#arizona coronavirus

[angelx1992]

[versatileer]

What Exactly Does the Word 'Law' Mean? How Government Works – PART V of Freedom For Which the Flag Stands Series '24

What Exactly Does the Word ‘Law’ Mean? As part of a special concerning the “Freedom For Which the Flag Stands“, and just in time for the elections, I am featuring a special treat for my viewers. In the final of a Five part weekly series for 2024, I am featuring the scope of what the word “law” really means. What is the difference? Is what you think law is really a law–or not? Is is a state issue,…

[shiftythrifting]

Coronavirus shaped lights and an AZ license plate (we don’t live in Arizona)

[covid-safer-hotties]

Also preserved in our archive

Coronavirus infections in the United States are up in December, according to the latest figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

The week that ended Saturday, December 7, saw test positivity rates rise to 5.4 percent; higher than the last week of November (4 percent) and the week before (4.5 percent).

Rates of COVID-19 positivity—the percentage of people taking COVID-19 tests who have a positive result—were higher in states in the middle of the U.S. compared with states nearer the East or West coasts.

Texas and its bordering states, known as region 6, had the highest rates in the country at 6.4 percent, closely followed by region 5 (Minnesota to Ohio) at 6.1 percent.

Regions 7 (Nebraska to Missouri) and 8 (Montana to Colorado) had rates of 6 and 5.9 percent respectively.

In contrast, the area with the lowest rates of COVID positivity was in the Southeast, region 4 (Florida to Kentucky), with only 2.2 percent of COVID tests coming back positive.

(Follow the link for the interactive map!)

The percentage of emergency department visits that were diagnosed as COVID has remained largely unchanged in recent weeks, at 0.6 percent—with the highest rates located in the Southwest: New Mexico at 1.8 percent and Arizona at 1.5 percent.

Deaths from COVID are highest in North Carolina, with 1.4 percent of deaths attributed to the virus.

California, Michigan, New York and Florida also have higher than average rates of COVID-related deaths, ranging from 1.2 percent in California to 0.6 percent in Florida.

These rates are low compared to the same month last year, according to data from the CDC's hospitalization surveillance network, called COVID-NET.

Preliminary data from COVID-NET indicates that 1.4 people per 100,000 were hospitalized with COVID in the U.S. during the week ending December 7.

That is much less than the 6.1 per 100,000 people that were hospitalized with COVID during the same week in 2023.

The same data shows that since October 2024, 19.1 per 100,000 people have cumulatively been hospitalized with COVID—compared to 48 per 100,000 during the same period in 2023.

The CDC recommends that everyone aged 6 months and older should get a COVID-19 vaccine this season, meaning from October 2024 to September 2025.

This is because vaccine protection decreases over time and because the vaccines are updated to give people the best protection against new strains.

The newest COVID-19 strain is called XEC, a subvariant of Omicron that is believed to be more transmissible, but milder than previous strains.

The CDC lists current likely symptoms of COVID-19 as:

Fever or chills Cough Shortness of breath or difficulty breathing Sore throat Congestion or runny nose New loss of taste or smell Fatigue Muscle or body aches Headache Nausea or vomiting Diarrhea

Many of these symptoms overlap with other illnesses, such as flu, which is why experts advise taking a test to find out what the illness is. These can be mailed to people's homes for free.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Walter Einenkel at Daily Kos:

Anti-immigrant lies and rhetoric spewed by Donald Trump and his party have caused real and terrifying results. On Thursday, several city, county, and school buildings in Springfield, Ohio, were targeted by a bomb threat. On Friday, a Springfield middle school was closed and two elementary schools were evacuated. ABC News originally reported that there was no direct connection made between the threats and the GOP's repeated racist lies about Haitian immigrants abducting and eating pets. Additionally, ABC reported it was not “immediately clear if Friday's evacuations were from a new threat or linked to bomb threats sent via email Thursday morning.” But in an interview with The Washington Post, Springfield Mayor Rob Rue said that Thursday’s bomb threat “used hateful language towards immigrants and Haitians in our community.”

During Tuesday night’s presidential debate, Trump erroneously claimed, “In Springfield, they're eating the dogs. The people that came in. They're eating the cats. They're eating—they're eating the pets of the people that live there.” This lie has also been pushed by his running mate Sen. JD Vance a number of times. And Trump continued to perpetuate the lie, adding geese this time, in a campaign rally Thursday in Arizona.

The Haitian Times reported that some of Springfield’s Haitian community has felt so threatened during this barrage of right-wing hate-propaganda that they chose to keep their children home from school following the debate. “We’re all victims this morning,” one woman, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals, told the outlet. “They’re attacking us in every way.”  The same kind of racist rhetoric has also besieged Venezuelan immigrants in Colorado. Trump has repeatedly pushed bullshit crime numbers (which he did once again during the debate), targeting Venezuelan communities in the Centennial State as filled with “gangs,” and saying they were “taking over” Colorado cities. 

[...] This is sadly par for the course during a time of fascistic and hateful rhetoric. We saw it with Asian hate crimes rising during COVID-19 pandemic, when Trump and others would frequently use derogatory terms for the coronavirus such as “Kung Flu,” and the “Chinese Virus.” We've seen it in the rise of antisemitism connected to the rise of MAGA extremist rhetoric and conspiracy theory as well as the Palestinian/Israeli conflict. The consequences of the Republican Party’s need to target, isolate, and divide various groups of people, are that innocent, hardworking people suffer. At the same time, without any meaningful policies, the fear and economic uncertainty that the GOP repeats remains the same.  Trump said Tuesday during the debate that the Haitian immigrants in Springfield were “destroying” the residents’ “entire way of life.” That divisiveness, despite the fact that these Haitian Americans are part of that community, is the Trump way. And in a country made up almost entirely of immigrants, there’s always someone to blame.

