Governors DeSantis, Abbott Killed People

There's really no other conclusion to make than the headline to this post.

 

The governors of red states, by their lax policy choices during the COVID-19 pandemic, have effectively left their citizens to early and needless deaths. 

This figure comes from JAMA (Journal of the American Medical Association), in the article "The Growing Influence of State Governments on Population Health in the United States" by Steven H. Woolf, MD, MPH. Where you live makes a difference to your life expectancy, both comparing the US to other countries and within the US as well--and not just with respect to the pandemic. Woolf writes:

For decades, the population of the US has experienced shorter life expectancy and higher disease rates than populations in other high-income countries. The gap in life expectancy between the US and 16 peer countries increased from 1.9 years in 2010 to 3.1 years in 2018 and 4.7 years in 2020.1 The US health disadvantage is even worse in certain states, with states such as Alabama and Mississippi having the same life expectancy as Latvia (75 years).

Disparities in health across the 50 states are growing, a trend that began in the 1990s. For example, in 1990, life expectancy in New York was lower than in Oklahoma, but the trajectories separated sharply in the 1990s and, by 2016, New York ranked third in life expectancy, whereas Oklahoma ranked 45th. By 2019, mortality rates at ages 25 to 64 years differed by a factor of 216% between the states with the highest mortality rate (565.1 per 100 000) and the lowest rate (261.9 per 100 000), up from 188% in 1999. The widening gap cannot be explained by changes in the racial and ethnic composition of states, because the same trend occurred within racial and ethnic groups.

Someone should download these data and integrate under the curves to find the total difference in deaths. (I've already heard some of DeSantis's excuses: vaccine tourism, older population.) Woolf continues:

For example, excess death rates in Florida and Georgia (more than 200 deaths per 100 000) were much higher than in states with largely vaccinated populations such as New York (112 per 100 000), New Jersey (73 deaths per 100 000), and Massachusetts (50 per 100 000). States that resisted public health protections experienced higher numbers of excess deaths during the Delta variant surge in the fall of 2021 (Figure). Between August and December 2021, Florida experienced more than triple the number of excess deaths (29 252) as New York (8786), despite both states having similar population counts (21.7 million and 19.3 million, respectively).

And it's only going to get worse:

State control over health outcomes shows no signs of waning. Legislatures have passed and are considering numerous laws designed to transform elections, civil rights, school curricula, and climate policy. New laws and court decisions could affect health and health care and exacerbate inequities. The Texas abortion bill and other challenges to Roe v Wade, new state laws to nullify gun regulations, and other sweeping measures suggest that states will be wielding greater control over the health and safety of their populations. Increasingly, an individual’s life expectancy in the US will depend on the state in which they live....

States are laboratories for experimentation, but fragmented health policy has consequences. While other countries mounted a national response to COVID-19, the US was hobbled by 50 response plans and, to date, has lost more than 1 million lives. Although state governments have the right to set their own path and policies, the public should decide whether life expectancy should be part of the experiment.

I'm afraid that the American public is, at least via their votes for primarily Republican legislatures and governors, deciding that, astonishingly, there are some things more important than their health and their lives.

Flyers' Worst Nightmare

The clip is better when it loops, which I can't seem to arrange here. I guess you need to be a Pittsburgh Penguins fan -- the Philadelphia Flyers are their cross-state rivals, one of the deepest rivalries in sports. Sidney Crosby has tormented them for years....

Don't Look Now, But....

Price of Wheat, and the Price of Peace

 Global price of wheat, percent increase over the last month: 

The nominal price is in Euros/kg. What will hurt more, the price of wheat or the price of gas? I'm willing to pay both if that's what I'm asked to do to help win the Ukrainian War. I decided that after seeing this photograph.

Fossil Fuel Use Up Since Biden Took Office

I keep reading claims that Biden is blocking energy development in the United States. For example, this is from the Wall Street Journal, via Judith Curry's blog:

“Europe offers another reminder to the U.S. that blocking fossil-fuel development here won’t keep carbon “in the ground.” It merely hands a strategic weapon to dictators that they will turn around and use against us.”

In fact, oil, gas and coal production are all up since Biden took office in January 2021:

Source: https://www.eia.gov/petroleum/production/#oil-tab

Source: https://www.eia.gov/petroleum/production/#ng-tab

Source: https://www.eia.gov/coal/production/quarterly/

And this is from today's Morning Energy report (a daily email) from Politico:

The Biden administration has approved oil and gas permits on federal land at a faster clip than former President Donald Trump's final year, the U.S. still exports more crude oil and petroleum products than it imports and Keystone XL never started while much of the oil it would have transported got to market through rail and other means. Plus, the U.S. has never been closed off from oil imports, even bringing in 7.9 million barrels per day in the first year of the coronavirus pandemic when demand cratered.

Some people are eager to use the Ukraine crisis to blame Biden for everything, and to take advantage of it to further fossil fuel use even in light of the climate crisis (which Curry denies). 

Great Interview of a Russia Expert

I found this to be a very interesting and informative article in Politico interviewing Fiona Hill, a Russia expert who has studied Putin for decades. Among other things she says we're already in World War 3, and that Putin might well use nuclear weapons to get what he wants. Frightening. 

I recommend it, FWIW. 

Poetry from Ukraine

Sharing my wife’s words pic.twitter.com/LZNTvCQjqd

— eduardo (@celquie) February 24, 2022

Ukraine Abstractions End in a Split Second

This morning I heard an NPR host--don't know if he was national or local--summarizing their upcoming news, call Russian's invasion of Ukraine the "largest rearrangement of geopolitics since the Russian invasion of Afghanistan in 1979." That seemed awfully convenient and narrow-sighted. What about the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan? The U.S. invasion of Iraq?

It's amazing how abstract all this seems until you see something like this:

Absolutely shocking footage of a Russian warplanes firing missiles into a residential area in #Ukraine 🇺🇦.

A child screams in terror. pic.twitter.com/CqYg4qIUqf

— Thomas van Linge (@ThomasVLinge) February 24, 2022

Spinoza

2020 By Far the World's Worst Economic Year in My Lifetime*

From FRED:

*if you're poor or lower middle class (global). If so, too bad, so sad for you. You should have arranged to be born somewhere better, of course. No one really cares about you. Again. 

A Dolphin and a Whale

Here's a dolphin and whale doing...something quite different, according to this expert, which we'd like to interpret as a cute, cuddly dance, but the ocean is vast and brains are weird and deep and we really don't know, given that these species are millions of years old and here long before us. We can't at all expect this behavior is just now being seen for the first time, given the size of the ocean and the lifetime of these species....

Still, it's delightful!

Galbraith Quote

“The only function of economic forecasting is to make astrology look respectable.”

–– John Kenneth Galbraith

Andrew Dessler on Joe Rogan's Podcast

Notable climate scientist Andrew Dessler just recently was on Joe Rogan's Podcast:

I just learned of this and haven't listened to it yet--doing that now--but knowing Andrew I anticipate it will be very good. Especially in light of the recent Jordan Peterson laughable claim about climate models on Rogan's podcast.

More later.

More, 3:45 pm:

Here is a link to my slides: https://t.co/v5Mtj1LC1M
I'm only including the slides I showed, but I've included blank slides to keep the slide numbers the same.

— Andrew Dessler (@AndrewDessler) February 16, 2022

COVID Cases By Income Level

At first glance this was surprising to me--I thought it should be the opposite, with the highest incomes having the lowest COVID case counts and vice versa, since they have the best access to vaccines, therapeutics, doctors, etc. But after thinking about these data I guess it's about (at least) two factors.

1. Those with higher incomes travel more and are more exposed to a wider group and variety of others as they go about their daily business, while the poor stay primarily in their local environment. (But then wouldn't COVID easily burn through those poor, local areas and essentially infect everyone?)
2. Data collection and reporting are much better in wealthy areas than in poverty-stricken areas, so the results are biased towards counting cases among the wealthy, etc. down through the various income levels.

Any other suggestions?

 

An Argument for Keeping Mask Mandates

Some Sense on COVID

I think this guy makes a lot of sense. I read someone who said we've had great success in running a marathon but why stop before we've finished? Case rates and death rates are still high -- falling (case rates in the US, anyway), but still high -- in fact, still higher than any peak of a previous surge. Deaths are just slightly lower than the peak of the second surge. I get that everyone is tired of the pandemic, but quitting precautions too early will only prolong it.

If you're tired of people saying they're 'done with Covid', that they want to 'move on' from the pandemic, get 'back to normal'... even as 3,000 people die on a daily basis & while ignoring Long Covid, this angry monologue from me tonight... is for you:pic.twitter.com/045qQMuXNO

— Mehdi Hasan (@mehdirhasan) February 10, 2022

A Hiking Robot

How long until these things are racing up and down the Appalachian Trail to see which can do it the fastest, and can they beat the fastest humans? (Don't laugh.)

 

Fortunately, there are steps and cliffs and ladders (and a few bridgeless streams) on the A.T. that these robots can't yet handle. So maybe the (longer but easier) Pacific Crest Trail. But the day is coming.

A Statement from Putin

Macron should have insisted on the chair down to the far left and not taken no for an answer.

About Whatever's Going On in Canada

I'm starting to lose the thread of what's going on in Canada, except it seems disappointingly American, minus the military wannabes in camo with assault rifles hung over their shoulders. Instead there's a lot of honking and some rude behavior, which is very disappointing for such a civilized country, I have to say.

It started over truckers protesting -- what else -- having to roll up their sleeves and get a little shot or two in their arms in order to deliver goods across the US-Canadian border and minimize infecting the populace in the process with a serious disease that has already helped killed over 900,000 Americans and 35,000 in Canada -- the equivalent of about 300,000 if you adjust for population. (So Canada has 1/3rd the number of deaths per capita. See why this protest is so disappointing.)

Ottawa's mayor has declared a state of emergency. WaPo:

The emergency declaration was designed to give officers more “flexibility” to respond to the hundreds and sometimes thousands of truckers and their supporters who are gathered in the streets to denounce coronavirus measures, Mayor Jim Watson said Sunday. And, he said, the declaration reflects the “serious danger and threat to the safety and security of residents.”

Fireworks were shot off, drivers blared their horns and streets remained blocked for the second weekend in a row, and Watson admitted Sunday that authorities were “outnumbered” and “losing this battle” against groups who were “calling the shots.”

Ottawa Police Service said in a statement Sunday it had launched over 60 criminal investigations amid the ongoing protests — including thefts, hate crimes and property damage. At least seven arrests had been made as of 9 p.m. Sunday local time in relation to property damage and other acts of “mischief,” police said. “Multiple vehicles and fuel have been seized,” the statement said.

Among the more than 500 tickets issued this weekend were notices of “excessive honking” and seat belt violations.

On Sunday morning, police said officers had issued more than 450 tickets since the day before, including to trucks with no insurance and obstructed license plates. Another 100 tickets were announced Sunday evening, including to people who were driving the wrong way or had alcohol readily available.

Police also said that it had issued a warning to the public that they could be subject to charges if they were found to be supplying demonstration trucks in the red zone with fuel.

So far it seems no worse than you might see in any parking lot of a National Football League game in America on a Sunday afternoon in October, but clearly some right-wing Canadians have been taking notes. The whole thing seems surprising since Canadians seem down with vaccine mandates. This is from last August:

According to a recent Ipsos poll, in light of the recent mandate that vaccination will be mandatory for air and train travel as well as for public servants, Canadians show that not only do they agree with these measures, but they would support imposing a vaccine mandate for healthcare workers and teachers as well. A strong majority agree with the recently announced mandatory vaccination for federal public servants (80%) and the requirement for proof of vaccination for flying on an airplane or taking a train international or inter-provincially (82%). Similar proportions support mandatory vaccination for healthcare workers (84%), for teachers (81%), or vaccine passports to enter restaurants, gyms, or other indoor spaces (72%).

I saw that the protest has now spread to Toronto and Vancouver, at least. Perhaps there's something more going on here than a protest over just vaccines, that's it become about Trudeau's policies in general, I don't know. I hope my Canadian readers can provide some insight.

[And right in the middle of hockey season! Tsk tsk.]

A Haunting Picture from World War 2

Update: Here's the true story of this train and its rescue, and more pictures.

--

I found this picture on, I think, YouTube. All I know of it is that it was taken by an American GI, of Jews leaving a train that was on its way to a Nazi concentration camp, a train the Americans (Allies?) has stopped, liberating the prisoners onboard. 

I find this picture to be joyous and tragic and haunting and uplifting all at once, and more. I know the woman and her child in front are saved, in the center of the picture, but the person who really gets to me is the women in back of them on the left, in the black coat with her arms out and a scarf or hood over her head. I can only guess, but she looks like she was just a few minutes ago beyond all hope. She looks like a ghost, like a skeleton, like she was just dead. She has black pits for eyes, sunken cheeks, huge forehead. And now she seems risen from the dead, out of a grave, just now realizing she is alive again, that she is no longer a breathing corpse but is just now again a human being. She can't smile wide enough. She's not yet on even ground but she knows it is there at the top of the hill, and even though her face is unclear it seems to have a look I've never seen before. Or maybe I'm imaging it. But that's part of what a great picture does.  

Why I'm Not Watching the Winter Olympics

I'm not going to watch the Winter Olympics on television.

A big reason is that I don't have television. Or at least cable TV. I don't get NBC, the network carrying the Winter Olympics.

I gave up on television in 2008, a good decision for me. I'm not saying everyone should do it. You have to be a bit of a misanthrope. I'm not going to linger over that issue here. It always sounds like bragging anyway, when it's just a lifestyle choice. I still have Amazon Prime, Netflix in the last month, and watch YouTube Shorts. And hockey on ESPN+ on my big desktop screen.

I could have TV if I wanted it, of course. I even would if I wanted just to watch the Winter Olympics. I'd subscribe to the NBC's Winter Olympics via their streaming service, Peacock, or Fubo TV or Sling TV maybe or some similar bundler who carries them (if they are, not sure).

But to the point, I'm not watching the Winter Olympics on purpose.

A big reason is China's human rights abuses. They're not slowing down and no one is really trying to stop them. I'm not pretending I am either. I'm nothing really. 

With that is NBC's ignoring these abuses for the sake of profits, and other corporate sponsors doing the same.

The official worldwide partners of the Olympics are Airbnb, Alibaba, Allianz, Atos, Bridgestone, Coca-Cola, Intel, Omega, Panasonic, Procter & Gamble, Samsung, Toyota, and Visa.

Of course I'm not perfect on this. I have a couple of Visa cards I'm not getting rid of. I think my laptop has an Intel chip and my next laptop likely will as well. I may drink a couple of Diet Cokes in the next couple of years, though vastly fewer than I once did. Proctor & Gamble probably makes more of what I buy--soap and toothpaste and whatnot--than what I'm aware of.

But I'm not going to be an easy chump.

I'm also not going to acquiesce to the vast and obvious corruption of the IOC (International Olympic Committee), who seems to no longer know any bounds of vice and corruption. A couple of weeks ago I read about their requirements for cities hoping to host a winter or summer games, and it actually included the requirement that the host city provide a separate lane on their streets for the use of only Olympic officials for travel between Olympic venues.

These people think they are fucking royalty.

This kind of thing, plus all the horrendous, seemingly constant bribery that takes place to garner the right to host the Olympics in a certain country, are just revolting. 

It's now all politics, ideology, nationalism, marketing, corporatism -- a perfect blend of a 21st-century dystopian novel in the making, come to real life. As if nothing else were ever possible, as if nothing else could have ever even come to pass.

Yes, the athletes worked hard to get there. I'm sorry, I can't satisfy everyone, they'll be fine.

So I'm just going to stay home and suffer the pandemic, suffer cabin fever and gray Oregonian skies, watch hockey, read too late, chat too late, blog too late, watch Amazon Prime and Netflix too late and fall asleep too early. Daylight Savings Time starts on March 13th. Maybe then it's OK to poke my head up and start looking around again. If not I'll hunker down some more with my cat and we'll stay here until god damn summer if we have to, I swear, and I just might hold my breath until then too.

Sidney Crosby Doing Sidney Crosby Things

It's the All-Star break in the NHL, also what was to be the break for guys to go play in the Olympics, until it was decided they wouldn't go, because of COVID and losing too many league games. Big disappointment. 

But still gives us time for some Sidney Crosby of my Pittsburgh Penguins.

The guy is amazing. Literally almost every game he does something you just don't see almost anywhere else. Some recent examples:

An amazing assist:

SIDNEY. CROSBY.

What a feed. 😱 pic.twitter.com/lotpZYqpGX

— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) January 26, 2022

Crosby almost makes an amazing one-handed deflection for a goal in overtime, then unfortunately completely runs over the goalie Connor Hellebuyck of the Winnipeg Jets. Unfortunately. No penalty (there were only 11 seconds left in OT anyway) but Crosby did at least ask if Buycky was OK. Oh yeah, Crosby then went on to score the only goal in the shootout series, winning the game for the Penguins.

Alors a qui la faute Dubois ? Où Crosby?

Je vous laisse la main.

Le pauvre Hellebuyck pic.twitter.com/doRyJch6pi

— Jeudepuissance (@jeudepuissance) January 23, 2022

Jumps up out of the way while blocking the goaltender for an Evgeni Malkin goal:

Evgeni Malkin picks up his first goal of the season with a bomb on the power play, along with a beautiful screen from Sidney Crosby. pic.twitter.com/2S9UI8L5b6

— Danny Shirey (@DannyShireyPGH) January 12, 2022

I already mentioned Crosby's banked empty net goal, completing a hat trick for the night:

Um, did Sidney Crosby just score a hat trick... by accident? pic.twitter.com/74v5COsRBW

— Pittsburgh Penguins (@penguins) January 22, 2022

Tonga Eruption from 73 km Away

Here's video from someone who was only 73 km away from the Jan 15th Tonga eruption.

Actually it's isn't as hair-raising as I might have expected. I mean, you can hear some bits of ash falling against the windows, but not really see any, and see some pressure waves in the atmosphere, but it doesn't look all that devastating.

It's surprising because it looks like, from the following point-of-view, the eruption quickly covered the 73-km mark and further:

https://youtube.com/shorts/zccfDSvaJrY?feature=share

(Sorry, this is a YouTube Short, YouTube's answer to TikTok, and I don't see how to embed it.)

What "Endemic" Really Means

From today's Nature Briefing (from Nature magazine):

Misuse of the word ‘endemic’ in relation to COVID-19 is encouraging a misplaced complacency, says evolutionary virologist Aris Katzourakis. A disease can be endemic as well as both widespread and deadly. Malaria, for example, is an endemic disease that killed more than 600,000 people in 2020....

That article continues

...In other words, a disease can be endemic and both widespread and deadly.... Ten million fell ill with tuberculosis that same year [2020] and 1.5 million died. Endemic certainly does not mean that evolution has somehow tamed a pathogen so that life simply returns to ‘normal’.

As an evolutionary virologist, it frustrates me when policymakers invoke the word endemic as an excuse to do little or nothing. There’s more to global health policy than learning to live with endemic rotavirus, hepatitis C or measles.

Stating that an infection will become endemic says nothing about how long it might take to reach stasis, what the case rates, morbidity levels or death rates will be or, crucially, how much of a population — and which sectors — will be susceptible. Nor does it suggest guaranteed stability: there can still be disruptive waves from endemic infections, as seen with the US measles outbreak in 2019. Health policies and individual behaviour will determine what form — out of many possibilities — endemic COVID-19 takes.

So what does "endemic" really mean?

To an epidemiologist, an endemic infection is one in which overall rates are static — not rising, not falling. More precisely, it means that the proportion of people who can get sick balances out the ‘basic reproduction number’ of the virus, the number of individuals that an infected individual would infect, assuming a population in which everyone could get sick. Yes, common colds are endemic. So are Lassa fever, malaria and polio. So was smallpox, until vaccines stamped it out.

One thing is for sure: ignorance, misunderstanding, misinformation, and disinformation will continue to be endemic, at best, with little-to-no likelihood of a vaccine.

A New COVID (Sub)variant

Now there's another new COVID variant unleashed, this one a subvariant of omicron. It's been tearing through Denmark, where it's called BA.2. (BA.1 is the original omicron.) Danish researchers say it's about 1.5 time more contagious than BA.1, but not any more likely to cause disease (or less likely, presumably).

It had already been starting to appear in many other countries, and now it's shown up in Texas, where it's called "stealth omicron," because

You cannot identify the type of variant through a PCR test like you can with omicron. Genomic sequencing has to be conducted in a specialized lab to identify the variant, which takes longer.

In Denmark, where stealth omicron cases are rapidly increasing, it went from 20% of cases in December, to 45% of cases two weeks ago, and now it’s about 65% of cases. “It’s moving fast, it’s taking over the landscape,” said Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, infectious disease specialist at University of California San Francisco.

So more reason to stay home, if you needed one.

Sidney Crosby's Impressive Empty Net Goal

Sidney Crosby of the Pittsburgh Penguins scored his third goal of the game Friday night, a hat trick, with some pretty impressive geometry. (Though after the game he said he was just trying to pass to a teammate over on the side and the goal wasn't intentional. You can say that kind of thing when you're a superstar.)

Um, did Sidney Crosby just score a hat trick... by accident? pic.twitter.com/74v5COsRBW

— Pittsburgh Penguins (@penguins) January 22, 2022

Latest COVID-19 Case and Death Rates, By State

The Kaiser Family Foundation has published COVID-19 case and death numbers, by state, as of 1/20/22. They are, unfortunately, not surprising.  

I'd just like to give some kudos to my governor, Kate Brown, who has maintained an indoor mask mandate here in Oregon since March 2020. Here near Salem everyone has been quite cooperative and still are. (I've heard stories that in red Oregon, on the east side of the Cascade Mountains, it's entirely different. But only a fraction of the population lives in that part of the state -- Western Oregon has 75% of the state's population.) From these data it looks like the mandate has made a real difference, and although some people give her grief for maintaining the mandate, it looks to have made a real difference.

Utah is interesting -- high case rate, low death rate.

COVID-19 cases per million as of 1/20/22

and

COVID-19 deaths per million as of 1/20/22

Schrödinger Was a Pedophile

Apparently this has been known for a few decades, but quietly, and it's hitting the news again: Erwin Schrödinger, famous for his fundamental contributions to quantum mechanics, was a pedophile who preyed on young girls. Girls as young as 12 and 17. Apparently he admitted to impregnated a girl who was 17 years old, who had a botched abortion and was thereafter unable to conceive for life. From Futurism:

Perhaps most diabolically, the physicist kept a record of his abuse in his diaries, even justifying his actions by claiming he had a right to the girls due to his genius.

Walter Moore, author of the biography “Schrödinger, Life and Thought” published in 1989, said that the physicist’s attitudes towards women “was essentially that of a male supremacist.” Disgustingly, the biography seemed to downplay and even romanticize his abusive habits, and describes him as having a “Lolita complex.”

Schrödinger also attempted a relationship with a different 12-year-old girl, disgustingly writing in his journal that she was “among the unrequited loves of his life.” However, he decided not to pursue her after a family member voiced their concerns that the physicist was a, you know, unrepentant abusive predator.

The Irish Times article from which the Futurism article is sourced is available only to subscribers, but apparently it says there is a petition to rename a lecture hall at Dublin’s Trinity University that’s named after Schrödinger.

I won't be surprised if, given the environment on campuses these days, there's a small movement to rename his equation and cat, but I doubt that will succeed. What do you think?

1.5°C by 2033

Berkeley Earth has global warming at 1.2°C (a little higher than NOAA and GISS by 0.1°C) and is projecting 1.5°C by 2033, relative to 1850-1900, which is the baseline I think everyone should be using now if they can. (Or the oldest baseline they can obtain.)

At 1.2°C of global warming, with current pace, we will hit 1.5°C in 2033 and 2°C by 2060. With last 7 years being warmest on record, 2021 among them, we have strong confirmation of the global climate crisis as shown in excellent analysis by @BerkeleyEarth https://t.co/MU3ub7cfrr pic.twitter.com/O5WnIo0aD0

— Johan Rockström (@jrockstrom) January 16, 2022

Reminder: this tweet won't display properly in the Edge browser. Google's little joke, I guess.

Gasoline Prices vs Median Family Income

OK thanks to commenters I think we're honing in on the truth about gasoline prices, by comparing them to median family income since 1990. It paints a much different picture than comparing them to personal income per capita:

 

Clearly median family income is barely, if that, keeping up with gas prices, and that's only in recent years. And now falling behind again.

And just as clearly, median family income isn't keeping up with personal income per capita -- evidence of the widening income inequality, I guess.

Early Bud

Now there's a tree/shrub in front of my porch with buds on it. I don't think this is normal for central Oregon in mid-January. And the buds have been there for several days -- I only took this picture yesterday. The meteorological records say the average daily temperature in Salem falls to a minimum on Dec11-Jan5; usually the third week of January is the week with snow here, though this year it was Dec26-28. May still snow more, who knows. I haven't kept close tabs, but it seems very early to see a bud on anything here. 

Gasoline Price vs Personal Income

Here is the average US gas price vs personal income per capita, since 1990. Neither is adjusted for inflation, and both are set to a scale of 100 on 8/20/1990, when the gasoline data begins.

The personal income data is annual, so it ends in 2020.

So, at least for the average person, gas prices surged ahead under the oilman Bush, but income is now outpacing the price of gas over the last 30 years.

Even if you started working in 2010, you're still ahead, assuming you're getting the average increase in personal income.

But it never seems that way, does it?

The Price of Gasoline Isn't That High

Some people are complaining about the price of gas, and ok it is at a 7-year high. But both nominally and adjusted for inflation, it's been significantly higher much of the time over the last 15 years:

Gasoline prices here are the weekly US national average from the EIA's This Week in Petroleum, adjusted via the Consumer Price Index. The blurriness is brought to you by Google (who owns Blogger). Click on the graph to get a clearer version.

I keep track of what I pay for gas, and my mileage, and while I haven't adjusted it for statewide inflation here is what I've paid since two years before I moved to Oregon in 2006:

So there hasn't been much of any increase here, and would obviously be a slight decrease over time if adjusted for inflation. 

I think people (that is to say, Americans) just like to complain about the price of gas no matter what, think they have an inherent right to $2/gallon gasoline, and imagine their political leaders can do something about it (as I once sort of did). But it's mostly a function of the price of oil:

All Climate Data in One Small Place

Someone should put this on a business card and laminate it, and sell it at climate conferences, teacher conferences, and wherever science is discussed.

A high quality image record of multiple adverse rapidly increasing climate change indicators by Ed Hawkins, to which I added ocean acidification. pic.twitter.com/O6EYutKvcS

— Peter D Carter (@PCarterClimate) January 9, 2022

Sidney Crosby is a Class Act

Sidney Crosby is the best:

Brian Page, who was paralyzed while playing for the Little #Flyers in November of 2020, gets a puck from classy ⁦@penguins⁩ captain Sidney Crosby. Video: Zack Hill. pic.twitter.com/JKwH328jRT

— Sam Carchidi (@BroadStBull) January 7, 2022

On the other hand, it's surprising how little you have to do to be labeled a "class act" when you're already a superstar.

Seriously though, I've never heard of a classless thing Sidney Crosby has ever done.

OK, maybe this. But it was against the Flyers, cross state rivals, cross state haters, who surely deserved it.

Happy New Year

The Books I Read This Year

I thought I'd list the books I read in 2021. My goal is always to read a book a week, but I never succeed -- this year I read 27, which is lower than last year's 32. I try to read a diverse selection, including nonfiction (N) and fiction (F); over the years 56% of the books I've read have been nonfiction. A few things here I read were to write reviews for Physics World: Seven Pillars of Science, Lightspeed, and (coming) A Quantum Life. After the authors I list the year of publications.

I've highlighted in bright yellow books I absolutely loved, and in light yellow books I thoroughly enjoyed. The Ministry for the Future was unique sci fi and I think would be quite appealing to anyone who closely follows climate issues. Tenth of December is a book of short stories from George Saunders, who has a wild imagination--the stories were a joy to read, and one in particular still quite memorable. And The Overstory by Richard Powers is simply one of the best novels I have ever read. It's a book about trees, and I'm still thinking about some of them, and the people who were involved with them. It's a remarkable book and I highly recommend it to everyone, especially those with an environmentalist bent. I cried more than once while reading it, and I'm actually getting a tear in the corner of my eye right now. I'm not even sure why--that's the beauty and power (and mystery) of this book. At least it was to me.

I'm interested in hearing what books you loved this year and would recommend.  

Just A Nice Chart

Earth's average global surface temperature compared to total radiative energy from the Sun. Diverging.

 

Climate Models vs Skeptic Models

Didion Quote

“I think we are well advised to keep on nodding terms with the people we used to be, whether we find them attractive company or not. Otherwise they turn up unannounced and surprise us, come hammering on the mind’s door at 4 a.m. of a bad night and demand to know who deserted them, who betrayed them, who is going to make amends.”

-- Joan Didion, On Keeping a Notebook

Didion died on Thursday at age 87.

Omicron Less Severe Than Delta, But More Contagious

So it appears, based on a preliminary study in Scotland, that the omicron variant of COVID is more transmissible but less severe than the delta variant.

Perhaps good news for individuals, but bad news for hospitals.

From the Washington Post, about a study conducted in Scotland with apparently a population with characteristics close to the US:

The study, which has not yet been peer reviewed, found that people infected with the omicron variant were almost 60 percent less likely to enter the hospital than those infected with delta, the globally dominant variant is being eclipsed rapidly.

The Scottish scientists said that recently vaccinated people appear to have some protection against symptomatic infection from omicron but less so than against delta. A third dose or booster of an mRNA vaccine was associated with a 57 percent reduction in the odds of developing symptomatic covid-19. Boosters gave better protection against the delta variant — more than 80 percent.

and

That group, led by Neil Ferguson, reported that those infected by omicron were 15 to 20 percent less likely to go to an emergency room with severe symptoms and 40 percent less likely to be hospitalized overnight, when compared with those infected by delta.

But they say the numbers are too small to reach definitive conclusions.

Still, those aren't odds I'm interested in playing. The unvaccinated clearly don't care anyway, but will no doubt use this as justification to stay unvaccinated, even though many of them will still die.

Moreover

Ferguson also urged caution.

“Our analysis shows evidence of a moderate reduction in the risk of hospitalization associated with the omicron variant compared with the delta variant,” he said. “However, this appears to be offset by the reduced efficacy of vaccines against infection with the omicron variant.”

Ferguson stressed that given the high transmissibility of the omicron variant, “there remains the potential for health services to face increasing demand if omicron cases continue to grow at the rate that has been seen in recent weeks.”

To my surprise, new US COVID cases on Tuesday were down from Monday, 189,030 compared to 276,389. But they'll be higher today. We'll see how much higher. 

"Don't Look Up" Trailer

This actually looks like it might be pretty good:

Yesterday Saw Second-Highest Case Count in the Pandemic

Yesterday saw the second-highest number of new recorded COVID cases since the start of the pandemic, lagging only last winter's peak in the (uses fingers to count) third wave. I suspect today will set a record. On NPR this morning Fauci said this will likely peak sometime in January -- I forget if he gave a more precise time -- then decline just as fast. I wonder now if we aren't all going to get COVID by then. The hospitals are going to be a mess, if they aren't already. As in, you won't be able to get into one if you need to. I'm really starting to fear what's coming in the next few weeks -- it could be unprecedented. 

The New York Times says most new infections may soon be breakthroughs, that is, in the vaccinated, especially the unboosted. In the US, 61% are vaccinated (2 shots) but only 28% are boosted (3 shots). 

But with Omicron, being fully vaccinated does not appear to provide the same level of protection, in terms of infection and transmission. While the vaccinated still appear likely to avoid serious illness, there remains a risk they will experience symptoms. They may also pass the virus to someone else.

With the ability to spread widely and quickly, Omicron is poised to become the dominant variant. It’s unclear how severe or mild Omicron is for someone who has not been vaccinated and thus has no coronavirus immunity. In the United States data suggest that around 61 percent of Americans of all ages are fully vaccinated. There are millions of Americans who are not vaccinated.

Hospitals are already overburdened by Delta patients, and the consequences of many infections in a short period will be increasingly deadly. Even cases among the vaccinated can still lead to long Covid.

Fortunately, there’s mounting evidence that a third shot, which the Food and Drug Administration authorized in November for all adults, can increase people’s defenses. But only around 28 percent of Americans have received a booster.

From the Washington Post:

Hope in the U.S. Terminal Decline

The US is paralyzed and now appears to be in terminal decline.

Paradoxically, that and the fact that we constitute just a tiny sliver of humanity may be the world’s best hope and a dark reason for optimism.

— Scott Denning (@airscottdenning) December 20, 2021

The Omicron Surge

Seems like it's time to start worrying seriously about COVID numbers again, doesn't it? And getting serious about precautions. Again. I've gotten lax about washing my hands when I get home. We all still wear masks indoors here in Oregon -- haven't stopped since March 2020, and compliance is near 100% around here, in blue Oregon.

You hear that the omicron variant is more contagious but causes a less serious illness than the delta variant, but I am doubting that. After reading this excellent NPR article, it seems that conclusion was based on a large South African study where most participants had some prior exposure to COVID and thus had built up some natural immunity. That's unlikely to be the case in the US and Europe for the unvaccinated. So there may be some big surprises in store for them. As the graph below shows, already Denmark and the UK are getting slammed, highly vaccinated countries you'd think would have a handle on COVID by now. (Admittedly I cherry picked these two countries for their extreme and growing rates. That's the point.) Omicron is surging in the northeast US, and in Washington DC, and hospitals are getting slammed and in some cases at capacity. Check out this Sunday newspaper ad by Cleveland area hospitals. Being vaccinated and boosted, to me that's the scary part -- hospitals being so overwhelmed they can't take care of non-COVID patients who need emergency care or surgeries they have scheduled. (Of course, I'm fear getting COVID, too.) And for that I directly blame the selfish people who refuse to get vaccinated. It's absurd and I simply can't understand their objections, given the consequences of getting the disease and the risk they pose to society. It really seems like something in the water supply has removed rationality from a third of the people in this country. 

Save of the Year (Perhaps)

Malcolm Subban of the Buffalo Sabres, Friday night against the Penguins. Even Subban doesn't know what he did, let alone how.

His save was so good @Subbz3r0 got his own segment on @sportscenter

(and yes it was also #1 in the #SCTopTen) @BuffaloSabres @NHL pic.twitter.com/UlH6uGQTLH

— ᴀʀᴅᴀ Öᴄᴀʟ 🏒 (@Arda) December 18, 2021

Penguins still won 3-2 so it was OK.

Malcolm is younger brother of NJ Devils excellent defenseman and all-around rapscallion P.K. Subban. There's a still younger brother, Jordan, not yet at the NHL level. All play defense.

Einstein Quote

"I must seek in the stars what was denied to me on earth." 

-- Albert Einstein, in a letter to his secretary and lover, Betty Neumann, in 1924 

via A Quantum Life by Hakeem Oluseyi

NOAA: Fourth-Warmest November

Total global warming according to NOAA is now 1.09°C (via linear regression)

NOAA global temperature anomaly for Nov 2021 = 0.91°C relative to 1901-2000 (4th-warmest Nov) = 1.17°C relative to 1880-1909 = 2.10°F

Global land anomaly = 1.50°C rel to 1901-2000 (3rd-warmest Nov) = 2.00°C relative to 1880-1909 = 3.60°F

Data: https://t.co/VdxQIYp1xu pic.twitter.com/tk9cfvFMtp

— David Appell (@davidappell) December 13, 2021

A Unique NHL Goal?

This alley-oop goal may be the most unique goal ever recorded in NHL history. It was scored Friday night by the Anaheim Duck's Sonny Milano, with the assist, the unique part, the alley oop, by Trevor Zegras. Watch afterward, even they can't believe they pulled it off:

The announcers get it wrong, missing that Milano batted the puck in. The goalies and defense looked stunned and confused. Zegras and Milano can't quite believe it.

Wow.

A "Michigan" goal, also called a "Michigan lacrosse goal," is where a player scoops the puck up and whips it around the goal and in next to the goalie's head:

It's still rare, but becoming more frequently seen in recent years. Some people call it the "Sidney Crosby goal," because Crosby did it in the minor leagues as a 16-year old when he played for Rimouski Oceanic, though apparently he didn't invent it:

He's only tried it rarely in the NHL though, like here last season:

Some pros don't like it, some do, some won't try it. Young kids are the ones going for it -- in the top video, note that Trevor Zegras is only 20 years old, in only his second NHL season.

Swarm of Moderate Earthquakes Off Oregon Coast

Starting about 1:30 pm Pacific Time yesterday there have been a swarm earthquakes off the Oregon Coast. I get alerts from the USGS Earthquakes Hazard Program and so far there have been 27 of magnitude 4.5 or greater, with the highest M5.8 (twice). 

No tsunamis are expected or have been reported, according to EarthSky. They quote an ex-AP science writer who lives on the Oregon coast:

As of 7:05 a.m. PST [15:05 UTC on December 8], there were 56 quakes in the swarm, 13 of which were 5.0 to 5.8 magnitude.

Probably means nothing... except here we're all waiting for the M9+ that will probably devastate this entire region. Oh boy. 

Nice Chess Writing

Maybe you know, but the World Chess Championship is taking place is Dubai right now, the defending champion Magnus Carlsen of Norway against Russian grandmaster challenger Ian Nepomniachtchi. Through eight games, Carlsen was up by 2 points. 

Here is how Oliver Roeder introduced his article about game 9 for fivethirtyeight.com, which I think is just beautiful:

Wonderful writing. 

However Nepomniachtchi lost game 9, and it's now clear Carlsen will retain his title. Carlsen just turned 31 on Nov 30. He was ranked #1 in the world at age 19, and became world chess champion in 2013 at age 22. (Only Gary Kasparov was younger, by about 5 months.) 

The current game 6 was the longest world championship game in history, 136 moves. It seems most think it wiped Nepo out psychologically, and perhaps physically as well.

Match is best of 14 games, with Carlsen now up 6-3. So the result seems to be a given at this point. I wish Carlsen, with his good looks and cool Gen Z personality, was bringing some growth to chess in the US, but we're probably too fucked up of country to hope for that now.

--

* I was chess champion of my high school, way back when we still dressed halfway decently and the world still had hope, except for the fear of global nuclear war and the end of all life on Earth. Also won a round robin tournament in my hometown among about 50 people when I was 16, beating a bunch of old men (viz. those now my age) and a too-smart little 13-year old Asian kid in the last game, for the tournament win, when everyone else was looking in over our shoulders, when he made a tiny mistake (I thought) around move 11 and I thought for 20 minutes, all those people hovering over us, then moved deep into his territory and tore him apart in a couple more moves. Maybe one of the best moments of my life. You know how those are, when you're 16. Wish I still had my written record of the game. My parents picked me up and I had a trophy and they didn't even notice or ask about it, and me, being 16, didn't say a thing.

Chuck Wiese Was Even Dumber Than I Thought

Awhile back I corrected Chuck Wiese for making the claim that the monstrous late June Pacific Northwest heat wave, which here peaked at 117°F (47.2°C), was natural. 

An ex-TV meteorologist, not a scientist, with only a B.S., his analysis included some bad physics based on a misunderstanding of the nature of blackbodies.

Actual scientists, doing real scientific analysis, concluded, not surprisingly, that the worst heat wave in the history of the world included a significant anthropogenic component: "It was almost impossible for the temperatures seen recently in the Pacific North West heatwave to have occurred without global warming."

In his usual fashion, Wiese responded with a fusillade of insults indicative of his uncertainties and insecurities. It wasn't pleasant to dig through his verbal crap -- no doubt its intended purpose -- but now that I have it's clear he only dug his hole deeper. 

Wiese wrote:

I have stated that the 15 micron band which composes the Q-branch of its radiation behaves nearly as a black body over that narrow range of wavelength where the absorption coefficients are very high similar to black body radiation.

Let's recall, yet again: a blackbody is one that absorbs all radiation incident upon it.

So a single band, like the 15-micron band, cannot behave "nearly as a black body." Period. It doesn't absorb all radiation, it only absorbs 15-micron radiation. End of story. So blackbody equations do not apply to it. 

Wiese just doesn't know what he's talking about.

And this is hardly the only reason why his analysis was ridiculous and nuts. 

The worst heat wave ever occurred (well, a 1000-year weather event) because of humans. It killed over 1,000 people. I doubt someone like Wiese cares -- for him they're just fodder in his culture war. But he was wrong. And he has to face that, and will one day or another. 

Why? Because things are not going to be getting any better.

Stunning Image From Mars

An image of the Maria Gordon notch on Mars from the Curiosity rover. The cliff on the right is 12 meters high.... I almost feel like I've hiked through here somewhere in Arizona.

Knowing the Future One Second Ahead

Lots I should be blogging about, but for the moment this will have to do: a goalie who knows where the shoots are going a second before the other team shoots them.

This was an absurd sequence by Braden Holtby pic.twitter.com/tJXb7cyGMm

— Brady Trettenero (@BradyTrett) December 1, 2021

Unbelievable

Try to hold down your breakfast.

Kyle Rittenhouse in Florida hangin’ with former @BachelorABC contestant and his new publicist. Next stop stay at Florida Governor’s Mansion? pic.twitter.com/ybfJUzBuya

— Daniel Uhlfelder (@DWUhlfelderLaw) November 22, 2021

About Gas Prices

Paul Krugman posted a graph that I wish I had thought of:

One issue that seems to have influenced voters Tuesday was the price of gasoline — over which Biden has no control. Here's US gas prices and the world price of oil (divided by 42 to make it a price per gallon) pic.twitter.com/rSwv1q8DzN

— Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) November 4, 2021

Everyone is complaining that gas prices are high, and they are for the last few years, but they really aren't for the last 10 years or so, when adjusted for inflation:

This is weekly data on gas prices from EIA's This Week in Petroleum, adjusted for inflation via the Consumer Price Index. Gas prices were high during the Bush Jr administration -- probably a feature, not a bug -- and then after the financial crisis. 

But it appears, from Krugman's graph, that presidents don't have much, if any, influence on gas prices -- they're set quite deterministically from the price of oil. 

NASA GISS: 4th Warmest October; Warmest on Land

#NASA #GISS land-only surface temperature anomaly for October 2021 = 1.58°C = 2.84°F relative to 1880-1909, a record high for the month. Global surface anomaly is 4th highest for Octobers at 1.21°C (same baseline).https://t.co/s2iWlyZ1a7#GlobalWarming #climatechange

— David Appell (@davidappell) November 18, 2021

Frustrations and Highlights

Superstar Sidney Crosby of the Pittsburgh Penguins is having a rough start to the NHL season. He needed wrist surgery right before the preseason started, missing several of the first regular season games, then after one game back got COVID and missed several more games. In his first game back, down 5-1 to the Washington Capitals on Sunday night, he took out his frustration on Capitals defenseman Martin Fehervary:

Crosby taking out some frustration in his return to the lineup. Pens down 5-1 to Caps pic.twitter.com/zHD40mg7OW

— Brady Trettenero (@BradyTrett) November 15, 2021

No penalty called on Crosby, nor did the NHL Department of Player Safety fine or suspend him. In fairness, Crosby gets pummeled on plenty and it only gets noticed when he fights back. The days of goons and enforcers who once protected the likes of Wayne Gretzky are long gone.

I wish my job had some similar outlet for my frustrations.

A couple other highlights from Sunday.

Connor McDavid doing the kind of thing Sidney Crosby used to do:

Connor McDavid good lord pic.twitter.com/U4h9k4hM9i

— Brady Trettenero (@BradyTrett) November 6, 2021

and an amazing save from Tampa Bay goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy:

Oh my VASY 😳🚫 pic.twitter.com/YsdiJqpXbk

— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) November 14, 2021

Divergence of Lower Troposphere Warming Measurements

This is a graph of the difference in warming of the lower troposphere as measured by the RSS research group compared to UAH (University of Alabama at Huntsville). The divergence continues to widen. 

The quality/resolution of the graph is terrible, unless you click on it. I'm posting this also so I can complain about it on the Blogger Forum. Not that I expect them to change. Why show a low resolution figure when clearly they store the full resolution image? I don't get it. Wish I could easily transition my blog to another platform -- Wordpress I guess -- but by now I have over 15 years of posts.

Sorry for whining. This is dispiriting.

The Business of America

 Calvin Coolidge said  “The business of America is business!” He didn't say its business is people. 

Greta Didn't Invent "Blah Blah Blah"

Greta Thunberg has received a lot of attention for her "blah blah blah" admonition towards those negotiating climate agreements -- not without cause -- and, my favorite, some activists have taken to calling the diplomats "bleaders." Sounds sheep-like, too. Nice.

But it turns out "blah blah blah" isn't original with Thunberg -- it goes all the way back to COP1, the first Conference of the Parties in Berlin in 1995. This is from How to Blow Up a Pipeline by Andreas Malm:

Tuvalu Addresses COP26

Of course, we're all supposed to accept this a necessary for our lifestyle:

This photo of Tuvalu’s virtual address to the Climate Conference says everything that should need to be said. #COP26 pic.twitter.com/SOstgl6wKr

— Ben Phillips (@benphillips76) November 5, 2021

Some Basic Evidence for Manmade Climate Change

I think it's often worth pointing out evidence of basic predictions and expectations for anthropogenic climate change, and here are a couple, both from "Vapor Storms" by Jennifer Francis in the November 2021 issue of Scientific American:

The increase in water vapor, as a result of a warmer atmosphere:

By the way, there's 1.27e16 kg of water vapor in the atmosphere, on average, or an average of 24.9 kg/m². (That's 0.25% of the atmosphere's mass, or 3,970 ppm by mole. Interestingly, that's only equivalent to 2.5 cm (1 inch) of equivalent sea level rise.) So an increase of about 0.9 kg/m² (as it looks from the graph, weighting between land an ocean) is 3.6%. Half the predicted 7% per °C of warming predicted by the Clausius-Claperyon equation. Not sure why. 

Increase in extreme rainfall in the US:

Source for both: Jennifer Francis, "Vapor Storms," Scientific American 325, 5, 26-33 (November 2021). http://doi:10.1038/scientificamerican1121-26.

Insult from World Leaders at Trevi Fountain

I'm sorry, but this little gesture is pretty damn stupid and insulting. These leaders of the free world have more power than anyone, at least nominally. Why do they need "luck" to address climate change? They need to use their power to bring forth initiatives, policies, regulations and laws!

Also, whatever media handlers allowed this episode and photograph should be fired. What a dumb message it sends.

World leaders toss a coin at Trevi for good luck fighting the climate emergency pic.twitter.com/zFIDPJnVf7

— Bruno Maçães (@MacaesBruno) October 31, 2021

Yes I know about the Trevi Foundation tradition (though it's not for luck).