Archive for 2020

HOW MANY OF OUR AGING AND INFIRM ELITES ARE IN ON THE CHINESE VAMPIRIZED POLITICAL PRISONER GRAVY TRAIN? IS THAT WHAT THEY’RE AFRAID WILL COME OUT? BTW, DID YOU KNOW THAT TRANSFUSIONS WITH YOUNG PEOPLE’S BLOOD WILL KEEP YOU YOUNGER? ONLY OF COURSE, THERE ARE NEVER ENOUGH VOLUNTEER DONORS. AGAIN, WOULD YOU PUT IT PAST THEM?  Evidence: China Executes Political Prisoners to Harvest Organs.

BUT THE MEDIA IS LIKE THE COYOTE TRYING TO TRAP THE ROAD RUNNER WITH AN ACME VIRUS. IN THE END, THEY’RE NOT GOING TO LIKE THE RESULT:  Unintended Consequences.

OPEN THREAD: Discuss the newsworthy events of the day, if any.

A WHILE BACK I GAVE A FAVORABLE REVIEW TO STEVE (S.M.) STIRLING’S SHADOWS OF ANNIHILATION. That was an advance copy, but it’s out now and I still recommend it. Good reading, especially if you’re practicing social isolation and need to be amused!

TO AVOID COVID-19 AND OTHER ILLNESSES, DON’T USE “SUSTAINABLE” GROCERY BAGS: Greening Our Way to Infection.  The campaign to eliminate single-use plastic bags at the supermarket could prove deadly during the coronavirus outbreak. It has forced shoppers to switch to reusable tote bags that have proved quite “sustainable” for viruses and bacteria from food. The pathogens can linger for days — and then be spread all over the supermarket, especially at the checkout counter.  Researchers have repeatedly demonstrated that the pathogens in the bags are a serious public-health hazard unless grocery shoppers wash the bags regularly, which few people do.

The plastic-bag bans have never made any sense, because the replacement bags are harmful not only to people but also to the environment, as I’ve written. I compared the bag bans to medieval sumptuary laws — which forbade commoners from wearing certain clothes or using certain products that offended their social superiors — but perhaps I was unfair to the medieval rulers who made the laws. At least their edicts didn’t sicken or kill their subjects.

HISTORY: East TN historians reflect on 1918 flu pandemic amid coronavirus concerns. “We thought we’d heard about it in other places. We thought we were kind of dodging a bullet and then suddenly in October, around October 3rd, 1918 suddenly a few local soldiers got sick and within about two weeks 6,000 people in Knoxville were sick with the Spanish flu.”

CORONAVIRUS UPDATE: LDS Church Cancels Church — Worldwide.

Coronavirus: Ireland closes all schools and says mass gatherings should be cancelled as country goes into lockdown.

Ohio health official estimates 100,000 people in state have coronavirus. Testing is way behind reality. And many of them are probably asymptomatic for a while yet. Some will stay that way, others will later get very sick.

Inside coronavirus-hit small towns in northern Italy.

World races to contain coronavirus pandemic.

Matthew Broderick’s Sister Placed in ICU After Testing Positive for Coronavirus.

How to protect yourself at the gym, one of the germiest places around.

Special Report: Italy and South Korea virus outbreaks reveal disparity in deaths and tactics.

Is It Hay Fever, The Common Cold Or Coronavirus?

No, coronavirus is not a good argument for quitting cash.

Why Have So Few Americans Been Tested for Coronavirus?

After problems arose with the C.D.C.’s test, officials could have switched to using successful tests that other countries were already using. But the officials refused to do so, essentially because it would have required changing bureaucratic procedures.

The federal government could also have eased regulations on American hospitals and laboratories, to allow them to create and manufacture their own tests, as Melissa Miller of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine told The Washington Post. But federal officials did not do so for weeks.

On Facebook, Virginia Postrel observes, “The people who screwed this up weren’t Trumpites. They were the pros.”

How Government Red Tape Stymied Testing and Made the Coronavirus Epidemic Worse: FDA and CDC bureaucrats stopped private and academic diagnostic tests from being deployed.

‘Don’t panic’ says US woman who recovered from coronavirus.

UPDATE: Sorry, had the wrong link on the LDS worship services suspension before. I’ve updated it now.