Afghanistan! (Full Version)

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rombsix -> Afghanistan! (Aug. 18 2021 14:02:32)

Y'all - what on earth is happening? It seems there are some pretty seismic shifts taking place of late. I don't know about y'all, but I am in a pretty doom and gloom state, and very worried about the state of global affairs. I am sensing a lot of tension that might be a harbinger for a serious storm. China invading and taking over Taiwan? A huge economic crash with stagflation like in the 1970's? Am I just overly anxious, or are y'all feeling this way too? I don't understand these things very well and I'm not a content expert, but I am picking up on some concerning vibes in the world right now: all of the above, plus COVID, climate change worsening, etc. Your thoughts?

My country went down the drain, by the way... it's over.



I went to buy a smoothie the other day in Nashville, and they said they couldn't make me one because of supply shortages. They're unable to purchase cups to pour drinks into!

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Pgh_flamenco -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 19 2021 3:56:14)

There’s no shift in the Middle East. That the US occupation and attempt at nation building in Afghanistan was revealed as a farce should come as no surprise to anyone. The US has taken on too much debt and this could make it difficult to dig our way out of the next recession. Supply shortages in the US have multiple causes: People who weren’t working due to the pandemic had more free time and still had money to spend. A lot of products have been selling out quickly. There’s also a worker shortage when it comes to low level jobs because people would rather collect unemployment, government stimulus, child credit payments, etc., than work.

I doubt the outlook for humanity has ever been very encouraging. Today is really no better or worse than times past. I see all of this chatter about climate change, but no one talks about over population. The latter will be a big part of crises throughout the world several decades from now.




ernandez R -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 19 2021 7:50:55)

The outlook for society? You mean humanity?

I'm thinking we are all like Rob mentioned on his thread, Sisyphus rolling our stone up hill but rather then Homers Greek tale more like Camus and the Absurd: we must hunker down bearing life's load but instead of pushing stones are we not like dung beetles rolling our little balls of **** up hill head down and tail first, oblivious to a world we take ass first , that or just get it over with and suicide.

Humanity was never meant to last, top tier predators never survive, are the first to go as conditions change, it's true, the cockroaches and the sharks will out last us all, perhaps the scarab too.

I think we need fist look inside ourselves, this is where every challenge, each answer can be found. I call it this a ruby red slipper of life, you know, when Glenda the good witch asks Dorothy Gale, yes I even know her last name, what have you learned time in Oz, or was it the Scarecrow?

"Well... I think that it ... That it wasn't enough just to want to see Uncle Henry and Auntie Em. And it's that if I ever go looking for my heart's desire again, I won't look any farther than my own back yard because if it isn't there, I never really lost it to begin with."

Not exactly Camus or Homer but it will do cause let's face it we are neither. We are a humble humanity lost searching for what can only be found looking in a mirror once we make a moment to put down our little ball of ****e and ask:

What is any afghan looking for, the student this Taliban, the goat heard or the mulla, their mother, her daughter?
Isn't it peace? To go ones way unfettered by the course of nations across oceans or a history past tall white ranges and wide stretches of sand?

Peace, and yet we kill and war for it. Yes we, you and I, your nation and mine, your faith slaughters theirs and theirs enslaves those, even my lack of one is trapped in it's own empty theosophy and as such I have no prayer, only this:

There's no place like home, there's no place like home, there's no place like home.

HR




Mark2 -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 19 2021 16:58:59)

Talking with the wife this morning. She was trying to figure out what the truth was regarding the US pullout. Biden says this, another source says that.......I told her the truth is when we lay down at night, we are both sleeping next to the one who we love. That's it. Everything else is uncertain.


quote:

ORIGINAL: ernandez R

The outlook for society? You mean humanity?

I'm thinking we are all like Rob mentioned on his thread, Sisyphus rolling our stone up hill but rather then Homers Greek tale more like Camus and the Absurd: we must hunker down bearing life's load but instead of pushing stones are we not like dung beetles rolling our little balls of **** up hill head down and tail first, oblivious to a world we take ass first , that or just get it over with and suicide.

