Saturday: Hili dialogue

March 15, 2025 • 6:45 am

Welcome to a CaturSaturday: it’s  March 15, 2025: the Ides of March. But for Jewish cats it’s the Idle of March, as they relax and read scripture on shabbos. And it’s National Egg Cream Day, celebrating a drink associated with Jewish areas of New York. This drink contains neither egg nor cream, but consists of seltzer, milk, and chocolate syrup, traditionally Fox’s U-Bet Chocolate Syrup. Here’s a finished one. I don’t know how this got invented, but it’s good, though now hard to get in New York City. Here’s Gem Spa, THE place to get the iconic egg cream, and I’ve had one there. If you’re in NYC, you have to get one!

It’s also National Corndog Day, Maple Syrup Saturday (be sure to buy the darkest one you can find), Natonal Peanut Lovers Day, Play the Recorder Day (see below) and National Pears Hélène Day.

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the March 15 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*I’m surprised, but Columbia University has disciplined more of its students who engaged in illegal protests last year. (h/t Jez)

Columbia University has expelled or suspended some students who took over a campus building during pro-Palestinian protests last spring and temporarily revoked the diplomas of others who have since graduated, officials said Thursday.

The university said in a campus-wide email that a judicial board brought a range of sanctions against students who occupied Hamilton Hall last spring to protest the war in Gaza.

Columbia did not provide a breakdown of how many students were expelled, were suspended or had their degrees revoked, but it said the outcomes were based on an “evaluation of the severity of behaviors.”

The culmination of the monthslong investigative process comes as the university is reeling from the arrest of a well-known Palestinian campus activist, Mahmoud Khalil, by federal immigration authorities last Saturday. President Donald Trump has said the arrest would be the “first of many” such detentions.

At the same time, the Trump administration has stripped the university of more than $400 million in federal funds over what it calls a failure to combat campus antisemitism. Congressional Republicans have pointed specifically to a failure to discipline students involved in the Hamilton Hall seizure as proof of inaction by the university.

Now we’ll leave aside what the meaning of “temporarily revoked diplomas” is, but it’s clear Columbia is doing it to get back the $400 million in federal dosh withheld by the administration (see the demands that the government levied on Columbia in the tweet below). It shouldn’t be necessary for it to reduce the anti-Semitic atmosphere without that pressure, though.

*As usual, I’m stealing a few items from Nellie Bowles’s snarky news/humor column in The Free Press, called this week, “TGIF: Everything’s computer“:

→ MAHA™: RFK Jr. went to a Steak ’n Shake with Fox News this week and proceeded to do an infomercial. This is the infomercial presidency, and every news hit comes with a promo code. In this country, it’s always 3 a.m. on the Home Shopping Network.

RFK: Steak ’n Shake just switched out and people are raving about these french fries, you taste them.
Sean Hannity: They’re amazing, they really are.

RFK, a little later: You taste these, it’s a completely different experience. The customers are raving about it. Steak ’n Shake has been great. We’re very grateful for them, for RFK’ing the french fries. They turned me into a verb.
Hannity: By the way, a plastic straw, thank god.

And it looks like someone ghostwrote RFK Jr.’s suspiciously pro-measles vaccine op-ed last week (you can rest easy knowing it absolutely was not me). Because here he is now: “It used to be, when you and I were kids, everybody got measles. And measles gave you lifetime protection against measles infection. The vaccine doesn’t do that. . . it used to be very young kids. . . they were protected by breast milk, and by maternal immunity. Women who get vaccinated do not provide that level of maternal immunity.” This administration is all about two steps forward, three steps back.

He says these things and then won’t own it, so it’s very hard to honestly debate or even properly make fun. Call him anti–measles vax, and there would be uproar from his community that he’s not anti-vax, no, no, just aware, alert, poly-vax-ual. It’s always: “I’m pro–measles vaccine, but also measles is a lie and the vaccine destroys the mother-child bond.” He speaks in riddles wrapped in conundrums. He is MAHA but also Steak ’n Shake and plastic. It’s crystals, but AI. I can’t live like this.

