By Lambert Strether of Corrente
Affected person readers, it’s been a really lengthy week in the actual world and I’m drained. So, this Water Cooler isn’t precisely an Open Thread, however it’s brief. And now I’m going to discover a cool breeze and shut my eyes. Discuss amongst yourselves! –lambert
–lambert
Hen Track of the Day
I regarded for one more species of songbird that mimics, and got here up with the Thrasher.
Brown Thrasher, Otsego, Michigan, United States. Plus insect sounds!
In Case You May Miss…
- New RCP polling averages: No excellent news for Trump.
- Reticulum networking stack
Politics
“So most of the social reactions that strike us as psychological are in truth a rational administration of symbolic capital.” –Pierre Bourdieu, Classification Struggles
2024
Lower than 100 days to go!
Friday’s RCP Ballot Averages:
There isn’t any excellent news right here for Trump. The deterioration in each Pennsylvania and Georgia is particularly marked. Keep in mind, nevertheless, that every one the fluctuations — in truth, all of the leads — are throughout the margin of error. So the “pleasure” is predicated on, nicely, vibes.
“How Harris Has Fully Upended the Presidential Race, in 14 Maps” [New York Times]. “We at the moment are again to the identical electoral map that we had earlier than Mr. Biden’s summertime polling collapse: As soon as once more, the winner in November will come right down to the seven battleground states of Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.” • 270toWin agrees with the magnitude of the shift, though they pass over North Carolina:
“Harris has opened up a second path to victory, in response to The Put up’s polling mannequin” [WaPo]. “Our modeling exhibits that Harris has two paths to potential success: the Rust Belt states of Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania and the Solar Belt states of Georgia, Arizona and Nevada in addition to North Carolina (she might win in both area and nonetheless declare the White Home). In the meantime, Trump should win each the Rust Belt and Solar Belt to triumph.” • Hmm.
* * * Kamala (D): Kamala’s mendacity once more:
Trump: I by no means bought credit score for COVID
(Over 1,000,000 People died and he informed us to inject bleach) pic.twitter.com/vww2MtJurW
— Kamala HQ (@KamalaHQ) August 14, 2024
First, Trump isn’t mendacity. The vaccines that Biden mandated had been all developed by Trump’s Operation Warp Velocity. Second, of the million that died, most died on Biden’s watch. Third, “inject bleach” is a lie (on a par with the lie about Vance and his sofa). Once more, Democrats appear to choose to lie. Even once they don’t must. It’s bizarre.
Trump (R): “Trump Gambles on Outdoors Teams to Finance Voter Outreach Efforts” [New York Times]. “The Republican marketing campaign for president is quietly being remade by new federal pointers that empower big-money teams and threaten to undermine occasion management nicely past the 2024 election. Former President Donald J. Trump’s group has enlisted a few of these teams to spend a whole lot of tens of millions of {dollars} to knock on a whole lot of hundreds of doorways throughout the nation — saving the marketing campaign vital cash within the course of. However the Trump marketing campaign is making a severe gamble in doing so, betting that these outdoors teams, which they don’t instantly management, can perform their marching orders with out accountability…. Senior Republican Occasion officers concern that the choice — and the Trump marketing campaign’s efforts — will result in the occasion shedding appreciable management over get-out-the-vote operations, a lot as they’ve on the earth of tv promoting, the place the scripts and techniques are sometimes crafted by tremendous PACs with their very own ambitions and concepts.” • One other imponderable…..
Syndemics
“I’m in earnest — I cannot equivocate — I cannot excuse — I cannot retreat a single inch — AND I WILL BE HEARD.” –William Lloyd Garrison
Covid Assets, United States (Nationwide): Transmission (CDC); Wastewater (CDC, Biobot; consists of many counties; Wastewater Scan, consists of drilldown by zip); Variants (CDC; Walgreens); “Iowa COVID-19 Tracker” (in IA, however nationwide information). “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!
Assets, 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 studies); 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).
Assets, Canada (Nationwide): Wastewater (Authorities of Canada).
Assets, Canada (Provincial): ON (wastewater); QC (les eaux usées); BC (wastewater); BC, Vancouver (wastewater).
