Follow the Science? How COVID Authoritarians Get It Wrong

[Muda69]

COVID Revealed America To Be a Nation of Rulers, Not of Laws

https://reason.com/2022/03/25/covid-revealed-america-to-be-a-nation-of-rulers-not-of-laws/

Quote

"The United States is a nation of laws, badly written and randomly enforced," noted the late musician and satirist Frank Zappa. I often think of that snarky comment as I write about the sausage-making process in city councils, state legislatures, and the federal government. Did I mention that California's state government has 518 agencies, boards, and commissions?

Our system of checks, balances, more checks, additional balances, impact reports, legal challenges, voter initiatives, regulatory rulemakings, and administrative hearings frustrates people who want to "get something done." Americans spent $14 billion on the 2020 election cycle to influence political outcomes—and that was just for the presidential and congressional races.

I once ran a modest state bill to reduce the insanely onerous licensing regulations for people who shampoo hair at salons. After months of hearings and debate, the Assembly defeated it for going too far. That explains the public's desire to cut through the red tape and, as Arnold Schwarzenegger once promised, "blow up the boxes" of government.

Yet after COVID-19, it's obvious our democratic system of lawmaking is, as Winston Churchill put it, "the worst form of government, except for all the others." Given the choice between a system resembling a Rube Goldberg cartoon (with his bizarre and overly complex contraptions designed to complete simple tasks) and one that's streamlined and efficient, I'll take Goldberg's vision any day.

As we saw throughout the country but in California in particular, governors were happy to dispense with the usual checks and balances and impose rules by executive order and fiat. Some initial rules were defensible during a public-health crisis, but it wasn't long before elected officials operated like czars—imposing illogical and contradictory restrictions that made no rhyme or reason.

They kept moving the goalposts. One day, counties were on lockdown based on such and such infection rates, but the next day standards changed. In September 2020, for instance, Gov. Gavin Newsom issued a re-opening blueprint based on COVID cases per 100,000 population, but then he refused to let counties that met the standard to loosen up their rules.

"A week after announcing the new blueprint, Newsom announced that the state would actually adjust those raw numbers using an algorithm based on testing rates," according to an NPR report. "Each county's case rate gets bumped up or down depending on how their testing rates compare to other counties." Californians got the sneaking suspicion we simply were subject to the whims of the king.

I viewed the pandemic as serious, but it became obvious that many rules the governor imposed had nothing to do with containing the virus. Governors (and not just Newsom) and federal regulators followed the Rahm Emanuel school of thought ("Never allow a good crisis to go to waste")—and used the pandemic to impose policies they always supported but could never pass via the usual channels.

"Newsom has used his executive authority to shut down businesses, move local elections to vote-by-mail, accelerate spending on homeless shelters, alter court proceedings and provide benefits for essential workers," according to an April 2020 Politico report appropriately headlined, "Newsom executive orders test constitutional bounds—and legislative goodwill."

The previous month, Assemblyman Kevin Kiley (R–Rocklin) published a 138-page document detailing the 400 laws the governor had unilaterally changed following his State of Emergency declaration. "Our founders had good reasons for rejecting autocratic models of government in favor of separation of powers, checks and balances, and the rule of law—all of which Gavin Newsom has discarded," Kiley wrote.

Kiley and Assemblyman James Gallagher, R-Yuba City, challenged this in court, arguing the 1970 California Emergency Services Act does not give the governor authority to "legislate by unilaterally amending existing statutory law." The specific issue centered on the governor's decision to send vote-by-mail ballots to all of the state's voters—a good idea, in my view, but one that should have taken place by normal legislative action.

The Sutter County court sided with the Assembly members, although the decision didn't affect the election because the Legislature approved vote-by-mail after Newsom's order. That in itself proved that such executive actions often were inappropriate. There was plenty of time to pass the measure correctly, but Newsom preferred to impose the measure with a stroke of his pen.

An appeals court sided with the governor and found the emergency act gave him vast authority—including the "police power" to create new law. The California Supreme Court let the appeals court decision stand, meaning that in any declared emergency the governor can do whatever he deems appropriate without serious checks or balances.

Last month, Newsom mercifully lifted the vast majority of edicts and orders—but the precedent has been set for future emergencies. There are no real limits on executive power. Life is returning to normal after two long years, but I might never again complain about our convoluted democratic process.

A true Pandora's Box of authoritarianism and oppression has been opened.

 

[DE]

2 hours ago, Muda69 said:

COVID Revealed America To Be a Nation of Rulers, Not of Laws

https://reason.com/2022/03/25/covid-revealed-america-to-be-a-nation-of-rulers-not-of-laws/

A true Pandora's Box of authoritarianism and oppression has been opened.

 

Could not agree more, but some have their head in the sand or up their a$$.

[swordfish]

[DE]

2 hours ago, swordfish said:

and hunter biden's laptop

and hrc russian collusion

and trump's lawsuit against all those treasonous folks

and maxwell's sex trafficking 

what else...

[Bobref]

4 hours ago, DE said:

and hunter biden's laptop

and hrc russian collusion

and trump's lawsuit against all those treasonous folks

and maxwell's sex trafficking 

what else...

Don’t forget the Trilateral Commission, and I’m sure the Pope is somehow involved, too.

[Impartial_Observer]

Regardless of conspiracy theories, I think it’s pretty clear that this has been a boondoggle from the beginning, across party lines and two national administrations. 

[Bobref]

6 hours ago, Impartial_Observer said:

Regardless of conspiracy theories, I think it’s pretty clear that this has been a boondoggle from the beginning, across party lines and two national administrations. 

I guess it is a question of expectations. Anyone who expected political leaders to be able to deal efficiently with a virus never seen before, let alone studied, amidst a global pandemic in the 21st Century, was always being unrealistic. Too many people think real life is like TV: “A global pandemic, but don’t worry, we’ll figure it out and have it handled by the next commercial break.” Science doesn’t work that way. It especially doesn’t when you add in all the politicos who sought to make political hay out of the pandemic.

[DE]

11 hours ago, Bobref said:

Don’t forget the Trilateral Commission, and I’m sure the Pope is somehow involved, too.

🤷‍♀️

[DE]

15 hours ago, DE said:

and hunter biden's laptop

and hrc russian collusion

and trump's lawsuit against all those treasonous folks

and maxwell's sex trafficking 

what else...

Interested to hear back from those that think these events are "bogus", but thought all the allegations against Trump were legit.

[DanteEstonia]

19 hours ago, DE said:

and hrc russian collusion

Here's a photo-

 

All you triggered Tories are just projecting again. 

[DE]

51 minutes ago, DanteEstonia said:

Here's a photo-

 

All you triggered Tories are just projecting again. 

This is hilarious.  A picture of Michael Flynn sitting at a table with these folks prove nothing.  They are a picture.  Try again Jr.  You are a smart young man.  You read the news.  These HRC collusion issues are no longer "conspiracy theories" or "projections".

 

[Impartial_Observer]

6 hours ago, Bobref said:

I guess it is a question of expectations. Anyone who expected political leaders to be able to deal efficiently with a virus never seen before, let alone studied, amidst a global pandemic in the 21st Century, was always being unrealistic. Too many people think real life is like TV: “A global pandemic, but don’t worry, we’ll figure it out and have it handled by the next commercial break.” Science doesn’t work that way. It especially doesn’t when you add in all the politicos who sought to make political hay out of the pandemic.

Trust me Bob, the bar was not set real high in my expectations of the government. I believe in the Hippocratic Oath, it mentions something about “do no harm”.  

[DE]

44 minutes ago, Impartial_Observer said:

Trust me Bob, the bar was not set real high in my expectations of the government. I believe in the Hippocratic Oath, it mentions something about “do no harm”.  

😀

[DE]

55 minutes ago, Impartial_Observer said:

Trust me Bob, the bar was not set real high in my expectations of the government. I believe in the Hippocratic Oath, it mentions something about “do no harm”.  

I am watching a video of Fauci on C-Span on a video clip shared with me.  He discusses the importance of natural immunity.

Ironic thing is, I can not find it on youtube.  🤷‍♂️

Edited March 31, 2022 by DE

[Bobref]

1 minute ago, DE said:

I am watching a video of Fauci on C-Span on a video clip shared with me.

Ironic thing is, I can not find it on youtube.  🤷‍♂️

Cue the music from “The Twilight Zone.”

[DE]

2 minutes ago, Bobref said:

Cue the music from “The Twilight Zone.”

Funny part is, you make light of something that actually happening.  

The left is blaming the right for banning books, yet the leftie big tech folks are the ones censoring important, factual information.

 

[swordfish]

https://www.c-span.org/video/?465845-1/universal-flu-vaccine

Not denying Covid is real, (I and Mrs. SF have already had it) just pointing out that Dr. Fauci and his cronies were tossing around the idea of a "Universal Flu Vaccine" in October of 2019 and lamenting the fact that to test an MRNA vaccine would take a minimum of 10 - 15 years.....While speculating an Asian virus would be enough to start an "Entity of Excitement"......Wondering if 2 + 2 = 4 in this scenario.....Since about 90 days after this conference the very "Entity of Excitement" came to pass worldwide......

