A Dart From Germaine to Mr. Haynes

Context

The Washington Post reports on the CDC's failure to rapidly develop and distribute a test for the CARS-CoV-2 virus. It took the CDC in Thailand several hours to develop a test based on the WHO test. It took a couple more days before the first person in Thailand was diagnosed with COVID-19. It took the CDC in the US about six weeks to finish developing its test. WaPo writes:

Another breakthrough came the next day, Jan. 13, when the WHO publicly shared a protocol, essentially a recipe, specifying the materials needed to build a molecular test.

The Thais used that protocol to make a second test to detect the virus. This redundancy would eventually become the model for developing a vaccine against the virus.

Using their version of the WHO test, Thai health officials within days found other cases, including a taxi driver.

“The early availability of the RT-PCR testing definitely helped to reduce transmission and save lives,” Pongpirul told The Post by email.

John R. MacArthur, a physician who had led the CDC’s Thailand operations since 2013, said that when PCR testing confirmed the first case there, “I immediately contacted CDC leadership in Atlanta to let them know what was happening.”

“Seeing the first case outside of China, I thought, was a big moment,’’ MacArthur said in a phone interview. 

“The test that the WHO used early on was quite successful,” said Le Duc, a former senior CDC official who still serves as an adviser to the agency. “I frankly don’t know why CDC didn’t accept it.”

“If we would have put [tests] out there quicker, could we have saved lives? Well sure,’’ said Peter C. Iwen, director of the Nebraska Public Health Laboratory in Omaha. “If we would have diagnosed quicker, we would have saved people.”

The dart

WaPo asked for an interview, but the CDC blew it off: 

Redfield and other CDC leaders declined to be interviewed or to respond to written questions about the agency’s handling of the test.“Appreciate the opportunity, but we are going to pass,” said CDC spokesman Benjamin N. Haynes.

Something about that blithe “appreciate the opportunity” response prompted me to write to Mr. Haynes. I wrote this: 

To: Media (Media@cdc.gov)

Regarding Benjamin Haynes' Washington Post comment (CC: Harmon, Bonds)

Dear Mr. Haynes,

I read your comment to the Washington Post regarding a request for an interview. Your response, “Appreciate the opportunity, but we are going to pass”, was disgusting and an insult to the American people. You and the CDC owe the American people an explanation, not smug deflection while you slither under a rock to hide from accountability. It is no wonder that so many Americans are hostile to the federal government. Your arrogant attitude directly feeds the hostility and distrust. Does this come mostly from you personally, the CDC or Trump?

You are derelict in your duty and should resign.

Sincerely,

My real name, PhD, JD

San Diego, CA

CC: Carrie Harmon, Michelle Bonds

Questions: Was Mr. Haynes derelict, or did I overreact? Does the CDC owe the American people an explanation, or should this story be kept a secret?

Merry Christmas! Happy Holidays! Best Wishes!

 Pictures by pros:

Pictures by me:

blooming in the desert

A rare freshwater stream about 65 miles east of San Diego

A couple of blocks from my house

A rare flower blooming -- I've seen this in only one place

in my ~15 years of hiking in the mountains east of San Diego 

It is rare and thus precious to me, even if it is common elsewhere

That hawk used to be there almost every time we hiked the mountain

then the tree fell and now that sight is gone forever

That was what was left of a tree after the 2003 Cedar Fire in San Diego county

It is still there today in 2020 - we it saw again last week

Capybara (really big rodents) and offspring units at the San Diego zoo

(2012)

One morning over the bit of bay behind our house

(2016)

Book Review: The Tyranny of Merit

“Thomas Frank ... criticized liberals’ focus on education as the remedy for inequality: ‘To the liberal class, every big economic problem is really an education problem, a failure by the losers to gain the right skills and get the credentials everyone knows you’ll need in the society of the future. .... It really isn’t an answer at all: it’s a moral judgment handed down by the successful from the vantage of their own success. The professional class is defined by its educational attainment, and every time they tell the country that what it needs is more schooling, they are saying: Inequality is not a failure of the system, it is a failure of you. .... The real problem was one of inadequate worker power, not inadequate worker smarts. The people who produced were losing their ability to demand a share in what they made.’” -- Chapter 4, Credentialism: The Last Acceptable Prejudice

“[Johnathan] Alter saw a similarity between Kennedy’s team and Obama’s, who ‘shared the ivy league as well as a certain arrogance and a detachment from the everyday lives of most Americans.’ As things turned out, Obama’s economic advisers contributed to a folly of their own, less lethal than Vietnam but consequential nonetheless for the shape of American politics. Insisting on a Wall Street-friendly response to the financial crisis, they bailed out the banks without holding them to account, discredited the democratic party in the eyes of many working people, and helped pave the way to Trump.” -- Chapter 4, Credentialism: The Last Acceptable Prejudice

Michael Sandel’s 2020 book, The Tyranny of Merit: What's Become of the Common Good?, is a detailed analysis of why there was and still is a populist backlash and widespread public support for the president. Sandel’s analysis sheds light on factors he argues are important in driving people to support a authoritarian nationalist. Sandel is a Professor of Government at Harvard and teaches political philosophy. His focus includes political and economic moral philosophy, which he wrote on in several books including his 2012 book, What Money Can't Buy: The Moral Limits of Markets (book review here).

The essence of Sandel’s argument is that American politics on the left and right have shifted since the 1960s to a mindset that asserts merit as the moral justification for wealth inequality and equally importantly, social esteem associated with work. In essence, both the right and left latched onto the false concept that if you work hard and play by the rules, you will get your just reward. That is not always true. It is not true most of the time for most people. More than academic credentials, factors such as luck and other fortunate circumstances like being born into a wealthy family are also often relevant.

In poll and interview data, Sandel sees the main complaint among Trump supporters as one of resentment of the bad attitude of liberal elites toward the dignity of working class work and the workers who do not have college educations. Sandel argues that open discrimination against people without college degrees, about two-thirds of the American people, is the last acceptable prejudice. People without a college degree remember and still feel the sting of Hillary Clinton calling them ‘deplorables’ and Obama referring to their security blanket need for ‘guns and bibles’. Those things cut deeply and are still remembered with anger and resentment.

Regarding higher education, Sandel recognizes a need for talent, merit and university education. His criticism focuses on when the educated elites get it wrong. When things go bad, e.g., Vietnam and Iraq, the elites and their elitist attitude, have a hard time seeing their own hubris, failings and weaknesses. He argues that the problem has been worsened by a slow reduction in the number of people without college degrees who participate in high level politics. Overt prejudice against non-college educated people is made socially acceptable by meritocratic ideology. 

Several things add to the credibility of Sandel’s argument. Other people could see and predict the resentments among the losers that would arise if a system of merit without social conscience came to dominate thinking and policy in government and society. What we are witnessing today was predicted with amazing accuracy decades ago by British sociologist Michael Young writing in 1958. The reasoning then was the same as what Sandel asserts today. To his credit, Sandel makes the origin of his argument clear. What Sandel has done is fit the current data with the earlier prediction. One source commented on Young and Sandel:

“THE BRITISH SOCIOLOGIST Michael Young coined “meritocracy” in 1958 in the title of a satire, The Rise of the Meritocracy, which purported to look backward from 2034 at a dystopian United Kingdom on the brink of revolution. Young feared the new meritocrats he saw emerging in the post-World War II order would surmount multiple rounds of rigorous testing for intelligence and talent, then wield their authority over government and business with the assurance that, unlike the aristocrats of yore, they had earned their perch atop a hierarchy. Everyone else would have lost the chance for power and prosperity because of personal failings like laziness—which would fuel resentment among populists who felt shut out of the system. To Young’s dismay, he lived to see the notion of “meritocracy” enter common use as a term not of censure but of praise, used by leaders from Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher to Bill Clinton and Tony Blair. More recently, Barack Obama recited “You can make it if you try” like a personal slogan in more than 140 speeches during his presidency. 

The latest entry in this debate comes from Bass professor of government Michael Sandel, the political theorist .... In contrast to Guinier’s reformist account, his The Tyranny of Merit: What’s Become of the Common Good? launches a direct attack on the philosophical underpinnings of meritocracy: he comes not to salvage the concept, but to bury it. Meritocracy, he argues, is obviously imperfect in its current form; it approximates true equality of opportunity only roughly. But even if equality of opportunity were attainable, which Sandel doubts, he thinks meritocracy would be neither desirable nor sustainable: even a perfect meritocracy has multiple flaws that make it unjust. The biggest problem is that meritocracy demands equality of opportunity at the starting line, but legitimates whatever inequalities follow as natural products of innate differences in talent and virtue: hardworkingness, intelligence, perseverance.” (emphasis added)

Both Sandel and Young argue that inequalities sanctioned by meritocracy lead to an insidious self-satisfaction among the winners and a seething resentment among the losers. The losers see a system that is rigged against them, and disrespects them. The winners cannot see the contribution of circumstances, luck and public infrastructure that led to their success based on their innate talents and hard work. Sometimes, winner innate talents are limited, but luck or circumstances more than compensate and the meritocracy doesn't account or for care about that. 

One last point that Sandel repeatedly makes needs to be commented on. Meritocracy is focused on people as consumers, not as producers. Most people are both. The consumer focus leads to GDP-based thinking and ignores the well-being of the producers. The ill-effects of globalization, automation and free trade could have been softened, but they were not. Many people who lost good jobs never recovered. Sandel writes:

“Those left behind by four decades of globalization and rising inequality were suffering from more than wage stagnation; the were experiencing what they feared as growing obsolescence. .... [Liberals][1] have been offering working-class and middle-class voters a greater measure of distributive justice -- fairer fuller, access to the fruits of economic growth. But what those voters want even more is a greater measure of contributive justice -- an opportunity to win the social recognition and esteem that go with producing what others need and value. .... It falls to politics to reconcile our identities as consumers and producers. But the globalization project sought to maximize economic growth, and hence the welfare of consumers, with little regard for the effect of outsourcing, immigration and financialization on the well-being of producers. The elites who presided over globalization not only failed to address the inequality it generated; they also failed to appreciate its corrosive effect on the dignity of work. .... the anger abroad in the land is, at least in part, a crisis of recognition. And it is in our role as producers, not consumers, that we contribute to the common good and win recognition for doing so.”

Footnote: 

1. Although this review repeatedly mentions failings of liberals and liberalism, Sandel makes it clear throughout his book that conservatism is even more on board with the downsides of the meritocracy illusion. The modern GOP is very hostile to job retraining and income support spending that would soften the blows of globalization and job loss. Sandel wrote: “Looking back across the wreckage we can see why this project failed. First of all, it was never really implemented.” The controlling conservative ideology holds that the losers deserve their plight and that generally makes effective worker protection policy impossible in our broken, polarized government. Obstinate, uncaring conservatism is more toxic than misguided liberalism.

Lack of government can be 

a big part of people’s problems

The COVID Relief Bill: Tax Breaks for the Rich, Lack of Concern for Everyone Else

Context

Deriding the "Green New Deal" and "Medicare for All," Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell vowed to be Congress' "grim reaper" and thwart all progressive proposals on the Senate floor. "If I'm still the majority leader of the Senate after next year, none of those things are going to pass the Senate," the Kentucky Republican told a small crowd during an event in his home state Monday. "They won't even be voted on. So think of me as the Grim Reaper: the guy who is going to make sure that socialism doesn't land on the president's desk." -- CBS News, April 22, 2019

The New York Times writes:

Tucked away in the 5,593-page spending bill that Congress rushed through on Monday night is a provision that some tax experts call a $200 billion giveaway to the rich.

It involves the tens of thousands of businesses that received loans from the federal government this spring with the promise that the loans would be forgiven, tax free, if they agreed to keep employees on the payroll through the coronavirus pandemic.

But for some businesses and their high-paid accountants, that was not enough. They went to Congress with another request: Not only should the forgiven loans not to be taxed as income, but the expenditures used with those loans should be tax deductible.

“High-income business owners have had tax benefits and unprecedented government grants showered down upon then. And the scale is massive,” said Adam Looney, a fellow at the Brookings Institution and a former Treasury Department tax official in the Obama administration, who estimated that $120 billion of the $200 billion would flow to the top 1 percent of Americans. 

The new provision allows for a classic double dip into the Payroll Protection Program, as businesses get free money from the government, then get to deduct that largess from their taxes. 

And it is one of hundreds included in a huge spending package and a coronavirus stimulus bill that is supposed to help businesses and families struggling during the pandemic but, critics say, swerved far afield. President Trump on Tuesday night blasted it as a disgrace and demanded revisions.

“Congress found plenty of money for foreign countries, lobbyists and special interests, while sending the bare minimum to the American people who need it,” he said in a video posted on Twitter that stopped just short of a veto threat.

Once again, the radical right GOP makes clear that it serves wealthy people and interests before average and poor people and without one shred of regard to increasing the federal debt. Oddly, the president seems to be miffed about the focus on service to the rich and powerful. One can only wonder what prompted that bizarre, out-of-character outburst.

The other aspect of this complex, massive bill that may jump out is the way it was written and presented to congress.

“Members of Congress have not read this bill. It’s over 5000 pages, arrived at 2pm today, and we are told to expect a vote on it in 2 hours,” Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Democrat of New York, tweeted on Monday. “This isn’t governance. It’s hostage-taking.”

Senator Ted Cruz, Republican of Texas, agreed — the two do not agree on much.

“It’s ABSURD to have a $2.5 trillion spending bill negotiated in secret and then—hours later—demand an up-or-down vote on a bill nobody has had time to read,” he tweeted on Monday.

A personal peeve

In the last few days, the MSM reported on this in ways that are increasingly personally irritating. NPR referred to the process as having taken about seven months to do. That is false and completely misleading. Other sources are making similar gross mistakes in mischaracterizing the situation. In fact, it took the House a short period of time to write and pass the bill. Republican Senator Mitch McConnell did little or nothing after that to work on its passage. McConnell played his usual obstructionist Grim Reaper role and ignored the House bill, which the House passed last May.

What some sources gently suggest, and I believe is true, is that partisan politics, not concern for the American people, prompted McConnell to finally take up the COVID relief and spending bill. The two republicans running for Senate in Georgia appear to be floundering in their campaigns. Passing the bill out of the Senate would give them something to point to as their success on behalf of the American people. McConnell does not care about the welfare of the American people any more than the radical right GOP in congress or the president. What McConnell and the GOP are concerned about is remaining in power. McConnell wants to remain in power as Senate majority leader. That is why this bill was passed and that is why no one in congress had a chance to read it before voting on it.

That is how this disaster would have been reported if accuracy and context were important to the MSM.

When the hell is the MSM going to grow a spine and start reporting accurately? Probably not as long as big corporations own it. The profit motive and advertiser demands are not only incompatible with professional journalism. They are highly destructive and hostile toward it (and democracy and the rule of law).

Four key ways Barr broke with Trump at the attorney general's news conference

 

(CNN)Two days before he leaves the Justice Department, Attorney General William Barr offered his sharpest rebuke to date of President Donald Trump's baseless allegations surrounding the election result, rejecting Trump's efforts to act on the conspiracy theories the President has embraced to explain his loss to President-elect Joe Biden.

Barr rejected the call for a special counsel to investigate claims of election fraud, while adding he saw "no basis" for the federal government to seize voting machines, a legally dubious step some of Trump's allies have proposed in recent days.

The attorney general also rejected appointing a special counsel to investigate allegations against Biden's son, Hunter Biden, which are currently being probed by federal prosecutors and IRS investigators. And Barr contradicted Trump's disputing that Russia was likely the culprit in a massive cyber breach of US government systems, saying "it certainly appears to be the Russians."

At the news conference held to announce new charges in the 1988 terrorist bombing of Pan Am Flight 103, Barr put down a marker that could give his soon-to-be-acting successor, Deputy Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen, some political cover should Trump try to pressure Rosen or others at the Justice Department.

While Trump has been making false claims about the election for more than a month now, he appeared to take the effort a step further last week, hosting a meeting with lawyer Sidney Powell and her client, former national security adviser Michael Flynn, who had suggested Trump could invoke martial law. The meeting included a discussion of appointing Powell as a special counsel to investigate election fraud and an executive order to allow the federal government to inspect voting machines. Powell and Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani returned to the White House on Monday afternoon.

Barr's resignation, announced last week, was negotiated with Trump after the attorney general came under fire for saying there did not appear to be widespread fraud in the November election. Barr was attacked by Trump's allies for pushing back on the baseless allegations surrounding the election that have been raised by Trump's campaign and his allies and rejected over and over again in the courts.

It's a remarkable position for Barr to be in after he was one of Trump's most ardent defenders in the Cabinet, helping to push back against the findings of special counsel Robert Mueller and appointing a US attorney to investigate the origins of the FBI probe into Trump's campaign and Russia.

Monday, Barr appeared to reject Trump's efforts to break norms surrounding the election result. But he declined to engage on another norm Trump is flirting with challenging in his final days, declining to answer a question on whether Trump had the right to pardon himself.

Here's where Barr publicly distanced himself from the President:

On a special counsel on the election: 'I haven't and I'm not going to'

After the election, the Justice Department announced it would investigate allegations of election fraud, but in a December 1 interview with the Associated Press, Barr pushed back on Trump's baseless claims the election was stolen from him. "To date, we have not seen fraud on a scale that could have effected a different outcome in the election," Barr said.

As the courts have rejected allegations of widespread fraud, Trump's backers have pushed for a special counsel to keep probing the election, including the suggestion of naming Powell, who has focused her conspiracy theories on voting machines.

Barr said at Monday's presser that there was "fraud, unfortunately, in most elections. I think we're too tolerant of it." But he said he stood by the finding that there was no systemic or broad-based fraud, which Trump refuses to admit.

"If I thought a special counsel at this stage was a right tool and was appropriate, I would name one, but I haven't and I'm not going to," Barr said.

'No basis' to seize voting machines either

Barr also rejected the notion that the US government should consider examining voting machines, which stems from a baseless conspiracy theory offered by Powell and Giuliani.

Giuliani had called Ken Cuccinelli, the senior official at the Department of Homeland Security performing the duties of the DHS deputy secretary, to ask if it was possible for DHS to seize voting machines, but Cuccinelli told him it wasn't within DHS' authority, CNN reported on Saturday.

Barr was clear in his position Monday.

"I see no basis for seizure of machines by the federal government," he said.

No need for Hunter Biden special counsel

The news this month that Hunter Biden was under federal investigation -- and the steps the Justice Department took before the election to follow proper protocol and not disclose the probe before the election -- was one of the key factors that raised Trump's ire toward Barr and led to his planned resignation.

"Why didn't Bill Barr reveal the truth to the public, before the Election, about Hunter Biden," Trump tweeted two days before he tweeted Barr's resignation letter.

Since then, Trump has pushed for a special counsel to investigate the allegations against Hunter Biden, a question that could fall to Rosen, who is set to fill the top Justice Department job for the final month of Trump's presidency and, potentially, until the Senate confirms Biden's attorney general nominee.

Federal prosecutors in Delaware and IRS investigators are conducting the probe, which is focused on Hunter Biden's financial dealings. He has not been charged with any crime, and his father is not implicated.

"To the extent there's an investigation, I think it's being handled responsibly and professionally currently within the department, and to this point, I have not seen a reason to appoint a special counsel, and I have no plan to do so before I leave," Barr said when asked about Hunter Biden.

Asked about the concern over what happens to the probe in the next administration, Barr said he was hopeful there wouldn't be political interference. "I'm hoping the next administration handles that matter responsibly," he said.

'Certainly appears' Russia responsible for hack

Trump contradicted his own officials, Republican and Democratic members of Congress and cybersecurity experts on Saturday when he publicly raised doubts on Twitter about whether Russia was responsible for the massive cyberattack on US federal government agencies.

Trump's tweet, in which the President downplayed the significance of the hacking and suggested China could have been responsible instead, is only the latest instance where Trump has avoided condemning Moscow and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

On Monday, however, Barr did not follow Trump's lead, instead pointing to the comments last week from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who had said Friday, "We can say pretty clearly that it was the Russians that engaged in this activity."

"I agree with Secretary Pompeo's assessment. It certainly appears to be the Russians, but I'm not going to discuss it beyond that," Barr said.

The US has not yet formally attributed the hack to Russia, but US officials and lawmakers say there's little doubt about who was behind the attack.

White House officials had drafted a statement assigning blame to Russia for the attack and were preparing to release it Friday afternoon but were told to stand down, CNN reported on Saturday.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/21/politics/barr-news-conference-break-trump/index.html

A Community of Superadobe Earthbag Domes Empowers Its Residents

 

Built with earth-based materials, these colorful domes were constructed with the help of local residents looking to revive their local economy.

In reducing the carbon footprint of both existing and new buildings, there are a number of possible strategies. One approach is to reduce the size of homes, thus reducing the energy needed to heat and maintain them (which is one reason why smaller homes are gaining popularity). Another is to increase their energy efficiency, as we see being done with Passivhaus / Passive House homes. Yet another tack is to change the kinds of materials we use in constructing more eco-friendly homes, swapping out materials with high embodied carbon (a.k.a. upfront carbon emissions) like concrete and steel for more sustainable materials like wood, cork and bamboo.

There's yet another weapon to add to the growing arsenal of sustainable materials – but it's not a new one, rather, it's something that humans have used for millennia – earth. The soil beneath our feet is actually a great building material, whether it's rammed, or compressed into modular earth blocks. We've seen a number of interesting architectural projects using earth-based materials, be they large or small.

Superadobe to the Rescue

On Iran's Hormuz Island, these distinctive domes were constructed by Tehran-based firm ZAV Architects, using an innovative method called superadobe. Initially developed as a form of earthbag construction by Iranian-born architect Nader Khalili, the technique involves layering long fabric tubes or bags filled with earth and other organic materials like straw to form a compression structure.

Intended as a project that encourages "community empowerment via urban development," the domes have been built with the help of local residents, who were trained with the necessary construction skills.

The architects explain that the idea was to help boost the local economy, and provide alternative options to locals:

"Hormuz is a formerly glorious historic port in the strategic Strait of Hormuz in the Persian Gulf, south of Iran, that controls the shipment of petroleum from the Middle East. The island has outstanding colorful surreal landscapes. Oddly, the local inhabitants of the beautiful, touristic and politically strategic island struggle economically, getting involved in illegal trafficking activities using their boats."

Seen from above, the small-scale domes take on organic shapes and connect in a variety of ways to form clustered structures.

In between these clusters, walkways and other connective spaces for gathering, playing and resting are formed.

Seen from far away, the domes seem to echo the landscape, while offering a brightly colored contrast to the earth from which they are made. The designers make an interesting analogy of these domes as parts of a vibrant carpet:

"In this project a carpet is woven with granular knots inspired by the particles that make up the ecotone of the island. The sandbags that create the spatial particles (a.k.a. domes) are filled with the dredging sand of the Hormuz dock, as if the earth has swollen to produce space for accommodation."

Inside the domes' shady interior, one can see that this type of construction is well-suited to the arid climate, as earth-based materials provide wonderful thermal mass. That means that the domed interiors stay cool during the day as the thick earthen walls absorb the sun's heat, and at night, when temperatures drop, the walls can radiate that stored heat, helping to regulate temperature fluctuations.

The way in which the interiors are painted also offer clues into how to use the space. The inherent roundness of the spaces are a refreshing alternative to the angularity of orthogonal buildings.

The aim was to choose an approach that benefitted the island's residents as much as possible, since international sanctions have affected the island and the whole country for many years, say the architects:

"[By] earmarking a bigger share of the budget to labor costs rather than expensive imported materials, [it benefits] the local population, empowering them by offering training for construction skills."

As the architects point out, the project raises some interesting questions on how far architecture can be a vehicle for socio-economic change: "In a country where the state struggles with political disputes outside its borders, every architectural project becomes a proposal for internal governing alternatives, asking basic questions: what are the limits of architecture and how can it suggest a political alternative for communal life? How can it attain social agency?"

These are fascinating questions that many architects have asked themselves in the past, and likely won't be answered any time soon. But regardless of the possible answers, the aim to build a better future for residents will go on: the next phase of this award-winning project will involve constructing a "multipurpose cultural residence" that will boost local tourism generated from an annual land art event held nearby, which will hopefully continue to fulfill the empowering mission of this unique project.

https://www.treehugger.com/superadobe-presence-domes-by-zav-architects-5091869