2:00PM Water Cooler 10/18/2024

By Lambert Strether of Corrente.

Bird Song of the Day

Blue-and-white Mockingbird, Location, PN Cañón del Sumidero, Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, Mexico.

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In Case You Might Miss…

1. Friday Charts: RCP chart; shows Big Mo shifting toward Trump; Covid charts show nothing but good news.
2. Walz fabricator vanishes.
3. Trump cancellations.
4. Boeing waits on SEC approval for stock and bond offering; FAA opens new safety review.

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Politics

“So many of the social reactions that strike us as psychological are in fact a rational management of symbolic capital.” –Pierre Bourdieu, Classification Struggles

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2024

Less than three weeks to go!

Friday’s RCP Poll Averages:

Big Mo shifts toward Trump, this week, even in WI (that is, if you ignore the entire concept of margin of error). Of course, we on the outside might as well be examining the entrails of birds when we try to predict what will happen to the subset of voters (undecided; irregular) in a subset of states (swing), and the irregulars, especially, who will determine the outcome of the election but might as well be quantum foam, but presumably the campaign professionals have better data, and have the situation as under control as it can be _{MR SUBLIMINAL Fooled ya. Kidding!}.

“Most say they are worse off than four years ago: Gallup” [The Hill]. “The Gallup poll, released Friday, found that 52 percent of Americans said they and their family are worse off today than they were four years ago. Another 39 percent said that they were better off while 9 percent said they felt the same now as they did back then. The responses varied based on the person’s party affiliation. Around 72 percent of Democrats say they were better off in 2024 than 2020, according to the survey. The numbers were much lower for independents, 35 percent, and Republicans, 7 percent. Gallup’s monthly Economic Confidence Index (ECI), which ranges from -100 to +100, was currently at -26 with 39 percent saying they were better off financially four years ago. For comparison, in 2020, around 55 percent said the economy was better — and the ECI was -4…. Approximately 46 percent of Americans say their current economic conditions are “poor,” some 29 percent described them as ‘only fair,’ while 25 percent said they were ‘good’ or ‘excellent.’ Additionally, 62 percent said the economy is ‘getting worse,’ a higher figure than 32 percent who said it is ‘getting better,’ according to the survey.” • Yikes! Somehow I don’t think more media appearances will solve this problem.

“A Mystery $30 Million Wave of Pro-Trump Bets Has Moved a Popular Prediction Market” [Wall Street Journal]. “Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump are neck and neck in the polls. But in one popular betting market, the odds have skewed heavily in Trump’s favor, raising questions about a recent flurry of wagers and who is behind them. Over the past two weeks, the chances of a Trump victory in the November election have surged on Polymarket, a crypto-based prediction market. Its bettors were giving Trump a 62% chance of winning on Thursday, while Harris’s chances were 38%. The candidates were in a dead heat at the start of October. Trump’s gains on Polymarket have cheered his supporters, and they have been followed by the odds shifting in Trump’s favor in other betting markets. Elon Musk flagged Trump’s growing lead on Polymarket to his 200 million X followers on Oct. 6, praising the concept of betting markets. ‘More accurate than polls, as actual money is on the line,’ Musk posted. But the surge might be a mirage manufactured by a group of four Polymarket accounts that have collectively pumped about $30 million of crypto into bets that Trump will win. ‘There’s strong reason to believe they are the same entity,’ said Miguel Morel, chief executive of Arkham Intelligence, a blockchain analysis firm that examined the accounts. The big bets on Trump aren’t necessarily nefarious. Some observers have suggested that they were simply placed by a large bettor convinced that Trump will win and looking for a big payday. Others, however, see the bets as an influence campaign designed to fuel social-media buzz for the former president.” • This would be reflexive?

