Joe Manchin, unlikely hero of the republic – for now

The New Neo Posted on by

Manchin has held firm against Build Back Better – so far. Is he alone among the Democrats? We don’t know, but no one else has come out publicly against it.

From a comment at Powerline:

It’s such a joke that we have even come to this. This massive legislation or any transformational, highly impactful legislation should not come down to whether you can convince one person to vote for it. I’m not talking about “gang of 8” stuff, so that John McCain could wield more power than he deserved. But we are in a 50/50 Senate situation, and there is no effort whatsoever to work with even one Republican, much less a true bipartisan effort. I don’t believe in bipartisanship for its own sake, but getting 50% + 1 was never the way this was supposed to work…

That was what was so unusual about Obamacare back when it was passed. It was the first “transformational” legislation without bipartisan support (there was even a bit of bipartisan opposition). The Democrats had discovered something, which is that if they voted for a bill that gave people perks, even an unpopular bill with a downside, it would be hard to remove, especially if it destroyed the previous system (in this case, the existing system of health insurance) that was in place. Why tweak the old system when you can invent a totally new one that gives your favored groups what they want and screws others? You might take a small hit in the short run (2010 mid-terms, for the Democrats) but in the long run you will have made it harder for the right to function or to rid the country of the new system, because they will have to design another from scratch.

In the case of the federal voting bill known as HR1, the Democrats desperately want to pass it because it would make their future elections easier to win, and block Republican efforts to ensure that fraud doesn’t occur. Even before COVID gave the Democrats the excuse to do away with certain voting safeguards that some states had erected, HR1 was the very first bill they passed in the House in early 2019 when they got the majority as a result of the 2018 election. It didn’t make it in the Senate, but not because the Democrats wouldn’t dearly love to pass it. But Sinema has come out against ending the filibuster in order to pass it in a narrow vote.

This is interesting, from that expert on West Virginia (one of the reddest states in the nation), Bernie Sanders:

Well, I think [Manchin’s] going to have a lot of explaining to do to the people of West Virginia, to tell him why he doesn’t have the guts to take on the drug companies to lower the cost of prescription drugs,” he said. “West Virginia is one of the poorest states in this country. You got elderly people and disabled people who would like to stay at home. He’s going to have to tell the people of West Virginia why he doesn’t want to expand Medicare to cover dental hearing and eyeglasses.”

That is a good example of the leftist mindset. The idea is that voters – even voters in red states – only care about short-term gains and ignore long-term costs, and only look at bits and pieces of a bill rather than the whole thing. Sander knows, of course, that people on the right are not in favor of this bill and he even knows that it’s not popular with independents. But he doesn’t care. If it could be passed, he’d do it in a heartbeat – as would almost every single Democrat, whether they call themselves “moderate” or not.

Music and snobbery

The New Neo Posted on by

As part of my newish – or rather, renewed – interest in popular music, I’ve been listening to a lot of music old and new. No doubt it’s at least partly as an escape from the political dolors du jour. But it also has its own fascination for me. I find it highly entertaining and even calming to listen to my favorites from the 50s through the 80s. And this time, I prefer watching as well, if possible in videos or live performances.

When I was growing up, even though we were hardly poor, my access to music was almost laughably limited compared to today’s internet and digital age. It was mainly through the radio that I heard the songs of the day, although I could have watched a show like “American Bandstand” and if so I would have gotten more of the visuals. But I found that program boring, and for me the way I listened was to turn on the radio while I did my homework. In later years there were parties in college where hired bands would play cover versions of the current hits. Much later on, in my days as a young married woman and mother it was mostly back to the radio again, only this time in the car while doing errands.

And then at some point popular music became a miss for me much more often than a hit, and for the most part I quit listening. I find that the popular music of today leaves me almost totally cold, even that small portion of it that seems at least superficially like the music I loved in my youth. Where are the hooks I used to like so much? Why don’t I hear them? Why do the voices sound either slurred or tortured or boringly similar to each other, or all of the above? Why are the words so often meaningless or ironic or repetitive or obscene?

There are styles in music, but there’s also snobbery in musical tastes. I don’t think new music doesn’t appeal to me because I’m a musical snob; at least, I never have been one before. In fact, I’ve never cared what music other people liked or disliked, nor did I look down on anyone for their tastes. But I’ve noticed here and elsewhere that some people not only have strong opinions on music and what they like, but are also what I might call musical snobs – that is, they look down on those who like music that they consider inferior in some way.

I think there are at least two spectra on which people often judge musical tastes in this way. The first is a continuum from cool to uncool. That’s more for popular music such as rock or jazz or pop or disco or rap. The second is a continuum from lofty to populist, and it’s used more for classical music. But there is interface and the two graphs are essentially the same thing – what’s in among the cognoscenti and what’s out.

People not only have preferences – sometimes they can explain those preferences and sometimes not. And sometimes they are quite knowledgeable about music theory and technique and sometimes not. But preferences and knowledge aren’t what I’m talking about – I’m talking about disdain for those who like music that a person has decided is inferior.

I’m not just talking about the disdain some feel for my newly-beloved Bee Gees, although that of course exists. I’ve noticed that the music looked down on is often dance music, both in the pop world (disco being a prime example) and in the classical one (I’ve long noticed disdain leveled against mere ballet music). Why is that? Is dance music considered less pure in some way? Because in pop or rock I have a liking for music with a strong beat as well as harmony, and my favorite classical composers have all had works that have been used in well-known ballets (Chopin, Tchaikovsky, Bach, and Dvorak).

I’m no music expert, and although as the saying goes I know what I like, I don’t always know exactly and precisely why I like it. But in the last year or so of turmoil and angst I’ve been drawn more and more to listening to music and to thinking about it more as well, not just about what I like but about why people like what they like.

New Hampshire statistics on COVID hospitalizations and the unvaccinated versus the vaccinated

The New Neo Posted on by

New Hampshire has been relatively unscathed by COVID up till now, so among the entire population – vaccinated and unvaccinated – there probably hasn’t been as much previous community exposure as in many other states. Also, most of the prior deaths in that state were in nursing homes and other long-term care facilities.

The governor and legislature of NH are Republican, and the state doesn’t have a COVID history of draconian measures, nor have there been calls for mandated vaccination. The state is basically purple, although right now, as I said, Republicans are in control, and it retains a bit of its libertarian history (“Live Free or Die”). The vaccination rate in the state is somewhere between 55% and 65%, which for New England is slightly low.

Presently the state is experiencing a spike in COVID cases (Delta, not Omicron) that gives New Hampshire the distinction of having the highest per capita COVID rate at the moment in the nation. That’s cases, and of course a case rate is almost meaningless without looking at the seriousness of those cases. The news there is not good for New Hampshire, which is also experiencing a higher hospitalization and death rate than before, as well as a higher proportion of serious cases in people under 60 and not in long-term care.

What interests me the most, and what caused me to write this post, is that New Hampshire is offering unusually complete statistics on the proportions of vaccinated to unvaccinated people who’ve been hospitalized for COVID (or perhaps “with” COVID, although New Hampshire being New Hampshire and not Massachusetts or New York, my guess is that it’s more “from COVID” than “with,” as compared to other states).

The pattern is clear: the unvaccinated are heavily represented in the serious cases, much more than would be expected based on their proportion in the population. Somewhere between 35 and 45 percent of New Hampshirites are unvaccinated, but here are hospitalization statistics; you can take a look for yourselves.

As I’ve written many times before, I defend anyone’s right to remain unvaccinated for any reason whatsoever. But it does trouble me that quite a few unvaccinated people in New Hampshire are dying who might otherwise have lived, had they been vaccinated. Of course, some vaccinated people are dying, too, but it seems clear that vaccination confers a significant benefit over nonvaccination for those who actually do contract COVID, at least in New Hampshire at the moment.

That really does seem to be the case, although of course with COVID statistics it’s hard to know for sure.

[NOTE: By the way, neighboring Maine is experiencing a similar surge, although I can’t find any reports in Maine about the vaccination status of the hospitalized. Maine has a similar relative low previous community exposure to COVID, much like New Hampshire, although its politics are far more blue, and the government there has been much more aggressive about masking and that sort of thing. That part doesn’t seem to matter, as far as I can tell.]

California as abortion “sanctuary” state

The New Neo Posted on by

If Roe is overturned it will almost certainly leave decisions about abortion law in the hands of each state, for that state only. If Governor Newsom of California has anything to say about it, California will not only keep abortions legal, but will become what he refers to as a “sanctuary” for those seeking them, even from other states:

“We’ll be a sanctuary,” Newsom announced. “We are looking at ways to support that inevitability and looking at ways to expand our protections.”

The state of California, according to Newsom’s Democratic legislative allies, could provide travel expenses including gas, lodging, transportation and child care for those seeking to kill their unborn children. Already, some 15% of America’s abortions occur in California, according to the Guttmacher Institute. That number would skyrocket if the state began subsidizing abortions across the land.

When I first heard this “sanctuary” business, I assumed that the idea would be a form of abortion tourism that would bring money to the state. But if it’s being subsidized by the state in the proposed manner, that won’t be the effect.

So, what about money? Is California so flush with it that the state can afford this, and is it what the people actually want?:

Armed with an estimated $31 billion budget surplus, both Newsom and top Democratic state lawmakers seem prepared to make good on that promise. Senate Democrats on Wednesday outlined the budget proposal they’ll release in full next year, emphasizing that California has both the wealth and the political wherewithal to protect reproductive rights, while Newsom told the Associated Press that he sees California as a “sanctuary” for out-of-state patients seeking abortions.

Meanwhile, California centers that counsel pregnant women against abortion are making their own preparations and increasing staffing levels ahead of the expected influx of patients, said Jonathan Keller, president and CEO of the California Family Council.

Here are some of the state panel’s recommendations; there are others:

Create a California Reproductive Scholarships Corps to strengthen abortion access in underserved areas, including regions primarily served by health systems with religious affiliations.
Explore ways to offer medication abortion services to out-of-state patients via telehealth.
Remove existing barriers to abortions later in pregnancy.

That last sentence in particular is chilling.

California can do what it wants to with its money, revenue collected through some of the highest taxes in the US. But I find it hard to believe that this proposal is what the majority of Californians think is the best use of its funds – to facilitate and subsidize abortions throughout the land.

That Whitmer kidnapping trial looms

The New Neo Posted on by

I’ve covered this topic already in many posts, but here’s a newer article that focuses on some of the corruption of the FBI agents and informants involved in entrapping the Michigan Whitmer kidnapping defendants. I use the word “entrapping” purposely, because I have become convinced that’s what went on.

Here are two sentences from the article that I want to highlight:

That situation is complicated by the fact that the case has become a political lightning rod, with right-wing commentators calling it a prime example of government overreach. Some even baselessly assert that the Michigan investigation was a test run for what they claim was a false flag operation conducted on Jan. 6.

Typical, typical. We call it “baseless,” so just trust us – we don’t actually have to look to the stated basis for the claims to which we refer. Plus, “right-wing commentators” – say no more; must be false, right?

But if you’re been following the case, the main go-to guy for the entrapment claims is Glenn Greenwald, who is anything but a “right-wing commentator.” In fact, if he has any political leanings at all, he’s always been on the left, although he’s primarily libertarian (but a left libertarian). And you be the judge as to the strength of his thesis about entrapment, the Michigan plot, and the January 6th demonstrations. I find his arguments quite compelling; for example, please read this, and he’s written plenty more on the subject. You can also find many of my own posts about the issue here.

The word “baseless” and the contention that it’s only “right-wing” people making this claim acts as a signal to readers to ignore any such claims. We see the use of that technique many times, because it’s a favorite of the left and the MSM – and it works.

Some of the Whitmer kidnapping defendants seem to be facing possible life sentences. The defense of entrapment – which I assume they will raise – is very hard to prove; the law favors law enforcement (the FBI) in such cases. It’s a golden opportunity for government to launch the infiltration of marginal groups, encourage foolish young men (it’s usually young men) who otherwise would not be committing crimes to plan said crimes, led and egged on by the FBI and their informants, and then to slam them with the possibility of very serious prison time. It’s been going on for a long long time – even back when I was in law school, and it disturbed me then. Back then the targets were on the left, after 9/11 they were Muslims, and now they’re white guys on the fringe right.

Biden has lost the approval of many voters under 30, but…

The New Neo Posted on by

…before you think this is great news, take a look at the reasons.

For “some,” it’s because he hasn’t been quick enough or thorough enough in implementing the full leftist wishlist:

According to YouGov/The Economist polling, support for President Biden among Americans under 30 has taken quite the beating this year — an average of just 29 percent of these young voters now approve of the job Biden’s doing as president, compared with an average of 50 percent who disapprove. That net rating of -21 points “is the worst for any age group,” writes The Economist…

Some respondents told YouGov the president hadn’t yet done enough to combat issues of climate change and health care; others cited Biden’s unfulfilled student debt promises as reasons for disapproval.

From that Economist link:

This is a sharp reversal from the beginning of the year, when young voters gave Mr Biden a net approval rating 32 points higher than older people did. And Mr Biden is falling out of favour fastest with the youngest groups.

However, if young voters stay away from voting for whatever reason – even if it’s Biden’s failure to be leftist enough – that’s not good for Biden and it could be good for the GOP. And then of course Biden may not run in 2024 – and/or his opponent may be Trump again, who seems to “energize” young voters to vote for his opponent, even if it’s Biden.

Then again, what is this “some respondents” bit? What percentage of respondents? Isn’t this a poll? Where are the actual figures?

Not that it matters so much. Polls have lost much of their power to persuade, they’ve been wrong so often. Then again, they do tend to be able to show trends, and my sense is that Biden’s falling numbers are a real trend.

Vox and public health officials struggle to make Omicron sound really scary…

The New Neo Posted on by

…and fail.

Here’s the way it goes:

The omicron variant, the latest curveball in the pandemic, may lead to less severe cases of Covid-19 than earlier strains of the coronavirus, according to one of the largest real-world studies of omicron released so far.

That’s good news, but it could be overshadowed by other data showing that the variant is far more contagious than any version of the virus to date — and that it can evade some immune protection from vaccines and prior infection.

Taken together, these traits make for a counterintuitive situation: Omicron poses a lower risk to most individuals, at least for those who are vaccinated, but the threat to the overall population is high. The question now is whether omicron will infect so many people that it overwhelms the health care system and drives up hospitalizations and deaths — in spite of the smaller percentage of people who come down with severe disease.

Yoohoo Vox – perhaps you could tell us what that percentage might be? I don’t see that figure anywhere in the article, which continues this way:

The answer [to Omicron] is partly in our hands. The strategies that have contained Covid-19 throughout the pandemic still work against omicron, but governments, institutions, and individuals have to be willing to use them.

The strategies that have contained COVID? I haven’t seen too much about any such containment that is consistently related to one strategy or another. Correlation is not causation, etc, and at any rate many of the most draconian strategies seems to have occurred in the areas where COVID hit most seriously. But oh yes, we’ve got to keep going with this stuff…because…whatever.

The article cites a South African study:

The study showed that hospitalization risk was 29 percent lower with omicron infections compared to infections in South Africa last summer, even after controlling for vaccination status.

Once again, we are given no actual rates, just comparative rates.

More:

“One thing we found was that the patients were staying for a shorter time in hospital, and that was across all age groups recently, compared to over time,” said Harsha Somaroo, a public health medicine specialist at the University of the Witwatersrand. Somaroo is also an adviser to the health department of Gauteng, the South African province that has become the epicenter of the country’s omicron wave.

So Omicron isn’t only causing lower hospitalization rates, it also involves shorter hospital stays and less serious disease even among those who are hospitalized.

Nevertheless, Vox would like you to know:

Most US cases are still driven by the delta variant, but omicron could end up fueling a towering spike in hospitalizations and overwhelm the health system just as the winter respiratory infection season hits its peak.

A towering spike. Overwhelm the health system.

Still more:

But almost two years into the Covid-19 pandemic, public patience is wearing thin, and the will to pursue many tactics is fading. The news that omicron may be less severe than other variants could worsen a sense of complacency. It’s also a tough messaging challenge for public health officials.

“How do we confront this where many of us will be at relatively low risk if we end up getting infected — but the secondary impacts of an out-of-control wave that fills up the hospitals with cases … could be quite dire?” asked Lessler.

I’ll take that one: you can’t. People aren’t listening to you anymore. It’s not that we don’t respect the fact that COVID can kill; of course it can, and we’re aware of that. It’s just that the absolute risks seem quite low right now, and with Omicron they seem especially low. You’ve cried wolf on this “the hospitals will be overwhelmed!” theme way too many times. We are tired of you.

So yes, it’s a “tough messaging challenge.” Too bad. Your grip on the public may finally be waning.

Derek Chauvin pleads guilty to federal charges

The New Neo Posted on by

I’ve written exhaustively on the subject of Derek Chauvin and the death of George Floyd. I’m not going to go into the details again here, but suffice to say that Chauvin was following police recommended procedure at the time, and there is an enormous amount of reasonable doubt that he actually caused Floyd’s death.

It was also clear pretty much from the start that Chauvin had been labeled a monster by the world, and that he would be convicted no matter how weak the evidence against him. In addition, for personality reasons, Chauvin just isn’t a naturally sympathetic defendant at all.

And so it came to pass.

It was also clear that the feds would be pursuing him, although it’s unusual to do so when the person has received such a long sentence as a result of state proceedings. So it’s no surprise whatsoever that Chauvin has realized that resistance is futile and he has pled guilty:

Chauvin also faced civil rights federal charges along with three other officers in Floyd’s death, as well as charges related to alleged abuse of a 14 year old during an arrest…

The NY Times reports:

“A federal prosecutor said in court that the government had reached a plea deal with Mr. Chauvin under which prosecutors would seek to have him imprisoned for 25 years. That sentence would run concurrently with his state sentence, meaning it would lengthen Mr. Chauvin’s prison term by about two and a half years.

“Under the proposed sentence and rules about credit for good behavior, the earliest Mr. Chauvin would be released from prison would likely be around 2042, when he would be in his mid-60s. The sentence will ultimately be up to a judge at a later hearing…

“The terms of the plea agreement call for Mr. Chauvin to serve his time in a federal prison, which is generally considered to be safer and could separate Mr. Chauvin from prisoners he may have arrested. The agreement would also prohibit Mr. Chauvin, who was fired from the Minneapolis Police Department one day after Mr. Floyd’s death, from ever working as a police officer again.”

That last sentence is especially absurd, since it’s obvious Chauvin could never work as a police officer again. Why on earth would he want to, and who would hire him? Plus, how many 65-ish-year-old police officers are there?

And what of that 14-year-old he is alleged to have abused? You may not remember, but that’s a case I wrote about at great length previously (last April), in a post titled “Why don’t they just stone Chauvin to death and get it over with?”. Please read it if you want to understand what was involved with that 14-year-old. As is often the case, the facts may surprise you.

“Build Back Better” is dead (for now), but HR1 may be undead

The New Neo Posted on by

Joe Manchin has foiled the Democrats again – for now. by refusing to pass the monstrous Build Back Better bill:

Democratic senators now concede there is no chance of passing the Build Back Better Act before the end of the year, as they had hoped.

