How many inmates in jails or prison have been vaccinated with a booster?

May 18, 2021
By Tiana Herring and Emily Widra

Throughout the pandemic, (click here) prisons have been a hotspot for COVID-19, with case rates in prisons between four to five times higher than in the general population. Despite being disproportionately impacted by the pandemic, however, most states did not prioritize incarcerated people in their vaccination plans. As a result, seven months since the first vaccines were distributed, just 55% of people in prison have been vaccinated, leaving them vulnerable to infection.

Using data from the UCLA Law COVID-19 Behind Bars Data Project, The Marshall Project/AP, and other state-specific sources, we calculated the current rate of vaccinations among incarcerated people in 48 state prison systems and the federal Bureau of Prisons. For our measure of vaccination, we counted anyone who had received at least one dose of a vaccine as of May 14, 2021. Our findings are disheartening:

In 17 state prison systems and the Bureau of Prisons, less than half of incarcerated people have received a vaccine.

Vaccination rates are the worst in Utah, South Carolina, and Alabama where 20% or less of the prison population has received the first dose of a vaccine.
And two states – Florida and Wyoming – have not released any vaccination information at all. Their lack of transparency makes it impossible to hold these Departments of Corrections accountable and ensure they are doing all they can to limit the spread of the virus....

People with good intentions were used for their capacity to build a coup against President - Elect Biden.

I think Jennifer said it best, "That is not okay."

The organizers of January 6th bring an interesting perspective to Trump's real intentions for that day. He hijacked the rally to carry out a coup against the newly elected Pesident Biden. That is exactly what it is. It was a coup attempt by Trump. No one else is responsible for the march on the Capital. Trump diverted the "end of presidency" rally and redirected it to carry out a violent coup against the Rule of Law in the USA Constitution.

To the issue of voter fraud and mail-in ballots. The identity question is best to return to an actual signature when entering the ballot station. "Voter ID" is a very bad idea. It allows elections to become places where personal information can be exploited for many other purposes. It is simply wrong to require any person to provide proof of identity when their signature is all that is needed. Year after year in a voter record book the same signature appears when signing in to vote. There is nothing else needed. The other option is a thumb print next to the signature. If ever one runs into inappropriate activity when voting the thumb print may provide insight into who it may be.

But, im all honesty, I think we are seeing nafarious uses of the Voter ID and it's many laws. Now, lawyers are asking judges to release confidential information to a candidates campaign to determine if any of the persons voting were fraudulent. That is simply unrealistic. Voting should not be a burden so much as a responsibility. There should be a day off on election day and everyone should vote.

Occam's Razor. Simplicity is the best answer. 

 

Moderna has come out to state their mRNA vaccine in two does and a booster is effective against the Omicron variant.

December 20, 2021
By John Woolfolk and Harriet Blair Rowan

The fast-spreading COVID-19 omicron variant (click here) has rocketed to dominance over the highly contagious delta strain across much of the U.S., jumping from less than 13% of sequenced cases on Dec. 11 to more than 73% in a week’s time, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported Monday.

It was unclear how fast omicron has spread in California — the California Department of Public Health had not updated its variant tracking data and had no immediate comment Monday. But the rapid spread across the rest of the country alarmed infectious disease experts.

“Amazing — this is faster than I expected,” said Dr. John Swartzberg, clinical professor emeritus of infectious diseases and vaccinology at UC Berkeley’s School of Public Health. “I think this is fair to say: This is explosive.”...

I believe there is a test case in Senators Warren and Booker. (click here) There is no statement as to the variant the two Senators contracted, but, they are ill after being vaccinated and this is the first Level Three Virus that circumvents immunity. So, currently, in looking at Moderna's statement and the two Senators, it is reassuring there is great degree of protection from the variants with a two injection initial shots and a booster. The three shots are providing a really good degree of protection. That is reassuring. We are on the right path with these viruses and there is good news to the efforts by research scientists.

December 20, 2021

Yahoo Finance’s Anjalee Khemlani (click here) explains the latest coronavirus news as Moderna announces the results of its booster vaccine dose against the Omicron variant, COVID-19 cases rise, and Europe braces for lockdowns....

...We've got news out of Moderna saying that their booster shot-- so the half dose compared to the initial course-- is effective against the omicron variant in addition to a full dose suggested as a booster or as an option. They've studied both and have come out with results showing that the half-dose booster is 30-- gives you 37-fold protection against omicron, and a full dose-- that's 100 milligrams-- gives you 83. That's in comparison to Pfizer, which had reported 25-fold increase protection from a booster dose....

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What the heck?

RUSSIAN OCCUPIED LAND NEEDS TO END!!!!!

...1,500 soldiers (click here) of the Operational Group of Russian Forces in Transnistria (OGRF) are based at the decommissioned Soviet-era ammunition depot at Cobasna, in the unrecognised breakaway state of Transnistria. Located just 2km from the Ukrainian border, this depot is the largest in Eastern Europe with around 22,000 tons of military equipment guarded by the Russian troops. Russophile Transnistria had long been a point of cooperation between Russia and Ukraine, who serve as two of the mediators in the international effort to find a peaceful resolution to its separatism. Now, however, it has the potential to open a fourth front in the looming conflict feared by many observers and civilians....

This cannot be tolerated. These are methods of the old and failed Soviet Union. The occupied land needs to dismantled and returned to sovereign countries. THIS IS AN ILLEGAL OCCUPATION BY THE RUSSIANS. After the failure of the Soviet Union, Putin looked around to preserve mlitary sites whereby Russia could keep munitions and soldiers to assault Europe. This is one of those sites. Basically, Ukraine is surrounded by Russian troops and munitions. The current Ukraine military is not up to the challenge, but, if Russia is going to resist it's occupation of these lands that don't belong to them, then there is going to be conflict. Ukraine is being wittled away at to lessen it's strength and promote invasion.

...called on Russia to “urgently formulate a proposal for resumption of the process of removal and destruction of ammunition from the Cobasna site.”... 

There is nothing new here. Russia is simply the Soviet Union with a smaller foot print. These are all failed Soviet tactics. These soldiers are not protecting Russian sovereign lands. They are deployed to harass Ukraine and prepare for a multi-front war to end the sovereign country of Ukraine. That priority is a direct threat to Europe.

...Chisinau has argued that because Transnistria is internationally recognised as Moldovan territory, the presence of Russian troops there against its political will undermines Moldovan territorial sovereignty. Russia contends that the remaining OGRF troops serve as peacekeepers, authorized by the 1992 ceasefire and will remain until the conflict is resolved....

In 1992, Russia wasn't a threat and their peacekeeping was welcome. Enough of this mess with Russia already. Russia is NOT a reliable peace partner anywhere.

Perhaps the United Nations needs to remove Russia as a country willing to provide peacekeepers. These Russian troops need to leave as they have been completely unable to secure the peace for the region. The West needs to formulate deployments into these Russian occupied areas to bring real peace and not just a faux face of Ukraine invasion plans.

The Biden adminisration should hold a USA Police Summit in 2022. There is a crisis in law enforcement.

"Morning Papers"

The Rooster 

"Okeydoke"

December 19, 2021
By Julius Prodis Sulek

Officer Michael Brown (click here) and his police dog Odin burst into the bedroom with a pack of officers from Richmond’s gang unit, and there he was: the intruder hiding under the bed.

It was around midnight as the swarm of police, guns drawn, crowded into the dark, cramped room to capture the 21-year-old man who had barged into a neighbor’s apartment after police showed up at his home to search for a weapon.

But in the shaky glow of their flashlights, they quickly discovered the suspected gang member wasn’t the only one concealed under the bed.

“Hey, there’s a kid under here!” an officer called out with alarm....

This reminds me of another police incident where a show of unnecessary force lead to the death of James Boyd.

March 16, 2021

By Russel Contreras

Albuquerque - A deadly New Mexico police shooting (click here) that happened a year ago Monday prompted angry protests and a murder investigation into the officers involved.

The fallout from the killing of James Boyd, a mentally ill homeless man, provided an early glimpse of the outrage that would spread across the country in 2014 over what critics decried as heavy-handed law enforcement tactics.

Boyd’s death came amid a wave of police shootings in Albuquerque. Mayor Richard Berry called it a game changer and urged the U.S. Justice Department to finish an investigation into the police department so a federal monitor could be appointed....

The issue regarding police violence within the USA is a two edge sword, in that, officers need options and the law abiding public, including those with mental health problems, need protection from them.

The policing with attack dogs is a worry. Of course, it can be a good tool, but, under what circumstances. I see the use of dogs in the USA as a means of detecting illegal drug activity. But, as a routine form of law enforcement, the question arises, once a dog tastes the blood of humans are they still effective in their purpose?

In an issue (click here) described in "The Mercury News" the police officer lost control of the dog. The dog caught by his harness under a porch was interpreting the struggles of the man in pursuit as aggression and became more aggressive and more injury was inflicted. Dogs don't think in terms of civility or crime, they think in "pack mentality" and protection of the pack, even if that pack is one man and one dog. Should the dog ever be "off leash?"

“I attempted to call K-9 Gunnar to my side several times,” Hodges later wrote in a police report, but the Belgian Malinois (click here) “refused to come off the contact ​​as the suspect was screaming, flailing his arms, agitating K-9 Gunnar.”

In speaking to a guard dog trainer it was stated dogs need to own their aggression to know their capacity. They need to experience their own strength in training to understand they are not in danger when they attack a target or in this case a potential criminal.

Dogs, tasers, guns and flash bangs are not the best domestic tools for a police officer in a country that likes to think of itself as civil. Yet, because of capitalism and consumer choices available in the USA, police officers are sadly outgunned by sincere criminals. It seems to me there needs to be a summit that encompases current police practices with current danger to police on the job and current dangers in those practices.

The issues law enforcement face today also include their top killer, COVID-19 and it's variants.

A summit of police enforcement in the USA could include all these issues. There needs to be a vision of future enforcement that doesn't face gun violence and military style weapons in their work. Some of the reasons for the crisis is the authority each individual officer allows themselves as seen in the murder of George Floyd.

But, the future vision for police officers needs to include a higher level of safety from more than the virus, but, also the chance of meeting a criminal that has more power at the end of a gun than the officer does. The USA needs a new vision of law enforcement and that includes an evaluation of danger within the societies where police do their work. 

Are current measures appropriate and what does a society have to do to end the problems police face? That aspect of SOCIETY RESPONSIBILTY is a huge part of the picture no one ever addresses. Why? Because of the profit margins of all aspects of the USA economy. Economists need to be part of a larger picture to target the violence and keep the benevolence.

The summit will have to encompass every aspect of danger for police officers, what causes it and a PLAN to end that danger to return the USA to PEACE WITHIN IT'S BORDERS.

I do not believe police use grievance processes at all to mayors and council to end violence within the city. They simply take it on the chin and that spawns self-righteous attitudes, bonding and strategies outside the definition of good police work.

The full

15.7 day old moon

99.1 percent lit