Im-Politic: Despite Omicron, Progress Against the Virus So Far Has Continued

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CCP Virus, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, coronavirus, COVID 19, hospitalization, Im-Politic, mortality, Omicron variant, Washington Post

I wasn’t planning on writing on CCP Virus-related issues today in part because I just posted on them on Saturday. But given today’s stock market rout (so far) and the recent instances of virus-related disruption of sports, education, and business due to fears about the highly contagious Omicron variant, it seems worthwhile to present the latest data on the virus’ ongoing impact on public health so far.

And the big takeaway so far is that despite Omicron’s arrival in the United States and the continuation of the Delta variant’s dominance of reported domestic virus cases, the damage to Americans’ health as best as can be measured has continued a persistent decline.

Although these conclusions need to be seen as very preliminary, they deserve attention for several reasons, especially considering the magnitude of the policy response so far. First, although Omicron was probably present in America well before the first case was confirmed on December 1, it’s now nearly three weeks after that apparent initial infection. So the new variant has been here for a while. Second, the also-highly infectious Delta variant still accounts for fully 97 percent of all reported cases across the country as of yesterday, although certain regions (like the New York City metropolitan area), have recorded a much greater Omicron presence.

Third, it’s getting to be winter throughout the United States. So any new variant that came state-side was inevitably going to pack quite an infection punch simply because respiratory viruses tend to spread faster in cold weather, and mainly because more of us spend more time in indoor spaces with less-than-super-ventilation.

So given all that, here’s what’s been happening since December 1 with the two indicators that tell us the most about the public health impact – hospitalizations and deaths (although, because of reporting methodology problems described here, neither is great):

First, new hospitalization admissions, as measured by daily changes in the seven-day averages (7DAs), which smooth out the random fluctuations that always pop up over shorter periods. And I’ve switched over to getting them straight from the website of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) rather than taking them from the Washington Post‘s virus tracker – which also draws from the CDC, and remains very good, but which doesn’t seem to transfer hospitalization information from the agency consistently enough.

On December 1, when the first Omicron case was detected, the 7DA average of these admissions was rising at a five percent rate. By December 4, this rate of increase had hit 16 percent, and stayed in that neighborhood through the ninth. But it was back to the single digits three days later, and has fallen steadily since. As of last Friday, moreover, the 7DA had actually fallen by two percent. So if anything, it looks like the strain on hospitals, has been easing most recently overall in the nation.

The trends in the 7DAs in the daily death counts have been much more volatile, but considerable improvement can be seen here, too. (And these figures come from the Post tracker.)

As of December 1, the 7DA of these counts was down by nearly 22 percent. But it shot up to just over 42 percent on December 3, and stayed above 40 percent through the seventh.

But a dramatic drop-off began right afterwards. On December 8, the 7DA sank all the way down to abut 13.5 percent. The following day, 3.3 percent. And on the tenth, it declined by nearly seven percent. Moreover, this rate kept falling through the fourteenth – and by double-digits on two of those days.

On the fifteenth, it jumped back into positive territory (nearly 7.5 percent), but as of last Friday was back down to a little more than 4.5 percent. (For the record, we have numbers for Saturday, the eighteenth and yesterday, and they were about five and four percent, respectively, but reporting for weekends can be pretty spotty, so don’t make too much of them.)

In other words, American deaths associated with the CCP Virus are still taking place every single day – and in big numbers. On December 1, that day’s count was 2,678. Last Friday, it was 2,099. But that’s down nearly 22 percent. Measured in terms of the more reliable 7DA, they’re up from 1,048 to 1,291 – up more than 23 percent.

But what’s most important – and the most that can realistically be hoped for – is that the rate of increase slows. If these somewhat encouraging trends hold, let’s hope that the Biden administration and other public health authorities recognize that this is what the 7DA data have been showing both on the mortality and hospitalization fronts.

Im-Politic: So the Vaccines Work…Except in Europe?

Tags

CCP Virus, coronavirus, COVID 19, Europe, Im-Politic, infections, lockdowns, mortality, vaccination, vaccine mandates, vaccines, Washington Post, Worldometers.info, Wuhan virus

There’s no doubt about it: Europe is having a terrible time with what looks like a severe new CCP Virus wave. Not made nearly as clear by the coverage – this new wave is rising despite high vaccination rates in most of the countries being hit. As this post will show, two key trends are casting serious doubt on broad claims of vaccine effectiveness claimed by the U.S. public health establishment and others who have viewed it as the only reliable source of “The Science” on the pandemic and fighting it.

The first trend is in reported infection rates. As known by RealityChek regulars, I don’t take this metric especially seriously because it can be impacted by developments having little to do with the actual severity of the pandemic – like testing rates and numbers of asymptomatic infections. (The latter complicates the situation because people carrying the virus who are feeling no effects are relatively unlikely to take a test.)

But the public health establishment takes infection rates very seriously – and evidently in Europe as well as in the United States. So here are the relevant figures for eleven European countries – with their full vaccination rates as of November 22 on the left and the change in the seven-day moving average (7DMA) of daily new infections between November 15 and November 22 on the right. The vaccination rates come (with the exception noted below) from the Washington Post‘s virus tracker feature, and the infection rates from the worldometers.info website. And for comparison’s sake, I’m including the U.S. figures as well.

Netherlands:        73.0 percent*     +48.76 percent 

Germany:             68.0 percent      +30.62 percent

Belgium:              75.4 percent      +45.52 percent

Austria:                65.7 percent      +24.40 percent 

UK:                      69.1 percent        +9.06 percent 

France:                 69.6 percent      +81.76 percent 

Czech Republic:  58.6 percent      +39.58 percent 

Portugal:              86.9 percent      +48.04 percent

Denmark:             78.5 percent      +21.30 percent 

Spain:                   79.8 percent      +58.98 percent 

Italy:                     73.1 percent      +26.59 percent

USA:                    59.0 percent      +11.24 percent

*See here for the Netherlands vaccination rate   

It’s easy to see that there is absolutely no correlation between the two sets of numbers. Just look at the contrast in infection rate increases between the United Kingdom and France – even though their full vaccination rates are nearly identical. Also, how come highly vaccinated Spain and Portugal are seeing case numbers rise so quickly? Why are Italian case numbers rising much more slowly than those on the Iberian peninsula, even though it’s vaccination rate is somewhat lower? And why does the United States, with the second lowest vaccination rate (due to all those supposed kooks who won’t get vaxxed?) come in with the second lowest infection growth rate in this group?

