onfocus

"’Unfortunately, not only has little to none of that funding been utilized, you are now proposing the very cuts that we sought to avoid with that emergency line of credit,’ Manchin said in his letter."

The new Postmaster is considering closing several post offices even though the coronavirus relief package passed by Congress included up to $10 billion in Treasury loans. I wonder if it's because the new Postmaster has a financial interest in seeing it fail? From the Washington Post: Trump ally takes over crisis-ridden Postal Service as top Senate Democrat demands inquiry on hiring:

"DeJoy and his wife, Aldona Wos, the ambassador-nominee to Canada, have between $30.1 million and $75.3 million in assets in USPS competitors or contractors, according to Wos’s financial disclosure paperwork filed with the Office of Government Ethics."

It's just grifting all the way down. The USPS is going to be critical to democracy here in the near future.

"Just as premature reopenings of bars, stores and restaurants ended up causing big Covid outbreaks and hurting business activity in many Sun Belt states, virus outbreaks on campuses could cause a stampede away from universities eroding trust in universities as responsible stewards of young people’s health and safety."

In the face of no good choices, I think colleges should prioritize the health of their communities.

"There are two key mitigation strategies for countering poor ventilation and virus-laden aerosols indoors: We can dilute viral particles’ presence by exchanging air in the room with air from outside (and thus lowering the dose, which matters for the possibility and the severity of infection) or we can remove viral particles from the air with filters."

Time to think about filtration and ventilation.

"Theirtube is a Youtube filter bubble simulator that provides a look into how videos are recommended on other people's YouTube. Users can experience how the YouTube home page would look for six different personas."

What if the YouTube I see is not the YouTube you see? This is a good demonstration of how personalized recommendations work.

"Federal tactical teams that have clashed with protesters in Portland in recent weeks will soon be leaving the city, Gov. Kate Brown of Oregon said Wednesday."

Relieved to hear this.

Update: Surprise! Now, not true. Article I linked has been updated to the headline: Federal Agents Agree to Withdraw From Portland, With Conditions. Those Conditions? Never! (Paraphrasing.)

"“As a search engine, Google’s mission is to quickly direct searchers to great information, wherever that information is, as Page went on to explain. At that time, that generally meant to direct people from search results to websites. As search technologies have developed, that’s not always the best way to assist people.”

She did not answer questions about whether those changes present the search engine with a conflict of interest."

It's a meritocracy! Google just happens to make all the best things. AND they decide which things are best. Win-win.

"Fast forward five years and journalists and commentators are still talking about imminent pivots and praising him for always-temporary changes in his tone."

Tiring Trump trope.

Let’s say we threw the kitchen sink at COVID-19 in the U.S. Let’s say we started now with the goal of being open for business in October— meaning schools, in person voting, sports, everything. If we did everything. What would happen?

I've been thinking about this a lot lately. Nice to see someone write out the logic of a new, stronger lockdown.

"“These were very clear examples that didn't just upset me, they upset Facebook’s employees, they upset the entire civil rights community, they upset Facebook’s advertisers. If you still refuse to listen to all those voices, then you're proving that your decision-making is being guided by some other voice,” she said."

They definitely aren’t guided by their own policies. Facebook just ignores or rewrites them to suit the administration.

"A majority of Americans are concerned that reopening schools this fall for in-person learning will lead to a surge in new coronavirus infections."

Most people realize we can’t wish the virus away. This survey didn’t even ask for opinions about covid-19 testing in schools or how people feel about increasing funding for schools to take on these challenges. I think we should be talking about those.

"Relying on the self-control of young adults, rather than deploying the public-health infrastructure needed to control a disease that spreads easily among people who live, eat, study, and socialize together, is not a safe reopening strategy—and yelling at students for their dangerous behavior won’t help either."

We shouldn’t blame students when campuses start closing. The Oregon Health Authority just warned that test results are taking up to two weeks to come back. We know before opening that we don’t have the testing infrastructure in place to have an accurate, timely picture of spread.