"The officer isn't a racist asshole, she's just dangerously incompetent" is not the slam dunk defense you might think it is.
Apr 13, 2021
Today's Tweet
“I’m the right person for the job. Unless the guy who was impeached twice, failed to get reelected, never read his intelligence briefings, tried to overthrow our democracy, and now faces multiple criminal and civil lawsuits runs again, in which case I’m totally behind him.” https://t.co/jIjQ1PNiq9
— Windsor Mann (@WindsorMann) April 13, 2021
Quick Thought
A million years ago, I sat in a classroom at Arvada West High School and listened to a veteran of the Colorado State Patrol as he told us - with more than a touch of real pride - that in his whole career, he'd never drawn his weapon.
The guy had been a cop longer than I'd been alive.
He told us straight out that under any but the most dire circumstances, drawing your weapon meant you'd failed at your job as a peace officer.
COVID-19 Update
World
USA
Vaccination Scorecard
FDA, CDC call for pause in use of Johnson & Johnson vaccine after six reported cases of rare blood clots
Federal health officials on Tuesday called for a pause in the use of the Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccine, saying they are reviewing reports of six U.S. cases of a rare and severe type of blood clot in people after receiving the vaccine.
All six cases occurred among women between the ages of 18 and 48, and symptoms occurred six to 13 days after vaccination, according to a statement issued by the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The CDC will hold a meeting Wednesday of its Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices to review the cases and assess their potential significance, the statement said. The FDA will continue to investigate the cases.
“Until that process is complete, we are recommending a pause in the use of this vaccine out of an abundance of caution,” the statement said. “This is important, in part, to ensure that the health care provider community is aware of the potential for these adverse events and can plan for proper recognition and management due to the unique treatment required with this type of blood clot.”
The type of clot, called cerebral venous sinus thrombosis, was seen in combination with low levels of blood platelets, the agencies said. Treatment is different from what might typically be administered; while usually an anticoagulant called heparin is used to treat blood clots, it is dangerous to give heparin in this situation. Alternative treatments need to be given, they said.
The officials said the clots “appear to be extremely rare.” They said people who have received the Johnson & Johnson vaccine who develop severe headache, abdominal pain, leg pain or shortness of breath within three weeks after vaccination should contact their doctor.
The rare blood clots, paired with low levels of platelets, were first detected in people in Europe who had received the vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford. European regulators said it was “plausible” that the clots were linked to that vaccination and have also been reviewing four similar clotting cases after vaccination with the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, which uses a similar technology.
In a statement, Johnson & Johnson spokesman Jake Sargent said the company shares all adverse event reports about individuals who receive the vaccine with health authorities.
“At present, no clear causal relationship has been established between these rare events and the Janssen COVID-19 vaccine,” Sargent said. “We continue to work closely with experts and regulators to assess the data and support the open communication of this information to healthcare professionals and the public.”
New Cases: 588,258 (⬆︎ .43%)
New Deaths: 8,803 (⬆︎ .30%)
USA
New Cases: 56,522 (⬆︎ .18%)
New Deaths: 460 (⬆︎ .08%)
Vaccination Scorecard
Total Vaccinations: 120.8 million (⬆︎ 1.34%)
Total Eligible Population: 45.2%
Total Population: 36.4%
It's to be taken seriously and we want to be sure there are as many safeguards in place as possible while still being able to deliver the necessary services to people.
So now, lemma just say - fuck the anti-vaxxers and the whiny-butt vaccine-reluctant pussies who're are sure to go swarming across the intertoobz to make another mess because of this, and to delay the efforts to get this fucking monster under control.
FDA, CDC call for pause in use of Johnson & Johnson vaccine after six reported cases of rare blood clots
Federal health officials on Tuesday called for a pause in the use of the Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccine, saying they are reviewing reports of six U.S. cases of a rare and severe type of blood clot in people after receiving the vaccine.
All six cases occurred among women between the ages of 18 and 48, and symptoms occurred six to 13 days after vaccination, according to a statement issued by the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The CDC will hold a meeting Wednesday of its Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices to review the cases and assess their potential significance, the statement said. The FDA will continue to investigate the cases.
“Until that process is complete, we are recommending a pause in the use of this vaccine out of an abundance of caution,” the statement said. “This is important, in part, to ensure that the health care provider community is aware of the potential for these adverse events and can plan for proper recognition and management due to the unique treatment required with this type of blood clot.”
The type of clot, called cerebral venous sinus thrombosis, was seen in combination with low levels of blood platelets, the agencies said. Treatment is different from what might typically be administered; while usually an anticoagulant called heparin is used to treat blood clots, it is dangerous to give heparin in this situation. Alternative treatments need to be given, they said.
