1) keep the old folks locked up.
2) let the young 'uns fuck each other on the street like it's saturnalia.
i know this contradicts your instincts towards the need to control.
but, you're wrong...
Tuesday, March 17, 2020
this study is backing up my point about the futility of mitigation. but, if mitigation is futile, surely suppression is even less likely.
i keep saying this, but you know what i actually get out of reading this? it's that capacity is way, way, way too low.
these studies are all about how to reduce the case load to align with existing resources. they started with "flattening the curve", which was obviously naive, and which this study debunks. but, then they go back to suppression - having apparently forgotten that the whole reasoning behind mitigation was that suppression was seen as unrealistic.
i guess you need to let them work it out, because the bean counters are vicious, they really are. but, i'm telling you right now that the only way to deal with this is to get that red line up by increasing the system's capacity, and they're just wasting time trying to fuck with the curve.
you know what i'm reminded of? chamberlin trying to argue with hitler. you know what flattening the curve is? it's giving hitler austria, hoping that's enough. but, this virus won't stop at the sudentenland, and it won't stop in poland - it wants lebensraum, and it will keep coming.
we need to ramp up spending. and we need to stop wasting time arguing about it.
like i say: if i owned a bar or restaurant, i would keep it open and take the government to trial over it.
if you want to stay home, that's your choice. you do't have to come in.
and, if you're in a vulnerable group, you probably should.
but, the majority shouldn't have to put their lives on hold to protect a minority of seniors and smokers.
banning bars and leaving grocery stores open?
not coherent. not evidence-based.
you're far more likely to bump into a vulnerable person in line at costco than you are at an edm show.
rather, that's a right-wing government targeting scapegoats and blaming sinners for the spread of disease in old testament fire and brimstone fashion, whether it's conscious or not.
so, an old person catches the virus in a hospital as a consequence of a sick person coming into contact with them - a situation we know is a problem.
and, instead of announcing measures to segregate and isolate old people, we announced a ban on the sinful behaviour that occurs in bars and restaurants.
because we're stupid.
i want to be clear about what i'm saying about these border closures and bans on events.
these actions are not driven by the science. the science suggests that this disease is harmless for the vast majority of people, and any authoritarian action should be restricted to very specific groups. history also tells us that when you try to take broad actions like this to protect special interest groups like seniors and smokers, it always backfires.
so, we're not closing borders on the advice of science; the scientists would tell us to avoid doing that.
what the border closures are is a statement of nationalism, under the direction of donald trump, who sees the world with an us vs them mentality. we close the border to the asians and the europeans, because they're not like us; we keep them open to the americans and british because we're allies. this allows the president to blame the problem on foreigners, rather than on the inefficiencies of capitalism. our government is unfortunately towing the line on this, and what we've learned over the last few years is that this is what we should expect from the liberals, moving forward - they'll do everything right, until dipshit donald calls and ruins everything, at which point they will immediately fall in line and do what they're told. sadly, demands from the white house, no matter how stupid, seem to trump virtually everything.
likewise, the focus on bars is the kind of thing you'd expect from a fundamentalist government. it's the kind of logic you'd expect from somebody like mike pence. we're sick because of the sinners, and god is punishing us for it, so let's shut down all of this debauchery and go to church, instead. but, there's no actual evidence that bars or restaurants are spreading this at all - and quite a bit of reason to think that organized religion has already been a major problem, and will become an even bigger problem moving forward, due to it's tendency to coerce vulnerable populations in to giving away their money.
the science says we should be doing very specific, targeted things; we're not basing our reaction on the science, we're taking broad and often irrational steps, because we're basing it on concepts of ethnic nationalism and self-righteous religious retribution.
and, most of us seem to be too stupid to realize it.
if we continue to ignore the science and give in to kneejerk authoritarianism that deludes us into feeling safe, or makes us feel like we made correct "moral" decisions, this is going to run out of control very quickly.
and, we will have the hamfisted authoritarians, who tried to take control of the situation and merely made it worse by doing so, to blame.
you know what probably happened?
you've probably got dipshit donald calling trudeau up in a dejected rage, unable to even get boris johnson on the phone, and falling back on the only country that cannot and will not reject him, looking for some kind of ally in his attempt to blame the problem on foreigners.
and, we caved.
because we had to.
because nafta.
i can imagine it. trump looking for some kind of reassurance, somebody, anybody that will align in policy - trying to create a fortress north america, to wall itself off.
and, it no doubt came with a threat. because that's how you treat your friends, when you're america - you threaten them. canada can find itself in or out.
so, we end up locked in the room with this contagious, dying patient that's running his mouth off and won't stop, because we know our finances depend on it....
how did we get ourselves into this?
and, canada?
how do we get ourselves out of it?
for canada to ban everybody except americans is basically equivalent to a healthy person locking themselves in a room full of sick people.
and, we no doubt had to do it to save the economy from a narcissistic idiot that destroys everything he goes near.
can we get a quadrupling of that spending on ventilators? if we're stuck with this...
i'm not calling for a ban on travel from the united states. i've been clear: i oppose travel restrictions as a means to slow the spread of viruses, because it's anti-science and it makes things worse. if you ban travel from america, they'll start sneaking in through the forests, instead. they'll drive to mexico and fly in. you laugh. but, if they need to get in, they will.
but, i'm fully cognizant of where the problem is right now, and it's inside of the united states, not outside of it.
you couldn't write a worse policy if you tried.
wait.
so, we're banning everybody except americans, where the spread of the virus is probably worse than anywhere else in the world?
now, i know why there's such a quick, irrational, anti-science, boneheaded u-turn.
our policies are no longer being written by one of the best science teams in the world, but are being written by one of the biggest idiots that's ever held public office.
if we see a spike in cases, we should blame it on donald trump.
what can we do in the face of this kind of unwanted foreign meddling? we'd better buy a lot of gear. we're going to need it....
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