By Lambert Strether of Corrente

Hen Tune of the Day

California Thrasher, Mori Pt., San Mateo, California, United States. Brief and candy!

In Case You May Miss…

1. Democrat Nationwide Conference vignettes .
2. Boeing 777X and 787 debacles.
3. Covid, anosmia, and lack of govt perform.

Politics

“So lots of the social reactions that strike us as psychological are in reality a rational administration of symbolic capital.” –Pierre Bourdieu, Classification Struggles

Democrats en Déshabillé

2024

Lower than 100 days to go!

Friday’s RCP Ballot Averages:

There isn’t a excellent news right here for Trump. The deterioration in each Pennsylvania and Georgia is particularly marked. Bear in mind, nonetheless, that each one the fluctuations — in reality, all of the leads — are throughout the margin of error. So the “pleasure” relies on, properly, vibes.

Biden Defenestration:

“Joe Biden, Trump Casualty” [The American Conservative]. “The Joe Biden who addressed the conference final evening was already a ghost, one fated to hang-out the White Home till January 20. He’s an offended, impotent spirit. Heedless of his bare hypocrisy, he linked Trump to neo-Nazis in a single breath and insisted within the subsequent that he had been a president for all People, “demonizing nobody.” Quite the opposite, he demonized Republicans relentlessly, not simply final evening however all through his administration. “Democracy has prevailed, democracy has delivered, and now democracy have to be preserved!” he shouted—after he, the democratically chosen nominee of the Democratic Social gathering’s voters, handed the nomination over to a alternative who had by no means gained a lot as a single presidential major. • Hang-out and — presumably — run the manager department?

* * *

Democrat Nationwide Conference Vignettes:

Walz:

Tim Walz’s children doing bunny ears behind him whereas he’s on nationwide TV on the DNC is essentially the most relatable, Minnesota content material. pic.twitter.com/w0VDEehdeM

— Nate Morris 🥥🌴 (@_natemorris) August 20, 2024

Democrat Nationwide Conference:

“The Democrats’ Previous Guard Passes The Torch At The DNC” [HuffPo]. “Of the 25 elected officers who had been scheduled to talk, 13 had been underneath 50 years previous. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, 34, introduced the home down and seemingly leveled her profession up along with her speech. Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, 37, slammed ― actually ― the conservative blueprint known as Undertaking 2025 after bringing it out as a big printed guide. Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear, 48, and a trio of younger girls delivered the get together’s most necessary message, promising to guard abortion rights. Different younger leaders, together with Whitmer, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore and Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, had been seemingly held in reserve, with the talking schedule for the subsequent three nights not but absolutely revealed. The youth push additionally helps the get together promote the concept of Harris as a contemporary begin, a solution to transfer previous the chaotic politics of eras outlined by former President Donald Trump and the coronavirus pandemic.” • As if the coronavirus pandemic didn’t occur principally underneath Biden, with outcomes that we all know. (Man-oh-man, do I detest the phrase “younger chief.” It’s as if each chief in very subject is following… Now what’s the English phrase I’m in search of…. Precept, that’s it. It additionally presuppposes an institutional binary between younger and previous, and implies a kind of nurtuing course of the place the younger are introduced alongside, presumably by mentors. Improper and unrealistic respectively.)

“At Democratic Conference, UAW head threatens strike towards Stellantis over delayed plant reopening” [ABC News]. ” A high-profile spat between the United Auto Staff and Stellantis over reopening an Illinois manufacturing unit complicated has made its approach into the race for U.S. president and will elicit a strike towards the automaker. In a speech on the Democratic Nationwide Conference Monday evening, union President Shawn Fain accused the corporate of reneging on guarantees to restart a now-closed meeting plant in Belvidere, Illinois, simply over an hour northwest of Chicago…. After the contracts had been accredited, Biden visited Belvidere with Fain to have fun the plant reopening…. Fain, carrying a crimson T-shirt that stated ‘Trump is a scab. Vote Harris,’ instructed the conference that the union gained robust contracts and the plant reopening with the help of Vice President Kamala Harris and President Joe Biden.” • Effectively, he did get a T-shirt….