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Kamala (D): “The Person Promoting a Lurid Claim About Tim Walz Vanishes, Leaving the Lie Behind” [Mother Jones]. “The ‘Black Insurrectionist’ profile began claiming last week that he’d been in touch with a former student of Walz who baselessly alleged the Minnesota governor sexually abused him years ago when he was a teacher and football coach. The @Docnetyoutube account seems to have been deleted sometime on the evening of Thursday, October 17. It’s unclear if the user deleted the account or the company did: under Elon Musk’s ownership, X no longer responds to journalists and could not be reached for comment.” I remember, back in the 2008, Larry Johnson peddling the story that he had a tape of Michelle Obama saying “whitey,” but it never materialized. But Larry Johnson persisted, as we say. @Docnetyoutube did not, lending a bit of credence to my paranoid theory that the account was a sort of honey trap, designed to get Trump to, er, trumpet the accusation. Then would come the rugpull. But Trump didn’t take the bait. And so the account — despite its big follower count — disappeared, its job done. More: “Earlier this week, a video began circulating on the platform claiming to depict Walz’s alleged victim. One of the most widely-seen tweets promoting the video was also recently deleted. It came from an X user calling himself @TheWakeninq, who uses variations of the name “QAnon76″ on other websites. But the video, as BBC journalist Shayan Sardarizadeh noted, had obvious hallmarks of being a deepfake, with distorted facial features and a foreign-accented voice that was out of sync with the speaker’s movements. While the alleged victim is a real person who, according to his social media presence, did graduate from the school where Walz once taught and coached, other videos on his Facebook account capture someone who looks different and speaks with an American accent. According to his Facebook account, the now-adult former student—who did not immediately respond to a request for comment—has previously experienced homelessness; a Gofundme from 2021 said that he was living in Hawaii and trying to ‘get off the streets.’ The video is still up on @TheWakeninq’s Rumble page, where it has been viewed by at least 6,000 people. A local Texas Republican official named Sarah Fields, who also describes herself as a journalist, shared the video on Wednesday, claiming the student had come forward and ‘officially’ accused Walz of abuse. She claimed to have filed public record requests with Walz’s old school, before adding that ‘Reportedly, a lawsuit is soon to be filed. I will keep you all updated. I’m watching this very closely.’ ‘I was able to confirm with multiple sources within the Trump campaign that THEY believe there is truth to these allegations, and have begun their own investigation,’ she wrote.” • I follow plenty of right wing sources, but NONE of them are promoting @TheWakeninq’s video, so I’n guessing the Texas Republican can be dismissed (although the public records report might turn up other stuff, for example on the DUI). Anyhow, from the breathtaking chutzpah and “bearing false witness” standpoints, the “Black Insurrectionist” fabrication (Republican) and the “Vance had carnal relations with a couch” (Democrat) stories weigh in the balance more or less equality, although an accusation of ped0philia is obviously an order of magnitude more vicious. Anyhow, you saw it unfold here!

Kamala (D): “Biden tells Obama ‘she’s not as strong as me’ — and ex-prez agrees ‘that’s true’ at Ethel Kennedy service” [New York Post]. Off-mike incident: “‘She’s not as strong as me,’ said Biden, 81, according to the translation, which was produced by [by a professional lip reader] analyzing the on-video lip movements during the discussion. “I know … that’s true,” the popular former president agreed, adding, ‘We have time.’ ‘Yeah, we’ll get it in time,’ said Biden. Moments earlier, Obama said, ‘it’s important that we have some time together’ in a possible reference to campaigning alongside Harris. • I dunno. “Time” to do what?

Kamala (D): “Opinion: Obama reminds voters Harris is the candidate of hope and joy this election” [USA Today]. “Obama’s support for Harris signals a commitment to continuity, reassuring voters that the vice president embodies the same values of hope, progress and bipartisanship that defined his presidency.” • The columnist’s bio: “Marla Bautista is a military fellow columnist at USA TODAY Opinion.” Oh.

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Kamala (D): “Full interview: Vice President Kamala Harris sits down with Bret Baier in ‘Special Report’ exclusive” (video) [FOX]. Here’s a transcript. This caught my eye:

Kamala Harris (26:07): I invite everyone to go to KamalaHarris.com and you will see that I have 80 pages of policies that are quite comprehensive and should be accessible to anyone who would like to read them. And it includes what I intend to do about affordable housing, what I intend to do about small businesses, what I intend to do to-

Bret Baier (26:27):

And that’s why we invited you here.

