Freeman Dyson, and so it goes.
Jack Welch fortunately lived long enough to see his "miracle" and pet-theories (6-Sigma) debunked. Asshole.
"NASA is enlisting whatever help it can get to make sure its crewed Moon and Mars missions go smoothly, and that might include help from schools. The agency is running a new round of its Moon to Mars Exploration Systems and Habitation Academic Innovation Challenge (M2M X-Hab if you want a much shorter name) that encourages university students to study and develop spacefaring tech. The challenge will reward work on habitation, vehicles, robotic advance missions, 'foundational systems' (think autonomous mission tech and remote manufacturing) and human spaceflight architecture focused on the lunar Gateway."
How prepared are we for the coronavirus? "5W Public Relations said that 38% of Americans wouldn't buy Corona 'under any circumstances' because of the outbreak, and another 14% said they wouldn't order a Corona in public… Online searches for 'corona beer virus' spiked in early February, but have since declined." Yeah, we're fucked. (Grokked from Tania)
From the end of January, and I'm not sure if I posted this before or not… "US preparedness to deal with the threat of coronavirus has been hampered by the personnel and budget cuts made by the Trump administration over the past three years, according to health experts." A functioning government helps protect us all. And Trump's personality and the conservative ideology of "austerity" (which is really just, "cut the fucking budget for things that don't go boom") have left us dangerously unprepared and unequipped to confront a global pandemic. (Grokked from Joe Hill)
Have I mentioned the rumors about a person who had COVID-19, was "cured" and tested negative, and who now tests positive again?
"Chinese researchers have confirmed a case of asymptomatic transmission of the new coronavirus: A 20-year-old woman from Wuhan passed it to five of her family members but never got physically sick herself." Almost all diseases have this, and IIRC for the yearly flu you're contagious for about a day before you demonstrate symptoms. But now it's documented.
"COVID-19, the disease caused by coronavirus, may have been spreading in Washington state for weeks undetected, according to researchers at the Seattle Flu Study." Ta-da! (makes Jazz Hands).
"San Mateo County's Health Officer Dr. Scott Morrow said the county's focus is changing from a 'containment strategy' to one of 'community mitigation,' which means taking steps to lessen the impact." And yet nobody asked him about the luggage beside the podium (I'm kidding). (Grokked from Xeni Jardin)
How goes our response so far? "The (CDC) shunned the World Health Organization test guidelines used by other countries and set out to create a more complicated test of its own that could identify a range of similar viruses. But when it was sent to labs across the country in the first week of February, it didn’t work as expected. The CDC test correctly identified COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus. But in all but a handful of state labs, it falsely flagged the presence of the other viruses in harmless samples." Cool, cool. (Grokked from Bo Bolander)
"A nursing home in Washington state is being closely monitored after five residents and a staff member tested positive for the coronavirus, one man died and more than 50 others showed respiratory symptoms, according to state health officials." And away we go.
"When Donald Trump Jr said Democrats hope coronavirus 'kills millions of people' in the US because they want to bring his father down, he was merely “pushing back” at politicisation of the viral outbreak by Trump opponents, Mike Pence claimed in an interview broadcast on Sunday." As usual, conservatives have got it backassward and are nearly attempting to fireball Trump.
"Tapper noted that Republicans have also chimed in with negative comments toward Democrats over coronavirus. Pence interjected, 'Well, look, what I am telling you is that this is really a time for us to come together.'" You first, Mikey.
"Bank of Japan Governor Haruhiko Kuroda said on Monday the central bank will take necessary steps to stabilize markets jolted by the coronavirus outbreak, bolstering speculation about coordinated global policy action." But they're not buying it. "US stock futures and markets in Europe fell Monday despite reassurances from the world's central banks that they stand ready to help limit the economic and financial damage caused by the novel coronavirus outbreak." As of typing this, the Dow is up, but there are wide swings. So it looks like a concerted effort to either capitalize on the downturn or to prop up the market.
Other "forgotten" elements of American History… "Fuming over the civil rights movement, Southern segregationists had concocted a way to retaliate against Northern liberals. In 1962, they tricked about 200 African Americans from the South into moving north. The idea was simple: When large numbers of African Americans showed up on Northern doorsteps, Northerners would not be able to accommodate them. They would not want them, and their hypocrisy would be exposed."
"The Bible That Oozed Oil… A small Georgia town, a prophecy about Donald Trump, and the story of how a miracle fell apart." Why faith doesn't require truth, because truth often contradicts what people want us to be faithful in.
"The seniors are participating in a workshop sponsored by the nonprofit Senior Planet called 'How to Spot Fake News.' As instructed, they pull up a reputable fact-checking site like Snopes or FactCheck.org and, within a few minutes, identify the meme is peddling fake news." If only my fellow X-ers would do the same thing. As I said last year, the only effective counter measure is education. And this is a start.
"The worry is that under Dorsey's leadership, Twitter is not poised to capitalize on a flood of news this year, including the U.S. presidential election, the summer Olympic Games in Tokyo and the coronavirus outbreak, that could attract people and advertisers to the platform." So a big donor to Republican causes it attempting a leveraged takeover. Because that'll turn out well.
How's the Kushner Middle East Peace Plan working out? "Israelis are voting in an unprecedented third general election in less than a year, with the prime minister fighting for his political survival." Dear Israelis, he's just not that into you. Let him go.
And how else is the ME? "Greece has blocked any new asylum applications for the next month after Turkey 'opened the doors' for migrants to travel to the EU… Greek officials earlier said they had stopped nearly 10,000 migrants crossing the land border with Turkey."
"Turkey deployed swarms of killer drones to strike Russian-backed Syrian government forces, in what a senior official said was a military innovation that demonstrated Ankara’s technological prowess on the battlefield." But where are the drones, send in the drones, don't bother they're here.
So, what else is happening? "North Korea fired two unidentified projectiles into its eastern sea on Monday, South Korean officials said, apparently resuming weapons demonstrations after a months-long hiatus that may have been forced by the coronavirus crisis in Asia." Ah, yes. Almost forgot about him.
"Afghanistan's president publicly rejected the timeline for a prisoner swap with the Taliban on Sunday, just one day after the United States signed a peace deal with the militant Islamist group that proposes a March 10 deadline for an exchange of prisoners." Hey guys, maybe we should have invited the Afghans to the talks. Remember what happened the last time we withdrew from Afghanistan? I'm sure it won't happen again.
"A D.C.-based federal judge ruled Sunday that President Donald Trump's appointment of Ken Cuccinelli as acting U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services director violated the Federal Vacancies Reform Act, a decision that suspends two policies Cuccinelli implemented while leading the agency." You mean there's actual rules? Who'da thunk it.
"More than any other president in recent memory, Trump has tied his fate to the stock market. He has tweeted about it more than 140 times since taking office and has made stock price gains a key part of his reelection pitch, often inflating the gains as he did in a video just released by the White House on Feb. 22." How's that strategy working out for ya, Sparky? It wasn't helpful to roll out Larry Kudlow on TV before he recovered from his bender.
"And despite his very public falling out with the president when he was attorney general, Sessions' argument is that he's best suited to fight for Trump's agenda… 'Others talk big about Trump, hoping to get your vote,' Sessions says in one ad. 'But talk is cheap. I've been with him from the start.'" Apparently Jeff didn't get all the memos.
"The new president was impetuous, bottomlessly ignorant, almost chemically inattentive, while the bureaucrats were seasoned, shrewd, protective of themselves and their institutions. They knew where the levers of power lay and how to use them or prevent the president from doing so. Trump’s White House was chaotic and vicious, unlike anything in American history, but it didn’t really matter as long as 'the adults' were there to wait out the president’s impulses and deflect his worst ideas and discreetly pocket destructive orders lying around on his desk… After three years, the adults have all left the room—saying just about nothing on their way out to alert the country to the peril—while Trump is still there." (Grokked from Xeni Jardin)
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