Realignment and Legitimacy

“A Rancher Who Leads a Paramilitary-Fashion Group Sues Biden Over Border Insurance policies” [Texas Observer]. Just a few element: “The lead plaintiff is Michael Vickers, a veterinarian who additionally owns a 1,000-acre ranch in Brooks County. Brooks County, which doesn’t border Mexico, has a inhabitants of seven,000 and a protracted historical past of recorded deaths of migrants, who die in distant areas whereas making an attempt to bypass its Border Patrol checkpoint. For almost 20 years, Vickers has led a paramilitary-style, civilian patrol group known as the Texas Border Volunteers. Vickers and his spouse, Linda, had been as soon as affiliated with the Minutemen, a company that former President George W. Bush known as a ‘vigilante’ group. Within the swimsuit, Vickers alleges that undocumented immigrants have broken his property on account of Biden’s insurance policies. He has incurred greater than $50,000 in fence and gate damages since 2021 and the worth of his property has decreased, based on the lawsuit. At occasions, Vickers and different Texas Border Volunteers have supplied emergency assist or assisted with physique recoveries. However the group sees its principal mission as discovering and detaining migrants, and has a historical past of allegations towards it, together with members tying migrants’ arms along with shoelaces or zip ties and taking their belongings, and members pulling weapons on migrants, because the Observer reported in 2014. The group was integrated in Texas in 2006, state enterprise filings present, and has been tax exempt since 2008, based on Inside Income Service information.”

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 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 information). “An infection Management, Emergency Administration, Security, and Basic Ideas” (particularly on hospitalization by metropolis).

Lambert right here: Readers, thanks for the collective effort. To replace any entry, do be happy 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 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).

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

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

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Keep protected on the market!

Maskstravaganza

“Masks bans disenfranchise hundreds of thousands of People with disabilities” [STAT]. “If masks are banned the place I stay, I must make the selection between endangering my transplant and my well being each time I depart the home, or to stay on everlasting lockdown in my dwelling. As incapacity oracle and activist Alice Wong reminds us, masks bans are an extension of ‘ugly legal guidelines,’ historic legal guidelines and ordinances that prevented disabled individuals from being in public. We should be seen and to be included in public life. Masks bans are a menace not simply to disabled individuals, however to all of us. It’s by no means too late to start out masking once more—to guard not simply your well being and the well being of individuals round you, but additionally to guard our basic human rights.” • In addition to hundreds of thousands of lifeless normals who simply don’t need to be contaminated as a result of they had been respiratory.

Masks bans (1):

NEW: Zero tolerance at @UofCalifornia for encampments, blocking pathways, masking to defend identities. President Drake directs chancellors to strictly implement campus guidelines after enormous protests over the Israel-Hamas warfare this previous spring. https://t.co/hFFRVL4ek5

— Teresa Watanabe (@TeresaWatanabe) August 19, 2024

Masks bans (2):

Nassau County, NY simply handed a masks ban and now residents say they will take footage of anybody carrying a masks and ship them to police.

That is why we have to cease any type of masks ban laws. They empower vigilantes to harass and surveil individuals carrying masks. pic.twitter.com/80NJgWndpJ

— Dr. Fortunate Tran (@luckytran) August 20, 2024

From a Letter to the Editor in Newsday.) On masks bans, I wrote: “The thought happens, then, that many regular residents need masks bans to not help regulation enforcement, however for acts of vigilantism and personal retribution.” This isn’t vigilantism, but when Perlmutter had thought to introduce the idea of residents arrests, it will be.

