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By Lambert Strether of Corrente.
Bird Song of the Day
American Robin, Burton Drive Hideaway
King, Washington, United States. “American Robins upset by 2 Barred Owls in a tree, called for at least 15 minutes. Owl calls at 0:33 and 1:38. Occasional other birds include Pacific-slope Flycatcher.”
Politics
“So many of the social reactions that strike us as psychological are in fact a rational management of symbolic capital.” –Pierre Bourdieu, Classification Struggles
Biden Administration
“‘You’re screwed’: Romney’s exit threatens a collapse of Senate’s middle” [Politico]. “And as maligned as Romney, Manchin and Sinema are by one party or the other’s faithful, the possible 2024 departures of two or three of them would change the Senate, which passed several notable bipartisan deals in the last Congress…. For two years under a 50-50 Senate, President Joe Biden found some legislative success by letting the chamber work its will. A roving bipartisan group started on Covid aid in late 2020 and came together on big issues that had bedeviled previous Congresses: gun safety, same-sex marriage protection, microchip manufacturing and infrastructure investment. Democrats made their fair share of partisan moves, jamming through hundreds of billions in party-line dollars and a massive pandemic aid plan, but the Senate’s playing field was also open for centrist maneuvering…. Still, the legislative filibuster and its 60-vote threshold remain intact — and that could mean new members step into the bipartisan breach. The question is whether that means collaboration only on essential government functions like keeping the lights on and raising the debt ceiling or whether there’s a bipartisan desire to do more.” • So the real issue is [genuflects] the filibuster….
2024
Time for the Countdown Clock!
“‘They did it to me’: Trump says Biden impeachment inquiry might be motivated by revenge” [Politico]. “Former President Donald Trump has ‘no idea’ whether Republicans will vote to impeach President Joe Biden. But he does have a theory on what motivated House Republicans to launch a Biden impeachment inquiry: revenge. ‘They did it to me,’ Trump told former Fox and NBC host Megyn Kelly during an hourlong interview on SiriusXM radio that aired Thursday. ‘And had they not done it to me, I think, and nobody officially said this, but I think had they not done it to me … perhaps you wouldn’t have it being done to them.’”
“Court orders Trump fraud trial be temporarily halted after he sues the judge” [Independent]. “They are seeking the involvement of an appellate judge to initiate an “Article 78 proceeding”, which aims to compel [Justice Arthur Engoro] to significantly weaken the case brought forward by the attorney general.” • New York court mavens: What the heck is an “Article 78 proceeding”?
“What’s behind the nonsensical campaign to replace Biden-Harris in 2024” [MSNBC]. “Let’s get this out of the way at the outset: No matter how many pundits speculate and pen scorching hot takes floating the idea, Joe Biden is not dropping out of the 2024 presidential race. He’s not dumping the vice president, Kamala Harris, from his ticket. And above all, he remains the best-positioned Democrat to defeat Donald Trump next year…. Biden announced his candidacy for re-election earlier this year. He’s already raised $77 million as of July, and has no serious primary challenge. He remains broadly popular among Democratic voters, even if he clearly has work to do in order to reassure wayward party members. … He has given every imaginable signal that he is running and that his heart is in it. Barring some unforeseen health event, he’s not dropping out… Nor will Biden jettison Harris from the presidential ticket. While it’s true that Harris is not terribly popular, dropping her from the ticket would be a slap in the face to the most consistently loyal constituency in the Democratic Party — Black women…. Lastly, and this is the crucial point: Biden is better positioned than any other Democrat to beat Trump next year. Not only has he already done it, but he is the incumbent president, and incumbent presidents usually get re-elected. Any other Democratic candidate, whether it’s California Gov. Gavin Newsom or Whitmer, would be untested on the national stage and, perhaps even more important, unvetted. Why anyone thinks it would be a good idea to cast aside an incumbent president with a record of accomplishments and all the advantages of incumbency, for a candidate who most Americans don’t know, is difficult to fathom at any time. … If Biden and Harris both dropped out, as The Washington Post’s David Ignatius called for this week, potential Democratic candidates would need to feverishly raise money, hire staff and put a campaign structure in place just months before voters go to the polls. The Democratic nomination race would be an ugly protracted food fight with no front-runner and a reasonable chance that no candidate would win enough delegates to capture the nomination before the Democratic National Convention.” • Sounds like Democrats would have to learn to practice politics! What a concept! But if Biden won’t drop out, he’ll have to be pushed out. Jill better keep a close eye on his pills. Or, if Biden were Castro, his cigars.
“Biden campaign plots long-game strategy as Democrats’ fears of a Trump win spike” [CNN]. “It’s not just that voters continue to say Biden is too old or maybe not up to the job, though that keeps coming up in Democrats’ focus groups. It’s a malaise about the president that operatives keep noting that goes beyond a slew of national polls – including one from CNN last week – that show a negative view of the president’s performance. ‘I feel indifferent, honestly,’ said a voter in one late summer focus group conducted in a strong blue district, one of several described to CNN by operatives involved. ‘I don’t have a very strong opinion, except I’m glad that it’s not the previous person.’ ‘I feel like he’s done no harm versus the previous president,’ said another. ‘It’s not bad, it’s not great. ‘It’s basically just trying to bring our country back up to where it was before,’ said a third. ‘So instead of doing great things, just kind of keeping us more middle ground.’” Importantly: “Inside Biden’s campaign headquarters… aides have not shifted from their plan to stay mostly under the radar and off the trail until next spring. In the meantime, they’re ramping up an extensive data and outreach experiment that they say is the only way to account for how much has changed in politics, technology and psychology in the eight years since the last presidential election not defined by social distancing, car rallies, Zoom fundraisers and the rest that came with the Covid-19 pandemic. The mission: see which Republicans and swing voters they can pull back from drifting to Trump, and whether there is any hope of getting the wider electorate actually excited about anything from Biden.”
“‘I don’t know what he’s done’: In the UAW president’s hometown, autoworkers lash out at Biden” [Politico]. “”Historically, man, if you didn’t vote Democrat years ago, and you were in the union, sometimes you got your ass kicked,” he said. “Democrats were for the working people. That sh*t has changed. I’m telling you what, the Democratic Party was not what it was 20, 30 years ago.’” • More like 40 or 50.
“The Democratic Party Rigs the Primaries” [Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Wall Street Journal]. No debates, rigged primary calendar. And: “If other candidates overcome all that, they have another hurdle: a class of superdelegates called “party leaders and elected officials,” or Pleos. In 2018 the DNC voted to remove other superdelegates from the first round of voting at the convention to limit the power of party elites to override the people’s choice. Because no official will likely dare provoke the wrath of the DNC by pledging to me, only DNC-approved candidates will get any Pleos. Their net effect will be to impose the party insiders’ will on Democratic voters. Assuming no Pleo backs me, I would have to win more than 70% of regular delegates to beat Mr. Biden. The DNC seems to have forgotten the purpose of the modern primary system, which is to replace backroom crony politics with a transparent democratic process. Our campaign has contacted the DNC in advance of its next meeting in Washington, asking for a clear process in which the candidate chosen by a majority of primary voters will be the party’s nominee. In two letters sent this week to DNC Chairman Jaime Harrison, my campaign requested a meeting to discuss voter rights. We noted that the DNC consults closely with Julie Chávez-Rodríguez, Mr. Biden’s campaign manager, and we assume that Mr. Harrison will agree to meet with us. Still, we have had no response of any kind from the party since June.” • Party’s response: “LOL no.”
AZ: “Biden admin mass releasing migrants directly onto Arizona streets as border crisis rages” [FOX]. “Fox News Digital reported this week how Border Patrol leadership has set ‘bookout’ targets for sectors amid increasing numbers that is straining capacity…. The Aug 8 email, obtained by Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody’s office as part of litigation, says daily encounters ‘[continue] to surpass the daily permanent bookouts and the in-custody numbers continue to rise creating significant risks to agents and detainees.” Consequently, the agency proposes ‘daily bookout targets’ per sector ‘to bring in-custody numbers to manageable levels’ based on 7-day averages. It then says that, if ‘consequence pathways’ such as expedited removal are not available, then releasing migrants with Notices to Appear (NTA/OR) at a future court date should be used.”
MI: “Michigan Fake Elector Tells Court She Acted ‘At The Direction’ Of Trump and His Lawyers” [Mediaite]. “One of the sixteen fake electors indicted this summer in Michigan told the court in a filing Monday that she acted ‘at the direction’ of former President Donald Trump and his attorneys. The court filing was submitted by lawyer Paul Stablein on behalf of his client Amy Facchinell and on Tuesday local media called it ‘one of the strongest connections yet between the efforts of the 16 Republicans in Michigan who are now facing felony charges and Trump.’ In July, Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel (D) indicted the sixteen fake electors on multiple counts over their role in trying to overturn the 2020 presidential election in that state — they all face serious prison sentences if convicted…. Stablein’s filing moves to establish that the conspiracy, fraud, and forgery charges Facchinell faces are a result of an attorney for Trump on Dec. 14, 2020 telling the Republican electors ‘that performance of their duties was necessary on behalf of the president and the Constitution.’ ‘Attorneys for the president specifically instructed Ms. Facchinello that the Republican electors’ meeting and casting their ballots on Dec. 14, 2020, was consistent with counsels’ advice and was necessary to preserve the presidential election contest,’ Stablein wrote.”
NC: “A 25-year-old from a small town leads North Carolina’s Democratic Party toward 2024” [NPR]. “Now, it’s been more than six months since Clayton was elected chair of the North Carolina Democratic Party, a promotion after leading her county’s party. And at 25 years old, she’s the youngest state party leader in the country. It’s a title she wears proudly, right alongside another: being from a small town. Both identities make many of her political battles personal, as she wrestles with the past faults of her party and what she wants the future to look like. ‘I was angry,’ she said of the Democratic Party. ‘I was angry that it was ignoring places like where I’d grown up.’
‘Rural areas right now are dying, and people for years have just sat there and said, ‘y’all deserve that,” she told NPR, sitting on the couch in her parent’s living room during a summer afternoon in Roxboro, N.C. If you’re going to choose to live in an area like that, you deserve just to die out.’” • Rule #2. See yesterday’s discussion of small (Republican) vs. large (Democrat) counties.
NV: “Judge Rules Clark County Teachers Union Coordinated A Sickout Strike” [Nevada Globe]. “Today, Judge Crystal Eller ruled in favor of the Clark County School District (CCSD) who sought an injunction against the Clark County Education Association’s (CCEA) role in coordinating a sickout strike which disrupted school and district operations affecting nearly a dozen schools throughout the Las Vegas valley this past week…. The current injunction filed by CCSD on Monday contended that it ‘defies logic to suggest that mass absences constitute anything other than a strike.’ Today, Judge Eller agreed, noting, ‘the idea that sickouts are not a strike is preposterous.’ The CCEA contended that the absences were due to staffing shortages, a holiday weekend, Covid and the seasonal back-to-school flu, and that the union did not coordinate the rolling sickouts. However, CCSD included exhibits from a whistleblower and a teacher who claimed that the one of the school closures was led by a unionized teacher who mobilized colleagues to take the day off Tuesday and this upcoming Friday to disrupt instruction. Under Nevada law, it illegal for state public employees to strike.”
Obama Legacy
Meta-chutzpah:
Not many murder their parents and throw themselves at the mercy of the judge because they
Democrats en Déshabillé
Patient readers, it seems that people are actually reading the back-dated post! But I have not updated it, and there are many updates. So I will have to do that. –lambert
I have moved my standing remarks on the Democrat Party (“the Democrat Party is a rotting corpse that can’t bury itself”) to a separate, back-dated post, to which I will periodically add material, summarizing the addition here in a “live” Water Cooler. (Hopefully, some Bourdieu.) It turns out that defining the Democrat Party is, in fact, a hard problem. I do think the paragraph that follows is on point all the way back to 2016, if not before:
The Democrat Party is the political expression of the class power of PMC, their base (lucidly explained by Thomas Frank in Listen, Liberal!). It follows that the Democrat Party is as “unreformable” as the PMC is unreformable; if the Democrat Party did not exist, the PMC would have to invent it. If the Democrat Party fails to govern, that’s because the PMC lacks the capability to govern. (“PMC” modulo “class expatriates,” of course.) Second, all the working parts of the Party reinforce each other. Leave aside characterizing the relationships between elements of the Party (ka-ching, but not entirely) those elements comprise a network — a Flex Net? An iron octagon? — of funders, vendors, apparatchiks, electeds, NGOs, and miscellaneous mercenaries, with assets in the press and the intelligence community.
Note, of course, that the class power of the PMC both expresses and is limited by other classes; oligarchs and American gentry (see ‘industrial model’ of Ferguson, Jorgensen, and Jie) and the working class spring to mind. Suck up, kick down.
“New Hampshire risks losing delegates over presidential primary date fight with DNC” [CBS]. “The DNC is upending the 2024 presidential nominating process by making South Carolina the first primary state, knocking New Hampshire out of its coveted position. But New Hampshire has so far refused to concede the spot, breezing by a Sept. 1 deadline the DNC had set for New Hampshire to give up its position. On Thursday, the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee extended the deadline for New Hampshire to come into compliance to Oct. 14, reserving its threat of sanctions that would remove some of the state’s delegates at the Democratic National Convention next year if it doesn’t comply with the national party’s primary calendar changes. At this point, the committee says it has only received a plan from New Hampshire that does not include a primary date. If the New Hampshire primary is held ahead of South Carolina, Mr. Biden and his campaign may omit his name from the ballot in New Hampshire, in protest of its failure to comply with party rules. Mr. Biden, whose successful pursuit of the 2020 nomination was launched by South Carolina’s support, initially proposed that the state go first in the Democrats’ primary process. New Hampshire Democrats argue they lack the authority to move the primary because New Hampshire law requires the state’s primary to be set at least a week before any other nominating contest. To comply, a reversal of the 1975 law would have to pass a Republican-led majority in the Legislature. While just 43% of Democrats support the “first in the nation” law, a majority of Republicans and independents in the state support the law, according to a University of New Hampshire poll. A DNC calendar change has long been floated, and New Hampshire hasn’t taken steps to change its law.” • And speaking of the DNC—
“NC Rules & Bylaws Committee Meets To Consider 2024 Presidential Primary & Caucus Calendar” [C-SPAN]. “The Democratic National Committee’s Rules & Bylaws Committee met in Washington, DC to consider states’ plans for 2024 primaries, caucuses, and delegate selection. The two states with the most controversy — Iowa and New Hampshire, the traditional first-in-the-nation caucus and primary states — had the fate of their 2024 plans delayed until a later meeting of the Rules & Bylaws Committee, slated to coincide with the full DNC’s 2024 fall meeting in St. Louis. The committee also approved delegate selection plans from other states including Georgia and California, and discussed Maine’s experience with ranked-choice voting, which was being proposed by some states for their 2024 presidential primary contests.”
“The Democrats’ Oliver Anthony Problem” [Ruy Teixiera, The Liberal Patriot]. “The fact that Democrats responded with visceral dislike to a song that expressed the complicated populist views of an actual working-class person shows how unwelcoming the party has become to actual working-class people, as opposed to mythological proletarians who combine hatred of (Republican) corporations with reverence for ‘Bidenomics’ and careful usage of all the approved intersectional language… In a new CNN poll, Biden loses the working class by 14 points to Trump, while carrying college-educated voters by 18 points. That compares to Biden’s 2020 loss to Trump of ‘only’ four points among working-class voters…. We’ll likely see more of the same in 2024. As Brownstein observed in the article referenced above, it is likely that Biden, despite his “middle class Joe” persona, will wind up relying more, not less, on upscale voters than he did in 2020…..It just might work. Certainly it’s mathematically feasible to compensate for working-class losses by gains among the college-educated (though those gains have to be larger because the college-educated are a smaller group). But besides being risky, one has to wonder what kind of party the Democrats are becoming. Is this really the party they want to be, where the views, priorities, and values of the educated take precedence? We are getting very far indeed from FDR’s party of the common man and woman. Both political prudence and the core historic commitments of the Democratic Party should lead them away from their current path and back toward the working class.” • The irony of Ruy Teixiera, the Democratic strategist who more than any other moved created the permission structure for the Democrat PMC base to move the party toward idpol, morphing into Thomas Frank, just seven years too late, is hard to bear.
Realignment and Legitimacy
#COVID19
“I am in earnest — I will not equivocate — I will not excuse — I will not retreat a single inch — AND I WILL BE HEARD.” –William Lloyd Garrison
Resources, United States (National): Transmission (CDC); Wastewater (CDC, Biobot; includes many counties; Wastewater Scan, includes drilldown by zip); Variants (CDC; Walgreens); “Iowa COVID-19 Tracker” (in IA, but national data). “Infection Control, Emergency Management, Safety, and General Thoughts” (especially on hospitalization by city).
Lambert here: Readers, thanks for the collective effort. To update any entry, do feel free to contact me at the address given with the plants. Please put “COVID” in the subject line. Thank you!
Resources, United States (Local): 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 reports); 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).
Resources, Canada (National): Wastewater (Government of Canada).
Resources, Canada (Provincial): ON (wastewater); QC (les eaux usées); BC, Vancouver (wastewater).
Hat tips to helpful 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, square coats (11), tennesseewaltzer, Utah, Bob White (3).
Stay safe out there!
Censorship and Propaganda
“If You Suffer from Urgent Normal Syndrome, Ask for Help” [Jessica Wildfire, OK Doomer]. Well worth a read:
>
Urgent normal syndrome is defined by:
- Unhealthy attraction to crowded indoor spaces.
- Anxiety at the sight of masks or air purifiers.
- An urge to downplay threats.
- Avoidance of ‘bad news.’
Reachers have identified a number of unhealthy dynamics in group psychology that can make someone more vulnerable to urgent normal syndrome. First, groups can demonstrate normalcy bias that inhibits their normal fight or flight response. As Amanda Ripley has argued in Unthinkable, ‘large groups of people facing death act in surprising ways. Most of us become incredibly docile… Usually, we form groups and move slowly, as if sleepwalking in a nightmare.’
Researchers have shown how normalcy bias has hampered our response to the pandemic. As one article in the Journal of Community & Public Health notes, ‘social shaming reinforces our normalcy bias. It’s not cool to overreact.’
Collective amnesia also plays a role in urgent normal syndrome. As sociologist Alessandra Tanesini writes, ‘Communities often respond to traumatic events in their histories by destroying objects that would cue memories of a past they wish to forget.’ Communities actually spread what she calls ‘memory ignorance’ in order to suppress past mistakes, unpleasant memories, and divergent thought. According to Tanesini, this memory ignorance serves as ‘a form of self-deception or wishful thinking in the service of self-flattery.’
A third flaw plays a final role in urgent normal syndrome, and it’s called reactance. Initially proposed by Jack Brehm, reactance describes an intense desire among individualists to downplay threats and risks, especially if they perceive a loss of their personal freedom as a result.
We’ve witnessed an unsettling surge in all of these behaviors over the last few years, as more and more people encourage and even reward each other for disregarding the health and safety of those around them.
Elite Maleficence
Covid minimizer and Sociopath of the Day Leana Wen most likely* has Long Covid:
It’s official — Leana Wen has #LongCovid
“In July, I wrote about the unsettling experience of being.. very ill & hospitalized. Many readers have kindly written to ask whether I’ve fully recovered.”
“I wish I could say yes — The truth is far from that.” https://t.co/hiBUk2MSsK
— charlos (@loscharlos) September 14, 2023
NOTE * I let my schadenfreude get the best of me (hat tip, alert reader thump). But she certainly plenty of items on the checklist, especially the recurring fatigue.
“PROFILE: Leana Wen” [Covid Accountability Index]. From January, still germane. Massive takedown and outline of Wen’s career, concluding: “For a little while, I used to think of ‘Judas’ as a fun entrance jingle for professional wrestler and dad-rock musician Chris Jericho. Now I think of someone who lines her own pockets whilst betraying her colleagues and neglecting not only her children, but the tens of millions of children across America. If you’re going to be a sit-at-home MD all day Leana, why don’t you pick up a hobby instead – like solo-boardgaming or papercraft or something relatively harmless. It’s never too late to make a positive change.” • Ouch.
Case Data
NOT UPDATED From BioBot wastewater data, September 14:
Lambert here: Other signals — scattered and partial though they be — also converge on a drop: ER visits, positivity. We shall see. (I would include CDC’s wastewater map for comparison, but it’s eleven days old.)
Regional data:
Interestingly, the upswing begins before July 4, which neither accelerates nor retards it.
Variants
From CDC, September 16:
Lambert here: Top of the leaderboard: EG.5 (“Eris“). Still BA.2.86 here, not even in the note, but see below at Positivity.
From CDC, September 2:
Lambert here: Not sure what to make of this. I’m used to seeing a new variant take down the previously dominant variant. Here it looks like we have a “tag team,” all working together to cut XBB.1.5 down to size. I sure hope the volunteers doing Pangolin, on which this chart depends, don’t all move on the green fields and pastures new (or have their access to facilities cut by administrators of ill intent).
CDC: “As of May 11, genomic surveillance data will be reported biweekly, based on the availability of positive test specimens.” “Biweeekly: 1. occurring every two weeks. 2. occurring twice a week; semiweekly.” Looks like CDC has chosen sense #1. In essence, they’re telling us variants are nothing to worry about. Time will tell.
Covid Emergency Room Visits
NOT UPDATED From CDC NCIRD Surveillance, September 9:
NOTE “Charts and data provided by CDC, updates Wednesday by 8am. For the past year, using a rolling 52-week period.” So not the entire pandemic, FFS (the implicit message here being that Covid is “just like the flu,” which is why the seasonal “rolling 52-week period” is appropriate for bothMR SUBLIMINAL I hate these people so much. Notice also that this chart shows, at least for its time period, that Covid is not seasonal, even though CDC is trying to get us to believe that it is, presumably so they can piggyback on the existing institutional apparatus for injections.
Hospitalization
Bellwether New York City, data as of September 14:
Still climbing. I hate this metric because the lag makes it deceptive.
Here’s a different CDC visualization on hospitalization, nationwide, not by state, but with a date, at least. September 9:
Note the slight drop, consistent with Walgreens. At least now we now that hospitalization tracks positivity, which is nice. Even if we don’t know how many cases there are.
Positivity
NOT UPDATED From Walgreens, September 11:
0.4% Still thinking the dip is Labor Day data. Or perhaps people were actually testing for Labor Day, and stopped. The absolute numbers are still very small relative to June 2022, say. Interestingly, these do not correlate with the regional figures for wastewater. (It would be interesting to survey this population generally; these are people who, despite a tsunami of official propaganda and enormous peer pressure, went and got tested anyhow.)
NOT UPDATED Cleveland Clinic, September 9:
Lambert here: I know this is just Ohio, but the Cleveland Clinic is good*, and we’re starved for data, so…. NOTE * Even if hospital infection control is trying to kill patients by eliminating universal masking with N95s.
From CDC, traveler’s data, August 26:
A drop! And here are the variants:
No BA.2.86 for two of the long-delayed collection weeks. I have highlighted the two leaders: EG.5 and FL.1.5.1. Interestingly, those are the two leaders within the United States also, suggesting the national and international bouillabaisse is similar. Or we’re infecting the world.
Deaths
NOT UPDATED Iowa COVID-19 Tracker, September 13:
Lambert here: The WHO data is worthless, so I replaced it with the Iowa Covid Data Tracker. Their method: “These data have been sourced, via the API from the CDC: https://data.cdc.gov/NCHS/Conditions-Contributing-to-COVID-19-Deaths-by-Stat/hk9y-quqm. This visualization updates on Wednesday evenings. Data are provisional and are adjusted weekly by the CDC.” I can’t seem to get a pop-up that shows a total of the three causes (top right). Readers?
Total: 1,175,152 – 1,174,691 = 461 (461 * 365 = 168,265 deaths per year, today’s YouGenicist™ number for “living with” Covid (quite a bit higher than the minimizers would like, though they can talk themselves into anything. If the YouGenicist™ metric keeps chugging along like this, I may just have to decide this is what the powers-that-be consider “mission accomplished” for this particular tranche of death and disease).
Excess Deaths
NOT UPDATED The Economist, September 13:
Lambert here: This is now being updated daily again. Odd. Based on a machine-learning model. (The CDC has an excess estimate too, but since it ran forever with a massive typo in the Legend, I figured nobody was really looking at it, so I got rid it. )
Stats Watch
Manufacturing: “United States NY Empire State Manufacturing Index” [Trading Economics]. “The NY Empire State Manufacturing Index surprisingly jumped to 1.9 in September 2023 from -19 in August, beating forecasts of -10. The reading showed business activity in the NY state was little changed after shrinking sharply last month.”
Manufacturing: “United States Manufacturing Production” [Trading Economics]. “Manufacturing production in the US went up 0.1% from a month earlier in August 2023, following a downwardly revised 0.4% rise in July, in line with expectations. The index for durable manufacturing edged up 0.1%, and the index for nondurable manufacturing increased 0.2%.”
Industrial Production: “United States Industrial Production: [Trading Economics]. “Industrial production in the United States went up 0.4 percent from a month earlier in August 2023, above market expectations of a 0.1 percent increase and compared with a downwardly revised 0.7 percent rise in July.”
Finance:
Combine that with inflation, and you’ve got people scrimping on life’s necessities to pay down debt, which leads to a dour atmosphere in “the economy,” I would imagine.
Tech: “Google says it can’t fix Pixel Watches, please just buy a new one” [Ars Technica]. “Google makes a big deal out of its partnership with iFixit and the availability of replacement parts for its products, but one Google product that doesn’t seem fixable is the Pixel Watch. After spotting some posts from Pixel Watch users seeking a remedy after cracking the glass and coming up with no clear answers, The Verge got Google to confirm that, even 11 months after launch, there is no repair plan right now. Google can’t fix your watch. There are no parts. A Google spokesperson told The Verge ‘At this moment, we don’t have any repair option for the Google Pixel Watch. If your watch is damaged, you can contact the Google Pixel Watch Customer Support Team to check your replacement options.’ Damage like a cracked display isn’t covered under any kind of warranty, so buying a new device is the only official option.”
Today’s Fear & Greed Index: 55 Neutral (previous close: 50 Fear) [CNN]. One week ago: 51 (Neutral). (0 is Extreme Fear; 100 is Extreme Greed). Last updated Sep 14 at 12:32:38 PM ET.
Photo Book
“Notice what you notice” [Notice What You Notice]. Re Instagram, etc.: “That’s the funny thing about these social nets: they trick you into thinking you need them for your creative work, but they end up sapping you of so much of your energy that you don’t have the juice to do your thing. And they are an enormous distraction, not to mention addictive. That has been my experience, anyway. I’d be curious to hear if you agree and how you have responded to these nefarious challenges in your own work.”
The 420
“Thousands sign up to experience magic mushrooms as Oregon’s novel psilocybin experiment takes off” [Associated Press].
Epic Healing Eugene [Oregon] — America’s first licensed psilocybin service center — opened in June, marking Oregon’s unprecedented step in offering the mind-bending drug to the public. The center now has a waitlist of more than 3,000 names… No prescription or referral is needed, but proponents hope Oregon’s legalization will spark a revolution in mental health care…. Colorado voters last year passed a measure allowing regulated use of magic mushrooms starting in 2024, and California’s Legislature this month approved a measure that would allow possession and use of certain plant- and mushroom-based psychedelics, including psilocybin and mescaline, with plans for health officials to develop guidelines for therapeutic use.” • Hmm!
News of the Wired
Contact information for plants: Readers, feel free to contact me at lambert [UNDERSCORE] strether [DOT] corrente [AT] yahoo [DOT] com, to (a) find out how to send me a check if you are allergic to PayPal and (b) to find out how to send me images of plants. Vegetables are fine! Fungi and coral are deemed to be honorary plants! If you want your handle to appear as a credit, please place it at the start of your mail in parentheses: (thus). Otherwise, I will anonymize by using your initials. See the previous Water Cooler (with plant) here. From lcm:
lcm write: “Black-eyed Susan and echinacea, mostly self-sown, in central VA.” Masses of color, exactly to my taste.
