Posts Made By: James Brown

Originally Posted by Richard Davis

And I think I stated that when I wrote this:

I don't recall the same level of intensity then as I'm seeing today.  If they were, which I'm conceding is possible.

You might want to understand that my father was in the Military and was very politically active so perhaps I remember it better than you, especially since my older sister was a hippie and ran away from home in 1968 to shack up with her boyfriend.  

I remember those times seared into my memory.  


 

Is this the sister whose house you have been building this winter and spring?  I hope so, it would be a shame if her youthful adventure messed up your relationship permanently.  

I have some political memories from the '60s, but not many.  Mom and Dad have always been republicans.  They still are, although they won't vote for Trump.  Go figure.  They are both quite sharp and voted third party last time.  Probably what they will do again.  I remember Mom crying when Bobby Kennedy was shot.  I generally remember the controversy over the war and I remember LBJ, but mostly because his initials and mine are the same (JLB) and the news headlines were always LBJ this and LBJ that.  Pretty cool if you are 5 or 6.   I remember watching Laugh-In which was very political, but I don't think I got a lot of the jokes.  

Originally Posted by Richard Davis

I was making a point that those like you, with you cavalier attitude, who don't speak up and out, against what is going on in this nation are part of the problem.

Tyranny can only succeed when good men do nothing. 

You might have a point - interestingly, this is the exact same point my black cousin-in-law made this weekend in a family Zoom chat.  He is much more supportive of the BLM movement than me, and it is his opinion that treating blacks as equals under the law is not enough.  In his view opposition to racism means getting out and doing something about it.  "Silence is violence."  That sort of thing.

He is a good man and I like him a lot, but I disagree with him and you both when you say that those who don't speak out are part of the problem.  Also, I agree with Brian - speaking out here is not really speaking out at all.

Jim

Originally Posted by Richard Davis

LOL!!  What does that mean??  Why would I give a damn about her youthful adventure?  

My sister has had a life of shacking up with all kinds of people throughout her life and I couldn't care less.  Why would I?  Why would her youth have any bearing on my relationship with her?

She grew up in California, as I did and she'll be the first to tell you she's tried every drug out there including Heroin.  She's never gotten addicted to any substance except for alcohol.  

Her husband is an ultra liberal Union Electrical worker who just retired at 62 and he loved Obama and he hates Trump.  

He and I have gotten into many discussions about Politics, and he's a lefty.

My sister basically just votes for whom he votes.  

So what.  

And BTW, I just finished up her house.  She's now waiting on the plumber to correct the myriad of mistakes the company made and then they'll be able to get their final and their CO. 

I'll send photos soon!  

You obviously have me pegged all wrong.  

Family is what counts in my life, not things, although like everybody, I like nice things. 

I could get into a knock down, drag out fist fight with you, you might beat my ass, or I might beat yours, and it wouldn't matter one wit to me, because then I could have lunch with you an hour later and forget the whole thing.  

That's the type of guy I am.

Those guys on the left here, and you apparently have zero intuition about people.

Rod is most likely right now running to Herb to get me kicked off here.  

He might succeed.  

If he does, you'll be left to deal with those fools.   

I guess we'll find out in a couple of minutes perhaps.  

 

Sorry to get you so worked up.  I was just making small-talk.  

Originally Posted by Richard Davis

See, I'll quote Reagan here.  "there you go again".  

I promise you Jim, I'm not worked up.  

I'm not even slightly perturbed.  Man, your powers of perception are surely off the mark.  

I was small-talk too, except that my small talk is run on sentences.

I thought you probably knew that by now? 

I didn't mean you were foaming at the mouth or anything.  You typed a lot and you typed it fast in reply to a reasonably innocuous comment.  Your small talk is not that small!

For both Darian and Rich:

I have asked a couple of questions up-thread and I am genuinely curious about your replies.  I don't want this to get lost in the banter.  NO rush though.  I'll be calling it quits soon and probably won't log in over the weekend.

1.  "Assuming my financial circumstances do bias my outlook, why do you think that the poor will be worse off under a Biden presidency?  What will Biden do that causes the poor to suffer more than they do under Trump?"

2.  "Hi Darian, No offense taken.  How do you reckon your life will change if Biden is elected and "leftists" are put on the Supreme Court?"

