Authoritarianism is the Bailout Klepto-Keynesianism's final phase.

“There is no better perch from which to execute Galbraith’s bubble-prolonging playbook than the shadow presidency.”

22.02.2025 12:31 — 👍 14    🔁 9    💬 1    📌 1

Excerpt from a public letter Roald Dahl wrote encouraging people to vaccinate their children. Olivia, my eldest daughter, caught measles when she was seven years old. As the illness took its usual course I can remember reading to her often in bed and not feeling particularly alarmed about it. Then one morning, when she was well on the road to recovery, I was sitting on her bed showing her how to fashion little animals out of coloured pipe-cleaners, and when it came to her turn to make one herself, I noticed that her fingers and her mind were not working together and she couldn’t do anything. “Are you feeling all right?” I asked her. “I feel all sleepy,” she said. In an hour, she was unconscious. In twelve hours she was dead. The measles had turned into a terrible thing called measles encephalitis and there was nothing the doctors could do to save her. That was twenty-four years ago in 1962, but even now, if a child with measles happens to develop the same deadly reaction from measles as Olivia did, there would still be nothing the doctors could do to help her. On the other hand, there is today something that parents can do to make sure that this sort of tragedy does not happen to a child of theirs. They can insist that their child is immunized against measles. I was unable to do that for Olivia in 1962 because in those days a reliable measles vaccine had not been discovered. Today a good and safe vaccine is available to every family and all you have to do is to ask your doctor to administer it.

The measles outbreak in Texas is reminding me of the public letter Roald Dahl wrote about losing his daughter to measles in 1962, just before the vaccine was publicly available.

15.02.2025 17:48 — 👍 26989    🔁 11883    💬 413    📌 551

Thanks for reminding me of this piece of brilliance.

15.02.2025 20:32 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

CDC cuts expected to devastate Epidemic Intelligence Service, a ‘crown jewel’ of public health Members of the CDC's Epidemic Intelligence Service were warned Friday that many of them were about to be fired

Doing the unthinkable: The deep cuts to the #CDC's workforce today are expected to decimate the Epidemic Intelligence Service, a program that has trained public health rapid responders for decades.
Envy of the world. Poof!
www.statnews.com/2025/02/14/t...

14.02.2025 20:30 — 👍 10882    🔁 4544    💬 529    📌 426

Thank you @warren.senate.gov !

04.02.2025 22:41 — 👍 12    🔁 1    💬 0    📌 0

The last vestige of American democracy is this small, commemorative statue of the Lincoln Memorial at Capitol City Ink in Dulles airport.

05.02.2025 18:21 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

White House pauses all federal grants, sparking confusion The Trump administration has put a hold on all federal financial grants and loans, affecting tens of billions of dollars in payments.

A little etymology/vocabulary lesson is in order:

Why is it called the "executive" branch of government?

Because its job is to _execute_ decisions made elsewhere (by the legislative branch). By "pausing" funding already allocated, it has ceased to do its job www.washingtonpost.com/business/202...

28.01.2025 04:23 — 👍 29    🔁 9    💬 0    📌 1

I’m not sure how this Bluesky thing works or what I’m doing, but I’ve brought my books, cats, and favorite mugs and I’m moving in.

24.01.2025 00:50 — 👍 3    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0