Aurora, CO and Springfield, OH are two communities in the news recently as a result of right-wing hate mobs targeting the cities to push their anti-immigrant BS.

[shadowfromthestarlight]

The Biden administration put out a press release announcing that the $83 million in federal funds for the McCain Library were being drawn from the American Rescue Plan’s Capital Projects Fund. The full name of the fund is actually the Coronavirus Capital Projects Fund. The Coronavirus Capital Projects Fund consisted of $10 billion that was supposed to “directly support recovery from the COVID-19 public health emergency” in response “to the public health emergency”. Now nearly 1% of that original $10 billion is being used to build a non-presidential library that will somehow help us “recover” from the pandemic. The McCain Library is getting nearly as much CCF cash as the total given to tribal governments. It appears to be one of the largest single beneficiaries of the coronavirus emergency fund. There is something appropriate in one career politician honoring another through a massive misappropriation of funds that were only allocated due to a national emergency. A politician’s library is not a response to a public health emergency. The Biden administration’s justification for the massive misappropriation of funds is the claim that the McCain Library will provide a space for health screenings and job fairs. There were far cheaper ways to provide a space for job fairs than an $83 million senatorial library. Arizona could host ten thousand job fairs for that kind of money and provide actual health resources to the people who really need them. The $83 million in misappropriated coronavirus emergency money had nothing to do with a public health emergency and everything to do with an urgent political emergency. Biden is underwater in the polls and the McCain family have become crucial allies against Republicans. The 2024 presidential candidate didn’t travel to Arizona to promote an $83 million space where someone might occasionally hold a job fair, but to use McCain to attack Republicans. In a speech with McCain family members and former Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, who supervised the gubernatorial election that she claimed to have won, in attendance, Biden warned that Republicans represented an urgent threat to democracy. In his ‘democracy’ speech, Biden claimed that, “democracy means rule of the people, not rule of monarchs, not rule of the monied, not rule of the mighty.” If that’s what democracy means, what does it mean when a career politician takes $83 million in public health emergency funding to build an institution honoring another career politician that is backing his unpopular campaign? Biden wasn’t handing out that $83 million and delivering a speech about the importance of democracy to uphold it, but to undermine it. Faced with an unwinnable election, Biden is turning to Arizona as a model for his 2024 election strategy. The plan, there and everywhere, is to stigmatize his political opponents as dangerous extremists, to divide the GOP,  break off influential party interests, and encourage public officials to violate the law in managing the election and counting the votes by insisting that democracy will be destroyed if he loses. This isn’t democracy: it’s an end-run around democracy. The majority of Democrats and Americans don’t want Biden back in office. The polls have been crystal clear about that. But Biden isn’t interested in what the majority of his party and his country think. He’s not betting on democracy, but on a political establishment that bridges party differences. The $83 million in coronavirus recovery funding allocated to the McCain Library shows why Biden, like McCain, feared democracy and chose oligarchy over listening to the people. The real threat to democracy comes from established political interests subverting elections and the multi-trillion budgets they pass and then distribute shows how they subvert America.

[mediaexposed]

The vaccine 💉 tip looks like a snake tongue 🐍

They call it a jab. Like a snake jab.

This is the first synthetic mRNA going into peoples bloodstream directly

If you look up the word human on emoji search bar on iPhones it’s: 🧫🧬🫀🤖

Trumps tower in Chicago looks just like the vaccine needle

University of Arizona and many scientists found high level of snake enzymes and venom inside people dying of covid organ failure.

1.) https://www.abc15.com/news/coronavirus/university-of-arizona-researchers-find-link-between-covid-deaths-and-snake-venom

2.) https://azpbs.org/horizon/2021/09/enzyme-found-in-snake-venom-driving-covid/

A snake bite 🐍💉causes

Loss of taste

Loss of smell

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9155339/amp/NSW-man-lost-sense-taste-smell-bitten-red-bellied-black-snake-three-years-ago.html

The anti venom to snake bites? The blood of a lamb! Jesus is the perfect lamb

🐑 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2005-05-23/sheeps-blood-provides-rattlesnake-anti-venom/1576314

China is the dragon 🐉

Bible says dragon is Satan

Corona means crown 👑

Satan getting crown

Covid backwards in Hebrew means demon of a dead spirit

This is spiritual warfare

Bible says all life is in the blood…

The blood of the lamb.

We cannot taint our blood with any more vaccines or boosters that are full of snake enzymes to make immune system so dependent and weak.

It is proven covid mRNA vaccines do alter DNA through reverse transcriptase because reverse transcriptase is an enzyme that is a product of cDNA which if you click Moderna patents: the cDNA is long listed.

Pharmekia in Greek means poison, sorcery, witchcraft, drugs.

Bible says all nation deceived by it’s sorcery

If you got vaccinated , must repent and truly ask Jesus to cleanse your temple again

[markpickardlife]

Three years ago in 2019, visiting my father while he was visiting my sister in Arizona. That was right before the coronavirus outbreak. <3 https://www.instagram.com/p/CpbecqvSP6Q/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[amaditalks]

In case anyone else wanted specifics, Sinema’s little show here was her no vote against an amendment that would’ve included a minimum wage increase in the massive coronavirus relief bill from 2021.

