Wednesday, October 14, 2020

COVID-19 Spread After 9/22 Trump Rally in Moon Township, PA, Part 3

  How many of his own voters does a maskless, crowded, shoutfest called a Trump rally sicken or even kill?

Three weeks ago, Trump had large rally in Moon Township, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania. A few thousand attended from western Pennsylvania, eastern Ohio & the panhandle of West Virginia.
So far, there's no evidence that #COVID has increased much in these areas:

                                    October 13 map

                                    October 1 map

                                    September 24 map

While there are some increases in Western Pennsylvania, the main hotbed for spread in Pennsylvania over the last month has been the Centre county area, home to Penn State.  Centre county is the reddish county in the upper right hand corner of the map (it really doesn't show up much on the 10/1 map).

So I'm glad to have been wrong about Trump's 9/22 rally in Moon Township.  It might have contributed slightly to COVID-19 spread, but there's no evidence it was yet another super-spreader event.

                                    October 13 map

                                                October 1 map

                                              September 23, 2020

Sadly, Pennsylvania "turned orange" in its COVID-19 outbreak over the last few weeks, probably mostly due to the Penn State Surge.  It has been yellow most of the year, and Allegheny county is still yellow.

                                    October 13 map

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Thursday, October 01, 2020

COVID-19 Spread After 9/22 Trump Rally in Moon Township, PA, Part 2

 How many of his own voters does a maskless, crowded, shoutfest called a Trump rally sicken or even kill?

A week ago, Trump had large rally in Moon Township, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania. A few thousand attended from western Pennsylvania, eastern Ohio & the panhandle of West Virginia.

So far, there's no evidence that #COVID has increased much in these areas:


COVID-19 spreads gradually. It can take a couple of days to a couple of weeks for the number of cases to increase by much. Here's are detailed Allegheny County maps for 9/23 and 9/30:





So far, there's no evidence that COVID-19 has increased much in the Allegheny County as a result of Trump's recent maskless rally. Which is good so far. Will double-check again next week.







Wednesday, September 23, 2020

COVID-19 Spread After 9/22 Trump Rally in Moon Township, PA, Part 1

How many of his own voters does a maskless, crowded, shoutfest called a Trump rally sicken or even kill?

Trump had large rally in Moon Township, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania on 9/22. I don't have numbers; no news outlet made any estimates. Saw some photos and I'd guess maybe around 5,000 (unless the crowd was photoshopped as the famous Inauguration photos were).

Allegheny County has had fairly low spread since March.  We've usually been a "yellow" county; we were briefly "orange" after the bars were opened up more in July, but the spread has decreased some since then  when bar hours were restricted again.

Moon Township is in the Western central part of Allegheny County and is home to the Pittsburgh International Airport.  It tends to vote red, but just barely.  I worked in a Moon county district for 3 elections including 2016.  While the red candidates usually won, they never won by much.  Amazingly in 2016, both Hillary Clinton and Katie McGinty won by a few votes in that district, but lost at the state level (though not by much).  Location of Moon Township:

Here's current COVID19 info from Allegheny county & COVIDACTNOW stats. Will update at least weekly. Had low spread so far. Moon Township has had 92 Coronavirus cases/10,000 & 9 deaths. North Fayette Township has had 69 cases/10,000 & 3 deaths.




Probably worth noting - Beaver county is just north of the airport, Washington county is about 10 miles south of the airport.  The West Virginia panhandle is about 15 miles west, and Ohio is about 20 miles west.




At least once a week over the next few weeks, I'll update COVID county case information to see how many people Trump has made sick as a result of his 9/22 rally in Moon Township.

But I wondered - is there a pattern for counties to have a higher-than-average COVID-19 spread?

Here's a Johns Hopkins University map from 9/24, showing the COVID-19 spread in counties in southwestern Pennsylvania, eastern Ohio, the panhandle of West Virginia and a bit of northwestern Maryland. The one dark-colored county indicating higher COVID-19 spread is Columbiana County in Ohio south of Youngstown. Interestingly, Pence spoke in Columbiana County 3 weeks ago (September 4).


The dark-ish county northwest of Allegheny County, adjacent to Columbiana County, is Beaver County. Beaver is very close to Moon Township (where Trump spoke on 9/22). Trump has spoken there a few times, but not since last June. However...when VP Pence went to Ohio on 9/4, he also stopped in Beaver County the same day. Not that you see masks at Pence rallies either.

So it will be interesting to see whether the COVID-19 rates start to go up in Allegheny County, in Washington County (which is also quite close to Moon Township), in the WV panhandle (Weirton area), and in an eastern Ohio like Jefferson County in the weeks following the maskless, loud Trump rally in Moon Township on 9/22.

Monday, August 31, 2020

You've Got to Be Carefully Taught...

