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Thread: COVID19 Factors We Should Consider/Current Events

  1. #7111
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    • starting strength seminar april 2024
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    Quote Originally Posted by Buddy Rich View Post
    Anthony Colpo is the best blogger you probably don’t know about. This is his third article on COVID-19. Worth your time.

    COVID-19: How Social Distancing and Lockdowns are Destroying Lives – Anthony Colpo
    Great article Buddy, thanks for sharing mate. The first three paragraphs had me laughing out loud;

    Well, it’s now ten months into the shit-show that is 2020, and COVID-19 is still the biggest news story around. Lockdowns and travel bans are still in place around the world, even though studies repeatedly show the ‘deadly’ virus is in fact very benign. Seriously, if you’re going to get a ‘disease’ then you couldn’t do much better than COVID-19, whose infection fatality rate is so low it is measured in fractions of a percent.

    So even the CDC’s own data shows that, if you are 19 and under, the virus is essentially a non-issue. If you are aged 20-49, then your odds of dying with COVID-19 are around the same as the annual likelihood of getting struck by lightning: 0.0002.

    Even in the 70+ age group - apparently at imminent risk of mass extinction if we’re to believe the ongoing hysteria - the best estimate fatality ratio is a mere 0.054. That means of every 100 persons in this age group allegedly infected with COVID-19, 94.6 will survive.

  2. #7112
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    Quote Originally Posted by AndrewLewis View Post


    How would you account for existing jobs that make $18/hour that have labor supply lower than other markets? For example, why be an EMT when you could work at Home Depot for the same pay?
    The training and talent levels required to work as an EMT are negligibly different than those required to work at Home Depot. This is reflected in the fact that the wages are not significantly different (EMTs in my region make 14.50, Home depot makes probably about $12) both of these wages are well below what is necessary to live without government assistance, so why make the taxpayers pay for these workers' living expenses via medicaid, SNAP, TANF, EITC etc rather than making the corporate world pay by increasing the minimum wage?

  3. #7113
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    Quote Originally Posted by cmdrfunk View Post
    The communists at Facebook and Twitter, those who push the fine people and russia hoaxes, have decided you aren't even allowed to see this story.BREAKING: New York Post locked out of Twitter after publishing Biden bombshell | The Post Millennial

    https://twitter.com/abigailmarone/st...45116870078466
    And virtually EVERYBODY knows about this now. This was a big mistake.

    Quote Originally Posted by Haghstull View Post
    The training and talent levels required to work as an EMT are negligibly different than those required to work at Home Depot. This is reflected in the fact that the wages are not significantly different (EMTs in my region make 14.50, Home depot makes probably about $12) both of these wages are well below what is necessary to live without government assistance, so why make the taxpayers pay for these workers' living expenses via medicaid, SNAP, TANF, EITC etc rather than making the corporate world pay by increasing the minimum wage?
    Do you see why I've been deleting this imbecile?

  4. #7114
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    Quote Originally Posted by ltomo View Post
    Patrick's proposals read like a litany of policy decisions pulled straight from Reddit. I wonder what he does for a living?
    I keep wondering this about all the long post zealots that have sprung up worldwide during COVID. It’s pretty bad.

  5. #7115
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mark D View Post
    I only have time to respond to a couple of your proposals, and I won't even get into the fact that many would require a Constitutional amendment to enact:


    —in some way eliminate or reduce the effect of the electoral college so there are more than 12 swing states - Of course it would be MUCH better to have the Presidential Election decided by five states, seriously without the Electoral College CA, NY, NJ, IL and FL would dominate the election. Tough luck if you live in Montana, Wyoming or Delaware.
    The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact seems to be a real possibility (National Popular Vote). It seems to me that eliminating the electoral college would allow all sorts of coalitions to develop which currently can't. I'm not sure you're right that eliminating the electoral college would lead to candidates putting resources in even fewer places.

    Quote Originally Posted by Mark D View Post
    --abolish the fucking Senate, honestly; it’s an outdated House of Lords - See above, it also helps prevent the more populous states from dominating the less populous ones. I personally believe one of our bigger mistakes was making Senator an elected position instead of them being appointed by the state governments as was originally done, that kept more power where it belongs, in the hands of the state governments who are closer to, and therefore more under the control of, the people.
    Direct elections give people less power than elect people who will perform a direct election on their behalf? Also, are less populous states being oppressed? Democrats won the popular vote in 6 out of the last 7 elections, and I think people on the right underestimate how maddening it is to lose an election in which you get more votes. Winning the popular vote 6 out of the last 7 times and yet having 6 of the 9 justices on the Supreme Court be conservative feels very unfair. I think it is unfair in addition to the Supreme Court being a bad idea anyway. Majority rule has a lot of problems, but minority rule is even more illegitimate.


    Quote Originally Posted by Mark D View Post
    —Have the president declare Marbury v. Madison was wrongly decided - Look up separation of powers, the President has no such authority. And without such protections, how do we undo laws which run afoul of the Constitution? Suppose Congress were to pass, and the President were to sign, a law that's in clear violation of the Constitution. Let's say something like "All news outlet must have approval of information by Federally appointed advisors prior to publication, any information deemed unacceptable by such advisors is prohibited from publication." A clear violation of the First Amendment, but now the law of the land. How does it get overturned absent Marbury v. Madison?
    Judicial review isn't in the Constitution. It's happened before in American history that the president says he won't pay attention to the Supreme Court and he could do it again. As Ryan Cooper wrote for The Week the other day, "judicial review is not nearly as intrusive in every other country as it is here. Some nations, like Austria or France, have a special Constitutional Court which rules on constitutional questions, but relatively infrequently. In others, like Finland or Denmark, judicial review basically never happens. In no other developed democracy does basically every piece of major legislation have to run a years-long gauntlet of tendentious lawsuits trying to get through the courts what parties could not get through the legislature," (Democrats have a better option than court packing). There are links in that article which back up what he's saying.


    Quote Originally Posted by Mark D View Post
    —Congress must approve the use of all combat troops and cannot deploy those troops for an indefinite period of time - Already done. We haven't had a formal declaration of war since the unpleasantness of the early-mid 1940s, but any time combat troops have been deployed overseas since then has been authorized by Congress.
    I think most people who read the 2001 AUMF don't believe it authorizes everything which has been done in its name. The authorization clearly says it gives permission for Presidents to use force only to go after those responsible for Sept. 11th.

    Quote Originally Posted by Mark D View Post
    —move away from schools being funded by property taxes so as to integrate society and stop, or at least mitigate, racial conflict - And how do you propose they be funded? Income taxes? So of course the places with higher incomes (therefore higher income taxes) will have better schools. Oh wait, your next point is:

    —fund all schools equally so there’s equality of opportunity; if we’re serious about everyone starting at the same place, we can’t disadvantage children - This concept gets up my nose. I went to NYC public schools and the NYC public college, and I've made a good life for myself. Success depends FAR more on your ingrained attitude toward education (derived during your formative years from your parents) than on the alleged "quality" of the school. You don't make equality by pulling the higher-performing people down, no one wants to watch a one-on-one basketball game between Michael Jordan and Michael Moore where Jordan is encumbered by 100 lbs of sand-bags to make it more equal.
    I don't pretend the funding is the end-all be-all of education. I agree that success in education has a lot to do with one's attitude, which is something I think will be better for every child if society is more integrated. And how much is spent is probably more important than how much money is spent. Nonetheless, this was 10-12 years ago but I had a job where I went to a lot of the public schools in the big ISD where I grew up, and the rich districts had beautiful buildings with big windows which let plenty of sunlight in. They also had small class sizes aand gorgeous, fully-stocked libraries with desks that were always in good shape. The poorer schools literally did not always have working lights and water fountains. The buildings were ugly--maybe there was a small window in the corner of every classroom. I think stuff like that takes a toll on people even if they have a great attitude.

    I also don't know how funding schools equally is pulling higher-performing people down. If, as you say, "Success depends FAR more on your ingrained attitude toward education (derived during your formative years from your parents) than on the alleged "quality" of the school" then changing funding wouldn't pull high-performing people down because performance isn't based on funding. I don't think your basketball analogy is appropriate anyway. A better analogy is that of two people with roughly equal skill but one has to use a basketball which is partially deflated.


    Quote Originally Posted by Mark D View Post
    Is our system perfect? Of course not, nothing made by man is. But our system has generated the free-est, most productive, most prosperous nation the world has ever seen, and what we've produced has lifted up the rest of the world as well.
    I don't know that that's true. I don't know how you're measuring productivity but the U.S. today isn't the leader by any measure I've seen. As for being the free-est, I don't know what measure you're using for that either. We have the 5% of the world's population and about 20% of its inmates. I would think that putting tons of people behind bars for bullshit reasons is the opposite of freedom. The Sentencing Project just came out with a report today which noted that 9 states are barring at least 10% of their African American population from voting. Tennessee's the leader at 22% (https://www.sentencingproject.org/wp...d-Out-2020.pdf). That's a pretty astonishing number.

    In terms of prosperity, the Federal Reserve put out a study for 2019 which said that when faced with an emergency $400 expense, 37% of people wouldn't have the money to pay it. Some people could borrow from friends or put it on a credit card, but 12% wouldn't be able to pay it at all (The Fed - Publications: Report on the Economic Well-Being of U.S. Households (SHED)). That's not my idea of a prosperous nation. The RAND Corporation, which isn't exactly a radical outfit, found that if wages had kept pace with productivity for the last 50 years, a median full-time worker would make $92,000 per year. As it is, that worker makes $50,000 per year. That means if wages had kept pace with productivity, the bottom 90% of America would take home $2.5 trillion more in income per year. That's not something which makes me rejoice about the greatness of America either. Maybe things aren't as awful as they could be but I'm not satisfied they couldn't be better. (Inequality Robs $2.5 Trillion From U.S. Workers Each Year)

    As far as lifting up the rest of the world, the story Robert Gordon tells is that that's due to a cluster of inventions which were created from about 1870 to 1940. Those inventions--electricity, cars, elevators, refrigerators, central heating, running water, indoor toilets, etc.--revolutionized the world and led to explosive economic growth. But we've milked dry the gains from those inventions. He puts the end date of that explosive growth at 1970 with a small resurgence in the late '90s and early '00s due to the internet. If what he's saying is right, we don't have a system which inevitably produces economic prosperity. Human beings stumbled upon some important inventions, and because we likely won't stumble upon such an important cluster of inventions again, growth is probably going to remain low in our current system.

