PCIntern
PCIntern's JournalI never met Donald Trump. I don't know him.
But I can see that he possesses traits of severe mental illness. He should no longer be working in the government. Sad!
"If you don't take a temperature you can't find a fever"
From the brilliant tell-all novel House of God by the pseudonymous Samuel Shem.
Who needs testing?
Just remember: the chief resident invented Dr Jung’s Anal Mirror so people could see their own. How great is THAT?
Next: "I learned a lot from Adolph Hitler"?
Well folks, The difference between this disease and economic policy is that faulty economic policy takes months or even years to manifest itself. This disease takes days to manifest itself, and very shortly we are going to be seeing the results of this premature opening in many areas.
Then the media is going to report this, shaking their collective heads, and repeating Republican mantras such as “we certainly didn’t see this coming”. Folks like Chuck Todd and Andrea Mitchell will be faux-aghast at this development. Quietly shaking their heads, they will opine that perhaps the president is not pursuing the exact correct course in all this.
Recently, I watch the film Network, for perhaps the 20th time, and decided that we need “a moment”. We need a moment where in a reporter stands up and says you are a liar. This is the Joseph Welch moment that is required here to deal with a sociopath like this. Courtesy, decency, gentility, and politesse will not work. What is needed is a verbal bazooka. But I hold out little hope that these single funds will do this.
Never forget that in fact, nice guys finish last.
I'm good and goddamned sick and tired of the notion of "simplicity"
with respect to all of this pandemic and its viral roots.
Microbiologically, physiologically, and genetically both we and the virus are incredibly complex,,,complex beyond virtually anyone's ability to begin to understand the ten-dimensional web of intricacy. for all the knowledge of man, for all the millions of research-years into the science of life, we have only begun to scratch the surface. the depths of knowledge are virtually limitless - the well goes down into a virtual infinity of darkness.that which occurs at the molecular level, and of the processes involved are just beginning to truly be understood. To give you an idea: my Genetics textbook from 1972, useful only as a doorstop now, was considered the complete book of knowledge of its day. A textbook today would not only contradict and contravene much of what was in the old text, but whole fields of research have been invented since then which were not even considered by the authors, much less the details, much less the paths upon which the world's laboratories are striding down. The book is ancient history. My point is that at that time, people professed to understand the process oh so well. turns out, not only were they not even close, but in many many respects, they were dead wrong. That's OK, that's science, that's knowledge, that's how it works. It' how humans think and process and attain. Intellectual scientists know they are just creating the early building blocks for later discoveries. there is no endpoint.
So where is this going? I'll tell you...
Yes, masks are important, they are great for massively reducing the transmission of the disease, but this disease has evolved such that one version of transmission, though obviated by the technique of wearing a mask, will be successful in transmitting in other manners and it will evolve such that it will become incredibly efficient in its transmission. It is a remarkable organism inasmuch as by and large it does not kill its host: it is available for transmission in asymptomatic carriers for a great length of time. It can live in aerosol, on surfaces, in excrement and semen we think, on plain surfaces for great lengths of time, so proximity is everything. Viral load...yes that is apparently at this point required for infection or possibly reinfection but that doesn't have to remain either...it could wind up evolving into a very very potent pathogen.
Now the mechanisms for all this are complex of course, and we don't know, we can only guess. but the one thing we cannot do is invoke an "if...then" proposition, that is IF we do such and such THEN we will rid ourselves of this pox. No, we will statistically improve the situation, but from what I can see, there are avenues and mechanisms which are heretofore minimized or not realized yet. Yes, we are researching, but please allow me this rhetorical question: have you seen a basic scientist on the air who has stated that we will in reasonable time solve this problem, say the way we solved polio or smallpox? I haven't. and that is important. They DON'T KNOW. And they DON'T KNOW HOW at this point.
I am personally frightened for the country at this point: we have no attention span as a nation and we have a terrific number of people who either believe that this cannot happen to them and theirs through religiosity or luck, who believe that this really does not exist in the manner that the mass shootings didn't really exist, and those who are just plain dumb. This is going to be neither simple nor easy and there is going to be a lot of death and suffering and unfortunately, there is going to be a lot of post-COVID-19 morbidity and mortality down the line and way down the line, involving organ systems and biochemical processes which we have yet to understand due to inexperience. We aren't in the second inning of a nine inning game, we are in Spring Training...
This may be a bit long-winded, but please bear with me...
I was thinking today that the response by the idiots to all of this is rejection of fundamentals; "See, there are only 80,000 deaths, ya gotta die from something, right? More deaths by such and such or so and so than this..."
So it reminded me of the pre Y2K readying: many people with whom I'm acquainted did a lot of work for major firms with that and yes it worked out rather well. But all the naysayers, the usual crowd said: "I told you nothing would happen...all that for nothing." You idiots, that was because tens of thousands of people devoted millions upon millions of hours to ensuring that major systems would continue to work.
And so it is with quarantining: if we hadn't done this we would have had untold deaths and many more severely injured for life as a result of pulmonary scarring or other nightmarish results of the infection of this "Democrat Hoax" 
of course...