The officials said the clots “appear to be extremely rare.” They said people who have received the Johnson & Johnson vaccine who develop severe headache, abdominal pain, leg pain or shortness of breath within three weeks after vaccination should contact their doctor.
The rare blood clots, paired with low levels of platelets, were first detected in people in Europe who had received the vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford. European regulators said it was “plausible” that the clots were linked to that vaccination and have also been reviewing four similar clotting cases after vaccination with the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, which uses a similar technology.
In a statement, Johnson & Johnson spokesman Jake Sargent said the company shares all adverse event reports about individuals who receive the vaccine with health authorities.
“At present, no clear causal relationship has been established between these rare events and the Janssen COVID-19 vaccine,” Sargent said. “We continue to work closely with experts and regulators to assess the data and support the open communication of this information to healthcare professionals and the public.”
Apr 12, 2021
Today's Tweet
I laughed. I cried. I threw things.
The way I screamed after watching the end of this video! 😩😩😩😂 pic.twitter.com/gTmu58sezO
— Stepmother of Dragons 🐲 (@cheembeam) April 12, 2021
Today's Question
And again - why do we have to rely on a late-night comedy show for good journalism and media criticism?
Daily Show - Trevor Noah
Our Boys In Blue
As always - nobody with a living thinking brain would make a blanket statement condemning all cops for the actions of a few.
As Derek Chauvin’s former bosses line up to condemn him, ‘policing in America is on trial’
One by one, Minneapolis police leadership and veterans took the stand in former officer Derek Chauvin’s murder trial to view the video footage of him pushing his knee into George Floyd’s neck.
“Pulling him down to the ground, face down and putting your knee on the neck for that amount of time is just uncalled for,” the department’s longest-serving officer testified.
“That’s not what we train,” said an inspector who used to lead the department’s training.
“Not part of our training and is certainly not part of our ethics or values,” the Minneapolis police chief said.
The testimonies offered by these and other high-ranking police officials, punctuated by a chief appearing in uniform, marked an unprecedented courtroom condemnation of an officer by so many of his own department’s leadership, according to law enforcement veterans and legal experts.
They also underscored how policing remains at the heart of a crucial debate that could decide the trial’s outcome. Prosecutors say Chauvin “betrayed this badge,” describing his actions as beyond the pale for police, while the defense argues the ex-officer was using necessary force and “did exactly what he had been trained to do.”
Please tell me the irony is not lost on us.
Officer fired amid call from Va. governor for investigation into pepper-spraying of Black Army officer
That said, it seems like "a few" falls quite a bit short of reality.
So the truth sounds something like: What the fuck is wrong with all these fuckin' cops?
When the whole world is watching us to see what we're doing to stem the tide of authoritarianism, how do we go stumbling on with these mixed signals?
WaPo: (pay wall)
One by one, Minneapolis police leadership and veterans took the stand in former officer Derek Chauvin’s murder trial to view the video footage of him pushing his knee into George Floyd’s neck.
“Pulling him down to the ground, face down and putting your knee on the neck for that amount of time is just uncalled for,” the department’s longest-serving officer testified.
“That’s not what we train,” said an inspector who used to lead the department’s training.
“Not part of our training and is certainly not part of our ethics or values,” the Minneapolis police chief said.
The testimonies offered by these and other high-ranking police officials, punctuated by a chief appearing in uniform, marked an unprecedented courtroom condemnation of an officer by so many of his own department’s leadership, according to law enforcement veterans and legal experts.
They also underscored how policing remains at the heart of a crucial debate that could decide the trial’s outcome. Prosecutors say Chauvin “betrayed this badge,” describing his actions as beyond the pale for police, while the defense argues the ex-officer was using necessary force and “did exactly what he had been trained to do.”
"...exactly what he had been trained to do" is a stunning indictment - and not just in its "I was only following orders" dumbfuckery. Chauvin's attempt to use the Nuremberg Nazi defense has to show normal people what a sorry fucked up state of affairs we're dealing with here.
The cops are being trained to kill us? And the cops are sure we're going to understand all this and let them off the hook, cuz hey - that's what we're paying them to do?
Meanwhile, also via WaPo:
Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam said Sunday he is directing Virginia State Police to investigate a traffic stop during which two police officers held an Army second lieutenant at gunpoint months ago in the southeast part of the state. Town officials said later that night that one officer was fired.