3.  Same question for Rich or anyone else who cares to reply.

Obviously I'm trying to reinforce my original point here.  I don't think that most average Americans will have their lives changed dramatically for better or worse by a Biden election or by any president's election, for that matter.  If you have some concrete thoughts on how your life or other folk's lives will change for the better or worse if Biden is, or is not elected, I'd love to hear about it.

Jim

Originally Posted by James Brown

For both Darian and Rich:

I have asked a couple of questions up-thread and I am genuinely curious about your replies.  I don't want this to get lost in the banter.  NO rush though.  I'll be calling it quits soon and probably won't log in over the weekend.

1.  "Assuming my financial circumstances do bias my outlook, why do you think that the poor will be worse off under a Biden presidency?  What will Biden do that causes the poor to suffer more than they do under Trump?"

2.  "Hi Darian, No offense taken.  How do you reckon your life will change if Biden is elected and "leftists" are put on the Supreme Court?"

3.  Same question for Rich or anyone else who cares to reply.

Obviously I'm trying to reinforce my original point here.  I don't think that most average Americans will have their lives changed dramatically for better or worse by a Biden election or by any president's election, for that matter.  If you have some concrete thoughts on how your life or other folk's lives will change for the better or worse if Biden is, or is not elected, I'd love to hear about it.

Jim

I see that Darian already replied.  Fast and furious day on the forum!

Originally Posted by Jim Moscheck

I think I killed this thread. No one think it’s still relevant considering the news the past week? Dr Fauci testified today that we are going in the wrong direction and he sounded pretty grim.

Hi Jim:

I took some time off from updating the graphs, but I am still following the pandemic pretty closely.  A few random thoughts:  

Some states have seen significant upward swings in the infection rate, but it is tough to tell how much is an increase in actual infections versus a result of increased testing.  Michigan might fall into the category of increased reported infections, with some of that being an effect of increased testing.  The upward trend states are probably experiencing actual increases in infection rate, but in most cases it is from very low starting points compared to NY or NJ.  Nowhere near overwhelming the hospitals as I understand it.

Colorado conveniently posts a chart showing the percent of positive tests.  That is extremely useful because it verifies that Covid 19 is on a downward trend, at least in our state.

Something I have been thinking about a lot - Covid19 is going to be with us for a long time.  Maybe years.  We can not lock down society forever - I am a firm supporter of lock downs if the health care system is going to be overrun.  If the health care system is not going to be overrun, I am fine with reasonable mitigation (masks, spacing in restaurants, work from home if you can and so on.)  Obviously I am in favor of protecting vulnerable populations in long term care, nursing homes and the like.  But I think the schools need to open this fall and I think that commerce needs to be re-engaged.  I know that this will result in increased deaths, at least for the near term.  It is cold-blooded, but some level of death from Covid19 has to be acceptable to society.   We are not going to drive the death rate to 0 even if we were to totally lock down the economy causing financial ruin to many.

I don't have a "number" of how many deaths are acceptable, but according to the graph below, the US is trending toward a steady state of maybe 500 deaths per day.   That is a terrible loss of about 180,000 per year, but only a tiny percentage of the 2.8 Million Americans who die each year.  Especially considering that many Covid 19 deaths are folks who were quite likely to die relatively soon without the virus.  I am feeling particularly cold blooded, but, objectively, I think this is accurate.  That 500 per day number might continue to decrease too, as more effective therapies are invented.  

So, I strongly support reopening the economy with reasonable social distancing measures thrown in.  This curve below is grim, but manageable - I think that we'll have to live with it for quite a while:

Jim

Of course I see that our Governor, whom I think has done a fine job with the pandemic locally,  re-closed the bars yesterday because of a Colorado uptick and especially among younger Coloradans.  Damn, I missed the window to get into a bar... .  Guess I'll have to continue drinking at home!

I have mixed thoughts about this step.  An uptick is an entirely predictable effect of relaxed closures.  Relaxing the closures is necessary for the economy.  So I personally think that a manageable uptick while not exactly OK, is still acceptable if manageable.  I bet that the kids in Denver flooded the bars and shed their masks.  If that is the case, the governor might be making the right move - for a short time anyway.  When the bars re-open again, perhaps masks will be more acceptable? 

