Operation Warp Speed: Cutting Corners and Red Tape?
Trump’s plan has never been limited to the logistics of distribution of a COVID vaccine:
“Operation Warp Speed (OWS) is a public–private partnership initiated by the U.S. government to facilitate and accelerate the development, manufacturing, and distribution of COVID-19 vaccines, therapeutics, and diagnostics.[1][2] The first news report of Operation Warp Speed was on April 29, 2020,[3][4][5] and the program was officially announced on May 15, 2020.[1]”
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Warp_Speed
“….Ethical discussions also surround the research and testing of vaccines, including discussions about vaccine development, and study design, population, and trial location.
To be licensed, vaccines go through many years of research, and must pass rigorous safety and efficacy standards.[1] The vaccine development and research process includes diverse experts many scientific and social disciplines, including public health, epidemiology, immunology, and statistics, and from pharmaceutical companies. These stakeholders may have conflicting priorities and motives, which contributes to various ethical discussions.[10]
Sometimes researchers disagree about whom to include in vaccine trials. To properly test a vaccine’s effectiveness, a clinical trial including a control group that does not get the test vaccine is usually necessary.[1] Failing to provide any adequate preventive option can be a difficult decision when the vaccine can potentially prevent a serious, untreatable, or fatal infection, however….”
https://www.historyofvaccines.org/content/articles/ethical-issues-and-vaccines
“Pfizer’s Covid-19 vaccine promising, but many questions remain
Pfizer’s vaccine is a new type of technology that’s never been used in mass human vaccination.”
12/09/2020 @ 9:34 am
Ron, did you read what you wrote?
“Trump’s plan has never been limited to…”. The thing of it is, “the plan” is not what is being injected into arms. The product that will be used is the actual vaccine. The vaccines being used currently are neither the result of Trump’s plan…nor are they the plan itself. They are the vaccines. What Trump planned did not result in the composition of the vaccines.
Have you ever ridden in a Volkswagen?
12/09/2020 @ 6:48 pm
Ron, did you read what you wrote?
Bitey, do you remember what you wrote:
“And as for “Operation Warp Speed”, the program has more to do with logistics than the science of developing the vaccine.”
Operation Warp Speed couldn’t be more about the logistics of distribution than the science of development.
Biden’s administration will have the primary responsibility and obligation to manage the logistics of distribution…
On this point, the point of this post, your assertion re the scope of Trump’s Operation Warp Speed is flat out wrong…
Hence, anything you say that flows from or through your erroneous assertion is tainted with the error and may be discounted and or disregarded as a. consequence….
12/11/2020 @ 12:15 pm
Ugh! Ron, when “Warp Speed” was put together, and the race to produce a vaccine commenced, money was set aside, and certain protocols were devised, etc.
GERMANY broke through with the first vaccine. Uk was second. The protocols from “Warp Speed” were not involved. What remains of Warp Speed will apply to the distribution and storage, and medical administration. Warp Speed did not result in a vaccine being produced. AS SUCH, no sin sister plan resulting from racism or Donald Trump’s incompetence touches on the COMPOSITION of the vaccine. Not of Trump’s idiocy is involved in how anyone came up with a drug. ALL THAT REMAINS…is distribution.
12/11/2020 @ 12:16 pm
Sinister. God, this auto correct sucks.
12/09/2020 @ 10:52 am
As someone who has had enough life threatening health conditions to require a hefty grab bag of meds (am currently on six), I can say that every drug causes some kind of side effect and/or long term consequences for somebody. Read the teeny tiny eight point pale gray typeface on the circular that comes with your script, or look it up on drugs dot com if you doubt this.
Today’s news tells us that yesterday the UK learned the Pfizer vaccine can cause encephalitic shock in people who have allergies, to what they don’t know yet. Their recommendation is that vaccination sites be facilities that are equipped to deal with this emergency possiblity, in other words, no CVS or Walgreens, and that people in doubt should bring an epi pen to their vaccination. Reading between the lines, encephalitic shock is an extremely serious body response, requiring immediate emergency medical attention, and the people who had this response were in dire enough circumstances to make this a headline story.
There will be stuff with these vaccines and the stuff will reveal itself over time. We can count on that. The statistical risk data aren’t yet fully known. Knowing this can have a lot to do with any individual’s decision. The wait and see approach allows the data to accumulate.
The media are focusing their attention on persuading the public. While I love Obama with billions of suns, him taking the vaccine on tv won’t convince me. I’ve read some extremely interesting discussions in the Washington Post commentariat, multiple retired medical professionals and pharmaceutical researchers offering their thoughts. Apparently, what the media isn’t telling us (yet) is that there are multiple vaccines still in trials, vaccines that will probably turn out to be safer and with fewer issues, and the feeling is these will become the vaccines most of us take.
Re: Ron’s distrust as a result of the Tuskegee experiment. Yesterday there was a lengthy article at WaPo about this exact thing. If you have a subscription, it’s here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/social-issues/black-vaccine-trust/2020/12/07/9245e82e-34c2-11eb-b59c-adb7153d10c2_story.html
tl;dnr Ron is not crazy or lacking in altruism. A couple tidbits from the article:
“Walker, a former journalist who was the first Black woman to co-anchor a newscast in Boston, was so troubled by her congregants’ suspicion of a coronavirus vaccine that she asked Anthony S. Fauci, the government’s top infectious-disease expert, to speak with them.
And he did. In an online forum for which more than 2,800 people signed up, Fauci talked about the vaccine development process and why it was essential for the Black community to get vaccinated. When Walker polled her congregation afterward, at least half were unpersuaded.
“I think it just speaks to the issue of you can’t change people’s minds with one conversation when you are trying to turn people around from decades of skepticism, from decades of distrust,” Walker said. “It is not going to happen overnight, no matter what the urgency.”
And this:
Fewer than half of Black Americans say they would get a coronavirus vaccine, compared with 63 percent of Hispanic people and 61 percent of White people, according to a December report from the Pew Research Center. Many Black people say they do not trust the medical establishment because of glaring inequities in modern-day care and historical examples of mistreatment.
Finally, a metta comment.
