TGIF 1/1/2021

How about we go all celebratory for this week's entry?

Cheers to the end of the current Congress on Sunday. The next Congress, the 117th, begins at and the beginning of the next one, also on Sunday. There are 45 new Republican members of the House, and 15 new Dems. That the Dems lost so many seats, at a time when they were hoping for a 'blue wave,' is not a good sign, but we'll see how things go.  There are also two new Dem Senators and six new Rs, with two seats to be decided in Georgia on Tuesday.  

Cheers to the Georgia runoffs. Voter registration was sky high, turnout has been high, and the polls are tight - not that anyone dares pay attention to polls, right? It is fun to look at the push me-pull you aspects of the race, where Trump-supporting extremists are still saying the November election was rigged and so there's no reason to vote in the runoffs, while the at the same time the president, the president-elect, and many others are going to Georgia to drum up voter excitement and drive turnout. I expect we'll see two red wins, but you never know. I think maybe what we all should be rooting for, regardless of our politics, is an early decision, so we can get over our bad selves and move on. It's long past time that we put the 2020 election to bed.

Cheers to progress with vaccines. I don't think we were even close to hitting the promised 20,000,000 vaccines by 12/31/20. And we're hearing horror stories about distribution plans - or the lack thereof, vaccines sitting in warehouse undistributed, and of course there's the by now par-for-the-course finger-painting coming from a certain guy with a really popular Twitter account.  And we had a fired hospital pharmacist arrested for purposefully tainting vaccines by leaving them out for too long, and we had some folks who received injections of Regeneron - a treatment, not the vaccine. And even given all of that, I believe that things are going to start falling into place, that we'll get the logistics and the arguing worked out so that folks will get the shot in their arm that we need in the country's arm. I believe it's going to get better sooner than later, and I hope you'll add your optimism to mine.

Cheers to Brexit. I've got no compelling personal interest in the UK's decision to leave the EU; I kind of think it was a bad idea, but I don't know enough to comment intelligently. I do, however, appreciate that they managed to get a deal done, finally, and that things both sides can move forward. This, too, is something we'll have to watch to see what the impact will be on the US and the rest of the world, and whether the folks who voted to leave will be happy with their victory. And, we'll have to wait and see if others (Poland, perhaps?) will be emboldened to have a 'leave' vote of their own.

Cheers to 2021. Rarely have so many, who disagree on so much, shared such an appreciation for the passage of time. The turning of the page on a calendar. The dropping of a crystal ball in Times Square. Fireworks over iconic landmarks around the world. Weird performances by musicians some of those watching have never heard of, or hope to never hear from again. 

Our reasons for eagerly awaiting the arrival of 2021 surely include wanting to get past the worst of the pandemic - that one's shared by just about everybody. Others? Wanting to see the end of the Trump administration, or the start of the Biden Administration. The potential end of Mitch McConnell's reign of terror. A return to normalcy. The thrill of having the Buffalo Bills in the playoffs, and the Patriots watching on TV. They are endless, the reasons one wants to see the dawn of the new year - but even in times as divisive as these, most of us will agree we're glad 2020 is over, and we're looking forward to better things in 2021. 

Cheers to us, and TGIF, everyone.

Sunday School 12/27/20: Extra Credit

In yesterday's Sunday School, we heard from three members of the House -- one Republican and two progressive Dems. 

For your Extra Credit today, we've got That Guy from Vermont and three prominent governors. 

TGFV (Sen. Bernie Sanders), talked with Jon Karl on This Week with(out) George. Here are the highlights.

On Trump's messing around with the COVID stimulus bill (he did finally sign it last night), he said "what the president is doing right now is unbelievably cruel," pointing to folks who are losing extended unemployment benefits and who might be evicted if Trump vetoes the bill.  

My view is that given the terrible economic crisis facing this country, yes, we do need to get $2,000 out to every working-class individual in this country, 500 bucks for their kids. But you can't diddle around with the bill. Sign the bill, Mr. President, and then immediately, Monday, Tuesday, we can pass a $2,000 direct payment to the working families of this country.

He also said that, during the entire time he was lobbying for $2000, with only one Republican joining him, TGFV never heard from Trump or anyone else on the higher payment, including Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin.  He also referred to Trump as "an extraordinary narcissist, pathologically narcissistic."

He pretty much dodged the question on whether it was a mistake for the Dems to refuse the pre-election $1.8T relief bill, saying "at this moment, working families are suffering more economic desperation than any time since the Great Depression. We should be responding to that need" with no mention of Pelosi's decision.

And, finally, on whether the Biden cabinet is progressive enough, his answer is no.

Well, what I have said many, many times is the progressive movement itself probably is 35 or 40 percent of the Democratic coalition. And I believe that the progressive movement deserves seats in the cabinet. That has not yet happened.

He's like to see "strong progressives in the administration"  

who believe that healthcare is a human right, who believe we’ve got to make sure that public colleges and universities are tuition free and that we have to be aggressive on issues like climate change, racial justice, immigration reform.

Next, Karl talked with My Favorite Republican (MFR), Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan. 

On whether President-elect Biden is keeping his promise to reach out to Republicans, MFR says so far, so good. The two have already talked, and he's reached out to govs on both sides of the aisle - and not only is he reaching out, he "seems to be listening" to them and their concerns. 

I know your previous guest probably would like him to move more -- more to the left, but I've been pushing to try to keep him, you know, in a more moderate place where he's willing to reach across the aisle and work together with Republicans.

On what kinds of "damage" president Trump can do in the next three weeks or so (Karl mentioned the ridiculous pardons as one example), MFR says he "gave up guessing what he might do next." The veto of the NDAA has been troubling, he said, but the fooling around on the stimulus bill "really bothers" him.

... you know, both parties were so far apart in the House and the Senate, the Problem Solvers Caucus, some really bipartisan folks on both sides of the aisle, brought everybody to the table. They reached an agreement. Secretary Mnuchin worked together with them and made commitments on behalf of the administration. And then not eight months before or even eight days before, but after it was passed, then the president raises these objections... 

On Rs standing up to Trump, he says more of them are, and more of them will. He also said that while Trump will still have a voice in the party, it's going to be different after the inauguration, when he won't have as much influence. Perhaps worse, in my opinion, is the uphill battle he faces on a larger scale.

There's an awful lot of people that want to be the next Donald Trump. But I'm going to be fighting to try to return our party to its roots, and to become a bigger tent party to reach out, a more Reaganesque party, more positive, hopeful vision for the future.

