It’s Friday, April 3rd, 2020…but before we begin, we interrupt our regularly scheduled broadcast for two brief public service announcements.
First…
Second, in addition to being the 41st anniversary of our first arrested landing aboard the U.S.S. Lexington (CV-16)…
…this day also marks the 23rd occasion of TLJ’s 39th birthday:
Baby, you’re the greatest!
Now, here’s The Gouge!
First up, if our lead item is any indication, as the Wuhan pandemic progresses, things are going to get a lot crazier before they get saner, as FOX reports a…
“…Moreno expressed concerns to authorities that the ship had an alternate purpose than to assist with COVID-19 and was potentially linked to a government takeover and he derailed the train to “wake people up.”
“You only get this chance once. The whole world is watching. I had to,” Moreno told investigators, according to the complaint. “People don’t know what’s going on here. Now they will.”
A California Highway Patrol officer who witnessed the crash said he saw “the train smash into a concrete barrier at the end of the track, smash into a steel barrier, smash into a chain-link fence, slide through a parking lot, slide across another lot filled with gravel, and smash into a second chain-link fence.”…”
‘Duardo, you got some SPLAININ to do…not the least of which is why, with at least 500 yds. of asphalt and concrete between you and the Mercy, you chose a locomotive, a mode of transport notoriously difficult to direct with no tracks beneath it.
We’re gonna go out on a limb here and predict Mr. Moreno’s train isn’t stopping at all the scheduled stations.
“By the time paperwork was completed and the body was taken to a riverside crematorium on Monday night, local residents had surrounded the hearse, said two police officers, who asked not to be named. A crowd of around a hundred people demanded the body be taken elsewhere, fearing Samir’s cremation would contaminate the area, one of the officers said.
“The mob grew in numbers and turned aggressive,” the officer said. Police called in reinforcements and baton-charged the crowd, before cremating Samir’s remains around midnight.
The backlash in Kolkata may not be an anomaly. News reports have emerged across India of mobs harassing people they suspect of carrying the virus, including doctors and air crew.Some healthcare workers in rental accommodation have been forcefully evicted by their landlords over infection fears, a doctor’s association said this week.“
In the best of times, hundreds of millions of Indians face everyday challenges which make the poorest Americans seem rich by comparison; and what’s about to face the subcontinent is likely to prove the worst of times. Pray the heat lessens COVID-19’s effects.
Next up, writing at the WSJ, Messrs. Benny Peiser and Andrew Montford offer…
“The coronavirus pandemic has dramatically demonstrated the limits of scientific modeling to predict the future. The most consequentialcoronavirus model, produced by a team at Imperial College London, tipped the British government, which had until then pursued a cautious strategy, into precipitate action, culminating in the lockdown under which we are all currently laboring. With the Imperial team talking in terms of 250,000 to 510,000 deaths in the U.K. and social media aflame with demands for something to be done, Prime Minister Boris Johnson had no other option.
But last week, a team from Oxford University put forward an alternative modelof how the pandemic might play out, suggesting a much less frightening future and a speedy end to the current nightmare.
How should the government know who is right? It is quite possible that both teams are wrong…Several researchers have apparently asked to see Imperial’s calculations, but Prof. Neil Ferguson, the man leading the team, has said that the computer code is 13 years old and thousands of lines of it “undocumented,” making it hard for anyone to work with, let alone take it apart to identify potential errors. He has promised that it will be published in a week or so, but in the meantime reasonable people might wonder whether something made with 13-year-old, undocumented computer code should be used to justify shutting down the economy. Meanwhile, the authors of the Oxford model have promised that their code will be published “as soon as possible.”
…Calculations aren’t the only problem. Only a few weeks into the pandemic, we don’t have enough data to feed into the models. In particular, information about how many people are infected but remain asymptomatic is highly tentative. This means that there are a huge number of mathematical models that might explain what has happened so far, each extrapolating a very different future.New data can change predictions considerably.