Kamala Harris (26:28):… strengthen our economy.

On Kamala’s website there is a downloadable PDF, “A New Way Forward For The Middle Class,” which is in fact 82 pages long, so Kamala’s staff briefed her properly. (I don’t miuch like “you will see,” because I’m still holding a grudge from 2008, when every Obot said “check the website” when asked about policy. No. It’s the candidate’s job to put the policies across to voters, not simply gesture vaguely at marketing collateral. Anyhow, from page 6 (not like the New York Post Page Six, except maybe the bold-faced names:

(Weirdly, the spot color is red, and not blue. Who did that?) Who exactly does this persuade? It’s all of the piece with “100 Generals Endorse Harris!” (or a million spooks). If I wanted serious analysis done, mainstream economists are the last people I would go to. Or ratings agencies.

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Trump (R) (Smith/Chutkan): “Chutkan unseals much-redacted Jack Smith evidence used to build Trump’s Jan. 6 case” [The Hill]. “A judge on Friday unsealed nearly 1,900 pages of evidence [np]special counsel Jack Smith assembled in building the election interference case against former President Trump, publicly posting the highly redacted trove. Though the bulk of the documents are redacted, with many pages fully unviewable, the documents still provide a window into the breadth of Smith’s case — and of Trump’s conduct still unknown to the public.” And: “U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan, who oversees the trial proceedings, released the information against objections from Trump, suggesting his desire to shield the information due to the election amounted to its own form of interference. ‘If the court withheld information that the public otherwise had a right to access solely because of the potential political consequences of releasing it, that withholding could itself constitute—or appear to be— election interference,’ she wrote in a Thursday night order requiring the documents’ release.” I think that’s a debater’s point. The putative evidence hasn’t been tested by the defense. This is a document dump — on a Friday, no less — and unbecoming to the Court. More: “Prosecutors argue Trump’s effort to thwart the transfer of power was almost entirely carried out as a private citizen. Trump’s attorneys are due to respond in the days following November’s presidential election.”

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Trump (R): “Trump cancels a streak of events with only days until election” [Axios]. “Former President Trump’s planned appearance at a National Rifle Association event next week was cancelled Thursday, the latest in a slew of scuttled public appearances and interviews by the former president in recent weeks. With only 17 days to go until Election Day, the spate of cancellations gives voters fewer chances to hear from Trump before heading to the polls in a coin toss race.” • Hmm.

Trump (R): “Trump’s closing argument: It doesn’t have to be this way” [The Hill]. “Voters rate crime as one of their top concerns. During the debate a month ago between the two presidential candidates, the ABC anchor who co-moderated the face-off memorably weighed in to fact-check Donald Trump on the subject. The former president had said that crime in the U.S. under the Biden-Harris administration was “through the roof.” David Muir stepped in to correct the record, saying ‘President Trump, as you know, the FBI says that overall violent crime is actually coming down in this country.’ The GOP candidate called the FBI data ‘defrauding statements,’ meaning ‘false.’ And now it turns out Trump was right. Although the FBI stats initially showed that crime had gone down 2.1 percent in 2022, the agency has revised the data to show the number of violent misdeeds has actually increased by 80,029, or 4.5 percent. The FBI added to the tally an additional 1,699 murders, 7,780 rapes, 33,459 robberies and 37,091 aggravated assaults that year. That was awkward for the Biden-Harris White House, which had taken a premature victory lap for driving crime to a ‘near 50-year low.'” • Oopsie. (I hate that “closing argument” trope. An election is not a trial or a debate. Even if the last action or statement by a candidate is dispostive for any given voter, that doesn’t imply it’s the final link in a chain of logic.)