Our own uptick seems pretty manageable - your state might be different!  Jim



   

Originally Posted by Rod Kaufman

I'm sure the governors of Texas and California and elsewhere would likely disagree on many points with Jim's analysis. Beyond that, China is ahead of the curve again both in reducing infections and in vaccinating its military:
"According to a CanSino statement, clinical trials of the new vaccine have shown a "good safety profile" with initial results indicating that Ad5-nCoV had potential to prevent diseases caused by SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus strain that causes Covid-19." "CanSino had previously announced in May that the Canadian government was allowing human trials of the Ad5-nCoV vaccine." Perhaps that's what international cooperation can lead to with the appropriate leadership in the WH...
https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/30/health/china-coronavirus-military-vaccine-intl-hnk-scli/index.html

Hi Rod:

Like I said, your state may be different.  Nonetheless, the Covid 19 death rate in CA is still only 156/million - less than 10% of the New York death rate.  Total deaths in CA are at 6,168 as of today, out of a population of 39,500,000 (all according to Worldometer).  In other words, about 0.0156% of your population has died with or from Covid 19 so far.

The overall "all causes" annual California Death Rate has been running at 6550 per million, through 2018.  The usual suspects, heart disease and cancer lead the pack of course.

https://wonder.cdc.gov/controller/datarequest/D140;jsessionid=7A5EB96D73838A8C273D68C443DF740B

Let's say that the overall California Covid 19 death rate jumps some and ends up at 500/million/year.  That would be terrible of course, but still well within the capacity of the California health care system.  Even under those circumstances do you keep the economy shut down for a whole year? 

Also, it is not entirely clear that the California death rate will spike - even though the positive tests are up.  At least the data does not show a death rate spike yet (see graph below).  A lot of the new cases may be in healthy enough individuals to beat the virus, assuming CA is prudently protecting the vulnerable.  Also, it may be that the positive test spike is in part caused by increased testing.  A lot of factors come in to play.

To reiterate, the disease is dangerous and I support economic shut downs, if it looks like the health care system is in jeopardy.  Otherwise, I think we all have to tolerate some level of "acceptable" deaths for the sake of the economy, just like we tolerate other deaths.  I think we should take reasonable steps that do not involve total economic shut down (masks, distancing, spacing, voluntary work from home etc.)  I certainly can sympathize with a Governor who answers to people and press who are uncomfortable with or unwilling to accept any deaths, but being governor is not supposed to be an easy job.

Jim

Originally Posted by Russ Carroll

Jim,

I’ve been to the ER twice this week. New blockage in my heart/arteries. I do not ha e COVID-19, but I have now been around it in a city not yet even near a peak yet. It is awe full.

Even if you could somehow contain the deaths in some uniform way as you describe, which defies everything that is going on right now, what you cannot control is the devastation on ERs and hospitals as well as the incredible suffering inflicted on the public by this disease. I had to spend three hours in a virus airborne infection isolation room until results came back that I did not have COVID-19. That alone was a horrific experience knowing that I was Sleeping g in a room the COVID-19 patients had been in recently waiting for life-saving treatment. I am extremely lucky that the ER and hospital I was in was not overrun by COVID-19 patients as I may not have survived a delay. Many deaths in cities that are now being overrun like Dallas and Phoenix will have nothing to do with COVID-19 but the lack of medical care at ER’s because of it.

This virus has a life and a mind of its own and it’s not going to be managed by simple equations like taking the total number of deaths per year and dividing it by 365. It is much closer to a hostile adversary striking at cities with a disruption that is far more devastating than simply picking off a few people here and there on a daily basis.

We are not even treating this at the national level with the seriousness that it demands and I guarantee you from what I have seen and experienced we are going to pay and enormous price that probably did not have to happen. This will go down as one of the truly incredible tragedies primarily caused at the political level as idiotic as that sounds.

I have to go in for another heart procedure this coming week, and I’m obviously not looking forward to it but I am grateful that it’s even available to me...at least for now

Russ

PS I fully expect to recover because of the life-saving work done in our ERs and hospitals.

Hi Russ:

I feel crummy being hyper-analytical in this thread, knowing that is a luxury I have since Covid-19 is not real to me in the sense that it has not attacked me or a loved one yet. 

Please take care, get well soon and we'll keep you in our thoughts and prayers.  I am extremely pleased to hear that you expect a full recovery.

Jim