 Now, since we've had an Independent, and a Republican, let's hear from a Dem - Michigan's Gov. Gretchen Whitmer who visited the Face the Nation classroom to talk with Margaret Brennan.

On whether people have learned the value of their local governments this year, Whitmer said she hopes so, adding that no governor wanted to be in the situations they're in, but "it was incumbent on us to rise to the occasion" given the lack of a broader national strategy.  She also said the governors who acted regionally, learning from and sharing information with each other, benefited everyone because each state's experts were collecting different information that could be helpful to their cross-state line counterparts.

I should note that Ohio's Republican Gov. Mike DeWine was also on in the same segment as Whitmer, and he was generally in agreement with Whitmer on most of the questions, but he did point out one area where they might have differences of opinion: who gets the vaccine. 

I think there's been a real consensus among what we call A1 group, which is the-- the first responders, our medical people, our EMS, people who are risking their lives every-- every single day, as well as where we've taken the most losses, and that is in our nursing homes. I think there's probably going to be more lack of consensus among people in general when you get beyond that first group.

That segued into the question of how 'essential workers' are being defined, as Brennan mentioned reading that Colorado may be putting ski resort employees on their list. Whitmer said it could vary widely from state to state, and that varying will probably speed up as the vaccines get out there. And, she said, they've going to be "doing the hard work" of identifying who is-- has the most exposure, who is out there in jobs that are, you know, come into contact with the public at greater numbers." 

Brennan also asked how Whitmer makes sense of the experience of the threats against her (I think the question included both the ones where her life was threatened but also the day-to-day stuff that they're all hearing). She said every governor is getting backlash of some sort, some because of the steps they are taking to keep people safe and safe lives (she's in that bucket), but she also noted that's not the case for everyone.

Other governors are getting a backlash because they haven't done enough and people have been dying on their watch. There are no easy solutions here, no clearly obvious solutions here. Yet, I believe that the right thing to do is to follow the science and to put people's lives first because we can and we will recover from the economic blowback, from COVID-19 that has run amok in our country. What we can't do is, you know, bring someone back to life.

The bipartisan collaboration between the governors generally, which MFR has often mentioned in interviews, as well as the regional collaboration such as the kind we've seen here in New York with neighboring states, is something I hope US Senators and Congressmembers learn from, and take with them to Washington when the new legislative session kicks off next month.  

I mean, there's no time like the present, right?

See you around campus.  

In Case You Missed It (v64)

I had a back-to-normal week here, in terms of getting posts out of my head, through my fingers, and posted.  Here's last week in review. 

The Sunday School classrooms were full of Republicans, and there was a marked difference between the guys from Georgia and Louisiana and one from Indiana, in terms of how much of a grasp on reality they each had.  Here's a bit from the correct side of history. Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger talked with George on This Week. Here's what he had to say about the Rs who refuse to accept the results of the election.

... at the end of the day we, as Republicans, didn't turn out enough voters. Our office, as secretary of state, is really just to look at what those vote totals were, and we report the results. And that's why it gets back to the state party didn't do their job, didn't raise enough money and didn't turn out enough people.

Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy, who has said publicly that Biden won, talked with Chris Wallace on Fox News Sunday.  Wallace asked if Trump's refusal to accept the results damages our democracy. Cassidy said Trump basically has conceded, since he ordered the GSA to begin the official transition process. He also said this.

Now, if you want to speak about how things are undermined, I think the president -- by the way, if there's fraud, it should be uncovered. But it should be uncovered in a way which a judge agrees. If the president is able to show that, then that's important. If they can't show, that's also important.  I'm hoping the American people would look and say, proven in a court of law, no, the court of law threw it out, and use that to base their faith in how the elections go. And so that's -- it's incumbent upon the president and his legal team to establish that. 

The only definition of 'incumbent' that Trump understands is the one that identifies him as the current occupant of the White House; any other definitions are secondary at best, and probably much further down the list that that.

In addition to the Rs being out in force, so were the medical experts, talking about our horrible performance in trying to bend the coronavirus case, hospitalization, and death curves downward. In addition to the experts, HHS Secretary Alex Azar was also wandering the halls, offering platitudes and little comfort. I touched on that in your Sunday School Extra Credit.

In his discussion with Chris Wallace, who asked about the president's continued refusal to follow his administration's guidance on mask-wearing, specifically including at the Georgia rally he held the night before, Azar said

Chris, our advice is always the same, wash your hands, watch your distance, wear face coverings when you can't watch your distance and be especially careful of those settings like overcrowded indoor bars and restaurants or multi-family household gatherings where you're going to let your guard down and take that face covering off. So, Chris, our advice is the same, regardless of the setting.

And, "regardless of the setting," Azar is incapable of saying anything negative about his boss. In another part of the interview, he directly contradicted Dr. Deborah Birx's advice, too. Great leadership from the secretary on that.

And speaking of "regardless of setting," the president held a little vaccine get-together (absent anyone from the Biden transition team, naturally), which turned into one of his famous open mic poetry slams. Here's a snipped of the OrangeVerse from the gathering, part of a stream on the election he just lost.

And if somebody has the courage, I

know who the next administration will be.

And I’ll tell you what: Life will be much easier

for this country because of what we’ve done

right now and because of a lot

of the people in this room.

The job you’ve done on the vaccine,

together with a lot of others,

has been a modern-day

miracle, and it’s really been

acknowledged as such.

And I want to thank you.

I want to give you my love,

and I want to give you my thanks

because you’re very special people.

The people who worked on the vaccine are special people; the folks who worked on getting manufacturing ramped up are special people; the folks who worked on the distribution plan are special people. The guy with the mic? Nah, not so much. 

The theme of coronavirus-pandemic-vaccines also made it into the Wondering on Wednesday entry last week. 

And speaking of yelling, I'm surprised there's been so little actual yelling from the Rs on news that the Trump administration turned down opportunities to get additional doses -- lots and lots and lots of additional doses - of the Pfizer vaccine, perhaps putting us in jeopardy of not having enough doses as fast as we need them.

While HHS Secretary Alex Azar says that Pfizer is "negotiating in the press" to sell more doses to the US, others aren't seeing it the same way. Including the president, who signed another (apparently) toothless Executive Order or, as the Guardian article linked above puts it,

... as with many headline-grabbing orders issued by Trump the decree did not appear to be impactful or enforceable, analysts said.