But like I said, in my view, infection rates don’t deserve much relative attention. Death rates aren’t a flawless measure of virus severity, either, but they’re another matter – especially because so many inside and outside the public health establishment say that the main value of the vaccines is less their power to prevent infections than to prevent serious illness and death. That proposition holds more strongly for Europe, but as you’ll see, there are several big exceptions.

Below are the data comparing the same vaccination rates (on the left) and CCP Virus death rates (on the right) for the eleven European countries plus the United States. The death rate number is the change in the 7DMA between November 15 ad November 22 and is also from the worldometers.info site.

Netherlands:        73.0 percent*       +52.17 percent 

Germany:             68.0 percent        +22.35 percent

Belgium:              75.4 percent        +27.59 percent 

Austria:                65.7 percent        +27.27 percent

UK:                      69.1 percent           -5.80 percent

France:                 69.6 percent        +27.03 percent 

Czech Republic:   58.6 percent       +43.75 percent

Portugal:               86.9 percent       +30.00 percent 

Denmark:              78.5 percent       +50.00 percent

Spain:                    79.8 percent        -26.09 percent 

Italy:                      73.1 percent         +5.36 percent

USA:                      59.0 percent        +0.29 percent 

The lessons of this table are more difficult to draw for one main reason – the absolute numbers of deaths involved for most of these countries are extremely low. Meaning single or double digits low. And as known by RealityChek regulars, very low numbers can be highly volatile when it comes to percentage change terms, because only a tiny move in absolute numbers can produce huge relative moves. (For exampile, an increase of one to two in absolute terms equals a 100 percent increase.)

The three exceptions are Germany (where the daily deaths 7DMA have been growing recently by the high-100s), the United Kingdom (where they’re rising by the mid-100s), and the United States (where daily growth still exceeds 1,000). Even taking these disparities into account, it’s interesting that the U.S. daily death rate has been stable lately and in fact has come way down since August; and that in the United Kingdom, with its average vaccination rate, mortality is declining.

And in relative terms, on this front, both countries have been out-performing Germany – whose vaccination rate is a bit lower than the United Kingdom’s but a good deal higher than the United States’. It’s true that death rates are lagging indicators (because CCP Virus victims typically take a while to pass away). But the different directions in this indicator in these three countries don’t seem to have much to do with their vaccination rates.

As for the high vaccination countries, the rates of mortality increase are indeed worrisome, and simply because of their often-soaring infection rates could worsen. But the absolute numbers are still so low that the only reasonable conclusion is “Wait and see.”

That’s why even though tight virus-related restrictions are reappearing all over Europe (see, e.g., here, here, and here), it seems panicky at best to close down entire economies and societies – especially given all the collateral damage that would result. Sweepingly linking employment opportunities to vaccination status, as the Biden administration has sought seems equally unreasonable in light of these mounting signs that the jabs simply aren’t the panacea that was initially advertised.

An announcement yesterday by the President’s coronavirus response coordinator that “We can curb the spread of the virus without having to in any way shut down our economy,” indicates that Mr. Biden is learning the first lesson. A more targeted approach toward vaccinations and other responses, focusing on the most vulnerable, would be a welcome sign that he’s learning the second.

Im-Politic: American Journalism’s Editing Crisis Deepens

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Biden, Bloomberg.com, China, Donald Trump, editing, Im-Politic, imports, Jeff Bezos, journalism, Mainstream Media, Michael Bloomberg, tariffs, Trade, trade deficit, trade war, Washington Post

A RealityChek post last month suggested that America’s news media are experiencing a genuine editing crisis, and just yesterday appeared an example that left even me – someone who for decades has been tracking these lapses (or biases?) and the misinformation they’ve often spread – speechless.

Well, OK, not exactly speechless. But here’s what I mean.

The Bloomberg.com article in question, titled, “China’s Response to U.S. Trade Talks Shows Gap Between Two” was almost entirely unobjectionable. Indeed, for the most part, it focused quite competently on recent statements made by top U.S. and Chinese officials showing how far the two economies remain from resolving the trade and broader commercial issues they’ve clashed over for many years.

But then came this chart:

From the title, you’d expect it to show both that the immense U.S. trade deficit with China currently stood at an all-time high, and that the increase was being driven largely by still soaring American imports from the People’s Republic.

Except if you eyeball the chart with even a little care, you see that if America’s imports from China (the solid white line) are now in record territory, it’s not by much compared with the previous peak in mid-2018. Moreover, since they’ve barely budged since then, and the U.S. economy has grown by some ten percent during this period, the China shortfall has clearly become smaller as a share of gross domestic product – a crucial piece of context.

Moreover, it’s absolutely clear that the Chinese trade surplus with the United States hasn’t been surging at all lately. Indeed, according to the vertical orange-ish bars it’s represented by, it’s slightly below last year’s peak and has fallen slightly  since early 2018. Yes, there’s been a surge. But it took place during the decades before.

And kind of mysteriously left out: Mid-2018 is when former President Donald Trump began imposing tariffs on imports from China.

But that’s not the main point here. I’ve seen and written about headlines that misrepresent the body of the article they accompany. (That last post on editing provided one example.) But I don’t ever recall seeing a chart’s title contradicted by the chart itself. Like Amazon.com co-founder Jeff Bezos, who now owns the Washington Post, Bloomberg.com co-founder and majority owner Michael Bloomberg has more than enough bucks to at least try preventing such embarrassing goofs. Time to start opening up that wallet.  

Im-Politic: America Still Has a Big Gen. Milley/China Problem

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Biden, Bob Woodward, China, Dan Sullivan, Donald Trump, House Armed Services Committee, Im-Politic, Joint Chiefs of Staff, Mark Milley, Nancy Pelosi, Peril, Rick Scott, Robert Costa, Senate Armed Services Committee, Vicky Hartzler, Washington Post

Mark Milley must be one of the luckiest folks in America. The rest of us, not so much. Because more than two weeks after the news broke of a new book claiming that this top U.S. Army General promised his Chinese counterpart advance warning of an American attack, and despite two days of sworn Congressional testimony on the subject, Milley has still not expressly denied the charge. In fact, he’s further muddied these crucial waters. Consequently, someone who might have committed treason and at the very least may suffer from horrendous judgment remains the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and therefore President Biden’s chief military adviser.

