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It’s the Stupidity, Stupid
“The best way for people to prevent spread is to get vaccinated … second best is to wear masks.” – Justice Kagan
This is so stunningly counterfactual, so blindingly stupid that it is upsetting that a Supreme Court Justice deciding federal COVID policy made this statement. How can she not know that infection case numbers have not in any way declined anywhere on the planet as a result of large vaccination rates? How can she not know that mask mandates (even with actual high usage) have resulted in immeasurably small to nonexistent reductions in spread? How can she not know that federal “experts” have recently declared cloth and surgical masks to be useless — after two years hectoring us to use them?
How scary is it that this highly qualified, high-ranking federal judge is not only spectacularly misinformed but seemingly confident in her grasp of the issues? Does mere membership in the bubble-dwelling self-congratulatory elite excuse this kind of cognitive malpractice?
What does this woman read, watch and listen to—and what other spectacularly wrong opinions has she formed as a result? What the hell happened to America’s highly educated class that this kind of kneejerk partisan error is not an embarrassment but a norm.
It is healthy to have policy differences among Americans but when those we should be able to look to make the best-grounded, well-reasoned arguments for their side choose to be intellectually lazy to the point of absurdity, we have a real problem.
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I’m waiting for Clarence Thomas’s opinion before I do anything.
Or, the best way to listen to advice from Justice Kagan is when she’s mumbling something through her mask so you can’t really discern what she’s saying.
It is difficult to understand why if the Court, as in Kagan’s view, can accept the mandated vaccination as a legal health measure for the areas covered, there would not be justification to just mandate it for every person. Why would it have a limitation at all?
The issue is not so much about the science but the legal basis for the order. Not even the Biden clownshow proposes an express national mandate, just cumulative harrassment using existing regulatory overreach.
But Kagan referenced it in the health context rather than legal or Constitutional. It should not matter to her whether it is working or not.
“Shut up,” they explained.
She and Sotomayor do not rank high on the intelligence scale.
I have responded to judges who make such claims with: “Is there evidence in the record supporting that statement, or are you taking judicial notice?”
Both times, the judge (this was 2 different judges) snapped back at me angrily but didn’t answer the question.
I’m beginning to think that Leftism causes brain damage.
Hard to sort out the chicken & egg thing, there…
Or is it the other way around? (half joking)
Re: “How can she not know that infection case numbers have not in any way declined anywhere on the planet as a result of large vaccination rates?”
Well, actually ….
While I agree with your post, its vital that when castigating the Left for having their facts wrong that we have ours scrupulously in order. It is certainly true that vaccinated people can get sick (especially with the newest variant) and can infect others. But it is also true that they get infected at a lower rate than the unvaccinated.
Virginia does a particularly good job of providing Covid numbers by vaccine status. So I’m highlighting them as an example. But other data sets that include vaccine status show the same kind of thing. Here are the weekly new case numbers from VA from the week ending 12/18/21. ( The last full week before the data might have some Holiday hinkiness ) This is the rate of infection per 100,000 population by vaccine status.
Now, it could be that, because their symptoms are so mild, that many vaccinated people who are actually infected never get tested so the case numbers for vaccinated are lower than they really are. But I don’t know of any reliable numbers on that.
Your inference that these numbers are influenced by frequency of apparent symptoms is likely correct.
This study finds that vaxxed people have half the incidence of culturable nasal viruses than the unvaxed but that this difference declines over time.
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.12.28.21268460v1
So unless we are all boostered every three months (and the virus doesn’t mutate anyway) we will soon reach a point where there will be no difference in infection rates. That is already the trend line.
Obviously the best way is to require hazmat suits. Since the Dem authoritarians have no limiting principles, why not mandate them. Wikipedia has about 60 vaccines in their list, why not require *all* of those too?
I think I get better information here without much effort than I would be able to sift out of public media with the same effort. You guys do good work. Thanks.
It could work out that way. My crystal ball isn’t that clear. We’ll see. In the meantime we have to be careful to avoid overstating the facts and to separate out the what is from the what might be.
I can say I’m not anti-vax. I have taken flu shots on numerous occasions for the last 25 years although not every year by any means. I haven’t taken these shots and the reason relates primarily to the fact that the trials usually required by the FDA were bypassed and the emergency approval process bypassed requiring “informed consent”. This was my initial position so I was waiting for that to change. Then there seemed to be some failures in the reporting of side effects in VAERs and there was a concerted effort to prevent doctors and their patients from engaging in treatments. I don’t know the facts there but quite a few medical professionals, doctors and nurses, have chimed in.
So I had my first open-heart surgery in 2007 and I have not had one sick day (no colds, sore throat, or sniffles) from then until a few weeks ago when I had a sore throat for a few days and then a cough that persisted diminishing to nothing after a month. I had something I thought was the flu about 2002 and that was the last time I could remember having such an illness, almost 20 years. Maybe this is why I am not anxious about not having gotten this vaccine. But every day that passes makes me trust this government less or maybe there is no trust at all left.
What does that mean, “taking judicial notice?”
Have you already shown us that trend line and I missed it.
First, start with the fact that the number of unvaxed declines as a result of attrition and vaccination. Second, infection numbers are increasing rapidly. The latter can’t happen unless the vaxxed are increasingly infected. I first noticed the trend in Minnesota dat from the incomparable Kevin Roche.
Omicron is at 85% of COVID infections in heavily vaxxed Denmark. Infections in the boostered over age 40 are groups are now predominant (see below: Orange in unvaxed, blue is two shots, green is boostered, red is previously inflected. From @ianmSC) the trend is unambiguous.
I gotta assume that the vaccines must offer some reduction in transmission, at least in the short term but apparently not as much as I had once assumed. And Dr. Fauci expressly told us that vaccinations would function like herd immunity and reduce transmission to a trickle once we exceeded 70% vaxxed. It is the failure to distinguish between the reality of modest, declining, disappearing reductions and what was promised (back when it was a disease of the unvaxed) that I object to. Kagan still believes an inoperant version of the narrative which is inexcusably innumerate.
“Judicial notice” is when a fact is assumed without having to present evidence because the fact is so well established that it would be a waste of the court’s time to put on evidence to prove the fact. For example, the court can take judicial notice that gravity causes things to fall toward earth. If in court a party proves that an object left an airplane and later was found on the ground, the party does not have to prove how or why the object traveled from the airplane to the ground – the court could take judicial notice that gravity exists, and causes items to fall to the ground.
Justice Kagan is stating a factual conclusion (vaccines and masks prevent the spread of disease (presumably specific to Covid). Ryan’s question would be asking Justice Kagan to point to where in the court trial’s record is the evidence that supports that factual conclusion, knowing full well that there is none. So, is she saying that the efficacy of vaccines and masks to prevent spread of (presumably this particular) disease is so well established that no proof is necessary? A lot of people will disagree with Justice Kagan’s statement of fact. Judges are not supposed to take judicial notice of contested facts.
This reminds me when I was in a small Tantra Yoga workshop in 2003, and the leader said something about “praying” , or something like it, for the “victims of the war”.
Feeling quite global in this spiritual context, I asked, “Which war?”
She said, “What do you mean, which war?
“Well, I just read that the UN says that this year, there are currently 28 separate wars going on”
She had no response.
But there were no more oblique political overtures after that.
This is not true. Justice Kagan is very capable. Justice Sotomayor is competent, but in my view is below the usual standard for a SCOTUS justice. Sotomayor is competent to be a federal appeals court judge, in my view.
I disagree with both of them about a great many issues, but this is not due to a lack of intelligence on their part.
About the OP:
First of all, can someone provide a link supporting assertion “that federal “experts” have recently declared cloth and surgical masks to be useless”? I have not seen any such evidence, and this seems to be a disputed issue.
Second of all, it does appear that there is quite a bit of evidence that vaccination is the best way to prevent spread.
My own impression is that Justice Kagan got it mostly right. The best way to stop the spread is vaccination, though it is not perfect. Masking is probably high on the list of other ways to stop spread, but it has very limited effectiveness. I’m not sure if masking is second on the list — quarantine and social distancing might be a bit more effective, and these three probably are not very effective, but are probably better than nothing.
I agree which is why this is so disgraceful. Surfing the NYT/WaPo/CNN zeitgeist as if that were a viable substitute for intellectual vigor is no way to go through life.
Thank you very much. I can see where it may be useful to know that term.
Jerry Giordano (Arizona Patrio… (View Comment
My own impression is that Justice Kagan got it mostly right. The best way to stop the spread is vaccination, though it is not perfect. Masking is probably high on the list of other ways to stop spread, but it has very limited effectiveness. I’m not sure if masking is second on the list — quarantine and social distancing might be a bit more effective, and these three probably are not very effective, but are probably better than nothing.
No.
Vaccination greatly reduces the incidence and severity of symptoms in the infected vaxxed but has not reduced community spread at all.
Jurisdictions that masked do not have lower incidence than those that do not.
Quarantine is absolutely useless and the prior science told us that it would be given the nature and timing of infectiousness of respiratory pandemics.
Social distancing is a fetish that ultimately makes no difference in shared enclosed spaces.
No lockdowns worked even to provide a delay in spread. The followup studies are near unanimous.
The science told us that we should have circled the PPE wagons around the vulnerable and not kidded ourselves that any of these general suppression strategies would have worked. It is enraging that with all the data available, we are still discouraged (or cancelled) if we question the bogus assumptions behind any of this.
Scientifically speaking, Atlas and the Great Barrington guys were right. The mindless general NPI mandaters were wrong. It is not even a close call anymore.
It is pretty obvious that Justice Kagan is unaware of just how unscientific her statements were. The lack of awareness that there is even another, far more substantive side to the policy issue is deeply troubling.
The best way to slow (i.e. not stop) the spread is for everyone to stay home, but the cost/benefit ratio is too high. Second best would be rigorous use of tests, which thanks to FDA bullheadedness and Biden’s market distortions is probably not practical right now. Vaccination certainly can help, too, but that no longer seems to be the main benefit of vaccines. Masking could help, too, but I’d put it well behind the others, in 4th place.
Maybe some could argue otherwise, but it’s not at all obvious that vaccines are the best for that purpose. I’m glad we have the vaccines and wish more people would get vaccinated, but vaccination status is not going to make workplaces safe. A little safer, maybe, but not safe enough to justify Kagan’s sweeping remarks.
‘If it just saves one person…from getting the flu, it’s worth it!’