She also helped to tank the passage of the John Lewis Voting Rights Act.

Her seat is up in this cycle. If you’re in Arizona, be ready to vote in the primary in August. The Democratic front runner and almost certain nominee is Ruben Gallego, who currently represents most of the Phoenix metro area in the House of Representatives. The apparent Republican front runner is Kari Lake, the ethically unsourced election denying Trumpist who lost the last gubernatorial election. 

[newstfionline]

Sunday, September 8, 2024

Georgia Tests a Novel Tactic in School Shootings: Putting Parents on Trial (NYT) In a landmark criminal case in Michigan earlier this year, James and Jennifer Crumbley became the first parents convicted in connection with killings carried out by their child in a mass shooting. Now, in the first mass school shooting in the United States since those convictions, Georgia officials appear poised to try the same tactic. On Thursday, prosecutors filed charges, including two counts of second-degree murder, against the father of the suspect, saying he had provided a gun to his son “with knowledge that he was a threat to himself and others.” Such charges were all but unheard of before the Michigan case, and the Georgia prosecution will test the emerging push to hold parents responsible for mass shootings by young people. The prosecutions raise thorny questions about culpability. “These cases are horrible, and I very much understand why a prosecutor would feel like parents like this were egregious in their lack of care,” Professor Yankah said. “But I do think it’s worth pausing to realize that we have blown right by a deeply held principle: that you’re only responsible for your actions, and that when other people act, you’re not responsible for what they do.”

For the second year in a row, most U.S. cities are seeing significant declines in homicides and violent crime (Washington Post) Crime is falling rapidly in many U.S. cities for the second year in a row, a decline attributed in part to the end of the pandemic’s empty streets and shuttered stores. Law enforcement officials also credit a renewed focus on gun crimes—analyzing evidence faster, hitting suspects with federal charges where possible, and quickening the pace of arrests to prevent tit-for-tat violence. Violent crime shot up during the coronavirus pandemic and its immediate aftermath. In 2020, killings jumped nearly 30 percent, the largest one-year increase since the federal government began compiling national figures in the 1960s.

These Americans want out (NYT) Amid an election cycle fueled by existential rhetoric, some Americans are thinking about walking away. Not from politics. From the entire country. This summer, nearly 2,000 readers responded to a New York Times survey asking if they would leave the United States should their favored candidate lose the presidential election in November. Another 3,000 people responded to similar questions asked over social media. Some respondents had already moved. Others were taking the steps—looking for jobs overseas, or seeking ways to qualify for residency. Their reasons were varied, though the candidates at the top of the ballot figured prominently. Many said they feared the country might spiral into authoritarianism should Donald Trump win a second term. Others were deeply concerned about how a Kamala Harris administration would handle the war in Gaza and the economy. There was more general angst—about gun violence, political vitriol, abortion restrictions, rising antisemitism, racism and L.G.B.T.Q. discrimination. Overwhelmingly, respondents were in their prime working years—not students, retirees or wealthy travelers—and straddled the political spectrum. “There is a general sense that the U.S. is in decline and it doesn’t matter who wins this next election,” said Megan A. Carney, an associate professor of anthropology at the University of Arizona.

Chinese migrants in Mexico (AP) Despite her well-paying tech job, Li Daijing didn’t hesitate when her cousin asked for help running a restaurant in Mexico City. She packed up and left China for the Mexican capital last year, with dreams of a new adventure. The 30-year-old woman from Chengdu, the Sichuan provincial capital, hopes one day to start an online business importing furniture from her home country. “I want more,” Li said. “I want to be a strong woman. I want independence.” Li is among a new wave of Chinese migrants who are leaving their country in search of opportunities, more freedom or better financial prospects at a time when China’s economy has slowed, youth unemployment rates remain high and its relations with the U.S. and its allies have soured. While the U.S. border patrol arrested tens of thousands of Chinese at the U.S-Mexico border over the past year, thousands are making the Latin American country their final destination. Many have hopes to start businesses of their own, taking advantage of Mexico’s proximity to the U.S.

Argentina’s unusual currency (Foreign Policy) In response to Argentine President Javier Milei’s austerity measures, the poor northeastern province of La Rioja has unveiled its own currency. Milei’s policies have dramatically reduced funding to the opposition-led provincial government, which defaulted on its debt in February. La Rioja’s governor, who created the currency, hopes that it can stimulate the local economy. The currency, the chacho, is named after a local historical hero and can be exchanged for pesos at a fixed rate. The governor has so far distributed more than $3 million worth of chachos to residents. Although the measure is a political affront to Milei, he has signaled that he will not block it. Whether it will help La Rioja’s economy, however, is another question: Analysts told Bloomberg that this type of money-printing is what got Argentina into its financial straits in the first place.

September heat wave in Europe (Washington Post) With the hottest time of year on average in the rear view, Europe is still scorching as summer transitions to fall. In recent days, many parts of Scandinavia have posted their highest temperatures on record so late in the year. Several other European countries have also set notable September heat milestones, including Austria, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy and Slovenia. The September heat wave follows Europe’s hottest summer on record and the hottest summer for the planet.

Distracted and Divided, Russian Security Service Misses Threats (NYT) On the day Ukraine launched its daring incursion into Russia’s Kursk region, the Federal Security Service, the Russian agency most responsible for protecting the border, played down the seriousness of the operation. Calling it “an armed provocation,” the agency said its forces were working to push the Ukrainians back. That was nearly a month ago. Since then, Ukrainian forces have occupied a small but significant patch of Russian territory and killed or captured hundreds of Russian troops, according to officials, analysts and satellite imagery. President Vladimir V. Putin has said an assessment of the failures in Kursk would be made only after the situation in Russia’s border region had stabilized, but intelligence experts say that a large measure of the responsibility rests with the Federal Security Service. Despite its sprawling networks of agents and vast budget, the agency, known as the F.S.B., first failed to anticipate the Ukrainian incursion and is now struggling along with the Russian Army to dislodge a sizable Ukrainian fighting force.

‘Out of a Horror Movie:’ Typhoon Yagi Makes Landfall in Vietnam (NYT) Typhoon Yagi made landfall in Vietnam on Saturday, packing powerful winds and torrential rain that killed at least four people and injured more than 70 people, according to state-run media, and forced tens of thousands to evacuate. Earlier, the storm smashed into southern China, where at least three people died. The typhoon, one of the most powerful to strike northern Vietnam, made landfall at 1:30 p.m. near the city of Haiphong. The storm’s gales sank boats, broke utility poles and uprooted trees in coastal towns near Halong Bay. More than eight million people in the northern provinces were experiencing power failures, according to state-run media. Vessels in the Quang Ninh were swept away, some with crew members onboard, according to news accounts. One sailor was killed and more than a dozen others were missing. “I’ve never seen anything like this in my life,” said Nguyen Viet Anh, 32, a resident of Ha Long City, in a phone interview. “I don’t even recognize my town,” he said, describing the fallen trees and tin roofs ripped off homes. “It’s just like out of a horror movie.”

Prince Hisahito becomes the first royal male in Japan to reach adulthood in 4 decades (AP) In a big milestone for Japan’s royal family, Prince Hisahito turned 18 on Friday, becoming the first male royal family member to reach adulthood in almost four decades. It is a significant development for a family that has ruled for more than a millennium but faces the same existential problems as the rest of the nation—a fast-aging, shrinking population. Hisahito, who is set to become the emperor one day, is the nephew of Japanese Emperor Naruhito. His father, Crown Prince Akishino, was the last male to reach adulthood in the family, in 1985. His status as the last heir apparent poses a major problem for a system that doesn’t allow empresses. The government is debating how to keep succession stable without relying on women. The 1947 Imperial House Law, which largely preserves conservative pre-war family values, only allows a male to succeed to the throne.

Gaza enters its 2nd school year without schooling (AP) This week, when they would normally be going back to school, the Qudeh family’s children stumbled with armfuls of rubble they collected from a destroyed building to sell for use in building graves in the cemetery that is now their home in southern Gaza. “Anyone our age in other countries is studying and learning,” said 14-year-old Ezz el-Din Qudeh, after he and his three siblings—the youngest a 4-year-old—hauled a load of concrete chunks. “We’re not. We’re working at something beyond our capacities. We are forced to in order to get a living.” As Gaza enters its second school year without schooling, most of its children are caught up helping their families in the daily struggle to survive amid Israel’s devastating campaign. Children trod barefoot on the dirt roads to carry water in plastic jerricans from distribution points to their families living in tent cities teeming with Palestinians driven from their homes. Others wait at charity kitchens with containers to bring back food. Humanitarian workers say the extended deprivation of education threatens long-term damage to Gaza’s children.

They Thought It Was Safe to Go Home (NYT) After Boko Haram fighters threatened them, they could not risk staying. Over a decade, the extremist group had killed tens of thousands of people in the cross-border scrubland around them. So the residents of Mafa, a village in northeast Nigeria’s Yobe State, fled in terror. About two weeks after that evacuation in late July, according to a village leader, a local official told them it was safe to go back. It was a catastrophic decision that ended last Sunday in fighters killing dozens of villagers, mostly men and boys, and burning Mafa to the ground. At least 170 people were killed, and more are missing. It came on the heels of another major attack in West Africa—on Barsalogho, a town in Burkina Faso, where members of another terrorist group killed as many as 400 people on Aug. 24, according to victims’ relatives.

Four Thieves Vinegar Collective (404 Media) An anarchist collective called Four Thieves Vinegar makes it its mission to teach people how to make do-it-yourself pharmaceuticals to drastically cut the cost of drugs at the expense of, essentially, bootleg drugs, arguing effectively for a right to repair but for your body. For instance, the hepatitis C drug Sovaldi costs $1,000 per pill, taken once per day for 12 weeks, an $84,000 treatment that works reliably. Initially, the chemists working there thought a DIY version synthesized from available precursors would cost $300 for the entire course, or $3.57 per pill, but they actually got it to $70 for the course, or 83 cents per pill. Mixæl Swan Laufer, the chief spokesperson of Four Thieves, said that the research that goes into making a new drug is hard, but that actually producing some of these medications after they’ve been invented is sometimes easy and inexpensive. Charging astronomical prices to people who are dying is immoral, and Four Thieves seeks to normalize the idea of making some types of medicine yourself. [Note: This is not an endorsement of Four Thieves.]

[angelx1992]

[lenbryant]

(Long Post Atlantic) Rural Republicans Are Fighting to Save Their Public Schools

Many state legislators see voucher programs as a threat to the anchors of their communities.

By Alec MacGillis

This article was featured in the One Story to Read Today newsletter. Sign up for it here.

This article is a collaboration between The Atlantic and ProPublica.

Drive an hour south of Nashville into the rolling countryside of Marshall County, Tennessee—past horse farms, mobile homes, and McMansions—and you will arrive in Chapel Hill, population 1,796. It’s the birthplace of Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest, who helped found the Ku Klux Klan. And it’s the home of Todd Warner, one of the most unlikely and important defenders of America’s besieged public schools.

Warner is the gregarious 53-year-old owner of PCS of TN, a 30-person company that does site grading for shopping centers and other construction projects. The second-term Republican state representative “absolutely” supports Donald Trump, who won Marshall County by 50 points in 2020. Warner likes to talk of the threats posed by culture-war bogeymen, such as critical race theory; diversity, equity, and inclusion; and Sharia law.

And yet, one May afternoon in his office, under a TV playing Fox News and a mounted buck that he’d bagged in Alabama, he told me about his effort to halt Republican Governor Bill Lee’s push for private-school vouchers in Tennessee. Warner’s objections are rooted in the reality of his district: It contains not a single private school, so to Warner, taxpayer money for the new vouchers would clearly be flowing elsewhere, mostly to well-off families in metro Nashville, Memphis, and other cities whose kids are already enrolled in private schools. Why should his small-town constituents be subsidizing the private education of metropolitan rich kids? “I’m for less government, but it’s government’s role to provide a good public education,” he said. “If you want to send your kid to private school, then you should pay for it.”

The coronavirus pandemic provided a major boost to supporters of school vouchers, who argued that extended public-school closures—and the on-screen glimpses they afforded parents of what was being taught to their kids—underscored the need to give parents greater choice in where to send their children. Eleven states, led by Florida and Arizona, now have universal or near-universal vouchers, meaning that even affluent families can receive thousands of dollars toward their kids’ private-school tuition.

Read: Salvaging education in rural America

The beneficiaries in these states are mostly families whose kids were already enrolled in private schools, not families using the vouchers to escape struggling public schools. In larger states, the annual taxpayer tab for the vouchers is close to $1 billion, leaving less money for public schools at a time when they already face the loss of federal pandemic aid.

Voucher advocates, backed by a handful of billionaire funders, are on the march to bring more red and purple states into the fold for “school choice,” their preferred terminology for vouchers. And again and again, they are running up against rural Republicans like Warner, who are joining forces with Democratic lawmakers in a rare bipartisan alliance. That is, it’s the reddest regions of these red and purple states that are putting up some of the strongest resistance to the conservative assault on public schools.

Conservative orthodoxy at the national level holds that parents must be given an out from a failing public-education system that force-feeds children progressive fads. But many rural Republican lawmakers have trouble reconciling this with the reality in their districts, where many public schools are not only the sole educational option, but also the largest employer and the hub of the community—where everyone goes for holiday concerts, Friday-night football, and basketball. Unlike schools in blue metro areas, rural schools mostly reopened for in-person instruction in the fall of 2020, and they are far less likely to be courting controversy on issues involving race and gender.

Demonizing public education in the abstract is one thing. But it’s quite another when the target is the school where you went, where your kids went. For Todd Warner, that was Forrest High School, in Chapel Hill. “My three kids graduated from public schools, and they turned out just fine,” he said. “Ninety-five percent of our students, our future business owners, our future leaders, are going to the public schools. They’re not going to private. Why take it away from them?”

The response from voucher proponents to the resistance from fellow Republicans has taken several forms, all of which implicitly grant the critics’ case that voucher programs currently offer little benefit to rural areas. In some states, funding for vouchers is being paired with more money for public schools, to offer support for rural districts. In Ohio, voucher advocates are proposing to fund the construction of new private schools in rural areas where none exist, giving families places to use vouchers.

But the overriding Republican response to rural skeptics has been a political threat: Get with the program on vouchers, or else.

That’s what played out this year in Ohio’s Eighty-Third District, in the state’s rural northwest. Last summer, Ohio adopted universal private-school vouchers, with middle- and working-class families eligible for up to $8,407 per high-school student and even the very wealthiest families eligible for almost $1,000 per child. Private-school leaders urged already enrolled families to seek the money, and more than 140,000 families applied for vouchers. The cost has exceeded estimates, approaching $1 billion, with most of it going to the parochial schools that dominate the state’s private-school landscape. Voucher advocates are now pushing to create educational savings accounts to cover tuition at unchartered private schools that are not eligible for the vouchers.

Read: Do private school vouchers promote segregation?

School leaders in Hardin County—with its cornfields, solar-panel installations, and what was once one of the largest dairy farms east of the Mississippi—are deeply worried that vouchers stand to hurt county residents. Only a single small private school is within reach, one county to the south, which means that virtually no local taxpayers would see any of that voucher money themselves—it would be going to private-school families in Columbus, Cincinnati, and other large population centers. (And under Ohio law, the very public schools that are losing students must pay to transport any students who attend private institutions within a half-hour drive of the public school.)

Craig Hurley, the superintendent for Hardin’s Upper Scioto Valley District, is a solidly built 52-year-old who calls himself a staunch conservative. He attended the district’s schools and has worked in them for 30 years. He knows that they provide meals to 400 students, nearly two-thirds of whom qualify for free and reduced lunch. Even though the high school can muster only 20 players for football—basketball fares better—the fans come out to cheer. “Our district is our community,” he told me. “The more you separate that, the less of a community we’re going to be.”

Hurley has calculated that local schools are receiving less state funding per student than what private schools now receive for the maximum possible voucher amount. Yet private schools face almost none of the accountability that public schools do regarding how the money is spent and what outcomes it achieves. “We have fiscal responsibility on all of it, on every dime, every penny we spend,” he said. “There’s no audit for them.” Not to mention, he added, “a private school doesn’t have to accept all students, right? They pick who they want.”

Thirteen miles east, Chad Thrush, the school superintendent in Kenton, the county seat, noted that his school system is the second-largest employer in town, after Graphic Packaging, which makes plastic cups for vending machines. He worries that the rising cost of the voucher program will erode state funding for public schools, and he worries about what would happen to his district if a new private school opened in town. Thrush understands the appeal of vouchers for parents who want a leg up for their kid. But, he told me, “we need to be looking at how we’re preparing all students to be successful, not just my student.”

As it happens, the two superintendents have a crucial ally in Columbus: their state representative, Jon Cross. Like Warner in Tennessee, Cross is an ardent pro-Trump conservative, and deeply opposed to private-school vouchers. At a legislative hearing last year, he cut loose at a lobbyist for Americans for Prosperity—the conservative advocacy group founded by the industrialist Koch brothers—who was testifying for vouchers, one of the organization’s long-standing causes. “Wouldn’t we be better off taking some money in our budget to fix the schools?” Cross said. “I tell you what, I really like my public schools. I’m really proud that Carson and Connor, my sons, go to Kenton City Schools and get an education from there just like I did.”

The schools in Hardin and Marshall Counties are majority white. But some rural Republican legislators in other states have been willing to buck their party leaders on vouchers even in more racially diverse districts. In Georgia, of the 15 Republican state representatives who blocked a voucher proposal last year, more than half came from rural areas with substantial Black populations. One of them was Gerald Greene, who spent more than three decades as a high-school social-studies teacher and has managed to survive as a Republican in his majority-Black district in the state’s southwestern corner after switching parties in 2010.

Greene believes vouchers will harm his district. It has a couple of small private schools in it or just outside it—with student bodies that are starkly more white than the district’s public schools—but the majority of his constituents rely on the public schools, and he worries that vouchers will leave less money for them. “I just felt like we were abandoning our public schools,” he told me. “I’m not against private schools at all, but I just did not see how these vouchers would help southwestern Georgia.”

After failing to pass a voucher program last year, the state’s Republican governor, Brian Kemp, and proponents in the legislature tried again this year, and this time they succeeded, albeit with vouchers more constrained than elsewhere: They can be used only by students in school districts that are ranked in the bottom quartile and whose families make less than 400 percent of the poverty level ($120,000 for a family of four), and their total cost can’t exceed 1 percent of the state’s total education budget, which caps them now at $140 million.

Partisan pressures simply became too strong for some skeptical Republicans, including Greene’s counterpart in the Senate, Sam Watson. Seminole County Superintendent Mark Earnest told me about the conversation in which Watson let him know that he was going to have to support the limited vouchers. “They have turned this into a caucus priority. It’s getting very political,” Watson said. “Thanks for letting me know,” Earnest replied, “but all vouchers are bad for public education.” Watson’s response: “I know, but I couldn’t go with the Democrats. Sorry.” (Watson did not respond to a request for comment.)

The highest-profile rural Republican resistance to vouchers has come in Texas, the land of Friday Night Lights and far-flung oil-country settlements where the public schools anchor communities. Late last year, the Texas House voted 84–63 to strip vouchers out of a broad education bill. In response, Governor Greg Abbott launched a purge of anti-voucher Republicans in this year’s primaries, backed by millions of dollars from the Pennsylvania mega-donor Jeff Yass, a finance billionaire.

Among those targeted was Drew Darby, who represents a sprawling 10-county district in West Texas, and who frames the issue in starkly regional terms: The state’s metro areas depend on his constituents to provide “food, fiber, and hide,” to “tend the oil wells and wind turbines to provide electricity to people who want to be just a little cooler in the cities.” But without good public schools, these rural areas will wither. “Robert Lee, Winters, Sterling, Blackwell,” he said, listing some hamlets—“these communities exist because they have strong public schools. They would literally not exist without a good public-school system.”

Darby, a fiscal conservative, is also opposed to a new entitlement for private-school families that is projected to soon cost $2 billion a year. “In rural Texas, there’s not a whole lot of private-school options, and we want our schools to get every dollar they can. This doesn’t add $1, and it’s not good for rural Texas.”

Darby managed to stave off his primary challenge, but 11 of the 15 voucher resisters targeted by Abbott lost, several in races so close that they went to a runoff. Abbott is unapologetic: “Congratulations to all of tonight’s winners,” he said after the runoff. “Together, we will ensure the best future for our children.”

Also succumbing to his primary challenger was Jon Cross, in western Ohio. His opponent, Ty Mathews, managed to make the campaign about more than just vouchers, taking sides in a bitter leadership split within the GOP caucus. And for all the concerns that local school leaders have about the effect of vouchers, the threat remained abstract to many voters. “I’m not worried about it, because we don’t have the revenue here anyways in this town for anything to be taken from us to be given to a bigger town,” one 60-year-old woman told me after casting her vote for Mathews. A younger woman asked simply: “What exactly are the vouchers?”

But in Tennessee, Todd Warner and his allies staved off the threat again this year. To overcome rural resistance, voucher proponents in the Tennessee House felt the need to constrain them and pair them with hundreds of millions of dollars in additional funding for public schools, but this was at odds with the state Senate’s more straightforward voucher legislation. The two chambers were unable to come to an agreement before the session’s end in April, by which point the House bill had not even made it to the floor for a vote.

For Democratic voucher opponents in the state, the alliance with Warner and other rural Republicans was as helpful as it was unusual. “It was strange,” Representative Sam McKenzie, a Black Democrat from Knoxville, told me. McKenzie compared it to Twins, a movie in which Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny DeVito played unlikely fraternal twins: “Representative Warner and I were in lockstep opposition to this voucher scam.”

Watch: Why school choice fails

One voucher supporter, Representative Scott Cepicky, told me he was confident that his side would eventually prevail. “We’ll work on this again next year,” he said. “The governor is committed that we’re going to run on school choice again.” And Americans for Prosperity has made clear that it’s coming after voucher opponents. Its Tennessee state director, Tori Venable, told Warnerduring the legislative session that “I can’t protect you if you ain’t on the right side of this.”

Another conservative group, the American Federation for Children, sent out a text message in March attacking Warner for his opposition to “parental rights,” without using the term vouchers. And a retired teacher in Marshall County, Gwen Warren, told me she and her husband recently got a visit from an Americans for Prosperity canvasser citing Warner’s opposition to vouchers. “She said, ‘We’re going around the neighborhood trying to talk to people about vouchers. We feel like Tennesseans really want the voucher system.’” To which, Warren said, her husband replied, “You’re very much mistaken, lady. We don’t want vouchers in this county, and you need to go away.”

Warner remains unfazed by all this. He is pretty sure that his voucher opposition in fact helped him win his seat in 2020, after the incumbent Republican voted for a pilot voucher system limited to Nashville and Memphis. And he notes that no one has registered to challenge him in the state’s August 1 primary. “They tried to find a primary opponent but couldn’t,” he said with a chuckle. “I was born and raised here all my life. My family’s been here since the 18th century. I won’t say I can’t be beat, but bring your big-boy pants and come on, let’s go.”

This article is a collaboration between The Atlantic and ProPublica.

[covid-safer-hotties]

Also preserved in our archive

By Jess Thomson

"Very high" levels of SARS-CoV-2—the virus that causes COVID-19—have been detected in wastewater samples in the U.S.

Between October 27 and November 2, wastewater sampling from New Mexico revealed "very high" levels of the virus, with "high" levels being detected in Oregon, Arkansas, and Maine, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Meanwhile, "moderate" levels were detected in Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, Ohio, South Dakota, Virginia, and Wyoming.

Additionally, 19 states have "low" levels, and 13 states and D.C. have "minimal" levels, according to the CDC.

(follow link to see interactive map)

However, South Dakota, New Hampshire, Mississippi, Pennsylvania, and Virginia all have limited coverage, meaning that "data for the most recent week are based on a small part (less than 5 percent) of the population and may not represent viral activity levels for the entire state," the CDC explains.

This data represents a change from last week, where "very high" levels of viral activity were detected in Montana, and "high" levels in Arkansas, Maine, Minnesota, Nebraska and Wyoming.

The level of viruses in wastewater, especially when tracking viruses like SARS-CoV-2, is used to gauge the presence and spread of infections in a community. By analyzing the genetic material (like viral RNA) present in sewage, scientists can estimate the number of infected individuals in a given area, including those who may not have been tested or are asymptomatic.

"Wastewater (sewage) can be tested to detect traces of infectious diseases circulating in a community, even if people don't have symptoms," the CDC states. "You can use these data as an early warning that levels of infections may be increasing or decreasing in your community."

This method is especially helpful for early detection of outbreaks, as changes in wastewater virus levels can indicate a rise in cases before symptoms appear in the population or testing data reflects the increase.

Map shows where coronavirus has been detected in the wastewater across the U.S. Dark red states (New Mexico) have "very high" levels, while red states are "high", dark orange are "moderate", light orange are "low" and yellow are "minimal".

National COVID wastewater levels appear to be the lowest they have been since June, although levels in the Midwest seem to be on the rise in recent weeks.

A recent surge in COVID-19 cases has been mainly driven by a new set of subvariants, known as FLiRT, named for the locations of mutations on the virus's spike proteins—the structures that allow it to enter human cells.

These spike proteins also serve as targets for the immune system and vaccines, so changes in their makeup may enable the virus to evade the body's defenses more effectively. However, current vaccines are still expected to offer some protection against severe illness and long COVID-19.

As of November 2, the leading subvariant, KP.3.1.1 made up over 45 percent of COVID-19 cases in the U.S. over the prior two weeks, while the new XEC variant accounted for 9 percent, according to the CDC. KP.3 made up 21 percent, JN.1 made up 10 percent, and "other" made up 15 percent.

"There is no evidence, and no particular reason to believe, that XEC causes different symptoms than all the other SARS-CoV-2 currently in circulation," Professor Francois Balloux, a computational systems biologist at University College London in England, previously told Newsweek. "XEC is not expected to cause more (or less) severe symptoms than other lineages currently in circulation."

While COVID levels across the U.S. have been dropping since the summer, the "high" and "very high" levels in some states may indicate that winter infections may be about to leap.

Symptoms of COVID, according to the CDC, include:

Fever or chills Cough Shortness of breath or difficulty breathing Sore throat Congestion or runny nose New loss of taste or smell Fatigue Muscle or body aches Headache Nausea or vomiting Diarrhea

[brookstonalmanac]

Events 4.4 (after 1950)

1958 – The CND peace symbol is displayed in public for the first time in London. 1960 – France agrees to grant independence to the Mali Federation, a union of Senegal and French Sudan. 1963 – Bye Bye Birdie, a musical romantic comedy film directed by George Sidney, was released. 1964 – The Beatles occupy the top five positions on the Billboard Hot 100 pop chart. 1967 – Martin Luther King Jr. delivers his "Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence" speech in New York City's Riverside Church. 1968 – Martin Luther King Jr. is assassinated by James Earl Ray at a motel in Memphis, Tennessee. 1968 – Apollo program: NASA launches Apollo 6. 1969 – Dr. Denton Cooley implants the first temporary artificial heart. 1973 – The Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City are officially dedicated. 1973 – A Lockheed C-141 Starlifter, dubbed the Hanoi Taxi, makes the last flight of Operation Homecoming. 1975 – Microsoft is founded as a partnership between Bill Gates and Paul Allen in Albuquerque, New Mexico. 1975 – Vietnam War: A United States Air Force Lockheed C-5A Galaxy transporting orphans, crashes near Saigon, South Vietnam shortly after takeoff, killing 172 people. 1977 – Southern Airways Flight 242 crashes in New Hope, Paulding County, Georgia, killing 72. 1979 – Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto of Pakistan is executed. 1981 – Iran–Iraq War: The Islamic Republic of Iran Air Force mounts an attack on H-3 Airbase and destroys about 50 Iraqi aircraft. 1983 – Space Shuttle program: Space Shuttle Challenger makes its maiden voyage into space on STS-6. 1984 – President Ronald Reagan calls for an international ban on chemical weapons. 1987 – Garuda Indonesia Flight 032 crashes at Medan Airport, killing 23. 1988 – Governor Evan Mecham of Arizona is convicted in his impeachment trial and removed from office. 1990 – The current flag of Hong Kong is adopted for post-colonial Hong Kong during the Third Session of the Seventh National People's Congress. 1991 – Senator John Heinz of Pennsylvania and six others are killed when a helicopter collides with their airplane over an elementary school in Merion, Pennsylvania. 1991 – Forty-one people are taken hostage inside a Good Guys! Electronics store in Sacramento, California. Three of the hostage takers and three hostages are killed. 1994 – Three people are killed when KLM Cityhopper Flight 433 crashes at Amsterdam Airport Schiphol. 1996 – Comet Hyakutake is imaged by the USA Asteroid Orbiter Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous. 1997 – Space Shuttle program: Space Shuttle Colombia is launched on STS-83. However, the mission is later cut short due to a fuel cell problem. 2002 – The MPLA government of Angola and UNITA rebels sign a peace treaty ending the Angolan Civil War. 2009 – France announces its return to full participation of its military forces within NATO. 2010 – A magnitude 7.2 earthquake hits south of the Mexico-USA border, killing two and damaging buildings across the two countries. 2011 – Georgian Airways Flight 834 crashes at N'djili Airport in Kinshasa, killing 32. 2013 – More than 70 people are killed in a building collapse in Thane, India. 2017 – Syria conducts an air strike on Khan Shaykhun using chemical weapons, killing 89 civilians. 2020 – China holds a national day of mourning for martyrs who died in the fight against the novel coronavirus disease outbreak. 2023 – Finland becomes a member of NATO after Turkey accepts its membership request.

[thedreadpiratejames]

Are you better off than you were four years ago?

March 19: Trump declares drug a 'game changer'

As parts of the country start shutting down in an effort to curb virus spread, Trump announces the FDA will fast-track approval of unproven coronavirus treatments, including chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine.

"The nice part is, it's been around for a long time, so we know that if it -- if things don't go as planned, it's not going to kill anybody," Trump says at a task force briefing.

March 20: Trump banks on 'a feeling' as Fauci calls evidence 'anecdotal'

Director of the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Dr. Anthony Fauci says, "the answer is no" when asked at a task force briefing if hydroxychloroquine is an effective coronavirus treatment, explaining signs of the drug's promise were purely "anecdotal evidence."

"But I'm a big fan, and we'll see what happens," Trump steps forward to add. "I feel good about it. That's all it is, just a feeling, you know."

March 21: Trump cites success of small French study, publisher later says data 'did not meet its standards'

Trump tweets to his roughly 84 million followers that hydroxychloroquine taken with the antibiotic azithromycin could be "one of the biggest game changers in the history of medicine" and should "be put in use immediately."

March 24: Arizona man dies after ingesting non-medication chloroquine

A man in Arizona dies after ingesting a form of chloroquine used to clean fish tanks in an apparent attempt to self-medicate for the coronavirus, according to hospital system Banner Health.

The man's wife, who says they learned of chloroquine's connection to coronavirus during one of Trump's press conferences, tells NBC News they took it because they "were afraid of getting sick."

March 28: CDC distributes a Health Alert Network warning against using chloroquine phosphate

CDC distributes a Health Alert Network (HAN) warning against using chloroquine phosphate without the recommendation of a doctor or pharmacy after one person is made seriously ill and a second dies from ingesting non-pharmaceutical chloroquine phosphate (a chemical aquariums use that is commercially available for purchase at stores or online) to prevent or treat COVID-19.

April 5: Trump on hydroxychloroquine: 'What really do we have to lose?'

"If it works, that would be great," he adds. "But it doesn't kill people."

April 9: NIH begins clinical trials of hydroxychloroquine

April 13: Study in Brazil linking hydroxychloroquine to fatal heart problems makes headlines

April 22: Vaccine chief ousted

The head of the federal agency charged with overseeing the rapid production of a coronavirus vaccine says he's removed from his post after trying to push back on problems he saw infecting the federal response, including being handed "misguided directives" to push the drugs chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine.