By Lambert Strether of Corrente.
Patient readers, this is an abbreviated Water Cooler because I need to finish up a post on Apple’s “Crush” Ad and finance capitalism. –lambert P.S. A reader corrected a Covid Resources entry in a comment, and for the life of me I can’t find it. May I ask this reader to comment once more? Thank you!
Bird Song of the Day
Ventriloquial Oriole, Deramakot Forest Reserve, Sabah, Malaysia.
Politics
“So many of the social reactions that strike us as psychological are in fact a rational management of symbolic capital.” –Pierre Bourdieu, Classification Struggles
2024
Less than a half a year to go!
National results now moving Trump’s way. All of the Swing States (more here) are now in Trump’s column, including Michigan and Wisconsin. Pennsylvania leans more Trump this week than last. Of course, it goes without saying that these are all state polls, therefore bad, and most of the results are within the margin of error. Now, if either candidate starts breaking away in points, instead of tenths of a point…. NOTE I changed the notation: Up and down arrows for increases or decreases over last week, circles for no change. Red = Trump. Blue would be Biden if he were leading anywhere, but he isn’t.
* * * Trump (R) (Bragg/Merchan): “Trump hush money trial: A timeline of key events in the case” (Associated Press). First key event: “January 2005: Trump marries his current wife, Melania.” • Hmm. Useful, though!
Trump (R) (Bragg/Merchan): “Michael Cohen: A challenging star witness in Donald Trump’s hush money trial” (Associated Press). “In criminal trials, many witnesses come to the stand with their own criminal records, relationships with defendants, prior contradictory statements or something else that could affect their credibility. Cohen has a particular set of baggage. In testimony, he will need to explain his prior disavowals of key aspects of the hush money arrangements and to convince jurors that this time he is telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.”
Trump (R) (Bragg/Merchan): “Stormy Daniels Takes the Stand” (Lawfare). From their live blog, the defense, questioning Jeff McConney, Trump Organization controller: “Bove, however, does not get sidetracked. Payments to lawyers are for legal expenses, right? Yes. And you booked those expenses as legal expenses, right? Yes. You rarely had conversations with President Trump, right? Very rarely. And you never gave him a tour of the accounting system, did you? Right. Did (Trump Organization CFO Alan) Weisselberg ever suggest that Trump told him to do these things? No, McConney says. He never told him that.” • Hate the source, but it’s a good live blog. Worth a read.
Trump (R) (Bragg/Merchan): “Stormy Daniels Steps Down” (Lawfare). • Many inconsistences in Daniels story, but substantive?
* * * Biden (D): “Remarks by President Biden at a Campaign Reception | Seattle, WA” (transcript) (White House). ” But we’re never going to forget.We’ll never forget the fact — him lying about the pandemic. He knew how dangerous it was, but he didn’t want to — he wouldn’t say it to anybody. He said, ‘Just go inject a little in your arm.’ (Laughter.) Too bad he didn’t. (Laughter and applause.) Look — all kidding aside, it was bizarre. . And all the data shows those million, every one of them had eight people that were significant to them — brothers, sisters, uncle, aunts, mothers, fathers, wives, children.” • Open, shameless lying (no doubt to a cheering “Vote Blue No Matter Who” crowd). On bleach: I don’t have time to dig out the link, but the day this story broke, I checked the transcript, because you always have to check the transcript with Trump. Trump didn’t say that. “Bleach” was Pelosi’s addition, and the press dogpiled with it. More seriously, on the million deaths, most of them happened on Biden’s watch. See the handy chart at right:
Trump is trying to make the country forget how a million people died of covid while he was president, but we’ll never forgethttps://t.co/S2r51UXxkA pic.twitter.com/GXKDugn67k
— wsbgnl (@wsbgnl) May 13, 2024
* * * “Trump Leads in 5 Key States, as Young and Nonwhite Voters Express Discontent With Biden” (New York Times). “Donald J. Trump leads President Biden in five crucial battleground states, a new set of polls shows, as a yearning for change and discontent over the economy and the war in Gaza among young, Black and Hispanic voters threaten to unravel the president’s Democratic coalition. The surveys by The New York Times, Siena College and The Philadelphia Inquirer found that Mr. Trump was ahead among registered voters in a head-to-head matchup against Mr. Biden in five of six key states: Michigan, Arizona, Nevada, Georgia and Pennsylvania. Mr. Biden led among registered voters in only one battleground state, Wisconsin.”
“Democrats Hold Leads in 4 Crucial Races That Could Decide Senate Control” (New York Times). “Democratic candidates for the Senate in Arizona, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin lead their Republican rivals and are running well ahead of President Biden in key states where he continues to struggle, according to polls by The New York Times, The Philadelphia Inquirer and Siena College.”
Pandemics
“I am in earnest — I will not equivocate — I will not excuse — I will not retreat a single inch — AND I WILL BE HEARD.” –William Lloyd Garrison
Covid Resources, United States (National): Transmission (CDC); Wastewater (CDC, Biobot; includes many counties; Wastewater Scan, includes drilldown by zip); Variants (CDC; Walgreens); “Iowa COVID-19 Tracker” (in IA, but national data). “Infection Control, Emergency Management, Safety, and General Thoughts” (especially on hospitalization by city).
Lambert here: Readers, thanks for the collective effort. To update any entry, do feel free to contact me at the address given with the plants. Please put “COVID” in the subject line. Thank you!
Resources, United States (Local): AK (dashboard); AL (dashboard); AR (dashboard); AZ (dashboard); CA (dashboard; Marin, dashboard; Stanford, wastewater; Oakland, wastewater); CO (dashboard; wastewater); CT (dashboard); DE (dashboard); FL (wastewater); GA (wastewater); HI (dashboard); IA (wastewater reports); ID (dashboard, Boise; dashboard, wastewater, Central Idaho; wastewater, Coeur d’Alene; dashboard, Spokane County); IL (wastewater); IN (dashboard); KS (dashboard; wastewater, Lawrence); KY (dashboard, Louisville); LA (dashboard); MA (wastewater); MD (dashboard); ME (dashboard); MI (wastewater; wastewater); MN (dashboard); MO (wastewater); MS (dashboard); MT (dashboard); NC (dashboard); ND (dashboard; wastewater); NE (dashboard); NH (wastewater); NJ (dashboard); NM (dashboard); NV (dashboard; wastewater, Southern NV); NY (dashboard); OH (dashboard); OK (dashboard); OR (dashboard); PA (dashboard); RI (dashboard); SC (dashboard); SD (dashboard); TN (dashboard); TX (dashboard); UT (wastewater); VA (dashboard); VT (dashboard); WA (dashboard; dashboard); WI (wastewater); WV (wastewater); WY (wastewater).
Resources, Canada (National): Wastewater (Government of Canada).
Resources, Canada (Provincial): ON (wastewater); QC (les eaux usées); BC (wastewater); BC, Vancouver (wastewater).
Hat tips to helpful readers: Alexis, anon (2), Art_DogCT, B24S, CanCyn, ChiGal, Chuck L, Festoonic, FM, FreeMarketApologist (4), Gumbo, hop2it, JB, JEHR, JF, JL Joe, John, JM (10), JustAnotherVolunteer, JW, KatieBird, LL, Michael King, KF, LaRuse, mrsyk, MT, MT_Wild, otisyves, Petal (6), RK (2), RL, RM, Rod, square coats (11), tennesseewaltzer, Tom B., Utah, Bob White (3).
Stay safe out there!
Airborne Transmission
“Reducing Transmission of Airborne Respiratory Pathogens: A New Beginning as the COVID-19 Emergency Ends” (Linsey C. Marr and Jonathan M. Samet, Environmental Health Perspectives). Important. Concluding: “In the authors’ opinion, it is clear that the largest hurdle to reducing the risk of airborne transmission of diseases is not the lack of scientific knowledge but rather barriers to implementation of interventions. These barriers include funding to support changes to infrastructure and operations, education of facility managers and decision-makers about technical solutions, and raising public awareness about the importance of indoor air quality for health. Timely and evidence-driven standards for indoor air quality and ventilation are needed, along with effective air-cleaning technologies to effect change and promote equity in protection against airborne pathogens. In the opinion of the authors, we must bridge the gap between science and implementation to realize the potential of improved indoor air management more fully.
Perhaps the greatest barrier is that no single entity is responsible for designing, implementing, and evaluating initiatives to reduce transmission of respiratory pathogens in indoor environments. A strategic research agenda is needed that addresses key uncertainties and supports development and implementation of evidence-based strategies to reduce infection risk in indoor environments. There are parallel gaps around respiratory protection.97 No single entity is charged with addressing critical evidence gaps, and research funding in this area was limited prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. We are concerned that progress will stall with developing evidence-based interventions to reduce airborne infection with the end of the COVID-19 emergency. .”
Testing and Tracking
“CDC launching wastewater dashboard to track bird flu virus spread” (STAT). “Reluctance among dairy farmers to report H5N1 bird flu outbreaks within their herds or allow testing of their workers has made it difficult to keep up with the virus’s rapid spread, prompting federal public health officials to look to wastewater to help fill in the gaps. On Tuesday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to unveil a public dashboard tracking influenza A viruses in sewage that the agency has been collecting from 600 wastewater treatment sites around the country since last fall. The testing is not H5N1-specific; H5N1 belongs to the large influenza A family of viruses, as do two of the viruses that regularly sicken people during flu season. But flu viruses that cause human disease circulate at very low levels during the summer months. So the presence of high levels of influenza A in wastewater from now through the end of the summer could be a reliable indicator that something unusual is going on in a particular area. Wastewater monitoring, at least at this stage, cannot discern the sources — be they from dairy cattle, run-off from dairy processors, or human infections — of any viral genetic fragments found in sewage, although the agency is working on having more capability to do so in the future.” • Why on earth this extreme deference toward dairy farmers with a pandemic at stake?
Transmission: H5N1
“Despite H5N1 bird flu outbreaks in dairy cattle, raw milk enthusiasts are uncowed” (Los Angeles Times). • Go long Darwin Awards.
Elite Maleficence
The UN cleaned its air by 2021. They know:
The new building H of @UN leads the way in ventilation: 100% fresh air and no exhausted air recirculation. This enables it to achieve excellent results at the COVID Airborne Risk Assessment simulator from @CERN .
These elements are present in the 2021 @UN Geneva Annual Report. https://t.co/C2qWwC4tzS pic.twitter.com/EsYLceQmYe
— LET’S AIR / NOUS AÉRONS (@nousaerons) May 12, 2024
They just don’t want you to know.
Lambert here: Patient readers, I’m going to have to rethink this beautifully formatted table. Looks like Biobot data still functions, CDC variant data functions, ER visits are dead, New York hospitalization seems to be dead since 5/1 (No, it’s alive!), when CDC stopped mandatory hospital data collection, Walgreens functions, Cleveland Clinic functions, CDC traveler’s data functions, New York Times death data has stopped. (Note that the two metrics the hospital-centric CDC cared about, hospitalization and deaths, have both gone down). Ideally I would replace hospitalization and death data, but I’m not sure how. I might also expand the wastewater section to include (yech) Verily data, H5N1 if I can get it. Suggestions and sources welcome.
TABLE 1: Daily Covid Charts
LEGEND
1) ★ for charts new today; all others are not updated.
2) For a full-size/full-resolution image, Command-click (MacOS) or right-click (Windows) on the chart thumbnail and “open image in new tab.”
NOTES
(1) (Biobot) Our curve has now flattened out at a level far above valleys under Trump. Not a great victory. Note also the area “under the curve,” besides looking at peaks. That area is larger under Biden than under Trump, and it seems to be rising steadily if unevenly.
(2) (Biobot) No backward revisons….
(3) (CDC Variants) FWIW, given that the model completely missed KP.2.
(4) (ER) CDC seems to have killed this off, since the link is broken, I think in favor of this thing. I will try to confirm. UPDATE Yes, leave it to CDC to kill a page, and then announce it was archived a day later. And heaven forfend CDC should explain where to go to get equivalent data, if any. I liked the ER data, because it seemed really hard to game.
(5) (Hospitalization: NY) The data is now updating again. I suppose to a tame epidemiologist it looks like “endemicity,” but to me it looks like another tranche of lethality.
(6) (Hospitalization: CDC) Still down. “Maps, charts, and data provided by CDC, updates weekly for the previous MMWR week (Sunday-Saturday) on Thursdays (Deaths, Emergency Department Visits, Test Positivity) and weekly the following Mondays (Hospitalizations) by 8 pm ET†”.
(7) (Walgreens) Slight uptick.
(8) (Cleveland) Leveling out.
(9) (Travelers: Posivitity) Flattens.
(10) (Travelers: Variants) JN.1 dominates utterly. Still no mention of KP.2
(11) Looks like the Times isn’t reporting death data any more? Maybe I need to go back to The Economist….
Stats Watch
There are no statistics of interest today.
Real Estate: “The hot business of cold storage” (Sherwood News). “If you had to identify a specific type of real estate that has seen its value increase because of changing consumer eating habits, global demographic shifts, worldwide pandemic preparedness, and US export policy — while its importance to reducing global carbon emissions and adapting to climate change rise in tandem — refrigerated warehouses may not be your first pick. But there’s a strong case to be made that the expansion and evolution of the cold-storage industry — often called the “cold chain” — will play a significant role in energy, environmental, and economic news in the 21st century. Cold storage facilities aren’t fun places to visit; some are kept so frigid, at minus 50 degrees Fahrenheit, that the workers who toil in these windowless spaces rotate in 15-minute shifts, despite their heavy protective gear. But refrigerated warehouses are great to build and own. Investors and developers expect 8 to 10% annual growth in this specialized real estate, according to Adam Thocher, SVP of Global Programs and Insights at the Global Cold Chain Alliance (GCCA). That’s made it a profitable real-estate niche. ‘When I think of our business at its most germane, it’s food infrastructure,’ said Jonathan Epstein, managing partner of BGO (formerly BentallGreenOak), a global real-estate investment firm that develops and operates these spaces. ‘And because of the nature of changing supply chains, there’s not enough of it, especially in the developing world, and what’s there is old.’”
Antitrust:
An excellent rundown on how Amazon works. https://t.co/JpZ8Q2dNLf
— Matt Stoller (@matthewstoller) May 11, 2024
I should probably have filed this under Guillotine Watch….
Today’s Fear & Greed Index: 50 Neutral (previous close: 47 Neutral) (CNN). One week ago: 47 (Neutral). (0 is Extreme Fear; 100 is Extreme Greed). Last updated May 13 at 12:21:57 PM ET.
Rapture Index: Closes up one on Earthquakes. “The strongest quake in 25 years hit Taiwan” (Rapture Ready). Record High, October 10, 2016: 189. Current: 188. (Remember that bringing on the Rapture is good.) • Bird flu not a concern, apparently. And I hate even to go here, but the “Tribulation Temple” category is a mere 3. If Tribulation Temple = Third Temple = whatever temple it is that the Red Heifer loons want to build, then the Rapture Index made the right call, amazingly enough. It said: “Don’t worry about the Red Heifers.”
News of the Wired
“The rage epidemic: is our modern world fuelling aggression?” (Guardian). “According to the Gallup Global Emotions Report, anger around the world has been rising since 2016, with 23% of respondents now feeling angry on any given day – figures are understandably much higher in war zones. In the UK in recent years shop workers and service staff have reported sharp rises in customer abuse in recent years, and one study showed criminal violence in GP surgeries had doubled in five years (this was back when it was possible to get an appointment in a GP surgery). Reported road-rage incidents also increased by 40 per cent from 2021 to 2022 (although lockdowns would have played a part).” • Lockdowns Not a pandemic virus shown to have decreased executive function. Lockdowns (lambert bangs head on desk).
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