Vaccines: Covid

“COVID vaccine efficacy towards extreme sickness just below 50%, per early estimates from 2023” [Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy]. “Two European observational research estimate the vaccine effectiveness (VE) of the COVID-19 XBB.1.5 vaccine accredited in fall 2023 towards hospitalization, the primary one discovering 49% general VE in adults, and one displaying good safety—however uneven uptake—amongst pregnant girls.” • For XBB.1.5, not the at present dominant KP* variants.

Transmission: Covid

“‘A way more infectious’ COVID variant fueling California’s relentless surge” [Los Angeles Times]. “‘It’s so stunning to me that it hasn’t gone down but,’ stated Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious ailments specialist at UC San Francisco. ‘It’s a little bit bit extra of a protracted season for California.’” Ah, UCSF. Perhaps we should always ask Bob Wachter. Extra: “‘It’s this confluence of a way more infectious variant on high of oldsters’ general immunity having waned — both from pure or vaccine-induced immunity,’ [Dr. Elizabeth Hudson, regional chief of infectious diseases at Kaiser Permanente Southern California] stated. ‘It’s simply type of come [as] an ideal storm.’” With non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) solely being thought of far too late, as regular. Extra: “An open query is whether or not COVID will proceed to rise as children return to high school. Medical doctors are urging individuals to remain dwelling in the event that they’re sick and asking dad and mom to maintain their ailing children from attending faculty, to restrict unfold of illness.” NPIs erased once more! Humorous factor, Kamala’s from California. So is Pelosi. And but they by no means point out Covid in any respect.

Sequelae: Covid

“Sufferers recovering from COVID-19 who offered with anosmia throughout their acute episode have behavioral, purposeful, and structural mind alterations” [Scientific Reports]. N = 73. From the Summary: “Right here, we report findings from a pattern of sufferers consisting of 73 adults with a gentle to reasonable SARS-CoV-2 an infection with out indicators of respiratory failure and 27 with infections attributed to different brokers and no historical past of COVID-19. The individuals underwent cognitive screening, a decision-making job, and MRI evaluations. We assessed for the presence of anosmia and the requirement for hospitalization. Teams didn’t differ in age or cognitive efficiency. Sufferers who offered with anosmia exhibited extra impulsive different adjustments after a shift in possibilities (r = − 0.26, p = 0.001), whereas sufferers who required hospitalization confirmed extra perseverative selections (r = 0.25, p = 0.003). Anosmia correlated with mind measures, together with , thinning of cortical thickness in parietal areas, and lack of white matter integrity. Therefore, anosmia could possibly be an element to be thought of when figuring out at-risk populations for follow-up.”

Morbidity and Mortality

“Deaths Are Up Publish-Covid, and So Are Funeral Shares: Prognosis” [Bloomberg]. “The variety of formally reported Covid fatalities (7.1 million worldwide) doesn’t absolutely clarify the development in extra deaths. (Neither do Covid vaccines, since physique baggage had been piling up months earlier than the pictures had been launched, and a number of research present the immunizations defend towards extreme sickness and demise). There’s no silver lining to the tragic lack of life. But when one group sees an upside, it’s these offering funerals, cremations, and burials. Publicly traded corporations dealing with funerals and associated companies have handed traders a median 79% return since Jan. 1, 2020 — outpacing the 60% acquire within the MSCI All Nation World Index, one of many broadest measures of the worldwide fairness market. The US highlights the morbid image. Within the 20 years earlier than the pandemic, the variety of deaths had been climbing at a median clip of virtually 1% a yr — reflecting inhabitants development and getting older, and the devastating opioid epidemic — for a crude fee in 2019 of 869.7 deaths for each 100,000 People. Covid catapulted the speed properly past 1,000 in 2020 and 2021 earlier than the speed dropped again to simply over 984 in 2022. Final yr, there have been 927.4 deaths per 100,000 individuals within the US — nearly 12% above the 20-year common — for almost 3.1 million deaths all up. The coronavirus instantly and not directly contributed to a lot of them. For example, a bounce in drug overdoses and alcohol use–associated ailments throughout the pandemic seemingly added to fatalities from unintentional accidents and continual liver illness in 2023, based on a research this month. Covid additionally led to extra cardiometabolic illness, and age-adjusted mortality charges for diabetes, coronary heart illness, and stroke had been above pre-pandemic ranges.” • Go lengthy morticians. Shocked, really, that Silicon Valley hasn’t tried to “disrupt” this enterprise.

