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Open thread Dec. 9, 2022

Dan Crawford | December 9, 2022 5:58 am

Open thread Dec. 6, 2022, Angry Bear angry bear blog

3 Comments

Fred C. Dobbs says:

December 10, 2022 at 11:17 pm

A Message to the Next Generation of Scientists

NY Times – Anthony Fauci – Dec 10

Although I hesitate to use the hackneyed expression “It seems like just yesterday,” it ‌does feel that way as I prepare to leave the National Institutes of Health ‌after over five decades. As I look back at my career, I see lessons that may be useful to the next generation of scientists and health workers who will be called on to address the unexpected public health challenges that will inevitably emerge. …

… the far bookend of my N.I.H. career is H.I.V./AIDS, the near bookend is C‌ovid-19. ‌‌This ‌pandemic was not completely unexpected, since emerging infectious diseases have challenged humanity throughout history, but some diseases can transform civilizations‌‌, and C‌ovid-19 is the most devastating pandemic of a respiratory illness to afflict humankind since the‌‌ 1918 influenza pandemic. And there‌‌ is much to be learned from ‌‌this ongoing experience with C‌ovid-19.

The United States is ‌reminded of the importance of continued investments in basic and clinical biomedical research. The major successes of the C‌‌ovid-19 pandemic have been driven by scientific advances, particularly life‌saving vaccines that were developed, proven safe and effective in clinical trials and made available to the public within one year — an unprecedented feat.

Other lessons are painful, such as the failures of certain public health responses domestically and globally. We also must acknowledge that our fight against C‌‌ovid-19 has been hindered by the profound political divisiveness in our society. In a way that we have never seen before, decisions about public health measures such as wearing masks and being vaccinated with highly effective and safe vaccines have been influenced by disinformation and political ideology.

It is our collective responsibility to ensure that public health policy decisions are driven by the best available data. Scientists and health workers can do their part by speaking up, including to new and old media sources, to share and explain in plain language the latest scientific findings as well as what remains to be learned. …

… As I ‌think of that 27-year-old who arrived on the N.I.H. campus in 1968, I am humbled by the enormous privilege and honor I have had serving the American and global public. ‌

I have experienced enormous joy and benefit from ‌‌training and learning from the hundreds of brilliant and dedicated physicians, ‌scientists‌ and support staff members working in my laboratory, in the N.I.H. clinics and in the N.I.A.I.D. research divisions and from domestic and international research collaborators.

Looking ahead, I am confident that the next generations of young physicians, scientists and public health practitioners will experience the same excitement and sense of fulfillment I have felt as they meet the immense need for their expertise to maintain, restore and protect the health of people around the world and rise to the continual unexpected challenges they will inevitably face in doing so.
Fred C. Dobbs says:

December 11, 2022 at 8:36 am

Democrats to Iowa: Get Lost!

NY Times – Dec 11

Democrats are getting their derrières handed to them by the kickers and the Busch Light drinkers from out here on the edge of the Great Plains all the way to Appalachia, where the Republicans roam.

So what do the Democrats do?

Dump the Iowa caucuses into the ditch. At the hand of President Biden, no less. He decreed that South Carolina’s primary should go first on the presidential nominating calendar, displacing Iowa. The Democratic National Committee seems happy to oblige.

We get it. Let someone else take a turn up front. …

… it’s OK that South Carolina goes first. Iowa can do without the bother. The Republicans are sticking with Iowa, the Democrats consider it a lost cause. No Democratic state senator lives in a sizable part of western Iowa. Republicans control the governor’s office, the Legislature and soon the entire congressional delegation. Nobody organized the thousands of registered Latino voters in meatpacking towns like Storm Lake. Democrats are barely trying. The results show it.

The old brick factory haunts along the mighty Mississippi River are dark, thanks to Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton and everyone else who sold us out for “free trade.” Keokuk, the gate city to the river, was once a bustling industrial and shipping hub but recently lost its hospital. Your best hope in rural Jefferson was to land a casino to save the town. You essentially can’t haul a load of hogs to the packinghouse in a pickup anymore — you need a contract and a semi. The sale barn and open markets are quaint memories. John Deere tractor cabs will be made in Mexico, not Waterloo. Our rivers are rank with manure. It tends to frustrate those left behind, and the resentment builds to the point of insurrection when it is apparent that the government is not here to help you.

It’s hard to feel from 30,000 feet. So Donald Trump landed in Sioux City on the eve of the midterm election to claim his stake before a large crowd buffeted by the gales out of Nebraska. “The Iowa way of life is under siege,” Mr. Trump bellowed. “We are a nation in decline. We are a failing nation.”

They loved him. The Democrats view the crowd as deplorable, and told Iowa to get lost.
- Fred C. Dobbs says:
  
  December 11, 2022 at 8:41 am
  
  Dems represent urban (& suburban) America, academics & intelligentsia & people of color The GOP represents the rest, with a lot of somewhat confused independents wondering what to do next.