NedNotes (not blog): 28nov20 COVIData Dump

 

NOTE: ¡Happy Thanksgiving, everybody!

WARNING: a political rant is on the way

B.L.U.F. (bottom-line, up front): cursory glance at the current events for another week of the coronavirus contagion. A political 'comment' (ahem) on a questionable ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court in the Archdiocese of Brooklyn case.

A Tribute to First Responders (link)
Got pandemic fatigue? Go cry in your beer. Imagine illness, burn-out, risking the welfare of loved ones to serve the needs of others. That is what our medical first responders -- E.M.T.s, R.N.s, M.D.s, P.A.s, and other care-givers -- endure. This article is heart-felt; God be with these good people, always.

Quick Data Discussion
The data are confusing this week; a little unsettled. As a an amateur observer, I defer to epidemiologists and other experts on the look forward. Reviewing these data, I note the following numbers:

1. While testing results improved, it is difficult to tell what they say, since the level of testing has not improved much and so asymptomatics are likely not being recorded.
2. Seven states studied recorded double-digit weekly growths in death tolls, often also posting high levels of positivity rates (i.e., the presence or recent presence of the coronavirus in the person tested). 
3. Such worrying states include (by population): Wisconsin, Minnesota, Oregon, Utah, Iowa, New México, and South Dakota. Only Pennsylvania is struggling in the Northeast while New England, with the possible exception of New Hampshire, has knuckled down on the rash of new infections to contain the coronavirus contagion effectively.
4. While less immediate, Texas, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Ohio, Michigan, Washington State, Tennessee, Indiana, Missouri, Colorado, Kentucky, Oklahoma, Nevada, and Idaho struggle to (re-)gain control of the COVID-19 epidemics within their borders.

The Goofiness of Originalism (link)
In the Supreme Court case of the Archdiocese of Brooklyn, the Court voted five-to-four to strike out New York Governor Andrew Cuomo's ban on more than a few people congregating at a time in a house of worship. In fairness to the Court, at least two of the five Justices in the majority deemed the measures excessive or more burdensome on houses of worship rather than indefensible. Nevertheless, the ruling sure looks like the 'legislating from the bench' so loudly lamented by whining originalists.

The decision flies in the face of experience with this pandemic, as case studies document in Iceland, Italy, the U.K. and New Zealand (e.g., in actuality, transmission being cut by 98% with social distancing, contact tracing, and masking) where close to half of the confirmed cases were asymptomatic. Additionally, as the Empire State noted in a legal brief to the Court, religious services have been 'super-spreader' events (e.g., the worshipper in Korea who spread the coronavirus to some five thousand fellow congregants).

The problem with rulings like this one is that they base themselves on what the Founders wrote or said at the time they drafted the Constitution. That anti-intellectual exercise restricts legal reasoning and judicial guidance to linear inferences for today's society from a three month period of discussion taking place two hundred, thirty-three years ago among a far more homogeneous group of people with the narrow purpose of writing a general Constitution.

Try to imagine sitting down with Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and George Mason -- after they have had a few days to acclimate a bit to our vastly different world -- and discussing these bugaboos, like this ruling or the 2nd Amendment with them. How do you think they would react to originalism in theory and, worse, in practice as a cover story for an ideology of a minority rule of an élite régime defined by power and wealth alone?

They would laugh in our faces for invoking originalism; that is what they would almost certainly do. In tune with the times, one of them might even say, "You are full of it, pal. Of course there should be restrictions now on congregations with the onset of this terrible plague. Yes, life goes on, but we do not have to be stupid about it. Besides, those limits, with your 'zoom' technology, neither establish a national church, nor do they suppress the privacy or private practice of anyone's religious beliefs." 

That theoretical Founder would look at his two out-of-place-&-time contemporaries and say, "Okay, boys, one, two, three . . . ." At which point all three would say 'duh' in unison. These scholars need to read some Fromm and Emerson to remember that a hardened ideological consistency is out-of-step with the often chaotic rhythm of life and just as often provides a means of avoiding the burdens, rather than preserving the blessings, of freedom.

Other notes
The Food & Drug Admin. is proceeding with the Emergency Use Authorization to rush a drug that supplements remdesivir to strengthen its efficacy in treating full-blown COVID. More evidence afoot that actual case counts understate infection rates due to untested passive carriers.