Comments on Biden

Some accounts have suggested that Democrats did badly because Joe Biden is unpopular and is dragging them down.  I am inclined to this that over personalizes it.  Biden is unpopular because people are generally unhappy with how things are going -- whether COVID restrictions, gas prices, general inflation, crime, etc.  Interesting note: Quarterly growth fell to 2% annualized for the third quarter of 2021.  Joe Biden's popularity fell at about the same time.  Coincidence?  Possible, but it seems unlikely.

Will he get a boost from passing legislation in Congress?  Who knows?  Republicans are getting hysterical and calling it communism, but they never managed to build up the same sort of all-out outrage over the infrastructure bill or Build Back Better that they did over Obamacare.  My guess is the legislation will not have much effect one way or the other.  What will make a difference in improvement in overall conditions.

My assessment of Biden now is that is showing the strengths and weaknesses of a longtime Senator serving as President.

The strengths:  He is really good at the horse trading and wheeling and dealing to get complex legislation passed a deeply divided legislature.  After all, that is what me made a thirty-plus year career in doing.

The weaknesses:  He hasn't shown much executive competence, despite serving eight years as Vice President.  It is my understanding that his main role as Vice President was serving as liaison with the Senate in negotiating legislation. 

This raises an important question.  Is it, after all, a mistake to elect so many Senators as President.  Might it be better to choose state governors, who have more executive experience, and tend to be pragmatic and focused on getting things done.  A governor turned president could have a Senator as Vice-President to do the negotiating with Congress.*  An obvious objection might be that Democratic governors then to be blue-state governors who would seem too liberal for swing voters.  But there are other options like John Bel Edwards (Louisiana) or Tom Wolf (Pennsylvania).

What will make a difference is an improvement in overall conditions, meaning, primarily, the economy. 

The two main drags on the economy are COVID and supply chain issues.  Supply bottlenecks are also an important factor in inflation, which is a major source of discontentment.  

As for COVID, while everyone is fighting over vaccines, an effective treatment is now in the pipeline.  Biden should mobilize the same resources for manufacture and distribution of treatment that he did with vaccines.  Also testing.  Free home test kits from the FDA and reclassify them as public health.

There has been some improvement on the front, by the way.  Just a few weeks ago, when I went to order a home test kit online they were nowhere to be found.  Home tests can now be ordered, but they are still expensive and not widely available in stores.  We need home test kits to be plentiful as toothpaste.  I am hoping that test kits will be like hand sanitizer, gloves, masks, and other medical supplies -- nowhere to be found until suddenly they were everywhere.

Incidentally, Biden faces a dilemma here. Right now, widespread availability of testing is widely popular and has not become a culture war issue.  If he keeps quiet about ramping them up, he will not get credit.  But if he makes a big announcement, COVID testing will become yet another culture war issue that right wingers must resist at all costs.  And I have to wonder even in the absence of widespread announcements, if test kits become widely used, how long will people who see vaccine passes and masks as intolerable tyranny submit to testing.  My advice is to keep quiet.  If every drugstore has test kits, people will find them and use them, if only to know when they need treatment.

As for supply chains, I don't pretend to know, but Biden needs to focus like a laser on clearing them up.

And, of course, deal with any other crises that may come up, whatever they may be.

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*Other options:  Someone who has done both. Or someone who has served in Congress and held a Cabinet post.

Can US Democracy be Saved?

I am really beginning to despair for the future of US

The Republican base is quite clear.  The 2020 election was stolen.  Any acknowledgement that it was legitimate is a deal breaker.  Swing voters, by contrast, don't see a party that refuses to accept elections it loses and appears to condone violent insurrections as a deal-breaker. They appear to see the insurrection as ancient history and recognizing election results as the sort of insider baseball that no normal person actually cares about.

This election is not a must-win, merely a testing of the waters and a harbinger of things to come.  But the next election truly is a must-win. We have to face the real possibility that Republicans will elect election officials who will refuse to recognize election results they don't like.  Or state legislatures who overrule results they don't like.  Or a congressional delegation that will certify Donald Trump as winning regardless of the actual outcome.

The Republican base will demand this as a basic qualification for office.  Democrats don't seem to be able to convey the importance of the issue.  And swing voters just don't care and are more interested in gas prices.

That being said, I do see two hopeful developments. First, a Republican winning a high profile election should give some reassurance to the Republican base, who see elections as hopelessly rigged against them.

Second, a Republican lost the election for governor in New Jersey by a narrow margin.

Since the 2020 election, two Democrats won by a narrow margin in Georgia and went unchallenged, other than a short and appropriate delay for a recount.  But the basic idea that Republicans should never  recognize a Democrat as winning was not fully established at the time.  Since then Democrats have won a seat in Congress in New Mexico and the recall in California.  Republicans conceded, but the margin was so broad as to make a challenge hopeless.  So far, the New Jersey candidate has not conceded, but neither has he gone full-on Trump. So we may see whether Republicans are willing to concede narrow losses.

Update:  After two weeks, Republican candidate Jack Ciattarelli has finally conceded defeat and urged his supporters to accept the results and live to fight another day.  So, since Trump's unprecedented attempt to overturn the election, Republicans have lost by margins ranging from narrow to wide and conceded in all cases.  They have also won a high-profile election in Virginia and other elections elsewhere, all without the results being challenged.  All of this is to the good and shows the election process working normally.  The question is whether it will continue to work normally if and when MAGA candidates take over election counting offices after the 2022 election.

A Follow Up on My Last Post

 Other people, who know more than I do, have expressed my views on critical race theory in schools much better than I have.

Jonathan Chait:  

Yes, CRT is a term to describe a family of academic theories that are not being taught to schoolchildren. But many school administrators are embracing its theories as the basis for their anti-racist practices. Some of these lessons are reductive, employ shaming, and are ineffective. Repeating over and over that these lessons are not, strictly speaking, CRT is a way of shutting down any channel for identifying and correcting errors.

 Julian Sanchez: (read the whole thing.  It's really good).

First, it’s of course true that K-12 schools are not "teaching Critical Race Theory” any more than they’re teaching vector calculus. And this is the instinctive response of people who had some sense of what “critical race theory” was before it became a buzzword.

But most people had never heard of CRT before it became a buzzword. To them it means “a fuzzy constellation of stuff happening in schools I’m uncomfortable with.” And that is very explicitly the point of the folks mounting the crusade.

. . . . .

The plan, explicitly, is to hijack the label—evoking an abstruse academic theory that might motivate a secret elite plot—to slap on a whole cluster of loosely related phenomena. And the fact that it’s inaccurate is, somewhat ingeniously, a component of its effectiveness.

Because, predictably, people with at least a passing prior acquaintance with CRT say “that’s absurd, nobody’s teaching that to 9th graders.” Which is literally true. But *the stuff in schools people are vaguely uncomfortable with* is, indeed, happening.

So when people say “this is nuts, schools aren’t teaching CRT,” it feels like gaslighting.

Comparing the critical race theory to the 1619 project, Sanchez says:

Maybe I’m naive, but I tend to think in both cases, you’d get a surprising level of consensus if you sat normal people down for an hour of quiet discussion. “Yes, OK, these five things were wrong, the other stuff is right."

The function of the package deal is to try & push the folks with legitimate or at least debatable objections into a coalition with the folks who have illegitimate objections, as though there’s some unified thing they’re all taking issue with.

 And our side somehow has to turn the temperature down enough to find that consensus among normal people and exclude the ones with illegitmate objections.

Schools and School Boards: The Substance, OR My Thoughts on Critical Race Theory

So, with those procedural issues that should not be controversial out of the way, what of the substance being debated by school boards?  So far as I can tell, there are three main issues -- mask and vaccine mandates, critical race theory, and transgender issues.  Republicans oppose all three; Democrats favor them.  And maybe this is just the usual assumption that everyone agrees with my, but my impression is that public and parental opinion generally favors mask and vaccine mandates, opposes critical race theory, and has not really processed transgender issues. Thus a focus on mask mandates favors Democrats and a focus on critical race theory favors Republicans.  

I might as well express my own, rather unconventional, views on the subject.  I favor mask and vaccine mandates.  Masks appear to be effective at stopping COVID spread in schools. Granted, COVID is rarely serious in children.  There are nonetheless two reasons to want to stop its spread.  One is that the total number of children in school is very large. Even a small percentage of a very large number can add up to a significant absolute number.  The other is that children's education has already been disrupted by virtual learning.  The last thing we need is to disrupt it further by having high absentee rates due to COVID.

With respect to transgender issues, respectfully, speaking, I think elite opinion has lost its mind.  Biological males and females exist.  Subjective self-identification does not change that fact.  Hormone treatment only partly changes it. Yet this fact is unspeakable.  To point out the obvious is to be branded as a bigot.  I do not think it has really attracted all that much public attention because the numbers of people involved are very small. The usual response, for instance, to a bill seeking to ban transgender athletes from girl's sports is to say that actual instances are very rare.  Fair enough.  So long as the issue is purely hypothetical, it appears to be too rarified to sustain much controversy.  But when actual biological males start showing up in girl's restrooms or competing on girl's teams -- well, let us just say that if Democrats really want to go to war over this one, the term lemmings with suicide vests comes to mind.

Finally, there is critical race theory.  That is an extremely difficult issue.   Nor does it do to say that critical race theory is an academic theory taught only in law schools and that the things being associated with CRT -- that people are not individuals but members of groups, that all white people are oppressors and all black people victims simply due to group membership -- are not actual CRT but just bad diversity training (as one post put it).  That dodges the real issue -- are these teachings, regardless of what you call them, appropriate for elementary and secondary schools.  And maybe even more broadly, what should our schools be teaching about race.  That is the real issue here and should not be disguised by quibbling over the semantics.

So let me start with a few viewpoints of my own:

1. The history of race in the US is ugly.  Any minimally honest history has to acknowledge this painful fact.
2. Race is not all black and white; nor is it all black, white, indigenous and Asian.  White immigrants have also faced bigotry, and also been some of the most fiercely bigoted against other races.
3. We also have many great achievements that are worthy of celebration.
4. Other countries have ugly pasts, too.  James Loewen, author of Lies My Teacher Told Me proposes, "U.S. history is no more violent and oppressive than the history of England, Russia, Indonesia or Burundi -- but neither is it exceptionally less violent."  I am not sure whether I agree, but it is a useful perspective.

So when it comes to teaching school, I do believe that schools should teach our ugly history of race, in an age-appropriate manner.  I don't believe US history should be taught solely  from the perspective of race.  We also have many positive achievements that should also be taught.  As for the role of race in today's society, current events in general are an extremely explosive topic and should be handled with care.

I recall reading a most disturbing article in either the New Yorker or the Atlantic -- liberal publications -- giving a most disturbing portrait of New York City schools. By the author's account, the educational establishment is universally left wing and subscribes to a lot of preconceived dogmas that interfere with actually delivering an education.  Before 2014, these were minor undercurrents and easy to ignore, but since then, schools have trended in a most alarming direction.  Now, the author was talking about New York City, so his experience may not be typical, but it suggests what the education establishment might do elsewhere if they could get away with it.

So what were these disturbing trends?  Alas, I cannot find the article, but most notable was a tendency to treat children, not as individuals, but as members of identity groups, and to assume that all white children were oppressors and all other groups victims.  A podcast featuring a speaker from the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) recounted the case of students being asked to confess white privilege, chart oppressor categories, and unlearn the Judeo-Christian value system.  She also warned about schools not just teaching about controversial theories, but expecting students to endorse viewpoints, whether they agreed or not, and engaging in "thought reform."  

This may or may not meet the technical definition of Critical Race Theory, but it is not appropriate and should not be taught in schools.  At the same time, critics of the anti-CRT movement are right to point out that many of the bills banning CRT are so broadly written that they could be taken as barring any honest discussion of the ugly aspects of our history.

I would also add that, while the educational establishment overwhelmingly leans left, censorious parents strongly lean right.  While "cancel culture" is a left-wing phenomenon in academia and journalism, it is a right-wing phenomenon in elementary and secondary schools.  Terry McAullife infamously said that he would not let parents dictate what schools could teach.  It was an extraordinarily impolitic remark and may have cost him the election in Virginia, but can we concede that he had a point?  If we give every parent with a complaint a veto over the curriculum, schools will be paralyzed and unable to function.  

So, how do you draw the balance here?  I don't really know enough about education to offer more than simple common sense. But, again, many people, from the left-wing education establishment to right-wing parents, are not sensible.  But the best general suggesting I have seen in thoughtful pieces is the need to distinguish between teaching about a controversial idea (any minimally honest history will include some very controversial ones) and endorsing such ideas.

Schools and School Boards: The Procedural Side

 I am firmly of the opinion that democracy is hard because it requires us to place procedure ahead of substance.  So any attempt to address schools and school boards has to start with procedural matters that shouldn't be hard, but apparently have to be emphasized.

Naturally I am inspired by the right-wing uproar over Attorney General Merrick Garland's memo calling on the Department of Justice to coordinate with local officials in dealing with threats to school board members.  The memo states "While spirited debate about policy matters is protected under our Constitution, that protection does not extend to threats of violence or efforts to intimidate individuals based on their views. Threats against public servants are not only illegal, they run counter to our nation's core values."  Naturally Republicans took this to mean criminalizing public comments at school board meetings. 

So let's start with some basic common sense.  Parents showing up at school board meetings to express their views is entirely appropriate.  Disrupting meetings, shouting down other speakers, and turning public meetings into shouting matches is not appropriate. Such conduct is especially inappropriate when done by activist from out of town, with no children in the schools, attempting to thwart the wishes of the majority, which has happened in some cases (though by no means all). That being said, such disruptions are merely inappropriate and not a crime, much less a federal offense.  There is no reason to prosecute such conduct, but it is entirely reasonable for school boards to remove disrupters from meetings and do is necessary to maintain order, just like any other public (or private) body.  And threatening school board members (or anyone else, for that matter), or stalking, trespassing, vandalism, or brandishing weapons are crimes and should be treated as such.  

This should be so much common sense and not at all grounds for controversy, but apparently some people are not able to distinguish between showing up at school board meetings and speaking and threatening school board members.  And, in fairness to the right wing, the National School Board Association letter that inspired the DOJ memo really did go too far, calling such threats and intimidation "domestic terrorism" and suggesting prosecution under the PATRIOT Act.  

I did some basic background looking into what federal laws might be invoked.  In general, I think it is best to make clear what is and is not considered a crime and what could not could not be subject to federal prosecution, so that people will have clear guidance on what is and is subject to prosecution.  (And yes, I realize this also communicates what loopholes to exploit).  The most obvious federal offense here is a federal ban on threats or extortion by mail or other "interstate communications" such as e-mail, texts, phones, etc.  Using any of these methods to send a ransom note for a kidnapping carries a sentence of 20 years.  Using these methods to threaten kidnapping or bodily harm with intent to extort money or any "other thing of value" carries a 20 year sentence.  Using these methods to transmit threats of kidnapping or bodily harm without extortion carries a sentence of five years.  Using these methods to threaten damage to property or reputation, or criminal charges in an attempt to extort carries a two year sentence.  Threats to property or reputation without an attempt at extortion are apparently not federal crimes.  Showing up in person and committing stalking, harassment or vandalism, though certainly more menacing to the target, are not federal crimes.

Kidnapping obviously is not an issue here.  Are threats demanding that an official resign from office or change his/her vote, or that a candidate drop out from the election considered extortion?  I don't know.  Nor do I know how direct a threat or attempt at extortion has to be to qualify.  No doubt there are federal precedents.  But clearly any letter, e-mail, text or phone call threatening bodily harm or kidnapping is a federal crime carrying a sentence of five years.  Just recently our local newspaper announced that someone was being charged under federal law for sending threatening e-mails to a local meteorologist who had run for Senate as a Republican and was considering a run for governor.  It commented that this carried a potential sentence of five years.  The same sentence is entirely appropriate for anyone threatening school board members.

What about domestic terrorism?  Well, our terrorism statute defines domestic terrorism as:

[A]ctivities that—
(A) involve acts dangerous to human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of the United States or of any State;
(B)appear to be intended—
(i) to intimidate or coerce a civilian population;
(ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or
(iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping; and
(C) occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States

Clearly threats to school board members (1) are a violation of the criminal laws of federal or state law, and (2) occur within the territorial jurisdiction of the US.  I do not think there is much doubt that they are intended to influence policy of a government by intimidation or coercion.  But I do not see what is being described as dangerous to human life.  However, if things were to escalate from mere threats to shooting at school board members, running them off the road, or putting pipe bombs in their mail boxes, that would look very much like domestic terrorism.

And one other point.  Isolated threats against school board members are a local issue to be handled locally.  When threats become pervasive, it becomes a national issue and appropriate for federal prosecution. 

What to Do About COVID: Test, Test, Test

Also interesting about having COVID: My Republican but not ant-vax boss's reaction to getting the disease after being vaccinated.  His conclusion was that the vaccine is worthless in preventing infection, although it may make infection less severe.  Given that he was the first infection in is study group in months, that sounds overly harsh, but it is indisputable that vaccines lose their effectiveness quickly, and that frequent boosters will probably be necessary.

Perhaps even more significantly, he has become opposed to any attempt to prevent spread.  At least, he opposes masks and disinfecting surfaces.  He does see it as appropriate for me to have an air filter in my office since I deal with elderly clients, but opposes any further use of air purifiers. And his is generally opposed on principle to any attempt to stop the spread.  Everyone will end up getting it, he says, so why bother.   Instead, he wants a cure.  And the good news is that we may be months away from having an effective treatment.  So (I said) isn't it better to delay people getting it until treatment is available.

And, in fact, there seems to be a general opposition to any sort of prevention or mitigation on the right, in favor of cure. Most recent is the case of Allen West, unvaccinated, infected, and hospitalized, who has promoted the superiority of treatment by monoclonal antibodies over vaccines because vaccine "enrich[es] the pockets of Big Pharma," as opposed to monoclonal antibodies which, also come from big pharma. And certainly plenty of right wingers are angry at the prospect of having to get regular booster shots and see it as an affront.

I really do not understand this insistence that we must forego all prevention and mitigation and focus entirely on cure. I can understand it over lockdowns, which carry high economic and social costs and are only sustainable in the very short run (a few months at most).  I can sort of understand it over masks, which, though mostly sustainable over the long run, are uncomfortable and not sustainable for restaurants, bars, and gyms.  But why the resistance to vaccines?  And even if vaccines require regular boosters, why the outrage over that?  

I think it might be because right wingers hope that if everyone gets COVID everyone will have long-term immunity.  And there might be something to the approach if COVID was like, say, measles, and getting it once did give lifetime immunity.  But it belongs to the same category of virus as cold and flu, which give only a short-lived immunity.  Cases of re-infection have occurred.  While information on the subject remains sketchy, some evidence points to the possibility of immunity lasting as little as three months to as long as five years, with a median of 16 months.  

So far as I can tell, right wingers want to go back to their pre-pandemic lifestyles with no change whatever and no disruption, not even small changes like getting regular shots.  How many people get sick or die as a result is simply unimportant.  But what they ignore is that people getting sick and dying is itself disruptive.  Take it from me, being sick for a week, convalescent for a week, still not full steam for a week, and then having to catch up is a whole lot more disruptive than getting a shot.  Getting a shot every six months is less disruptive than being out of action for two weeks every two years or so.  And having places you want to do business closed because everyone is sick is also disruptive.

Another part (and have have gotten this very strongly at work) is the sense that those of use who accept any sort of inconvenience in the interest of mitigation have been brainwashed by a sinister elite that is offering suggestions with no scientific merit, not to stop the disease, but simply to control our lives.  This view ranges from completely nuts (our anti-vaxxer arguing that the vaccine contains a microchip that will tell "them" about everything we do) to semi-rational (my boss saying that I an succumbing to propaganda, and that the people making these suggestions know less than they think).

Which leads to the subject of testing.  We need more of it, lots more.  Again, going back to personal experience, I knew that home testing existed.  I looked at the shelves of the pharmacy and didn't find any.  My boss had a test kit and explained that you have to go up to the counter and ask for one.  Well, the first time I asked the store was sold out, but I got one on a second try.  But tests are expensive ($24 for two).  And even more significantly, they are extremely hard to replace.  So when my boss first felt symptoms, he didn't want to "burn" a test, but asked for an appointment.  It took several days to get in and several more to get results and by then the whole office was infected.  I went ahead and burned a home test when it became impossible to deny that I had symptoms and actually found out before he did that I had it.  But by then I had met with five or six clients, called in a witness to a will signing, gone dancing, gone shopping, etc.  If home tests had been cheap and plentiful, everyone could have tested as soon as they felt symptoms or suspected exposure, and we could have stopped this a lot faster.  I also burned a test at the end of my quarantine to see if I was still positive (I was).  So now I am out of tests everywhere I look they are sold out.

Home tests have their drawbacks.  They are less sensitive slower lab tests and catch the infection only about 87% of time.  Tests are therefore sold in pairs with the recommendation that if the test is negative, take a second test two days later.  Two negative tests should be good enough.  Furthermore, the rapid tests are tests for antigens (proteins on the shell of the virus), a good marker for contagion.  And getting fast result allows people to quarantine and warn others sooner rather than later, a vital tool in stopping the spread. 

Furthermore effective, simple treatment is probably coming down the pike in the form of a pill that can be taken at home and can be much more widely affordable than monoclonal antibody infusions.*  Thus far the COVID pill has been 50% effective at preventing hospitalization and death in high-risk patients.  If taken early, could it prevent or at least mitigate illness altogether?  There is even hope that it may prevent household members from being infected.  Treatment is more effective the sooner it starts. Thus rapid, widespread testing is critical to important treatment.

So how do we make home test kits cheap and plentiful and how do we get people to use them?

Making home test kits cheap and plentiful is certainly doable.  Many other countries have done it.  The holdup in the US appears to be FDA insistence on a medical level of accuracy.  That creates an obstacle to production.  Joe Biden has promised to invoke to Defense Production Act to produce 280 million tests, but that is less than one test per American -- far too few to allow the frequency of testing that we need.  So the best way to increase production appears to be for Biden to change classification from medical device to public health tool to remove the FDA regulatory barrier. And that is my number one issue these days.  Let's all write to the White House to urge him to make the change.  Here is the link. Write or Call the White House | The White House.  

Some people have objected that making home test kits universal will lead people to stop reporting their diagnoses, making it harder to track the disease.  There are two responses to this.  One is that keeping track of the disease is merely an end to stopping it, and if the best way to stop it reduces reporting, so be it.  The second is that if COVID pills become widely available, people will have a strong incentive to report a positive test -- to get treatment.

But that still leaves the issue of getting people to actually use the tests.  Why should that be a problem?  After all, the fact that tests are sold out proves that they are in high demand.  Some 79% of Americans have expressed eagerness for home tests and an interest in regular self-testing.  Unlike all prevention measures, testing has not become a culture war issue.  It is often presented as an alternative to vaccines.

But given the overall trajectory of this country, can anyone doubt that if rapid testing becomes widely available it will become a culture war issue.  Swabbing the inside of your nose is uncomfortable.  Asking people to do it regularly is burdensome.  Already some people in the more paranoid precincts are spreading wild stories about something harmful on the swabs.  Saliva tests avoid the swab, but have to be mailed to a lab.  Some paranoid people fear the lab as well.  And who can doubt that once widespread testing becomes available, doing it regularly will once again make you part of the "sheeple" who have been brainwashed into fear, and will become an intolerable threat to freedom.

Weekly testing the workforce is offered as an alternative to vaccines.  How long before it starts to feel like harassment?  It is being proposed as a way to control spread in the schools.  Do you think ant-mask parents will accept the alternative?  No doubt there are Asian or Nordic countries where if people were asked to self-test before going restaurants or bars or large public gatherings, they would do so.  In the US they would not.  And imagine the outrage if any restaurant or bar or public gathering started requiring rapid tests as a condition of admission.**  Imagine the lines of people waiting!

In short, how do we avoid making COVID testing a culture war issue?  My advice would be to avoid fanfare.  Just have it show up on the shelves -- well advertised, but without a big governmental announcement.  Do focus group tests on how to sell it to the vaccine skeptics, but my guess is that the most effective pitch will be two-fold.  The closely track the reasons not to be concerned that self-testing will reduce reporting.  One is the emphasize the privacy and secrecy of the test.  Nobody else has to know about it.  And the other is to sell it as something to do out of self interest.  Find out soon so you can have effective treatment!

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*Presumably antibodies would continue to be used for high-risk patients.
**Actually, I am told that the Albuquerque Folk Festival did require rapid testing for everyone who did not present a vaccine card, but (1) that was presumably a distinct minority of people attending, and (2) it did not attract anti-vaxxer types.

Reflections on Catching COVID

Well, COVID is no longer an abstraction to me, or something that only affects other people.  I have now had it.  How has that affected me?

By way of background, I work in a five-person office.  Four of us were vaccinated; one is a confirmed anti-vaxxer.  All of us caught it.  The anti-vaxxer was diagnosed last, although in  hindsight he says that he may have been sick for several days and just in denial.  He also has diabetes and emphysema.  Unsurprisingly, he landed in the hospital.  Our office also has a young fellow only 19 years old, fully vaccinated, with no discernable risk factors, who also landed in the hospital.  The rest of us had only mild cases.

For me, my nose ran like a faucet.  The amount of Kleenex I used in the first few days was extraordinary.  Coughing and sneezing was less frequent that with a cold, but deeper -- terrifyingly deep.  I had sporadic, low-grade fevers, especially at night, never above 100.2.  I also had poor appetite, general fatigue, and insomnia.  The insomnia was the worst part of it. I did not lose my sense of smell or taste.  This lasted about a week.  I attempted to work from home, but my energy was extremely limited.  The next week my symptoms resolved except an about-to-sneeze feeling in my nose and a little post-nasal drip. But my energy was extremely limited.  Just walking around the block wiped me out.  My ability to focus on work was quite limited.  The following week I was well enough to go into work, but was still limited in how long I could focus before getting light-headed or brain fog and having to take a nap.  Since then it has been making up for lost time.

Infected people are supposed to quarantine for ten days from first symptom.  That means no shopping.  I learned to use Insta-Cart, and drive-up windows.  Three things I greatly came to appreciate -- pulse oximeters (my oxygen was fine), Kleenex with lotion (the difference is extraordinary given how often I was blowing my nose), and doing my own shopping.

So, thoughts on that.   

First of all, vaccines are far from perfect.  Four out of five people at the office were fully vaccinated, but all of us got sick.  I got the Pfizer vaccine.  It appears that Pfizer 47% effective at preventing infection five months out.  That means, even if we start giving boosters at six months, there will be significant numbers of breakthrough infections before then.  I personally got my first shot in April and my second on May 8.  That means I was considered fully vaccinated two weeks later, on May 22.  I felt sick enough to self-test on Sunday, September 26 and was probably contagious at least two days earlier.  So I was about four months out from the "fully vaxxed" date and probably about five months out from my first shot.

Second, this is not the same as saying that vaccines are worthless. My boss, a Republican but not an anti-vaxxer, concluded that vaccines are worthless at stopping the spread of COVID and merely mitigate its severity.  Yet he, himself, enrolled in a COVID study in order to get the vaccine early was was told that he was only their fifth breakthrough infection (his wife was the sixth), and their first in months.  He may very well be the beginning of a wave.  But the vaccine was apparently quite effective for a number of months at least.

Third, while people complain about the disruptions caused by mitigation efforts, getting the disease is also disruptive.  Five out of five people in our office were infected and got sick.  Granted, one stayed at his post for almost a week before giving out, and the next week some of us started coming back, at a highly reduced rate of efficiency, and without seeing clients.  But the disruption was absolutely real.  If everyone had gotten the disease at different times, the disruption would have been a lot less.

And finally, vaccines cannot do it alone.  We need much more rapid, abundant testing, and an effective treatment.