Before you panic

I see Joe "foot in mouth" Biden has unintentionally put the fear of god in everyone this morning. Stop for a sec and do a little research or better yet I've done most of it for you. I wanted to post news articles from the time but they are a little hard to copy and paste as they were reproduced from microfilm. I went back to newspaper articles of 1918 to see what was really going on at the time. Was it bad and did it spread like wildfire? Yes on both counts, but there was a difference from then and now. Back then the sanitary conditions were not what they are now. And the most important difference was that they had no antibiotics back then. From what I've read most of the people back then died of bacterial infections that were secondary to the actual flu. The "grippe" as it was called was not the primary cause. Bacterial pnumonia and "consumption" (that would be a bacterial form of TB) were the main causes. With the population having discharges from both ends and poor sanitation (they only had the old fashioned lye soap back then) you can see why it was so contagious and deadly. To give you an idea my dear old grandma before she died told me what life was like back then. They didn't have many cars then so people got where they were going by horse drawn wagons or carriages. There was the emissons from that mode of transportation that wasn't too pleasant but more importantly horses being living things died and it wasn't uncommon to note a steed laying in the street for days until the sanitation department came by to remove the remains.
One last item comes to mind from that period. A doctor from San Francisco wired a doctor in New York and ask him about the situation. How should we prepare for this emergency? The NY doctor wrote back "Build coffins!".
I think we're lucky right now. We have phones and the internet for communications and many antibiotics as well as better sanitation than in the early 1900s. You need to remember that was back when a common cold could kill you.

If you're a bit of a history buff you can go read the articles by going to the Brooklyn Eagle and look through their articles. Just type in influenza in the search.

UPDATE: Watching the CDC and DHS I thought I'd throw in a bit of info that they are not saying. That would be that this flu can be contageous when those infected show no signs of flu. In addition the flu can be contageous up to 7 days after becoming infected. For the agencies to tout how they're putting their emergency plan into effect is nothing more than damage control. They may be able to move Tamiflu around the country but that will do nothing to prevent the spread of the illness. My advice: If you have a low immune system or have young kids or older grandparents keep them away from crowds and public places as much as possible. They could no stop this event anymore than anyone could stop a tornado or hurricane. And as I said before wash your hands and cover your coughs and sneezes. And wipe the grocery cart handle. Now for the nice cheap BLT sandwich mmmmmm.

The swine is running

Washington state has now joined the rest of the nation with 6 cases of swine flu. This has not been totally confirmed by the CDC but initial testing indicate that it is not a regular strain of the flu. Expect the more cases to follow. How extensive will this outbreak become is anyone's guess. It could mutate and fade away or it could turn into something very bad. We'll see. Keep your hands clean and cover your coughs and sneezes.

The pendulum swings

There was at one time a large swath of American voters whether right or left leaning that made up a middle ground. It was the target of any politician running for office. It was a necessary function to appeal to that middle. Somewhere along the line the concept of promoting and campagning to the middle got lost. Maybe it was the "Contract for America" that set all this in motion I don't really know, but when the republicans signed on to that it seemed like they were signing a blood oath with the mafia. It's as if they had checked their morals at the door and all were to agree with their leaders no matter what. As they gained more and more power the idology moved swiftly to the far right where it remains today. The voters however are not as stupid as they might appear. But there is another factor here. It used to be that the political pendulum would swing quite slowly. With a core of politicians it was only the edges that gradually changed faces and the core people were focused on pleasing the center. They knew if they didn't they'd soon be out of office. Now in the last 15 or 20 years the pace of change has accelerated. Everything must now happen in an instant. A time frame of years is now expected to happen in months.
If the republicans ever hope to want to regain any power they're going to have to swallow hard and do an Oprah makeover the likes that has never been seen. Clinging to ideals to an ever shrinking base is not going to win elections. Specter put his finger square on their problem when he pointed out that there is no longer room in their party for moderates. To have Steele get up and say the party is looking for the hip hop urban and suburban folk is nothing more than trying to put tinsel on a turd. It still stinks. It's all become very clear that the republican party does not come close to representing the majority of America but a very small and elite class of wealthy. They are just trying to sucker you in to do their dirty work i.e. giving them more weath and power while you suffer and grow poorer.
America was fed up with what happened the last eight years and yanked the pendulum in the other direction. For the republicans to try and yank it the other direction at this point would be foolish. It's a guarantee for more lost seats in congress. If they don't change they will disappear. That's a basic law of nature. Adapt or die.

I say swine you say Mexican

And now for something politically stupid



Good grief now we have to be politically correct in talking about influenza? Seems the Israelis find the use of the term swine unacceptable and want it called the Mexican flu. I don't know if the Mexicans would want that or care. The islamists also find it offensive as pigs are considered unclean to both religions. Hey finally something jews and arabs have in common, they both hate pig viruses.
Well I guess that's it. No more tagging illness to countries or animals you might insult somebody. No more references to Spanish flu, German measeles, Hong Kong flu. I'll tell you what I find really sick (no pun intended) is naming illness to people like Lou Garrig or Wagners or whatever. Yep that's how I'd want to be remembered for the next 1000 years by golly, linked to a disease. There's a good one; if you were a disease what would your symptoms be? I've been trying my best to link George W. Bush to a disease or term that will be remembered for the rest of history but nothing seems to stick. Terms like Bushed or Bushwacked just don't quite give that smack of quick mental image as does Hooverville.
At any rate I now see articles in the news using the term human flu. Wouldn't want to offend anybody I guess.

You swine you

I was disappointed to read about the outbreak in Mexico of the swine flu. Disappointed? Disappointed because the first thing I do when there's an outbreak or when I want information related to my occupation I go to the CDC web site to see the latest scoop. I went there this morning only to find a news release from the other day. No stats or warning. That is unuual. Usually the center for disease control is right on top of things. So I went elsewhere to find that 62 people have already died and Mexico is cancelling many public events and handing out paper surgical masks like flyers at the mall.
The thought occured to me that we're behind the curve on this one. It usually takes four days for the flu to take hold. Now I'm wondering how long it takes for our produce (most of which comes from Mexico) to get to the store. (anybody out there haul produce that knows?) You just know this has hit the farm area first down there. Think I'll be cooking my tomatoes and peppers quite well thank you very much. And so much for the raw salads for a while unless it's from what I grow. No swines around here.
The Friday beaver was off last night I guess it's either mating season or he had a heavy date. The weather is nice here and he was missing in action today as well.

Keep your drums upright

Iraq Afghanistan and Pakistan oh my

Iraq continues to go as Iraq goes. The car bombs continue. There still no water and power at times. Unemployment is at 57% among young people. I was privledged to get a ton of information from a couple of bloggers who inspite of the prying eyes of Sadam's government were able to get information out to the world even while the U.S. and Britan were dropping bombs on them on a daily basis. They gave me a far better perspective of what was happening than any U.S. paper. Salam Pax truely did risk his life getting the real news out until one day he realized that they were on to him and it was time to depart. He left the country as did several other bloggers that I followed. It was just too dangerous for them and their families. His first blog details all of the happenings from before the war up to his leaving Where's Raed? Salam is now back in Bagdad and reporting on life there. His new blog Salam Pax This is a good blog if you want to find out what's going on there that the U.S. newspapers aren't reporting.


On to Pakistan
Taleban withdraw
Now before you hit the link here's a little background. Our tactic or plan if you will was to drive out the Taleban from the major cities and move them to the hills where they'd be of little threat. That was the Bush plan anyway. And like everything he touched it turned to sh*t. From reports the Taleban have regrouped and reorganized and now hold most of the area of southeast Afghanistan. In fact except for the major cities they pretty much hold the rest of the country to the east. What was the problem? The problem was that somebody forgot to read their history of the country. Afghanistan never really was a country like we tend to think of a country. It was more like a loose mish mash of tribes looking out for their own interest. We only managed to to get everybody on the same page when the Russians occupied the country. And who did we train? The Taleban were our best buds and we let them stay in power as they were the strongest faction of all the groups and the most capable of defeating the Russians. Well they defeated the Russians alright. It was said that the money the Russians spend there caused the collapse of the Soviet Union. However I really don't believe that. I think it was when we threatened to build the missle defense system (you may remember it as Star Wars under Reagan) but that's another story. So the Taleban being in eastern Afghanistan have been moving into Pakistan. A smart move for them since we won't go into that country after them. Gee does this sound like a repeat of history? Does Cambodia and Thiland come to mind? The Taleban has moved into an area called Swat a resort area in the very north and has been gradually moving south. This was just after the Pakistan government let them bring Islamic law to the region. Once that was done the Taleban started moving south closer to the capital city of Islamabad.
As everyone knows Pakistan has nukes but I'm sure they wouldn't use them for two reasons. One- they'd be bombing many of thier own people and Two - They have India to the east that also has nukes. What will happen now is anyone's guess. We know that we're scheduled to send more troops to Afghanistan but that won't do much if the Taleban is not there. Pakistan could be getting very crowded in the next several months. So this is the mess George W left us. No real plan. No real mission other than to fight terror (never knew you could fight a state of mind) and no possible end date. So the "No" party rallied a guy with no real military experience. All he did was learn to fly a jet and from his true bio he didn't do that very well (washed out of the guard because he wouldn't take a pee test and finish qualifying). So where do we go from here? All they need to do is wait us out in the safety of Pakistan. If they wait long enough we'll go the way of Russia and run out of cash or credit. Oh that's right we already did.

Happy Earth Day

Enjoy the earth while we still have it. You never know it could go away quite quickly the way we treat it.