New COVID-19 cases in Michigan are increasing, death rates remain low relative to early in 2020, bearing in mind that death rates lag. I can’t help but feel that lack of political will is stopping the same response as occurred last year.
Today I learned that LG is getting out of the smartphone business. Frankly, I am a bit surprised that we haven’t seen more of either consolidations or companies dropping out as I think there have been too many players in the market. Over the years I had one LG phone, and I think over the years that have had some pretty good products.
I read this long piece about how western countries have struggled to respond to COVID, which resulted in a tremendous loss of life. To me, it boils down to one issue, politics. It seems that in western countries led by elected leaders, decisions and lack of decisions were due to the calculus of political consequences. For example, the Trump administration’s slow response was due to all decisions made in terms of whether they help or hinder their ability to be re-elected. In the east there were no worries about election consequences, so there was probably little debate over whether to move fast or be alarmist.
In the United States we seemed to have lost the idea that there should be non-partisans in government positions so they focus entirely on the public interest and not on their political ambitions. The transition is most obvious in what has happened to the Supreme Court, which unlike the intent of the Founders, has in practice become partisan.
While reading Dave’s riffing on his perceived lack of apps, particularly good editors, I am wondering whether he has spent any time looking at the iOS or Android app stores. It seems to me he is only looking for desktop apps, and my sense is that much development as moved from the desktop to iOS. Cynically, I think development much more about making money today that it might have been back in the day.
My suggestion to Dave would be to do a search on markdown editors.
A sizable minority of Americans want to use airplanes belonging to others, theme parks belonging to others, sports stadiums belonging to others—without concession to the health of others or the property rights of owners. With guns, with COVID-19, with tech, the new post-Trump message from the post-Trump GOP is: Private property is socialism; state expropriation is freedom. It’s a strange doctrine for a party supposedly committed to liberty and the Constitution, but here we are.
David Frum, writing in The Atlantic
Requiring proof of vaccination is so attractive to businesses precisely because tens of millions of Republicans feel entitled to behave as if there were no pandemic. According to Gallup, those who don’t intend to get vaccinated are less than half as likely than those who are fully vaccinated to avoid public places, avoid small gatherings, avoid large crowds, and avoid traveling.
A consequence of not taking COVID-19 seriously is that the longer it lingers the more it will mutate and the longer we will keep fighting it.
In Jim Nance voice:
Welcome to opening day and freezing temperatures, a tradition like any other other!
Spring training is complete for the Chicago Cubs. Opening day is on Thursday, 1 PM versus the Pittsburgh Pirates at Wrigley Field. The weather forecast has temps in the mid 30s.
UPS delivered the new BenQ monitor that I ordered on time and to the correct location.
I don’t get this claim that baseball players can’t do contract negotiations and play ball at the same time. Lots of people do lots of things at the same time, all the time. Wait until Rizzo becomes a dad.
Minnesota Duluth won the longest game in NCAA Men’s Ice Hockey history early in the fourth overtime.
Just watched the North Dakota and Minnesota Duluth men’s hockey teams finish the third overtime of their NCAA regional final. Doubleheaders are not normally a hockey thing. Right now this is the second longest game in NCAA tourney history.
Whitmer claims that the current COVID-19 surge in Michigan is different because of the vaccines, and I find that hard to believe. I think citizens have demonstrated an unwillingness to do the right thing and the corresponding loss of life is of little concern.
Weeks ago Michigan began “opening” up again by allowing more people in restaurants and bars and more sporting events. Predictably, the number of new COVID-19 cases has been trending back up. I wish people would look at the graphs, it shows the numbers keep going up when we open up and down when we close down.
Unfortunately, I strongly suspect the governor is less likely to impose another lock down due to the amount of pressure put on by the people who continually cause the increase in numbers.
Last year on this date, Reuters wrote:
The United States has the potential to become the new epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic due to a “very large acceleration” in infections there, the World Health Organization said on Tuesday.
Unfortunately, that proved true.
The NFL appears to be expanding the number of streaming options for games, but I don’t see info about an ability to stream out of market games. The NFL needs a reasonably priced equivalent to MLB’s At Bat app.
We took our shot!
I set up a new Google TV to replace the Chromecast that was connected to our living room TV. The change was driven by the increase in the number of streaming services/apps that we now use, and which previously was primarily accessed via the Apple TV attached to the TV in our basement. Google TV doesn’t look much different than Apple TV, and I imagine Roku isn’t much different either. The remote enables voice access to Google Assistant, which I use more than Siri. I did notice that the MLB At Bat app is not the same as the one on Apple TV, but Netflix, Disney+, ParamontPlus, and Amazon all look much the same. Google TV costs much less than Apple TV. Ironically, I set up the Apple TV app and it too looks pretty much the same. I have to chuckle about running Apple TV on a Google product.
According to my notes, on this date last year we learned of the first fatality in Michigan due to COVID-19. As I read my blog from last year I am reminded of how much was not known about COVID-19 and the fear and chaos that transpired. From that back story comes the fact that today I and my wife will be getting our first vaccine shots.