isolar8001

isolar8001

Audioholic General
too funny and then sadly we replaced him with a dementia patient........... ;)
Maybe, but I would rather be around someone who forgets half of what they know ..... than be around someone who pretends to know everything and knows practically nothing.
 
M

mtrot

Senior Audioholic
Maybe, but I would rather be around someone who forgets half of what they know ..... than be around someone who pretends to know everything and knows practically nothing.
Lol, you literally just described Biden for his whole life!
 
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mtrot

Senior Audioholic
Any real conservative dislikes the MAGA world and that world is an inspiration and guiding star to the far right in Europe, while the rest look at it with alarm and contempt. A clear and present danger to our democracy and freedom, and you even had a failed coup attempt by Trump in which you refuse to hold him accountable. Some foot soldiers in the assault on the Capitol are sentenced but the planners, not so much.



I’ve posted earlier in this thread, last autumn, showing statistics between voting in 2020 and deaths from COVID. And yes, Republican districts had much more dying

I did watch a few of Trumps COVID briefings and they where absolutely appalling, but sadly they set the tone how to handle the pandemic, along with a number of other statements, actions as well as inactions. And that deadly influence is still ongoing.
Well, if the MAGA people are serving as an inspiration to Europeans to strive for more individual liberty and freedom from unjustified governmental authoritarianism, maybe that's a good thing. You have it completely backwards in that conservatives and most of the people who support Trump want MORE "democracy and freedom", not less. Are there complete nut cases on the right who are dangerous? Of course. But there there are plenty of such types on the left, as well. Who do you think shot up Steve Scalise and others at the Republican softball practice? A rabid Bernie Sanders supporter.

And, since you referred to the "planners" of the Jan. 6 riot, care to tell us any evidence you have of who they are and how they "planned" it? And why Pelosi turned down having the National Guard be there? And why the officers were waving the participants into the building?

Lastly, I'd agree that more people in Red areas were dying from covid. I wish they had sought advice from their medical doctors and not the internet. Although the initial claims of Fauci and Biden that the shots wold stop covid in its tracks and that if you took the shot, you couldn't transmit the virus, turned out to be wrong, it is clear that the shots significantly reduce the risk of severe covid illness and death.

There is blame to go all around regarding some actions that were taken, not the least of which was Cuomo forcing covid positive people into the nursing homes. And, early on, forcing pharmacies not to dispense medications with known anti-viral activity for patients who were going downhill and had no other options. And after the advent of the shots, the narrative became "all vaccine, all the time", and no other early treatment options were to even be discussed. Even in the absence of clinical trial results demonstrating a statistically significant reduction, some of these trials did show a reduction of risk. So, why couldn't people be allowed to try them? I believe thousands died because of this refusal to allow early treatments. That led to people sitting home and getting worse and worse until they couldn't breath, and then being admitted to the hospital and being slapped on a ventilator, which was the kiss of death.
 
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Mr._Clark

Audioholic Samurai
and three years later............

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

The author is basically saying "we got everything wrong." It would be more plausible if he had said "I got everything wrong and I continue to do so as evidenced by this opinion piece."

From the newsweek opinion piece:

>>Most of us did not speak up in support of alternative views, and many of us tried to suppress them. When strong scientific voices like world-renowned Stanford professors John Ioannidis, Jay Bhattacharya, and Scott Atlas, or University of California San Francisco professors Vinay Prasad and Monica Gandhi, sounded the alarm on behalf of vulnerable communities, they faced severe censure by relentless mobs of critics and detractors in the scientific community—often not on the basis of fact but solely on the basis of differences in scientific opinion."

Let's look at Bhattacharya.

>>>Dr. Bhattacharya, for instance, proclaimed in The Wall Street Journal in March 2020 that Covid-19 was only one-tenth as deadly as the flu. In January 2021 he wrote an opinion essay for the Indian publication The Print suggesting that the majority of the country had acquired natural immunity from infection already and warning that a mass vaccination program would do more harm than good for people already infected. Shortly thereafter, the country’s brutal Delta wave killed perhaps several million Indians. <<<

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/04/opinion/covid-pandemic-history.html

Before getting to the main point, I'll nit pick the NY Times opinion piece. As I read it, in the WSJ piece by Bhattacharya he didn't actually proclaim that COVID was only one-tenth as deadly as the flu, but Bhattacharya did suggest it might be that low (based on extrapolation and guesswork). The NY Times opinion is creating a straw man of sorts, but that doesn't mean Bhattacharya had a solid scientific basis to assert COVID is relatively benign.

Flu deaths in the U.S. ranged from 12,000 - 52,000 between 2010 and 2020.

1675297469535.png



That's about 350,000 total over 10 years.

In three years COVID has caused about 1.1 million deaths in the U.S.


I realize Bhattacharya was estimating the case fatality rate of COVID, not the total number of deaths. Still, no matter how slice or spin it he was off by a country mile.

The Newsweek piece says "they faced severe censure by relentless mobs of critics and detractors in the scientific community—often not on the basis of fact but solely on the basis of differences in scientific opinion." This is not really true. As I see it, the main reason that Bhattacharya drew criticism is because he started with an extremely low case fatality rate based on a SWAG (Scientific Wild-*ss Guess), and went on to argue policy issues based on this SWAG (e.g. the Great Barrington Declaration). To my mind the policy arguments went way beyond the evidence (I had actually hoped early in the pandemic that the case fataility rates would prove to be as low as some of the estimates).

Nassim Taleb annoys the living sh*t out of me because he's so flipping arrogant, but I do think he gets a lot of things right when it comes to assessing risks and decision making when faced with limited data.

The YouTube video (link below) is just one example, it's probably not the most relevant to the topic at hand but I'm not motivated to sift through all of his material to find the best one.

 
Alex2507

Alex2507

Audioholic Slumlord
No, he's trying to be clever, belittling East Texas, as if my living here somehow marginalizes my comments.
Oh, you live there? Then yeah, for sure he was breaking your balls.

Just move to Louisiana. They get all the respect.
 
Mikado463

Mikado463

Audioholic Spartan
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

The author is basically saying "we got everything wrong." It would be more plausible if he had said "I got everything wrong and I continue to do so as evidenced by this opinion piece."

From the newsweek opinion piece:

>>Most of us did not speak up in support of alternative views, and many of us tried to suppress them. When strong scientific voices like world-renowned Stanford professors John Ioannidis, Jay Bhattacharya, and Scott Atlas, or University of California San Francisco professors Vinay Prasad and Monica Gandhi, sounded the alarm on behalf of vulnerable communities, they faced severe censure by relentless mobs of critics and detractors in the scientific community—often not on the basis of fact but solely on the basis of differences in scientific opinion."

Let's look at Bhattacharya.

>>>Dr. Bhattacharya, for instance, proclaimed in The Wall Street Journal in March 2020 that Covid-19 was only one-tenth as deadly as the flu. In January 2021 he wrote an opinion essay for the Indian publication The Print suggesting that the majority of the country had acquired natural immunity from infection already and warning that a mass vaccination program would do more harm than good for people already infected. Shortly thereafter, the country’s brutal Delta wave killed perhaps several million Indians. <<<

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/04/opinion/covid-pandemic-history.html

Before getting to the main point, I'll nit pick the NY Times opinion piece. As I read it, in the WSJ piece by Bhattacharya he didn't actually proclaim that COVID was only one-tenth as deadly as the flu, but Bhattacharya did suggest it might be that low (based on extrapolation and guesswork). The NY Times opinion is creating a straw man of sorts, but that doesn't mean Bhattacharya had a solid scientific basis to assert COVID is relatively benign.

Flu deaths in the U.S. ranged from 12,000 - 52,000 between 2010 and 2020.

View attachment 59984


That's about 350,000 total over 10 years.

In three years COVID has caused about 1.1 million deaths in the U.S.


I realize Bhattacharya was estimating the case fatality rate of COVID, not the total number of deaths. Still, no matter how slice or spin it he was off by a country mile.

The Newsweek piece says "they faced severe censure by relentless mobs of critics and detractors in the scientific community—often not on the basis of fact but solely on the basis of differences in scientific opinion." This is not really true. As I see it, the main reason that Bhattacharya drew criticism is because he started with an extremely low case fatality rate based on a SWAG (Scientific Wild-*ss Guess), and went on to argue policy issues based on this SWAG (e.g. the Great Barrington Declaration). To my mind the policy arguments went way beyond the evidence (I had actually hoped early in the pandemic that the case fataility rates would prove to be as low as some of the estimates).

Nassim Taleb annoys the living sh*t out of me because he's so flipping arrogant, but I do think he gets a lot of things right when it comes to assessing risks and decision making when faced with limited data.

The YouTube video (link below) is just one example, it's probably not the most relevant to the topic at hand but I'm not motivated to sift through all of his material to find the best one.

Back on topic, thank you Mr Clark !

My point, to which you have contributed, is that 3 years in we can and should reflect and hopefully learn from what we did so as to have better paths going forward.

When asked earlier what I would have done differently, I ask these questions .......

Did the current administration throw the J&J vaccine 'under the bus' too soon ? Was the side effect of thrombosis too risky for all or more-so for certain age groups ? Is it true that the efficacy of the J&J vaccine has proven more stable over time with more durable antibodies combined with a stronger T-cell response ?
 
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Swerd

Swerd

Audioholic Warlord
Did the current administration through the J&J vaccine 'under the bus' too soon ? Was the side effect of thrombosis too risky for all or more-so for certain age groups ? Is it true that the efficacy of the J&J vaccine has proven more stable over time with more durable antibodies combined with a stronger T-cell response?
I thought that J&J pulled the plug on it's vaccine. It came later than Pfizer's or Moderna's products, and it was widely thought of by the public as 3rd best. At the time, the federal government infectious disease folks wanted all the vaccines they could get, but J&J decided to cut it's losses earlier rather than later. The only apparent advantage was the single shot requirement. That later turned into 2 or more shots as mutated versions of coronavirus continued to appear.

On the subject of whether any of the Pfizer, Moderna, or J&J vaccines were "real vaccines" … They absolutely are real vaccines. They're no less real than any other vaccine we've had against measles, chicken pox, polio, pneumonia, influenza, or any other infectious disease. The Covid-19 vaccines are more effective than some of these older vaccines, and less effective than others. Anyone who claimed they weren't real vaccines was infected by false propaganda. Probably from watching too much Faux News. Anyone who continues to claim they aren't real vaccines is openly displaying his ignorance.
 
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Mikado463

Mikado463

Audioholic Spartan
I thought that J&J pulled the plug on its vaccine.
while I think that's true I believe it was in the second quarter of 2021 that Thrombosis accusations came out and became more publicized than the mRNA issues (Myocarditis and Pulmonary embolisms)

It came later than Pfizer's or Moderna's products,
true, largely due to the fact of a greater difficulty in manufacturing, slowing it's rollout

and it was widely thought of by the public as 3rd best. At the time, the federal government infectious disease folks wanted all the vaccines they could get, but J&J decided to cut its losses earlier rather than later. The only apparent advantage was the single shot requirement.
At the time yes, but from what I have read its long term efficacy has shown to be more durable, albeit at the expense of initial short term effectiveness. The tortoise vs the hare !
 
mtrycrafts

mtrycrafts

Seriously, I have no life.
Back on topic, thank you Mr Clark !

My point, to which you have contributed, is that 3 years in we can and should reflect and hopefully learn from what we did so as to have better paths going forward.

When asked earlier what I would have done differently, I ask these questions .......

Did the current administration throw the J&J vaccine 'under the bus' too soon ? Was the side effect of thrombosis too risky for all or more-so for certain age groups ? Is it true that the efficacy of the J&J vaccine has proven more stable over time with more durable antibodies combined with a stronger T-cell response ?
One history of J&J
The tragedy of Johnson & Johnson’s Covid vaccine - STAT (statnews.com)
 
Mikado463

Mikado463

Audioholic Spartan
mtrycrafts, your article pretty much parallels what I have read so far. Of the two friends of mine that got the J&J jab, both have been COVID free(that they know of) so far. Both 65 plus years of age
 
mtrycrafts

mtrycrafts

Seriously, I have no life.
mtrycrafts, your article pretty much parallels what I have read so far. Of the two friends of mine that got the J&J jab, both have been COVID free(that they know of) so far. Both 65 plus years of age
I drink coffee every morning. So far, no car accidents. ;) :D

Naw, just kidding. :D
 
Trell

Trell

Audioholic Spartan
Well, if the MAGA people are serving as an inspiration to Europeans to strive for more individual liberty and freedom from unjustified governmental authoritarianism, maybe that's a good thing. You have it completely backwards in that conservatives and most of the people who support Trump want MORE "democracy and freedom", not less.
“You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.” -Inigo Montoya, The Princess Bride.
 
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