To recap, the book (Peril), by Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward (of Watergate fame) and Robert Costa, contended that last October 30, Milley telephoned People’s Liberation Army General Li Zuocheng, chief of the Joint Staff Department of China’s Central Military Commission, to reassure him that, contrary to China’s alleged fears, “the American government is stable and everything is going to be okay.”

Milley then supposedly continued with this stunner: “We are not going to attack or conduct any kinetic operations against you. If we’re going to attack, I’m going to call you ahead of time. It’s not going to be a surprise.”

If you don’t think this qualifies as at least the contemplation of treason, you need a Trump Derangement Syndrome check. Further, as I explained in September 16’s post, if the Woodward-Costa reporting is accurate, Milley’s call could have placed the United States in the gravest danger – to the point of prompting a preemptive Chinese attack (conventional or nuclear) on U.S. military forces Beijing deemed especially threatening, or even on the American homeland itself.

Woodward and Costa stand by their reporting. And as I noted, nothing could have been easier for Milley to deny specifically and categorically saying any such thing. Since he failed, however, I felt pretty confident that his scheduled appearance before the Senate Armed Services Committee (which was followed by a next-day session with the House Armed Services Committee) would finally set the record straight.

Unfortunately, both sets of lawmakers let Milley off the hook. (Here are the C-SPAN transcripts of the Senate and House sessions.)  The China calls came up at both hearings, but Milley’s most specific responses kept significantly contradicting each other. At the Senate hearing, Republican Dan Sullivan of Alaska, noted to Milley that “You’re quoted as telling the top Chinese Communit military commander quote ‘if we’re going to attack, I’m going to call you ahead of time.’ Is that true?”

Replied Milley: “Let me tell you what I actually said. What I said, if there’s going to be a war, if it there’s going to be an attack, there’s going to be a lot of calls and tension ahead of time.”

Sullivan then interjected: “Your testimony was you were certain President Trump would not attack. That’s your testimony this morning.”

Milley responded: “That is true. I was communicating to my Chinese counterpart instructions, by the way, to deescalate the situation, and I told him, we are not going to attack. President Trump has no intent to attack. I told him that repeatedly. I told him if therre was going to be an attack, there would be plenty of communications. I said I will probably call you. We’re not going to attack you. Just settle down. It’s not going to happen. And I did it twice in October and January.”

Sullivan interrupted again: “You’re giving a heads up to the Chinese Communist Party –

Milley replied, “I didn’t give them a heads up because we’re not going to attack. I was being faithful to the intent. I was being faithful to his [Trump’s] intent, Senator.”

Shortly thereafter, a similar exchange took place between Milley and Florida Republican Rick Scott. Here’s how it went:

Scott: (after Milley stated that, “I don’t even know what [Woodward and Costa have] written”:

“So this conversation about whether you would give prior notice to the military Communist China that America is not going to attack. So it is your testimony you will no ever give a heads up to the Communist Chinese military if the President of the United States. It doesn’t matter who the President is, that you are reporting to, is ready to attack?”

Milley: “Of course I wouldn’t.”

Scott: “You don’t feel like you did that, you said that at all.”

Milley: “No. The context we, we’re talking about, Senator, there was a significant degree of intelligence and I think I put the unclassified version in that timeline. It is not insignificant. Not like one reporter two. It is an entire bod of intelligence that led us to believe that the Chinese were misinterpreting our actions and misinterpreting what was happening inside our own country politically and they were assessing a situation that was leading to escalation, possible incident, and it would have been quite dangerous. So Secretary [of Defense Mark] Esper and I met and we met with other members of the team, and we developed an engagement plan to enure that we engaged at various levels, Secretary Esper, and he asked me to do that so I did that. I made a call and the theme was to de-escalate to lower tensions. I believe that is a faithful and loyal execution of my Constitutional responsibilities and I believe that was faithfully executing the intent of the President of the United States at the time because I knew with certainty President Trump was not going to attack the Chinese just out of the blue. It wasn’t going to happen. And if things did happen, there would be periods of tension, calls going back and forth.”

The problems with these Milley answers are:

First, they’re an awfully roundabout way of saying something on the order of “During my October 30 phone conversation with General Li, I never promised him I’d give him a heads up of any kind on an impending U.S. attack.”

Second, Milley’s claim that he hadn’t read the Woodward-Costa book – or even the relevant excerpts – simply strains credulity, especially since his original prepared remarks to both Senate and House panels make clear he knew the subject would come up. In fact, this business about him being unfamiliar with the exact Woodward-Costa claim could well be a legal device to avoid a lying to Congress charge if the book does turn out to be accurate.

Third, his responses are largely conditional on his insistence that he didn’t believe any Trump attack on China was being planned. This position flatly contradicts another contention made by Woodward and Costa. Of course, the authors could well be wrong.

At the same time, there’s tension between Milley’s remarks on this issue and his admission that right after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi phoned him to express major concerns that Trump was crazy enough to make such a reckless decision, the General says he “convened a short meeting in my office with key members of my staff to refresh all of us on the procedures, which we practiced daily at the action officer level.”

If he didn’t harbor any fears of a lunatic President, though, why take this step? Moreover, did he think his own “key” staff members were significantly less up to speed on such life-and-death protocols as the “action officers” who practiced them every day?

And finally, Milley’s insistence that “of course he wouldn’t” ever “give a heads up” to China about an impending attack clashes with his statement to Sullivan that he told General Li “repeatedly, I told him if there was going to be an attack, there would be plenty of communications. I said I will probably call you.” Unless the purpose of the call was to deceive the Chinese and convince them to let down their guard?

Milley had another chance to end the controversy the following day at the House hearing. Missouri Republican Vicky Hartzler asked him point blank, “Did you or did you not ask – tell [General Li] that if we were going to attack, you would let him know?”

Milley’s response: “As part of that conversation, I said, ‘General Lee [sic] there’s not going to be a war. There’s not going to be an attack between great powers, and if it was, the tensions would build up, there would be calls going back and forth between senior officials. Hell, I’ll call you. But we’re not going to attack you. Trust me. We’re not going to attack you. These are two great powers and I am doing my best to transmit the President’s intent, President Trump’s intent, to make sure the incident doesn’t escalate.”

Clear as a bell, right? And difficult to reconcile with his statement the previous day that he told Li that “if there was going to be an attack,” he would “probably call.” (Unless, again, to throw him and his country off the track – a possibility Milley never mentioned?)

