Misinformation

 There was a piece in the WSJ today titled "A false Narrative about Misinformation," by Robert Kaplan.  The takeaway is that Misinformation has had little effect on vaccination acceptance.  The article cites several polls and studies that compared the answers people gave before the pandemic to the current percent of the populace who remain unvaccinated.  The people who said they would not get a vaccination,  did not get the vaccination.  The numbers of vaccine skeptics did not increase because of  the  right wing  misinformation campaign, as one might fear.

No, these dunderheads were not influenced by any scientific facts or medical advice.  They simply saw the far-fetched lies as more evidence to support their previously-held opinions.  

No one has changed their mind, despite all the money spent by both sides to convince the other side that it was wrong.

We, the rightious, must also wonder if our own predispositions could be influencing the science and facts that we hold to be true.    

Everything we have learned about communicable disease can be summed-up in a few words: human interaction spreads the virus.  When you stop human interaction or get vaccinated  the disease cannot spread and it dies with it's last victim.    

This supports the wisdom of requiring  PROOF of vaccination before allowing anyone entry to any public place and especially all public transportation venues. 

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Post script Aug 7 2021

More corroboration of the observation that more factual information doesn't change opinions when it comes to vaccines:

https://news.yahoo.com/yougov-poll-vaccines-delta-210424125.html

"A survey of 1,552 U.S. adults, conducted from July 30 to Aug. 2, found that a full 40 percent of those who remain unvaccinated now believe that the COVID-19 vaccines, which rank among the safest ever produced, represent a bigger threat to their personal well-being than COVID-19 itself — even though more than 52,000 Americans are currently hospitalized because of the virus, nearly all of them unvaccinated, and more than 615,000 have already died from it."

A Few Thoughts on Election Integrity

 Having worked at the polls as a sworn Inspector for the past 15 or so years, I can attest to the fact that everyone I've worked with at the polls takes election integrity very seriously.   We are committed to a fair process that allows every registered voter to have their vote counted.  

Recently, a certain president has made an effort to discredit elections that he might not win. (Don't forget in 2016, he lost several GOP state primary contests and immediately labeled them "rigged." )  

While I'm aware of historical efforts to "buy" election, and rare cases of ballot tampering, elections in this country and this state (Mass.) are reliably managed  by individuals who take the vow of neutrality seriously. 

The effort to discredit mail-in voting has been ramping-up.  The first issue is the registered voter database.  Critics have cited cases where the rolls still contain thousands of names of people who have died or moved away.  They say these are possible means of voter fraud.  They worry that someone could send mail-in ballots for these dead and gone people.  Except that's not what happens in real life.  Some states actually compare signatures on mailed-in ballots against registration signatures. Most of the horror stories that are shared on social media involve some conspiracy theory, easily believed by gullible partisans.  Very few actual cases have been proven. 

The penalties for tampering in an election are severe.  This dissuades most potential tamperer. 

I believe Trump has been tampering with the election process since he was nominated and even more so since he was inaugurated.   I will not be surprised when, after being soundly defeated in the coming the November election, Trump and some of his appointees are indicted for election tampering.    This time he will not have a claque of enabling senators to save him. 

Secret ballot.  Some have raised the question of mail-in ballots not being secret.  Again, in my experience poll workers are sworn to maintain secrecy.  Typically, absentee ballots were aggregated as received, and not opened until voting day, when the Warden would feed the ballots into the voting machine, only examining a ballot if there was a malfunction (e.g. mis-marking of the ballot, causing it to be rejected).  Sometimes a voter will have their ballot rejected by the machine.  The Warden will always ask for permission to look at the ballot to determine the problem.  If the voter says "No," the problem ballot is destroyed and a new blank ballot is issued.  I am not sure how they do this in places where there is not a paper ballot.

