Stephan: I have been holding on to this report for two months because when I first read it I thought it had to be Democratic political exaggeration. I was wrong. If you look at the data today it is clear that Covid-19 is now principally a Republican disease, because Republicans are the ones who don't get vaccinated, and don't wear masks. The fact is the Red states are going to face first disproportionate death and, then, a generation of long-term health complications, as it becomes clear that a large number of people after contracting Covid have health issues on an ongoing basis. Nobody talks about this, but the people in states like Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas are going to have health issues for years, maybe the rest of their lives. Check the data for yourself.
Republican anti-maskers
Vying for least surprising news of the day are two extremely unsurprising news stories, both about the pandemic. Try to contain your non-surprise, please, no matter how difficult it may get.
The first story is from The Washington Post, and uses data to again confirm the bloomin’ obvious: States with high vaccination rates are now seeing fewer COVID-19 cases, while places with lower vaccinates are seeing pandemic infections “holding steady or increasing.”
Yep. The vaccines are working—but only among the people that actually, you know, get them. The Post was able to determine that in counties with at least 40% of residents vaccinated, COVID-19 infection rates that were “low” and “going down.” In counties with fewer than 20% of residents vaccinated, “not only are there higher case rates, but the number of cases there also is growing.”
In the second story, we see the predictable effects of the first. From NBC we learn that people coming into local hospitals with severe COVID-19 symptoms are almost all Americans who haven’t been vaccinated, from unvaccinated adults to children too young to be […]
John B. Alexander, PhD., Lieutenant Colonel, USA (Ret.) - Daily Kos
Stephan: John Alexander is a combat veteran who knows whereof he speaks. As the debacle of Afghanistan comesto and end he raise issues about the men and women who served there, that are not getting the coverage they deserve.
Returning soldiers from Afghanistan
From Vietnam we did return, not defeated, but not victors either. A new generation now faces similar circumstances as America’s longest wars officially draw to a close. The country, long weary of war, applauds withdrawal, while again, politicians talk of exits honorable.
Shamefully, they know they speak not truth, but embrace a strategic illusion for saving face. They hope reality will fade and be forgotten, save in the souls of those inextricably bound by memories of deeds that cannot be undone.
There is a constant gnawing in the minds of those who both met and meted out the horrors of combat; was it worth it? Why did my comrades die? For what cause?
Certainly not for glory
Dark Dreams
Constantly obscured are indigenous casualties; allies, enemies, and always the noncombatants who were just collateral damage of all sides.
Then, for those veterans who chance to sleep, there are the dreams; dreams that never end. Intentionally suppressed from daily consciousness, surreptitiously they reemerge from dark recesses demanding to be addressed.
While some integrate their experiences and apparently manage their lives into normalcy, many others […]
Stephan: Here is clear and incontrovertible evidence from the Census Bureau, describing what is happening to the United States as it becomes a majority-minority nation. You can see why the White supremacy MAGAT world has become so unhinged over this.
The United States is becoming more diverse more quickly than anticipated as minority communities grow while white populations shrink for the first time, the U.S. Census Bureau said Thursday as it released a new trove of data from the decennial count it conducted last year.
The data, which will be used to redraw political boundaries and administer hundreds of billions of dollars in federal, state and local programs over the coming decade, shed new light on a population that is growing both more slowly and more dramatically than anticipated.
Here are five takeaways from Thursday’s release:
The white population is shrinking
The number of white Americans is lower today than it was when the 2010 census was conducted. Today, whites account for about 57.8 percent of the population, the first time their share has ever dropped below 60 percent.
Whites have made up a progressively smaller share of the population in almost every census since the first one was conducted in 1790, but the raw number of white residents has never actually dropped in any prior 10-year period.
Stephan: I have to be honest, while I resent the incredible and unnecessary demands and workload of the medical staffs of hospitals as a result of the anti-vaxxer MAGATs, I don't mind that hundreds of them are essentially committing suicide. What really concerns and disgusts me is that as a result of the stupidity of the MAGATs, and the Republican governors they voted into office, children have been condemned to illness and death.
Credit: Luca Zennaro/EPA/Shutterstock
Nothing better exemplifies the gaping political divide in this country than our embarrassing and asinine vaccine response. Donald Trump’s scorched earth political strategy has fooled millions of Americans into flirting with death. And now thousands are once again dying for it.
Almost from the beginning, efforts to combat the virus were met with disdain from a president who felt the crisis made him look bad. The science was denied. We came to live in a world where masking was mocked and ingesting disinfectant was offered up as a possible cure.
All the while, the patients on ventilators gasped for breath, and refrigerated trailers filled with bodies. Death is one of the ultimate truths of life, and yet not even it could dissuade the headstrong from casting doubt on the science.
And then, a miracle.
In response to this raging, deadly virus, scientists developed multiple, highly effective vaccines with breathtaking speed. It was like a prayer had been answered. An antidote to the plague had arrived.
We should all have been celebrating in the streets and running to a lifesaving serum with […]
Stephan: All day I have been listening to news reports about how overcrowded red state hospitals are, how close to collapse they are. But what really makes me angry are the reports that there has been an 84% increase in children being hospitalized for Covid in the last week. All of this is the result of the incompetence and power hunger of Red state governors like DeSantis, and Abbott. I think these men and others like them, should be charged with perpetrating mass murder, indicted, found guilty and put into prison for years.
Red state MAGAT mass murderers Greg Abbott and Ron De Santis. Credit: Salon/Getty
Over a year ago, Salon’s Andrew O’Hehir described the mad scramble to reopen schools without a vaccine or coherent safety standards as “a ‘Deer Hunter’-style game of Russian roulette, played blindfolded under conditions of complete chaos.” One year later, Donald Trump is out of the White House but Republican and Democratic executives alike are all rushing to reopen schools — even as children under 12 are still not cleared to be inoculated despite an 84% jump in the number of children contracting COVID-19 last week alone. Advertisement:
