2:00PM Water Cooler 8/23/2023 | bare capitalism

By Lambert Strether of Corrente.

Fowl Track of the Day

Bornean Wren-Babbler, Danum Valley Analysis Station, Sabah, Malaysia.

Search for the Helpers

“‘That Girl From New England Who Shamed Us All’” [Ralph Nader, The New Yorker (LL)]. “The mass media is reluctant to acknowledge civic heroes until they show bodily bravery comparable to dashing right into a burning constructing to avoid wasting a baby. The media additionally lavishes huge protection on sports activities heroes and entertainers. Unnoticed by the mass media was the way it took place that the Illinois legislature, overcome by company lobbyists, handed laws permitting punitive damages for wrongful loss of life disasters, and despatched the invoice to Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker who signed it final Friday. Within the phrases of 1 state lawmaker, this effort began with ‘that woman from New England who drove down right here (to Springfield, Illinois) and shamed us all.’ That woman was my niece Nadia Milleron, who misplaced her daughter Samya Rose Stumo – an rising chief in international well being – to the faulty Boeing 737 Max that crashed in Ethiopia on March 10, 2019, killing all 156 folks on board. (Earlier on October 29, 2018, an identical additionally new Boeing 737 Max crashed off Indonesia’s coast, killing all 189 passengers and crew.)…. She spent months away from her Massachusetts house in 2022 getting appointments with each Illinois Assemblyperson – 177 of them – to plead her case in individual. Not one of the naysayers she encountered within the lobbying circles across the legislature deterred her, not even some plaintiff trial attorneys. By the sheer pressure of her authorized and factual arguments, her ethical authority and some senior political advisors in Chicago, she laid the groundwork for motion earlier final yr. The Illinois Wrongful Loss of life Act was championed by a younger African-American state lawmaker, Rep. La Shawn Ok. Ford. As soon as it began shifting via the Meeting (with little media consideration) it gained momentum among the many new Meeting management that carried via to the brand new management of the State Senate. Each legislative Homes are managed by Democrats. Nadia got here to this problem in Illinois, the place the Stumo household civil tort litigation towards Boeing is pending, with expertise in battling the large Boeing company’s energy to get its manner in Washington, DC.” • Milleron is certainly a “civic hero” (and we want extra). I’m additionally glad to see that the pencil-necked MBAs and greedhead CEOs who destroyed a terrific American engineering firm are going to get theirs. And but I couldn’t assist however surprise why Hendrik Hertzberg, Democrat loyalist par excellence, allowed Ralph Nader, the traitorous Inexperienced Social gathering Presidential candidate who, in Democrat minds, price Al Gore election 2000, to grace the New Yorker’s pages. Maybe the reason comes with Nader’s plug for Democrats, and the graceful, certainly unnoticed, operations of Pritzker’s PR crew?

Politics

“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

The Constitutional Order

Two households, each alike in dignity,
In honest Verona, the place we lay our scene,
From historical grudge break to new mutiny,
The place civil blood makes civil fingers unclean. –William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet

Shakespeare says the 2 households are “alike” in dignity, however he doesn’t say how a lot dignity they really have. If Verona’s households are like our events, the reply is “not a lot.”

* * *

“The Sweep and Pressure of Part Three” [William Baude and Michael Stokes Paulsen, University of Pennsylvania Law Review]. I extremely advocate this piece (and the following dialogue at NC, beginning right here). As a former English main and a fan of shut studying, I’m not averse to “originalism,” of which Baude and Paulsen present a magisterial instance, within the sense that understanding the regulation as a textual content should start with understanding the plain, public which means of the phrases used when the textual content was written. That’s how I learn Shakespeare, or Joyce, so why not the Structure? Simply so long as understanding doesn’t finish there! In any case, I’m working via it. One factor I discover is that there do appear to have been somewhat lots of rebellions and insurrections, not simply the Civil Struggle. To me, that is parallel to at least one lesson I drew from Mike Duncan’s Revolutions podcast (episode 1): There are somewhat lots of revolutions, too. Alert reader Pensions Man summarizes Baude and Paulsen as follows:]

The authors undergo an exhaustive textual and originalism evaluation of Part Three, and their Federalist Society leanings don’t deter them from reaching their conclusion that officers in each State who’re charged with figuring out candidate {qualifications} ought to conclude that Donald Trump is disqualified from being on ballots due to the oath he took on Inauguration Day 2017 and subsequently violated via his position within the riot that happened on January 6, 2021.

Taking “riot” as learn (I must do extra studying), extra on my persevering with protection of Part Three.

* * *

“Appeasing Donald Trump Received’t Work” [David French, New York Times]. Solely a matter of time earlier than the Munich analogy entered home politics, I suppose. “As highly effective as Baude and Paulsen’s substantive argument is, the late date signifies that by the point any problem to Trump’s eligibility would possibly attain the Supreme Court docket, voters could have already began voting within the Republican primaries. Tens of millions of votes may have been solid. The Supreme Court docket is already reluctant to alter election procedures on the eve of an election. How keen would it not be to take away a candidate from the poll after he’s even perhaps clinched a main?”

“Donald Trump May Have Lastly Stepped on the Final Authorized Landmine” [1945]. “It’s been clear from the outset that whereas there could be some authorized foundation to the argument by Maude and Paulsen, it’s most likely not real looking for such an argument to be enforced in a manner that stops Trump from being a candidate.” • Making Baude and Paulsen’s article extra a matter of prophylatic delegitimation than a critical intervention? In any case, Democrats immediately framed the January 6 riot as an riot, and the article’s energy comes not from its many footnotes, laudable although their quantity could also be, however from its sourcing from “inside the home’: The Federalist Society. That energy may have been exercised at any level within the final 2023 – 2020 = 3 years.  Making the delay slightly… odd.

Biden Administration

“Joe Biden Evaluating Maui Fires to Nearly Shedding His Corvette Sparks Fury” [Newsweek]. “President Joe Biden sparked outrage throughout his go to to Maui after making a joke that appeared to match the lethal wildfires on the Hawaii island with virtually shedding his ’67 Corvette… ‘I don’t wish to examine difficulties however we now have slightly sense, Jill and I, of what it’s prefer to lose a house,’ [Biden] stated. ‘Years in the past now, 15 years in the past, I used to be in Washington doing Meet the Press. It was a sunny Sunday,’ he continued. ‘Lightning struck at house, on slightly lake that’s exterior of our house—not a lake, a giant pond,—and hit a wire that got here up beneath our house into the heating ducts and air-con ducts,’ he added. ‘To make an extended story brief, I virtually misplaced my spouse, my ’67 Corvette, and my cat.’ Some—particularly these on the best—failed to understand the comparability, accusing the president of being insensitive to the tragedy in Maui.” • The Corvette comment actually does converse to character, displaying because it does Biden’s relentless triviality of thoughts and limitless self-regard. Sure, I do know Biden certified his comment with “I don’t wish to examine difficulties,” however why not flog the lifeless son, Beau, but once more? At the least that wouldn’t undermine the Biden “model” of being empathetic, as this toad hopping out of his mouth did. There are solely so many issues an advance crew can do. 

“Biden is accused of ‘nodding off’ throughout Maui wild fireplace memorial service in center of his disastrous five-hour tour of island” [Daily Mail]. That well-known liberal home organ and avatar of all that “mainstream media” provides the timeline:

His look on the memorial gave additional ammunition to critics.

Biden sat listening whereas the speaker advised of generosity amongst islanders.

‘Like many others who had been left with nothing, these two got garments, meals and shelter by somebody they might have by no means met earlier than,’ the speaker stated.

Biden then coughed, hand over his mouth, and seemed down.

‘We’re a group that depends on household, on ‘ohana’, whether or not by blood or by friendship,’ the speaker continued.

Biden then nodded, and seemed up.

‘And like many others, my son’s house burnt down,’ the speaker stated, as Biden’s eyes reverted to the entrance.

‘My daughter’s house burnt down. My house burnt down.’

Critics stated that Biden was asleep for the 9 seconds he seemed down.

Holy Lord. Haven’t you ever bowed your head for 9 seconds at a memorial service? Mourners are supposed to try this! Right here’s a C-SPAN clip:

I wouldn’t say Biden seems good, however he’s as awake throughout a service on a heat day as any of us outdated codgers might be. I do know the licit pleasures of dogpiling — dopamine loops — in addition to anybody, and that’s what’s occurring right here. (Personally, I feel the Corvette gaffe is quite a bit worse, because it speaks to character, so when the RNC circulated this clip, they stepped on their very own ****s.)

Our Famously Free Press

“Tucker Carlson’s Trump Interview Showcases Potential of Tie-Up With Elon Musk’s X” [Wall Street Journal]. “Tucker Carlson’s interview with Donald Trump is shaping up as a well-timed branding train for the brand new firm the previous Fox Information host is launching. Carlson taped an interview with Trump a number of days in the past and plans to stream it on X, previously often known as Twitter, with out advertisements, folks acquainted with the scenario stated. Its launch is anticipated to coincide with Wednesday’s first Republican presidential debate on Fox Information…. Carlson and former White Home adviser Neil Patel are engaged on beginning a brand new, subscription-driven media firm, in partnership with Carlson’s former government producer at Fox, Justin Wells, The Wall Road Journal reported final month. They’re within the strategy of elevating cash and have talked to X about utilizing the platform as its spine.  The Trump interview provides Carlson a high-profile alternative to indicate Elon Musk’s crew the potential for a deeper partnership.”

2024

Time for the Countdown Clock!

* * *

Good work from the Trump marketing campaign workers:

Trump crew, with DeSantis taunt in hand, already working perimeter of debate venue in Milwaukee. pic.twitter.com/AEvUV99dOW

— Alex Leary (@learyreports) August 22, 2023

They printed these indicators. None of that supposedly genuine hand-made stuff!

“Trump Says He Has Immunity. Will the Supreme Court docket Beg to Differ?” [Politico]. “On August 4, 2023, at some point after pleading not responsible to 4 federal felony prices arising from particular counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into efforts to thwart the 2020 presidential election, former President Donald J. Trump introduced on his Fact Social platform that ‘the Supreme Court docket should intercede.’ What he presumably means is that the Supreme Court docket, on enchantment from motions that his trial crew will undoubtedly file in all 4 felony circumstances, ought to rule that his conduct is untouchable as a result of it concerned actions taken whereas he was nonetheless president of the USA. ‘All the things that President Trump did was whereas he was in workplace as president,’ one among Trump’s attorneys, John Lauro, argued on NBC’s Meet the Press. ‘He’s now immune from prosecution for acts that he takes in reference to these coverage choices.’ Trump has raised broad claims of presidential immunity in litigation earlier than, with principally poor outcomes. Nonetheless, the argument just isn’t solely frivolous, partially as a result of the Supreme Court docket has solely weighed in on presidential immunity in a handful of circumstances, and none of these concerned indictments of a former president. Even when Trump loses his motions to toss out the indictments on immunity grounds on the trial court docket degree, which is probably going, the Supreme Court docket would virtually definitely vote to listen to the problem on enchantment given the unprecedented nature of those circumstances and the stakes for the presidency and the nation.” • Hmm.

“John Eastman, lawyer with Colorado ties, surrenders to authorities on prices in Georgia 2020 election subversion case” [Colorado Sun]. “Eastman stated in a press release supplied by his attorneys that he was surrendering Tuesday “”to an indictment that ought to by no means have been introduced.”” He lambasted the indictment for concentrating on ‘attorneys for his or her zealous advocacy on behalf of their shoppers’ and stated every of the 19 defendants was entitled to depend on the recommendation of attorneys and previous authorized precedent to problem the outcomes of the election. A former dean of Chapman College regulation faculty in Southern California, Eastman was a detailed adviser to Trump within the run-up to the Jan. 6, 2021 assault on the U.S. Capitol by the Republican president’s supporters intent on halting the certification of Biden’s electoral victory. He wrote a memo laying out steps Vice President Mike Pence may take to intrude within the counting of electoral votes whereas presiding over Congress’ joint session on Jan. 6 with a purpose to hold Trump in workplace.”

“Prosecutors: Trump Mar-a-Lago safety aide flipped after altering attorneys” [Politico]. “A Trump worker who monitored safety cameras at Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago property abruptly retracted his earlier grand jury testimony and implicated Trump and others in obstruction of justice simply after switching from an lawyer paid for by a Trump political motion committee to a lawyer from the federal defender’s workplace in Washington, prosecutors stated in a court docket submitting Tuesday. The aide — described as ‘Trump Worker 4’ in public court docket filings however recognized elsewhere as Yuscil Taveras — held the title of director of knowledge expertise at Mar-a-Lago. He initially testified to a grand jury in Washington, D.C., that he was unaware of any effort to erase the movies, however after getting the brand new lawyer ‘instantly … retracted his prior false testimony’ and detailed the alleged effort to tamper with proof associated to the investigation of the dealing with of labeled data saved at Trump’s Florida house, the brand new submission stated.”

“One MAGA juror can break all of it” [Salon]. “Extra related is the discovering by Sarah Longwell, a Republican strategist who holds frequent focus teams, that GOP main voters in the primary simply don’t care about Trump’s indictments. Nearly no Republicans have stated the indictments have made them much less more likely to help him. He’s their chief and so they consider he’s telling the reality when he says he did none of it. I’m afraid that if any of those trials find yourself with a number of of those fun-loving Trump followers on the jury, it’s going to be very arduous to shake them out of their perception that he can actually do no mistaken…. As he stated earlier than, he may shoot somebody on fifth Avenue and never lose any votes. For as soon as he wasn’t mendacity.” • Clearly, we have to reform the jury system. Who’s taking level on that?

* * *

“Ron DeSantis Calls Trump Supporters ‘Listless Vessels’ Forward of First Republican Debate” [People]. “On Friday, the Florida governor and 2024 presidential hopeful, 44, advised The Florida Normal that Trump supporters had been ‘listless vessels.’ Making a reference to claims that he’s a RINO (Republican in Identify Solely), DeSantis added that there’s ‘a strand in our get together that views supporting Trump as whether or not you’re a RINO or not.’ ‘You might be essentially the most conservative individual since sliced bread,’ he stated, however ‘until you’re kissing his rear finish, they are going to by some means name you a RINO. So until you’re completely indifferent from precept and what you truly consider — and outcomes — it’s extra about, you recognize, what faction you occur to do.” • BItterness isn’t a pretty high quality in a candidate, and blaming voters isn’t technique. Trump supporters are gleefully evaluating DeSantis’s “listless vessels” gaffe to Clinton’s “deplorables,” however there’s a couple of motive for that.

* * *

“How Vivek Ramaswamy Turned A Billionaire” [Forbes]. “Ramawamy’s fortune stems from a drug-development firm named Roivant Sciences, which went public in 2021. Its inventory is up almost 40% this yr, boosting the worth of Ramaswamy’s 10% stake to roughly $600 million. Since founding the corporate 9 years in the past, he has sucked over $260 million out of Roivant within the type of wage, bonuses and capital beneficial properties. He diversified these proceeds into a reasonably customary funding portfolio, roughly 60% shares and 40% bonds. However he additionally added some taste, with a touch of Bitcoin and Ethereum, some shares of YouTube competitor Rumble and a stake in crypto funds agency MoonPay.”

“The place Is All This Vivek-omentum Main?” [Slate]. “A clean-cut 38-year-old Indian American from the Midwest, a household man with oodles of interpersonal allure, a spiritual son of high-caste Hindu immigrants, a biotech entrepreneur and anti–social justice warrior with no prior expertise in Washington—what might be extra refreshing for the GOP than all this? … Whether or not they’re a results of circumstantial luck or precise political savvy, Ramaswamy’s heightened profile and enchantment are actually simple, and political observers are catching on. Monday alone noticed some hefty new journalistic profiles of Ramaswamy: from the Atlantic, a campaign-trail saga; from ABC Information, a group of nameless anecdotes from erstwhile associates that accuse Ramaswamy of mere clout-chasing… With DeSantis in decline and Trump skipping the talk altogether, the opposite GOP candidates are homing in on Ramaswamy, doubtless parsing all these biographical particulars for debate assault fodder. Because the Washington Put up reported, “”Advisers to a number of candidates … stated the [debate] stage is more likely to function a venue to litigate the inconsistencies in Ramaswamy’s coverage statements.’” • I assumed “Vivek the Pretend” confirmed the weak spot of the DeSantis crew. Nevertheless, I make a present of “Slick Vivek” to any marketing campaign that wishes it!

“Ramaswamy’s loans, DeSantis’ spending: GOP debate candidates by the cash” [Tampa Bay Times]. The deck: “A fast rundown of the marketing campaign finance panorama for every candidate anticipated to be on the debate in Milwaukee.” And: “Ramaswamy personally loaned his marketing campaign greater than $15 million, offering by far the most important chunk of his marketing campaign’s money. His small-dollar donor share is excessive partially as a result of the entire sum of donations from people is simply about $3 million. Nonetheless, the roughly $1.6 million his marketing campaign has acquired from these small-dollar donors is comparable or increased than another, extra established political veterans.”

“‘I Might Use a Little Extra Self-Flagellation’” [Politico]. “Christie’s present presidential bid is essentially the most attention-grabbing candidacy within the Republican main, and an important. Not as a result of he’s polling close to the highest of the lot. He’s not. If the competition, although, at this level is Trump and all people else, and the nominee by some means in the end comes from that batch of others, there’s no one else in that everyone else remotely like Christopher James Christie. The about-to-turn-61-year-old former governor of New Jersey was Trump earlier than Trump — charismatic, combative, politically incorrect — and he was, for that matter, Ron DeSantis earlier than Ron DeSantis — successful reelection in a landslide not simply in an erstwhile swing state however in an outright blue state. And now he’s an ex-prosecutor prosecuting a case, and it’s a case that makes a lot sense it generally can beggar perception that he’s the one one within the area who’s certified for the primary two debates who’s so vociferously making it. The case? Perhaps it’s not a terrific thought to as soon as once more again a person who had 4 years already as president and failed not less than as a lot as he didn’t and misplaced in 2020 and contributed to GOP losses in 2018 and 2022 and has been indicted 4 occasions within the final 4 months and subsequently would possibly spend as a lot time subsequent yr in a courtroom as on the marketing campaign path. ‘We will do higher,’ Christie has stated, calling Trump ‘a liar,’ ‘a coward,’ ‘a con artist,’ ‘a spoiled child’ and ‘a lonely, self-consumed, self-serving mirror hog.’” • So Trump like Duke and the Dauphin in Mark Twain’s Huck Finn? A consummate American? Nonetheless, “self-serving mirror hog” is nice. I ponder if Christie writes his personal gags? I wager he does; he appears to take pleasure in this. It’s good to see a contented warrior on the path!

* * *

“Joe Biden’s Ukraine protection falls aside” [Jonathan ]. “In a 2018 interview on the Council on International Relations, Biden bragged that he unilaterally withheld a billion {dollars} in US support from the Ukrainians to pressure them to fireside Prosecutor-Normal Viktor Shokin. The Ukrainians balked, however Biden gave them an ultimatum: ‘I checked out them and stated, ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor just isn’t fired, you’re not getting the cash.’ Nicely, son of a bitch. He received fired.”…. The response from the Washington elite was rapturous, although the story was not solely impolitic however embarrassing for an ally. The Ukrainians had been Joe’s new Corn Pop, and he recounted how he stared them down in a ‘Excessive Midday’ diplomatic second. A State Division memo is shedding disturbing mild on that account and shredding features of Biden’s justification for the motion.Certainly, the ultimatum could have been the quid in a quid professional quo settlement as a part of the Biden influence-peddling scandal. The premise of the story is that Biden took this extraordinary stand as a result of there was little hope for the anti-corruption efforts in Ukraine if Shokin remained prosecutor. That’s now questionable. The Oct. 1, 2015, memo summarizes the advice of the Interagency Coverage Committee that was dealing with the anti-corruption efforts in Ukraine: ‘Ukraine has made ample progress on its reform agenda to justify a 3rd assure.’ One senior official even complimented Shokin on his progress in preventing corruption. So Biden was advised to ship on the federal support however elected to unilaterally demand that Shokin be fired. When the firing occurred, Shokin’s workplace was investigating Burisma Holdings, an vitality agency that paid Hunter Biden an enormous amount of cash….. Main diplomat George Kent wrote then-Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch, ‘The actual concern to my thoughts was that somebody in Washington wanted to interact VP Biden quietly and say that his son Hunter’s presence on the Burisma board undercut the anti-corruption message the VP and we had been advancing in Ukraine [because] Ukrainians heard one message from us after which noticed one other set of habits with the household affiliation with a identified corrupt determine whose firm was identified for not enjoying by the foundations.’” • Oh.

Republican Funhouse

“McCarthy says Home could launch Biden impeachment inquiry when Congress reconvenes” [Just the News]. “‘The factor that holds up whether or not we do impeachment inquiry, present us the paperwork we’re asking… If they supply us the paperwork, there wouldn’t be a necessity for impeachment inquiry,’ [House Speaker Kevin] McCarthy advised Larry Kudlow on Fox Enterprise. ‘But when they withhold the paperwork and struggle like they’ve now to not present to the American public what they should know, we are going to transfer ahead with impeachment inquiry after we come again into session….  ‘The one tales that haven’t modified are the whistleblowers from the IRS. Their story has held up repeatedly,’ he went on. ‘If the Biden administration continues to struggle to withhold data that would actually clear all this up… we must transfer to an impeachment inquiry.’ McCarthy went on to liken the Biden administration and its use of federal workplace for allegedly illicit means to the administration of Richard Nixon.” • Ouch!

Democrats en Déshabillé

Affected person readers, it appears that evidently individuals are truly studying the back-dated publish! However I’ve not up to date it, and there are lots of updates. So I should do this. –lambert

I’ve moved my standing remarks on the Democrat Social gathering (“the Democrat Social gathering is a rotting corpse that may’t bury itself”) to a separate, back-dated publish, 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 Social gathering 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 Social gathering is the political expression of the category energy of PMC, their base (lucidly defined by Thomas Frank in Pay attention, Liberal!). ; if the Democrat Social gathering didn’t exist, the PMC must invent it. . (“PMC” modulo “class expatriates,” in fact.) Second, all of the working elements of the Social gathering reinforce one another. Depart apart characterizing the relationships between parts of the Social gathering (ka-ching, however not solely) these parts comprise a community — a Flex Web? An iron octagon? — of funders, distributors, apparatchiks, electeds, NGOs, and miscellaneous mercenaries, with property within the press and the intelligence group.

Be aware, in fact, that the category energy of the PMC each expresses and is proscribed by different lessons; oligarchs and American gentry (see ‘industrial mannequin’ of Ferguson, Jorgensen, and Jie) and the working class spring to thoughts. Suck up, kick down.

* * *

Realignment and Legitimacy

“Resentment makes the world go spherical” [Janan Ganesh, Financial Times]. “With due respect to the physicists engaged on nuclear fusion, essentially the most highly effective supply of vitality within the universe, if it may ever be harnessed, is human resentment. Nietzsche thought it made the world go spherical. (And he didn’t even stay to see what it will drive his fellow Germans to do after their defeat within the Nice Struggle.) There isn’t any understanding trendy Russia with no sense of its ressentiment as a shrunken empire. If we slim the lens from the geopolitical to the private, we see resentment at work much more. Discover what number of populist leaders are what could be known as relative outsiders. Privileged by virtually all requirements, these folks really feel shut out of what they regard because the true in-crowd. Nigel Farage: a former stockbroker, but additionally a non-graduate and much-mocked seven-time loser of elections to parliament. Boris Johnson: Etonian and Oxonian however neither posh nor wealthy. Marine Le Pen: a dynast, however not one who handed via France’s prime faculty for technocrats. After which the final word living proof: Donald Trump, an outer-borough arriviste, ridiculed by the sensible set for his ghastly style and paprika tan. This sample goes not less than way back to Richard Nixon, one other butt of hurtful jokes in a rustic with extra class sensitivities than it pretends. As a scholar, he so resented the social elite amongst his friends that he based his personal fraternity for outsiders and also-rans. (A form of Brics on campus.) What animates the populist proper just isn’t a lot an ideological programme. It’s what the British would name chippiness, directed at an actual or imagined beau monde.” And: “On the face of it, no two entities are much less alike than Trump and China.” • Oh noes! He went there!

#COVID19

“I’m in earnest — I cannot equivocate — I cannot excuse — I cannot retreat a single inch — AND I WILL BE HEARD.” –William Lloyd Garrison

Sources, United States (Nationwide): Transmission (CDC); Wastewater (CDC, Biobot; contains many counties; Wastewater Scan, contains drilldown by zip); Variants (CDC; Walgreens); “Iowa COVID-19 Tracker” (in IA, however nationwide knowledge). “An infection Management, Emergency Administration, Security, and Normal Ideas” (particularly on hospitalization by metropolis).

Lambert right here: Readers, thanks for the collective effort. To replace any entry, do be at liberty to contact me on the deal with given with the vegetation. Please put “COVID” within the topic line. Thanks!

Sources, United States (Native): AK (dashboard); AL (dashboard); AR (dashboard); AZ (dashboard); CA (dashboard; Marin, dashboard; Stanford, wastewater; Oakland, wastewater); CO (dashboard; wastewater); CT (dashboard); DE (dashboard); FL (wastewater); GA (wastewater); HI (dashboard); IA (wastewater stories); ID (dashboard, Boise; dashboard, wastewater, Central Idaho; wastewater, Coeur d’Alene; dashboard, Spokane County); IL (wastewater); IN (dashboard); KS (dashboard; wastewater, Lawrence); KY (dashboard, Louisville); LA (dashboard); MA (wastewater); MD (dashboard); ME (dashboard); MI (wastewater; wastewater); MN (dashboard); MO (wastewater); MS (dashboard); MT (dashboard); NC (dashboard); ND (dashboard; wastewater); NE (dashboard); NH (wastewater); NJ (dashboard); NM (dashboard); NV (dashboard; wastewater, Southern NV); NY (dashboard); OH (dashboard); OK (dashboard); OR (dashboard); PA (dashboard); RI (dashboard); SC (dashboard); SD (dashboard); TN (dashboard); TX (dashboard); UT (wastewater); VA (dashboard); VT (dashboard); WA (dashboard; dashboard); WI (wastewater); WV (wastewater); WY (wastewater).

Sources, Canada (Nationwide): Wastewater (Authorities of Canada).

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

Hat tricks to useful readers: anon (2), Art_DogCT, B24S, CanCyn, ChiGal, Chuck L, Festoonic, FM, FreeMarketApologist (4), Gumbo, hop2it, JB, JEHR, JF, JL Joe, John, JM (10), JustAnotherVolunteer, JW, KatieBird, LL, Michael King, KF, LaRuse, mrsyk, MT, MT_Wild, otisyves, Petal (6), RK (2), RL, RM, Rod, sq. coats (11), tennesseewaltzer, Utah, Bob White (3). 

Keep secure on the market!

Maskstravaganza

The masks that accepts straws:

I’ve been utilizing @SIPmask for just a few days now and I’ve discovered it tremendous handy in Vietnam the place a few iced coffees are a each day necessity for me!

The primary picture reveals the uncovered valve (it comes with a cap that can be utilized to dam it when not in use).

The second picture… pic.twitter.com/7gQVMiToWa

— Breathe Protected Air (@safe_breathe) August 22, 2023

“Insanity: American Satirist C.J. Hopkins Sentenced in German Speech Case” [Matt Taibbi, Racket News]. The German case towards Hopkins is absurd and Taibbi is correct to take up the cudgels on Hopkins behalf. However: “It’s concerning the tweet… It’s the duvet artwork from the guide and it’s me going after the masks factor, just like the one tweet I feel, not precisely verbatim however fairly shut, says the .” • Hopkins is lifeless mistaken — and once I say “lifeless,” I imply it — on the science and engineering of masks sporting. Taibbi may need talked about that, simply so that folks don’t take Hopkins critically as a thinker.

Elite Maleficence

HICPAC assembly report:

Yeah, nicely they simply made your testimony personal.

— Lazarus Lengthy (@LazarusLong13) August 22, 2023

Here’s what is alleged to be the full clip. 46 minutes?!

I’m pressed temporally and can’t hear (and in any case I don’t wish to stroke out). Readers? See NC on HICPAC right here, right here, right here, and right here.

“Undertaking NextGen Awards Over $1.4 Billion to Develop the Way forward for COVID-19 Vaccines and Therapeutics” [US Department of Health and Human Services]. “Immediately, the U.S. Division of Well being and Human Companies (HHS), via the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response (ASPR), awarded a pitifully small greater than $1.4 billion for Undertaking NextGen to help the event of a brand new technology of instruments and applied sciences to guard towards COVID-19 for years to come back.” Right here’s the vaccines half: “$1 billion to 4 BARDA Scientific Trial companions to help vaccine Part IIb scientific trial research: ICON Authorities and Public Well being Options, Inc of Hinckley, Ohio; Pharm-Olam, LLC, of Houston, Texas; Technical Sources Intl (TRI), Inc, of Bethesda, Maryland; and Rho Federal Programs, Inc., Durham, North Carolina.” • A good remark:

Right here’s an up to date checklist of the sterilizing vaccines, efficient monoclonal antibodies, lengthy Covid therapies, up to date air flow lists in companies and colleges and the motion plan to struggle this virus after virtually 4 years. pic.twitter.com/AGPxsOOKmU

— Jess (@MeetJess) August 23, 2023

Res ipsa loquitur….

“HHS awards $1.4 billion to drive growth of latest Covid-19 vaccines and therapies” [CNN]. “One other $1 billion in funding will go to 4 firms that may lead scientific trials of Covid-19 vaccines. HHS says the funding will help section 2b scientific trials of latest sorts of vaccines. HHS will choose the vaccines that will probably be examined this fall, and the research will start over the winter.” • In order that they’ve picked the contractors, however not that vaccines! A stately tempo, and significantly in distinction to the previous man. With solely 4 vaccines to be examined, what number of do you suppose will probably be nasal vaccines (i.e., vaccines with not less than the potential to be sterilizing)? My guess can be one. Now ask your self whether or not the (hypothetical) nasal vaccine chosen would be the one with the best chance of success, or the least? After all, I might be too paranoid–

“Biden admin pumps cash into growing new COVID vaccines” [Axios]. “A number of the remaining funds will go in direction of higher vaccine manufacturing expertise, comparable to a nasal spray that in idea may guard higher once more an infection.” • No cash quantity is listed. In any case, my impression is that the problem with nasal vaccines just isn’t manufacturing — Bharat does wonderful, sure? — however supply. And it’s not clear to me whether or not nasal spray bottles must be optimized for the chemical composition of the spray, or not; my guess is sure. Readers?

When you’re woke, superspreading occasions are jake with the angels:

Masks in no way pervasive. however current. Amazingly, a dishevelled blue. These are imagined to be public well being scientists! (Mandy’s truly worse than Rochelle, who may colorably plead ignorance. However Mandy should know the science. And but she plows forward, leaving an infection in her wake.)

Case Information

NOT UPDATED From BioBot wastewater knowledge, August 22:

Lambert right here: Glad reminiscences of tape-watching days! Closing in on a Trump-era surge degree; Biden’s, in fact, are increased. It is going to be attention-grabbing to see what occurs when colleges open up. I wish to congratulate the Biden administration and the general public well being institution, the CDC particularly, for this huge and unprecedented achievement. And a tip of the ol’ Water Cooler hat to the Nice Barrington goons, whose insurance policies have been adopted so assiduously! A curious reality: All of Biden’s peaks are increased than Trump’s peaks. Exhibits you what public well being can do when it’s firing on all eight cylinders! Musical interlude. NOTE I’m not joyful that Biobot can’t replace this knowledge extra steadily. 

Regional knowledge:

Backward revisions. The nationwide flattening is as a result of Midwest downward swoop. I’d look ahead to the backward revisions on that. Curiously, the upswing begins earlier than July 4, which neither accelerates nor retards it.

Regional variant knowledge, August 19:

EG.5 (the orange pie slice) nonetheless appears evenly distributed. Sadly, the Midwest knowledge just isn’t obtainable, so we are able to’t infer something concerning the Midwest surge and any variant(s), in some way. 

Variants

NOT UPDATED From CDC, August 19:

Lambert right here: High of the leaderboard: EG.5 (“Eris“). I’m not highlighting the BA.2’s as a result of the interactive model reveals that these BA.2’s been hanging round at a low degree for months.

From CDC, August 5:

Lambert right here: Undecided what to make of this. I’m used to seeing a brand new variant take down the beforehand dominant variant. Right here it seems like we now have a “tag crew,” all working collectively to chop XBB.1.5 right down to dimension. I certain hope the volunteers doing Pangolin, on which this chart relies upon, don’t all transfer on the inexperienced fields and pastures new (or have their entry to services lower by directors of in poor health intent).

CDC: “As of Could 11, genomic surveillance knowledge will probably be reported biweekly, based mostly on the provision of constructive check specimens.” “Biweeekly: 1. occurring each two weeks. 2. occurring twice every week; semiweekly.” Seems like CDC has chosen sense #1. In essence, they’re telling us variants are nothing to fret about. Time will inform.

Covid Emergency Room Visits

From CDC NCIRD Surveillance, August 19:

Lambert right here: Regular enhance. (The black line is “mixed”, however it’s simple to see that Covid, the crimson line, is driving every thing.)

NOTE “Charts and knowledge supplied by CDC, updates Wednesday by 8am. For the previous yr, utilizing a rolling 52-week interval.” So not the complete pandemic, FFS (the implicit message right here being that Covid is “identical to the flu,” which is why the seasonal “rolling 52-week interval” is acceptable for each_{MR SUBLIMINAL I hate these folks a lot}. Discover additionally that this chart reveals, not less than for its time interval, that Covid is not seasonal, despite the fact that CDC is attempting to get us to consider that it’s, presumably to allow them to piggyback on the present institutional equipment for injections.

Hospitalization

I hate this metric as a result of the lag makes it misleading. However, right here’s bellwether New York Metropolis, knowledge as of August 22:

Nonetheless getting worse. However how a lot worse?

Positivity

NOT UPDATED Walgreens, August 21:

So, Walgreens is again within the sport (and how on earth did that debacle occur? We breathlessly await the information protection). The share of positives is the very best ever, although absolute numbers are nonetheless small relative to previous surges.

NOT UPDATED From CDC, July 31:

Lambert right here: That is the CDC’s “Traveler-Based mostly Genomic Surveillance” knowledge.

Deaths

NOT UPDATED Iowa COVID-19 Tracker, August 9:

Lambert right here: The WHO knowledge is nugatory, so I changed it with the Iowa Covid Information Tracker. Their methodology: “These knowledge have been sourced, by way of the API from the CDC: https://knowledge.cdc.gov/NCHS/Situations-Contributing-to-COVID-19-Deaths-by-Stat/hk9y-quqm. This visualization updates on Wednesday evenings. Information are provisional and are adjusted weekly by the CDC.” I can’t appear to get a pop-up that reveals a complete of the three causes (prime proper). Readers?

Whole: 1,172,960 – 1,172,801 = 159 (159 * 365 = 58,035 deaths per yr, in the present day’s YouGenicist™ quantity for “dwelling 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 could must resolve that is what the powers-that-be contemplate “mission achieved” for this explicit tranche of loss of life and illness). 

Extra Deaths

The Economist, August 23:

Lambert right here:  Again to virtually dailiy. Odd when it’s, odd when it stops. Based mostly on a machine-learning mannequin. (The CDC has an extra estimate too, however because it ran perpetually with a large typo within the Legend, I figured no one was actually it, so I received rid it. )

Stats Watch

There are not any official statistics of curiosity in the present day.

Tech: “Apple’s remedy of small video games developer makes a textbook antitrust case” [9to5Mac]. “Apple has voraciously denied accusations that the App Retailer has monopolistic management over iPhone apps, but the corporate’s capacity to unilaterally shut developer accounts with out rationalization varieties a textbook antitrust case. One small video games developer had its Apple Developer Program (ADP) account terminated with out rationalization, was unable to enchantment because it hadn’t been advised what accusations it wanted to handle, took Apple to court docket – after which had its account reinstated after 5 months of misplaced gross sales, nonetheless with out rationalization or apology…. Some 5 months after Digital Will had its apps pulled from the App Retailer, and two months after it despatched a lawyer’s letter to Apple, the Cupertino firm reinstated the account. No rationalization was provided. The corporate estimates that its complete losses and prices exceed $765k, and is in search of damages from Apple.” • One for Stoller. Pocket change for Apple; life-changing for a small developer.

Immediately’s Worry & Greed Index: 47 Impartial (earlier shut: 46 Impartial) [CNN]. One week in the past: 50 (Impartial). (0 is Excessive Worry; 100 is Excessive Greed). Final up to date Aug 22 at 8:00 PM ET. C’mon, Mr. Market! Someway!

The Gallery

“An Deserted Cupboard Finds a Trove of Unseen Kodachrome Slides Documenting Sixties San Francisco” [This is Colossal]. “There’s a Vivian Maier-esque story out of San Francisco that’s drawing consideration to a newly found physique of labor from a largely unknown photographer.” Vivian Maier is terrific. Extra: “Again in 2020, David Gallagher, who runs the historic archive often known as SF Reminiscence, acquired a hefty cupboard that was discovered deserted in San Francisco’s Mission District. Inside had been 920 Kodachrome slides capturing life within the California metropolis all through the Sixties, with no figuring out particulars concerning the photographer…. There are kids at play, an officer displaying off a chunky, white rabbit, and households swimming in Fleishhacker Pool earlier than the general public saltwater advanced closed in 1971. Collectively, the gathering creates a definite photographic tapestry of life within the metropolis throughout a time of huge change and progress.” • I consider that in the present day, of the rabbit, we’d say “chonky boi”:

“When logic and proportion….”

“Tens of millions of outdated printed photographs are sitting in storage. Digitizing them can unlock numerous reminiscences” [Associated Press]. “After retiring in 2021 from an extended profession as a U.S. diplomat who labored all around the world, Lyne Paquette returned to her house in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and retrieved from storage 12,000 photographs that she had taken from her movie digital camera throughout her wide-ranging travels. After spending months sorting via all of them, Paquette despatched about 3,500 to be digitized.. ‘It brings again a lot happiness, however generally disappointment,’ Paquette, 67, says. ‘I can see now: I’ve had a really, very wealthy life.’” • Watch out of rights, and of storage, too. You don’t need your reminiscences to be a part of some AI’s coaching set.

Class Warfare

“Rubbing Shoulders: Class Segregation in Every day Actions”  (PDF) [Maxim Massenkoff, Nathan Wilmers]. The Summary: “We use location knowledge to check exercise and encounters throughout class strains. Low-income and particularly high-income people are socially remoted: extra doubtless than different earnings teams to come across folks from their very own social class. Utilizing easy counterfactual workout routines, we examine the causes. Whereas some industries cater primarily to low or high-income teams (for instance, golf programs and wineries), trade alone explains solely a small share of isolation. Individuals are most remoted when they’re near house, and the tendency to go to close by places explains about one-third of isolation. Manufacturers, mixed with distance, clarify about half the isolation of the wealthy. Informal restaurant chains, like Olive Backyard and Applebee’s, have the most important constructive influence on cross-class encounters via each scale and their variety of holiday makers. Greenback shops and native pharmacies like CVS deepen isolation. Amongst publicly-funded areas, libraries and parks are extra redistributive than museums and historic websites. And, regardless of outstanding restrictions on chain shops in some giant US cities, chains are extra numerous than unbiased shops. The combination of institutions in a neighborhood is strongly related to cross-class Fb friendships (Chetty et al., 2022). The outcomes uncover how insurance policies that help sure private and non-private areas would possibly influence the connections that type throughout class divides.”

“How Do the Wealthy Turn out to be and Keep Rich?” [Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis]. “Ozkan famous that, on common, the wealthiest people started their careers considerably richer than different households in the identical cohort. For instance, the richest 0.1% of households at ages 50 to 54 owned about 120 occasions the economywide common wealth, which was $437,000 in 2015. When these similar households had been of their late 20s, they already possessed, on common, 20 occasions the economywide common wealth, Ozkan identified. Ozkan additionally famous that the wealthiest households at ages 50 to 54 had been closely invested in fairness, notably personal companies, beginning at a younger age. As an example, he identified, the wealthiest people held 85% to 90% of their wealth in fairness, whereas below-median households held 90% of their complete property in housing. Consequently, the wealthiest earned markedly increased returns. ‘It follows, then, that fairness earnings, together with capital beneficial properties, supplied the primary supply—83%—of complete lifetime earnings for the wealthiest 0.1%. In distinction, households within the backside 90% of the wealth distribution earned 80% to 90% of their lifetime earnings from labor companies,’ Ozkan wrote. ‘Curiously, inheritances (accrued between 1994 and 2014) constituted a negligible fraction of assets for all wealth teams, together with the highest wealth homeowners.’ The richest households had been additionally important savers. Ozkan famous that the wealthiest 0.1% of households had saved 70% of their gross earnings over the examine interval.” • Hmm. If the wealthy started their careers “considerably richer,” and but “inheritances constituted a negligible fraction of assets for the highest wealth homeowners,” then how was the “primitive accumulation” completed? A “nice crime“?

Information of the Wired

“Visualizing the mysterious dance: Quantum entanglement of photons captured in real-time” [Phys.org]. “Researchers on the College of Ottawa, in collaboration with Danilo Zia and Fabio Sciarrino from the Sapienza College of Rome, just lately demonstrated a novel method that enables the visualization of the wave perform of two entangled photons, the elementary particles that represent mild, in real-time…. This experiment was made doable by a sophisticated digital camera that data occasions with nanosecond decision on every pixel…. The influence of this analysis goes past simply the tutorial group. It has the potential to speed up quantum expertise developments, comparable to enhancing quantum state characterization, quantum communication, and growing new quantum imaging methods.” • Now do cats.

Contact data for vegetation: 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 photographs of vegetation. Greens are wonderful! Fungi and coral are deemed to be honorary vegetation! If you would like your deal with to seem as a credit score, please place it initially of your mail in parentheses: (thus). In any other case, I’ll anonymize through the use of your initials. See the earlier Water Cooler (with plant) right here. From Upstater:

Upstater writes: “On our path by the creek, a Jack within the Pulpit. I marked it and can see if it produces seeds and try propagation.”

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