom. Open to science and common sense. Open to discovering new ways to connect when it is unsafe to ‘do it the way we’ve always done it.’

“Open to saving lives by giving up some of the traditions and sacraments we hold dear. Open to wearing masks to show we love our neighbor. Open to keeping the sanctuary closed so more of us can come back together safely when it is time. Our church is open to following Jesus who, himself, spent time in the wilderness. We will remain open, and someday, by the grace of God, we will be able to worship together again.”

Or, as someone else noted recently, “If the only place you can worship your god is in a building specially built for it, you have a very small god.”

Obviously, we need some church music:

Date to Church – the Replacements
I Met Her In Church – the Box Tops
Church – Lyle Lovett

And some more religion tunes:

Have a Talk with God – Stevie Wonder
Down to the River to Pray – Alison Krauss
Wayfaring Stranger – Rhiannon Giddens
Personal Jesus – Depeche Mode
(What If God Was) One of Us? – Joan Osborne

Maybe a service:
Zoom Church – Saturday Night Live

Risk in the midst of a pandemic

There is a cost/benefit analysis in opening up the country in the midst of a pandemic. Donald Trump (R-now of FL) and Governor Andrew Cuomo (D-NY) both acknowledge it. We’re dealing with a risk assessment. The more people go out, the greater the risk. So the logical person would be engaged in what is known as risk mitigation.

But because the people in the United States seem to live in different realities, this has become very difficult. As an editorial in Axios noted: “Far from being the unifying force other catastrophes have been, the COVID-19 pandemic is tearing a divided America — and world — further apart.”

Former President George W. Bush released a video urging national unity in fighting this coronavirus pandemic. “Let us remember how small our differences are in the face of this shared threat… We rise or fall together, and we are determined to rise.” While I personally applauded the effort of someone I never voted for, it wasn’t universally appreciated. The tweeter-in-chief, for instance, whined that W should have spoken up to defend him during the impeachment event.

Mask averse

Governor Mike DeWine (R-OH) has been a reasonable voice in this discussion. He has recommended masks, but won’t require them because he says it goes too far for his citizenry. Also in Ohio, a lawmaker refuses to wear a mask because God?

Stillwater, OK rescinded its mask requirement because of the pushback. And a restaurant in Texas FORBIDS masks being worn by their employees.

I understand the tension between being safe and going back to normal, between complete lockdown and or doing nothing at all. Perhaps the restrictions have made people crazy. In what civilized society does someone wipe his nose on an employee’s shirt? Or push someone into a fountain? Or shoot someone in the head? The victims’ crimes? Asking people to engage in physical distancing behavior such as wearing a mask! A couple of teenage employees were shot because the McDonald’s dining room was closed. We’re in screwed-up territory. And we’re screwing ourselves.

I had foolishly, it appears, believed that when people went out, they would engage in appropriate social distancing and take reasonable precautions. Pictures of crowded beaches belie that theory. Polling suggests that many people rejected the number of the sick and the dead, including a significant one. They certainly dismiss as untrue projections a month out. Perhaps, as a result, anywhere between a sixth and one-third of the populace are already deciding not to get a vaccine when it becomes available.

Like it’s 2016

The Boston Globe reports that it’s memes, text chains, and online conspiracies that have fueled coronavirus protesters and discord. This is similar to what took place in 2016. “Only this time, the online manipulation campaigns… could be deadly.”

We can have disagreements about what’s the appropriate course of action. My friend David Brickman makes a modest proposal about New York’s reopening. “Where will art museums and galleries fit into this plan?” He thinks they should be among the first businesses to reopen, in part because many small museums or galleries could easily maintain social distancing protocols.

But these are not just differences of opinion I’m seeing in America. It’s nearly civil war at a time when we should have a common enemy, COVID-19. We’ll see very soon how the virus is winning, and we’re all losing.

More COVID Linkage

CDC Guidance for Reopening Is Deep-Sixed by the White House.

More Cases Among Viewers Of Fox News Host Who Downplayed Pandemic.

Not An Emergency Once He Found Out Who Was Dying.

How He Left the Country Dangerously Unprepared.

To understand the danger of outbreaks in meatpacking plants, look at the industry’s history.

Does Anyone Still Want to Be a Doctor?

A Guide to Reading Facial Expressions Behind Protective Masks.

‘Sadness’ and Disbelief From a World Missing American Leadership.

How to Avoid Burnout in the Middle of a Pandemic.

7 Ways Travel Will Change for the Better in a Post-Pandemic World

Read NOTES FROM THE PANDEMIC.