Take an example from astronomy. On March 12, 1998, media around the world announced that a mile-wide asteroid was on a possible collision course with Earth in 2028. Only a day later, the global asteroid scare was over as additional observational data showed it would miss by 600,000 miles. While the initial calculations weren’t inaccurate, they were based on limited data and weren’t properly scrutinized, which made the announcement premature. A short delay while new information was collated was all it took to show that there was no risk at all.
…Covid-19 is no false alarm, but public health could benefit from a similar warning system, which would help governments and health officials communicate uncertainties and risks to the public.
When competing models are giving wildly different, and in some cases frightening, predictions, the pressure on governments to adopt a draconian approach can be overwhelming. But, as we are seeing, the costs of such measures are extraordinarily high. Nations cannot afford to lock down their economies every time a potentially devastating new virus emerges. Setting up an effective pandemic hazard scale would inform policy makers and the public, helping fend off media demands for “something to be done” until the right decisions can be made at the right time.“
This is not to imply said decisions will always be right, simply more fully informed.
Side bar, your honor: are we the only one reminded of the similarly questionable results of equally under-informed studies on the effects of anthropogenic global warming?!?
In a related item at Best of the Web, Jim Freeman’s thoughts are just as blunt in what he entitles…
“President Donald Trump unfortunately continues to present our anti-viral options as doing nothing or a massive government response which disrupts American society and sends federal debt surging. This is especially concerning because the infectious-disease experts on whom he is relying for advice cannot reasonably be expected to also forecast the economic results of their policies.
…Today the White House released the following Presidential statement:
During National Financial Capability Month, we recognize the importance of financial literacy to a free and prosperous society, and we commit to ensuring that all Americans have the resources they need to make informed financial choices and provide opportunities for a brighter and more secure future.
The President might consider providing financial briefings for the people whose decisions now have enormous financial implications. For example, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Fauci said at a White House briefing on Tuesday:
If you look at our history, we’ve been through some terrible ordeals. This is tough. People are suffering. People are dying. It’s inconvenient from a societal standpoint, from an economic standpoint to go through this, but this is going to be the answer to our problems.
Dr. Fauci has spent a laudable career leading the federal effort against infectious diseases. His belief that the current economic impact is merely “inconvenient” illustrates that he cannot reasonably be expected to also serve as an expert on the costs of virus countermeasures…”
Nor should he be. After all, even the greatest sawbones in history ultimately admitted he was…
…not an expert in cost-benefit analysis.
Speaking of those renowned in their fields around the world, writing at the WSJ, Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Romer and Dr. Rajiv Shah offer what is, on its face, a sensible alternative to what amounts to a 2020 version of the 1950’s (Yeah, THAT oughta help!) “duck and cover“:
“For now, social distancing is the best America can do to contain the Covid-19 pandemic. But if the U.S. truly mobilizes, it can soon deploy better weapons—advanced tests—that will allow the country to shift gradually to a protocol less disruptive and more effective than a lockdown.
Instead of ricocheting between an unsustainable shutdown and a dangerous, uncertain return to normalcy, the U.S. could mount a sustainable strategy with better tests and maintain a stable course for as long as it takes to develop a vaccine or cure. The country will once more be able to plan for the future, get back to work safely and avoid an economic depression. This will require massive investment to ramp up production and coordinate the construction of test centers. But the alternatives are even more costly…”
As our…and likely your…401K/pension plan can attest.
To echo Jeff Foutch’s thought, we’d gladly take the bullet…i.e., we’re 64…if it meant our children’s future financial security would be preserved. Though, as Pelosi’s rapidly approaching 80, we’d infinitely prefer she take it, particularly since she bears so much more responsibility for this messthan we.
Meanwhile, the protestations of the Disloyal Opposition and their Socialist MSM shills to the contrary notwithstanding, NRO‘s Zach Evans details what should come as no surprise to anyone with half a brain:
“…The news comes a day after Dr. Deborah Birx, response coordinator for the White House Coronavirus Task Force, suggested that the U.S. response to the pandemic may not have been as effective as possible due to “missing” data from China.