→ Cops are here to check on your religious status: Two uniformed police officers in Toronto, sitting before a Toronto Police logo, talked about how beautiful it is that so many people are “reverting” to Islam post–October 7 (Muslims believe we are all by default Muslim, so conversion is called reversion). Something about these guys in their official cop uniforms is extra alarming. It all feels a little Sharia-esque. And for good measure, in Cincinnati, the rabbi who runs a progressive Reform synagogue was disinvited from an anti-Nazi rally. See, he’s not anti-Zionist. Because it’s really, really hard to be Jewish and also think Jews don’t have a deep connection to Israel, since there’s so much about it in the Torah (the Old Testament, to my WASP friends out there). Tricky. Jerusalem is genuinely in so many prayers. Zion is too. Oh, Zion this. Oh, Zion that. Maybe in our davening it could be replaced with Park Slope or South Beach, but it’s not quite as evocative. Or, as the officers at my door suggest, you could simply revert.

→ I guess we all need to watch Snow White: Disney reportedly canceled the London premiere of its live-action remake of Snow White after fears of provoking an anti-woke backlash. The star, Rachel Zegler, has called the original Snow White plot “dated” and “weird,” which honestly, I’m sure it is. The big, beautiful moment is when the prince kisses our princess while she is in a coma. Where is the affirmative consent, sir? And how come all those dwarfs are giving advice? Do they have MSWs? The new Snow White is about “women being in roles of power,” which sounds weirdly like Meghan’s podcast.

What’s happening is this: We’re in an awkward transitional moment between two cultures right now, and movies take a while to make. So the old woke culture will still sputter out a few of these moralistic tales for the next year or two, movies where no jokes can be made, movies where the character whose whole thing was jumping is replaced by a character in a wheelchair and there’s no explanation. Captain America starring a man who says the character shouldn’t represent America, a bad place. That sort of thing. Soon, we will arrive into the new culture. Soon, we will enter the right-wing movie era, where diversity is that the female costar has a brunette best friend, who, at 135 pounds, is cast as hilariously fat. In the new movies it’s just a slow scroll of lines of code and the guys who get it get it, you know? Movies in 2026 will have mandatory quotas but it’s just for Chads of different heights. Soon, the women in roles of power will also be in comas.

*Because of funding cuts, the University of Massachusetts has rescinded every offer to its incoming biomedical class for the fall. (h/t Phil)

With federal research funding imperiled by brutal cuts under the Trump administration, biomedical graduate programs nationwide are making tough decisions that will scale back the next generation of scientists.

On Wednesday, news broke that UMass Chan Medical School—a public school in the University of Massachusetts system—has rescinded all offers of admission to biomedical graduate students for the 2025–2026 school year. That means an entire class of future scientists has been wiped out. Those who were initially accepted to the program can try to join again in a future cycle under a priority consideration that won’t require them to reapply, according to a letter sent to a previously admitted student that was shared on social media.

In a statement provided to NBC10 Boston, a spokesperson for the school confirmed that several dozen applicants had their acceptance offers rescinded. “With uncertainties related to the funding of biomedical research in this country, this difficult decision was made to ensure that our current students’ progress is not disrupted by the funding cuts and that we avoid matriculating students who may not have robust opportunities for dissertation research,” the statement reads.

Rachael Sirianni, a biomedical engineer in the Department of Neurological Surgery at UMass Chan Medical School who works on treatments for pediatric brain tumors, called the situation “heartbreaking.” Writing on Bluesky, Sirianni called it “a terrible loss for students. But it’s also a loss for all of science. Science *runs* on grad student labor.” But, she added: “Public medical schools have no other choice; there is no other source of funding, and everyone in academia is at extreme risk right now.”

. . . . UMass is the latest biomedical graduate program to make news for cutbacks amid the Trump administration’s new policies. The administration has halted new grant funding and is trying to radically cut support for so-called “indirect” research costs, which cover maintaining laboratory space and administrative functions, among other things. The cut has been temporarily put on hold amid a legal battle.

The article goes on to describe funding cuts at Duke, Vanderbilt, Penn, and other schools. It’s not a good time to be doing science, and I feel sorry for the new generation of STEM students coming up.  But I’m getting a bit more optimistic that Vance will not succeed Trump, so perhaps these policies might end in a few years.