Hat tricks to useful readers: Alexis, 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, KF, LL, Michael King, KF, LaRuse, mrsyk, MT, MT_Wild, otisyves, Petal (6), RK (2), RL, RM, Rod, sq. coats (11), tennesseewaltzer, Tom B., Utah, Bob White (3).
Keep protected on the market!
Origins Debate
“Pentagon nonetheless funneling cash to suspended EcoHealth Alliance, unable to entry potential gain-of-function analysis information overseas” [New York Post]. “The Pentagon remains to be funneling cash to the suspended grantee EcoHealth Alliance and is unable to completely entry information on gain-of-function analysis it could be funding abroad — together with in China, in response to a letter completely obtained by The Put up.” • Leaving apart gain-of-function, EcoHealth is an apparent NGO cesspit of dodgy accounting and sleazy contracting, as Self-importance Truthful confirmed in exhaustive element again in 2022. It’s arduous to see why they might have any ongoing contracts.
Coverage
“The World Is Not Prepared for the Subsequent Pandemic” [Michael T. Osterholm and Mark Olshaker, Foreign Affairs]. The deck: “Governments Have to Make investments Far Extra in New and Higher Vaccines.” From the textual content:
Officers ought to make no mistake: there might be extra influenza and coronavirus pandemics, and any one in all them might show much more catastrophic than the COVID-19 pandemic. Each time it happens, which means the viral particles could be suspended within the air for lengthy intervals and distances. When such an outbreak transpires, fast international transmission will occur earlier than anybody realizes the world is within the earliest days of a years-long pandemic. Governments can not wait to organize till a virus is already spreading around the globe. Because the final 5 years have proven, even a reasonably lethal illness can have monumental well being, financial, social, and political penalties.
And but, no point out of non-pharmaceutical interventions in any respect — though blocking the airborne route by means of air flow and masking is the one technique to, because it had been, “clip the wings” of the virus earlier than it spreads, whether or not the virus be Covid, H5N1, MonkeyPox, and even SmallPox. (By the way, re: “When such an outbreak transpires”, the phrase transpires derives from the Latin spirare, to breathe. It’s just like the return of the repressed #CovidIsAirborne.)
TABLE 1: Every day Covid Charts
Lambert right here: Value noting that nationwide Emergency Room admissions are as excessive as they had been within the first wave, in 2020.
LEGEND
1) ★ for charts new at present; all others are usually not up to date.
2) For a full-size/full-resolution picture, Command-click (MacOS) or right-click (Home windows) on the chart thumbnail and “open picture in new tab.”
NOTES
[1] (CDC) This week’s wastewater map, with scorching spots annotated. Retains spreading.
[2] (CDC) Final week’s wastewater map.
[3] (CDC Variants) KP.* very fashionable.
[4] (ER) Value noting Emergency Division use is now on a par with the primary wave, in 2020.
[5] (Hospitalization: NY) Taking place. Doesn’t must be a everlasting factor, in fact. (The NY city space has kind; in 2020, as the house of two worldwide airports (JFK and EWR) it was an vital entry level for the virus into the nation (and from thence up the Hudson River valley, because the wealthy sought to flee, after which across the nation by means of air journey.)
[6] (Hospitalization: CDC). The visualization suppresses what’s, in proportion phrases, a major improve.
[7] (Walgreens) Fiddling and diddling.
[8] (Cleveland) Leaping.
[9] (Vacationers: Positivity) Up. These sh*theads at CDC have modified the chart in order that it doesn’t even run again to 1/21/23, because it used to, however now begins 1/1/24. There’s additionally no technique to regulate the time vary. CDC actually doesn’t need you to have the ability to take a historic view of the pandemic, or examine one surge to a different. In an any case, that’s why the form of the curve has modified.
[10] (Vacationers: Variants) It’s rumored that there’s a brand new variant in China, XDV.1, nevertheless it’s not displaying up right here.
[11] Deaths low, however positivity up.
[12] Deaths low, ED up.