Plandemic: one of those Internet things

Can’t I just ignore it?

techniques of science denial — From a Creative Commons license

Recently, I repeatedly kept seeing a reference to a video called Plandemic. I have not viewed it. Mostly, the message is “See it before THEY take it down again.” The video has reached cult status. It’s like the outlaws in the Wild West. Or the gangsters like Bonnie and Clyde in the 1920s and 1930s America. Plandemic has achieved, it seems, folk hero status.

So much so that Forbes has posted a piece by Tara Haelle called “Why It’s Important To Push Back On ‘Plandemic’—And How To Do It.”

Plandemic interviews a scientist who was appropriately discredited for scientific misconduct and fraud. [Judy Mikovits] is a known, established anti-vaccine advocate (despite her denial in the film), and she presents a long list of unsupported statements that involve COVID-19, various vaccines, HIV/AIDS, Anthony Fauci, pharmaceutical company collusion and other elements of an elaborate, long-running cover-up. It’s a doozy, checking nearly every box in the long list of conspiracy theories and disinformation circulating about the coronavirus.

Politifact fact-checked eight of Mikovits’ most misleading claims in the film. It’s one of several links debunking the video in the Forbes piece.

Ubitquitous

Forbes asks: “Why is this video suddenly everywhere? Why are so many drawn to it?” And answers it:

First, it taps into people’s uncertainty, anxiety, and need for answers—common reasons anyone is attracted to a conspiracy theory. Second, it is packaged very professionally and uses common conventions people already associate with factual documentaries. Third, it successfully exploits ancient but extremely effective methods of persuasion.

Oh, and why is it being removed? YouTube keeps taking it down because it violates community guidelines for false and misleading information.

Someone named ZDoggMD reacts to the “crazy” viral video. He says, “Don’t waste your time watching it. Don’t waste your time sharing it. Don’t waste your time talking about it.”

Forbes takes a different tactic: “Why should I bother saying anything at all? Can’t I just ignore it?”

Conspiracy theories like those in this video are actively, directly harmful, and dangerous. They can influence people’s behavior in ways that harm those people and public health—including you personally—in general. We can’t afford to let these ideas run unchecked.

If you don’t push back on them, even to those you love or don’t want to upset, you’re enabling them. You’re allowing people to spew harmful, dangerous nonsense that kills people and demoralizes the millions of health care providers trying to save lives.

And the writer has some tips on how to debunk, ideally without alienating the people. She points to the Atlantic article by Liz Neeley, How to Talk About the Coronavirus.

See also, from Politifact: A documentary full of false conspiracy theories about the coronavirus.

Wrong side of history and science

“Give Me Liberty or Give Me COVID-19” (actual sign)

I am simultaneously utterly fascinated and incredibly irritated by the protesters of the physical distancing protocols. They see themselves as the heroes in the story. Some high-ranking governmental official has been a provocateur, tweeting “liberate Virginia,” “liberate Minnesota”, “liberate Michigan” et al., and they are listening.

Meanwhile, the guy doing the daily press conferences at the federal level has been saying that he would let the science decide when to open up the country. I really wish those two guys could get on the same page.

Maybe he is, as Truthout noted, gone off the rails — “gaslighting the American people, instigating armed rebellion via tweets, interfering with deliveries of PPE to frontline health care workers, and ultimately making it abundantly clear that they won’t be taking an ounce of responsibility for this disaster.”

The protesters, I gather, believe that they are on the right side of history, demanding “freedom”. They may think they’re disciples of Martin Luther King Jr. But as someone pointed out – somewhere in this blog, I believe – they are not the heroes of the piece. They are the violent uprising as James Meredith tried to enter Ole Miss in 1962. They’re the jeering crowd when the Little Rock Nine integrated Central High in 1957.

Poor physical distancing

And their violence is their very gathering. As health officials warn against anti-social distancing protests, we should note the risk. It’s one thing to risk one’s own well-being. But they are threatening everyone they come in contact with, and everyone THEY in turn meet. It is a slap in the face to every health care worker.

Some of them carry American flags, while others display symbols of hate – Nazi insignia, Confederate flags, anti-Semitic bamnners. A few are armed with guns, to prove…something, I think. The Weekly Sift guy wrote: “They aren’t patriots at all in any real sense. If you ask them to do anything for the common good — stay home, do without a haircut, wear a mask in public, pay taxes — it’s too much.

“Their vision of America is that the government builds us roads, delivers our mail, protects us from criminals, educates our children, and sends helicopters to pluck us off the roof when the flood comes, but in return, we wave flags and otherwise don’t have to do anything we don’t want to do. JFK’s idea that we should ask what we can do for our country — that’s tyranny. All that ‘pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship’ crap — we don’t do that anymore.”

Sidebar

I was going to write about how, 50 years ago, members of the National Guard killed students at Kent State in Ohio. What I wrote five years ago is sufficient. I should note that today’s National Guard has been vital in assisting states in the time of COVID.