Author: Spocko

The reopening schools issue reminds me of how in many states school boards had to decide about arming teachers.

No national or state mask mandate means that decisions are pushed down to cities, counties and school boards. When there is no law and no funding city councils and school boards can be swayed by the powerful & organized people in their community.

In the past the “guns everywhere” people were better organized, had better lobbyists and catchier messages. So they won.

Lately the Parkland activists, MDA and other groups fought back at the state and local level. But they didn’t always win.

I watched a LOT of those meetings. Allowing those boards to make life or death medical decisions is crazy.

Part of the blame goes to medical professionals and scientists who say, “Just look at the data!” Elected officials can be craven cowards. They don’t make decisions based on reason alone.

The data alone isn’t going to make elected officials act the way we want, so we must use other pressures.

In Florida I watched school boards decide about arming teachers. The Governor said, “You have to do something from the options we decided on.”

The choices were cops in schools, armed security guards, or teachers/admin with guns. The school districts wanted to comply with the state law so they went with those options–even though cops in schools were proved ineffective at stopping mass shootings.

The state also used funding to get their way.

This is the same kind of pressure that cities (and by extension school boards) are getting now on opening schools in states with no mask laws.

1000’s of people die every month from gun violence and the national elected officials said “We won’t pass laws stopping guns.” State officials said, “We won’t pass state laws banning guns AND we won’t allow cities to ban guns.”

In this environment school districts had to figure out how to save student lives while their city and state elected officials passed laws that led to their communities swimming in guns.

The state said “We will give you money  for School Resource Officers. We did this because they have a great slogan, “Only good guys with guns can stop bad guys with guns!”

The data shows that SROs don‘t prevent students from being killed 99.99 percent of the time they are present during a school shooting. The gun lobby had the best slogan and their views influenced our elected officials better than the views of the groups against it.

The attitude in America up to Parkland was, “We can’t stop the proliferation on guns outside the schools, it’s too hard. We voted to let the numbers grow and grow and now we all just need to live with a certain level of gun deaths every month.” That attitude on guns still prevails, while some of us are working on mitigation gun deaths others are still pushing for more guns.

Masks for all would help prevent COVID-19 infections inside the schools, but even better would be NO COVID-19 outside of schools. Sadly we have to deal with higher Covid rates OUTSIDE of schools because we weren’t willing to learn from other countries. Now some states aren’t willing to learn from other states!  We also have an incompetent corrupt leaders at the national and state level.

But just like the way the elected didn’t pass national and state gun laws–meaning there’s a high percent of guns floating around in the state–the elected won’t pass mask laws, meaning more COVID-19 is floating around the state.

More guns in cities and states increases the odds of more school shootings and deaths. More COVID-19 in cities and states increases the odds of more school infections & deaths.

The lobbyists who want guns everywhere do it so they can make money. Yes, they will talk about “freedom” but it’s about making more money. Until recently they were a more powerful lobby than the people who didn’t want guns everywhere.

Why won’t states pass mandated mask laws? Because the lobby that says, “The economy!” and “Trump’s reelection!” is powerful now.

Here is the Mayor of Oklahoma City explaining how they will listen to experts, but also the opinions of the citizens. That’s fine. But as I have seen in Riverside & Orange counties in California, elected officials don’t always listen to public health experts on life or death medical decisions. (County With 2nd Most COVID Deaths In CA Rescinds Pandemic Orders) And that’s a big problem for the life and death of the people in those communities.

Ultimately, there are nine elected officials and in our form of government, I am just one of those nine votes. If you have opinions regarding a mask ordinance or other mitigation responses, I encourage you to reach out to your City Councilmember before Thursday’s meeting.

— Mayor David Holt (@davidfholt) July 10, 2020

Parents will have to go to cities, counties and school boards to fight and explain that the lives of teachers and children are more important than “The Economy!”

The parents will be up against people who will will use lies, bribes, threats and slogans to win. They will talk about “Freedom” from mask wearing but it’s really people making money in “The 1% economy” and supporting what Trump decides.

The Trump admin have given up preventing the proliferation of COVID-19 just like many Americans have given up on gun proliferation saying “it’s too hard to stop.” Guns are  everywhere because of people’s previous actions. Actions can be taken to change that.

Elected officials saw that we would accept a certain level of deaths from gun violence every month even thought they could be preventing by passing certain laws at the national and state level.

Now some elected officials are preventing certain laws at the national and state level from being passed that could prevent deaths from COVID-19. They expect us to accept a certain level of COVID-19 deaths every month just like we accepted the gun deaths.  We have the data to show how mandated  mask laws will save lives, but the data alone isn’t going to make elected officials do the right thing to protect lives.

When our national and state leaders fail us we need to use all our skills, and pressures to keep our students & teachers alive.

Chris Hayes was pissed last week. He raged at the Trump administration’s many failures. People have made tremendous sacrifices for months and his government still doesn’t have the testing and contact tracing capacity we need.

His guest, former Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala, spoke about the disaster in Florida and brought up just  how bad our contact tracing is.

9,000 new cases in one day. 29,000 in the last seven days. It’s a disaster. It’s a catastrophic failure of leadership. Of our Governor, of our President. The mayors are scrambling to try to do the right thing.

We don’t have contact tracers as you pointed out. Listen. Rwanda, in Africa, has 12 million people. They have 60,000 contact tracers. We’re not even in the ball game.

I’ve been writing about contact tracing issues since the beginning of this pandemic. I wrote  “Let’s Track The COVIDIOT Protesters” back in April.  By now I thought I’d be writing about privacy concerns in a national database.  But it hasn’t been implemented because of another massive failure of Trump admin.

In April I though the Michigan state police should have enforced the Governor’s executive orders about wearing masks and social distancing. They didn’t, possibly because the protesters were white–and armed.

The state also had the ability to trace the people protesting the lockdown in Lansing.   They didn’t. However, Dr. Rob Davidson (@DrRobDavidson) and my friends at the Committee to Protect Medicare  did.  To be more exact, they traced the cell phones of 300 of the 3,000 at the protest. The data suggested the people at the Lansing protest spread COVID-19 throughout the state.

The Governor Whitmer then begged Mike Pence, the head of the Coronavirus Task Force, to tell people to stay home because evidence showed an event with no social distancing and few masks spread CORONAVIRUS. He didn’t.

Contact tracing should to be used for public health and not co-opted for other uses. I attended a conference on technology, public health and the pandemic recently.  (Flatten the Curve Summitt) They stressed all contact tracing programs must have oversight designed in so misuse can be detected and stopped.

They also discussed privacy and apps on smart phones but pointed out not everyone has one. The good news is the basics of contact tracing can be done with humans talking to humans.

Some worried the Trump administration would use the data in a national database to go after their enemies and deport “illegals.”  Instead the Trump admin just didn’t develop a national contact tracing program at all.  Contact tracing was pushed off to the states and then wasn’t sufficiently funded

Then the Trump Campaign held a big rally of unmasked people standing close together while shouting about their freedums. This is a textbook superspreader event.

6,000 at Trump’s Tulsa Rally, June 20

Dozens of Secret Service officers and agents told to self-quarantine after Trump’s Tulsa rally, June 24 (link)

The failure of Trump’s campaign to keep their own people infection free will lead to more infections and deaths.

In the Washington Post article you can already see how the campaign staff are stalling. Every day they delay more can get infected.

• How long is the incubation period for the disease?
  

  Two to 14 days, but typically five days.

• When does someone become contagious?
  

  Two days before showing symptoms.
  

  From COVID-19 Contact Tracing course offered by Johns Hopkins University (link)

We don’t know yet if the campaign even turned over their attendee data to the understaffed Oklahoma State Department of Health.

State Plans to Hire Fewer Contact Tracers Than Experts Recommend

Trevor Brown OklahomaWatch   (Maybe Campaign head Brad Parscale @parscale dumped the million ticket requests on them and said, “Sorry about all those TikToc users!”)

A functioning CDC or state department of health could use the infection rate at rallies to prove the dangers of maskless indoor shout fests. But the Trump admin does NOT want to know the results of testing and tracing of people at the rallies.

Reporter at Trump’s Tulsa rally tests positive for COVID-19, June 26 (link)

3,000 at Trump’s Phoenix Rally, June 23

Trump held two rallies in Tucson and Phoenix where about 9,000 gathered indoors to cheer and chant. Most didn’t wear masks.

When the news shows covered the Trump rallies they discussed concern about the spread of COVID-19. It was met online with classic Whataboutism. “Where was your concern when you were praising BLM protests?!!!”

I’ve always been concerned about big gathering. Was that maskless person on the left in the photo infected?  If people were exposed to COVID-19 at a protest or a rally there should be contact tracing so that the people exposed can take steps to be tested and to self isolate.

Both groups should be traced. It’s not supposed to be political, it’s about public health.

In this video I combined an interview with the Director of Arizona’s Department of Health Services, Dr. Cara Christ, discussing contact tracing with video from the Phoenix rally. I then followed it with Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey telling people to expect a call from public health.

Before the event 700 medical professionals signed a letter to the Governor asking him to ban large inside events. The event went on anyway.  Before the event they could have been testing of everyone entering, but there wasn’t.

Once it was revealed people infected with COVID-19 attended the rally the contact tracing for everyone should have started–not just for Trump’s advance team and Secret Service.

Contact tracing is just another part of this pandemic Trump botched because he doesn’t want to know the number of infected, even if it will save the lives of his own followers. (Remember the attack on Saddam Hussein? “He gassed his own people!”)

If the “Right” people die–in the right way–things change
Eventually we will get a general idea of how many of Trump’s rally attendees were suicide bombers and how many were just  bomb carriers.  If we had enough contact tracing capacity before these events lives could have been saved.

In the future I hope Governors will ban indoor, maskless rallies.  But based on their past actions they will only do so if enough of the “Right” people die  (i.e. white men and women who are Trump supporters).

To make a ban happen they will need hard evidence, otherwise the right will cry “We didn’t KNOW if they got it from that event! They might have gotten it from some place else! Like a BLM protest!”  They are very good at working the scientist refs. A good scientist has to acknowledge they can’t know for certain if a person was infected at the event unless that person
1) Tested negative before the event
2) Only attended the event
3) Went into 14 day quarantine
4) Tested positive following the 2-14 day incubation period.
(These steps are EXACTLY what OSDH suggested people do on June 16th!)

I don’t have a lot of hope that we’ll see any good contact tracing following the two Trump rallies. But the one good thing that has happened with all the attention on the maskless indoor shoutfest is that Mike Pence just canceled his rallies in Tucson and Florida!

Good news! It looks like @PaulaReidCBS's question made an impact! Pence canceled his live "Faith in America" rallies in Tuscon & Sarasota Florida. @KTAR923 @jboehm_NEWS @ejmontini @SoonerReporter @pmonies @suekroll @kylegriffin1 @VinGuptaMD @DrRobDavidson https://t.co/onsjAzv97g pic.twitter.com/kP7EzrhTaF

— Spocko (@spockosbrain) June 28, 2020

Someone with COVID-19 will attend the Tulsa Trump rally. 

When we alert the Oklahoma Health Department the Trump campaign will scream about having to turn over the attendee data for contact tracing. They won’t want to do it, even though it will save lives.

The attendees will scream about Trump’s betrayal. They won’t be able to own the libs by getting infected and dying!

How do we do this? By using the campaign’s desire to please Trump with big audience numbers against them. We take their lack of concern for anyone’s life but Trump’s and use it to save lives.

The Trump Campaign should have mandated masks and held it outside with social distancing. But they didn’t, so now the correct procedure after news of an infection should be to alert everyone who attended.

Attendee data should be turned over to Col. Lance T. Frye, M.D. the commissioner for Oklahoma State Department of Health (OSDH) to start contact tracing. But will it be?

1) The Trump campaign admits they have all attendee data. (Especially inside, no entry without registered ticket. )

2) It’s legal to turn over the data
— June 3, OK Attorney General Mike Hunter today advised the Oklahoma State Department of Health (OSDH) that releasing the data about COVID-19 infections does not violate state or federal law, as long as individuals are not identifiable. (Link)

3)The Trump Campaign doesn’t care about the health of their followers. We know that. They care about being sued and are doing the minimum to avoid charges of gross negligence.  As shown by this tweet.

BTW, I’ve identified another source that has the legal right to attendee data. If the Trump campaign doesn’t turn over the data IMMEDIATELY, I would contact the Tulsa City Councilor, Vanessa Hall-Harper, the Tulsa State Senator, Kevin Matthews and The Tulsa State Rep. Regina Goodwin who would get this other source to turn over the attendee data to Oklahoma’s health department for contact tracing.

Trump’s campaign will stall, the Governor will say it’s not required, the health department will say it’s impossible because the state has no funding for contact tracing and the CDC/federal government won’t help. IF THAT HAPPENS WE CAN STILL USE THOSE FAILURES and Trump’s “natural experiment” in bad science and policy to educate the public on the need for masks and epidemiologist recommended contact tracing of people exposed to COVID-19.

• There should be a national education program for all Americans on the need to start wearing masks everywhere.
• There should be a bipartisan law, signed by Trump, that mandates wearing masks until there is a vaccine.

I don’t think a law is going to happen, so in the meantime people on the left need to educate people and figure ways to save the lives of others on the right even if they try to kill themselves.

Infecting Trump Followers To Own The Libs

Trump’s Covid-19 Denial Team is aware of this issue and will have made up reasons to not turn over attendee data. Their reasons will be BS and will delay the process for weeks. That means more infections to innocent people who didn’t sign a waiver and didn’t give their consent to risk being infected.

Instead of wanting to help people no matter HOW or WHERE they got infected, they will deny the one to one causality of COVID 19 infections from their indoor rally. “You can’t prove they got infected at OUR rally!”

They will compare COVID 19 infections rates at George Floyd outdoor protests. “You chose to go to a protest and you were exposed to COVID-19. Why didn’t you stop protesting?” They will make false comparisons. “How would you like it if the government took the cell phone data from the protest and turned it over to the Health Department so they can alert people who have been exposed so they can start self isolating?”

(BTW, the police probably have your cell phone data from protests. They COULD use that data for public health, but will they? They are sitting on it until they get subpoenas for criminal cases and civil lawsuits on police brutality.)

It is insane that the Trump Campaign won’t turn over attendee info to its own health agencies or red state health department agencies even it it could SAVE THE LIVES OF THEIR FOLLOWERS! However, they WILL give that data to anyone that wants to sell Trump supporters MAGA hats.

Yes, saving the lives of Trump supporters are in our own self interest, since they can infect us too. But we should do it even without earning self-interest points. We must bear their mockery when they call our life saving mask wearing  “virtue signalling.”  We do it because it’s the right thing to do. It’s what patriotic citizens of the United States of America do.

I’m going to quote philosopher T.M. Scanlon’s book title featured in the NBC hit show ‘The Good Place, We will do all these things because it’s part of What We Owe to Each Other.“

I just found out there is a spreadsheet of the hundreds of videos of police brutality across the country. Activists Create Public Online Spreadsheet of Police Violence Video  It’s horrific. It made me sad and angry. After my outrage I thought “What can we do with this resource to drive change?”

People are already using the videos to change laws and public opinion. That’s a great, but in our country you also need money to fund change and to fight the powerful, well-funded groups who don’t want change.

When I saw the videos I knew they could also be used to get money from civil lawsuits and that money could be used to drive police reform actions.

When I mentioned this idea to people they quickly pointed out that the money doesn’t come out of the police department budget. It’s all covered by the cities’ insurance polices. That’s when I fell into Helpless Defeatist mode. What yanked me out of HD mode was something I learned from listening to Sam Seder talk to trial lawyers like Mike Papantonio on Ring of Fire:

Here is Ring of Fire episode 543: We Know the Police Can do Better;

When trial lawyers win big civil lawsuits the settlements sometimes can change policy for an entire industry. So what if the police are  shielded by the cities’ current insurance polices? Create settlements that involve more that just getting the cities’ money for individuals. Develop settlement agreements that involve putting the money into specific social services or to pay for independent monitoring of the police.

There is probably some Latin legal name for what I’ll call a “Police Brutality Class Action Civil Suit.” Specific victims in the video who were hurt are the lead plaintiffs, but everyone attending the protest is part of the suit.  The proceeds can cover an individual’s specific damages, but a larger amount for the rest of the people can be used to fund specific police reforms. In addition, some money would be used to hire people who will keep fighting for those reforms.

• LAPD investigating 56 allegations of misconduct by officers during protests; 7 taken out of the field   Link

My Money. My Agenda.

The “Defund the police” conversation has led to, “How can we move money from the police to other services?”

Citizens can re-prioritize where the money goes. They change city budgets. First step is to look at where the money comes from then who controls it and what strings are attached to that money.

How do cities get money? They Issue bonds. Raise taxes. Get federal money. Get private money. Raise fees. Assess penalties. Seize assets. Have the police write tickets for violations of laws (BTW, that was how Ferguson got a lot of their money.) There are always multiple demands on how the money will be used. However, if the source of money is the Police Brutality Class Action Civil Suit, that money can be directed to policing reform.

Police reform is wasted without corresponding accountability

Tuesday on the Rachel Maddow show she talked to Reddit Hudson, the co-founder of the National Coalition of Law Enforcement Officers for Justice.  Hudson talked about their effort for reform that have been put into place, but were not effective. He noted that “any training  or reform that is going to be effective has to come first with real accountability.”

He then described what happened in Saint Louis after Ferguson where a great bill to create an independent panel that would investigate all police-involved shootings was put up by St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner. The Saint Louis Police officers Association, run by“a buffoon” Jeff Roorda, politically leveraged their influence and the bill wasn’t even brought to the floor for a vote.

(Gardner is now suing the Police union alleging a coordinated, racist conspiracy to drive her from office.)

Hudson said, “This is what all the people you see on the screen should expect as we move forward to do this thing. These police unions, you have to be aggressive and take a stand and push for them to acknowledge the human rights, civil rights and civil liberties of the communities they are sworn to serve.”

Hudson knows that to make police reform happen we need to have a movement that has multiple types of power. The “bad optics” of police beating people is huge, but what happens when the people on the streets are back at work 6 months from now? The police unions will still be there working full time to protect their power. For example Saint Louis POA head Jeff Roorda is still in charge. Five Years After Ferguson, Jeff Roorda Is Still a Dick

“What has created the environment in which zero accountability exists and they have expectations that nothing is going to happen is the power and leverage that police unions across the country have enjoyed for generations.”

• 2 more Atlanta cops fired over pulling college students from car at George Floyd protest

  June 10, 2020 CBS News

WATCH: here’s my video of when two young people were tased, dragged out of their car in downtown Atlanta Saturday night. We’re working to find out why this happened and what led up to it @cbs46 https://t.co/JL4nMFCnls pic.twitter.com/USRby69Kp2

— Jasmina Alston (@JasminaAlstonTV) May 31, 2020

I’ve learned from battling the NRA that their constant presence in legislative bodies makes a big difference. I never underestimate their ongoing marketing, PR and lobbying efforts. A bunch of volunteers can try to redirect the money to different institutions than the police but they will be up against highly paid, well-connected lobbyists and their army of men who can legally use deadly force.

Remember when the tobacco companies were sued? The state used a lot of that money for health care but also for ads and programs to stop smoking. Let’s do the same. Use “class action” police brutality settlements to fund police reform but also to remind people why it was done, how it’s working and what is different now. Give people metrics, both financial and emotional. “Unlike last year, the city did NOT spend 30 million in police brutality settlements. Also police beatings are down 60% following the new reforms.”

Criminal cases are going to be filed. They won’t all succeed but the civil lawsuits coming out of those might. Those civil cases have a better chance of winning, so let’s be creative NOW about how those cases are used to achieve our goal of police reform and to help the people in the community where the protesters were beaten.

My thoughts on using financial leverage comes from my own methods used on defunding RW media but also from the Southern Poverty Law Center lawsuits where they sued to get the assets of racists and hate groups. If I understand correctly the SPLS doesn’t get the assets for people and then turn around and say, ‘Now give us all the money we won for you.” Those people decide what to do with the assets.

City Governments Ask: Where’s the money for change coming from?

I know people in city government who want police reform. They know their city is going to be hit with massive lawsuits and they can’t pass on the financial pain to the police culprits. This is where smart, successful civil rights lawyers and political policy people can help. Look into methods to fund the fight for reform. Financial gains from civil lawsuits can drive change and be used to counter the powerful police lobby that blocks reform.

Insurance leverage. No compliance. No coverage.

Another way city governments can force police reform is to look closely at their insurance policies. City charters require they carry insurance for their fire, police and city workers. In order to remain covered those groups have to be in compliance. My friends in the insurance industry have pointed out that many police department aren’t in compliance with the terms and conditions of their policies.

If the police see they are out of compliance and aren’t covered that’s a opportunity to take the cost of the settlements out of the police budget. One friend in Colorado suggested the cost should come out of the police pension fund! The police will scream–and start complying.

Hudson points out that the legal and financial systems were set in place by the police lobbyists to protect them from criminal and financial accountability. We can use the money from the Police Brutality Class Action Civil Suits to fund ongoing pressure for change in those system.

I coined a new term. Teargaslighting.

A version of gaslighting designed to sow seeds of doubt in the media on their definition of the chemical agents used to disrupt protesters.

“Trump Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany used teargaslighting on CNN’s Jim Acosta when he asked about how Trump cleared out the peaceful protesters outside St. John’s Church for his photo op.”

Here’s the clip of McEnany teargaslighting.

Keep watching past the 30 second mark. I know what she was doing with her “teargaslighitng’ but I wondered, if it’s not her specific definition of  tear gas, what was it?  What I found was educational and disturbing.

The cops, military and the bureau of prison’s riot squads probably used something from a company called PepperBall.  I watched their training videos and then combined them in this editorial video of what happened outside St. John’s Church.

On their website the company showed scenarios of the product use in housing projects, hospitals and prisons. Note the use of drones to disperse chemical agents. Is that next?

This product can cause real problems, especially with people who have compromised respiratory systems, here’s the product safety sheet.

INHALATION: If breathing is difficult, administer oxygen. Symptoms may include: coughing, sneezing, burning eyes and skin, nausea and possibly vomiting. If high concentrations are inhaled, immediately remove subject to fresh air. Keep person calm. If not breathing, begin artificial respiration. If breathing difficulty persists, seek medical attention.

(I don’t know for SURE PepperBall products were used. Many other brands of chemical irritants and incapacitant projectiles are in use. I’m sure the full investigation of the incident by the Biden administration will reveal details.
New reporting from USA Today includes photos of one of the products used.  They also reported how the White House attacked outlets for using the term tear gas in their reporting. )

To sum up: The police fired chemical irritant projectiles that cause difficulty breathing at people protesting the death George Floyd, who died when police knelt on his neck and back until he stopped breathing.

Instead of addressing what happened and why, the Trump Press Secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, decided to challenge the press on what they called the chemical agent that irritated lungs.  Or, to coin a term, teargaslighting.

Every wonder what Republicans say when asked about Trump’s horrible actions? This thread has multiple examples. From Kasie Hunt @NBCNews Capitol Hill Correspondent.

Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., on the president’s photo op at St. John’s last night: “Didn’t really see it.”

— Kasie Hunt (@kasie) June 2, 2020

Elected politicians know how to dodge questions from reporters. There are trained in multiple techniques. Constituents who challenge them sometimes can get a different response, but most politician know how to give non-answers. And the press accept it without digging.

Some politicians will try to look like they care while supporting Trump. Others are all in on Trump’s “dominance.” We know who those Republicans are and that they are expected to give a quote to support Trump.

But we often read about Republicans that say bad things about Trump in private but the press won’t identify them. This gives the politician the best of both worlds, they get to look concerned to the press, but still look like a public lackey to Trump.

It’s time to blow the cover on some of these people. But access journalists aren’t going to do it. My recommendation?

Regular citizens should listen to Q&A’s from Republicans during Town Halls & local COVID-19 press conferences. Sometimes a Republican will slip up and attack the President. When we find these examples we need to show them combined with actions against Trump. I don’t care if Ben Sasse (R) says he’s “troubled” by something Trump said or did, he votes with Trump almost all the time.

“But Spocko,” you may ask, “Why look for quotes from Republicans who condemn  Trump’s words and actions? It might help them get re-elected!” My answer?  Look for Republicans who aren’t running again in the fall. (here’s a link to all of them.) 
These are the people to focus on.  Many of these legislators are waiting to come back after Trump is defeated so they can come out as “the real Republican party.”

There is a category of people that the MSM want to hear from because they want to believe that there are some good Republicans out there. That is why the MSM LOVES the Lincoln Project, Steve Schmidt and George Conway. But they aren’t willing to push current elected officials for quotes that might help gather momentum from Republicans who want Trump out.

If these Republican retirees were voters they would be called swing voters–and we know how much the media love them. But they have been ignored, taken off the board while people hang on every word of Susan Collins.

They are preparing for their post congress careers as lobbyists and pundits.  They will want to be on the Sunday morning shows in 2021 to say how bad President Biden is doing at “healing the nation.”

Now is their chance to earn some real, “I spoke out against Trump during the bad times” credibility while they are still in congress.  The reporters know who these people are, they just need to push them.

It’s time to see who’s available to talk after lunch.

Original art by Pia Guerra @PiaGuerra. First posted March 13, 2017
https://hkstudio.tumblr.com/

These people won’t protect their own lives. Few masks. No social distancing.
I have family, friends and work colleagues in North Carolina. I worry about their health. I don’t know how to protect them from deadly public health failures and mistakes made by Trump and others in their state. What can I do to help them?

After I saw the photos  from this event I wrote letters to the local reporters in North Carolina who covered the non-mask wearing, non-social distancing observing fans at the opening of Ace Speedway in North Carolina on May 23rd.

Here is a version of the letter I sent to reporters in North Carolina: Jeff Mills, Winston Salem Journal and Andrew Carter, The Raleigh Observer. They covered the non-mask wearing, non-social distancing observing fans at the opening of Ace Speedway in North Carolina on May 23rd. I thought they could understand and reach them in ways I could not.

To: Jeff Mills, Winston Salem Journal
Fr: Spocko
Re: Will you follow up on your Ace Speedway story?

Hi Jeff:

I’m following up on your Winston Salem Journal story at Ace Speedway on May 23rd. ( or News Observer story) I saw the photos. Few masks. 100’s of people close together. Will you be doing a follow up?

You might have seen photos and news reports about the Lake of the Ozarks pool parties. It led St. Louis County Executive Sam Page to issue a statement on Tuesday telling residents of his county that, if they were at the Lake party this past weekend, they should self-quarantine.”

Will the Alamance County executive do the same? I’d call them but I’m just a blogger. You might get an answer.

I sent out a tweet with these attached photos from Robert Willett of News Observer and Walt Unks at Winston Salem Journal

I could do a story about the politics behind the pressure to get the venue permission to open, the lack of enforcement of the Phase 2 guidelines, the failure to prepare to trace anyone if someone infected is found to have attended. I would write it in about 21 days. But I’m an outsider and nobody cares what some liberal in SF thinks.

You spoke to several people for the story. If there is a spike in cases, it would be great if you spoke to the family of the sick or dead whose illness was traced to that outbreak (which will be difficult, but IS possible) and the doctors, nurses and EMTs that had to deal with the sick.

(BTW, the photographer Walt Unks did the story about firefighters honoring healthcare workers at Clemmons Medical Center, Kernersville Medical Center and Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center on April 20th. I’d lover to hear from them about the non-mask wearing attendees at the Ace Speedway.

I’d like to hear what the people who made the event happen have to say. People like Robert Turner, the co-owner of the track, his son and Sheriff Terry Johnson.

Then I’d like to hear from people you quoted who attended without wearing a mask or social distancing. People like Dave Magbee, 59, who made the short drive from Burlington. Kelly Britt, a retired postal worker from Charlotte and Bobby Nifong of Winston-Salem.

I’m especially interested in hearing from the people in the photos with children:

I’d like to hear from these men and the mothers of these children.  Its become clear to me that some men view people like me who wear masks and take precautions as liberal scolds who are eager to say “I told you so!” when people get sick and die.

What you can do, that I can’t, is to get back to these men and women with evidence of the consequences of people actively refusing to wear masks and practice social distancing.

BTW, I see that North Carolina has a tracking program called NC DETECT (The North Carolina Disease Event Tracking and Epidemiologic Collection Tool -PDF file) It’s a statewide, electronic, real-time public health surveillance system. You might want to talk to NCDHHS about how it was used to track illnesses after the Ace Speedway event. 

I’m guessing you spoke to more people who didn’t wear masks at the event, but their quotes didn’t make the story.  I’d like to hear from them after they hear about an outbreak. Would they still attend? Would they wear a mask? If not, why not? I ask this because of the tendency of certain men to “double down” on their mistakes when shown the proof.

I know men who would rather accept the death of 10’s thousands of others, even members of their own family, than admit they were wrong.  

Apparently for some people a disease is only real when it happens to people just like them or their family. Maybe if people in their community said “I went to Ace Speedway, I didn’t wear a mask and someone in MY family got sick and died. PLEASE wear a mask!” they would be listened to

I would also like to hear from the race car drivers. If they were to say. ‘I love to see fans in the stands, but it’s too dangerous. We’ll try this again after a vaccine. For now we’ll race on TV with empty stands.” That would be a good way to show they support the guidelines that save the lives of their fans, rather than just the wallets of the owners.

Finally, one of the reasons that I’m writing you is that you know the people in your community. I don’t. You clearly tried to be respectful of the people in your story. You might know how to reach them in a way a Vulcan blogger in SF, in a bright blue liberal  state can’t.

Here’s the deal, I have family, friends and work colleagues in NC and I worry about their health. I don’t know how to protect them from deadly public health mistakes made by others in their state.

You might know how to reach your readers where they live and keep them alive. Please try.

Thank you.
Live Long And Prosper
Spocko

@spockosbrain
P.S. Here is my most recent post on the need for masks. Want To Reopen Retail? Everyone Must Wear Masks

I’ve been reading the research on mask wearing and it’s compelling.  When I wear a mask it’s not “virtue signaling” I’m not doing it to piss off Donald Trump. I don’t do it to be politically correct. I do it to save my life and the lives of others.  If you aren’t already please, please, PLEASE wear a mask when you are covering these events.

For answers to this question listen to a great interview with Rebecca Solnit by Chris Hayes for the podcast: Why Is This Happening? Finding solidarity in a disaster with Rebecca Solnit: podcast and transcript

I recommend people listen to this not just to understand why conservatives are acting this way, but also because she describes all the good ways ordinary people in communities normally respond to disasters vs how movies and media portray them.

She uses her research into the 1906 earthquake and then talking about the flooding from levy failure after Katrina for the book:A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities That Arise in Disaster. (5:00)

REBECCA SOLNIT: …the hundredth anniversary of the San Francisco earthquake and fire was coming up in 2006, around 2004, I got involved in a few projects to think about what had happened, started looking really closely at what happened, and then realized that the earthquake didn’t do that much damage. Institutional authorities, treating the public as an enemy to be controlled, and making bad decisions was actually the most destructive force. And in the meantime, ordinary people were, as you note, remarkable, altruistic, creative, innovative, generous, putting the conditions of survival in a ruined city together.

She describes some of the bad decisions made by institutional authorities after the earthquake, (7:24)

Some people died, fire started. But the U.S. military, headed by General Funston, who had been a war criminal in the war in the Philippines, immediately assumed ordinary people would behave badly. And a lot of authorities assume what happens in disaster is that things are out of control. They see the fact that they are no longer in control as terribly dangerous because they assume the only thing that keeps ordinary people behaving well is the power of institutional authority with its threat of violence. So, the mayor issued a shoot to kill order for potential looting, which is the disaster moment for petty theft.

Then they get into a discussion on who is pushing the rush to return to normal, why they are doing it and and how those people define normal. (36:22)

CHRIS HAYES: And I think that the idea about the return to normal and how loaded that is along various lines of societal division is so at the forefront right now because you have this near, this insane situation of a vocal group of people, largely wealthy people, and they’re sort of propagandists, and Stooges wanting to march the country into untold death, destruction and misery because normalcy to them is so important.

REBECCA SOLNIT: Yeah. Yeah. And you know, and it’s not really just returning to the status quo, it’s returning to profitability, specifically to being back in business and propping up the markets. And I feel like, in a way, I never quite recognized before, these are people for whom dead things like money are alive and beloved in a tenderhearted way, and living beings are dead to them in some way.

I mean, who was it who said the other day that we should send America’s kids back to school and that whatever it was like a 3% casualty was an acceptable rate and it’s like, “Dude, you just said you’re willing to let a few million children die.”

Then yesterday I read an article in Vox by Ezra Kline, “Why are liberals more afraid of the coronavirus than conservatives? Covid-19 and the complex politics of fear.”

He asked political psychology researchers why are conservatives dismissing the danger, opening states and counties prematurely, refusing to wear masks and waving off the deaths of older people as a small price to pay? Their explanations don’t totally fit with how their research would predict how conservatives would act. Klein gives his opinion why he thinks conservatives are dismissing the danger:

But once a politician captures a party, other dynamics take over. For one thing, partisans trust their leaders and allied institutions. Very few of us have personally run experiments on the coronavirus, or gone around the world gathering surface temperature readings over the course of decades. We have to choose whom to believe, and once we do, we’re inclined to take their word when describing contested or faraway events.

For another, we all fall prey to motivated reasoning, in which we shape evidence, arguments, and values to align with our incentives. As Upton Sinclair said, “It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.”

I just read a column by Bob Altermeyer from August 23, 2018 that adds more understanding of conservative minds.

Why Do Trump’s Supporters Stand by Him, No Matter What?

When you don’t know why your beliefs are true, you can’t defend them very well when other people or events confront them. Once you’ve run out of whatever counter-arguments your authorities have loaded into you, you’re done. But being flabbergasted doesn’t mean you change your beliefs. You can keep on believing as much as before if you want. You can even pat yourself on the back for believing when it seems clear you are wrong. Some people do this, and you know who taught them to.

That is dogmatism, and experiments show that authoritarian followers have two or three times the normal amount of it because they believe many things strongly, but don’t know why. When the evidence and arguments against their beliefs becomes irrefutable, they simply shut down.
…
 When they hear bad news about Trump, they tell each other the explanation that the president gave, and that is good enough. It doesn’t matter that it makes no sense or contradicts earlier things he said or promised. The important thing is they are hearing it from a fellow believer and it is their job to believe it and say it too. Research shows that authoritarian followers value group cohesiveness much more than other people do, and strongly condemn persons who stop believing what the group believes.

Read the whole Altermeyer piece, it’s useful for understanding Trump’s followers. My next piece is, “How we can save conservative lives against their will.”

Cross posted to Spocko’s Brain

There needs to be a national campaign to support mask wearing. It needs to come from certain types of national organizations and be directed at corporations.

To make it work there needs to be movement on multiple fronts with support from people with various types of expertise and influence.

This needs to happen because of the massive failure at the national political level to protect lives during a pandemic.

Here’s a great piece in Vanity Fair about the power of wearing masks.

If 80% of Americans Wore Masks, COVID-19 Infections Would Plummet

They comparing data in the US vs other countries that wear masks to show the massive difference in deaths. They also created a simulator to show how masks can prevent infection.

“What’s most important about wearing masks right now,” said Guy-Philippe Goldstein, an economist, cybersecurity expert, and lecturer at the Ecole de Guerre Economique in Paris—and a masksim collaborator, “is that it works, along with social distancing, to flatten the curve of infections as we wait for treatments and vaccines to be developed—while also allowing people to go out and some businesses to reopen.”

The study addressed the cultural differences between countries about masks and how it’s been difficult to enforce in the US. If the business community wants to start up retail again, one way to do that is massive support of mask wearing at the retail level.

Americans can start pushing on masks at retail spaces because they are usually on private property and can refuse service to people not wearing masks  No Mask. No Service.

This piece in the New York Times points out why there needs to be widespread support for wearing masks:

Who’s Enforcing Mask Rules? Often Retail Workers, and They’re Getting Hurt
The risk of a violent reaction now hangs over jobs already fraught with health perils. May 15th by Neil MacFarquhar

So what will it take to make this happen? Given my background in convincing major corporations to walk away from toxic right wing media to protect their brand, here are the groups that can make it happen and the steps to take.

3 GROUPS TO SUPPORT, ENDORSE & ENFORCE MASKS IN RETAIL

To get all customers to wear masks in stores people with expertise and influence in the following areas need to help: Legal, insurance, financial, HR and PR.

The push needs to come from national organizations who have clout right now.  I’ve  listed them in the order of their current PR clout (which isn’t the same as their political, financial or actual clout.)

1) First responders (EMT, firefighters, police, sheriffs)
First responder organizations can tell retailers, “Making ads praising us is great, but if you want to save our lives, push for your customers to wear masks.”

• Use male EMT, firefighters and cops as mask wearing role models.A recent study showed that men think wearing masks show weakness and that they won’t be impacted. it’s irrational and incorrect, but it needs to be addressed.
  

2) Doctors, Nurses, Health Care Workers and Hospital Administrators
The representatives for doctors, nurses, health care workers can ensure retailers have the medical data to back up the policies, but the most important thing they can offer is their endorsement of the mask policy.

3) Lawyers with experience in state & local law, executive orders and public policy
Anti-maskers are using weaknesses in federal and state policy to stop implementation of mask wearing nationwide. Corporations need help to push back against a very small, but loud group that has the support of Trump and RW groups.

Making Mask Wearing the Reality in Retail

Customers can influence policy in retail. They can convince corporate HQ to make changes that give managers the tools to support and enforce policies that make mask wearing in retail spaces a reality.  Educate corporations that everyone wearing masks is good for their brands and bottom line.

Dead customers are bad for your brand (unless you are the BodyBagStore.)

For retail managers I wrote some scenarios local managers can use to shut down debates with anti-maskers.  Store mangers need a POLICY. Employees need a SIGN.

THE POWER OF RED HOT ALERTS & EDUCATION! 

I know from experience that there are people already doing the work behind the scenes to support mask wearing at the retail level. I’m writing this to encourage them. They are focusing on the health and safety of all the customers and staff first, which is good. But the media covers anti-maskers because it’s news and they need a “both sides’ story.

HOW YOU CAN SUPPORT MASK WEARING IN RETAIL
If you go to a store and see people not wearing masks what can you do? Call the company directly and find out their policy. Look to see what the State and local policies are.  If they don’t have one a policy send them one they can use. For example here’s Trader Joes’ policy page: Customer Use of Face Coverings. 

Or work with your favorite activist group that has experience with pressure campaigns on corporations at a national level. They can use the power of customer numbers.

In my experience people at corporations need to hear from people who support mask policies. Be polite. Alert them to your concerns. Educate them. Otherwise they will only see the stories about people complaining and threatening staff.  Conflict is news, compliance is not.  I know the people who work in Corporate HR, PR, communications and legal. They all want people to be safe. Sometimes they need reasons and excuses to tell top management to do what’s right instead of doing what Trump or a dumb Governor wants.

Company HQ especially need to hear that people in states that DON’T require masks, want masks. This is important since often they default to a narrow legal talking point. “We follow all state and local laws.” This doesn’t address the fact that on private property companies can require STRONGER POLICIES THAN WHAT THE STATES REQUIRE.

THE POWER OF RED HOT MEMES! 
If you don’t want to do any of this you can create memes, stickers, videos and social media to support mask wearing in stores.

I’m not an ad wizard, but watch this video and see how easily it could be changed into one supporting mask wearing.

[Fade in] Video of first responders wearing masks. They look at the camera and say,”If you care about me, (EMT), me, (Cop) me (Doctor) and me (Nurse) you will wear your mask when out in public and shopping here, (CVS,) here (Trader Joes) and here (Target).

We support masks in stores for everyone because, “We’re all in this together..” [fade out.]