As I’ve maintained all along, Milley is innocent until proven guilty. But the General has now had two weeks and several chances to explain himself clearly, and dropped the ball every time. The kind of questions his remarks still raise can’t be left unanswered, whether President Biden has “great confidence” in him or not.

In fact, just as easy as it would be for Milley to forthrightly challenge legitimately lingering doubts would be for Mr. Biden to dispel them completely. There’s surely a verbatim recording of the October 30 call in the government’s national security apparatus. All the President needs to do is order its full de-classification and release.

Im-Politic: Anti-Pandemic Economy Clamps Could Be Strengthening Just as the Virus Threat is Weakening

Tags

Andrew Jackson, Battle of New Orleans, Biden, CCP Virus, CDC, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, coronavirus, COVID 19, data, hospitalizations, Im-Politic, Jobs, lockdowns, mortality, OurWorldinData.org, stay-at-home, vaccination, vaccine mandates, vaccine passports, vaccines, War of 1812, Washington Post, Wuhan virus

What a stunning and thoroughly depressing point the U.S. fight against the CCP Virus may be at. Governments at all levels, private businesses, and non-profit institutions of all kinds are imposing all sorts of vaccination mandates on employees that could result in significant layoffs for the recalcitrant (including those with natural virus immunity) and equally important damage to the economy. And at the same time, the most reliable data now show that the virus’ destructive impact – recently renewed by the highly infectious Delta variant – is easing once again, and for reasons that look completely unrelated to vaccination rates.

Not that the most reliable CCP Virus data are incredibly reliable. As I’ve previously written, there are some awfully dubious definitions of “Covid-related deaths” being used across the country, and major holes in the coverage achieved by the official record keepers. In addition, serious problems have been revealed even in the hospitalization numbers – which I’d considered the most accurate gauge of the virus’ effects on human health.

All the same, the proverbial statistical curve for both indicators is now bending down for the first time since Delta began dominating the American virus scene in mid-summer.

As often the case, my source for the death and hospitalization figures are the Washington Post‘s very user-friendly CCP Virus databases. For this post, I’m also using some hospitalization figures for the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) website. Unless otherwise mentioned, the specific numbers here are changes in seven-day averages (7DA), which smooth out random fluctuations that tend to occur on a day-to-day basis.

Regarding mortality, the 7DA for daily reported covid-related deaths bottomed out on July 6 at 209 and it had plummeted by nearly 30 percent during the previous week. And through July 27, the 7DA stayed below 300. But by August 16, it hit 651 and thereafter began soaring rapidly.

By the 18^th, the 7DA average had jumped by nearly 32 percent week-on-week, and the rate of increase continued surging until it peaked on the 24^th at an appalling 77.90 percent. But thereafter, these increases dropped dramaticaly. A week later, they were down to just over 21 percent. That is, consistent with the “bend the curve” criteria, the problem kept worsening, but it was worsening much more slowly, which counts as welcome progress.

This encouraging development continued through September 9, by which time the 7DA was rising on a weekly basis by just 3.17 percent. In other words, it nearly stopped rising altogether. But this fall-off proved to be a head fake. Almost immediately, the weekly increases in the 7DA for covid-related mortality bounced back, and reached a discouraging 27.49 percent in less than a week (by the 15^th).

Yet another decline has followed, and this one has been considerably deeper. By September 21, the weekly 7DA increase was back below ten percent, and just four days later, hit zero for the first time since the second half of July.

Since then, and through yesterday, the 7DA has not only been decreasing on a weekly basis. It’s been decreasing faster and faster. Yesterday, the decline stood at 6.74 percent.

The hospitalization story has been somewhat different, and brighter, especially since early September. The 7DA for daily new hospital admissions for CCP Virus-related reasons bottomed out on June 25 at 1,824 and at that point, it was down on week by just under 5.20 percent.

By August 9, the situation had turned around completely – and then some. The 7DA had soared by 34 percent. Afterwards, however, came a consistent decline. By the 20^th, the weekly rate of increase in the 7DA had fallen to ten percent, and by September 1, the increases had stopped. The weekly 7DA registered its first weekly decline on September 6 (down two percent), and its first double-digit decrease on the 21^st (ten percent).

Since then through the 30^th, it’s fallen by ten percent or more twice, and the weekly decrease in the 7DA hasn’t dipped below seven percent.

Given the mushrooming of vaccine mandates and widespread claims – including by President Biden – that the nation is now facing a “pandemic of the unvaccinated,” you’d think that the above improvements stemmed overwhelmingly from increased vaccination rates. But the data – in this case, from the OurWorldinData.org website, provide no support for this conclusion.

Specifically, on August 24, when the 7DA of daily covid-related deaths was skyrocketing at that awful 77.90 percent weekly rate, 51 percent of Americans were fully vaccinated against the CCP Virus, and 9.1 percent were partly vaccinated. By yesterday, these figures were only 55 percent and 8.8 percent, respectively.

On August 9, when the 7DA for covid-related hospitalizations was growing by 34 percent week-on-week, half of Americans were fully vaccinated and 8.5 percent were partly vaccinated. Through yesterday, those numbers hadn’t changed dramatically, either.

Could mask-wearing be responsible? Trouble is, I haven’t seen any figures on how this practice has changed in recent months. (If you have, let me know.) As far as I’m concerned, the real reasons for this good CCP Virus news have to do with rising levels of natural immunity (especially important given Delta’s virulence), the distinct possibility that the CCP Virus is one of those pathogens whose lethality wanes as it mutates (an important Delta consideration, too), and the nation’s better treatment record – due to a combination of more experienced doctors and new therapeutics.

In early 1815, then-General Andrew Jackson led American forces to a great victory over the British in the Battle of New Orleans. But due to that era’s painfully slow communications, the triumph came about two weeks after the United States and Great Britain signed the treaty ending the War of 1812.  It makes me wonder how long the U.S. public and private sectors — which don’t have the communications excuse — will keep threatening the economy’s recovery with redoubled anti-virus measures just as the pandemic tide appears to be turning.   

Im-Politic: A Small Step Toward Quality Journalism ( I Hope)

Tags

Atlanta, crime, editing, Georgia, Im-Politic, journalism, Mainstream Media, Sally Buzbee, Tim Craig, Washington Post

It was not only great news that the Washington Post‘s new Executive Editor, Sally Buzbee, has just announced that the paper will hire 41 new editors. It’s urgently needed news, as made painfully clear by this September 13 article on rising crime in Atlanta, Georgia – which violates one of the most important rules of good journalism: Don’t try to shoehorn an article into a certain narrative when you’ve presented almost no supporting evidence.

The narrative chosen by reporter Tim Craig and evidently approved by enough editors to warrant publication is plainly stated in the headline: “Brutal killing of a woman and her dog in an Atlanta park reignites the debate over city’s growing crime problem.” It’s hardly unheard of for headlines to clash with the body of their story, or to exaggerate the findings. After all, nearly news organizations are private businesses, they need to make money, and what better way to generate the kinds of eyeballs that will make advertisers pay top dollar than clickbait – which of course is journalism’s version of flashy packaging.

And sometimes, headline writers just make innocent mistakes, and place such labels on stories too late for the reporter to object – or even an editor to spot it. That’s not a capital crime, especially when we’re dealing with a form of communication that’s often necessarily hastily composed.

But the claim of a “debate” on crime convulsing the city wasn’t confined to the headline. Craig himself wrote that Atlanta’s crime rate is dominating the political debate in Georgia, a state that is expected to be key in next year’s midterm elections. Georgia Republicans believe a tough-on-crime message offers them a chance to win back suburban Atlanta-area voters after the party suffered punishing losses in last year’s presidential and U.S. Senate contests.”

Meanwhile, “many Democrats,” readers are told, dismiss [such] concerns as a partisan effort to rally conservatives to the polls by stoking fear….”

The above link documents that Atlanta crime is definitely influencing city and state politics. But what’s weird about Craig’s story is that it per se offers almost no examples of such clashing opinions.

Toward the end of the article, Craig quotes a single resident fretting that “state Republicans will use the city’s crime problem to their political advantage.” But even she both acknowledges a “crime problem,” calls it “unbelievable” and “said she thinks some of the city’s Democratic leaders went too far last year by embracing calls to shift resources away from the police.”

The only Democratic politician whose views are presented – Fulton County District Attorney Fani T. Willis, told Craig that Georgia’s Republican Governor Brian Kemp, who’s up for reelection next year and has focused on the crime issue, “is right to be concerned” because “the city’s criminal justice system is overwhelmed amid a shortage of police officers and ballistics experts needed to help solve crimes.”

This is a debate on crime? Or even close?

In fact, the rest of Craig’s article is devoted almost exclusively to a wide variety of Atlantans emphasizing how serious the city’s crime problem is and worrying that if some dramatically different strategy to fight it isn’t adopted soon, its economy could suffer and its “community cohesion, vitality and civility” could be damaged. (One exception to the head of a local business booster group – who’s basically paid to be optimistic.)

Just as important, no one mentioned in the article voiced any support for defunding police or “reimagining public safety” to focus on non-coercive ways to reduce crime or any of the other police reform proposals that mushroomed following George Floyd’s 2020 murder by a Minneapolis police officer.

Spotting such internal contradictions isn’t the only editing problem experienced lately by the Post (or other major news organizations). As known by RealityChek regulars, the output of these outlets regularly contains major factual mistakes, ignores crucial context, presents too narrow a range of opinion, and relies on experts plainly not worthy of the title (to name just a few of their leading shortcomings).

So let’s hope Buzbee’s hiring decision stems from a recognition of these problems (rather than a desire to add new bells and whistles to their websites and the like), and that lots of other news organizations follow suit. Her newspaper’s latest motto, “Democracy Dies in Darkness,” spotlights the essential role journalism plays in protecting Americans’ freedoms. She and her peers should also remember that the trust on which this role is based will weaken further in incompetence.

Im-Politic: More Evidence That the Vaccines are No Cure-All

Tags

Biden, CCP Virus, coronavirus, COVID 19, death rates, hospitalizations, Im-Politic, public health, vaccination, vaccines, Washington Post, Wuhan virus

Time for a CCP virus update with a focus on the effectivnes of vaccines. And the big takeaway? Good luck to you if you can detect any evidence for the popular view (including President Biden’s) that the United States has been seeing a “pandemic of the unvaccinated” lately – and especially during pandemic phase dominated by the highly infectious Delta variant.

Full disclosure: I’m fully vaxxed and have been since late April. I got the shots as soon as I could make an appointment (not easy back then in my state of residence, Maryland). I’ll probably get a booster – and certainly have no inherent objections to these jabs.

But I’m 67 years old and have some underlying conditions that make me more vulnerable than other young seniors (although my physicians tell me I’m still  healthy overall). So I concluded that getting vaccinated made good sense for me. For anyone else? As always, the only medical advice I’m qualified to give is “Use your judgment in consultation with your doctor(s).”

In other words, I’m no anti-vaxxer. Instead, my main concern continues to be the often confusing advice given by public health authorities on dealing with the pandemic, their regular habit of departing from “The Science” in their recommendations, and – especially important – their willingness to push aggressively for policies with major implications for both other public health issues and crucial non-health-related issues based on highly questionable data. (The latest potential problem revealed concerned the hospitalization figures, which I and many others viewed as the most reliable measure of the pandemic’s status and the severity of the virus – though far from perfect.)

Here’s what I’ve just done. I’ve looked at the statistics for the states and territories that have fully vaccinated the highest percentages of their populations and the lowest percentages of their populations, and compared the changes in newly reported deaths and numbers of CCP Virus-related hospitalization rates over the last week as of this morning. My source, as often the case, is the Washington Post‘s very well-designed and thus very convenient interactive virus database. The results are below:

Top 10 vaxxed states   Full Vax rate  new deaths last week  new hospns last week

National average:         54.2 percent        +26 percent                   -6 percent

Vermont:                       68.8 percent      +100 percent             +26.5 percent

Connecticut:                 67.5 percent      +33.3 percent               +4.4 percent

Puerto Rico:                  67.4 percent       +8.3 percent                 -15 percent

Maine:                           67.2 percent            0 percent               +3.1 percent

Massachusetts:                 67 percent     +44.4 percent             +14.5 percent

Rhode Island:                66.5 percent        +50 percent              -11.8 percent

Guam:                            65.1 percent     +200 percent               not available

New Jersey:                   63.1 percent    +12.5 percent               +2.6 percent

Maryland:                         63 percent    +23.1 percent                     0 percent

New York:                      62.1 percent    -29.4 percent               -14.6 percent

Bottom 10 states for vaccination rates

National average:           54.2 percent      +26 percent                    -6 percent

West Virginia:                   40 percent   +91.7 percent                +9.3 percent

Wyoming:                      40.4 percent    +100 percent                 -9.4 percent

