Corona-zona

  Almost a year ago I blogged about the governors failing a marshmallow test  by rushing to end pandemic restrictions.  It was a reference to a famous study  done Stanford about self-control in kids. Basically it looked at kids' ability to forego a small immediate reward for a double reward after a delay. For context, at that time we were coming off a third wave of the virus (graph via Google/NYT): For the most part it was the usual-suspect COVIDiot governors in places like Texas, Mississippi, and Arizona who took this as a green light to end all pandemic restrictions. But there were other liberal states like Massachusetts who did the same (maybe other places too). I compared this to failing the marshmallow test because public health officials were saying it was too soon . As you probably remember and can see from the graph, they were right. Later that year we encountered a new Delta wave, followed by an Omicron wave. Now history is repeating itself. Republicans are ...

  Legislators in the Arizona House are pushing a law that would punish businesses that fire workers for refusing vaccine mandates. The bill is only 16 lines long, and the main part says: Notwithstanding any other law, an employee who is terminated for not receiving a covid-19 vaccine as a condition of employment shall receive either of the following: (1) Severance compensation paid by an employer in the amount of the employee's annual salary in one lump sum or installment payments over twelve months. (2) Reemployment with the employer at the same or similar position held on the date the employee was terminated and a reasonable accommodation provided by the employer to the employee. So basically if you require your employees to be vaccinated and they refuse, then if you fire them you have to pay them one year's salary as severance. The bill is retroactive to last November. This is obviously an anti-vax measure. I suppose they think it's necessary because the governor's ...

  A few players in the NBA are vaccine resisters.  According to an  article in Rolling Stone , they are pushing their players' union to reject plans by the league to require them to get the jab.   According to the story, during a recent teleconference the response from the players to the proposal was “Non-starter. Non-starter.” The group of COVIDiots rejecting the vaccines represents around ten percent of all players.   One of them is apparently Kyrie Irving. I say "apparently" because he refuses to disclose his vaccination status, but that's as good as disclosing your non-vaccinated status.   Mr. Irving makes around $34 million a year to throw a ball through a hoop. If I were paying someone that kind of money to do that work, you can be damn sure he'd either be vaccinated or be out of a job. The twist in the plot is that sensible and well-governed cities like New York and San Francisco have established rules that nobody can enter an in...

  Republican Arizona Attorney General Mark Byrnovich is running for the Senate seat currently held by Democrat Mark Kelley. So naturally he is frantically trying to show how T****y he is.   One way he's done that is by being the first AG in the nation to file a lawsuit against Biden's vaccine policies. Those include a mandate for federal workers and contractors, and an OSHA regulation requiring large employers to prove workers are vaccinate or are tested weekly. The mandate part isn't for Americans in general, it's for federal employees. Like any other employer the federal government certainly can make rules for its own employees. And OSHA certainly can regulate workplace safety. The OSHA regulation isn't even a vaccine mandate—notwithstanding the misleading statements in his press release —it's an option, vaccine OR testing. So Byrnovich is making a bizarre argument that Biden's policies violate equal protection because he's not making illegal immigrant...