Stats Watch
Housing: “United States Housing Begins” [Trading Economics]. “Housing begins in the US fell by 6.8% from the earlier month to an annualized charge of 1.238 million in July of 2024, the sharpest decline since March to the bottom stage since 2020, and contrasting with the downwardly revised 1.1% improve within the earlier month.”
Tech: “Fortnite Maker Epic Video games Challenges Apple’s Dominance With New iOS App Retailer” [Wired]. “Epic Video games at present formally launched a rival app retailer for iOS within the European Union, marking the primary time Apple’s personal App Retailer has needed to face a severe rival. The Epic Video games Retailer will initially provide Epic’s video games, together with Fortnite, for customers to obtain onto their iPhones, with plans to begin onboarding third-party builders’ video games starting in December…. Epic says its app retailer will take a most 12 % fee on gross sales, undercutting Apple’s App Retailer, the place charges can attain as much as 30 %… Epic is making use of a brand new EU regulation often known as the Digital Markets Act (DMA), which forces tech giants to make modifications to present rivals extra entry to their carefully guarded communities of customers. In Apple’s case, which means the corporate has to permit various app shops onto European units.”
Tech: “Elon Musk’s monetary woes at X have Tesla bulls fearing he’ll liquidate extra inventory” [Fortune]. “Musk’s repeated outbursts in opposition to advertisers have dried up the principle income for the loss-making firm previously often known as Twitter. A current determination to sue them for heeding his personal recommendation to not purchase adverts on the platform hasn’t helped. Sooner or later, he should present a contemporary infusion of money to salvage his $44 billion takeover. And which may imply Musk sells Tesla inventory to boost the cash—hurting anybody who holds the carmaker’s shares. ‘I’d expect one thing between $1 and $2 billion in inventory,’ stated Bradford Ferguson, president and chief funding officer of asset supervisor Halter Ferguson Monetary, in feedback posted to YouTube on Wednesday. This alone might trigger the inventory to lose between 5% and 10% of its worth. ‘It’s a large gap they should plug.’”
In the present day’s Worry & Greed Index: 36 Worry (earlier shut: 32 Worry) [CNN]. One week in the past: 23 (Excessive Worry). (0 is Excessive Worry; 100 is Excessive Greed). Final up to date Aug 16 at 1:13:54 PM ET.
Poetry Nook
“POETS Day! Helpful Strains and a Favourite from Pound [Ordinary Times]. “I exploit a line – overuse, my kids may say – from Yeats at any time when the chance pops up; ‘O saddest harp in all of the world.’ … It’s a superb line to deploy when a toddler offers you ‘However, I did my greatest!’ when even with out bending down you may see piles of Legos pushed below the mattress in a supposedly picked up room.” • POETS = Piss Off Early, Tomorrow’s Saturday. Which I appear to have finished!
“Cleansing up the ageing mind: Scientists restore mind’s trash disposal system” [Science News]. No, this isn’t about electoral politics. “Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and different neurological problems could be seen as ‘soiled mind’ illnesses, the place the mind struggles to filter dangerous waste. Getting older is a key danger issue as a result of, as we get older, our mind’s capability to take away poisonous buildup slows down. Nevertheless, new analysis in mice demonstrates that it’s potential to reverse age-related results and restore the mind’s waste-clearing course of. ‘This analysis exhibits that restoring cervical lymph vessel operate can considerably rescue the slower removing of waste from the mind related to age,’ stated Douglas Kelley, PhD, a professor of Mechanical Engineering within the College of Rochester Hajim College of Engineering and Utilized Sciences. ‘Furthermore, this was achieved with a drug already getting used clinically, providing a possible remedy technique.’” • Science is popping!
Personal, Safe and Uncensorable Messaging Over a LoRa Mesh” [unsigned.io]. The deck: “Or: The best way to arrange a totally personal, impartial and encrypted communication system in half an hour, utilizing stuff you should buy for below $100.” • It appears to be like like I may need set up firmware on {hardware} I purchase to get this Reticulum stack to work. Nonetheless, periodically, I’ve muttered about how I want to ship information over (say) radio, and never over the Web, away from the Censorship Industrial Advanced. Maybe some networking maven can remark.
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