  6. #7116
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jovan Dragisic View Post
    I keep wondering this about all the long post zealots that have sprung up worldwide during COVID. It’s pretty bad.
    This is some scary stuff. For anyone who doesn't know, it is VERY rare to see UK police with guns. It's usually only if there is a raised terror alert or they are responding so an incident with guns involved.

    Liverpool in the UK is under tighter restrictions and the police show up to a gym with guns to shut it down. What the hell is going on?!?!?

    Armed police serve Liverpool gym owner with fine as he REFUSES to bow to Covid closedown order | Daily Mail Online

  7. #7117
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jovan Dragisic View Post
    I keep wondering this about all the long post zealots that have sprung up worldwide during COVID. It’s pretty bad.

    As someone who's put some long posts up here myself, I'd point out you can just go to Instagram or Twitter if you want fucking brevity. I came here for reasoned debate, which requires both character and more characters.

    IMHO, frequent, short posts show more zealotry,in that you're checking in and commenting so frequently, rather than chiming in once in a while with a soliloquy or rant post.

    Which (facepalm!) is what I'm doing right now with this short interjection!
    Y'all need more smiley options on this here forum, Rip.

  8. #7118
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    Quote Originally Posted by AndrewLewis View Post
    Patrick, I agree with some of this, but

    How would you account for existing jobs that make $18/hour that have labor supply lower than other markets? For example, why be an EMT when you could work at Home Depot for the same pay?
    Wages aren't the only reason people choose jobs, despite what economists say. How many people do you know who chose their line of work solely on the basis of pay? Being an EMT is a hell of a lot more interesting than working at Home Depot. And if EMT companies have a tight labor market due to wages, they can raise their wages. A couple years ago there was a lot of bellyaching by business owners about not being able to find employees, and they could have solved their problem by just raising wages. I'm not familiar with EMTs specifically, but that's usually what's behind panic about tight labor markets--owners afraid their profit margins might be a little lower.


    Quote Originally Posted by AndrewLewis View Post
    How would you prevent inflation and minimum wage chasing each other as you normalize to inflation?
    Let's note that much higher minimum wages aren't bringing down or even seemingly hampering the economies of other countries. Also, according to the Economic Policy Institute, had the minimum wage kept pace with labor productivity growth since 1968, this year it would be more than $20 per hour, and this is despite the fact that the economy’s capacity to deliver higher wages has doubled in the last 50 years, as measured by labor productivity, or the amount of output produced by workers (Gradually raising the minimum wage to $15 would be good for workers, good for businesses, and good for the economy: Testimony before the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Education and Labor | Economic Policy Institute).



    Quote Originally Posted by AndrewLewis View Post
    In what market is this currently a problem? Can you provide a specific example?
    Yeah, iPhones and Apples computers is a big one. Apple wants to be the only company which can fix Apple products. Car companies and other electronics companies have tried the same thing in the past. Here's an article about Apple: The “right to repair” your computer and iPhone, explained - Vox



    Quote Originally Posted by AndrewLewis View Post
    Are you proposing nationalization of all universities? If not, how would you control and measure "ability to teach" and professor employment?
    I'm not totally sure what the best way to control and measure that is. States can make the regulation for state schools but defining and implementing it is another thing. I imagine that it's part just creating a culture where we change what we value in education. That doesn't require any laws or regulations. But I'd think student evaluations have a place too. They can be unreliable when classes are easy but I've also found that students are usually appreciative of the few teachers who actually open their eyes. I'm sure with some research we can find people who have good ideas on this.

  9. #7119
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jovan Dragisic View Post
    I keep wondering this about all the long post zealots that have sprung up worldwide during COVID. It’s pretty bad.
    I wrote one long post because Rip asked me the question of how the entire country would be different I was in charge. That's not a small topic. In contrast to my one long post, a fair number of peoplpe have said the same thing over and over for 712 pages. I'd prefer you put it one long post.

  10. #7120
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jovan Dragisic View Post
    I keep wondering this about all the long post zealots that have sprung up worldwide during COVID. It’s pretty bad.
    I used to hang out with guys like this, so I know the drill. Accusing people of living in echo chamber while he sits in his own is peak gaslighting. Notice also how people (like me) have tried to politely engage him in some of his delusions and he's totally ignored it. He's got a crush on Rip and a fetish for getting yelled at.

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