*A Canadian nurse was found guilty of professional misconduct because she supposedly harmed transgender people by saying things like people cannot change their sex, or that she doesn’t believe people “are born in the wrong bodies.” The report, while not penalizing the nurse for saying there are only two sexes in humans, does deny that in its report (see below; h/t Enrico, note that the link goes to the law center that defended her):

The Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms is disappointed that the Disciplinary Panel of the British Columbia College of Nurses and Midwives, in a decision released today, has found nurse Amy Hamm guilty of professional misconduct for statements made about sexuality and gender in various articles. This decision will negatively impact the freedom of expression of regulated professionals in British Columbia and across Canada.

The panel found professional misconduct in relation to four items where Ms. Hamm expressly identified herself as a nurse while making “discriminatory and derogatory” comments. The Panel found that describing herself as a nurse in the biography attached to three articles she had written, and in one podcast, was enough to create a connection to her profession which brought her under the purview of the regulator.

In September 2020, Amy Hamm, a Vancouver-area nurse, co-sponsored a billboard that read, “I ♥ JK Rowling,” referring to the British author’s public defence of women’s right to female-only spaces, such as prisons and crisis centres, restrooms and changerooms, and sporting events.

A Vancouver city councillor publicly condemned the billboard on social media, prompting the advertising company, Pattison Billboards, to quickly remove it. The sign was up for just 30 hours, but it had already been defaced with paint balls by the time it was taken down.

A self-proclaimed “social justice activist” complained to the British Columbia College of Nurses and Midwives (BCCNM) that Ms. Hamm was transphobic and, therefore, unfit to be a nurse. The complaint called for Ms. Hamm to be barred from her current and all future nursing positions. A second, anonymous complaint against Ms. Hamm accused her of “promoting and stoking hate speech towards trans and gender-diverse communities.”

Thus began Ms. Hamm’s more than four-year ordeal with the BCCNM. The matter was referred to the College’s Inquiry Committee for further investigation, which resulted in a 332-page report on Ms. Hamm’s tweets, articles, and other online activities. The report led to a citation (or charge) against Ms. Hamm that her allegedly “discriminatory and derogatory statements” constituted professional misconduct. There followed more than 20 days of disciplinary hearings starting in September 2022 and ending in March 2024.

(The BCCNM’s closing arguments can be read here. Amy Hamm’s closing arguments can be read here. The BCCNM’s reply can be read here.)

Here’s something from the ruling itself: a denial of the fact that there are two sexes.
The Panel understands that the statement that there are only two sexes – female and male – is an oversimplification that does not align with current medical or biological understanding. However, the Panel is also cognizant of the fact that most people, who do not have Dr. Bauer’s expertise, would consider there to be only two se xes. Stating there are only two sexes is not, in itself, discriminatory or derogatory to transgender people as it does not preclude the possibility of a transgender person transitioning to the opposite sex; rather, it is those statements which foreclose the possibility that a person assigned male at birth can transition to the female sex, or vice versa, that constitute discriminatory exclusion and erasure. The Panel therefore finds that the statement that there are only two sexes, without more, does not meet the threshold for discrimination.

I am not going to judge whether Ms. Hamm really did violate professional standards of conduct, but I do claim that the College of Midwives and Nurses doesn’t know much about biological sex, and that it’s wrong in saying that people can actually transition to their non-natal sex.

*A few days ago it looked as if the government would shut down because there weren’t enough votes in the Senate (and by that I mean Democratic votes) to allow a temporary budget bill to pass). Now it looks like it will, but that has exposed a generational divide among Democrats.  UPDATE: the bill passed narrowly yesterday: 54-46. The Dems who voted for the bill:

Democrats joining Mr. Schumer in voting to move it forward included several members of his leadership team — Senators Dick Durbin of Illinois, Brian Schatz of Hawaii and Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada — and two who have announced their plans to retire: Senators Gary Peters of Michigan and Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire. Democratic Senators John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, Kirsten Gillibrand of New York and Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire also voted yes, as did Senator Angus King, the Maine independent who caucuses with their party.

From the original story:

Senator Chuck Schumer’s sudden decision on Thursday to support a Republican-written bill to avert a government shutdown so enraged his fellow Democrats that some were already talking about primary challenges to the 74-year-old Democratic leader from New York.

The eruption of anger about Mr. Schumer’s seeming surrender thrust into public view a generational divide that has emerged as one of the Democratic Party’s deepest and most consequential rifts.

