It is wasteful for the government to commandeer resources from the private sector during good times, and it’s even more harmful when the government kicks the economy during a recession.
Robert P. Murphy, Ph.D., Contra Krugman: Smashing the Errors of America’s Most Famous Keynesian (2018), p. 18.
It was not immediately clear what had changed regarding “the science,” when, midweek, Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson lifted the Queen’s government’s mask mandates and other coronavirus restrictions.
The case for and against mask efficacy has been about the same for a very long time. There’s no obvious statistical evidence for mask mandates working. And pre-2020 studies showed ambiguous results for preventing virus transmission by wearing masks — and certainly not for the cloth masks most people wear.
So what changed?
Well, Johnson cited the omicron variant. “Our scientists believe that the omicron wave has now peaked nationally,” he said, adding that hospital admissions had stabilized and that London admissions were falling.
So he lifted mask requirements in schools, too.
This takes some pressure off him. The vast majority of Brits are tired of masks, especially on students.
Predictably, however, some school masters appear to be clinging to the cloth.
Regardless, why the change?
Spokespersons for the beleaguered opposition party, Labour, argue it’s mostly political, since Boris was caught at two bigwig parties where no one was wearing masks. “Can the PM share the evidence,” asked one, “behind his decision and that he’s not just protecting his job?”
And Johnson says that “the scientific evidence is there for everybody to consult” — but, face it, everything these politicians say is half-assessed and untrustworthy.
Still, at least the people of Britain will receive a little let-up from the oppressive “scientific” tyranny of their government.
Not all states to the west of the Atlantic can say the same.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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It wouldn’t surprise me if Tiffany McHugh, former director of the Foothills Christian Church Preschool in San Diego, wishes now that she had been running a preschool in a slack state like Florida.
Florida doesn’t penalize such malefaction.
It doesn’t even prohibit it. Yes, things have gotten pretty bad in states like Florida. They let the two-year-olds breathe: unthinkable! The policymakers in these states apparently labor under the presumption that the COVID-19 pandemic is not Bubonic Plague 2.0 and that, for kids, the risk of serious COVID-19 disease has always been very low.
Well, in California they take these risks seriously!!!!!!!
The Golden State’s Department of Social Services has shut down the preschool McHugh was directing and pulled her license. The problem? She couldn’t get the tykes to stay masked.
“There were a lot of children who were just too young to wear masks,” McHugh confesses,“they pull them off. It’s really difficult.”
This makes it sound as if she didn’t even try handcuffing the kids so that they could not remove their masks. Talk about dereliction of duty.
Other area preschools have not been similarly targeted, and so many suspect selective enforcement. But hold on. When you’re going after flouters of regulations, somebody has to be brought to book first.
Rest assured, all other San Diego and California preschools will be outlawed momentarily.
McHugh’s school has appealed the decision to ban her forlife from working with children. The hearing will be held on February 11.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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In a virtual meeting, online, the National Governors Association talked with President Joseph R. Biden, Jr., last week. The biggest issue? COVID.
About COVID tests, “I wish I had thought about ordering a half a billion two months ago,” Mr. Biden confessed.
While serious people are taking this seriously, blah blah, the truth may be that tests do more harm than good. There have always been problems with the tests: too many false positives; they induce panics at mere “case” levels, thus feeding propaganda and unworkable government “solutions” to the “crisis.”
About which Biden now admits he’s got … nothing.
Having run against Donald Trump and his alleged lack of a plan, boasting how the Democrats would conquer COVID, Biden now declares defeat: “Look, there is no federal solution.
“This gets solved at a state level,” acknowledged the president, “. . . and it ultimately gets down to where the rubber meets the road and that’s where the patient is in need of help, or preventing the need for help.”
That last phrase is odd.
“Preventing the need for help” sounds like he might mean patients taking control of their health care and their own immune systems. Could Mr. Biden be alluding to Vitamin D, Vitamin K, zinc, HCQ, Ivermectin, and many other immune system boosters and virus blockers?
Or Biden could merely be fumbling. He’s made much of the Omicron Variant, including at the governors’ meeting. But instead of addressing the actual trend of the latest iteration, politicians and propagandists push the idea that Omicron is deadly, when the evidence is clear: it is much less deadly than previous variants.
The great danger of COVID remains the governmental response.
Including, alas, Biden’s.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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While many experts, including Southwest Airline’s CEO, think that the air filtration systems on jetliners are so good that wearing protective face coverings (“masks”) is pointless, our Doctor Anthony Fauci will have none of it.
When the National Institutes of Health head honcho and Big Pharma Pusher No. 1 was asked about whether we can ditch masks on airplanes, he responded predictably: no. “I think when you’re dealing with a closed space, even though the filtration is good, that you want to go that extra
This was on ABC News’s This Week on Sunday.
“As Christmas approaches, COVID-19 again threatens to upend American life, driving the spread, Omicron,” ABC’s Jonathan Karl narrated. “At least 43 states now have confirmed cases of the latest and by far most contagious variant yet. On Saturday alone, New York state reported nearly 22,000 new COVID cases, breaking a single-day record set just the day before.” And then Karl mentioned total COVID deaths in the United States — but not the number of Omicron deaths.
See how the propaganda is pitched? The breathless relaying of statistics, but nothing like a sense of the science.
Contra Fauci, these once-discouraged and now-forever-exalted masks are not nearly as effective as made out. And they have severe “unintended” effects.
I put marks around “unintended” because for some people in power, the psychological effects of mandatory masks in a situation of perpetual or seasonal alarm might be the whole point: the inducement of a mass delusional psychosis. How very fascist.
We can appreciate the name “Fauci” both by rhyme and reason: Faucism is medical fascism.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Sometimes things are complicated.
Many factors matter when deciding whether it makes sense to wear a mask to fend off infection. Let alone whether it’s okay to compel others to do so.
Now add another question: whether it is ever okay to deliberately suppress discussion of these subjects.
I’ve talked about all this before. But on those occasions I could not yet point you to a lengthy Heartland Institute post by James Agresti on “Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Masks, and the Deadly Falsehoods Surrounding Them.”
Once disparaged as ineffectual except maybe for hospital workers, the power of masking up was later drastically oversold by policy makers.
Agresti aggregates evidence indicating that COVID-19 is spread mainly by fine aerosols that can stay aloft a long time and easily penetrate most masks. But the evidence for mostly aerosol rather than big-droplet transmission was ignored or downplayed by the WHO and CDC for over a year.
Agresti also argues that trials of the effectiveness of masks in preventing infection are “inconclusive” with respect to N95 masks in clinical settings. And that these studies show no statistically significant benefits for any masks in “community settings.”
To combat aerosolized COVID-19, he recommends more extensive indoor use of UV disinfection systems.
Lots to talk about. Experts familiar with the research that Agresti canvasses often disagree. How about it, big-tech social-media firms. May we discuss?
Or must we stick to received dogma regardless of observations and logic?
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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