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“Kamala Harris continues to underperform in critical states” [The Hill]. “Pick any average from the multitude of polling views — two-way, multicandidate, battleground states, and even individual battleground states — and Harris is running consistently below where Joe Biden was in 2020 and Hillary Clinton in 2016. So it’s no surprise Democrats are growing nervous…. Democrats have only two hopes. One is that today’s polls are more accurately gauging the electorate, and that Harris is therefore at least close to where she needs to be. The other is that by suddenly coming out of hiding to take friendly interviews, she can convince an electorate that seems unconvinced. Neither should be a source of comfort for Democrats. But hope is not a strategy. That’s why Harris’s campaign managers are changing theirs. They know she is losing now, and absent significant improvement, she will lose in November.”

Realignment and Legitimacy

Hmm:

Thank you for finally being honest that this dispute is personal for you. In all sincerity, your idealism, and that's where I think you're coming from, is laudable. You genuinely want a better world, and you sincerely think my ideas make things worse. I respect that, even if I… https://t.co/ODQfRIcKAx pic.twitter.com/0MTgjA73qq

— Matt Stoller (@matthewstoller) October 18, 2024

Stoller’s essay is worth a clickthrough. See at least the material on Kamala.

Syndemics

“I am in earnest — I will not equivocate — I will not excuse — I will not retreat a single inch — AND I WILL BE HEARD.” –William Lloyd Garrison

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Covid Resources, United States (National): Transmission (CDC); Wastewater (CDC, Biobot; includes many counties; Wastewater Scan, includes drilldown by zip); Variants (CDC; Walgreens); “Iowa COVID-19 Tracker” (in IA, but national data). “Infection Control, Emergency Management, Safety, and General Thoughts” (especially on hospitalization by city).

Lambert here: Readers, thanks for the collective effort. To update any entry, do feel free to contact me at the address given with the plants. Please put “COVID” in the subject line. Thank you!

Resources, United States (Local): AK (dashboard); AL (dashboard); AR (dashboard); AZ (dashboard); CA (dashboard; Marin, dashboard; Stanford, wastewater; Oakland, wastewater); CO (dashboard; wastewater); CT (dashboard); DE (dashboard); FL (wastewater); GA (wastewater); HI (dashboard); IA (wastewater reports); ID (dashboard, Boise; dashboard, wastewater, Central Idaho; wastewater, Coeur d’Alene; dashboard, Spokane County); IL (wastewater); IN (dashboard); KS (dashboard; wastewater, Lawrence); KY (dashboard, Louisville); LA (dashboard); MA (wastewater); MD (dashboard); ME (dashboard); MI (wastewater; wastewater); MN (dashboard); MO (wastewater); MS (dashboard); MT (dashboard); NC (dashboard); ND (dashboard; wastewater); NE (dashboard); NH (wastewater); NJ (dashboard); NM (dashboard); NV (dashboard; wastewater, Southern NV); NY (dashboard); OH (dashboard); OK (dashboard); OR (dashboard); PA (dashboard); RI (dashboard); SC (dashboard); SD (dashboard); TN (dashboard); TX (dashboard); UT (wastewater); VA (wastewater); VT (dashboard); WA (dashboard; dashboard); WI (wastewater); WV (wastewater); WY (wastewater).

Resources, Canada (National): Wastewater (Government of Canada).

Resources, Canada (Provincial): ON (wastewater); QC (les eaux usées); BC (wastewater); BC, Vancouver (wastewater).

Hat tips to helpful readers: Alexis, anon (2), Art_DogCT, B24S, CanCyn, ChiGal, Chuck L, Festoonic, FM, FreeMarketApologist (4), Gumbo, hop2it, JB, JEHR, JF, JL Joe, John, JM (10), JustAnotherVolunteer, JW, KatieBird, KF, KidDoc, LL, Michael King, KF, LaRuse, mrsyk, MT, MT_Wild, otisyves, Petal (6), RK (2), RL, RM, Rod, square coats (11), tennesseewaltzer, Tom B., Utah, Bob White (3).

Stay safe out there!

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Non-Pharmaceutical Interventions

“The flu shot is different this year, thanks to COVID” [NPR]. “This year’s flu shot will be missing a strain of influenza it’s protected against for more than a decade. That’s because there have been no confirmed flu cases caused by the Influenza B/Yamagata lineage since spring 2020. And the Food and Drug Administration decided this year that the strain now poses little to no threat to human health. Scientists have concluded that widespread physical distancing and masking practiced during the early days of COVID-19 appear to have pushed B/Yamagata into oblivion.” • No, not “thanks to Covid,” you morons. Thanks to non-pharmaceutical interventions!

Elite Maleficence

“Column: Can Stanford tell the difference between scientific fact and fiction? Its pandemic conference raises doubts” [Michael Hiltzik, Los Angeles Times]. One pearl of many: “During the opening panel, moderator Wilk Wilkinson, a blogger on the concept of ‘personal accountability,’ offered the astonishing criticism that public health leaders ‘focused very narrowly on deaths from COVID, and often it came at the expense of other social values’ such as ‘being able to visit people, … or putting children in school as they normally would go to school, or attend funerals.'” • Like Jesus said: Infect thy neighbor as thyself.

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TABLE 1: Daily Covid Charts

Wastewater
This week[1] CDC October 5	Last Week[2] CDC (until next week):
Variants [3] CDC October 12	★ Emergency Room Visits[4] CDC October 12
Hospitalization
★ New York[5] New York State, data October 17:	★ National [6] CDC September 28:
Positivity
National[7] Walgreens October 14:	Ohio[8] Cleveland Clinic October 5:
Travelers Data
★ Positivity[9] CDC September 30:	★ Variants[10] CDC September 30:
Deaths
Weekly Deaths vs. % Positivity [11] CDC October 12:	Weekly Deaths vs. ED Visits [12] CDC October 12:

LEGEND

1) ★ for charts new today; all others are not updated.

2) For a full-size/full-resolution image, Command-click (MacOS) or right-click (Windows) on the chart thumbnail and “open image in new tab.”

NOTES

[1] (CDC) Still some hot spots, but I can’t draw circles around entire regions this week. Good news!

[2] (CDC) Last week’s wastewater map.

[3] (CDC Variants) KP.* very popular. XEC has entered the chat.

[4] (ED) Down, but worth noting that Emergency Department use is now on a par with the first wave, in 2020.

[5] (Hospitalization: NY) Definitely down.

[6] (Hospitalization: CDC). I see the “everything in greenish pastels” crowd has gotten to this chart.

[7] (Walgreens) Big drop continues!

[8] (Cleveland) Dropping.

[9] (Travelers: Positivity) Up, though lagged.

[10] (Travelers: Variants).

[11] Deaths low, positivity down.

[12] Deaths low, ED down.

Stats Watch

“United States Housing Starts” [Trading Economics]. “Housing starts in the United States eased by 0.5% from the previous month to an annualized rate of 1.354 million units in September of 2024, in line with market expectations, trimming the downwardly revised 7.8% increase in August.”

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Manufacturing: “Boeing’s Multi-Billion Dollar Offering Waiting on SEC Nod” [Bloomberg]. “The company’s shelf registration on Tuesday, a filing to pre-register the securities, had not been deemed effective by the US Securities and Exchange Commission, according to the document. While that clearance is typically automatic for companies as big as Boeing, regulatory issues surrounding its disclosures about aircraft safety may prevent it from getting speedy approval, securities lawyers said. Without the SEC’s green light, Boeing cannot launch its hotly-anticipated sale that stands to shore up depleted funds and help it maintain a credit rating that is now hovering just above junk. The SEC can take 5 to 10 business days to let a company know if its registration will need a more formal review, the lawyers said. The review, in turn, could take days or weeks depending on the depth of the inquiry.”

Manufacturing: “Don’t bow down to striking workers, Ryanair boss urges Boeing” [Telegraph]. “[Ryanair boss Michael O’Leary] said: “They have to see out this strike and if that means all of our deliveries get delayed by a couple of months, frankly we would support that.” And: “The Ryanair chief said: ‘The timing of the existing contract running out was unfortunate given the state that Boeing is in, and that’s being exploited by the unions. Even if they do offer more, the unions won’t agree to a deal at the moment.’ He also claimed that the IAM had also been ‘incompetent’ in negotiating a 25pc settlement that it agreed to put to workers, only for it to be rejected in a formal vote.” The union leadership, yes indeed. More: “Boeing also faces a tough political background to the dispute. Mr O’Leary said: ‘It’s very difficult to resolve that strike when there’s a presidential election in three weeks’ time. The political situation is difficult over there.'”

Manufacturing: “The FAA is opening a new review of safety at Boeing” [Associated Press]. “The Federal Aviation Administration said Friday it will open a three-month review of Boeing’s compliance with safety regulations… The auditor said FAA has failed to ensure that Boeing and its suppliers make parts that meet engineering and design requirements and to investigate claims that Boeing puts improper pressure on employees who are authorized to conduct safety inspections. The FAA has closed only 14 of 34 reports of undue pressure, with the others remaining open for more than a year on average, according to the report.” • It’s a shame those reports are still open. Good hitmen are so hard to find these days!

Manufacturing: “NASA further delays first operational Starliner flight” [Space News]. “NASA will use SpaceX’s Crew Dragon for its two crew rotation missions to the International Space Station in 2025 as it continues to evaluate if it will require Boeing to perform another test flight of its Starliner spacecraft…. ‘The timing and configuration of Starliner’s next flight will be determined once a better understanding of Boeing’s path to system certification is established,’ NASA said in its statement about the 2025 missions. ‘NASA is keeping options on the table for how best to achieve system certification, including windows of opportunity for a potential Starliner flight in 2025.'” • Oh.

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Today’s Fear & Greed Index: 74 Greed (previous close: 71 Greed) [CNN]. One week ago: 74 (Greed). (0 is Extreme Fear; 100 is Extreme Greed). Last updated Oct 18 at 1:18:07 PM ET.

Gallery

The poor kid doesn’t have matching socks:

Family Group https://t.co/RLozVFNx9L pic.twitter.com/ye7BlyTDV5

— L. S. Lowry (@lowryartist) October 18, 2024

The painting is dated 1958, but I don’t know if it represents England in that time, or Lowry’s memory.

Zeitgeist Watch

Runways, first on my timeline:

Chicago O’Hare International Airport has 8 runways, more than any other civilian airport in the world. #Aircraft #Aviation pic.twitter.com/wnD1MU8S5E

— Aviation Facts (@AirplaneCentral) October 17, 2024

Events on runways, later on my timeline:

At approx. 3 this afternoon, @AmericanAir Flight 47 was on Taxiway Bravo, heading to its gate at T5 when it ingested a cargo container into its #2 (right) engine destroying the can and severely damaging the aircraft. There are no reported injuries #ChicagoScanner #avgeek #AA47 pic.twitter.com/bMahnpu7S8

— Windy City Wheelman (@WindyCityDriver) October 17, 2024

Algo doing its job, I guess!

News of the Wired

“Own and control the next Bandcamp” [Subvert]. From the FAQ: “Bandcamp’s back-to-back acquisitions—first by Epic Games in 2022, then by Songtradr in 2023—have its community feeling betrayed and concerned about the platform they once relied on. Bandcamp’s trajectory illustrates a depressing reality of the contemporary internet: platforms position themselves as artist-friendly alternatives, only to seemingly abandon their core values and community. It’s time for a new model – one we collectively own and control. A cooperative, or co-op, is a business owned and democratically controlled by its members. Subvert is owned by its membership base of artists, labels, supporters, and workers.” • Should launch in 2025. Interesting fundraising model: A physical newspaper.

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* * *Contact information for plants: Readers, feel free to contact me at lambert [UNDERSCORE] strether [DOT] corrente [AT] yahoo [DOT] com, to (a) find out how to send me a check if you are allergic to PayPal and (b) to find out how to send me images of plants. Vegetables are fine! Fungi, lichen, and coral are deemed to be honorary plants! If you want your handle to appear as a credit, please place it at the start of your mail in parentheses: (thus). Otherwise, I will anonymize by using your initials. See the previous Water Cooler (with plant) here. From Wukchumni:

Wukchumi writes: “Mineral King fall colors.” Indeed!

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