Northam (D) said the incident — in which body-camera footage shows police pepper-spraying, striking and handcuffing Caron Nazario — “is disturbing and angered me.” Nazario, 27, who is Black and Latino, filed a lawsuit this month against Windsor officers Joe Gutierrez and Daniel Crocker that alleges excessive force due to racial profiling.
And just in case things aren't already FUBAR...
Police fatally shoot man, 20, in suburban Minneapolis, sparking protests
Police fatally shot a man after a traffic stop on Sunday in suburban Minneapolis, sparking clashes between hundreds of protesters and officers in an area where tensions are already high during the ongoing trial of former police officer Derek Chauvin.
The victim’s family identified him as 20-year-old Daunte Wright. Hours after the shooting, hundreds of protesters surrounded the police headquarters and clashed with officers in riot gear, who fired flash bangs and tear gas. The Minnesota National Guard, which is deployed to the Twin Cities for the Chauvin trial, later arrived to assist police as numerous businesses in the area were broken into.
Police said the shooting happened just before 2 p.m., when an officer stopped a car on a traffic violation and found the driver had an outstanding warrant. As police tried to arrest him, he got back into the car and an officer fired at him, Brooklyn Center Police Chief Tim Gannon said in a news release.
- snip -
Aubrey Wright identified the victim as his son, Daunte, who is Black. He said police pulled him over because an air freshener was allegedly blocking his rearview mirror — a claim Aubrey Wright questioned because the car had tinted windows.
- snip -
The American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota called for an “immediate, transparent and independent investigation by an outside agency.” It also demanded the quick release of any body-camera footage, as well as all the names of the officers and agencies involved.
“We have concerns that police appear to have used dangling air fresheners as an excuse for making a pretextual stop, something police do too often to target Black people,” tweeted the ACLU of Minnesota.
At the risk of being just too darned repetitive: What the fuck is wrong with these fuckin' cops?
Northam (D) said the incident — in which body-camera footage shows police pepper-spraying, striking and handcuffing Caron Nazario — “is disturbing and angered me.” Nazario, 27, who is Black and Latino, filed a lawsuit this month against Windsor officers Joe Gutierrez and Daniel Crocker that alleges excessive force due to racial profiling.
And just in case things aren't already FUBAR...
WaPo - one more time:
Police fatally shoot man, 20, in suburban Minneapolis, sparking protests
Police fatally shot a man after a traffic stop on Sunday in suburban Minneapolis, sparking clashes between hundreds of protesters and officers in an area where tensions are already high during the ongoing trial of former police officer Derek Chauvin.
The victim’s family identified him as 20-year-old Daunte Wright. Hours after the shooting, hundreds of protesters surrounded the police headquarters and clashed with officers in riot gear, who fired flash bangs and tear gas. The Minnesota National Guard, which is deployed to the Twin Cities for the Chauvin trial, later arrived to assist police as numerous businesses in the area were broken into.
Police said the shooting happened just before 2 p.m., when an officer stopped a car on a traffic violation and found the driver had an outstanding warrant. As police tried to arrest him, he got back into the car and an officer fired at him, Brooklyn Center Police Chief Tim Gannon said in a news release.
- snip -
Aubrey Wright identified the victim as his son, Daunte, who is Black. He said police pulled him over because an air freshener was allegedly blocking his rearview mirror — a claim Aubrey Wright questioned because the car had tinted windows.
- snip -
The American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota called for an “immediate, transparent and independent investigation by an outside agency.” It also demanded the quick release of any body-camera footage, as well as all the names of the officers and agencies involved.
“We have concerns that police appear to have used dangling air fresheners as an excuse for making a pretextual stop, something police do too often to target Black people,” tweeted the ACLU of Minnesota.
COVID-19 Update
World
USA
Vaccination Scorecard
Texas Gov. Abbott says state is ‘very close’ to herd immunity. The data tells a different story.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said “simple math” is behind the recent decline of coronavirus cases in his state: Take the number of people who have been vaccinated and combine it with the number who have been infected. The result, he argued, is something “very close” to herd immunity — the point at which enough of the population is immune that the virus can no longer easily spread.
“We remain very vigilant and guarded and proactive in our response, but there is simple math behind the reason why we continue to have success,” Abbott, a Republican, said on “Fox News Sunday.” The equation “means, very simply, it’s a whole lot more difficult for covid-19 to be spreading to other people in the state of Texas.”
Experts have said that immunity from vaccinations and prior infections may have partly contributed to declining cases nationwide after the virus’s winter surge. But in Texas, the numbers Abbott cited don’t add up to herd immunity, according to estimates of that threshold.