 

 

 

[swordfish]

You ever get the feeling they are now grasping at something to keep this alive and people panicked??

A "Frankenstein" (sub)variant of a variant that combined with another variant from another variant, and BTW - THIS ONE MAY BE EVEN MORE TRANSMISSIBLE THAN THE LAST ONE THAT WAS THE MOST TRANSMISSIBLE!!

IDK - keep following the science I guess.....wink, wink.....

Note to the GID - please say your prayers for the Speaker of the House and all the Democrats who were with her and the President yesterday.  (The outcome of what you are praying for is at your discretion of course)

https://nypost.com/2022/04/07/frankenstein-covid-19-omicron-subvariant-xe-detected-in-uk/

A “Frankenstein”-style new Omicron subvariant is spreading in the UK — and some experts fear the mutation may be the most contagious form yet of COVID-19.

The XE variant — which has also been confirmed in India and Thailand — is a mix of Omicron’s BA.1 strain and the new “stealth” BA.2 form, the Daily Beast reported.

Such mutations are known as “recombinants,” and occur when a person gets infected with two or more variants at a time and they combine “Frankenstein” style, the outlet reported.

A total of 637 cases of the XE recombinant variant have been confirmed in the UK, according to data from the UK Health Security Agency.

It’s unclear whether XE causes more severe illness or evades vaccines, though early data suggests that it may be more transmissible than earlier forms of the Omicron virus.

“Early estimates suggest that XE has a community growth rate advantage of 1.1 (which represents a 10% transmission advantage) as compared to BA.2,” the World Health Organization said.

 

 

[DE]

1 hour ago, swordfish said:

You ever get the feeling they are now grasping at something to keep this alive and people panicked??

A "Frankenstein" (sub)variant of a variant that combined with another variant from another variant, and BTW - THIS ONE MAY BE EVEN MORE TRANSMISSIBLE THAN THE LAST ONE THAT WAS THE MOST TRANSMISSIBLE!!

IDK - keep following the science I guess.....wink, wink.....

Note to the GID - please say your prayers for the Speaker of the House and all the Democrats who were with her and the President yesterday.  (The outcome of what you are praying for is at your discretion of course)

https://nypost.com/2022/04/07/frankenstein-covid-19-omicron-subvariant-xe-detected-in-uk/

A “Frankenstein”-style new Omicron subvariant is spreading in the UK — and some experts fear the mutation may be the most contagious form yet of COVID-19.

The XE variant — which has also been confirmed in India and Thailand — is a mix of Omicron’s BA.1 strain and the new “stealth” BA.2 form, the Daily Beast reported.

Such mutations are known as “recombinants,” and occur when a person gets infected with two or more variants at a time and they combine “Frankenstein” style, the outlet reported.

A total of 637 cases of the XE recombinant variant have been confirmed in the UK, according to data from the UK Health Security Agency.

It’s unclear whether XE causes more severe illness or evades vaccines, though early data suggests that it may be more transmissible than earlier forms of the Omicron virus.

“Early estimates suggest that XE has a community growth rate advantage of 1.1 (which represents a 10% transmission advantage) as compared to BA.2,” the World Health Organization said.

 

 

Yes and that these same people could screw up a 1 car funeral.  CROOKS!

[Muda69]

1 hour ago, swordfish said:

You ever get the feeling they are now grasping at something to keep this alive and people panicked??

 

Of course.  Authoritarians like to use fear and uncertainty to control the populace.

 

[Muda69]

COVID Stimulus Checks Worsened Inflation

https://reason.com/2022/04/08/covid-stimulus-checks-worsened-inflation/

Quote

Inflation has surged across much of the developed world in the past year as COVID-19 lockdowns eased and pent-up demand for goods and services collided with ongoing supply chain snafus.

But inflation is running higher in the United States than just about anywhere else right now. Why's that? According to a new paper from four economists at the Federal Reserve of San Francisco, it's because the American government was relatively more generous during the pandemic, borrowing and spending trillions of dollars to not only fund COVID-19 relief efforts but to line the pockets of Americans with direct payments that enlarged the money supply and overheated the economy.

"Inflation rates in the United States and other developed economies have closely tracked each other historically," the economists write in an analysis published this week. "However, since the first half of 2021, U.S. inflation has increasingly outpaced inflation in other developed countries. Estimates suggest that fiscal support measures designed to counteract the severity of the pandemic's economic effect may have contributed to this divergence."

Inflation in the U.S. hit an annualized rate of 7.9 percent in February (data for March will be released by the Bureau for Labor Statistics next week), a 40-year high. Meanwhile, inflation in similar countries like France (3.6 percent), Germany (5.1 percent), and the United Kingdom (5.5 percent) is significantly lower, according to data from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), a consortium of 38 rich-world governments. (Across the OECD as a whole, the average annual inflation rate is about the same as the U.S., but that's due to the influence of outliers like Argentina—where prices are up over 52 percent in the past 12 months.)

February's global price data are not merely a snapshot, but indicative of a worrying trend. The Pew Research Center noted in November of last year that prices in the United States were rising more quickly than almost anywhere else. Between the third quarter of 2019 (the last full economic quarter before COVID-19 was first identified) and the third quarter of 2021, the U.S. inflation rate climbed by 3.58 percentage points—a larger change than in all but two other countries of the 46 nations included in the study.

Governments all over the world spent heavily to combat the pandemic, of course, but few handed out cash directly to citizens as the American government did. The four Federal Reserve researchers track sharp increases in "inflation-adjusted disposable personal income"—in layman's terms, excess spending cash—reported by American households over the past two years. "Throughout 2020 and 2021, U.S. households experienced significantly higher increases in their disposable income relative to their OECD peers," they write.

 

Source: Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco; https://www.frbsf.org/economic-research/publications/economic-letter/2022/march/why-is-us-inflation-higher-than-in-other-countries/

About $817 billion in direct payments to American households were delivered in three rounds during the pandemic, according to the COVID Money Tracker run by the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a nonprofit that advocates for lower deficits. The first round of stimulus checks was worth $1,200 per person and was approved as part of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act in March 2020. Another round of $600 checks was distributed starting in December of that year.

But the big blow came in early 2021, when the Biden administration pushed through a round of $1,400 checks as part of the American Recovery Plan, passed by Congress in March 2021.

Though each round of direct checks had slightly different parameters for determining who would get the payments, much of that $817 billion landed in the bank accounts of people who had never lost their jobs and were well above the poverty line. Households earning as much as $160,000 in joint income were eligible for the final round of direct payments disbursed during the first half of 2021—and many progressives in Congress thought the cutoff should have been even higher.

We're now reaping what Congress sowed. All that excess cash is chasing the same number of goods. That's a recipe for inflation straight out of any economics textbook. The four economists conclude that "U.S. income transfers may have contributed to an increase in inflation of about 3 percentage points by the fourth quarter of 2021."

This isn't a novel idea, of course. Larry Summers, one of the Obama administration's top economic advisers, was warning about rising inflation more than a year ago. Passing another stimulus bill in the spring of 2021, Summers warned in a Washington Post op-ed, "will set off inflationary pressures of a kind we have not seen in a generation." Other top economists, including a former chairman of the International Monetary Fund, offered similar warnings. The Biden administration and Democrats in Congress did not listen, and now here we are.

The value of this Federal Reserve analysis is that it does not look forward in time and try to project what will happen, but reviews existing data to tell what did in fact happen. Putting more money directly in Americans' pockets and bank accounts caused inflation to get worse than it otherwise would have been.

In fairness, the economists also point out that a less robust response to the pandemic may have caused a different kind of economic pain. "Without these spending measures," they write, "the economy might have tipped into outright deflation and slower economic growth, the consequences of which would have been harder to manage."

Any serious attempt to grapple with America's current bout of inflation must be aware of that possible alternate reality—the grass is not necessarily greener on the other side.

But that doesn't absolve the federal government—from the White House to Congress to the Federal Reserve—of its role in worsening this mess. The whole world is suffering through a period of high inflation, but American policy makers added a uniquely high amount of fuel to the fire.

MMT doesn't work.  This is proof positive.

 

[swordfish]

5 hours ago, Muda69 said:

COVID Stimulus Checks Worsened Inflation

https://reason.com/2022/04/08/covid-stimulus-checks-worsened-inflation/

MMT doesn't work.  This is proof positive.

 

Hmmm - Imagine that, my social studies teacher (back in 1982) was right afterall......

[swordfish]

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10708225/The-states-FAILED-protect-people-COVID.html

No $#!^ Sherlock...... 

 

 

 

[DE]

The truth is continuing to come out.  And people are still getting Zucked/Dorseyed here and there for speaking the truth.  A perfect example of "book burning".

[Muda69]

Covid hypocrite of the week: