Relevant and even prescient commentary on news, politics and the economy.

Risk Corridor Funds Awarded to Healthcare Insurance Companies and Coops

SCOTUS decided 8-1 in favor of health insurance companies and coops in MAINE COMMUNITY HEALTH OPTIONS v. UNITED STATES decision, April 27, 2020 to be paid. I have been following this issue since 2015 and SCOTUS finally ruled on Republican’s (Sessions, Upton, Kingston) blockage of the Risk Corridor Program funding. A bit of history to […]

Does recovering from Covid 19 cause immunity to new infection by Sars Cov2 ?

The WHO warns that it is not proven that we acquire immunity to Sars Cov2. If we don’t we are pretty much doomed. However, I don’t see how people could recover without developing immunity or develope immunity without memory with human immune systems. Here, as often, the burden of proof is placed on the optimistic […]

hydroxychloroquine and Remdesivir Update

I have repeatedly argued that, based on in vitro evidence, hydroxychloroquine should be prescribed while we wait for the results of clinical trials. Such results were just published. They are very disappointing. The link is to an LA Times Article: latimes.com 2020-04-17 malaria-drugs-fails-to-help-coronavirus-patients-in-controlled-studies On the other hand Early peek at data on Gilead coronavirus drug […]

Lansing, Michigan Protestor

James Smith protesting the protestors who are practicing unsafe methods of protest. They congregate in close proximity to others, failed to wear facemasks, threatened those people who were involved in the protest, and by their actions purposely prevented people and healthcare workers from having access to Sparrrow hospital in Lansing, Michigan. Their right to protest […]

World Chess Championship Ends

World Chess Championship Ends The two best chess players in the world faced off this month, undeterred by lockdowns, travel bans or any other restrictions.  They never had to see each other either. It helped that they were both computer programs.  The former champ, Stockfish, is the strongest of the traditional type of program, designed […]

A BEAR STORY FOR JASON … WITH HOPE

by Dale Coberly A BEAR STORY FOR JASON WITH HOPE [Jason is a “Libertarian”  who recently tortured his brain to produce a proof that we have no obligation to help anyone else, because they are probably bad or will sometime, if given the chance, do something bad.] A long time ago I saw a film […]

From Social Distance to Social Justice: An Unsolved Riddle

In the last two weeks of March and the first week of April, 2020 16.5 million new claims for unemployment were filed in the U.S. After the novel coronavirus is successfully contained some but not all of those jobs will return. The post-pandemic economy will not be the same as the economy before and to […]

Remdesivir V

This is interesting. In addition to the two huge multi center phase III trials of Remdesivir for Covid 19 with estimated completion some time in May 2020, there is a smaller but very large trial in Beijing with estimated completion May 1 2020. The East is Remd ! May Day May Day May Day “Estimated […]