Scientists don’t know the precise point at which herd immunity will begin, but in recent months they’ve said anywhere from 70 percent to more than 90 percent of the population would need to acquire protection. Anthony S. Fauci, the country’s top infectious-disease expert, has predicted 80 percent to 85 percent.
Lauren Ancel Meyers, a biology professor at the University of Texas at Austin and director of its covid-19 modeling consortium, said that “a lot of misinformation and misunderstanding” has surrounded the herd immunity threshold, and that several factors could still influence it.
“It depends on the efficacy and duration of immunity acquired through infection or vaccination, whether we have pockets of low immunity in our communities and whether there are emerging variants that can evade immunity,” Meyers said.
Just 19 percent of Texas residents are fully vaccinated, according to figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a lower share than all but six U.S. states. Health officials there have confirmed more than 2.4 million infections and counted an additional 400,000 “probable” virus cases. Almost 50,000 of those people have died, according to data gathered by The Washington Post.
The official number of people who have survived infection — about 2.77 million — plus the number inoculated — about 5.5 million — equals more than 8.27 million people with some form of immunity, or about 29 percent of Texas’s population.
However, there is a hidden variable that is crucial to this calculation: the number of people who have contracted the coronavirus but have not been formally counted — either because they were never tested or were never linked to a positive case.
It is impossible to know exactly what this number is, but researchers reckon that it’s much greater than what shows up on state data dashboards and the ubiquitous pandemic trackers. A team at Columbia University used a mathematical model to estimate the true scope of infections, and it found that by late January, 31 percent of Texans probably had contracted the virus.
This would mean at least 50 percent of residents have some sort of immunity — more than the official tallies would suggest, but still well short of Abbott’s pronouncement.
Jeffrey Shaman, the study’s lead researcher, added a note of caution when discussing his findings with NPR: Protection gained through mild or asymptomatic infection may wane and offer little help in the race to herd immunity, he said.
In his Fox News interview, Abbott said that more than 70 percent of the state’s seniors received at least one dose of a vaccine and more than 50 percent of those ages 50 to 65 have gotten one.
“I don’t know what herd immunity is, but when you add that to the people who have acquired immunity, it looks like it could be very close to herd immunity,” he said.
Last week, the epidemiologist Michael T. Osterholm predicted the beginning of a “fourth surge” of new cases, pointing to hot spots in the Midwest and the pattern of previous pandemic waves, which tended to hit northern states before moving south. His message was clear: In due time, case numbers will rise in states such as Florida and Texas.
In an interview with the New York Times on Sunday, Osterholm reacted bluntly to Abbott’s boast: “There is no way on God’s green earth that Texas is anywhere even close to herd immunity,” he said.
The governor has touted the state’s trends as evidence that his aggressive reopening strategy, which public health experts criticized, is working. In the month since Abbott lifted the state’s mask mandate, the daily average of newly reported cases has decreased from 4,700 to about 3,500. In March, scholar Daniel W. Drezner wrote in an essay for The Post that the politicization of herd immunity is “inevitable,” with scientists revising their threshold estimates upward and conservative commentators contending it is lower.
But such arguments could be costly, with experts pointing to virus variant-driven outbreaks in states such as Michigan and Minnesota as evidence that the country is not yet in the clear. Both Midwestern states have vaccinated a higher share of their populations than Texas — 24 percent in Minnesota and 22 percent in Michigan — yet they’ve been unable to escape the latest surges.
“We don’t know if and when we’ll get to the point that the virus is completely eliminated, particularly given complications like emerging variants and pockets of low vaccination coverage,” said Meyers, the UT biologist. “Still, the closer we get to herd immunity by closing gaps in vaccine coverage and overcoming vaccine hesitancy, the safer, healthier and more open our society will be.”
Are we entering a ‘fourth wave’ of the pandemic? Experts disagree.
New Cases: 633,649 (⬆︎ .47%)
New Deaths: 8,161 (⬆︎ .39%)
USA
New Cases: 47,874 (⬆︎ .15%)
New Deaths: 276 (⬆︎ .05%)
Vaccination Scorecard
Total Vaccinations: 119.2 million (⬆︎ 1.79%)
Total Eligible Population: 44.6%
Total Population: 35.9%
Why wait for the facts when you can just make up some shit, knowing your "base" will happily go on believing in the fairy tale of Republican competence?
Maybe, if you say it often enough, eventually it'll be true.
The Daddy State is alive and well in Texas.