Provisional ballots.  These are ballots that are given to people who show-up to vote but are not on the rolls.  At the discretion of the Warden, a ballot may be issued but is not tabulated until the claim of the voter can be reviewed/cross checked.  (In practice, there are only  handful of provisional ballots and are counted only if they could affect the outcome, say, in a recount situation)

Ballot Harvesting.  I think this is a recent concern stemming from the recent changes to allow large numbers of mail-in (versus "absentee") ballots.  Ballot Harvesting is when a third party (other than a relative or postal worker) collects ballots to deliver to a polling place.  Massachusetts does not address the legality of this practice, but it does seem open to possible abuse, and I would support making ballot collecting or harvesting illegal. 

Due to the pandemic, I will  not be working the in-person polls this November, but I feel confident that the results will not be "rigged."

Future Games

I do not approve of the premise of the popular "Hunger Games" stories.  Pitting teenagers against each other for the entertainment of the masses is just wrong.  I know what you're thinking:  Hey we do it all the time, it's called high school sports.  Yes, but we don't force them to actually kill the opposition.

I have long been an advocate of getting old people to do government-sponsored  fighting.  It just makes sense to stop wasting young innocent lives and instead get really angry old guys to do the fighting with each other.  Geezer Games might be a popular sport.

In his novel "Twenty Thirty"  Albert Brooks envisions a society nearly 20 years in the future, where killer diseases such as Cancer and Alzheimer's have been eradicated by cures discovered  circa 2014.  The population of octogenarians has grown well beyond predicted lifespans.  The burden of medicare and social security  to support the new cadre of un-dead has bankrupted the government.  Young people are forced to enter virtual indentured servitude to support aging parents. Generational conflicts inevitably evolve into open warfare between the old and young.

Both Brooks' pre-apocalyptic vision and the world where Hunger Games exist seem all too possible as our national leaders in both parties are stuck on short-term selfish concerns.  It seems inevitable that the legacy we are leaving to our grandchildren is a polluted, over-heated planet, ruined economies, and the real specter of endless global conflict as a population control measure.  

One of the recent reality shows (National Geographic) features "Doomsday Preppers."  Folks who call themselves "Preppers" range from citizens who believe in being stocked with emergency supplies in the event of a local, short-term disaster, such as weather or other act of God, to those who are actually preparing for Armageddon or polar shifts or pandemics.  Preppers are a subculture whose fears and plans have created a whole specialized market, blogs and newsletters.  

As a fan of science fiction I have read numerous accounts of the post-apocalyptic future.  None of them seems worth the effort of preparation to me.  If I have the choice of a future, I think I would rather fight another geezer to the death for sport than to hide out in a  bomb shelter with no TV or cold beer.  

Death Panels

Today in the Boston Globe there was a seemingly innocuous item that clearly confirms the worst fears of neocons and their brethren skinheads who protest loudly against what they call the government takeover of health care because it would enable Obama to kill your grandmother legally.

The title of the piece "Seniors largely spared of swine flu threat" reported by AP (of course) was cynically designed to allay the fears that seniors (generally defined as those age 65 and above) might feel about the threat level Orange PANDEMIC THAT IS SWEEPING THE GLOBE.

The body of the story consisted mostly of quotes from the un-informed ramblings of geezers who just wanted somebody to talk to. But if you read it carefully (as your humble scribe is wont to do) there was one statement that jumped out like a zombie in a horror flick:

"Federal guidelines call for the new H1N1 vaccine to be given first to pregnant women, those who live with or care for children 6 months or younger, health care workers, people age 6 months through 24, and people with chronic health problems or compromised immune systems. Only after shots are offered to those groups will the vaccine be available to healthy adults 64 or younger. After that, seniors, age 65 or older, would be eligible."

Despite the fact that this is badly written prose, the message is crystal clear: this is exactly the sort of health care rationing that conservatives say leads down the slippery slope to the feared Death Panels. If they can do it with flu vaccine, they can do it with knee replacements and vitally-needed medicine like Viagra.


This kind of healthcare policy, based upon scientific medical research of potential risk is obviously one of Obama's stealth weapons to kill old people and further his Socialist Agenda.