On the Eye of the Hurricane

[Latrinsorm]

Before December average new daily deaths exceeded 2,000 for exactly two days in April. On December 2nd we hit that grim milestone and lost at least that many for more than two months. 200,000 deaths later

Let me say that again.

TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND deaths later, we finally got under that bar.

For five days.

And we went back over yesterday.



An undying fantasy of certain people is that we can somehow protect the vulnerable and let everyone else do whatever.
Or that it's the nursing homes.
Or that vaccines will save us.
Or that it's the seasons.

The simple truth is that despite all of those, our decrease in cases has stopped.
It stopped because we let it.
It won't start again until we make it.

The simple truth is that our protection of the vulnerable hasn't brought deaths below the cases curve.
If anything, deaths have begun to outstrip cases.

The simple truth is that
NO
ONE
IS
COMING
TO
SAVE
US

.

I told you new cases would drop below 100,000.
I told you they would keep going down and plateau a week ago.
I told you they would rise sharply in March.

You watch a fly ball.
It goes up.
It goes up more slowly.
It goes up more slowly still.
It hangs for a moment in the air, perfectly frozen.

What happens next?

.

What more will it take for us to do something about it?

.

This is our final battle, and we've come to it late.
A year in, and we're still late.
The variants can't beat a fully vaccinated population.
Here's how far we are from a fully vaccinated population.



Oops that's Israel again, who surpassed our level of vaccinations on January 7th.
And two months later they STILL haven't driven deaths below cases.

.

We heard it was a foreigner problem - wrong.
We heard it was a California and New York problem - wrong.
We heard it was a big cities problem - wrong.
We heard it was a nursing homes problem - wrong.
We heard it was a seasonal problem - wrong.

Every single solitary time someone has said it won't be that bad, we'll magically be different and okay, they have been absolutely and incontrovertibly wrong.

Can we stop being wrong, for once?

Literally one time in the face of a catastrophic global pandemic?

Can we, for once, grow up?

.

No one's listening to a Connecticut Republican.
No one needs to twist the arm of blue state Democrats.
It's up to Republicans in red states.
Call your Representatives, call your Senators.

The liberals were right all along about this.

It doesn't mean the liberals were right about everything (although they were).
It doesn't mean the liberals will always be right about everything (although they will).

Just shut the f*** up and do the right thing.

Masks.
Shutdowns.
Printing money.

It's what we need now.
Not forever.
Not in November 2022.
Now.

Right now.

.

We aren't going into the eye of the hurricane.
We aren't in it.

We're already past it.

[Tgo01]

Masks.
Shutdowns.
Printing money.

Yeah! We just need to do more of the things we have already been doing that haven't been working!

[Stolis]

TL;DR

[Latrinsorm]

Yeah! We just need to do more of the things we have already been doing that haven't been working!

"We" haven't been doing anything. There has never been a unified approach to the pandemic in this country.

Not once.

All around the world, the places that have enforced strong responses have seen their cases go down.
All around the world, the places that have lifted those responses have seen their cases go up.
We know the causation is there because they're the same places.
Everyone has enforced and lifted measures.
Everyone has seen their cases go down and up shortly after.



Stupid people want you to say that the car doesn't slow down when we don't use the brakes.
No s***, Sherlock.
We have to use the brakes to slow the car down.

This really isn't that difficult.

[Stolis]

"We" haven't been doing anything. There has never been a unified approach to the pandemic in this country.

Not once.

All around the world, the places that have enforced strong responses have seen their cases go down.
All around the world, the places that have lifted those responses have seen their cases go up.
We know the causation is there because they're the same places.
Everyone has enforced and lifted measures.
Everyone has seen their cases go down and up shortly after.



Stupid people want you to say that the car doesn't slow down when we don't use the brakes.
No s***, Sherlock.
We have to use the brakes to slow the car down.

This really isn't that difficult.

Remember when we were told to just lock down for 14 days to flatten the curve? I'd consider that a pretty fucking unified hit the brakes.

[caelric]

Remember when we were told to just lock down for 14 days to flatten the curve? I'd consider that a pretty fucking unified hit the brakes.

Wasn't good enough for latrin. He and his ilk wanted the entire country to cower in their basements for months, damn the economic consequences which would have been worse than the 'vid

[Latrinsorm]

Remember when we were told to just lock down for 14 days to flatten the curve? I'd consider that a pretty fucking unified hit the brakes.

It should have been.

It wasn't.

Because we weren't told that by the CDC, or the Secretary of Health and Human Services, or the President, or anyone else with anything resembling the authority to implement it.

So there was no unified approach.

Not then.

Not ever.

[Latrinsorm]

Wasn't good enough for latrin. He and his ilk wanted the entire country to cower in their basements for months, damn the economic consequences which would have been worse than the 'vid

The US lost 4% GDP in 2020.
Japan lost 5%.

1579 Americans have died per 1,000,000 capita.
62 Japanese.

Unless you believe a human life is worth less than $500, the economic consequences of serious prevention are actually not worse than the pandemic, and only a colossally stupid person would think so after doing the math.
But the people who have spent decades training you to scream "ECONOMY!!!!!!!!!!111" to support Republicans know you'll never, ever, ever check their math.
Even now, seeing these indisputable numbers, you'll reflexively find another excuse.

And the people pulling your strings will keep profiting off of literally leaving you and your family to die.

Seems like another bad trade to me, but that's just rudimentary arithmetic talking.

[Neveragain]

Unless you believe a human life is worth less than $500

According to the murder factories you support, a human life is worth between $0 - $1000 dollars.

The irony.

[Neveragain]

Had People from the coastal cities not fled the festering petri dishes they have chosen to live in at the start of the pandemic, things probably would have been much different.

But of course we had the Democrats telling everyone to hug each other because the evil orange man was just a big dirty racist and the kung-flu was nothing to worry about.