Texas Gov. Abbott says state is ‘very close’ to herd immunity. The data tells a different story.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said “simple math” is behind the recent decline of coronavirus cases in his state: Take the number of people who have been vaccinated and combine it with the number who have been infected. The result, he argued, is something “very close” to herd immunity — the point at which enough of the population is immune that the virus can no longer easily spread.
“We remain very vigilant and guarded and proactive in our response, but there is simple math behind the reason why we continue to have success,” Abbott, a Republican, said on “Fox News Sunday.” The equation “means, very simply, it’s a whole lot more difficult for covid-19 to be spreading to other people in the state of Texas.”
Experts have said that immunity from vaccinations and prior infections may have partly contributed to declining cases nationwide after the virus’s winter surge. But in Texas, the numbers Abbott cited don’t add up to herd immunity, according to estimates of that threshold.
Scientists don’t know the precise point at which herd immunity will begin, but in recent months they’ve said anywhere from 70 percent to more than 90 percent of the population would need to acquire protection. Anthony S. Fauci, the country’s top infectious-disease expert, has predicted 80 percent to 85 percent.
Lauren Ancel Meyers, a biology professor at the University of Texas at Austin and director of its covid-19 modeling consortium, said that “a lot of misinformation and misunderstanding” has surrounded the herd immunity threshold, and that several factors could still influence it.
“It depends on the efficacy and duration of immunity acquired through infection or vaccination, whether we have pockets of low immunity in our communities and whether there are emerging variants that can evade immunity,” Meyers said.
Just 19 percent of Texas residents are fully vaccinated, according to figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a lower share than all but six U.S. states. Health officials there have confirmed more than 2.4 million infections and counted an additional 400,000 “probable” virus cases. Almost 50,000 of those people have died, according to data gathered by The Washington Post.
The official number of people who have survived infection — about 2.77 million — plus the number inoculated — about 5.5 million — equals more than 8.27 million people with some form of immunity, or about 29 percent of Texas’s population.
However, there is a hidden variable that is crucial to this calculation: the number of people who have contracted the coronavirus but have not been formally counted — either because they were never tested or were never linked to a positive case.
It is impossible to know exactly what this number is, but researchers reckon that it’s much greater than what shows up on state data dashboards and the ubiquitous pandemic trackers. A team at Columbia University used a mathematical model to estimate the true scope of infections, and it found that by late January, 31 percent of Texans probably had contracted the virus.
This would mean at least 50 percent of residents have some sort of immunity — more than the official tallies would suggest, but still well short of Abbott’s pronouncement.
Jeffrey Shaman, the study’s lead researcher, added a note of caution when discussing his findings with NPR: Protection gained through mild or asymptomatic infection may wane and offer little help in the race to herd immunity, he said.
In his Fox News interview, Abbott said that more than 70 percent of the state’s seniors received at least one dose of a vaccine and more than 50 percent of those ages 50 to 65 have gotten one.
“I don’t know what herd immunity is, but when you add that to the people who have acquired immunity, it looks like it could be very close to herd immunity,” he said.
Last week, the epidemiologist Michael T. Osterholm predicted the beginning of a “fourth surge” of new cases, pointing to hot spots in the Midwest and the pattern of previous pandemic waves, which tended to hit northern states before moving south. His message was clear: In due time, case numbers will rise in states such as Florida and Texas.
In an interview with the New York Times on Sunday, Osterholm reacted bluntly to Abbott’s boast: “There is no way on God’s green earth that Texas is anywhere even close to herd immunity,” he said.
The governor has touted the state’s trends as evidence that his aggressive reopening strategy, which public health experts criticized, is working. In the month since Abbott lifted the state’s mask mandate, the daily average of newly reported cases has decreased from 4,700 to about 3,500. In March, scholar Daniel W. Drezner wrote in an essay for The Post that the politicization of herd immunity is “inevitable,” with scientists revising their threshold estimates upward and conservative commentators contending it is lower.
But such arguments could be costly, with experts pointing to virus variant-driven outbreaks in states such as Michigan and Minnesota as evidence that the country is not yet in the clear. Both Midwestern states have vaccinated a higher share of their populations than Texas — 24 percent in Minnesota and 22 percent in Michigan — yet they’ve been unable to escape the latest surges.
“We don’t know if and when we’ll get to the point that the virus is completely eliminated, particularly given complications like emerging variants and pockets of low vaccination coverage,” said Meyers, the UT biologist. “Still, the closer we get to herd immunity by closing gaps in vaccine coverage and overcoming vaccine hesitancy, the safer, healthier and more open our society will be.”
Are we entering a ‘fourth wave’ of the pandemic? Experts disagree.
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