Idaho:                            40.5 percent     +120 percent              +10.3 percent

Alabama:                      40.7 percent     +110 percent                -14.5 percent

Mississippi:                  41.7 percent     -15.4 percent                -15.1 percent

North Dakota:              42.9 percent            0 percent                 +7.4 percent

Virgin Islands:             43.1 percent             0 percent              +16.7 percent

Georgia:                       43.5 percent     +50.6 percent               -10.2 percent

Louisiana:                    43.8 percent     +10.4 percent               -17.8 percent

Tennessee:                   43.8 percent      +28.3 percent              -12.2 percent

Before proceeding, another data caution shouldn’t be forgotten. Because most of the states in each group have very small populations, changes in both deaths and hospitalizations are often infinitesimal in absolute terms, which means that even tiny increases or decreases in those terms can produce huge percentage change results. Indeed, in places like Vermont and Wyoming and the Virgin Islands, these changes are only in the single digits in absolute terms.

All the same, as for some of the most obvious comparisons:

The number of top ten vaxxed states whose CCP Virus-related deaths rose during the past week is eight. For the bottom ten, it’s only seven.

The number of top ten vaxxed states where such deaths fell during that week is one. None of the bottom ten saw falling deaths.

The number of top ten vaxxed states whose hospitalizations rose over the last week is five. The comparable figure for the bottom ten vaxxed states is four.

The number of top ten vaxxed states whose hospitalizations fell over the last week is two. For the bottom ten vaxxed states? Six.

If anything, the bottom ten vaxxed states recently have been doing slightly better than the top ten according to these measures.

Also peculiar – and tough to square with the “pandemic of the unvaccinated” claim: Within these two groups, there are some big death and hospitalization variations between states with identical or very similar vaccination rates. Indeed, the fully vaxxed range in the top ten group is between 68.8 percent and 62.1 percent. Yet the trends for New York and Massachusetts, for example, are going in exactly the opposite directions – and very strongly so. Moreover, the top ten state with the best record on both counts combined by far is New York, even though it’s the least fully vaxxed state in this group.

Using the national average as the bar doesn’t produce a better story for the highly vaxxed states.

In that group, the number whose deaths rose faster than the national average is five. For the lowest vaxxed states, the number is six.

As a result, five states in the top ten category saw deaths rising more slowly than the national average, versus four in the bottom ten category.

Turning to hospitalizations, six of the top ten vaxxed states experienced worse changes than the national average, and data were unavailable for Guam. The comparable number for the bottom ten states was the same.

Therefore, three states in the top ten group experienced better hospitalization change results than the national average, versus four in the bottom ten group.

One possible reason for still taking the “pandemic of the unvaccinated” claim seriously: Many of these results might be explained by the fact that in the top ten vaxxed states, absolute levels of deaths and hospitalizations are starting from very low levels. So as explained just above, their apparently worsening records in many cases can be dismissed as a statistical illusion, and the focus should remain on how good their records in absolute terms remain.

And the converse for the bottom ten: Seeming improvements in their records may stem from death and vaccination rates that stood at very high absolute levels, and remained high despite impressive-looking percentage change drops.

But another possibility deserves at least as much attention: These supposed statistical illusions actually show that the virus is advancing and retreating in waves in many instances – and that to some extent, the results mean that the worst vaxxed states are seeing significant improvements in their numbers, and the best are seeing significant deterioration, for reasons having little to do with vaccinations, and much more to do with the nature of viruses and their natural life cycles.

One particularly notable example is Florida, which has received so much attention because Governor Ron DeSantis has so strongly opposed many mandatory mitigation measures. Its full vaccination rate is now a little higher (55.6 percent) than the national average of 54.2 percent, and actually has been rising somewhat faster.

Its death rate initially rose much more strongly than the U.S. rate as a whole, and has stayed considerably higher (1.69 daily new deaths measured by the seven-day average per hundred thousand residents, versus 0.59 for the nation as a whole). But over the last week, its daily deaths have risen much more slowly (seven percent versus 26 percent).

Similarly, Florida’s hospitalization rate is still higher than the national average (with 45 residents per 100,000 versus 29 per 100,000 for the entire United States). But over the last seven days, Florida daily hospitalizations are down 19 percent, versus six percent for the nation as a whole.

It’s become a commonplace to observe that viruses don’t care what your politics are, or where you live, or what your vaccine views are.  That’s all true.  But it looks like, except for considerations that have long been known, like age and race, certain they care much less about whether you’re vaxxed than where you happen to live at any given time as they appear, surge, and fade (to varying extents) as they always have.    

Im-Politic: So Far, Milley’s Sure Acting Like He’s Guilty of Treason

Tags

25th Amendment, Bob Woodward, China, Constitution, Defense Department, Donald Trump, election 2020, Im-Politic, Jen Psaki, Joint Chiefs of Staff, Mark Milley, military, Pentagon, Peril, Robert Costa, treason, Washington Post

I’d bother to advise General Mark Milley to lawyer up – fast – except I can’t imagine that even Johnnie Cochrane (Google “O.J. trial”) – ultimately could get the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff off the hook for treason charges if claims made by an upcoming book on the Trump administration’s final months are true. Worse, the President of the United States seems just fine with such behavior from the person who’s both the top military advisor to the chief executive and to the Pentagon.

It should go without saying that Milley, as with every other American, deserves a presumption of innocence. But his behavior since the publication of excerpts from Peril, by Washington Post correspondents Bob Woodward (of Woodward and Bernstein Watergate fame) and Robert Costa decidedly resembles that of someone who’s guilty as sin.

As stated by another Post reporter, according to Woodward and Costa, Milley called his Chinese counterpart last October 30 and told him, “General Li, I want to assure you that the American government is stable and everything is going to be okay.”

Allegedly, Milley continued, “We are not going to attack or conduct any kinetic operations against you.” (With this phrasing, Milley for some reason might have been trying to exclude cyber-attacks from his promise.) 

And here’s the key passage: “If we’re going to attack, I’m going to call you ahead of time. It’s not going to be a surprise.”

Again, if true, any number of aspects of this phone call could be shocking and disgraceful for any number of reasons centering around the possibility that the General shattered the principles of civilian control over the military by taking an unauthorized initiative with major implications not only for U.S. national security but overall U.S. foreign policy as well.

