March 15, 2021

'Cancel culture'? Sarah Silverman calls it 'righteousness porn' and 'really scary'

https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/story/2019-08-12/sarah-silverman-cancel-culture-blackface

Ok sarah, here is why you are wrong.

Some may see this as scary, but if you are on the hammer end of a slur, it is not a joke to you. Remember how you said "there would be dietrus" when you justifiably defended that fact harvey Weinstein was being investigated. You were right because, lo and behold, there was a gusher of toxicity that women in YOUR very industry had to work in. Now...what happened, did one of your sacred oxen got gored? Is it scary that people no long give a pass to people who used power over people. Many of these people were using that against YOU Sarah, like your "friend" adam corolla who is now a right wign darling, and how makes jokes about you that would violate the TOS agreement and the FCC.

March 9, 2021

Who Are the Scientists Behind the Great Barrington Declaration?

https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/covid19/89204

Long story short, Koch and libertarians prop up scientists to try and kill safety measures, surprise, surprise. Note how they talk about their version of "herd immunity", which is fancy for "kill the weak people we don;t like anyway."

The Great Barrington Declaration, a statement written by three public health experts from Harvard, Stanford, and Oxford, encourages governments to lift lockdown restrictions on young and healthy people while focusing protection measures on the elderly. This would allow COVID-19 to spread in a population where it is less likely to be deadly, the authors state, encouraging widespread immunity that is not dependent on a vaccine.

Restrictions have caused other harms, including lower childhood vaccination rates, worsening cardiovascular disease outcomes, fewer cancer screenings, and deteriorating mental health, they argue.

After gaining some publicity, this strategy was strongly denounced by many in the scientific community. While it supposedly received 8,000 signatures from public health experts and doctors, news outlets later revealed that some of those signatures were fake.

The declaration was sponsored by the American Institute for Economic Research, a libertarian, free-market think tank headquartered in western Massachusetts. The Institute is in a network of organizations funded by Charles Koch -- a right-wing billionaire known for promoting climate change denial and opposing regulations on business.

March 3, 2021

honestly: what can we do about Joe manchin?

Granted, I know we only have a 50 50 hold in the Senate. ! also dislike the idea of us losing the senate, where we know Mitch will sprint to his old chair. However, we cannot pretend that if he kneecaps us again, we can keep the Senate, as there will be people who genuinely think we can keep what little we won back. What can realistically be done to make him get in line?