Now it's strange: I just watched two very interesting disparate films: the first was Kirk Douglas in Ace in the Hole, wherein he plays a reporter in the southwest who reports upon a man trapped in a cave. In the beginning of the unfolding story, Douglas and his coworker enter the cave and Douglas says, and i'll liberally paraphrase: sure you've heard of 240 people trapped in caves or thousands of people in trouble or even a million suffering and dying, but those are just numbers: this is one man and people will respond more intensely because it is one...and people can identify with one as opposed to a larger number. It's better news and better sales.
The second film was a documentary on Natalie Wood and I most highly recommend it to film buffs and to people interested in family dynamics. It is entitled: Natalie Wood: What Remains Behind It is superb in every respect...
So to my point: these people who are attempting to minimize the loss of 80000 people SO FAR are utterly without any redemptive qualities at all whatsoever. I'm sorry: if you don't truly feel for these people, many of who were cut down in their prime, you are subhuman. This is how genocides and Holocausts occur - there are a great many who simply do not care one whit about the lives of others. When faced of course with the loss of a single individual, perhaps their relative or close friend, then all of a sudden it's "different" in the same way that for many when a woman chooses to terminate her pregnancy it is murder but when their daughter does it, well, it's "different" because she is "special". I had posted a death notice earlier today in another thread which saddened me terribly from Sunday's Philadelphia Inquirer. This large family lost a young lady and is obviously bereft, my God her GRANDMOTHER outlived her. And this is not simply a disease of the elderly, as there are new syndromes being discovered it seems, weekly. I fully understand that life goes on but we are risking possibly the life and limb of millions here at this juncture. Now the reason I mentioned the Natalie Wood Documentary is that it was exceptionally moving: here is a woman, an actress who debuted at age 4 and was followed her entire life in film. The intensity of the people's feelings for her were remarkable: her children, her husbands, her fellow actors, her crew, her directors, nearly everyone. This is emblematic for the effect that we all have upon our environments and when people casually write off individuals as the cost of doing business, well, the family which lost its matriarch in the Natalie Wood example, is just like every other family anywhere. What is ours is very precious.
But these morans (sic) will never admit this until its one of their own...then he or she will be "special". Unlike your family member or my family member: we are "ordinary" and "expendable". The fact that these people cannot and will not process this is beyond reprehensible: it is, as I stated before, subhuman.
I was reading the Philadelphia Inquirer this morning
And I came upon this obituary. I posted here for those lurkers who think that this is all bullshit and everybody dies so this is just as good a thing to die from as anything. Tell that to this large, obviously loving family.
https://www.legacy.com/obituaries/inquirer/obituary.aspx?n=bryse-ayn-ciallella&pid=196170557
I have two pieces of Pennsylvania dental news to share:
First is that the governor has now allowed us to wholly return for treatment of emergencies BUT WE MAY NOT AEROSOLIZE the procedure. That means: no ultra speed drill. That is like telling a carpenter to frame a house but don’t use a hammer for any reason at all whatsoever. Now, do you know, the handpiece is not only used for fillings or crowns: if you’re extracting a painful tooth and you need to divide it because, WELL BECAUSE YOU HAVE TO, you’re gonna need that handpiece. Chisel use is dangerous and most dentists practicing today were not trained to use them. No elective work permitted either: cleanings, restorations, crowns. You get the picture. I don’t know how I’m gonna do this but I will. Because I have to.
Second, a female dentist, Apparently a wife and mother, committed suicide. Yes, it is more common among dentists but this has sent shock waves through our community of dentists far and wide. I cannot begin to tell you the complexity of the effects this nightmare is going to have upon my profession but nothing will be the same. For example, there is no such thing anymore as a waiting room. So the nature of everything else In the profession is also going to be altered: much already has. This hiatus in practice has so disrupted individuals who are often compulsive and are used to rigidity in much of their lives. This threw uncertainty into the mix. For some people it’s the last straw. How tragic. By the way: in no way shape or form am I insinuating that dentists have more tragic existence than others. Far from it. What I’m saying is that often, problems are magnified because of the nature of those who enter the field. Suffice it to say that when I was teaching at Penn, the dean of students resigned because he just couldn’t deal with the volume of suicides and attempted suicides. I have a lot of awful stories better left untold.
I wish I had better news...
Call me a cynic but
I think all the docs Including Fauci are under self-quarantine to get them off the stage.
But that’s I....
Howcum the Republicans are SO much better
Than Dems at messaging?
I’ve been watching the Lincoln Project ads. They’re terrific. Perfect actually. And yet for all the years I’ve been watching Dem ads railing against the same miscreants, we have never been able to hit the nail on the head the way they can. That a Forced Retirement Senate ad is remarkable. Paced perfectly and WHAM!
When I was young my mother of blessed memory told me that it was the Coolidge Campaign that figured this all out in the beginning and they have been refining the tactics for generations.
A great Dem Ad, that of the atomic bomb going off while the little girl picked at the flower was pulled because it was too harsh. Too bad. the Republicans would have doubled down. We never learn. The Rethugs hated that MCCAIN said that OBAMA was a decent family man. This is anathema to them. It should be for us too then. Kick them when they’re down and stomp them some more after that. Nothing and no one is off limits.
Profile Information
Gender: MaleHometown: Philly
Home country: USA!USA!USA!
Current location: Jersey Shore
Member since: Sun Feb 22, 2004, 09:01 AM
Number of posts: 25,642