TABLE 1: Day by day Covid Charts

Tech: “AI initiatives would get $40M yearly in draft California journalism invoice agreements” [Politico]. “Synthetic intelligence initiatives would obtain tens of hundreds of thousands of {dollars} in a draft settlement on a carefully watched state legislative effort to make massive platforms like Google and Meta fund California newsrooms. The draft proposal, dated Saturday afternoon, would see California kind a public-private partnership with Google and information publishers to fund in-state newsrooms and AI over 5 years. The partnership would supply over $300 million throughout 5 years, together with a minimum of $40 million yearly for an unspecified ‘AI Innovation Accelerator’ program managed by a ‘yet-to-be finalized’ nonprofit…. A abstract of the draft proposal says it goals to ‘strengthen democracy and the way forward for work in an Synthetic Intelligence future’ — a outstanding shift from the unique function of Assemblymember Buffy Wicks’ invoice, which aimed to make platforms share promoting earnings from news-link sharing again to California newsrooms.” • Ah, Buffy Wicks.

Manufacturing: “Boeing Finds Cracks in Construction of 777X Take a look at Jets” [Wall Street Journal]. “Shares of Boeing fell about 5% Tuesday after the aircraft maker discovered cracks within the construction of its 777X jetliner in preliminary check flights, the newest setback for the long-delayed airplane. The corporate stated it will floor its four-plane check fleet whereas it replaces the defective element and types out what went fallacious. Boeing has orders for about 500 of the brand new plane that it plans to start out delivering in 2025. It’s unclear what influence the difficulty may have on the aircraft’s launch date. The 777X, designed for airways wanting to attach the globe’s main cities and to hold some 400 passengers extra, is already years behind. Boeing unveiled the aircraft in 2013 and stated it will begin delivering the mannequin in 2020. …. The corporate can be going through scrutiny of one other of its jets, the 787 Dreamliner. The Federal Aviation Administration stated it will require inspections of Dreamliners after an incident with a cockpit seat led to a LatAm flight plunging midflight in March.” • That new CEO certain will need to have his arms full.

Right this moment’s Concern & Greed Index: 50 Impartial (earlier shut: 44 Concern) [CNN]. One week in the past: 27 (Concern). (0 is Excessive Concern; 100 is Excessive Greed). Final up to date Aug 21 at 1:10:16 PM ET.

Gallery

Topical:

Information of the Wired

“Why Individuals Procrastinate, and The best way to Overcome It” [Scientific American]. “Placing all of it collectively, our analysis sheds gentle on the processes that result in procrastination. When confronted with a deadline, individuals appear to ask themselves, “Do I need to do that now?” That leads them to weigh the professionals and cons concerned—and their biases then come into play. Though extra rigorous testing is required, the coaching process utilized in our final research reveals promise as an avenue to help individuals who battle with procrastination. Cognitive coaching based mostly on this strategy—for instance, by means of an app—may assist individuals who battle with delaying duties. However there are extra instant implications of our work as properly. Our analysis signifies that valence weighting has the largest influence amongst individuals who lack the motivation and cognitive sources to pause and deliberate past their preliminary fast value determinations on whether or not or to not sort out a job. In different phrases, simply pushing your self to assume a little bit bit extra earlier than appearing could provide help to generate extra optimistic causes to get began and to make sure you don’t delay to tomorrow what you may finest sort out as we speak.” • I don’t assume rumination helps…

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ET writes: “Caught this man on my snapdragons one morning. Jap Pondhawk.”

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