My Take on the Vaccine Question

Apparently there are a lot of people out there who don’t want to take the vaccine. A small but significant number of NBA and NFL players, potentially up to 83,000 health workers in New York, and more elsewhere. Resistance is in the minority, but that minority is pretty serious about it. So here’s my take on the question:

While there’s a chance that COVID-19 could cause you to be hospitalized or even die, the odds are ever in your favor if you don’t happen to be in a high-risk group. I’ve known people who have caught it and died. I know people who caught it and it was a vicious flu-like illness. I know people who caught it and it was like a bad cold.

Natural immunity post COVID is apparently significantly better than any vaccine can produce.

No vaccine is ever risk-free. The negative outcomes are rare, but not non-existent. There have been no long-term trials. (Remember when all the “experts” said it was impossible to get a vaccine out in less that 3-4 years? That’s why.) We really don’t know what happens after a year or ten.

So you have a low, but non-zero chance of having a bad reaction to the vaccine. You have a low, but non-zero chance of getting sick enough from COVID to need to go to the hospital, or even die there. But if you don’t have co-morbidities, that risk is pretty low. You have a low, but non-zero chance of negative long-term effects.

Now, if you DO get sick, you run the risk of passing it on to others. Vaccines don’t work that way. That risk is to you only.

If you do get vaccinated, you can still get sick. Your odds of being hospitalized or dying is decreased, but not eliminated. And while sick you can be infectious. The vaccine doesn’t completely prevent infection, the normal primary case for vaccination.

There are no “solutions,” only trade-offs. If I were young and healthy (like a professional athlete), I would probably not get vaccinated and hope that when (not if) I catch it, it’s no worse than a mild cold and afterward I would have a robust immune response. But I’m not young and healthy, I’m 59, obese, and a dual-organ transplant recipient on immunosuppressives. I got vaccinated.

However, I’m absolutely opposed to vaccine mandates. If my work requires me to show proof of vaccination or get weekly tests, well, they can decide whether or not they want to fire me. I’m pretty certain I can get another job. Not everyone has that option.

As in all things, YMMV, but I fear government overreach more than I fear a virus.

Taking the Ticket to Ft. Sumter

A couple of days ago on Facebook, author Nick Cole posted:

“We are in bad shape. America is in big trouble now.

“We are here because one side decided to treat the other side as enemies.

“It’s best to be honest about these things.”

I commented:

“I’ve been saying this for years now: The two sides used to refer to each other as the “loyal opposition.” Some time around the election of Reagan, a significant contingent of the Left decided the Right wasn’t just wrong, wasn’t misguided, wasn’t ignorant – it was EVIL. They spent the next couple of decades spreading this belief among the Left, until now it is the belief of the majority in the positions of authority.

“You don’t debate with evil. You don’t negotiate with evil. You don’t compromise with evil. You don’t tolerate evil. You placate evil until you can find a rock big enough to crush its skull.

“They’ve almost achieved that.

“Politics, it is said, is the art of compromise. War, Von Clausewitz said, is politics by other means. When negotiation and compromise are no longer on the table, only force is left.

“When enough of the Right finally figures this out is when things get sporty – assuming the Left doesn’t grasp that rock first.”

In a comment to one of my FB posts yesterday, Kenneth Hall said:

“Remember that the establishment press are, at the direction of the UniParty, not only dispensing regime propaganda but trying to troll someone, anyone, into taking the ticket to Fort Sumter, so they’ll have a pretext for their Enabling Act. January 6 didn’t quite pay off for ’em. Remember: be as wise as serpents, gentle as doves.

“Doves with monkey wrenches.”

“Taking the ticket to Ft. Sumter.” As apt a metaphor as I have ever read. The Left keeps tightening the restraints, one click of the ratchet at a time, HOPING for someone to take that ticket so that they can pick up that rock and go to town. As Rahm Emmanuel said, “You never let a serious crisis go to waste. And what I mean by that it’s an opportunity to do things you think you could not do before.”

Things like violate the rights of half the country because you are morally superior to the Deplorable Bitter Clingers. You’re of the Expert Class. You know better. You DESERVE to rule. And these people stand in your way of achieving social equity!

Tomorrow will be the 20th anniversary of 9/11/2001. What’s changed? A country that was mostly united is now as divided as it was before the election of Abraham Lincoln.

Bin Laden considered the U.S. a “weak horse.” It was still tough enough to hunt him down and kill him, but that doesn’t mean his analysis wasn’t ultimately correct. Abraham Lincoln warned that no outside force could destroy the nation, the danger was from inside. He was right.

And now you understand why the oath taken by elected and appointed officials and members of the military is to uphold and defend the Constitution – not a person or position – against all enemies foreign or DOMESTIC.

Remember: The winners get to label who the domestic enemy was.

UPDATE: Larry Correia has something to say on the topic.

UPDATE II:

May be a meme of 1 person, beard and text that says 'FBI PLEASE DO TERRORISM mgflip.com No'

Working as Planned

I have pointed out the “failings” of the “public education” system for many years, noting that they’re only failings if the actual goal of the system is to actually educate. It’s obviously not. At its actual goals it’s succeeding beyond the wildest expectations of its creators.

Back in 2004 John Ringo published his novel “The Road to Damascus.” I saved an excerpt from that novel that seems appropriate here:

“(The party) is composed of two tiers. The lower tier produces many outspoken members who make their demands known to the upper tier. The lower tier is derived from the inner-city population that serves as the base of the party. The lower tier’s members are generally educated in public school systems and if they aspire to advanced training, they are educated in facilities provided by the state. This wing constitutes the majority of (the party’s) membership, but contributes little or nothing to party theory or platform. It votes the party line and is rewarded with cash payments, subsidized housing, subsidized education, and occasional preferential employment in government positions. The lower tier provides only a handful of clearly token individuals allowed to serve in high offices.

“The upper tier, which includes most of the party’s management, virtually all the appointed and elected government officials, and all of the party’s decision-makers, is drawn exclusively from suburban areas where wealth is a fundamental criterion for admittance as a resident. These party members are generally educated at private schools and attend private colleges. They are not affected by food-rationing schemes, income caps or taxation laws, as the legislation drafted and passed by members of their social group inevitably contains loopholes that effectively shelter their income and render them immune from unpleasant statues that restrict the lives of lower-tier party members and all nonparty citizens.

“(The party) leadership recognizes that in return for supporting a seemingly populist agenda, they can obtain all the votes they require to remain in power. Even the most cursory analysis of their actions and attitudes, however, indicates that they are not populists but, in fact, are strong antipopulists who actively despise their voting base. This…is proven by their efforts to reduce public educational systems to a level most grade-school children (in other countries) have surpassed, with the excuse that this curriculum is all that the students can handle. They have made the inner-city population base totally dependent on the government, which they control.”

Exhibit 90,145:

City student passes 3 classes in four years, ranks near top half of class with 0.13 GPA