Rand Paul is asking for federal aid for Kentucky...

 miamizsun wrote: 
not sure if this reflects the current count status...

Jo Jorgensen Heading Toward Second-Best Result in Libertarian Party History

The Libertarian presidential nominee is at 1.14 percent, has 1.58 million votes, and is ahead of all third-party candidates in every state.

 She's also beating the Trump-Biden spread in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Nevada.

 ScottFromWyoming wrote: 

i think i saw where we covered the spread in wisconsin

probably more to come

 miamizsun wrote:
 

Where?

and the usual spoiler label in three, two, one...

kcar wrote:

Can we move this conversation to the Covid thread where it belongs?

 ScottFromWyoming wrote:
 


Fauci and Birx must be living out a nightmarish hell. They have the greatest challenge of their professional lives in dealing with a once-in-a-century pandemic AND they have to tippy-toe around a screaming idiot who undercuts their advice, claims the virus will just disappear, claims that 99% of Covid19 cases are harmless, etc. 

I saw a video clip of Birx looking down at the floor while Trump was babbling about injecting people with bleach. She looked like she was about to cry or have a heart attack. My heart went out to her. 

 kcar wrote:
 
Okay, yeah, I wasn't tracking well. Since it's new in humans, they had to make some assumptions. First was that it was transmitted more like common colds are: hands touching face. Ergo, if you're wearing a mask, the greater risk is in touching it with unclean hands and generally putting your hands on your face more than you would normally, so they wanted to avoid that. Half of America said "I got it, I'm good, I understand" and never really checked in again for a couple of months, and they got really pissed off when it seemed as if the reversal came all of a sudden. Can't blame Fauci and Birx for that.

 ScottFromWyoming wrote:
 

I agree with you, SFW, that mask-wearing does seem to reduce transmission of the coronavirus. The discussion between Miamizsun and myself was more about why Fauci and Birx didn't immediately recommend wearing a mask.  

Miamizsun had first remarked that "i'm also disappointed in fauci/birx for not knowing or not telling the public to wear some sort of covering/mask"

I pointed Miamiz to the fivethirtyeight.com article to demonstrate that there was uncertainty among medical experts about the effectiveness of wearing a mask against coronavirus transmission before and up to early April 2020. So perhaps Miamiz's disappointment wasn't entirely warranted. 

Also, the CDC and the Journal of the American Medical Association started recommended wearing masks against the coronavirus around early April, about the same time the fivethirtyeight.com piece got published. From my earlier post:



https://khn.org/news/to-curb-c...

The "Friday" mentioned early on in the KHN piece was Friday April 3, 2020. The CDC on that day recommended wearing a mask, so the CDC wasn't that late to the masked ball.


https://jamanetwork.com/journa...

 kcar wrote:
 
Miamiz first: There's actually little documentation supporting the use of masks in surgery, it's just always been done that way. According to NIH

kcar  "As the piece points out, wearing a mask can give a false or exaggerated sense of security." First: the 538 article is 3 months old. A lot has happened since then. We've seen enough results from other countries to know that the more successful ones tended to enforce mask-wearing.

• 06-23-20
• CORONAVIRUS

Countries where everyone wore masks saw COVID death rates 100 times lower than projected

Now that there is global data about where COVID is spreading, scientists can see the various factors that help mitigate its spread. The simplest and most effective: masks.

 miamizsun wrote:
 


The Five Thirty Eight piece I linked to captures some of the uncertainty and opposing views within the medical community. I don't know Fauci and Birx's thinking but I imagine people in such positions in public health are very cautious about handing out advice because one or two retractions of such advice can wipe out the public's trust. As the piece points out, wearing a mask can give a false or exaggerated sense of security. 

This excerpt surprised me: 


The mask debate is part of that big picture of uncertainty. We just don’t have data, even for the efficacy of medical-grade masks in protecting against the transmission of a fluid-based virus like Ebola. The more specific the question becomes — What about cloth masks? What’s the best filter? How airborne is coronavirus, exactly? — the more hazy the data. There are studies on these issues, experts told me, but there’s not enough data to be conclusive. About the best anyone can say is that, depending on several variables like the type of mask and how well it’s used, there’s probably a small benefit to wearing masks — in preventing the wearer from spreading the virus to others.

 kcar wrote: 
as i understand it, there has been mask data around for eons (use in surgery for example)

and i think south korea's experts have some ties to fauci and birx (trained with them or under them)

they knew it long ago and shared it with their general population

maybe they got lax, maybe caught off guard, maybe didn't want us to panic

whatever it was it didn't get done

peace

 miamizsun wrote:
 

"i'm also disappointed in fauci/birx for not knowing or not telling the public to wear some sort of covering/mask"


In defense of Birx and Fauci, there was a great deal of uncertainty during the early weeks of the coronavirus outbreak in the US as to the benefits of wearing masks.


https://fivethirtyeight.com/fe...


https://khn.org/news/to-curb-c...

The "Friday" mentioned early on in the KHN piece was Friday April 3, 2020. The CDC on that day recommended  wearing a mask, so the CDC wasn't that late to the masked ball.


https://jamanetwork.com/journa...

 miamizsun wrote:
 

I can't say I know any of these people, nor have I figured out what Niskanen is about. Some sort of attempt at a 3rd way, I guess. In any case, Lindsey seems to know his libertarians, having long been one of them, I gather. And he sure shreds them. Parts 2 & 3 are also worth a read.

Re masks: Wearing masks was part of the culture throughout East Asia long before Covid-19 came along. They've had a number of health scares but also pollution problems etc. and generally a different attitude towards keeping others safe.. Here in Europe (and the U.S., I suspect) not so much. We're still learning. One can't read faces, for example, which is a big part of our communictions culture. If you watch Chinese politicians speak, it always feels like you're watching a robot. She could just as well be wearing  mask, right?

Infections are rising sharply again, here in Switzerland, after they lifted the lockdown sanctions. It is clear that wearing masks, say in public transport, would help prevent some infections. Everybody knows it, polls suggest everyone wants to wear masks. But look into a tram or train and hardly anybody does. The sentiment seems to be: if you're not wearing one, why should I? We feel stripped of a right we're used to having and so demand the new rule apply equally to all. Dumb, schizophrenic? Maybe. Unscientific? Yes. But also very human, as epidemiologists will tell you. Any theory of human action has to take into account how people actually behave, not how the theory would like them to behave. People here overwhelmingly want a rule, imposed from above which applies to all. And no, impose does not mean people are shot or jailed if they don't comply. Possibly fined, but probably not even that, at least here in Switzerland (other countries, France for example, love themselves some more authority. But then the French are notoriously non-rule-abiding). They tried delegating the decision on whether to impose wearing masks in public transport to the Cantonal governments. Nothing happened, except, eventually in Geneva (which has been hit hardest). And so the Federal gvt. had to step in and impose a nationwide ban, which is effetive as of next Monday. Let's see. My guess is, nothing much will change because night life has also been reopened. Bars and clubs seems to be the new hot spots. And with young adults, hanging out in groups, under the influence of alcohol, empathy is hard to come by. Clubbers are obliged to leave their name and number for contact tracers. A club that became the epicenter of a super-spreading event had a list full of Mickey Mouse + fake number entries. And many of those who could be contacted derided the contact tracers and were uncooperative. I'm sure many also not self-isolating. And so the drama continues...

 steeler wrote: 

every business here has a sign that says something to the effect that you must wear a mask to enter

and to social distance (including my office building)

it's their business so they make that choice 

since masks were requested indoors, i've only seen a few younger people without (or pulled down around their necks)

some of this was in the mall common area

of course people can't stuff their pie hole while wearing a mask

it looked to me that most protesters wore something, but at times very close together

they probably dropped cover to drink water or maybe to speak, but still 

i'm also disappointed in fauci/birx for not knowing or not telling the public to wear some sort of covering/mask

even if it was only a repurposed t-shirt

south korea, taiwan, japan all knew about that "science" long ago (or that it was a smart idea)

fauci has been there what? over thirty years and he doesn't know this?

if he did, to level with everyone up front?

peace

Within the context of the Covid-19 pandemic,  a question oft-raised is whether to wear a mask is — and should be — a matter of individual choice. There is scientific evidence that wearing a mask provides those who are near you with additional protection from being infected by you. And vice versa. One choosing not to wear a mask is not just choosing to assume the risk for himself or herself. He or she also is assuming the risk for others.

 rexi wrote: 

random thoughts

i'm pleasantly surprised to see you reading anything from bhl (rip) or niskanen

i've been a jerry taylor fan for a while and i also like brink lindsey along with steve teles

for obvious reasons, jerry has sort of an axe to grind and can tend to flare up occasionally

in other words i tend to disagree with some of his strong characterizations of people, esp on twitter

but most of the time on niskanen he does a good job trying to appeal to both sides of the aisle

i do like that he has embraced a general position of a prudent but generous "social safety net"

and he's smart enough to know that you'll need an even more robust production system to fund it

i can agree with both of those thoughts

brink lindsey and steve teles wrote a great book called "the captured economy"

for me bhl was never about matt and jason, it was all about the comments

some brilliant folks commenting there from time to time

regards

 rexi wrote:

 

To quote the article I linked to below which nobody seems to be interested in reading or debating (emphasis mine):

It is quite simply impossible to lead any institution capably without believing in the fundamental integrity of that institution and the importance of its mission. And the modern libertarian movement, which has done so much to shape attitudes on the American right about the nature of government and its proper role, is dedicated to the proposition that the contemporary American state is illegitimate and contemptible. In the libertarian view, government is congenitally incapable of doing anything well, the public sphere is by its very nature dysfunctional and morally tainted, and therefore the only thing to do with government is – in the famous words of activist Grover Norquist – “to shrink it down to the size where we can drown it in the bathtub.”The gradual diffusion of these anti-government attitudes through the conservative movement and the Republican Party has rendered the American right worse than irrelevant to the project of restoring American state capacity. It has become actively hostile, undermining the motivations needed to launch such a project and the virtues needed to pull it off.As I’ve already argued, none of this means that libertarians are wrong about everything, or that libertarian ideas are worthless. But it does mean that skepticism about government, standing alone, is an insufficient foundation for good governance. The insights of libertarian thought – suspicion of centralized power, alertness to how even the best-intended government measures can still go horribly wrong, recognition of the enormous fertility of the marketplace’s decentralized, trial-and-error experimentation – are genuine and abiding. But they are not sufficient. The ideology of libertarianism claims otherwise: It asserts that a set of important but partial and contingent truths are in fact a comprehensive and timeless blueprint for the ideal political order. The error of this assertion has been made painfully obvious by the pandemic, but it was increasingly evident for many years beforehand. The overlap between genuine libertarian insights and the pressing challenges facing the American polity has been steadily shrinking since the end of the 20th century.(…)For those of us who continue to believe in the indispensability of a critical stance toward government power, the task before us is one of intellectual reconstruction. We must reject minimal government as the organizing principle of policy reform. Making or keeping government as small as possible is an ideological fixation, not a sound principle of good governance. Small government is a false idol, and it is time we smash it. In its place, we should erect effective government as the goal that guides the development and evaluation of public policy. For maxims, we can look to America’s greatest stateman. “The legitimate object of government,” wrote Abraham Lincoln, “is to do for a community of people, whatever they need to have done, but can not do, at all, or can not, so well do, for themselves—in their separate, and individual capacities.”

Guided by the principle of effective government, we will sometimes conclude that government needs to be smaller, and sometimes that it needs to be larger – depending on the circumstances. Given where things stand today, we will often conclude that government can be made simpler. We will continue to champion the ideals of free markets and limited government, but we must reconceive those ideals to free them from their libertarian baggage.Free markets are the foundation of our prosperity and an important motor of social advance. But we need to see them, not as something that exists in the absence of government, but rather as complex achievements of good government. Free markets as we know them today are impossible without the modern state, and they function best when embedded in and supported by a structure of public goods that only government can adequately provide. The guiding principle of effective government, meanwhile, continues to impose important limits on the exercise of state power – but the contours of those limits are quite different from those demanded by libertarian ideology. Here the limiting principle addresses not the scope or subject matter of government action, but rather the effect of that action: The government policy or program in question must actually succeed in advancing its stated public purpose, and under no circumstances may benefit narrow private interests at public expense. The limiting principle, then, grows out of commitment to the public interest, not antipathy to government. The critical stance associated with policing the proper limits of state action thus shifts from anti-government to anti-corruption.

Excellent. Absolute ideology/goals are a dead end (outside of an individual's religious choice).  
Gov should be fluid, and shift depending on the circumstances.
Inhale, exhale, always looking for the right balance.
How do we get there from here? Revolution?

 Lazy8 wrote:
 

Re ranks, see my initial reply to SirD. To assume that social causation runs only from tha individual to the group and not vice versa is an unnecessary constraint on social reasoning and not borne out by reality.

Re Mises, particularly Praxeology / apriorism, I would say that an axiomatic approach to reasoning, i.e. arguing from first principles, is widely used in all sciences and fine as such, if not exclusively so. But all that can ever emenate from such reasoning is a hypothesis or theory, not an absolute moral truth. In any sound science, there will be a number of competing hypotheses and theories, the plausibility of which can only be argued in relation to an ends, but which do not constitute ends or 'moral codes' in themselves. That's called circular reasoning. It is at that point that scientific reasoning becomes ideological dogma - which is precisely what Mises has been accused of, even by his peers. And then there was his soft stance on fascism. But in that he is in good company of other figures of the right such as Hayek.

Re individual responsibility for actions. What about unintended consequences? Who coordinates group ations to minimise externalities and maximise average or overall wellbeing?

It is you who is drawing a caricature of society and the role of government within it. It is you who has apparently been persuaded that the possiblity of government overreach and necessity to keep checks and balances on its scope and use of force (has anyone disputed that?) means that all government ever does or ever should do is use force. And, quite ironically, it is in the U.S., where Libertarianism is most deeply engrained in the constitution and culture that the executive branch has indeed morphed into the very caricature its founders were apparently seeking to prevent.

To take the example of anti-vaxers from below. Who says that government should not aim to persuade its citizens to wear masks or temporarily refrain from certain activities to prevent the spread of a disease and / or protect the vulnerable. Which depraved, indoctrinated soul cannot conceive of an endless number of non-violent means by which it might effeticely encourage most all people to engage in mutually beneficial behaviour? Anti vaxer parents could be prevented from sending their offspring to public schools, for example or forbidden from being treated in public hospitals. Et. etc. And who communicates public messages through which channels? Is there an official public space for reasonable public debate or are there only for-profit private channels that will peddle any half truth to its truncated audience that promises to create a hype and a buck? Do Fox News Viewers actually know what being said in the fake news? Who controls and oversees the media landscape by which means? Rupert Murdoch? Is that in the public interest?

To quote the article I linked to below which nobody seems to be interested in reading or debating (emphasis mine):

It is quite simply impossible to lead any institution capably without believing in the fundamental integrity of that institution and the importance of its mission. And the modern libertarian movement, which has done so much to shape attitudes on the American right about the nature of government and its proper role, is dedicated to the proposition that the contemporary American state is illegitimate and contemptible. In the libertarian view, government is congenitally incapable of doing anything well, the public sphere is by its very nature dysfunctional and morally tainted, and therefore the only thing to do with government is – in the famous words of activist Grover Norquist – “to shrink it down to the size where we can drown it in the bathtub.”The gradual diffusion of these anti-government attitudes through the conservative movement and the Republican Party has rendered the American right worse than irrelevant to the project of restoring American state capacity. It has become actively hostile, undermining the motivations needed to launch such a project and the virtues needed to pull it off.As I’ve already argued, none of this means that libertarians are wrong about everything, or that libertarian ideas are worthless. But it does mean that skepticism about government, standing alone, is an insufficient foundation for good governance. The insights of libertarian thought – suspicion of centralized power, alertness to how even the best-intended government measures can still go horribly wrong, recognition of the enormous fertility of the marketplace’s decentralized, trial-and-error experimentation – are genuine and abiding. But they are not sufficient. The ideology of libertarianism claims otherwise: It asserts that a set of important but partial and contingent truths are in fact a comprehensive and timeless blueprint for the ideal political order. The error of this assertion has been made painfully obvious by the pandemic, but it was increasingly evident for many years beforehand. The overlap between genuine libertarian insights and the pressing challenges facing the American polity has been steadily shrinking since the end of the 20th century.(…)For those of us who continue to believe in the indispensability of a critical stance toward government power, the task before us is one of intellectual reconstruction. We must reject minimal government as the organizing principle of policy reform. Making or keeping government as small as possible is an ideological fixation, not a sound principle of good governance. Small government is a false idol, and it is time we smash it. In its place, we should erect effective government as the goal that guides the development and evaluation of public policy. For maxims, we can look to America’s greatest stateman. “The legitimate object of government,” wrote Abraham Lincoln, “is to do for a community of people, whatever they need to have done, but can not do, at all, or can not, so well do, for themselves—in their separate, and individual capacities.”

Guided by the principle of effective government, we will sometimes conclude that government needs to be smaller, and sometimes that it needs to be larger – depending on the circumstances. Given where things stand today, we will often conclude that government can be made simpler. We will continue to champion the ideals of free markets and limited government, but we must reconceive those ideals to free them from their libertarian baggage.Free markets are the foundation of our prosperity and an important motor of social advance. But we need to see them, not as something that exists in the absence of government, but rather as complex achievements of good government. Free markets as we know them today are impossible without the modern state, and they function best when embedded in and supported by a structure of public goods that only government can adequately provide. The guiding principle of effective government, meanwhile, continues to impose important limits on the exercise of state power – but the contours of those limits are quite different from those demanded by libertarian ideology. Here the limiting principle addresses not the scope or subject matter of government action, but rather the effect of that action: The government policy or program in question must actually succeed in advancing its stated public purpose, and under no circumstances may benefit narrow private interests at public expense. The limiting principle, then, grows out of commitment to the public interest, not antipathy to government. The critical stance associated with policing the proper limits of state action thus shifts from anti-government to anti-corruption.