Younger Democrats are chafing at and increasingly complaining about what they see as the feebleness of the old guard’s efforts to push back against President Trump. They are second-guessing how the party’s leaders — like Mr. Schumer, who brandishes his flip phone as a point of pride — are communicating their message in the TikTok era, as Republicans dominate the digital town square.

And they are demanding that the party develop a bolder policy agenda that can answer the desperation of tens of millions of people who are struggling financially at a time when belief in the American dream is dimming.

In other words, the younger generation is done with deference.

Some who argue for more militancy in opposing Mr. Trump say the party’s elders tend to be less comfortable with the type of unbending political warfare that is called for.

“Our party needs more of a fighting spirit,” said Representative Chris Deluzio, a 40-year-old from outside Pittsburgh. “This is not a normal administration, and they’re willing to do dangerous things.”

You know, I am angry enough at the misigash that Trump has pulled that I can sort of see the point of ”resistance,” but I still think that the further Left the party moves, the less likely they are to win. After all Kamala Harris was more on the progressive side than centrist Democrats that might have beaten Trump, but Harris lost handily.  Seriously, do we want someone like AOC running for President (she won’t be doing that, but I am talking about someone sharing her views)? Would they stand a chance of winning? Would Bernie Sanders? I doubt it. Ask James Carville.

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn,  Hili and Andrzej are practicing entomology:

Hili: Something is walking on the ceiling.
Andrzej: I see, but I don’t know the name of this insect either.
In Polish:
Hili: Coś chodzi po suficie.
Ja: Widzę, ale też nie wiem jak się ten owad nazywa.

In honor of Play the Recorder Day, Stupsi reminds us from Berlin.

“Das ist ein schöner Stock. Er riecht gut. Hast du ihn auch so gern?” (Translation: “That is a nice stick. It smells good. Do you like it, too?”

Stupsi’s staff Natalie playing the recorder instead of the usual harpsichord (listen for the cat interpolations). All she can remember is that it’s a Bach minuet.

Lagniappe: Natalie’s best friend Susanna Borsch, who lives in the Netherlands.  As Natalie says, “We used to play a trio for almost a decade when we were young. She does a lot of playing; one of my favorites of her is her duo she has with her husband Adrian Brown, the finest recorder maker and the maker of the recorder I play in the little clip above. He also made the concertinas that he plays here.

Here are Susanna and Adrian playing “All in a Garden Green.”

*******************

From Cat Memes: a beautiful kitty with a broken heart.

From Strange, Stupid, or Silly Signs:

From The Language Nerds (I love those Irish women’s names like “Siobhan” and “Aoife”):

From Masih: somebody invite her to dinner! She really can dance and sing, and she has been through a lot.  The video is half an hour long and it is definitely worth watching. It includes Masihs favorite dish, gormeh sabzi, which brings her to tears. (I have had it, too, and it is great!)

From Luana: What the government demands from Columbia if the school is to get the $400 million withheld for anti-Semitism returned.

From Simon, two tweets. They are not eating the dogs, but the dogs are not eating!

Next lawsuit:Dogs vs DOGE

— George Conway (@gtconway.bsky.social) 2025-03-14T17:05:14.400Z

Part II. I am not a big fan of d*gs, but I would never starve them.

Better than eating them?

— George Conway (@gtconway.bsky.social) 2025-03-14T17:11:16.201Z

Two from my feed:

This is so sweet, even though the man is ashes.

From the Auschwitz Memorial, one that I reposted.

Gassed on arrival at Auschwitz. Crime: being Jewish. Age: 5

— Jerry Coyne (@evolutionistrue.bsky.social) 2025-03-15T09:35:56.917Z

Two posts from Dr. Cobb. First, a sweet fishy:

We have a porcupine pufferfish friend that truly loves the Cam and we truly love him/her right back 🥰🐡 #porcupinepuffer #pufferfish #cutiepie #smile #coral #coralhead #coralcitycamera #miami #portmiami #miamibeach #biscaynebay #coralcity #civicpridethroughbiodiversity

— Coral City Camera (@coralcitycamera.bsky.social) 2025-03-14T14:15:08.584Z

Stupendous: the lunar eclipse as seen from the Moon! Earth blocks out the Sun. (Blue Ghost is a private lunar lander.)

Oh this is beautiful and wondrous!A total lunar eclipse (seen from Earth) is a total solar eclipse seen from the moon.Here is the “diamond ring” of last night’s eclipse seen by Blue Ghost on the Moon! 🧪www.flickr.com/photos/firef…

— David Grinspoon (@drfunkyspoon.bsky.social) 2025-03-14T14:21:25.004Z

 

 

 

40 thoughts on “Saturday: Hili dialogue”

  1. Fight for the things that you care about, but do it in a way that will lead others to join you. -Ruth Bader Ginsburg, US Supreme Court justice (15 Mar 1933-2020)

  2. Bold added :

    “UMass Chan Medical School in Worcester announced a hiring freeze, spending freeze and rescinded admissions for one of its biomedical science doctorate programs this week, citing ongoing uncertainty regarding federal funding.
    […]

    several dozen applicants seeking their doctorate at the Morningside Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences were informed that their offers of admission were rescinded.

    […]

    Current doctoral candidates for the school are not impacted, nor are any applicants to UMass Chan’s two other graduate schools: the T.H. Chan School of Medicine and the Tan Chingfen Graduate School of Nursing, the statement reads.”

    http://www.masslive.com/worcester/2025/03/umass-chan-freezes-hiring-rescinds-phd-program-admissions-amid-funding-uncertainty.html

    Also see :

    http://www.boston.com/news/health/2025/03/14/umass-chan-medical-school-rescinds-dozens-of-offers-amid-funding-uncertainty/

  3. Thank you to Natalie, Adrian, and Sussana for brightening up a grey Saturday morning here in Southeastern Virginia where a marine layer of dense fog has rolled in off the Atlantic. And thank you to Jerry for bringing them to us. So much talent in the world!

    1. Thank you, and so glad that the tunes could provide a welcome distraction to you. Sending a wave to you over the Pond!

  4. The recorder piece is not a minuet, which has beats in groups of three. It is a bourrée, in particular the first of a pair of them from Bach’s 3rd suite for unaccompanied cello. Transposing pieces to play them on other instruments was quite common in the 18th century, as was adding extemporaneous ornaments such as the concluding meow.

    1. Thank you Gordon, of course you are right! I was a bit too quick this morning after finding out about the Play the recorder Day and sending in this tune that I just like very much, to Jerry. And then not even taking the time to think about the meter before writing “it must be a Minuet” by Bach… Entirely my fault and thank you for the corrections! Many greetings from Berlin where the sun has set already.

  5. In looking up Masih’s gormeh sabzi in wikipedia, it is said to be first Iranian dish served in outer space. NASA astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli brought it along to the ISS on her mission Expedition 70, Crew 7. As with many astronauts, her Wikipedia entry, reminds us of the incredible accomplishments and qualifications of our astronauts. In her case: Persian/American who emigrated with parents from Germany to U.S. at age 4, MIT engineering grad, Marine combat veteran (150 missions) and helicopter test pilot, military rank lt col, 2000 flight hours, 199 days in space including one EVA. Quite a read.

  6. “Science runs on grad student labor.”

    This is true, but is it really the best system? Universities focus far too much on research expenditures, and professors spend far too much of their time chasing after money. At both universities and national labs, highly trained technicians have been replaced in favor of temporary workers in the form of grad students and postdocs. We train far more Ph.D.s than the job market can support.

    Maybe we can use the current chaos to forge something better.

    See: How Academia Resembles a Drug Gang for context.

    https://josswinn.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/How-academia-resembles-a-drug-gang.pdf

    1. (I know this is not your quote):

      “Science runs on grad student labor”

      … for 3-5 years per graduate student, neglecting undergraduate students at maybe 2-4 years per student max, neglecting tenure-track or tenured professors that write grants, neglecting technicians (indefinitely hired), neglecting inter-lab collaboration,…

      IOW definitely necessary — but insufficient — for science.

    2. Sometimes it works, sometimes not so much. I had the good fortune of having an advisor who was well-funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF). Unlike many professors, he encouraged his students to seek out their own dissertation projects, which he funded generously. This allowed his students to learn how to become independent researchers. They weren’t “labor.”

      My wife had a different experience. She was part of a large, well-funded, research group in the social sciences, and her advisor employed his students to perform various aspects of his research program. In her case, she was labor and—being a cog in a larger machine—she never did get the experience necessary to become an independent researcher.

      So, it depends. Yes. There may be other ways to conduct research and train the next generation. But I don’t know what they might be.

      1. Yes, Norman. My advisor explained those two philosophies to us years ago and said that he falls on the side of your advisor but with guidance. He wanted his students to hit the ground running with a PhD and be qualified for a faculty position OR a post-doc and not have to go the post-doc route for additional”training”.

  7. Regarding Islam in Canada, the situation also seems dire in England. Someone posted on twitter yesterday, Why is it only illegal for Christians to pray outdoors in England?

    1. As far as I know, praying outside is legal for all religions – the only exception is in buffer zones outside abortion clinics, and I presume that the exception applies equally to all faiths.

  8. All the schools named above that have funding cuts also have very large endowments. I get that they didn’t plan their annual budgets to support this, but, going forward, they could, and they will undoubtedly line up donors.

    As far as Columbia goes, it’s a long established practice of attaching strings to Federal funds. Don’t like the policy, don’t take the money.

    1. Amen. The economics of higher education is nothing more than cost shifting. If one thinks corporate America is corrupt, try and make sense of a university balance sheet…of which there are probably a multitude with little coordination. Columbia proves that in order to motivate a university to d the right thing, go after the bottom line.

    2. I recently learned that endowments, even those running into the high $millions, are not available for uses other than what they were earmarked for. They are not a single chunk of money but are instead thousands of small accounts designated for very specific purposes. These include individual scholarships, faculty positions in certain departments, student awards, and so on. They are legally NOT available for anything else.

      1. Stanford owns about 4,800 acres of the most valuable undeveloped land in the US. The value of that land may well eclipse their endowment of $37B. Stanford has said the land can’t be sold because of the Founding Grant. But somehow other uni’s have ignored substantial portions of their grants and endowments. What should be done here? And let’s not forget the homeless problem in the bay area.

        1. Building homes on Stanford’s land for the homelexx would just mean more people in the Bay Area would be homeless, drawn to the region in hopes of securing free housing when the next tranche of micro-houses were built to accommodate exponentially increasing demand. The drug dealers would follow them.

          (I say “exponentially” correctly because phenomena that spread by contagion show exponential growth, at least initially.)

  9. Regarding Irish names: I know a woman named Eibhilin, pronounced “Eve-leen,” Irish for Evelyn. And there’s the actress Saoirse (“Seer-sha”) Ronan; in the movie “Brooklyn” she played a character named Eilis, pronounced “Ay-lis,” Irish for Elizabeth.

  10. I don’t understand the “natural immunity” argument. The argument is that if say, you get measles, then you are immune to measles after that, which is better than getting a measles vaccine. But measles has far more risk than the vaccine. That is the whole point of the vaccine — get immunity with lower risk. That is why measles deaths were down after vaccines were available.

    1. You are correct.
      Belief that natural immunity is better for the population than vaccine immunity, merely because natural immunity is probably life-long while vaccine immunity wanes (at least as estimated in vitro), is a classic example of survivorship bias. Anyone who promotes it is either breath-takingly ignorant or is lying.

      That is unfortunately a fact of life. Some arguments that you can’t understand really are because the person making them is a liar.

    2. “That is why measles deaths were down after vaccines were available.”

      It’s that last sentence that will lose the Kennedy crowd. They will tell you, correctly so, that over 95% of the decrease in annual measles deaths in the United States happened before the vaccine was developed. The vaccine helped push those numbers even lower, but it was a minor contributor to the decrease in the death rate. Even though measles is not as deadly in a healthy population with access to quality medical care as the fearmongers would have us believe, I’m with you in that one need not face the risk of complications when an effective vaccine is available. (I’ve had the damn thing three or four times because the military finds it easier to jab you again than to either check or trust your records.) Too many pro-vaccine advocates overstate the risk of many vaccine-preventable diseases; too many anti-vaccine types overstate the risk of the vaccines. Sounds like a microcosm of our politics.

      I think there might be a middle ground in exploring why vaccine recommendations, schedules, and mandates are not uniform across the highly-developed countries. When the CDC insists, for instance, that a healthy six-month old in the United States get a COVID vaccine, one can reasonably ask without being an antivaxxer why our peer countries don’t all do the same. The same could be asked about healthy young men at risk of vaccine-induced myocarditis but at extraordinarily low risk of COVID complications; recommendations across countries vary widely. One can also ask whether it has been demonstrated that there is an optimal schedule for childhood administration. If not, why not? There are other questions along these lines that one could pursue. Finally, I also think it deeply mistaken for people to be dismissive when other people question the rapid growth of vaccines on the childhood schedule in the US in the years after pharmaceutical companies were granted legal immunity. I understand the reasons why this immunity was granted, but it doesn’t make one a nutcase to wonder whether billions of dollars in profits might have caused some to exploit the system.

      There will always be your hard cases who will resist anything; forget about them. But there are many reasonable people who have reasonable questions; they can be persuaded with proper science and education.

      1. ” They will tell you, correctly so, that over 95% of the decrease in annual measles deaths in the United States happened before the vaccine was developed. ”

        While true, this is misleading.

        The decrease in deaths from measles was due to the great improvement in medical care that occurred in the 20th century prior to the measles vaccine in 1968. Before that time, almost all children got measles before the age of 15, giving the population a general resistance. Of course that came at the cost, every year, of dead children. Fortunately, the 20th century saw a very big improvement in the quality of medical care, so as the years went by, fewer of those sick children died . The vaccine brought that death rate to zero, or nearly so.

        So, like I said, that statement, while true, is misleading.

      2. Measles deaths were down by 1950 compared to 1850. True because of general improvement in health and importantly, the discovery of antibiotics which are used to treat secondary bacterial infections.

        But measles is still nasty and occasionally even fatal (as we have seen) so vaccines are still advisable.

        Kennedy is just trying to muddy the waters.

      3. Deaths from all infectious diseases have fallen as nutrition and living standards have improved over recent centuries. In the specific case of measles, antibiotics to treat bacterial infections that often complicate it likely played a role in reducing case fatality. An often overlooked (because the death certificate might not say “measles”) complication of measles infection is miliary tuberculosis and tuberculous meningitis in the young child recently infected with TB from a contagious adult in the home. These are the forms of TB that are often still fatal even with antibiotic treatment. Acute measles infection depresses the cell-mediated immunity essential for containing tuberculous infection, analogous to what malnutrition does. In populations with a lot of TB transmission to infants and toddlers, aggressive forms of TB are an important contributor to deaths from measles. In the days before anti-TB antibiotics, this was the rationale for confining contagious adults in sanitaria, and later for vaccination of infants against TB, the latter still recommended for high-risk populations.

        Modern societies will see few deaths from measles epidemics, true. But the only way to have zero deaths from measles is to have no measles. And this is achievable.

        2. Ya’ll are preaching to the choir, Leslie. (Mostly. I would disagree if the “zero deaths” mentality were more broadly pursued, especially if it involved the perennial debate between freedom and security.) The broader point that I was making, though I did not explicitly draw it out, is that we need to acknowledge when people with whom we generally disagree take correct actions or speak true words—even if those people are Donald Trump or Robert Kennedy. As is, too many have let their politics and emotions infect their thinking. They either deny that “the other side” ever has a valid point or they quietly refuse to acknowledge it. They are, perhaps, even more resistant to admitting the mistakes of their own side or acknowledging gaps in our knowledge. As damaging as this mentality can be in domestic politics, it can prove catastrophic in the diplomatic and military realms—sometimes our adversaries have a valid point, other times we are blind to our own weaknesses.

          We will never rebuild trust in our governing, educational, and scientific institutions until sufficient number of the people in those institutions cease being part of the problem. The educated elite across the West have—as a class—made a hash of many of our institutions in recent years; as their incompetence and self-absorption grows, their arrogance only increases. Until they acknowledge their shortcomings, the plea to “trust the experts” will continue to fall on a growing number of deaf ears, and we will continue to see populist backlash. One of the joys of this site is that our host abjures the mind-numbing conformity and cowardice of so many in our governing and intellectual classes. It’s a small step, but dissent is valuable among a free people even when it is maddening and wrong.

  11. Open question from topics over the last few days, playing on my mind:

    If Khalil and what he supports, whom he endorses and gives aid and comfort to is NOT a threat to the United States……
    ….
    …what, exactly, does a threat to the United States look like to you?

    Metaphysically can such a person exist in your world?

    Put another way: Is there a better example you can provide of an enemy to our democracy, domestic tranquility and civic safety than this man?

    Can anybody help me on this one for I am at a loss. Go ahead… make my Caturday.