I wrote this in response to a provocative photo of black children being taught to hate police on another person's Facebook page. While I wrote this as a fact-check, it can come off as politicking in someone else's living room, which I should not have done.

But I do stand by what I wrote, so I'll post it here:

__________________________________________________________________________

I agree that hate is taught, but it works in all directions. Remember watching TV news in the '60s? The white southerners setting dogs and water cannons on black protesters? Remember the 3 voting activists murdered for helping black people register to vote? Remember the 4 girls murdered in a church bombing? How about Louise Day Hicks in Boston, raving on and on about bussing? How about the white guy who attacked a black man with a flag in Boston in 1976? When people are treated irrationally, they tend to respond irrationally and sometimes violently. I do not support the violence, but I sure understand it.

__________________________________________________________________________

And, as a reminder to anyone who may teach their kids to hate cops, a black cop in Saint Louis was murdered while on the job this weekend. I do understand training black kids to be overly cautious around the police; it's sad "the talk" is still necessary but it may be more necessary than ever these days.

Sunday, August 30, 2020

What Republicans Seem to Believe...

Copied from Rebecca Phipps on Facebook 

Just a note for my right leaning family and friends from my left leaning self and on behalf of my left leaning family and friends as we near voting day: 

You're being told that we want to disband police departments (and that we hate the police). We don’t, that’s a lie. We want to weed out racism and unnecessary police brutality and for those who abuse their power to be held accountable.

You're being told that we want to release all prisoners. We don’t, that’s a lie. We want to weed out racism and ensure the punishments match the crimes and to deprivatize prisons. 

You're being told that we want open borders. We don’t, that’s a lie. We want asylum seekers to be given their chance to seek asylum. We want to help people who are coming from unimaginable terror and poverty and give them the chances we have. We want to ensure children aren’t separated from their parents and that nobody is kept in cages. But we do want proper vetting.

You're being told that we want to take away your guns. We don’t, that’s a lie. We want logical gun control to help prevent mass shootings.

You're being told that we want to wage a war on Christianity and Christian values. We don’t, that’s a lie. We want people of all religions to be able to practice and worship freely.

You're being told that we want to get everything for free. We don’t, that’s a lie. We want to work hard and make sure that healthcare and education are affordable for all.

You're being told that we want a war against traditional marriage. We don’t, that’s a lie. We want people of all sexual orientations to be able to love freely, no matter who you love.

You're being told that we want to destroy or rewrite history. We don’t, that’s a lie. We want to recognize the ugly parts of our past and do everything we can to say “that’s not okay, let’s not honor those aggressors, let’s not let those things happen again.”

You're being told that we want to take away your constitutional rights. We don’t, that’s a lie. We choose to believe science and we wear masks to prevent the spread of this disease.

You're being told that we hate America. We don’t, that’s a lie. We recognize our faults and want us to do better, be better. Wanting better for your country and everyone in it is the strongest form of patriotism. 

Stop with the us vs. them. 

Stop with the straw man arguments. 

Stop with the fake news. 

My position is one of empathy, compassion and logic. Stop believing the hype. Stop with the division. Just because we want equality for all doesn’t mean we want to take anything away from you or your family. 

❤️🧡💛 ***Please copy and paste*** 

 [[Not written by me, but I agree with all of it.]]

Saturday, August 29, 2020

Uncommon SF & Mysteries Book Sale: Of Mice and Men

Uncommon SF & Mysteries Book Sale: Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

First Edition, Covici Friede Publishers, Good Condition







Sometimes, the books are neither SF nor fantasy but are uncommon.  This is a first edition of Of Mice and Men, published in 1937 by Covici Friede Publishers.  

Good condition - $30 + $8 shipping.

Interested in buying?  Email  Laurie Mann

Saturday, August 22, 2020

Save the US Post Office

Today is a day of action to support the United States Post Office.  Here are some of the things you can do to support this:  https://www.savethepostoffice.net/survey/save-the-post-office-remote-options/?

Someone on Twitter kindly posted the email addresses of the USPS Board of Governors.  I CC'd Louis DeJoy himself.   If you are staying in and can't protest at a post office, at least take a few minutes and write a letter to the Board of Governors:


To:
mduncan@inezdepositbank.com
,
barger.jm@gmail.com,
ron.bloom@brookfield.com,
roman@rmiv.com,
lee.moak@moakgroup.com,
DirectorAccessMailbox@cigna.com
cc:louis.dejoy@usps.gov

I am writing to you as you are supposed to have oversight over malfesance in the Post Office.  And yet, you are permitting damage to the Post Office by the federal government itself.  You don't care that people are dying as they aren't getting their medications in time.  You don't care that animals being shipped are dying en route due to delays.  You don't care about the damage you are doing to our democracy by your inaction.   I am disgusted but not surprised.  

Laurie Mann
McDonald, PA