24 April 2020

Who Needs Science When You Have Experts?

"Science", we are told, is the foundation of all which the Centers for Disease Control (CDC)--the government agency tasked with protecting the nation's public health--undertakes. Their decisions and recommendations are always guided by science--and presumably not by politics.

How do we know this? They tell us this. They promise us this.

Base all public health decisions on the highest quality scientific data that is derived openly and objectively
When it comes to the current COVID-19 (aka "CCPVirus") pandemic, however, they are falling far short of the mark. Many of their decisions and pronouncements lack scientific support or scientific rigor. The latest and most glaring example of this is the hype du jour over the wearing of masks and facial coverings to mitigate the spread of the disease.

18 April 2020

Lies, Damned Lies, And COVID-19 (CCPVirus) Deaths


"There are lies, damned lies and statistics."

Earlier, I noted that the real world data on the COVID-19 pandemic diverged from the "experts" projections in several key respects.  As I said at the time, "we're missing cases."

It turns out that not only are we missing cases, we are missing quite a few deaths as well.

16 April 2020

Free Fall: Where Will It End?

With the April 16 report of initial jobless claims, United States reached a grim milestone in grappling with the CCPVirus outbreak: 22 million people have now filed for unemployment in the past four weeks. To put that number in some perspective, the number of jobs destroyed by the CCPVirus shutdowns exceeds the total number of jobs created since the end of the "Great Recession" in 2009.

More remarkably, these jobs were not lost due to an external supply or demand shock, but due to deliberate government action. The United States quite simply chose to destroy a minimum of 22 million jobs, in what is already proving to be an act of economic suicide.

I will not delve further into the particulars of why the lockdown strategy was the wrong strategy to take. My comments on the strategy, as well as on the ultimate cost in lives, have already been made, and nothing has yet arisen to cause either their revision or retraction. The legality, the Constitutionality, the wisdom or unwisdom of the strategy, are all now as they have been.

The lockdown strategy, for better or worse, is the strategy that has been chosen to mitigate the effects of the CCPVirus--which is the proper name for the COVID-19 coronavirus, for it would not exist but for the malignancy and malevolence of the Chinese Communist Party. For better or worse, its consequences will shape the United States and the world going forward. We must consider those consequences if we wish to emerge from this crisis with any shred of what was.

12 April 2020

Who Counts The Deaths From Recession?

As of this writing, there are 551,081 cases of COVID-19 (aka CCPVirus) infection in the United States, and there have been 21,668 deaths. Worldwide, there have been 1,837,785 infections, resulting in 113,312 deaths. To prevent further deaths, we have been told extreme measures over and above rudimentary "social distancing" are necessary, including the wholesale closures of businesses, the destruction of millions of jobs, the contraction of the world economy on a massive scale.

We are rigorously counting every death from the CCPVirus, taking care not to miss any. Yet who is counting the deaths from the economic chaos being unleashed on the world?

Do Not Look For The Living Among The Dead

Why do you look for the living among the dead?
On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them. In their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here; He has risen! Remember how He told you, while He was still with you in Galilee: ‘The Son of Man must be delivered over to the hands of sinners, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.’ ” Then they remembered His words.

When the women who followed Jesus from Galilee to Jerusalem returned to the tomb in which He had been laid after His crucifixion, they were coming to ritually anoint His body with perfumes and spices in accordance with Jewish tradition, having waited through the Sabbath to do so. This was how they would say their final farewell to Him.

However, instead of saying "goodbye", they heard a most miraculous "hello!"

The women were also presented with a question: "why do you look for the living among the dead?"