    D.A.
    NYC

    1. “Put another way: Is there a better example you can provide of an enemy to our democracy, domestic tranquility and civic safety than this man?”

      Perhaps Trump and Musk and many in his cabinet?…or maybe some of the 1500 he pardoned, Proud Boys types and other domestic terrorists? There are lots of domestic examples. Hope that makes your Caturday. Yes, being sarcastic, but just sort of…

  12. As for Columbia: it’s about time the students who participated in the building takeover felt some consequences.

    I’m not a fan of Trump (I’m not even American). But the Dems should ask themselves why they lost to Trump.

    Maybe some people were just fed up with some of the Biden-era excesses and refused to vote for Harris.

    Unfortunately I’m not seeing many left wingers admitting this. The standard narrative remains: racist, sexist citizens refused to vote for a black woman.

    1. The narrative must be true. Our (as of yesterday officially ex-)Prime Minister said so himself right after the U.S. election. To be fair to the now lowly backbencher MP from Papineau, he didn’t play the race card. He just rebuked Americans for twice now sexistly missing their chance to elect a woman as President. Maybe if Hilary Clinton had been black he would have called them twice racist, too. But feminism is his thing, the virtue he was most self-indulgently proud of for 10 long years.

  13. Seeing the pronunciation guide for Irish names:

    Using English with its very lose pronunciation rules to explain other languages is an attempt to do fine job with crude tools similar to watchmaking in mittens or dentistry with a hammer and chisel.

    (“TIEG like you’re saying tie or Thai.” Come on. Just use IPA, or some lite version of it.)

    1. I agree it’s often tough to render pronunciation into text. IPA has become problematic in my country because of its widespread use for words in indigenous languages that never had their own written form. Few people (including me) can read the unfamiliar IPA characters and diacritical marks. When they first started to appear on road signs the IPA text was often mistaken for a long-lost writing system for the local indigenous languages.

  14. Re the earthly eclipse of the sun supposedly seen from the moon:
    Are the apparent, angular sizes of of the earth and the sun so close (by the same cosmic coincidence) as seen from the full-moon side of the moon’s orbit that they produce the same visual effect as a solar eclipse by the moon seen from the earth? Also, the earth’s atmosphere refracts a substantial amount of sunlight into its umbra, causing the full moon’s disc to appear coppery orange during totality, as it did early Thursday a.m., not invisible black. While of course I’ve never seen a solar eclipse by the earth, the eclipsing object in the Bluehair image looks to be free of refracting atmosphere. You can even see the chromosphere and solar prominences sharply, just as you could at last year’s eclipse. Finally, totality in a lunar eclipse lasts about half an hour and the radius of curvature of the earth’s umbra cast on the moon during partiality appears to be of larger radius of curvature than that of the moon’s disc. (Yes I realize the umbra is being cast of a sphere, not a flat disc.). This leads me to deduce that the apparent size of the earth seen from the moon is far too large to mimic an eclipse seen from earth. It is, after all, four times the diameter of the moon and the sun cannot appear larger from the far side of the moon’s orbit than it does on earth.

    I think someone is pulling our leg. What we are seeing here is a photo of last spring’s eclipse taken from earth just before or after totality. Now someone please fact-check me.

  15. 32 years in Manhattan and I’m yet to try an egg cream. They seem so 50s. I own no bobby socks or finned Cadillac. I get by….

    With the “reversion” to Islam Toronto government officials: I think a lot of Canada is a lost cause at this stage. 🙁

    (No offense, Leslie, hold the snowy line up there mate!)

    Loved the Israeli flag (and self) burning protesters. Couldn’t have happened to anybody more deserving. Next time call me and I’ll provide the lighter fluid to roast those terrorists to a crispy center! Enjoy the show with an egg cream. 😉

    Have a good Sunday,

    D.A.
    NYC

  16. “The star, Rachel Zegler, has called the original Snow White plot “dated” and “weird,” which honestly, I’m sure it is.”

    I wish Ms. Zegler a productive and happy – and especially a long – life, so that she may experience the rare privilege of a Zegler-esque type labeling her “dated” and “weird.” Just be patient; it will happen.

  17. Regarding the ‘hand grenade’ complaints sign. That gag also appears in the gun shop scene in the movie ‘Falling Down’.

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