Not only that, but Moncef Slaoui, the head of Operation Warp Speed, said "Frankly, I don't know," when asked how the new EO was supposed to work.

Gotta love toothless Executive Orders, especially when Trump said he wasn't going to use them.  

Your TGIF entry was short, it had a picture, and the font was really big, for the folks in the back of the room. Usually that's where the "fake news" people are, but in this case, that's where the fake Patriotic Americans are. 

Everyone knew he lost.

And now, barring an act of sedition, 

we will be done with him.

And, finally, I had the great fortune to click on a tweet link and read Roger Ebert movie reviews - of 50 movies he hated, the article said.  As I read them I saw quite readily that many of his reviews could be applied to the Trump presidency, his slate of only the best people, and some of their situations.  Here's just one example where, with minor tweaks to the titles or portions of Ebert's comments, we've got a spot-on review of our current situation. My changes are in italics.

And it would be hard to talk about the Trump administration without mentioning our great First Lady Melania, who starred in 2017's Exit from Manhattan.

I'm sorry, but I just don't get Melania Trump. I've seen her in three or four movies now, and she generally has the same effect on me as fingernails on a blackboard. She's harsh and abrupt and staccato and doesn't seem to be having any fun. She looks mean...  What were your first thoughts when Melania turned up in the leather dominatrix uniform? Did you maybe have slight misgivings that you were presiding over one of the more misguided film projects of recent years?

That one was fun. And we all need fun, right? 

There you have it -- the full and veritable pastiche from last week.  Thanks for stopping by. I'll be back later with today's Sunday School. Have a great day!

I'll be back later with your Sunday School. 

Wondering on Wednesday 12/9/20

Ready... Set... Wonder!

What's to wonder about today? Heck, what's NOT to wonder about? 

We learned today that the president plans on "intervening" in the Texas-and-other-states lawsuit to have the election results in states that are NOT part of the lawsuit overturned by the Supreme Court. It wasn't clear whether the president himself, or his campaign, or his our Department of Justice would be doing the intervening, or what that intervention would look like; as with much of what the president says, the devil is in the details and sometimes we find out there aren't even details. 

Who knows if that's the case here, but that's not even what I'm wondering about. Nope - I'm wondering which of the definitions of 'intervene' the president plans on pursuing? My money's on #3. 

Let's see, what else do we have... Oh, how about the lawsuit filed by Citizens for Ethics in Washington (CREW), the National Security Archive, the Society of Historians of American Foreign Relations, and the American Historical Association, to ensure that the outgoing Administration appropriately accounts for, and does not destroy, official White House records?  

The issue is a White House policy allowing folks to save just screen shots of messages, such as the ones that Jared used with the Saudi Crown Prince, instead of requiring them to keep the actual message including the metadata. And this is the second time that these groups, or at least a couple of them, have sued the Trump administration for this type of thing. The earlier suit involved deletion of the president's tweets, among other things. 

So, I'm wondering where are all of the 'lock him up' cheers? I mean, if destroying documents on a private server were worthy of FBI investigations, and you know, confessed liars leading chants at conventions and what not, I'm shocked - shocked! - that the Republicans aren't making the same noise about this?  Do you think they don't care? Or maybe they're too busy trying to not get questioned about who really won the election? 

Meanwhile, around the country, coronavirus protests are getting ugly - really ugly. This Twitter thread, from a county commissioner in Ada County, Idaho shows how bad things are. It recounts the protesters at her house (she wasn't there at the time) pounding on the door, shouting and otherwise scaring her children, who were home. It says, in part.

I am sad. I am tired. I fear that, in my choosing to hold public office, my family has too-often paid the price. Though I was born and raised in Idaho, I increasingly don't recognize this place. 

There is an ugliness and cruelty in our national rhetoric that is reaching a fevered pitch here at home, and that should worry us all...

I'm calling on Republican leaders who have politicized public health, who have amplified rhetoric, capitalized on it, tacitly endorsed it while holding hands with the most extreme factions in their party: take a hard look at what you've become. It's far past time to do better.

Yes, there is. And it comes from the top of the GOP food chain, as well as from the bottom, as we've seen throughout the pandemic, and of course, before and after the election. Coming on the heels of the statement by Gabriel Sterling, the election official in Georgia, I have to wonder this: when the hell are these people going to wise up, and knock their nonsense off, and call on their constituents to do the same? 

And speaking of yelling, I'm surprised there's been so little actual yelling from the Rs on news that the Trump administration turned down opportunities to get additional doses -- lots and lots and lots of additional doses - of the Pfizer vaccine, perhaps putting us in jeopardy of not having enough doses as fast as we need them. While HHS Secretary Alex Azar says that Pfizer is "negotiating in the press" to sell more doses to the US, others aren't seeing it the same way. Including the president, who signed another (apparently) toothless Executive Order or, as the Guardian article linked above puts it,

...but as with many headline-grabbing orders issued by Trump the decree did not appear to be impactful or enforceable, analysts said.

Not only that, but Moncef Slaoui, the head of Operation Warp Speed, said "Frankly, I don't know," when asked how the new EO was supposed to work.

And what am I wondering about on this, you ask? Not much, really - I mean, it sort of speaks for itself, right? Or, maybe, how many more days of this do we have? (You can check the countdown counter at the top of the right sidebar if you ever need to know.)

And finally tonight, let's take a moment to hear from Tennessee's Lamar Alexander, who's been celebrated on the floor of the Senate by many of his colleagues. as he nears the end of his time as a legislator. In a Twitter thread, CNN's Manu Raju shared the following info, to which I've added some emphasis.

Asked if Trump should concede after Monday, he said: "I think the votes are being counted, and states are certifying them and resolving disputes. And it's apparent when electors meet on Monday, Joe Biden is very likely to be the President-elect.

"And if he is, I hope the president will put the country first, congratulate Joe Biden and take pride in his considerable accomplishments, and help him off to a good start," he added. 

Alexander said: "It's especially important that we have an orderly transition if there's going to be one, because of the pandemic and the distribution of the vaccine. We don't need to lose one hour or one day in that distribution."

Now, I know that many of the Rs in DC and elsewhere are desperately afraid of the president, or they feel exactly the same way he does on every issue to the point where they won't ever call him out for anything. Or they're just spineless generally, I guess is a third option. But what I'm wondering here is, what on earth does Alexander have to lose by ditching the wishy-washy nonsense and just say that Biden is going to be president and that we need an orderly transition? Why can't he do that? Why can't any of them stand up to him? 

Are they waiting until January 19th or something?

Sunday School 12/6/20: Extra Credit

In this week's Sunday School, we talked to Republicans about the election. For your Extra Credit, let's talk with some of the pandemic experts, starting with Dr. Deborah Birx, who visited the Meet the Press classroom.

Chuck Todd wondered what Birx would say to frustrated healthcare workers, what with the new CDC guidelines on indoor mask wearing, and at the same time we've got a boatload of parties being thrown by the president and others in the administration.

I think it's really important that every single person understands that the way this virus is spread is if you're with anyone indoors without a mask, that's a viral spreading opportunity. If you're outdoors and hugging and kissing individuals, that is a viral spreading opportunity... And we have to listen right now to what we know works, which is mask, physical distancing, washing your hands. But not gathering. You cannot gather without masks in any indoor or close outdoor situation.

And, she's frustrated, too, with people making the arguments that mask don't work, we need herd immunity, that gatherings don't turn into superspreaders, and with the many areas where leaders aren't putting in the necessary restrictions. 

... this fall/winter surge is combining everything that we saw in the spring with everything that we saw in the summer, plus the fall surge going into a winter surge. And I think that's why Dr. Redfield made this absolute appeal to the American people. This is not just the worst public health event. This is the worst event that this country will face, not just from a public health side. Yet, we know what behaviors spread the virus and we know how to change those behaviors to stop spreading the virus.

She said that all states are trying to get things under control, but they all need to do more, including "critically informing their state population that the gatherings we saw in Thanksgiving will lead to a surge" and we can't have a 'it doesn't apply to me" attitude.

... You cannot gather with your mask off. You cannot hug and kiss people outside. We won't have a vaccine for even the most vulnerable Americans -- I'm thrilled with the vaccine. But we won't have them for the most vulnerable Americans until February. So we need to do this now.

Christmas travel is dangerous "because it mixes households" and because we don't know who the asymptomatic carriers are. She said  we need to increase testing of asymptomatic people, to identify people with the virus so we can stop them from spreading it. That's a huge change from how we test now, and would antagonize the president if he were paying attention.

And, of course, everything she's saying we need to do is being ignored by the president and members of his cabinet, or contradicted by them, including HHS Secretary Alex Azar, who visited the Fox News Sunday classroom.

Wallace played a clip of CDC Director Robert Redfield saying, "The reality is December and January and February are going to be rough times. I actually believe they're going to be the most difficult time in the public health history of this nation," and asked Azar if this was the result of "a massive failure by president Trump and his administration?" 

Azar blamed the weather. Well, the weather and something else. 

It's about behavior and cold weather. People are going indoors. They're not minding the three Ws. They're not wearing their face coverings. We're engaged in indoor behaviors where we let our guard down.  We need people to renew their commitment. 

He tried to change the subject, but Wallace stayed on topic, mentioning President-elect Biden's plan to ask for a 100-day mask-wearing commitment, as opposed to  president Trump saying back in April that he wouldn't be wearing a mask, and that it was voluntary, not necessary

This is when Azar referred to 'Vice President Biden,' and where he ignored two corrections by Wallace on that point. And this is where he tried to convince us that Trump is doing enough, and that all of his top advisors tell people to wear masks. Wallace refreshed Azar on Trump's maskless behavior, including his Georgia rally just the night before.

Chris, our advice is always the same, wash your hands, watch your distance, wear face coverings when you can't watch your distance and be especially careful of those settings like overcrowded indoor bars and restaurants or multi-family household gatherings where you're going to let your guard down and take that face covering off. So, Chris, our advice is the same, regardless of the setting.

It's hopeless, trying to get these folks to admit the president is unhelpful, or doing the wrong thing, or not saying the right thing. It's hopeless.

And here's the contradiction with Birx on mitigation efforts. Wallace asked about lockdowns, which Azar said were not necessary.

Chris, our community mitigation efforts have to be based in science and evidence or we lose public support and compliance for them. We know that our workplaces, our universities, our K-12 schools, flying on airplanes are not major vectors of disease transmission. It's overcrowded indoor restaurants and bars, it is multi-household indoor gatherings where we let our guard down. These are the things we need to protect against. If we go too far - and we defer to governors on the steps they need to take. It's their call. But we -- if we go beyond science and evidence, we will undermine public support... 

We won't get a unified voice, from the president on down, from this administration, but I expect we will from the next one.. 

Finally, the head of Operation Warp Speed, Dr. Moncef Slaoui, was in the CNN SOTU classroom. Tapper asked when we might see results from the vaccine, such as improvements in our death and hospitalization numbers. 

The vaccine efficacy, as we have seen it, actually starts reasonably quickly after the first dose of vaccine, and then is further maintained with the second dose. And, therefore, I am hopeful that, by the end of the month of January, we should already see a quite a significant decrease in the mortality and severe morbidity associated in the elderly population. 

He also said we don't know whether a person who's vaccinated will still be able to spread the virus, even if they're now no longer at risk. He thinks most folks will "control the virus" and not be infectious to others.

That work, we may have a first answer to it somewhere in February/March from the trial that we have conducted already, further analysis and some analysis in blood and things like that. But there are also -- we're discussing clinical trials where we may be able to assess whether people actually, on a daily basis, shed virus or stop shedding the virus when they have been immunized and exposed to this -- to the infection. 

Similarly, we don't know for sure on how long immunity will last, or if this'll become a seasonal vaccine we need.

...based on science and experience I have, this vaccine effectiveness will be long-lasting, because one of the hallmark of our immune system is, it has memory. It remembers everything we learned. It learned. And when it sees the virus again, it responds to it much, much faster than when it sees it the first time. I think that process of memory is likely to prolong our protection for probably a few years, and maybe many, many years. 

Tapper mentioned polling showing that "less than half of black Americans say they will get a coronavirus vaccine if one were available today." Slaoui said they've been working with everyone -- "NIH leadership, with the surgeon general, with all the leaders that we could" to engage the minority population, including to get clinical trial participants. And he said

Nobody is being used as a guinea pig. Unfortunately, this virus is impacting the African-American population and the Hispanics two and four times more than it does to the Caucasian part of our country. And we have to stop that. It's really very, very important that people take the time to listen to the data, listen to the people they trust that have some expertise. Please don't make your opinion outside of having listened to the data and to experts you trust. When that happens, I feel confident you will agree to be immunized. And that can help save your life.

As they closed the interview, Slaoui said he expects the FDA advisory panel to approve the Pfizer vaccine when it meets later this week.  

Masks on, folks, and I'll see you around campus. But you won't catch me in a plane anytime soon, I can assure you.

Wondering on Wednesday 11/18/20

Ready... Set... Wonder!

What's got me wondering tonight?  I'm glad you asked.

At what point, I wonder, will it just be said that the current crop of Republicans is the biggest, weaseliest bunch of scaredy cats that have ever been elected? 

I mean, I could see there being a handful of them who are weaselly and sneaky, and a handful of them who are scared to death that the mean orange man will turn on them and find people to primary them or worse, tweet about them day and night for the next four years, or even worse, sic their uneducated, deplorable constituents on them (the self-identifying uneducated deplorables, of course) and have them storm their maskless town hall meetings and yell at them that they're weaselly scaredy cats, but to have THIS many of them, all being weaselly scaredy cats at the same time, in unison?  What the actual hell did we do to deserve that, I wonder?

Seriously. I mean, I wonder if any one of them would begin to be able to explain to me why they are allowing what's happening to happen? Or, should I say, why they're allowing what is NOT happening to NOT happen? They're not willing to explain it, to me or anybody else -I'd be willing to bet they aren't even willing to be honest with themselves when they look in the mirror in the morning, but I'm pretty sure I'm not wrong on that. 

But pretend for a second that any one of them would offer up anything other than a "he has a legal right to be a baby," what's the explanation for sitting back and being silent as the orange man refuses to allow his administration to participate with the incoming administration? What possible explanation is there for that?  Is it one of these, I wonder?

• We don't want to upset him by telling him he's a loser?
• We don't want him to think that we're happy he's a loser?
• We need him to help us not be losers when they vote again in Georgia in January?
• We don't know what he will do if we tell him the truth?
• We don't actually give a rat's patootie about the country, we're only interested in staying in office?
• He has the nuclear codes?
• He might try and fire us? (Can he do that? He can't do that, can he?)
• No one wants to go first, but boy, once someone does, we'll all fall in line?
• Is it over? 
• We might be able to convince him, but he's got those two boys, and they're worse than he is?
• Did I say he's unstable and scares the crap out of me?
• I'm plotting my place for 2024 and I don't want to screw it up by angering him?
• It's not treason or anything, what he's doing, and he's already been impeached, so what can we do?
• It's not like we're not going to have a peaceful transfer of power on January 20th, so what's the harm in letting him play his little game of keep-away?

What's the harm, you wonder, you scared little weasel? LOOK AROUND! While you're so hell-bent on allowing the orange man to express his ever-loving loser soul, look at what's happening in the world!

There's still a global pandemic; there's still Brexit, the first crack in the EU; there's still Russia and China and North Korea and the Middle East (no matter how many villages or condos they name after the orange man); there's still all of the same problems that there were on Election Day, and the day after and the day after that. And the incoming administration is NOT getting briefings on any of that from anyone still in the current administration. 

LOOK AROUND! We've got vaccines coming, and somehow they have to make it to all the distant and disparate corners of the globe. by the way, but for us here, the incoming administration is not allowed to engage with the current Task Force or the Operation Warp Speed vaccine team. How can anyone think that's helpful? But, boy, don't you forget (because the orange man won't let you), those vaccines were developed on his watch, so it's all good, right? Never mind that the deaths of over a quarter of a million Americans from COVID-19, those deaths happened on his watch, too. And I can't help wondering, how many more will happen that don't need to, because he can't get out of the way and let the people who need to be talking to each other talk to each other?

Look around... All across the country, states are in the worst shape, pandemic-wise, since the beginning of this whole mess! How're things going in your hometown, Republicans? Everyone working? No hardships? Your hospitals still have plenty of rooms?  Your towns and cities all doing great with all of their COVID-related expenses?  Lucky you, if that's the case, but I'm having a hard time here, wondering whether I should believe a word of what you're telling me. 

LOOK AROUND! Just LOOK at the mess the orange man is making, the frivolous lawsuits, the lies, the lack of evidence, the constant assault on our principles, our processes, our people, including members of YOUR OWN PARTY attacking members of YOUR OWN PARTY! What the heck is wrong with you??

And, I have to wonder why you think doing nothing, including doing nothing about the orange man doing nothing about a transition, is more important than doing something about the state of things for the people in your state, your district, your hometown, and people all over the country who are NOT doing as well as you are, and who are NOT interested in your self-preservation - they're interested in their own survival, the survival of their towns, businesses, families, educational system, and more.

I couldn't care less about your self-preservation either, truth be told. I care a helluva lot more about our country and how we move on from a loser to the next guy, and I care about silly traditions like making it possible for the incoming team to be successful, and for the country to be successful. I don't have to like the person who's leaving, although sometimes I have. I don't have to like the person who's coming in, although sometimes I have. I don't have to like our traditional processes for shifting from one president to the next - but we have to have a process and we DO have a process, and we should be FOLLOWING the process, and YOU should be a part of ensuring that we DO JUST THAT.  He's YOUR guy - you've made that clear over and over and over.

Your job? I don't have to wonder about that at all. YOUR job is to make sure that YOUR guy gets with the program, for the good of the country. If you can't do that, then you don't deserve to be in office. You don't deserve the time of day from me or anyone else. You can get your weaselly scaredy cat fanny the heck out of Washington and go back to where you came from.

And hey -- wear a damn mask!  That you're STILL not doing that, at this stage of the game, is reason enough you should pack your bags and go home.

Sheesh.

Sunday School 11/15/20: Extra Credit

In this week's Sunday School, I focused on the Georgia Senate runoffs. For your Extra Credit, I wanted to spend some time with the experts and the pandemic. 

First up: Dr. Michael Osterholm, from the University of Minnesota, now a member of the Biden COVID Advisory Board. He told Chuck Todd on MTP that, at least for the next three weeks, the numbers are going to continue going way up because there are people "in the pipeline, meaning they're already infected." Still, he said, "our future's in our hands."

Right now, he said, the goal is to try and get through to summer when we'll have the vaccines and that we need to "focus on what's going to make that difference" to allow us to get there. And that's going to take a different approach - a national one, to help the state and local officials.

You see the governors struggling right now. They want help. I have actually talked to five governors in the last two days, all of whom said, "Wouldn't it be wonderful if we could all at least be on the same page? But right now, you've got -- my state is surrounded by four other states and they all have different recommendations.” That, by itself, is what we're talking about -- standardizing how we're all going to approach this. This virus doesn't care what party you are. It doesn't care where you live. We have to understand that that's what we have to work on right now.

As to how close we are to the breaking point of our health care system, he said his worst fear is we end up like other countries, 

People literally were dying in the waiting room of emergency rooms after spending ten hours just waiting to be seen. That's going to start happening. The media will start reporting it and we will see the breadth and the depth of this tragedy. That, I hope, will not be the way that we finally decide to reduce our risk, this idea of swapping air. We've got to stop doing that. And so, I think it is the health care system’s breaking, literally breaking, that will unfortunately bring us to a sense of reality of what we must do in the short term.

If we have a few more weeks of our current level of activity, that will happen here, he said.

Dr. Anthony Fauci talked with Jake Tapper on CNN's SOTU; he hoped that we would double down on wearing masks, hand washing, social distancing and avoiding crowds, knowing that we've got good news on vaccines but it will take a little time to get them. And, he agreed, it's possible we could see another 200,000 deaths in the next four months.

He also said that additional lockdowns "will likely happen" but not a national lockdown.

...I think what we are going to start seeing in the local levels, be they governors or mayors or people at the local level, will do, as you said, very surgical-type of restrictions, which are the function equivalent of a local lockdown. But we're not going to have a national lockdown. But if things really get bad, and you put your foot on the pedal, and yet still you have the surge, you may need to take the extra step that you're talking about.

Having effective vaccines on the horizon - Pfizer is likely asking the FDA for an Emergency Use Authorization, and the Moderna vaccine may be even more effective than Pfizer's - is great, but Fauci pointed out,

...we have to get people to take the vaccine. So, if we get the overwhelming majority of people taking the vaccine, and you have, on the one hand, an effective vaccine, on the other hand, a high degree of uptake of the vaccine, we could start getting things back to relative normal as we get into the second and third quarter of the year, where people can start thinking about doing things that were too dangerous just months ago.

But, he cautioned, just wishing those things were so isn't enough. We have to make it happen, and he emphasized, again, we have to do the "fundamental public health things" to get us where we want to be.  

And, on the lack of cooperation with President-elect Biden's team, Fauci was clear.

... it's very clear that that transition process that we go through, that time period of measured in several weeks to months, is really important in a smooth handing over of the information, as well as -- it's almost like passing a baton in a race -- you don't want to stop and then give it to somebody. You want to just essentially keep going. And that is what transition is. So, it certainly would make things more smoothly if we could do that.

As a public health measure, it's "obvious" that it would be better for the American people if the teams worked together. 

Martha Raddatz had Adm. Brett Giroir of the current administration's Coronavirus Task Force, and Dr. Atul Gawande of the incoming administration's Covid-19 Advisory Board in the classroom at This Week.

Giroir was first, and he too expressed optimism about the Pfizer vaccine, saying it "is a game-changer. It will bring an end game to the pandemic," but also noted cases are up, hospitalizations are up, and mortality is up.

We know what to do, he said: physically distance, wear a mask, and said

We're going to have to do things like limit attendance or close bars, close indoor restaurants, because that's very important. If we do these things, combined with the testing that we have, we can flatten the curve. If we do not do these things, the cases will continue to go up.

He also said "we could have 20 million doses" of the vaccine by the end of this month, and a similar number by the end of December.  

Raddatz asked him about getting people to do things we need to do, and he said "we all have to communicate very clearly that the science is clear, the evidence is overwhelming, whether you want to look at microbiological data or you want to look at epidemiology, city by city, state by state, country by country, that masks do work."

So, across the board, whether these are local mandates, whether these are voluntary, whether these are public service messages, we have to have the American people wear a mask when you can't physically distance. 

Raddatz noted there's one person who's not shouting that message, but Giroir wasn't concerned about that, because Pence and other Cabinet members are engaged. And on the transition, specifically on the head of Operation Warp Speed asking to be allowed to contact the Biden team, the only thing that was missing was the chicken to go with his waffles.

I can say, from my point of view, that the GSA controls the transition process. My team, all the docs that work for us, we want to be extremely transparent. We are extremely transparent with the media, with outside experts, with public health experts, some of which are actually on team Biden advisers.

Asked for a simple yes or no, "is it important to be able to talk to the Biden team at this point?"

Look. I want to be as transparent as possible with everybody. This is not a political issue. This is an issue of public health and saving American lives. And I think there's nothing more important than that. 

So, sorta kinda "yes," but definitely not, "Yes, it's critical and I'm going to press the White House to let us do exactly that."  Got it.

Moving to Dr. Gawande, Raddatz started by asking what he thought of Giroir's comments on the transition. He said he could hear in Giroir's voice that he wants to share the info.

Look, working with the (Biden) transition team, they are...ready to go, and are getting all of the information they can. But it's in the nation's interest that the Transition Team get the threat assessments that the team knows about... understand the vaccine distribution plan, need to know where the stockpiles are, what the status of masks and gloves. There's a lot of information that needs to be transmitted. It can't wait until the last minute. 

On stopping the surge, Gawande says first we need "a clear voice from the top backing the national comprehensive plan. And we've lacked that." We'll have that going forward. Second? Wear a mask. And, about the 'freedom' argument?

What I would say and I want to say to those citizens (who oppose masks) is simply that when a person goes into a store and does not wear a mask, when they go to a public gathering and they're not wearing a mask, they're hurting everyone's freedom. They are putting people in danger. Moreover, they are turning people away from shops and stores and that's hurting jobs. That is the critical mix of things. Opposing masks is like opposing washing hands, it's not political. We can pull together. We can do this.  

She asked him to clarify whether or not there'll be a nationwide lockdown (which Dr. Osterholm mentioned last week). He said they're not supportive of it and there's not a scenario that would make that necessary, "because we can get this under control."

The critical parts are understanding what we've learned since we did a nationwide lockdown in early April. And that is, that you can have targeted measures building on mask-wearing to include widespread testing, to include dialing up and dialing down capacity restrictions, and those measures need to happen on a more localized basis.

He pointed to NY's zip code-by-zip code restrictions, which is "quite effective. We do not need to go to a nationwide shelter-in-place shutdown."

So, when you hear the president say it's definitely going to happen, tell him to put it in his pipe and smoke it. And remind your friends that it was the Trump Administration that put in place the nationwide lockdown that we had earlier this year. If you do that, I'll give you even more extra credit. 

See you around campus - mask on, of course.

My Middle-aged White Lady Perspective: 'Seeing' Donald Trump

This letter to the editor, from a Florida newspaper, seeks to clarify the difference in how supporters and detractors see the president. It's popped up on my Facebook page a few times, and I decided to tackle it from my middle-aged white lady perspective. Emphasized comments are from the letter; the rest of them are mine. 

You see Trump's arrogance; I see Trump's confidence. Arrogance is presenting yourself as superior to others, usually in an obnoxious way. Donald Trump is a truly arrogant man. He talks down to everyone, particularly women (even more so to women of color). He is a relentless self-promoter, with world leaders, with the Boy Scouts, and everyone in between. He is a self-proclaimed genius. He knows more than everyone about everything. He alone can fix what's wrong. He is a pompous, overbearing, pretentious, rude, whining man. Honestly, I think the case could be made that he's an arrogant jerk because he lacks confidence, but I'll let the psychological experts make that call.

You see Trump's nationalism; I see Trump's patriotism. This is the first of two references to patriotism in the letter; I'll address them together in a minute. 

You hear Trump's unsophisticated words; I hear Trump's honesty.  No; you hear yourself being manipulated. He very carefully chooses his 'unsophisticated' words; he carefully curates his 4th-grade language level, and you can see how well it works by the way many people - certainly not all (I'm not looking to get into a 'deplorables' argument here) - are so faithful to his message, even when they ought to know better.

There is NO correlation between Trump's language and the truthfulness of what he says. Donald Trump very often is untruthful. In fact, he lies about everything. He lies about some things so often, a Bottomless Pinocchio category was created specifically to document those lies. That he lies with such proficiency, even about totally meaningless things, shows his innate dishonesty.

You see Trump's racism; I see Trump's words being misconstrued and twisted by the media daily to fit their narrative.  If the president's words require a multi-level, photon-torpedo-firing decoder ring to understand, and require an entire network of people to clarify them, he's not getting his message across. Oh wait - silly me. His message is perfectly clear, and his dog whistles hit the mark repeatedly.  It's not the media twisting his words, it's his designated deflectors working at his favorite network, and in the House and Senate, working so hard to twist the media into the bad-guy mold. 

If you think Donald Trump is not racist, explain his incessant attacks on an America judge.  And let me know how you like me being just as racist in that post as Trump. Or what you'd think if your kids, or your coworkers, or your pastor said what he says. 

You see Trump as a Republican; I see Trump as a Patriot. Donald Trump is not a Republican. He's not a conservative. He goes against much of that the Rs stand for. He says he loves our country, and he hugs and slobbers on the flag, and he waves his arms around during the national anthem, while demanding others stand at attention. He tells us how much he gave up to become president, and he says - regularly - that people who think like he is are 'patriots.'  Everyone else? Not so much. If you think the only way to love our country and be a patriot is to think like you, and be like you, you're missing the entire point of our country. 

You see Trump as a dictator; I see Trump as a leader. Trump is not a dictator, but he often talks as if he wants to be one, he admires people who are, and acts as if he is one. He uses the government as if it's at his beck and call, there to do his bidding. That's a gross misunderstanding of both what our government is, and the people for whom it works. It's also not an admired leadership trait.

You see Trump as an authoritarian; I see Trump as the only one willing to fight for our freedoms. Do tell, what freedoms are Trump fighting for? No one I've ever asked can name even one. We do know, that Trump's SCOTUS picks might jeopardize people's rights; we do know that Trump has implemented gun control measures; we do know that Trump regularly threatens the First Amendment... So, again, what are the freedoms he's fighting for on our behalf? 

You see Trump as childish; I see Trump as a fighter, unwilling to cave in to the Democrat lies. He is childish; he stomps out of interviews; he shuts people down; he's a bully domestically and internationally. What "Democrat lies" is he not caving in to when he calls people names? Says they're ugly? Talks about their physical features? Lies about them? Supports conspiracy theorists? Encourages others to be bullies?  He does all of those things, unprompted.

You see Trump as an unpolished politician; I see Trump as a breath of fresh air. Donald Trump pretends to be unpolished, and not a politician. He is not a breath of fresh air, he and his lies and his bullying and his threatening comprise a toxic cloud that hangs over our country, and over our allies. And he is a classic, arm-twisting strongman pol, who threatens members of his own party who might disagree with him. Don't go along with me? No endorsement. A barrage of negative tweets. Attacks against you in your district. Support for your opponent. And you think he's not a politician? That's laughable.

You see Trump as homophobic; I see Trump as the first president who has ever entered office supporting gay marriage. If you cared about LGBTQ rights, including gay marriage, you'd be less than excited about his SCOTUS picks. And, you'd be concerned about his administration fighting for LGBTQ discrimination in the courts; wanting to allow federal contractors to be able to fire LGBTQ employees; our Justice Department defending medical professionals who refuse to treat LGBTQ patients; visas not being issued to same-sex partners of diplomats; that children of gay and lesbian Americans are not allowed citizenship unless they were born of American sperm or an American egg, and so much more. 

You think Trump hates immigrants; I know Trump is married to an immigrant. And serial killers had friends, right?  Marrying an immigrant does not mean you are pro-immigrant. Donald Trump wanted to ban an entire faith from entering our country. He tells Americans to "go back where they came from." He attempted to end DACA, punishing children who were brought here when they were babies. His own companies hired illegal immigrants. He wants to ban the kind of immigration that allowed his in-laws to become citizens.  But yeah, he married an immigrant. 

You see Trump putting an end to immigration in America; I see Trump welcoming immigrants to America legally. Trump has undermined the legal asylum process, reduced opportunities for refugees to come here; suspended the rights of some refugees already here, made the green card process more difficult, rejected many more skilled worker visas, making it harder for American companies to be successful, and more. He's done all of his immigration stuff by Executive Order, a tool he said he would not use.

You see Trump's cages at the border; I see Obama's cages at the border. Look past the cages and look at who was in them - children separated from their parents. That's not the same as detaining families together. And there was no 'zero tolerance policy under the Obama administration. And of course, there are those kids whose parents can't be located. Not a handful of them, over 500 of them. That's on Trump.

You see Trump with a struggling economy; I see Trump with an amazing economy until the China Virus and Democrats shut it down. The markets were doing well. Unemployment rates were continuing their established downward trend. Those things are true. But America is more than the markets, and people seem to forget that it was the Trump Administration that shut down the country. At least, it was Donald Trump who said the biggest decision he would have to make was when to open it back up. So, you can blame China for the virus, if you want, but you should blame Trump for shutting down the country. He said he did it. I believe him.

You see the violence in the streets and call it 'Trump's America;' I see the violence in the streets of Democratic run cities who are refusing Trump's help and call it 'Liberal America.' Woof woof. That's you, responding to the president's unsophisticated dog whistle. 

Congratulations. 

Sunday School 10/18/20

Folks, tonight I have for you an interview with Lara Trump who, along with Kimberly "The Best is Yet to COME!!!" Guilfoyle, is one of the $15,000-per-month hidden campaign payroll women who are close to Trump sons. 

Lara, who is Eric Trump's wife, sat down with Jake Tapper on CNN's State of the Union for a fascinating exercise in classroom futility. It started, as Tapper's recent sessions have, with his lament at the lack of availability of anyone - literally anyone - from the White House to talk about important things, or should I say, things related to the coronavirus. 

Tapper asked her about the president's rally the other day when Mr. Trump suggested that we "lock them all up" as the crowd chanted to lock up Michigan's Gretchen Whitmer. And what did Mrs. Trump think about all of that? Well, she said, "it was the president's Department of Justice that actually thwarted" the plot against Whitmer, and that in Michigan, she thinks people "still feel like they are totally locked down" and "want to get back to some normalcy."

When Tapper pointed out that policy disagreements are one thing, but this kind of rhetoric is unhelpful, and maybe "the president should tone it down when talking about people about home there have literally been threats against their lives," Trump said she can show him her own social media and threats against her and her children, and that "this is not just on one side..." Tapper said threats against her are detestable, but pointed out that Joe Biden isn't encouraging this kind of thing - and if he were, Tapper would be calling on Biden to tone it down as well. 

Seeing that her argument wasn't going anywhere, she turned to a different tactic.

Well, look, this is - he wasn't doing anything, I don't think, to provoke people to threaten this woman at all. He was having fun at a Trump rally... There are issues at hand here that are bigger than just keeping everybody locked down. So I think people are frustrated. And look, the president was at a rally. It's a fun, light atmosphere. Of course he wasn't encouraging people to threaten this woman. That's ridiculous.

That's one word for it, I guess. 

Tapper moved on to Trump's problem with women, like the ones in a video he shared who have concerns about how the president has handled the pandemic, and asked how she would respond to them. She hit all the required talking points, including slamming Biden on his "lucrative" connections to China, and added "we have therapeutics that the president, the president himself, has proven by using them and coming over COVID. He's done with COVID now, and they work." And, she added, "the president has done, actually, an incredible job, Jake, with the coronavirus."

Tapper tried to explain the numbers, including the highest death rate in the world. She said that "we're coming out of it, we're seeing the death rate decrease dramatically." And, 

We also have a huge population. Whenever you want to compare us to Canada, compare us to Europe. We're doing actually much better than Europe is... not only with the virus, but financially. We are. These are numbers. You can go look them up. 

"Look them up! Look them up!! Look them up!" Look up those pesky facts, if you want to. Perhaps she should?

And when she said "Joe Biden, with the socialist policies he's trying to implement, would actually ruin America," Tapper gave up and tried to shift to "some questions where we can get direct answers."

• "I assume the answer is yes," that the president tested negative before the first debate, but she wasn't there and didn't know for sure.
• "Again, I -- I don't work in the White House. You will have to ask the president that directly (whether he'll release a negative test for everyone to see before Thursday's debate). He just had COVID. He has now been cleared of COVID, so that means he's had a negative test. I'm sure he will have another one before he goes to this debate."
• "If we're asked to wear masks, we will absolutely do so" at the debate."
• "We know that people get out of the White House and they get very lucrative book offers. They get speaking engagements, where paid a lot of money, Jake, to go out and say very negative things about this president," regarding comments from General John Kelly.

Tapper moved on to comments she and the president had made about Joe Biden's stutter (here's my Sidebar on that), and asked her how it makes kids with stutters feel when she makes fun of people like them.

LT: First and foremost, I had no idea that Joe Biden ever suffered from stutter. I think what we see on stage with Joe Biden, Jake, is very clearly a cognitive decline. That's what I'm referring to. It makes me uncomfortable to watch someone on stage search for questions and  try and figure out an answer.

JT: You have no - you have - I can't -  it's so amazing - it's amazing to me that... "a cognitive decline." You...

LT: Well, when you're trying to tell me that what I was suggesting was stuttering... 

JT: I think that you were mocking his stutter.

LT:  ...I had no idea Joe Biden...

JT: Yes, I think you were mocking his stuffer.

LT: Of course I wasn't, Jake. Wow. 

JT; And I think you have absolutely no standing to diagnose somebody's cognitive decline, especially...

LT: I'm not diagnosing, I'm saying that we see the Joe Biden of today is not the Joe Biden of five years ago, of ten years ago.

JT: I would think that somebody in the Trump family would be more sensitive to people who do not have medical licenses diagnosing politicians from afar. Plenty of people have diagnosed (the president) from afar. I'm sure it offends you. You don't have any standing to say...

LT: I'm not diagnosing him.  What I'm saying, Jake...

JT: You just talked about a cognitive decline.

LT: ...is that we can clearly see that Joe Biden is struggling...

JT: I have one last question for your, Lara. You campaigned...

LT:  ... at many times on stage. And that's very concerning to a lot of people that this could be the leader of the free world. That's all I'm saying.

JT:  Thank you, Lara Trump.

LT.  I genuinely feel sorry for Joe Biden.

JT. I appreciate it.  I'm sure it was from a place of concern. We all -- we all believe that. Lara Trump, thank you so much.

And that was the end of their chat. 

Let me know your thoughts in the comments. Do you think Lara Trump is concerned about Joe Biden? Or do you think she's being a Trump and making the kind of comments her husband, brother-in-law, and father-in-law are known for? And how would we know for sure? Drop a comment, if you like.

See you around the virtual campus - masks on, of course.