It’s pretty unpleasant to drop in here during a tea break to discover Ron being pummeled into the cement like he’s a jackhammer. That’s not debate or argument, that’s bullying. Maybe other voices here are unwelcome? Does anyone ever wonder why there aren’t more voices here? Speaking for myself, it’s that. If compassion is truly on anyone’s mind, it could start with more kindness and respect to Ron, to Raptor, to any soul who might wander in here. Most of us have spent months alone or with limited social contact. We’re just seeking some connection.
12/09/2020 @ 11:41 am
Green Heron, if you want to make a shitty comment like that, you should at least make yourself familiar with what has been said. I never question anyone’s right to decide for themselves on this or any other issue. I have said that numerous times. You have a desire to have this play out on a certain way. You’re lining it up like a whopper jawed billiard shot.
This vaccine has nothing to do with domestic violence. This vaccine has nothing to do with small pox covered blankets. This vaccine has nothing to do with racism. This vaccine has nothing to do with the Tuskegee syphilis experiment. This vaccine has nothing to do with genocide. They are all tragedies. It would be an additional tragedy if one person came along, read this, and decided that all of that bullshit had anything to do with the vaccines. They simply dont. NOW, as a result of one or any of those human tragedies, you might decide to not be vaccinated, or whatever. For the umpteenth time, I fully endorse that right. HOWEVER, that does not mean that I should say, yes, because of domestic violence, you should be wary of the vaccine. Also, a person’s reservations about the vaccine is their issue. But spreading that publicly, in a venue where it can and should be challenged, is not mistreatment of the one spreading the unsupportable statement.
When Ron posted a photo of the woman who positioned an arrow pointing to her crotch, inviting Trump to grab her, you asked him to remove the photo and implied that Ron was contributing to her abuse. I disagreed and supported Ron’s choice. It was news worthy, relevant, and not exploitative. We’re you “pummeling Ron”, or are the rules just different for you?
12/09/2020 @ 12:05 pm
Around the middle of last month, Alan asked me to start posting again. Maybe you’re familiar with the goings on of this site over the last several months and maybe you’re not. Be that as it may, the site needed traffic and content. Alan asked (and others), and I like them all, so I said, “I will contribute.”. It took a bit to gear up because I have been quite busy with other things, and it took a bit of change in my mind space. Around 11/16, I cranked out some pulp, and committed to keep going until I got a flow going.
Ron, to his credit, has been cranking the whole time. I dont always agree with what he says, and I dont even address much of what I do not agree with. I DEFINITELY don’t address disagreeable people, like yourself, generally.
I want the best for this site, and I noticed several have posted, increasing content, at least. That’s a good thing. I noticed you contribute nothing but comments. I’m sure that will change. What I don’t want is bullshit accusations about “casually dismissing genocide” (I did not notice you defending me on that charge), or the bullshit about picking on Ron. Don’t want it, don’t need it. I also don’t need the bullshit about ruining your tea at lunch… if I have anything to do with that.
SO…you can have it. I don’t need to contribute. You can pick up the slack and start posting. Enjoy your tea. Good luck to the site.
12/09/2020 @ 12:26 pm
bitey … don’t do that, don’t go off in a huff. Whatever’s going to make me think? You are the only Deep Thinker I encounter regularly and I have to work to even try to keep up with you. (If I don’t comment it’s usually because I didn’t keep up.) And for being a DT you are as down to earth and on point as anyone besides koshersalaami.
Look! I even posted something today. Not Deep Thinking stuff and only partly original but it’s interesting and it’s something. It’s a start. C’mon. Stay.
12/09/2020 @ 12:34 pm
Thank you, Jonna, but that is more than I deserve. Sincerely, that is kind of you.
Let me explain why this is not the place for me. There is what you have already witnessed. I’m not a bullshitter. This place needs someone to say that up is down because of how someone else feels about it. I would rather die.
12/09/2020 @ 1:33 pm
Bitey,
I was asked, no, told to contribute this month or my account would be closed.
Commenting only is not an approved activity.
Most of my comments are roundly ignored.
I felt harassed in the past by the same methodology and voices. It’s puzzling.
So far I haven’t conjured up anything worthy of posting, but you do.
Consistently.
I see you have been bashed. It’s a pattern.
Take a breather my friend and as grandma warned “Consider the source.”
12/09/2020 @ 2:46 pm
I’m starting to feel unwanted and unappreciated. No one told me I had to do anything and I posted today only because of information that showed up in my fb feed that I thought was interesting. I think I’m going to link it to fb now.
12/09/2020 @ 2:16 pm
Not only is it a pattern, it is also a formula. The formula works kind of like this.
“ As someone who has had enough life threatening health conditions…”. Start with some bullshit like this. Sway the discussion entirely away from reason, and to some purely emotional garbage.
Add in some of the following horse shit. “ There will be stuff with these vaccines and the stuff will reveal itself over time. We can count on that. The statistical risk data aren’t yet fully known…”. This is not a discussion of the issue at all. It just basically says that all that can be kn own is not yet known. True enough. That also makes ALL discussion of anything moot. Stamp that one bullshit also.
Then this part of the formula kicks in. The goofy bile about changing people’s minds. It looks like this. “ In an online forum for which more than 2,800 people signed up, Fauci talked about the vaccine development process and why it was essential for the Black community to get vaccinated. When Walker polled her congregation afterward, at least half were unpersuaded.”. What the commenter does here is COMPLETELY ignore the fact that this is not about persuading the other person. This is about providing a counter to an IRRESPONSIBLE public argument on the matter of public health. Again…say it with me…if you choose to not be vaccinated, I fully endorse that. What I disagree with is giving someone ELSE bad reasoning for what then public needs. That is not about changing minds. It is about not letting mental sewage to poison other people’s minds. This may be a bit too nuanced for the ‘I once had a pain’ club, but it is an an entirely valid practice.
Here is one of my personal irrational ideas that is exactly like the other blush it presented. I refuse to get on elevators with doors that close from right to left IF the building is over 7 stories high. The main reason for that is that elevators like that are way too small to avoid being run over by rhinoceroses. If you get caught in one of those elevators, you will likely be killed by a rhinoceros. That part is absolutely defendable….EXCEPT FOR THE FACT…that you will never meet a rhinoceros on an elevator.
But, Bill…people have been killed by rhinoceroses. Why do you “casually dismiss” the lethality and the severe pain of being trampled by a rhinoceros? Well, actually, I am not dismissing it. I am MERELY saying that that is entirely unlikely to ever happen as described. (I should probably explain here that I was not being honest when I said that I feared this. It just makes the ‘ooo, I have a pain’ club lean in a bit closer). By the way, club, everybody has had a pain. Everybody has had loss. 2020 is shitty WORLD WIDE. That doesn’t make your bottle of pills relevant to how Coronavirus vaccine was made. These things exist in the world independent, and not affecting one other. The Ostrogoths were chased by the Huns, and went and battled the Visigoths, and brought down the Roman Empire. None of that has anything to do with why the Browns can’t win a Super Bowl. If you CAN draw a line of connection, the world would like to hear it, but merely mentioning it does not make the case.
12/09/2020 @ 2:49 pm
Smart AND funny. Unbeatable.
12/09/2020 @ 2:30 pm
This is what Jonna and I meant.
You have the gift of being able to cut through the butter using only a hot knife. Some might say one shouldn’t even use butter, but you know your biscuits.
Remarkably in concert, while rhinoceroses have not been an issue, I did train our Bengal cat to keep elephants out of the yard and she has been quite effective at it.
That’s the reason I will throw caution to the wind and get the vaccine when my turn comes up.
12/09/2020 @ 2:41 pm
As far as I can tell, cats in Ohio are particularly good at keeping elephants out of yard…to say nothing of Visigoths.
12/09/2020 @ 2:51 pm
Yeah well my dog died months ago and I still have seen neither elephants nor rhinos nor even Visigoths in my yard and I take more meds than GH does so I must be right.
12/09/2020 @ 5:29 pm
omg, can’t we few remaining OSers get along…
My view is this is a worldwide emergency and haste is required…but the vaccine development is based on many preceding years of work in the general field, not just pulled out of the collective scientific behind…actually what gets me is this wonderful science & technology produced in an unprecedented way by an educated & dedicated (tho there is $ involved) minority to be applied to the shrieking masses who can’t even wear masks and stay home – Australia and NZ demonstrate how the virus can be virtually eliminated w.o. vaccine.
12/09/2020 @ 5:38 pm
Bitey, I’m not an active poster here. I didn’t get an email from Alan and am not on facebook. The reason I don’t write posts is because work already keeps me online too much– in zooms for nine and a half hours on a single day last week, gah. After commenting earlier, I didn’t get right back because another zoom and a report deadline at 4. It’s not possible to make a blog post, then hang out and tend to comments. I’d be criticized way more for dropping a post and not returning than I would as an occasional visiting commenter. Long comments are kinda like a post for me, so this one will have to do for you.
Three response points, to Bitey specifically, who I seem to have super pissed off:
1. Some of your detailed critical response was to words not written by me, but to several selections copied and pasted from the WaPo article I cited. I put quotation marks around the copied bits and also attributed them to the Post article, but you seem to have missed that in your reading. If you have an account at WaPo, you could follow my link and leave your critique for the article’s author there.
2. With regard to your ‘domestic abuse’ and the vaccine charge? Who said anything about domestic abuse and the vaccine? And genocide? I did not and missed it if someone did. After accusing Ron of not reading carefully, maybe slow down a little yourself.
3. It’s a mean spirited attack to say that citing my health issues is meant to emotionally skew an argument or to make people feel sorry for me. I’m so not about that. I’m sharing personal insight and definitely don’t see surviving cancer or heart surgery as debate tool or a tear jerker. First hand knowledge about serious drug side effects is in my wheelhouse though. Of course we’ve all had meds, all of us have had side effects, which is why a rushed vaccine with strong side effects might make some people skittery. It does *for me*.
The WaPo article–that I’m kinda flattered you thought I wrote–is quite long and goes into great depth about why more than half of Black people surveyed don’t want the vaccine. It’s what Ron was trying to tell you, confirmed in reputable journalism. It’s an issue that won’t be resolved by Dr. Fauci or a pastor’s gentle persuasion, so your cutting stupidity like butter with a knife approach certainly won’t change minds. Why not discuss the vaccine in terms of fears and concerns, minus the personal attack?
In general, it seems like there’s some resentment towards me by posters whom I don’t know, which makes me wonder if people signed on with different avatars here than OS. I’m not here enough to know who you are or were. Maybe I’ve perceived the climate wrong and regulars here are fine with harsh comments and posts about other posters. It feels like too much for me though, so I said so. There are a few here I enjoy checking in with and although we can hash and gnash, we seem to get along. Ron and I have had that argument about the unfortunate Trump supporter so many times it has moth holes in it. (Btw, in my internet research on the photo credit, because Ron didn’t believe that I could be certain the photographer was male, it turns out to have been featured on multiple feminist websites, so I’m not the only woman who has a problem with it)
Anyway, if this site remains open to occasional commenters, anyone who has a problem with me, feel free to ignore me, I’m fine with that.
12/09/2020 @ 5:56 pm
Great. Well, I’m done with your type of smear accusations. So, replace what I was trying to contribute…or dont. I don’t care to be your target anymore.
Oh, by the way, I had promised to float the site some money to maybe get a programmer. I had planned to foot the bill for a year. Had not heard anything lately, and was about to ask…you know, before I ruined your fucking tea. But, now you can replace that too. I am definitely, absolutely not going to pay to ruin your tea and hear you whine about that. So, make those arrangements too. I am done. Have fun with it.
12/09/2020 @ 6:17 pm
Back on OS, there was a thing called the Flounce Dress, given to those who dramatically flounced, claiming they’d never return, yet ultimately, everyone always returned. We all got the dress at one time or another and getting it was even kinda cool, like a badge.
So what I’m saying is here is your Flounce Dress, and I’m pretty sure I’ll see you here again. Ignore me if I bother you so much. It’s fine. Really.
12/09/2020 @ 7:17 pm
Some saw that as another mean girl thing. Not as clever as some thought and not everyone did come back.
12/09/2020 @ 8:01 pm
Uy
Thanks Jonna
People say illogical things. It happens. So we say why they’re illogical. Fine.
GH, the genocide thing came from Mrs. Raptor. I have no idea what she was referring to and I’m kind of conscious of genocide. I asked. I’m not sure I remember which thread it was on so I don’t know if it was ever answered.
If people want to wait for a later vaccine they think will be better based on advice from qualified medical personnel, that makes sense, as long as they’re really careful in the meantime. I mean that both for themselves and for the people around them.
If people want to say they don’t want to take this vaccine for ethnic reasons, that makes no sense at all. The reason it makes no sense is simple:
There aren’t separate vaccines for different ethnic groups, nor are there plans to restrict vaccines to or from different ethnic groups. Whatever the vaccine will do it will do to everyone. The vaccine itself can’t be racist. The process around it – in terms of development, approval, and distribution – doesn’t logistically fit the kind of racism that would lead to a worry. In other words,
Racism can’t physically be a factor here. There’s no way to make it one other than by doing something really widespread and obvious.
And it is not responsible to attempt to influence peoples’ decisions about the vaccine by raising the specter of a racist process that there’s no physical way to implement. You can get people killed doing that. That’s not an exaggeration – you can actually get people killed doing that. Not only the people who refuse to get vaccinated but the people around them who haven’t gotten vaccinated for whatever reason, such as they’re not part of the first groups eligible.
Frankly, it’s not responsible giving legitimacy to a potentially lethal viewpoint that has no basis in current reality but only in phobias based on our past. Yes, we’re still racist, but No, there’s no sign that racism is infecting (pun intended) the vaccination process, nor is there an easy way for it to do so. The Post may very well have reported it but I hope they had the sense to refute it.
Though I have a higher frustration threshold than Bitey does, I agree with his stand on this issue. Past that, I agree with Consider The Source very ardently.
And I was and remain in Greenheron’s camp on the photograph issue. If we are asked to defer to Ron on questions of racism, it is appropriate to defer to Greenheron on questions of sexism. That comment is directed at Ron as he’s the one asking for deference. Bitey defers to neither, so I don’t think hypocrisy is at work on his part.
But my overall point remains that this conversation is not academic. Very far from it. Yesterday I saw a meme listing the most lethal days in American history, with the 1900 Galveston hurricane being first, Antietam being second, 9/11 being third, the next few being recent days of COVID deaths, then Pearl Harbor. Today’s COVID death toll passed 9/11 for deaths in one day. We’re now at roughly one American death from COVID every half minute. Introducing bullshit racism reasons to avoid a vaccine, and they are bullshit reasons, is not responsible. If we’re going to do that, we have no place complaining about people not wearing masks.
12/09/2020 @ 9:26 pm
This is an area where my fence sitting tendencies really come to the fore. That is, I can see both sides.
Yes, kosh, I agree with all you say about vaccinations and bullshit and so forth. At the same time I can see the emotional, irrational grip that Tuskegee and smallpox blankets could have on black and Indian people. I don’t understand it completely because it’s irrational and I don’t do irrational that well but I accept that some people really, honestly do; that people can emotionally be in the thrall of such events and, though they may be totally rational in other aspects of their lives, are subject to irrational emotion in this area.
I have never had the experiences of a black man or an Indian woman and don’t feel them in the first person. In some respects I can even think the reactions are silly and unnecessary. I have sat through many hours of mandatory training the research world has put in place as a direct result of Tuskegee and I have commented to my Ojibwe neighbors, more of the people surrounding me who are much better off than I am, only partly ironically, that we all should have been killed in our beds long ago. But I can empathize with what I know of others’ experience and be tolerant of their differences from me. It’s not something they can be educated out of.
Ron and Raptor don’t have to get the damn shot. I don’t care. I’ll still do it and likely pretty soon because of some circumstances in my life and that’s just fine. That’s how herd immunity actually works.
12/09/2020 @ 10:41 pm
Jonna,
I don’t care if they get the shot. Mrs. Raptor in particular has so little exposure to others for other immunity reasons from what I understand that it probably wouldn’t make a difference for her. If Ron wants to wait, so be it. That’s not my issue.
My issue is pushing that viewpoint, which is very different than having that viewpoint. You don’t encourage anyone to avoid protecting their lives and the lives of those around them based on theoretical racist practices that whoever might want to perpetrate can’t logistically put in place. If I were racist and had a lot of authority in this area – like, say, if I were Donald Trump – I don’t know how I’d be able to pull it off. Tuskegee meant only giving drugs to Black people and the smallpox blankets only went to Native Americans. We don’t have the ability to do anything analogous. I’m not talking about anyone depending on the good will of the US Government, however you want to define it. But if you’re giving vaccines in, I don’t know, the Twin Cities, how do you make sure ostensibly dangerous vaccines only get administered to Black people or Native Americans? Screen them? You think nobody would notice? You think someone could get everyone in the processing chain to agree to do this and to keep quiet about it?
When I was a kid, a lot of Jews wouldn’t buy Volkswagen bugs because of this weird nightmare that the cars would lock them in and drive them to the reactivated camps. Yes, persecution causes nightmares. However, failing to buy Beetles didn’t endanger anyone’s lives. God forbid anyone should read this stuff and think it’s a good idea to avoid being vaccinated on those grounds, possibly because of ethnic identification, as in It’s A Thing We Do, We know better than to trust. You kill your own that way.
I had a friend in college I hadn’t spoken to since college. She was a little older than me. She died of COVID last week; my wife found out on Facebook from mutual friends. Another more current friend lost his elderly mother to this a couple of months ago; I didn’t know her well though I’d met her. Look, I get identity politics and I get devotion to identity politics, but let’s not get suicidal about it.
If you don’t think the vaccines have been vetted enough, that’s rational.
12/09/2020 @ 8:40 pm
OF (IF)
Late I’ve communicated with Catch 22, Just Phyliss and Mary Gravitt and ‘tempted to courage
encourage that is participation here (O! RB^James as well) all of whom are studied monifique
peppermint-like-phrase twisters as/well/as veteran perhaps beleaguered boog-a-loo Bangladesh-simpatico-OS BLOGGERs. . . ?!MIA!?
Even missing in action blokes e.g. Damon Walters is around and I don’t know why on earth
Rita Scibre does not resurface O that’s right she’s front-lining it as an RN … how’s the story go…
Albeit (without sayin’) comp for eyeballs hath exponentially gone giggly since (when was it?) ‘ought eight and the jamboree heyday of ‘no holds barred’. Glory days?
Moi thinks that a newfangled oddity might inspire viewership ‘thick or thin’ allegiance to
Mr. Al Milner’s professionalism and resounding expertise.
Why not sponsor a live drone of the seaweed and garbage impinging the North Pacific?
Earlier Senator John Kerry called for an environmental moonshot.
So where’s Johnny Robbish? Where’s Johnathan Wolfman?
Dr. Powell: I was insulted when you implied that I did not ‘really understand
sustained irony’…but stayed the course.
So Arlo Guthrie I’m not! Gingerbread all ’round yall!
12/10/2020 @ 12:23 am
Ronald, please be more careful with your featured images. Your original featured image for this article broke the format and was very blurry when the article opened.
12/10/2020 @ 9:57 am
The whole “Flounce Dress” mentality was mean spirited and terribly not funny.
Myriad’s question wondering if we could all get along deserves an answer. It’s “No.”
As directed by admin, I attempted to post this a.m.
Could not for the life of me figure out how to add an image, change the “plug-ins” and a realm of other tasks that will take too much time.
Maybe I’ll try again soon but adding frustration to my morning tasks is not what the doctor ordered and it is the only time I can find in a day for this.
I’ll read a bit more, but it does seem that we have collectively exhausted the topic of who should get a vaccine.
My conclusion is that anyone who can and wants to save their own ass should do it.
Black, brown, red, yellow, pink, beige and white asses all qualify.
12/10/2020 @ 11:14 am
Art, the first couple times I posted I found it difficult, too. This last time went smooth as silk. Since I have no conscious memory I have to think that sooner or later something like muscle memory comes to the fore.
12/10/2020 @ 11:20 am
Jonna made an excellent comment about the fence. There is a fence and a lot of people are sitting on it, with emotion and logic pulling in two directions. Ron is a logical man, but in this, he’s deciding with an emotion–distrust. Trust isn’t subject to logic. Calling his position bullshit, and insulting him personally seems harsh.
Accepting aspects of this highly abnormal life, even small decisions feel like a lot of work. Our information comes from the media, but since Trump became president, I distrust the media. Even reputable venues traded their moral and intellectual high ground for clicks on daily Trump lies and awfulness.
If Ron feels distrust about getting a vaccine, I haven’t seen him calling for others to avoid vaccination which seems KS’s concern. His post was basically here’s why I’m not doing it, you can go first, which is basically the exact same position that 52% of Black people had in the WaPo article. Ron’s resistance doesn’t seem to pose a danger to society, and browbeating him seems like a shallow intellectual exercise for the satisfaction of the browbeater. Okay, that’ll be my last at that.
Re: the flounce dress. I agree that it is mean spirited and it was absolutely intended as such, after such a lengthy and thoroughly mean spirited response to Ron and to me and to that poor reporter who wrote the Post article.
Art Stone, agree with you about making posts. Blogging software seems to have remained in the dark ages. I was forced to learn Zoom and Discord for work, and even so, it feels really hard to figure out the simplest tasks here, like editing or even placing a comment.
12/10/2020 @ 5:04 pm
Greenheron,
I’m not insulting Ron. I am disagreeing virulently with his action. There’s a difference.
12/10/2020 @ 6:07 pm
@Koshersalaami;
“My mother was a highly skilled and broadly educated, registered nurse.
Growing up I enjoyed the benefit of the care and counsel of a medical expert.
I don’t believe she would approve of, or have much faith in, Donald Trump’s Operation Warp Speed COVID19 Vaccine…
My mother was intensely antiracist…
The essence of this post is derived from counsel on the matter I would have received from my mother were she alive today. .
She would most likely agree that while vaccination is to be accepted as universally beneficial when done correctly, there’s too much to question and too much personal risk in rushing to accept a cure that could be worse than the disease…
However, you may choose to ‘trust’ the vaccine and queue up ASAP. It is your right and your option to do so…”
—From a comment on my previous post on the matter…
Suggesting that my position has potentially lethal consequences is hyperbole that is out of taste, out of line, and out of character…
There is no way I have that much or that kind of influence…
You give me much too much credit or you have no faith in your own posture….
My understanding is that the Ad Council is on board to assist in marketing the vaccines to reluctant or recalcitrant segments of the population….
Be that as it may, I’ll wait and watch with or without your permission….
12/11/2020 @ 12:44 am
I don’t have a problem with a medical objection. I have already stated that. I have a problem with
Re The COVID Vaccine: White Folks First…Please
Given what you know about vaccine development and distribution, how exactly could the Black population be targeted? Not who would want to, How could they do it? Do you think the White population intends to say “We’ll wait for Black people to be guinea pigs?” (I’ll get it the day it’s available to me and I am not remotely alone.) Do you think there are different versions of the vaccine for Black people? Do you think anyone could get the entire distribution system to go along with that? Do you think doctors and nurses will only vaccinate if you’re the right race?
There’s no way to target you, and yet you’ve said you don’t want the vaccine early on the grounds you’d be targeted? Granting legitimacy to a stand like that is dangerous because you could encourage someone to wait for a nonsensical reason that could get them sick or killed.
I don’t know if you influence anyone. About this I certainly hope not.
12/11/2020 @ 8:13 am
https://www.theroot.com/dr-anthony-fauci-appeals-to-black-community-the-vacc-1845853569
KS, you might get more insight into Ron’s distrust if you take the time to read this article, it’s not long. They cite a study where only 14% of Black people trust that the vaccine is safe. 18% believe that it would protect them from covid.
tl;dnr Dr. Fauci has appointed a Black woman scientist who works for Moderna (who makes the other vaccine that we haven’t been hearing as much about) to talk to the Black community about vaccine safety. He’s super concerned that the majority of the Black community won’t take the vaccine and given that they are the population worst affected by it, that’s a problem. He recognizes that they will not be convinced by a white doctor, so he’s trying with a Black scientist in a lab coat.
Btw, The Root is an excellent Black journalism site. Their reporting is professional and their reporters have written excellent pieces for the msm like NYTimes and the Post. They often cover stories you won’t see in the msm. Since the beginning of his presidency, they have not called Trump’s lies ’falsehoods’ like the msm. They call them lies, and his crimes, treason. Lurking in their comments has taught me a heck of a lot about how Black people feel about politics and white folks.
Racial justice and equality seems important to all of us here. So is understanding white privilege. White privilege is one reason why it’s hard to understand why Ron doesn’t trust the vaccine. KS, are you querying him so intensely because you really want his perspective, or because you want to impose yours? Not everything is a debate with a winner and a loser, or an argument, with someone right, the other wrong.
12/11/2020 @ 8:31 am
You know who cares about your feelings, Ron’s feelings…or feelings generally? People. Everyone here understands feelings. Everyone has said that everyone has the right to choose for himself.
You know what doesn’t care about your feelings? A virus. Viruses act in a certain way with no regard to how you feel about it. Now, why is it that you continue to address the issue as though it is about how Ron, or anyone else feels about it? No one, no one, no one disagrees with Ron’s feelings. The point of contention is putting out bad information where feelings are not involved. That place would be the objective world or reality as to the things that do not apply solely to you…( in this case Ron). Why do you insist on conflating the two?
Let me say it differently. Green Heron, you keep repeating…repeating…repeating the same thing as though it were never addressed. Everyone respects and understands one’s feelings as it applies to THEM. The difference is that the one too what the feelings should not influence the general, public question beyond one’s own skin on matters that involve something other than feelings.
Donald Trump FEELS that he was cheated in the election. It is perfectly fine to FEEL that way. What is not fine is to state publicly that there is something wrong with the election because the scientific result differs with how he FEELS about it. This has actually collided with the need for objective reality in the lead up to the runoff elections for Senators in Georgia. Inexplicably, Trump and his lawyers, and many others are saying, if the election is rigged, why should I vote? Trump feels he was cheated. That’s fine. Trump SAYING PUBLICLY that he was cheated, and that OTHERS should not vote is detrimental to democracy generally.
Now, if someone consistently answered that disconnect with, well, that is how Trump feels, that does not fix the issue. Trump is entitled to feel that way. No one takes issue with how he feels. Telling others that based upon those feelings…THEY should ACT differently is where the problem is. The problem is not with Trump’s feelings. The problem is not with Ron’s feelings.
12/11/2020 @ 8:56 am
By the way, this is cute:
“ Back on OS, there was a thing called the Flounce Dress, given to those who dramatically flounced, claiming they’d never return, yet ultimately, everyone always returned. We all got the dress at one time or another and getting it was even kinda cool, like a badge…”
And then:
“ Re: the flounce dress. I agree that it is mean spirited and it was absolutely intended as such, after such a lengthy and thoroughly mean spirited response to Ron and to me and to that poor reporter who wrote the Post article…”
“Getting it was kinda cool…like a badge”. “I agree it was mean spirited and it was absolutely intended as such…”
These things absolutely conflict. You are unrestrained by truth. You say one thing when it suits your circumstances, and then turn around and say the opposite right after that. There are so many things absolutely absurd about this business that I lack the desire to list them, but to have the gall to whine about “insulting Ron”…when he is not being insulted, and to admit that your comment that your “dress” bullshit was mean spirited…Jesus, who the hell do you think you are?
Let me say one more thing which seems to escape your sensibility. You publicly claim to focus on feminism, sexual harassment, abuse and such. Your actions which involve the gender micro-aggression involving awarding a “dress” to a man who does not wear them has all sorts of hypocrisy problems. Let’s say, without accusing, that you are not concerned about disrespect to the male gender. That’s fine. The problem with your “dress” crap is that you make a pejorative about an article of clothing most commonly associated with women in order to be “mean spirited”, your words, toward a man. You are actually insulting women. You always seems o make the rules different for yourself.
12/11/2020 @ 9:00 am
@Koshersalaami;
“Granting legitimacy to a stand like that is dangerous because you could encourage someone to wait for a nonsensical reason that could get them sick or killed.”
Spoken like a true person of white privilege.
60% of the black people in this country are skeptical about the vaccines that are being rushed “at warp speed” into production and distribution…
Your reaction to my post trashes and trivializes the very valid reasons for the skepticism.
Like a typical beneficiary of white privilege, you would prefer that black folks would just shut up and get the COVID shot so that YOU will have a better chance of surviving the pandemic….
Black people should now simply take the word of a systemically racist medical establishment, and a personally racist president, a system and an individual who have trouble with acknowledging black people as human beings, that the vaccines are equally beneficial to all…
I’m sure that the Ad Council will develop platitudes and euphemisms that are sufficient for the message that will be as substantive and meaningful to black folks as phrases like: “liberty and justice for all”.
One of the reasons that the virus has become such a national disaster is that someone told Trump that the virus will do more harm in communities of color than anywhere else….
So he ignored it and created a series of false narratives to justify and rationalize doing so…
The virus has proven Trump and his advisors to be egregiously in error….That virus has the potential of infecting the entire population…
As a consequence, black folks are now being told to just ‘shut up and dribble’.
Operation Warp Speed came into being because all sorts of white folks are dropping like flies….
You’re deluding yourself if you think or believe otherwise.
There’s absolutely no way a truly safe and effective vaccine could be developed and properly tested within a year’s time without cutting corners on the ethical standards and protocols…
I choose not to be a guinea pig just as I would choose not to be a scapegoat…
As far as I’m concerned, white folks can be their own ‘canary in the coal mine’…
Given what we know about the normal timelines for the development of vaccines, the development and distribution of the vaccines in less than a year makes mass inoculations little more than a global field test…
So, I repeat, white folks first….please…
I can wait….
12/11/2020 @ 10:07 am
Ron, have your baby sitter shade her eyes. I am about to light up the bullshit that you just wrote, and I don’t care to use nursery language to do so. You’re a grown man. I think you can take it.
Ok.
“60% of the black people in this country are skeptical about the vaccines that are being rushed “at warp speed” into production and distribution…
Your reaction to my post trashes and trivializes the very valid reasons for the skepticism.”
Black people. Skepticism. “Vaccines being rushed.” “Warp Speed”.
Warp speed refers to the speed of light. That speed can be expressed as 299,792,458 meters per second. It refers to the rate of travel. It actually has nothing to do with the rate of a process. It is a poorly titled book cover. It actually has nothing to do with what is in the book. Development of the vaccine does not involve distance. Constant reference to the stupid title does not convey responsibility or irresponsibility about a process. The program could just as easily have been named Speed of Due Diligence, but for political reasons, something alluding to the rapid speed of light was chosen. The name doesn’t change a single thing about the process.
Now, as for the vaccine, the Pfizer model, which is the first of several, was developed in Germany. “Warp Speed” is a program within the Trump Administration. Trump is the President of the United States. Germany and the United States are two separate countries. “Warp Speed” had no bearing on the production of the Pfizer vaccine. This is the second reason why the poorly named program should not even be insinuated in the conversation.
Also, with respect to the vaccine. This vaccine uses messenger RNA (mRNA), which is essentially a code of nucleotides, which build proteins. This “code” was given to the world by China, which decoded the DNA structure first. They published the data and the research about how to build a vaccine could begin. The corona on Coronavirus are “spikes” which look like a crown under a microscope in a 2-dimensional slide. In 3D, the spikes actually cover the virus like a sphere. Those spikes allow the virus to break into a person’s cells and cause infection. The mRNA process tells your body how to build proteins which will block those spikes, and keep them from causing infection in your cells/body.
This is a new process for making vaccines. It has never been done before. This type of process has never been possible before now. Te human genome (DNA) was decoded and published in 2003. Any medical profession before that time could not offer a useful opinion about how such a vaccine could work. Vaccines prior to now, and after this one share the name “vaccine”, but they are fundamentally different. Part of what took such along time to produce vaccines previously was injecting cells into chicken eggs, which served as the cultures for the virus to grow, and then pieces of virus would be injected into people to build antibodies. That is not how Covid vaccine works. The growth TIME is not necessary. The information is generated on a computer model. Once generated, it is catalogued. It does not have to literally GROW. That saves time. That is not a weakness in the new process. It is a strength.
Also, as an analogy, if you had 4 flat tires, it might take an hour or more to change them if you were doing it alone. You’d have to jack the car, get the tire, put it on, secure it, lower it, and repeat it three more times. Doing that one by one is what it means to do this in series. CONVERSELY, in a NASCAR race, a car can roll into a pit crew who can replace 4 tires in 4 or 5 seconds. They have special tools for the purpose, and can do them SIMULTANEOUSLY. That is what it means to do the process in parallel. There is an immense time savings in this process, and no reduction in safety. A different process is chooses for different circumstances. The race that we are currently in is the pandemic death race. Efficiencies can be created without reductions in safety.
Let’s see…”shut up and dribble.” Laura Ingram said this to/about LeBron James in reference to him expressing a public opinion about politics. James is a basketball player, and presumably she meant, play ball and stay out of politics. How this applies to “Black people” regarding this vaccine…I see no connection. James words had no bearing how whether or not anyone lived or died based upon how his words penetrated anyone’s consciousness. Conversely, saying that a vaccine is potentially dangerous and influencing anyone that it might be, for reasons that are not even possible is entirely a different matter. Growing that in in pure demagoguery.
And this:
“Like a typical beneficiary of white privilege, you would prefer that black folks would just shut up and get the COVID shot so that YOU will have a better chance of surviving the pandemic….”
Plenty of prominent Black people endorse the use of this vaccine. Barack Obama plans to take it. Al Sharpton plans to take it. Are they choosing to be guinea pigs, or hoping that I will be because of their “white privilege”? Simple answer, no. That notion is detached from reality. Given that this is a pandemic, a white person does not benefit from Black people taking the vaccine, if they themselves would not take it. The disease can kill them anyway. The assertion makes no sense. You may choose to not take it for your own reasons. That is not the same as saying that Black people, or tiger GROUPS OF PEOPLE should not because of your feelings about it based upon not knowing what it is.
One upon a time, people did not want electric lights put into their homes because they thought electricity would drain from the sockets and spill onto the floors and electrocute families. James Thurber’s mother felt this way when their house was built, and was one the first to have electric circuits rather than gas lighting. I have been to this home. It is across town. It was built in 1873. It still exists. Electricity did not leak into the floor and electrocute everybody. I’d be willing to bet that you have electric sockets and lights in your home now. Home burned down before 1873, and they have burned down since. People were electrocuted before and since. BUT…electric lights do not necessarily bring the death of inhabitants due to leaking onto the floor the way GAS…an earlier model…can. It is a different type of technology with different design, and greater efficiency. This change is analogous to that. (Oh, by the way, electricity has been used to intentionally, and unjustly kill Black people. Black people still use electricity. Even you and I do.)
12/11/2020 @ 12:25 pm
@Bitey;
Your comment is convoluted. It is confused, and conflated and nonresponsive…
Your analogies are erroneous and are replete with false equivalencies…
You completely miss the point re the issues and concerns raised by the skepticism of the majority of black people and as a result misrepresent my purpose…
“Demagoguery”?
Negro, Please!!!!
12/11/2020 @ 12:29 pm
That was amusing. I got a chuckle out of that. But, Ron, there is not a damn thing convoluted about that comment. If there is something that you do not understand, by all means ask. If you lack the courage to ask in the open, you can look up each and every point. You are confused. It is not confusing. The problem rests with you.
12/11/2020 @ 12:53 pm
@Bitey;
Not hardly…
Over the course of my career, I’ve read enough “snow jobs” to know one when I see one…
BTW
You have a nasty habit of wearing your insecurities and ambivalence on your sleeve…
Rare is the Bitey comment that doesn’t contain disparagement and or condescension in some form or another…
Be careful here before I say something that will make you want to pick up your ball and go home…
You can’t be both a bully and a brat and stick around, your skin isn’t thick enough for that…
12/11/2020 @ 1:07 pm
I’d be most pleased if you would address the facts listed for you. You have not dealt with the facts yet. Your entire argument is based upon your emotions. The facts you cite are archaic. I have shown you how they do not apply. That is what you refuse to touch.
Now, if you feel the need to make more ad hominem about me personally, feel free. I have not avoided you, Ron. You’re a man. I deal with you like you are. What IO don’t want to get into is someone standing in for you calling me a meanie…and acting like an asshole to do so. That’s bullshit.
I slap you on the nose with many comments because you act like you are above everyone. You often enter with such comments. I can show you. Often I repeat your words back at you, to show you what you are doing. Oddly enough, you tend to have forgotten that it was your opening.
And finally, when I address you with a rhetorical slap on the nose, it is ALWAYS on the subject. I wont say, “negro, please”…or, “as a cop you probably think…”, or bullshit like that. I don’t need to. My type of slap is “did you read what you just wrote?” You take offense to that. And yeah, I use the word “bullshit.”
Let’s see…”insecurities.” Interestingly enough, this whole conversation is about insecurities. The funny thing is, you, and GH are demanding that I recognize your insecurities about race and vaccines, and supplant a value of science with those. My response is while you may have those INSECURITIES…they should not be used to influence others. This may be the greatest example of projection every. I addressed insecurities (yours) by saying that you have every right to choose for yourself based upon…your word…INSECURITIES. My only objection is about projecting INSECURITIES into a context where it does not belong.
Jog my memory here. Who said, “white people first, please”? What is THAT…if not wearing an insecurity on your sleeve?
12/11/2020 @ 12:38 pm
Messenger RNA (mRNA):
Here is some info about what this process is. Read up. https://www.statnews.com/2020/11/10/the-story-of-mrna-how-a-once-dismissed-idea-became-a-leading-technology-in-the-covid-vaccine-race/
12/11/2020 @ 12:41 pm
Here is some information describing parallel and series circuits, where the concept comes from. Make yourself familiar.
https://www.thespruce.com/series-and-parallel-circuits-the-basics-1152850
12/11/2020 @ 12:47 pm
Here is a story about James Thurber’s mother and “dripping electricity.” I used this as an analog to the new technology of making a vaccine from mRNA. People (like yourself) have reservations about the vaccines based upon knowledge of the old process. The development of the Covid-19, using mRNA, does not have the time issue that you cite as a skipped step because it is not done in the same way. It differs like gas lights, tubing, and natural gas differs from electricity. (You do know that electricity does not drip and pool on the floor by gravity, right?).
https://www.fortnightly.com/fortnightly/2016/12/dripping-electricity
12/11/2020 @ 1:22 pm
I have completely misunderstood the reason my slippers have rubber soles.
12/11/2020 @ 2:32 pm
That’s right. Electrocution.
12/11/2020 @ 2:45 pm
Ron,
You think I want you to get vaccinated so I won’t get sick? I’m not the one at risk here. The population that avoids getting the vaccine is the population most endangered. When I talked about getting someone killed, I wasn’t referring to myself.
There are multiple issues here getting thoroughly conflated. I’ve been very careful to separate them and you’ve mixed them again. But I’ll start with two issues:
1. Not wanting the vaccine because of not trusting the time of development.
2. Not wanting the vaccine for fear that Black people are somehow being targeted.
I may not agree with your take on the first issue but I understand your having it. On the second issue, I think that’s flat-out irresponsible, mainly to Black people, because there’s no way to execute the actions you fear and Warp Speed is irrelevant to facts on the ground.
Trump didn’t develop the vaccines. Trump doesn’t have a way to distribute them strictly to one race. Trump is not necessarily rushing unduly given that the United Kingdom and Canada have both already approved vaccines.
As to the speed of development, Bitey has done a great job of addressing that. For a variety of reasons, both general and specific to this case, developing a vaccine can now be done more quickly than years ago. If you have knowledge that counters that, fine. A medical argument is a medical argument. I have no objection to a medical argument.
If you suspect the government or the Trump administration of planning to harm you, make a case for how they could. If not, don’t make a case to avoid getting vaccinated based on something that can’t happen. That isn’t rational and it could prove very dangerous.
It doesn’t become rational because a lot of people feel that way, regardless of their ethnicity.
12/11/2020 @ 4:47 pm
I just listen.
Did someone just yell OUT OF THE CAR LONGHAIR !?
12/11/2020 @ 6:39 pm
No, but I heard that song for the first time live, before it was a hit
and, due to COVID, my hair is as long as it was then. It reaches my shoulders.
12/11/2020 @ 7:28 pm
https://nowthisnews.com/news/dr-fauci-spotlights-young-black-woman-who-helped-develop-covid-19-vaccine-dr-kizzmekia-corbett
Corbett herself also addressed vaccine hesitancy while speaking with CNN’s Dr. Sanjay Gupta on the podcast “Coronavirus: Fact vs. Fiction.”
“Trust, especially when it has been stripped from people, has to be rebuilt in a brick-by-brick fashion,” she said. “And so, what I say to people firstly is that I empathize, and then secondly is that I’m going to do my part in laying those bricks. And I think that if everyone on our side, as physicians and scientists, went about it that way, then the trust would start to be rebuilt.”
12/15/2020 @ 1:29 pm
MSNBC is making a BFD of the vaccinations – deservedly, I suppose. It is a BFD. They showed the first people to get the shot at Yale including “Onyema Ogbuagu, principal investigator for the Pfizer COVID-19 Trial at the Yale Center for Clinical Investigation.” He is a black Nigerian man and being PI on this study is top of the heap and a VBFD. Just in case anyone might derive any small comfort or even conficdence from this fact.
https://www.nhregister.com/news/article/Pfizer-vaccine-arrives-at-Yale-New-Haven-five-to-15802842.php
12/15/2020 @ 10:30 pm
They must do all they can to overcome the history and daily experiences of black and brown people re the medical establishment….
This is evidence of the fact that there is some degree of legitimacy for the vaccination skepticism in black communities around the country..
12/16/2020 @ 11:42 am
Ron, was wondering how you think they are doing. Here it seems they are really trying. There’s a vid of the Black and Brown staff at Boston Medical Center staff doing a celebratory vaccine dance out in the street, that was in the local media, also because it made great vaccine PR.