“The medical community interpreted the Chinese data as, this was serious, but smaller than anyone expected,” Birx said at a press briefing. “Because, probably…we were missing a significant amount of the data, now that we see what happened to Italy and we see what happened to Spain.”
China could have prevented 95 percent of coronavirus infections if it had acted sooner to stem the outbreak, according to one study…”
Since we’re on the subject of Socialists playing fast and loose with both facts and information, in a forward from Ed Hickey, The Patriot Post reveals the truth behind…
“In 2015, New York’s Democrat Gov. Andrew Cuomo was faced with a decision: purchase a recommended 16,000 ventilators to add to the state’s pandemic preparation stockpile, or spend the millions elsewhere. Cuomo chose to go the latter route, commissioning a task force led by his health commissioner, Howard Zucker, to come up with a rationing plan for using the state’s existing ventilators should a pandemic scenario ever become reality. In other words, create a death panel that will determine who gets the state’s limited number of ventilators.
Furthermore, instead of spending $576 million on 16,000 ventilators, Cuomo elected to waste $750 million of the state’s budget on a solar-panel boondoggle known as the Buffalo Billion.
Now, five short years later, that unthinkable pandemic is here and New York, the state hardest hit by the China Virus, has been caught unprepared. Cuomo daily begs the federal government for more ventilators as if it was the job of the federal government to ensure that states were fully prepared for whatever crisis may come along…”
Yeah, run for President A-hole, PLEASE run!
Almost lost in the Wuhan Virus noise was this story filed by NRO‘s Tobias Hoonhout the MSM conveniently chose to ignore:
“The Justice Department inspector general said it does “not have confidence” in the FBI’s FISA application process following an audit that found the Bureau was not sufficiently transparent with the court in 29 applications from 2014 to 2019, all of which included “apparent errors or inadequately supported facts.”
Inspector General Michael Horowitz released a report in December which found that the FBI included “at least 17 significant errors or omissions in the Carter Page FISA applications and many errors in the Woods Procedures” during its Crossfire Hurricane investigation of the 2016 Trump campaign. After releasing the report, Horowitz said that he would conduct a further investigation to see if the errors identified in the Page application were widespread.
…Horowitz’s office said in a reportreleased Tuesday that of the 29 applications — all of which involved U.S. citizens – that were pulled from “8 FBI field offices of varying sizes,” the FBI could not find Woods Files for four of the applications, while the other 25 all had “apparent errors or inadequately supported facts.”
…The Woods Procedure dictates that the Justice Department verify the accuracy and provide evidentiary support for all facts stated in its FISA application. The FBI is required to share with the FISA Court all relevant information compiled in the Woods File when applying for a surveillance warrant.
“FBI and NSD officials we interviewed indicated to us that there were no efforts by the FBI to use existing FBI and NSD oversight mechanisms to perform comprehensive, strategic assessments of the efficacy of the Woods Procedures or FISA accuracy, to include identifying the need for enhancements to training and improvements in the process, or increased accountability measures,” the report states…”
Other than that, how’d you enjoy the loss of any remaining shred of credibility you still possessed, Messrs. Comey and Wray?!? Yeah, you read that right. The FISA abuses the IG identified at the FBI occurred from 2014 through 2019. Comey was fired in 2017.
If Chris Wray and anyone else even remotely connected with these FISA applications has a job tomorrow, they’ll have overstayed their welcome…not to mention avoided prison for far too long a time.
Here’s the juice: the DOJ and FBI are rotten to the core. It’s time we destroyed the institutions in order to save them.
Welcome to Washington: after all, this…
Which brings us, appropriately enough, to The Lighter Side:
Then there’s these bits of humor from G. Trevor…
…along with a couple more from Ed Hickey:
We’ve actually finished it, and decided Jenny deserves it for her birthday.
Finally, we’ll call it a week with this timely pearl of wit and wisdom from Speed Mach:
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