And whether Milley was completely freelancing or not, the notion that former President Trump’s dangerously unstable state of mind excuses this behavior is utterly unacceptable. The Constitution’s 25^th Amendment lays out procedures for dealing with situations like this, and none of them were invoked before Milley picked up the phone.

Worse, keep in mind that Milley made the first of two phone calls to Beijing was made October 30, before Election Day and well before Trump set off alarm bells with his behavior in the voting’s aftermath. In addition, if Milley really believed that Trump would order an unprovoked attack on China, his own sanity needs to be questioned.

Even if you fear that a Trump victory last November would have freed him to make all manner of reckless decisions, there’s no reason to think that China would have been placed in any danger unless Beijing set the stage for war by, say, invading Taiwan. In fact, one of the most common (however bizarre, given the massive tariffs and damaging sanctions he’d imposed) criticisms of the former President’s China policy at the time was that in order to preserve his 2020 trade deal with the People’s Republic, he’d been treating China and especially its dictator Xi Jinping with kid gloves. The Biden camp itself was making this accusation as late as last September.

But none of Milley’s supposed offenses compare with the claim that he told China’s top military officer that if Trump decided to strike, he’d warn the Chinese. Talk about providing “aid and comfort” to an enemy – a centerpiece of American law’s definition of treason. And from a real world standpoint, what if Milley got wind of such plans a few days before the attack was scheduled? Would he have given the Chinese that much warning? Which would have given them a chance to launch their own preemptive strike? How do you think that would have worked out?

Further, what if Milley was simply worried that Trump might try this, with no concrete evidence, or less-than-conclusive evidence? Just because he thought Trump was crazy. Would he have warned China in this circumstance? Who can tell?

For these reasons, the Woodward-Costa claims are so jaw-dropping that you’d expect an innocent Milley to deny them specifically and indignantly – with wording on the order of “I never told General Li or any other Chinese official that I would warn them about an impending U.S. attack.” If I was him, I’d threaten a slander suit, too, if the authors didn’t recant (and probably even if they did).

Milley, however, hasn’t done anything close. The only statement issued (and not by him, but by his spokesman) ignored the charges. And almost as interesting, his allies in the government haven’t denied these charges expressly, either, when speaking (anonymously, of course) to other journalists. Most disturbing of all, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki issued similar remarks yesterday – which must mean that Mr. Biden himself isn’t interested in getting to the bottom of this crucial matter.

The good news is that soon, neither the President nor the General may have a choice. On September 28, Milley’s scheduled to testify (under oath, natch) before the Senate Armed Services Committee on the Afghanistan debacle. You can be sure that the Woodward-Costa charges will come up, too. And if Milley deides to keep playing footsie, don’t be surprised if you see an attorney at his side – and even counseling him to take the Fifth.

Im-Politic: Has Biden Bet Right Politically on Afghanistan?

Tags

Afghanistan, Biden, border security, Charles Lane, crime, Donald Trump, election 2022, election 2024, Europe, hostages, Im-Politic, Immigration, Jimmy Carter, Lloyd J. Austin III, Open Borders, politics, refugees, Taliban, terrorism, Washington Post

Even if he didn’t peevishly block me on Twitter, I’d consider Washington Post columnist Charles Lane’s Tuesday piece on – how President Biden can “contain” Afghanistan-related damage to his presidency and historical legacy – pretty silly. For it completely ignores some screamingly obvious ways that this debacle can greatly worsen and keep degrading his image far into the future – and of course through the midterm 2022 elections and the 2024 presidential campaign.

Not that it’s out of the question that the domestic political calculation on which Mr. Biden is widely reported to have based his Afghan withdrawal will prove correct. The American public’s attention span can be pretty short and, as the President has rightly noted, who controls that remote “country” has no bearing on U.S. national security. (I use quotes because American policy has been led astray largely because there’s so little evidence that Afghanistan is a country in any meaningful sense of the word.)

Moreover, in case you haven’t noticed, the national news cycle has sped up considerably in recent years. Therefore, any public anger over the withdrawal botch could quickly evaporate once the next crisis or Biden failure, or Biden triumph that comes barreling down the pike. And the twenty-plus year Forever War remains unpopular. (See, e.g., here and here.  For an interesting exception, see here.) As a result, Afghanistan could indeed become yesterday’s meat loaf as far as U.S. voters are concerned, and even surprisingly quickly. 

Even so, it’s easy to imagine how fallout from the withdrawal could pose genuine threats to America and keep Mr. Biden “in the woods” politically.

For example, the odds seem good that the Biden administration will not be able to pull all American citizens out of Afghanistan during the partially open window the Taliban victors seem willing to provide – for now. Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III has already admitted that the U.S. military can’t guarantee Americans not already at the Kabul airport safe passage to the airport, and the State Department has advised these individuals to “shelter in place.” Many could be widely scatttered throughout Afghanistan’s Texas-sized territory.

The Taliban might agree to allow the United States to keep troops in the country beyond the August 31 total military withdrawal deadline set by the President – which Mr. Biden now says may be necessary to complete the evacuation. Or it might not. And if its leaders (whoever they really are) do decide to play nice with the United States, some groups in its jihadist ranks might not.

It’s plausible to believe that those Taliban leaders would want the American military completely gone as soon as possible, and therefore have strong incentives to play ball with Washington. But it seems to me just as plausible to believe that they’d find hostages very useful – say, as leverage to prompt the United States to release large amounts of the ousted Afghan government’s funds (which are currently held at the U.S. Federal Reserve), and the International Monetary Fund to release the smaller but not negligible amount of economic credits (called Special Drawing Rights or SDRs) that the previous regime was scheduled to receive about now. (See here for the details.)

If a hostage situation does emerge, then Mr. Biden could find himself with a problem at least as bad as former President Jimmy Carter suffered after the Iranian revolution in 1979. But even if hostages aren’t taken, a Biden administration decision to keep American troops on the ground in the country in defiance of  Taliban wishes in order to find U.S. personnel and escort them to the airport, or even increase the deployment to carry out these missions, could trigger renewed fighting and American casualties. And this fighting could last for weeks and even months.

Afghan refugees admitted into the United States could vex President Biden for years to come as well – and in two ways. First, as noted, if his administration casts too wide a net (and it’s widened already), any number of Taliban or Al Qaeda members or other jihadists could wind up resettling here. Few question the desire to protect Afghans directly employed by the U.S. military or other government agencies – and I don’t, either.

But calls are being issued to extend visas to still other categories of Afghans, and as always, it’s difficult to imagine that all of them could have been adequately vetted in peacetime given that the previous Afghan government wasn’t exactly the gold standard for efficiency or honesty. Now of course, conditions in the country are utterly chaotic, so the vetting challenge looks that much greater.

If any of those resettled in the United States wind up committing terrorist acts, there’ll surely be political hell to pay for the President. In fact, although, as I’ve argued repeatedly (e.g. here) the key to preventing Middle East-spawned terror strikes on America was never sending U.S. forces to chase around that terminally dysfunctional region every new jihadist group it would inevitably spawn. Instead, it was always securing America’s borders.

Consequently, Mr. Biden can now be fairly accused of failure on both these fronts.Thanks to his Afghan pullout, the Taliban might indeed permit jihadists from re-establishing a terrorist base benefiting from the protection of a sovereign state. And it’s reasonable to conclude that Islamic extremists in other countries and regions will be emboldened as well. At the same time, his Open Borders-friendly immigration policies were making it harder to keep them out even before Kabul fell. Talk about the worst of all possible worlds.

There’s a third refugee-related problem that could stain the Biden record long-term also: crime. Europe’s naive admission of literally millions of Afghans and other Middle Easterners fleeing their war-torn lands greatly undermined public safety in countries like Austria, Germany, and Sweden. No comparable problem has yet appeared in the United States. But so far, U.S. refugee admissions have been much more limited – largely, but not exclusively, because of the Trump administration’s more restrictive policies. If their numbers greatly increase during the Biden years, either because of more indulgent policies or failure to secure U.S. borders, all bets are off.

The 2020 U.S. presidential election showed that it’s dangerous to count Mr. Biden out. After all, until his primary victory in South Carolina, he was derided as a political “dead man walking.” In that contest, however, he benefited from powerful political allies like longtime South Carolina Democratic Congressman James Clyburn. I’m straining to see any similar saviors on the ground in Afghanistan or over the horizon. 

Im-Politic: A Phony Iceland CCP Virus Saga

Tags

CCP Virus, coronavirus, COVID 19, hospitalizations, Iceland, Im-Politic, Mainstream Media, misinformation, Reis Thebault, Washington Post, Worldometers.info, Wuhan virus

If you still doubt that the Mainstream Media are determined to uphold the CCP Virus vaccination narrative pushed by America’s public health, political, and business establishments (for starters), whatever the data say, check out the Washington Post‘s article yesterday about Iceland’s experience with vaccinations.

According to reporter Reis Thebault (and his editors), “online misinformation and conspiratorial social media posts” have portrayed the island country as a tale of vaccination failure because despite its high jab rate. Their rationale:

“Just one month after the government scrapped all covid-19 restrictions, masks, social distancing and capacity limits have returned. And U.S. authorities last week warned Americans to stay away.”

But this reasoning is bogus, Post readers are told, and in truth, “infectious-disease experts say Iceland’s outbreak actually illustrates how effective the vaccines are at preventing the virus’s most severe impacts.”

How come? Because “Many of the country’s recent infections have occurred among vaccinated people, but they’ve been overwhelmingly mild. So even as new cases multiplied, Iceland’s rates of covid-19 hospitalizations and deaths have remained low.”

And here’s the kicker: “Of the 1,300 people currently infected, just 2 percent are in the hospital. The country hasn’t recorded a virus death since late May.”

Iceland’s mortality performance is indeed impressive. As the Post‘s very convenient virus tracker shows, the United States is still suffering several hundred virus deaths per day. And that looks like proof positive that the island’s full innoculation rate of 71 percent deserves much and even most credit.

At the same time, the latest U.S. vaccination rate (50.7 percent) may not be low enough relatively speaking to account for this kind of lethality gap between the two countries. Maybe the fact that Iceland’s population is fewer than 360,000 (you read that right), which is 0.11 percent of the American total of some 330,000,000 has something to do with the difference? Not to mention high levels of U.S. demographic diversity versus Iceland’s near genetic homogeneity?

But where the Iceland success story unmistakably falls apart is on the hospitalization front. For all the alarm generated by the virus’ super-contagious Delta variant, the CCP Virus death rate remains remarkably modest – 1.69 percent of all those Americans infected, and 0.19 percent of the entire population.

That’s no doubt why hospitalization rates (reasonably) have attracted so much attention lately in the context of the vaccination debate, which has intensified because of the unexpectedly large numbers of “breakthrough” CCP Virus cases recorded among the fully innoculated. (See, e.g., here.)

As legitimately contended by champions of vaccines (and typically of vaccine mandates and passports and similar restrictions), protecting against serious illness matters crucially, too. So the very low levels of hospitalization among the vaccinated (figures which surely are pretty accurate because anyone who gets sick enough to require hospitalization is likely to seek hospitalization) argue powerfully for getting jabbed. In turn, for humanitarian reasons, they militate for supporting whatever carrots and sticks are needed to overcome hesitancy among the unvaccinated.

Of course, none of this clinches the broader case for maximum vaccination or for mandates, passports, and similar restrictions. The reasons, as I’ve previously explained, range from the unreliability of much CCP Virus-related death data to the immunity already enjoyed by those unvaccinated (either because they’re naturally virus resistant or because they’ve acquired immunity by recovering from the virus).  And don’t forget the low risk of transmission from the unvaccinated to the vaccinated (which follows inevitably from the claim that the vaccines are indeed highly effective). 

But let’s say hypothetically that none of these complications exist, and that hospitalization data really is the gold standard for success against the CCP Virus. In that case, Iceland’s record still wouldn’t look so great, especially compared to America’s. Indeed, Iceland’s hospitalization rate is actually higher today than the United States’.

Thebault’s article reports that “Of the 1,300 [Icelanders] currently infected, just 2 percent are in the hospital.” Here, however, are the U.S. data: 82,352 Americans currently hospitalized by the virus (straight from the Post’s virus tracker) out of 6,676,932 current active virus cases (from the also reliable Worldometers.info site – because the Post doesn’t seem to track current cases, as opposed to cumulative cases).

That’s a hospitalization rate of 1.23 percent. And since the way I was taught arithmetic, 1.23 percent is lower than two percent.

As indicated above, none of this means that vaccines per se are pointless.  Instead, what it does mean is that some skepticism about the jabs’ impact, and about claims that they’d soon bring back normality, is entirely justified, and that consequently, vaccine-uber-alles proponents who live in (glassily transparent) misinformation houses themselves shouldn’t be throwing stones.