Humanity was never meant to last, top tier predators never survive, are the first to go as conditions change, it's true, the cockroaches and the sharks will out last us all, perhaps the scarab too.

I think we need fist look inside ourselves, this is where every challenge, each answer can be found. I call it this a ruby red slipper of life, you know, when Glenda the good witch asks Dorothy Gale, yes I even know her last name, what have you learned time in Oz, or was it the Scarecrow?

"Well... I think that it ... That it wasn't enough just to want to see Uncle Henry and Auntie Em. And it's that if I ever go looking for my heart's desire again, I won't look any farther than my own back yard because if it isn't there, I never really lost it to begin with."

Not exactly Camus or Homer but it will do cause let's face it we are neither. We are a humble humanity lost searching for what can only be found looking in a mirror once we make a moment to put down our little ball of ****e and ask:

What is any afghan looking for, the student this Taliban, the goat heard or the mulla, their mother, her daughter?
Isn't it peace? To go ones way unfettered by the course of nations across oceans or a history past tall white ranges and wide stretches of sand?

My wife and I hada ocnversation this morning. She has been having a tough time during covid. She just lost her uncle the other day.


Peace, and yet we kill and war for it. Yes we, you and I, your nation and mine, your faith slaughters theirs and theirs enslaves those, even my lack of one is trapped in it's own empty theosophy and as such I have no prayer, only this:

There's no place like home, there's no place like home, there's no place like home.

HR




chester -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 19 2021 20:52:17)

quote:

we are both sleeping next to the one who we love. That's it. Everything else is uncertain


even that is uncertain.

memento mori and all that...




Kaloguitarist -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 20 2021 16:22:52)

I feel your pain El Rumbero!! I try to be optimistic about things and I am very sorry what is going on in your Country. I hope your family is staying safe with all this turmoil.

I have stopped watching the news and listening to all the negative stuff about covid, etc.

The media is just horrible, I am not sure what to believe anymore. I am not trying to down playing the situation, but, music is the best form of expression when feeling bummed out!

You have contribute so much in the realms of flamenco with all your cool videos. I have learned a lot from watching them.

This is mite off topic, but, I am just trying to cheer your up and give some hope regarding humanity!!!

Kalo




Ricardo -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 20 2021 20:16:39)

quote:

The media is just horrible, I am not sure what to believe anymore.


So you believed them before? This is no surprise to me whatsoever for some reason. It might go back to when I was a kid and I realized how a News “story” was just that…. A story. In 10 or 20 years some people will write about it or make a movie and we will have a better picture of the “truth”, which is just different perspectives anyway.

The world is what WE make of it, so don’t waste time blaming others, just do the things that inspire yourself and others that are important to you. I turned off the news long ago, and relaxed to a nice documentary on serial killers.[:D][:D]




Kaloguitarist -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 20 2021 21:15:14)

quote:

So you believed them before? This is no surprise to me whatsoever for some reason. It might go back to when I was a kid and I realized how a News “story” was just that…. A story. In 10 or 20 years some people will write about it or make a movie and we will have a better picture of the “truth”, which is just different perspectives anyway.


Well, not really believed in it, but, with this covid stuff BS..I was looking for some sort of guidance...Everyone at worked got vaccinated, and I finally gave in, but damn, I am not doing no Booster vac...I didn't really buy into the fear, but, i was afraid to push my luck..

quote:

he world is what WE make of it, so don’t waste time blaming others, just do the things that inspire yourself and others that are important to you. I turned off the news long ago, and relaxed to a nice documentary on serial killers.


I like this advise the BEST [:D]




BarkellWH -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 20 2021 22:32:27)

quote:

So you believed them before? This is no surprise to me whatsoever for some reason. It might go back to when I was a kid and I realized how a News “story” was just that…. A story. In 10 or 20 years some people will write about it or make a movie and we will have a better picture of the “truth”, which is just different perspectives anyway.


Journalists, whether cable, broadcast, or print, are like a bunch of lemmings. In the old days, in the 1930s and in the 40s during World War II, the majority of journalists who had gone to the university majored in history, political science, or perhaps English. In other words, they got an education. Today, most of those reporting the news major in "journalism" and learn about copyright law and, if they apply themselves, can write a decent paragraph. Although judging from much of the writing in newspapers, it is questionable whether many can even put together a decent paragraph. How many times have I seen the term "penultimate" used to mean the "last" or "ultimate end" in a series of actions?

One mark of the lemming-like behavior of today's journalists is that they latch onto a phrase and repeat it endlessly in their reporting. One such phrase is that Afghanistan is "the graveyard of empires." That phrase has been used to describe Afghanistan at least since the turn of the 20th century. It refers to the British and their retreat from Kabul in 1842 which resulted in only one survivor reaching Jalalabad, a British army surgeon named William Brydon, and goes all the way back to Alexander and his march through Afghanistan and the Khyber Pass to what is today Pakistan and the Indus River. And of course the Soviets and their ten-year adventure. Referring to Afghanistan as "the graveyard of empires" makes today's journalists sound sage indeed, although they probably had never heard the phrase in journalism school.

Another phrase beloved by today's journalists is "speaking truth to power." That phrase is so overused it should be retired and forbidden to be uttered or written. Whenever someone objects to a government policy, or some other organizational stance and states his objection, he is described as "speaking truth to power." Those who applaud the phrase seem to think that "speaking truth to power" requires a great deal of courage. It does not. It simply means that the individual in question disagrees with the prevailing policy.

One of the aphorisms in Friedrich Nietzsche's great work, "Die Froeliche Wissenschaft" ("The Joyful Wisdom" or "Science") reminds me of the lemmings in journalism today.

"Look, look, he runs away from men. They follow him, however, because he runs before them. They are a gregarious lot."

Most journalists would fit right in with Nietzsche's laughable gregarious lot.

Bill




BarkellWH -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 20 2021 22:35:08)

quote:

Well, not really believed in it, but, with this covid stuff BS..


Covid stuff BS..?

Bill




Kaloguitarist -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 20 2021 23:05:39)

quote:

Covid stuff BS..?


I didn't mean this in away that I think covid is BS...It is real, but, without getting into political stuff.....I feel many politicians and media outlets are not being honest with us.

Who do you believe???

Kalo




RobF -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 20 2021 23:14:12)

quote:

It refers to the British and their retreat from Kabul in 1842 which resulted in only one survivor reaching Jalalabad, a British army surgeon named William Brydon,

Here you go, Bill, Elizabeth Thompson’s “The Remnants of an Army” (1879), featuring your man, William. It’s pure coincidence, but I’m at this moment reading an article on the history of the Silk Road and the Hippie Trail and came across this picture, then popped over here, and here you are talking about him.



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BarkellWH -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 21 2021 13:22:11)

What a coincidence, Rob! Thanks for posting that iconic painting. Elizabeth Thompson's "The Remnants of an Army" captures the moment perfectly, with British officers riding out from the Jalalabad garrison to meet an exhausted William Brydon bringing first word of the fate of the Army of Afghanistan.

By the way, Rudyard Kipling had the British debacle in Afghanistan in mind when he penned the lines I use as my "signature" in my Foro posts.

Bill




Ricardo -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 21 2021 16:56:21)

quote:

ORIGINAL: BarkellWH

quote:

Well, not really believed in it, but, with this covid stuff BS..


Covid stuff BS..?

Bill


People, many people, vaccinated or not get sick from Covid twice or more often. People that live through small pox (don’t need a vaccine for it) catch it and get sick from it multiple times? Cold and flu evolves of course, could it be some of those positive tests were just flu?

News admission of new data showing the vaccines are not as effective (wearing off fast) is frustrating to all parties. In other words, when they insisted the vaccine was effective, it was BS. To be fair the booster was warned about as a possibility early on.




BarkellWH -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 21 2021 17:29:47)

quote:

In other words, when they insisted the vaccine was effective, it was BS. To be fair the booster was warned about as a possibility early on.


The news reports took their cue from the infectious disease specialists who correctly claimed that the vaccines, particularly the Pfizer and Moderna versions, were 95 percent effective. Those who have been fully vaccinated and have tested positive for Covid experience it mildly if at all. The evidence supports the effectiveness of the vaccines, as something like 99 percent of the hospitalizations and deaths from the Delta variant are the unvaccinated.

Now the CDC is advising a third booster vaccine eight months after being fully vaccinated. That does not indicate the vaccine is not effective. No one knew how long the effectiveness of the vaccine would last when they were approved. They are getting a better handle on it now. Again, just because a booster is required doesn't indicate the vaccine is not effective. It is effective, but we may need to have boosters at certain intervals to maintain the effectiveness.

Bill




Richard Jernigan -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 21 2021 18:10:36)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Ricardo
News admission of new data showing the vaccines are not as effective (wearing off fast) is frustrating to all parties. In other words, when they insisted the vaccine was effective, it was BS. To be fair the booster was warned about as a possibility early on.


I don't know who you are talking about insisting the vacccines were effective.

I read most of the scientific or science based info on the vaccines that came my way. Having spent a long career in science and engineering my takeaway was that

1. Over the time period of the trials, the mRNA vaccines were very effective at preventing disease: 94% +/- a few percent.

2. It was unknown how long such immunity would last. In people who recovered from COVid-19, antibody levels were seen to diminish after a number of months.

Note that the preseence of antibodies is not the only indication of immunity. Besides antibodies in the blood stream there are memory cells which promptly promote the production of antibodies when the virus is detected, and other memory cells which promptly destroy infected human cells to limit the replication of the virus.

Since the vaccine tests which enabled the emergency use authorization a new strain of the virus has appeared which is far more contagious, and likely makes you sicker than the strain the vaccines were tested against. In the USA the new strain has seriously sickened younger people more often than the original did.

Furthermore, as time passes more has been learned about how long immunity lasts: perhaps not as long against the new strain as against the original one. The new strain has out-competed the original one. It is now so much more prevalent that it is difficult to compare it to the original strain in current cases.

It is nearly impossible for the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test for COV-SARS-2 to mistake influenza for COVID-19. The PCR test detects segments of the coronavirus genome that absolutely do not occur in any strain of influenza.

Distinct from the PCR test, the antigen test detects certain proteins that are part of the novel coronavirus. Its false negative rate is higher than the PCR test, but its false positive rate is about the same, very near zero. In other words, this test is more likely to miss a case of COVID-19, but in practice simply will not mistake flu for COVID-19.

I do not insist that nobody misrepresented the scientific results. A lifetime of reading news accounts of things I was personally involved with taught me that respected news sources like the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, and even the Scientific American sometimes misunderstood or distorted the facts.

However I am not aware that any of the sources I named have bungled news of the novel coronavirus or the vaccines.

RNJ




mrstwinkle -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 22 2021 12:45:23)

Gotcha is not the drugs, but the political bs.

They were sold as a way to prevent transmission. That is now clearly false. Yet they want to keep you locked up and masked unless you take the vax.

Dystopian nightmare




Richard Jernigan -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 23 2021 0:37:06)

More than 80% of people in the hospital for COVID-19 in the Austin area are unvaccinated. About 60% of people in the area are vaccinated. The 40% unvaccinated are contributing 80% of hospitalizations.

When the vaccine trials were conducted, the average unvaccinated person infected three other unvaccinated people. The mRNA vaccines were 95% effective in preventing disease, whether asympromatic, presymptomatic or symptomatic. The vaccines were clearly very effective in preventing transmission.

The incidence of disease declined to a low level in July, vaccinated people were unlikely to be infected if exposed. It was fairly safe for vaccinated people to go without masks outdoors, or in sparsely populated areas indoors.

With the new delta strain of the virus, the rate of transmission has gone up from three to around seven. The new strain is clearly more than twice as contagious as the old one. Furthermore there have been more "breakthrough" infections among vaccinated people. Even people without symptoms who are infected by the new strain may carry a heavy viral load in the nose and throat, making them efficient spreaders of the disease.

The delta strain of the virus has made the vaccines less effective as preventers of transmission, so the science based medical advice has changed. There are many more cases of the virus than there were a month ago, the virus is more contagious and the vaccines are less effective.

Limiting social interaction and wearing masks are once again scientifically advisable.

In Texas the political BS is the governor acting contrary to scientific advice based on empirical evidence.

RNJ




BarkellWH -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 23 2021 2:40:48)

The biggest load of BS is coming from those ignorant individuals who think that mandating a mask in order to prevent the transmission of Covid 19 is "taking their freedom away." These yahoos have no idea what freedom is, or more specifically, what lack of freedom is. I have to laugh when I see these guys talking about wearing a mask being equivalent to lack of "freedom."

I know something about what lack of freedom is because I experienced and saw its effect first-hand. My first assignment in the US Foreign Service was to our Embassy in Sofia, Bulgaria during 1974-76. It was at the height of the Cold War, and Bulgaria was a hard-line Communist country that slavishly followed Soviet policy so closely that it was known as the 16th Soviet republic.

Bulgarian citizens could not travel abroad, even to other Eastern European Soviet satellite countries. Only the top-level Bulgarian members of the "Nomenklatura" could obtain passports, and then only if they were granted permission. Bulgarian citizens could not move from one region of Bulgaria to another without permission and had to have an "internal passport" to do so. The entire cultural life in Bulgaria was predicated on the old "Socialist Realism" mandated by the authorities in lockstep with the Soviet Union.

Bulgarian citizens could not interact or form friendships with members of the Western diplomatic corps. We could not exhibit friendship with Bulgarian citizens because to do so put them in jeopardy with their own government. We found this out when my wife exchanged friendly greetings with a Bulgarian woman who took care of our apartment building. The woman soon was transferred out to another building. That was a lesson we took to heart when dealing with Bulgarians. Even members of the Bulgarian Foreign Ministry had to obtain permission to attend dinners to which we and other US Embassy members invited them.

There were no "stolen" elections in Bulgaria because there were no legitimate elections to steal. No dissent was tolerated, absolutely none. The Bulgarian Committee for State Security (the secret police) kept tabs on both Bulgarian citizens and foreigners, particularly those of us representing Western countries in the Diplomatic Corps. And in 1978 there was the infamous "Markov Affair," in which Georgi Markov, a Bulgarian dissident journalist who had defected to the UK, was assassinated on a London street by a member of the Bulgarian secret police using a ricin-tipped umbrella to puncture him in the thigh.

So all I can say to those ignorant yahoos who cannot distinguish between wearing a mask as a public health measure and repressive lack of freedom is you need to get out more and experience the real world, and stop whining and mewling over something you know nothing about.

Bill




estebanana -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 23 2021 3:41:54)

quote:

Bulgarian citizens could not interact or form friendships with members of the Western diplomatic corps. We could not exhibit friendship with Bulgarian citizens because to do so put them in jeopardy with their own government. We found this out when my wife exchanged friendly greetings with a Bulgarian woman who took care of our apartment building. The woman soon was transferred out to another building. That was a lesson we took to heart when dealing with Bulgarians. Even members of the Bulgarian Foreign Ministry had to obtain permission to attend dinners to which we and other US Embassy members invited them.


Same here. When I traveled to China in 1993 to go to school at the National Academy of Fine Art for a course in art history we were told by the faculty of our visiting school not to engage Chinese students in a way that would draw attention to them.

One of our students broke this protocol and staged a ridiculous performance in front of the Chinese students dorm. He shaved his head and wrapped packing tape around his mouth and over his eyes. The Chinese students had two reactions that they yelled across the gap between the student dorms and the foreign students dorms. Some were cussing us out in Chinese and saying we don’t want your irreverence towards authority, our Chinese way is correct! And some students yelled down at our student doing the demonstration to cheer him on.

Some other Chinese students threw coke bottles at him.

After about five minutes this hard ass security proctor in a grey suit and sunglasses marches up and grabs the American by the arm as the American pulls the tape off himself and gives the raised fist power sign. The proctor was a character, he looked like former military and we called him William S. Burroughs because of the style of sunglasses he wore. Burroughs hauled the offender to the provosts office where a big meeting took place between our faculty leader and the school president and a few mucky mucks. They all made the stupid American kid admit he was out of line and released him into the care of our faculty leader. He came back to the dorm and bragged how he only got his wrists slapped.

The weekend came and some Chinese kids were asked to go home for the weekend. That’s the gossip we heard filtered through the Waiban, the Chinese office in charge of foreign students. The next week some of the students who cheered the dissenter American did not return to school. The faculty head from my school told me they had either been discharged from school in disgrace or sent to education camp for a stint before they could come back to class. A stint meant like a year.

The idiot that did the demonstration is now a philosophy teacher at a small east coast college and he never really learned his lesson. I don’t know what became of our Chinese comrades in art because we were smart enough at that point to know writing to them would get them undue amounts of surveillance over their heads. The punishment to a few American students who the Waiban thought were friends with the student who staged the debacle was to remove the air conditioners from our rooms. They took them for ten days. Our rooms were bugged and monitored by English speaking Waiban officials. The Waiban and the lead US faculty were friends who socialized for ‘official reasons of goodwill’ but they got together for dinner and drinks. Casually, the lead woman at the Waiban said to the lead faculty of our school- “It seems like you have a Christian sex cult under your care.”

I think of anti mask nimrods like I think of the philosophy professor who in his youth got a bunch of Chinese kids in trouble. They are not responsible for their actions and stupidly endanger others. They should have coke bottles thrown at them, best if they get hit too.




Richard Jernigan -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 23 2021 7:58:42)

Here in Texas we have the worst of both worlds. A law passed in the 1970s allows the governor to declare an emergency, which confers powers upon him to "protect the public."

Our heroic governor duly declared an emergency near the beginning of the pandemic, and has extended it several times, so that it is now in effect. A couple of months ago he employed these emergency powers to prohibit requiring masks, vaccinations, or even asking someone their vaccination status. This was presumably to protect the "rights" of those who complained of infringement upon their "freedom."

The governor is up for reelection next year, and is doing what he can to strengthen his position against primary opponents to the right of him.

With the surge of infections due to the delta variant of the virus and the low rate of vaccination statewide, many school boards initiated mandatory masking on school campuses. They were immediately sued by our Attorney General, who may have the distinction to be the only state Attorney General currently indicted for felonies.

Two restaurants in town posted a requiremen that to dine indoors customers must be vaccinated or show a negative test within 72 hours. The state liquor board threatened to revoke their licenses.

Courts have issued temporary injunctions against the Attorney General's efforts. The hugely popular Willie Nelson Picnic has required vaccination or a negative test to attend. The cases are making their way to the state Supreme Court, which has upheld the governor's voter suppression efforts, also empowered by his emergency declaration.

So we have totalitarian tactics to protect the "freedom" of those who choose to endanger us by refusing to be vaccinated or to wear a mask. This is how the governor employs his emergency powers to "protect" the public.

RNJ




estebanana -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 23 2021 8:39:28)

I don’t understand what people who support Gov. Abbott get in return for his intransigence against following scientific protocol. What’s in it for them besides saving them from having to make minor lifestyle adjustments? He’s perpetuating the sickness and if the masking requirement is found unconstitutional by the Supreme Court, woe unto the US because there will be consequences.




Escribano -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 23 2021 10:43:12)

In Italy, I have just managed to get a vaccine after much blagging and squirming around the red tape for non-citizens. The state has introduced a green pass, so you cannot enter restaurants, museums, nightclubs, trains etc. without proof of a vaccination. In other words, you are outcast.

Mask are not mandatory outside but we all wear them. They mean business here.




estebanana -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 23 2021 10:48:49)

1983 - Reagan first term the Southern Strategy in full swing, AIDS and HIV are not fully understood by the scientific community. As data sets emerge over the next decade we learned that you can’t get HIV from a toilet seat. ( something a lot of us figured out by 1984 by reading the medical news)

But when HIV was a potential threat early on fundamentalist Christians went nuts using it to scapegoat gay people. The science process took much than it necessary to clear up how exactly the virus spread. Gay activists like Act Up, had to confront the CDC led by Fauchi to get them to talk about it in public. Fauchi says we got some of the science wrong, but we’re not scapegoating gay people. He apologized for the initial information gaps and doubled efforts to get better data sets. We’ll all that happened and as a result the gay community in which I have many old healthy friends isn’t anti mask or anti vaccine.

But in 1980’s gay people were stigmatized by this reaction from the religious right. Turns out high risk for getting HIV more likely in intravenous drug users. The gay world went on a world wide campaign to raise awareness about safe sex and drug use that had far reaching effects for good.

Science is a process that constantly changes, and good scientists are honest about what they know minute by minute. The public has to stay aware move by move. In the beginning of the pandemic it was foretold that there would be mutations and they were unknown setbacks until they happen. What we do know us that so far vaccinated people are exponentially better off and the mutation effects them less. And if more people don’t take responsibility to get vaccinated each month that goes by the chances of more virulent mutations happening in the winter get more likely. We the yearly cycle of a corona epidemic heats up in the Fall and causes more infections. It’s critical people mask up and get vaccinated. It’s also hypocritical knowing what we all know about science that certain political actors scapegoat any group for wearing masks.

I’ve had family members and school mates and employers die of AIDS. I don’t want any of them to die from Covid.



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estebanana -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 23 2021 10:57:31)

quote:

Italy, I have just managed to get a vaccine after much blagging and squirming around the red tape for non-citizens. The state has introduced a green pass, so you cannot enter restaurants, museums, nightclubs, trains etc. without proof of a vaccination. In other words, you are outcast.

Mask are not mandatory outside but we all wear them. They mean business here.


I was able to get the first shot today in Japan. It makes me mad that it’s been available in the US for months and people fight against it. That’s what abuse of privilege looks like.




Morante -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 23 2021 12:06:03)

I do not believe politicians: I regard them as professional liars. Nor do I believe most of the press: it is largely controlled by the politicians.

I believe Adolfo Garcia Sastre and his wife Ana, whose life work is on vaccines, in Mount Sinai.

Por suerte, they are personal friends: my wife used to travel with them when they were students. They have a house in Cádiz, so we see them every summer.

Adolfo says that no vaccine can ever be 100% effective but the vaccine is crucial in controlling the pandemia and the more people vaccinated the better.

The idea of a third booster is ludicrous when you consider that a great proportion of the world population has none. Negacionists are just irresponsible.




mrstwinkle -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 23 2021 13:33:47)

I'd quite happily give mine away to someone who wants and needs it. Just remove the idiotic rules that don't work.




estebanana -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 23 2021 14:48:42)

quote:

I'd quite happily give mine away to someone who wants and needs it. Just remove the idiotic rules that don't work.


This is why you’ll win the coveted Darwin Award long before me. Congratulations on your achievement in being ahead of me at something.




Kaloguitarist -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 23 2021 14:58:17)

quote:

More than 80% of people in the hospital for COVID-19 in the Austin area are unvaccinated. About 60% of people in the area are vaccinated. The 40% unvaccinated are contributing 80% of hospitalizations.


What Richard has stated here is correct. My cousin works with doctors and in the hospital and she stated the same thing.

Most all patients that come in are NOT vaccinated! She was the one who encourage me to take the vaccine shot.

I see people who will not wear a mask and will not get the vaccine because they talk about their freedom. But, they are not thinking about freedom when they get covid 19 and have to be hospitalized and sometimes worst case on a ventilator.

Kalo




JasonM -> RE: Afghanistan! (Aug. 23 2021 15:23:12)

quote:

Y'all - what on earth is happening? It seems there are some pretty seismic shifts taking place of late. I don't know about y'all, but I am in a pretty doom and gloom state, and very worried about the state of global affairs. I am sensing a lot of tension that might be a harbinger for a serious storm


Hopefully the aliens will obliterate planet earth soon [:D]




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