Covid Vaccines and Conspiracy Theories - Food For The Obtuse

Recently, I've been exposed to some of the current wild and fantastical conspiracies associated with the virus and more importantly, vaccination.  They've left me completely flabbergasted and provided another reminder of how gullible too many Americans are.  In all fairness, much of the medical mumbo jumbo is likely over the heads of those who believe it.  The whole mRNA thing is beyond my own span of attention.  However, we can still use the tools we all have at our disposal to ferret out bullshit, a suspicious and critical mind.  My regular readers know that I rarely take questionable assertions at face value and tend to fact check on my own.  For example, one of the fringe outlets claimed that 'CDC data released on July 9th' shows a massive spike in deaths from vaccines.  Before I called bullshit, I went to the CDC's website to confirm.  Because they're a government entity, they put everything they release on their website.  I think we both know what I found; or didn't find.  Now, I'm calling bullshit.  Something I did find was a direct correlation between vaccination rates and Covid deaths.  No surprise the states with higher vaccination rates have fewer cases and deaths.  

Another way to utilize your critical mind is to ask the questions 'to what end?' and 'Who profits from this and how?'  These questions, and most of this entry, are universal with respect to conspiracy theories in general, but we'll stick with the one at hand.  Who would benefit from the successful outcome of the supposed conspiracy and why?  Clearly, the pharma companies would receive the greatest benefit by reaping huge profits from government contracts to develop and manufacture the vaccines on an emergency basis.  PPE manufacturers also benefitted from a massive spike in demand.  Hell, I received some nice upside orders from 3M earlier in the pandemic.  Maybe I'm in on the conspiracy.  Shit, I've said too much.

What stands out to me is the massive number of 'auxiliary players' required to be complicit in the scheme, but who wouldn't profit.  What's in it for them to participate or at least keep their mouths shut?  It's not as though the profits pharma took in would be sufficient to buy everyone's silence.  Let's look at one of the most important groups of auxiliary players, the media.

Why is it that these conspiracy theories are always 'broken' by fringe media outlets, or bloggers, or some guy in the produce aisle?  They're never ever covered by legitimate news outlets.  The media's in on it!  Sorry to burst your bubble, but logic says otherwise.  For those who've forgotten, all of these outlets (CNN, NYT, Fox News) are for profit companies.  What generates the most revenue for a news outlet?  Certainly not suppressing what would be sensational developments.  Such reporting would generate massive ratings / readership, which would make them more money than an entity paying them hush money.  Because not only would they get a short term bump, but the ratings and higher ad placement prices would carry on for some time.  The media, all the media, would fight tooth and nail to break such a story and cover it non-stop for as long as that gravy train lasted.  

On the flip side, what do the conspiracy theorists get in return for their activities?  Attention, money, and (misplaced) credibility that they wouldn't have received were they going about their lives.  Who wouldn't throw out a ton of bullshit for that payout?  Seems the conspiracy freaks might have greater motivation than those allegedly complicit in the conspiracy they're trying to sell.   

Touching on the politically motivated, it would be quite the fantasy world to get D's and R's to agree to this sort of thing (or anything else, for that matter).  Make no mistake, they'd all have to be complicit.   Not happening.  The wretched right seems hell bent on their constituents dying from Covid by keeping them from getting vaccinated, even though they've all be vaccinated themselves.  There's some serious motivation for them to be driving the shit out of these conspiracies, if there were even the tiniest fragment of truth to them.  But you're not hearing a peep from even the more euthanasia worthy lawmakers, like MTG or Louis Gohmert.  I'll let you draw your own conclusion, but perhaps it's because such conspiracy theories are too obviously bullshit for even these dipshits to give oxygen to.  

The bottom line is that massive 'evil' conspiracies can't exist in secret, period.  Somebody always fucks up.  There will always be someone who loses the the fortitude to remain evil and caves.  Or, someone inadvertently shares too much with that underage hooker in Dallas.  This almost always happens when one party is involved.  Dozens of parties all gettin' down on the evil?  Hah!  Again, pure fantasy.  It becomes more of a farce, when you consider governments are involved.  Nothing stays secret in governments.  Throw in language barriers and differing agendas of the various supposedly involved countries and leaks will occur.  Every damned time.

Ultimately, there's no way the conspiracy at hand could be true.  It would have been leaked by someone and amplified through every level of media, by those with the incentive to do so, of which there are many.  

Vaccination should be mandatory.  Those who believe this is a draconian and distasteful measure are idiots.  Your kids have to be vaccinated against various things to attend school, so you've already complied with mandatory vaccinations and given proof to the school system.  Oops, didn't think of that, did you?  You're not a fucking virologist, so don't pretend to know what is and isn't true on the internet about the virus, particularly when crosschecking facts blows the damned thing up prima facia.  You don't have feathers, so stop parroting everything you read that you fall for.  Do the right thing for yourself and your family, for a change.  Take off the tin foil hat, say goodbye to Q once and for all, and get your fucking family vaccinated.  

Also, stop with the idiotic memes comparing mandatory vaccinations with the Holocaust or any other Nazi symbolism.  Comparing vaccination with genocide is offensive, because there is no fucking comparison, you moronic snowflake.  While I'm typically fine allowing morons to identify themselves in grand fashion, there are too many soft minds in this country who may believe the bullshit.  Largely in the same way there are those who believe the election was stolen from the Cheeto faced shit gibbon; but I already covered that one.  

Now, really get off my lawn.

Dog Shit and Drag Queens

It's been quite the week, filled with all sorts of things impacting my dull life.  I didn't feel as though any of these topics deserved their own entry, so here's the omnibus update.  Buckle up, buttercup.

The job interviewing process has become manic, with what should have been five interviews this past week (I feel like one of the popular girls!).  Most companies aren't bothering with phone interviews anymore, preferring to go right to video calls for first and second rounds.  I've worn the same dress shirt for at least four interviews, at this point.  I'm only wearing it for an hour at a time, so it's not as though it gets dirty or wrinkled.  It goes without saying I also wear shorts for these interviews.  

I'd be lying if I said I miss in person interviews.  For those who've never been on one in another city, it's not much fun.  Get up at O Dark Thirty, rush to the airport, pray flights are on time, arrive at destination, rent car, head to interview, try to push the stress and fatigue out of your system and appear vibrant and on the ball for an hour.  Rush to catch your return flight, land at midnight.  Try to remember what you said on your interview.  My favorite one of these was when I flew to Chicago in front of a heavy snow storm.  Flights were being cancelled all over the place.  I wound up flying into Baltimore, staying the night, then driving to Richmond in the storm.  

Next up is something that if it was a dessert, would be called Masochist's Delight.

Changing the furnace filter required a trip down a hallway I never visit and during that exercise, I discovered that my dog does have some separation anxiety, illustrated by the half dozen piles of what had began as loose dog shit.  By the time I discovered the little brown piles of joy, they were becoming fossilized and approaching diamond hardness.  I'll spare you the details of the required cleanup effort, but it probably goes without saying a good time was not had by all.  

My clothes washer decided to demonstrate its ability to sustain water flow and flooded my laundry room.  It demonstrated its displeasure with my ceasing that activity by not working since.  I'm fairly sure it's the water pressure / level sensor and have a replacement arriving next week.  In the meantime, I'm reprising my college student role, by taking laundry to my parents.

The battery on the Caddy SUV I appropriated from my parents has passed into the great lead acid beyond and from what I've read on the internet, there's a fifty fifty chance a trip to the dealer will be required for a memory re-flash.  Yet another reason I'll never buy American again.

On the positive side, I quit smoking a week ago and haven't killed anyone (yet).  Yes, I'm an intelligent individual and yes, I know it's bad for me, but it was one of the few things that gave me a modicum of pleasure.  Ultimately, I had to face the fact that I wasn't thirty anymore and couldn't grab a smoke, then jump into a vigorous workout.  It was finally catching up to me and I found myself lacking energy and occasionally becoming winded when I shouldn't have.  Since quitting, my workouts have been infinitely more productive and I'm quickly losing the weight I gained during the parental Florida incident.  Stress, ice cream, and no place to work out will pack on the pounds.  

I'll finish with something scandalous.  Tomorrow, I'm going to Sephora and buying makeup for myself.  No, I'm not joining a drag queen show, even though I have the time.  For the aforementioned video interviews, I've set the stage quite well, I think.  I've got the right stuff in the background and an inexpensive set of photo studio lights to help minimize the effects of aging.  Unfortunately, I have a very fair complexion and the lights wash me out and make me look like a member of the undead.  I'd read that a large number of men were using makeup to optimize their appearance on video conferences and it seems I'll be one of them.  

What do you think?  Vanity, craziness, or solid marketing?

Staying in KC - The Best Option?

We'll wait a minute or so for my regular readers to pick themselves up off the ground after reading the title...

As I await what I hope will be a solid job offer to arrive this week, I decided to be proactive and explore living options.  I checked out both the shit PA city, where my new office would be located (I grew up there, so I know it's shit) and home (Richmond, VA).  Because I would want to relocate to Richmond, regardless, I would only lease a house in PA.  Richmond could be a lease or potentially a purchase out of the gate.  Long story short, the housing situation is fucked, which I somewhat expected, considering the boom that's going on at the moment.  

Because of said boom, I've ruled out buying a home in either location.  It would piss me off to spend a bunch of money on a house, only to see it lose 15% of its value, once things even out again.  Besides, the only things on the market are overpriced new construction.  On the rental side of things, there are literally no options that meet my criteria at any price within 45 minutes of my potential new office, in PA.  At 46 minutes out, there's a 5,500+ sq ft house for rent at $3,250.  Both are a bit above my threshold.  Hell, I'd get lost in that place!

Richmond is slightly better, in terms of rental options, but not great.  There are slightly better purchase options, but damn, if those prices haven't jumped since I last went house shopping in the area.

Much as it kills me to say, I think it's in my best interest to stay put in KC, where I've got a reasonable lease, and ride things out.  This might make for a difficult conversation with my new employer, but unless they want to offer me an even beefier signing bonus, they can't force me to move somewhere there ain't a place to move into.  Don't get me wrong, I'll still hate this flat hell hole, but I'll at least have a solid exit strategy.

Scientists and Dating Sites

Because my life doesn't contain sufficient trauma, I continue the on again, off again, dating thing, although to a lesser extent, knowing I'll be moving in the near future.  In any case, I've discovered another trend I think is worth reporting on.  I've only encountered this one on Plenty of Fish and it's a head scratcher.  Over the course of the past few weeks, I've noticed a number of women listing their occupation as cosmologist.  For those who may not be clear on what a cosmologist does (I was a bit vague, myself), they're scientists that study the universe; how it formed, how it's changed, and what exists within it.  What's odd is none of them have advanced degrees and all have pictures with their faces with impeccable makeup.

Yep, there are a bunch of women cosmetologists who can't even spell what they do for a living.

Millions of People Believe The Election Was Stolen

Over the past few months, we've all heard this over and over from right wing dipshit members of Congress and state governors.  The statement is invariably used as justification for increasing the security of our election process.  Of course their definition is to make the process more secure from those pesky people of color and other left leaning types.   The dipshits are no longer claiming the election had actually been stolen, because anyone with half a brain would vilify them for being morons and/or liars.  The cry is that millions of people believe it was.  

What makes my head hurt is how they're claiming action is required because millions of people believe something happened that didn't happen at all.  If the election was stolen from the Cheeto Faced Shit Gibbon, why didn't the Dems steal any state legislatures and flip them?   If you're defrauding the poor Liar in Chief out of his office, why not go big?  Also, why don't you tell them it didn't happen, moron?   You know...the truth???  Fuck you, logic and reason.  But I digress.

Rather than cause my readers and myself to have an aneurism by further discussing the moronic talking points, I want to provide some context with respect to the number of people who believe the lie, versus other not real things Americans believe in.  All of the numbers below are from one or more legitimate studies, based upon responses by American adults.  Let's see if there are any other misconceptions that require a more urgent response.  

Our baseline:  30-50 million Republicans believe the outcome of the Presidential election was due to fraud, depending on your source and day of the week.  

Again, what about others who aren't that bright?  We need to address their concerns in a far more urgent matter versus our baseline group.*

- 114 million people (44%) aren't confident vaccines don't cause autism

- 85 million (33%) Americans are unable to identify a right protected in the first amendment to the Constitution.  A similar amount were unable to name either of the three branches of the US government.  If a third of Americans don't know jack about the Constitution, how the fuck would they know if an election had been stolen?

- 65 million (25%) believe the sun revolves around the earth. 

- 52 million (20%) don't know hamburgers are made from beef.

Other groups that are smaller, but more disconcerting, should be addressed as well.

- 18 million (7%) think that chocolate milk comes from brown cows.  

- 12 million (5%) believe a master race of interstellar lizard people secretly run the US.  Offers a good rationale for not learning the Constitution, I guess.

There are a lot of Americans impacted by these various concerns, for much longer than the dumb MAGA heads have been impacted by their most recent stupidity.  What about them?  More people don't know that hamburgers are made from beef than believe the election was stolen!  What about the children??

If you're looking for some kernel of wisdom in this entry, I'm afraid you'll be disappointed.  However, I will offer my own conclusion from the above data, which is Americans are fucking dumbasses who deserve to be ruled by the lizard people.

*Numbers based upon basis of 258 million adults in the US.

Dating Expectations - Nebraska Edition

 Surfing through my phone, while waiting for my mother at a doctor's appointment yesterday, I found myself on the dating app that reminds you of the material you'd use to start a fire.  One of the profiles I encountered of a woman, who lived in Omaha, Nebraska.  She must have been in KC today, to pop up, but that's neither here nor there.  Her photos were mostly of her dressed up for one event or another, with no casual attire present.  A few years ago, she would have made DPOW for her profile consisting solely of what she didn't want in a man, but the true reason for my taking note is what those deal breakers were.  She stated emphatically that she didn't like hunting and asked what I assume to be the rhetorical question of why so many men posted pictures with fish they caught.  Here profile is here.

I literally chuckled when I read that bit.  

I'm offering what I think is a well-reasoned rebuttal to her requirements:  You wannabe socialite of the flatlands!!!   You fucking live in Nebraska and take issue with outdoorsmen???  Fuck, half the women there have their own photos of fish they caught on their profiles.  If you want a trove of sophisticated and urbane gentleman, MOVE!!!

Now, get off of my lawn...

An aardvark's tongue can grow up to 12 inches (30.5 cm) long.  No, I don't have their number.

I Was a Threat and Had to Go

We've all heard someone make such a claim to legitimize getting whacked from a job.  It's typically those you know to be incompetent who make it, so no one takes it seriously.  However, in my case, it's true.  Below is my story.  

It started out as the best thing that happened in my career.  I was an actual executive with a VP title and everything.  All of North American sales and marketing reported to me.  The company was privately held, based in Switzerland, but mostly run by Germans.  I was the first American to run the business in over a decade as was my boss, the president of North America.  

Unfortunately, I quickly realized my boss was in way over his head.  He'd never actually managed anyone before and his previous role was as an application engineer.  The controller and I agreed we'd mentor the president; we were confident he'd rise to the occasion.  Except, not only did he not rise, he withdrew and became more resentful toward me as time went by.  

When I started, he told me he would be in the office from 9 a.m. until 3 p.m. as he was responsible for the logistics for his offspring at school.  He'd be working from home and available on his mobile outside that window.  Except not only did he keep that same schedule year round, he was completely dark, when not in the office.  And that's when he decided to come in at all.  On the full days he worked from home, he was not only unreachable, but occasionally posted golf scores on his FB page (according to those who were friends with him).  There were periods of time where no one knew where he was or could get in touch with him.  One of those was when a board member from Switzerland popped by.  'We were in the same meetings, how could he just disappear?'

The man refused to make a decision on anything.  The most jaw dropping example was at a baseball game.  We'd booked sky boxes for the entire staff, complete with catering.  Sometime around the 6th inning, a hostess popped by to ask Jason if we were about done eating or would we like a final food restock.  My girlfriend and I were sitting behind Jason and were both stunned when he literally began to stammer, finally spitting out 'uh...go ask our controller'.  That's how paralyzed he was.  

Another perfect example of his complete lack of ownership was the day our office was in the path of a complete nightmare of a storm.  Hail, wind, torrential rain.  It was so bad, I grabbed my team and hustled them to the safest place in the building I could think of.  No surprise that we lost power.  That shouldn't have been a problem because our building had a generator.  But it wouldn't start because Jason hadn't signed the maintenance agreement.  So there we were; about 20 people dead in the water without power.  After it was clear that situation wouldn't be remedied any time soon, I headed over to Jason's office to huddle up on next steps.  I planned to let my own people go home, but he owned the operations side.  I wanted us to be aligned on our actions.  When I reached his door, he was in front of it, his cute little backpack on his shoulders, locking it up.  When I asked what he was doing, he said 'I'm goin' home.'   I stood there dumbfounded as he walked away, his people stuck in the dead building because he hadn't given them permission to leave.  I turned on my heel and went around, sending everyone home.  The most telling aspect of the story came the next morning, when the warehouse manager called my cell to inform me the power was still off and that they needed direction.  Despite being completely useless, I always deferred to Jason on operations issues and responded to the warehouse manager that Jason would have to make that call.  She interupted me mid sentence to say she'd already tried him and it went right to voicemail.  Then, she said something to the effect of 'you and I both know Jason's MIA and couldn't make a decision even if she could reach him.  Wow.

Because of his paralysis, I became the de facto leader of North America.  And I worked my ass off for my team; 60 hour weeks were the norm.  I quickly garnered their respect by being decisive and having a vision for the future (and communicating it).  There were literally occasions where a customer service person would stop at my door and say 'I'm so excited for the direction you're taking us'.  I shit you not.  

It was quite the downward spiral.  Jason could see he'd lost the team's respect, whereas I'd gained it.  His resentment toward me grew stronger by the day, as he saw me being who the team looked to.  He'd occasionally try to force me to kiss the ring, by berating me for doing something he didn't like, but would come up empty when I'd ask how I should have handled it.  We were spending too much money on promotion, but I caught hell for planning to skip some expensive trade shows, where we didn't have anything new to promote anyway.  There are those who would suggest he was afraid of me.  Those episodes became more and more common, until they reached a breaking point.  I remember telling him 'you want to be a leader, then you have to lead!!!'

Shortly after, there was some sort of upcoming celebration planned, with both the Swiss owner and the CEO coming in to participate.  I had solid relationships with both.  Things with Jason had gotten to the point where it was time for all of his laundry to come out.  It was time for a coup.  Obviously, I kept that to myself, but Jason would have had to be brain dead to not realize I had reached my limit and would serve up a mound of dirt on him.  I suspect there were also things he caved on to the Germans that he was afraid to tell me, so he was afraid of what I'd say about that to the Swiss.  

That's when Jason actually grew a pair of balls and made a decision (to save himself).  He lobbed a note to the aforementioned owner and CEO stating I had to be dismissed with utmost urgency.  This note also outlined my various, and completely fictitious transgressions, to support his decision.  Because the Swiss are scum bags (I've got a dozen data points on that one), they let him do it.  I know these things because the owner and his wife invited me to dinner with them, the next time they were in town and shared the whole thing.  Hans said it came out of the blue.  I remember looking him in the eye and asking, 'didn't you think the timing was a bit odd, Hans?  He absolutely had to get rid of me right before you and Walter came over.'  Blank stare.  With Hans being Swiss, it was dropped there.  

Returning to when I was shown the door, Jason waited until a day I was working from home to inform me.  Some might say he was too afraid to do it face to face.  I was told I was done, that someone would be by to collect company property, and that I would be arrested if found on the company property.  Then came the crown jewel.  Jason went around to the members of my team I was closest to and informed them they were to have no communication with me and doing so would be grounds for termination.  What would lead the president of a company to put illegal conditions on employment for select individuals? 

In the years since, the owner recognized he was in over his head (we was a young guy and his grandfather was the founder) and hired a professional management team.  I'm sure the new CEO took a all of two minutes to see Jason for what he was, although it took a year before Jason was demoted back to engineering manager, having led the North American operation to double digit losses in the interim.  

Info about the company and Jason here.