They may have “hoped” they would pass it, but there was never any indication that it could be passed, so the only news here is that Manchin hasn’t folded yet. Maybe he will do so later on, and maybe he won’t.

More:

But more importantly, there is also a chance the entire Build Back Better bill will have to be reworked to accommodate Sen. Joe Manchin’s (D-W.Va.) opposition to including a one-year extension of the expanded child tax credit in the bill.

Manchin says he does not oppose the tax credit, which he has backed in past legislation. But he argues that because the credit is likely to be renewed over the next decade, its true cost is not reflected in the current bill’s official Congressional Budget Office score.

The West Virginia senator wants the bill to reflect the 10-year cost of the tax credit, which would require other tax hikes or spending cuts to prevent the official cost of the bill from rising heavily.

Is that his only objection? If so, why didn’t they already accommodate him? Well, perhaps it’s not his only objection:

The 10-year extension of the tax credit would cost about $1.5 trillion, but Manchin also wants to keep the overall cost of the bill at $1.75 trillion.

That means there would be little room for other Democratic priorities in the legislation, such as long-term home health care, generous child care subsidies, expanded Medicare benefits, universal prekindergarten and raising the cap on state and local tax deductions….

But there’s no clear path forward, because Manchin has made it clear that he’s not eager to pass the bill anytime soon and has thrown up various objections to different elements of the bill.

“Apparently, Manchin’s approach to this has changed a lot. I don’t know where he is today or where he’ll be tomorrow,” Durbin said.

This seems like nonsense to me. Even I have known for quite some time that Manchin has had multiple objections. In addition, I think that he’s not the only one in the Democratic Party worried about this bill. He’s just the one who can afford to say so. The others are too afraid.

Manchin holds a lot of power right now. That includes the power – if he should choose, although I don’t think he ever will – to switch parties and throw the entire Senate to Republican control.

If you recall the election of 2020, once the Senate got into Democratic hands, it was clear they had big big plans. But the foundation of those plans involved jettisoning the filibuster, which was necessary for almost all the rest, due to their exceedingly slim majority. The plan was: get rid of the filibuster, pass HR1 (the “voting rights” bill that took federal elections out of state hands and guaranteed opportunities for fraud), and then admit the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico as states. With those three moves, the Democrats calculated – and correctly, I believe – that they would establish permanent control over the government. That would be Game, Set, Match – for the foreseeable future.

They were thwarted because Manchin and Sinema didn’t support nuking the filibuster. Yesterday there was news that this plan was undergoing a renaissance, and that there might be some agreement on the filibuster and a revival of the HR1 abomination. Well, today there’s this:

Of course, some Democrats are happy to get rid of the filibuster. The problem is that Sen. Sinema isn’t one of them. So Democrats have given up on trying to convince her to end the filibuster completely and are instead trying to pitch some kind of one-time workaround just for this voting bill. Instead of the nuclear option, this would be the tactical nuclear option:

“Manchin and Sinema both attended a meeting on Wednesday afternoon with Sens. Jon Tester (D-Mont.), Tim Kaine (D-Va.) and Angus King (I-Maine), centrists who are advocating for a workaround to the filibuster to pass voting rights legislation…

“Democrats are no longer trying to scrap the filibuster altogether given Manchin’s and Sinema’s opposition. Instead, they’re pivoting to an attempt to sway the two moderates on a reform that could enable anti-gerrymandering and a restoration of the Voting Rights Act to evade the 60-vote requirement. The leading options include installing the talking filibuster, forcing the minority to hold the floor and continuously put up at least 41 votes to block legislation or an exception specific to the issue of elections and voting…

“In a statement to POLITICO, a spokesperson said that Sinema ‘continues to support the Senate’s 60-vote threshold, to protect the country from repeated radical reversals in federal policy which would cement uncertainty, deepen divisions, and further erode Americans’ confidence in our government.’”

One would think there would be more than one or two Democrats holding that position, and willing to do so publicly. But if one thought that, one would be wrong.