Bernardo de La Paz
Bernardo de La Paz's JournalAnd Reaperublicons are claiming body counts are being inflated. Are they the Body Bag movement?
Thanks. Good point about sails. Let me expand along with you about not fighting
Yes, you have to change tack when thoughts overwhelm. But the mind and ego will only let you do that if you have sufficiently processed the material. If you've done that, then you can accept that thoughts and anxieties will come up. Acceptance is key.
Fighting the thoughts or trying to deny the thoughts or trying to crowd them out doesn't work. That generates churn and wears down a worry path in the brain.
When thoughts come up, don't fight them. Check to see if all the points have been duly considered. If they have not, then consider the thing and decide if you can do something about. If you can, do. If not, accept.
Once you've considered and done what you can and accepted what you can't change, then you can much more easily change tack and take an exit to something distracting, be it entertainment or work or home maintenance or hobby or creativity.
Re pessimist and optimist, here's another one for you that is somewhat orthogonal:
A pessimist says the glass is half empty, an optimist says the glass is half full, an engineer gets another more appropriately sized glass.
I like your one about wind and sails and will do my best to remember it.
Some lines of my post were lifted from my Journal entry https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1014&pid=2465562
Cheers to you and our Original Poster.
Yes. It is the logistic curve (sigmoidal) which is like two exponentials glued together
Basically it is exponentially increasing until 50% and then exponentially decreasing, which means a long taper as the human population gets saturated with infection. It describes in a way the population growth of antibodies in the human bio-culture. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logistic_function#In_ecology:_modeling_population_growth
Logistic curve (Wikipedia):
The rate of change of the curve is the famous Curve We Are Flattening, because that is the rate at which we adding new cases. Technically it is called the logistic distribution (though it is not a probability distribution). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logistic_distribution As you lock down, you slow the rate of infection, which flattens the curve and spreads it out so that hospitals and health care workers are not overwhelmed.
Logistic distribution (Wikipedia):
Can't show it here, but look at the Daily New Cases bar graph for South Korea: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/south-korea/
Perhaps that is the real reason for those recent calls & flights & killing oversight
Putin donates some equipment and a plane flies it to the US for propaganda points.
Later, watch Jar Jar and Navarro send some (large quantities?) of their great hoard to third parties in Europe who sell it to Russia at a discount.
Third parties will give the tRump family Gang a huge kickback through other third parties, perhaps financing real estate, propping up tRump.
tRump closed door to China (not really) & said bend over by this window
There was some large number of people (40,000?) who came through from China after tRump "blocked" flights. Some were legitimate airlifts repatriating citizens. Others not so much. Few of those returnees were asked question about their health and even fewer had their temperature taken. Many were crowded into arrival corridors.
Why did tRump close China and not Europe? Because he is a racist.
He could not conceive of a pandemic spread by white people.
Must pre-empt by explaining that the lower deaths are because D GOVERNORS shut down states
... to flatten the curve.
tRump blocked flights from China but 40,000 people (check number) came in direct from China & even Wuhan after the block, sometimes without even border control asking if they had symptoms, let alone checking temperature.
He essentially did nothing for a month until the sudden U-turn. Oh, wait, he golfed and held rallies a lot.
That the curve is flattened and that it is working to reduce hospital overload is credit to DEMOCRATIC Governors. This must be stated frequently and clearly and often and repeatedly whenever possible.
Governors had to fight Jar Jar and tRump and still are fighting them to get basic needed supplies while Navarro and Jar Jar are outbidding them.
The Republicons have already begun the gaslighting: https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=13268237
Their selling points (lies, but big lies roll far and must be countered):
* Trump acted fast and decisively in closing the borders (leaky closure to a single country)
* Deaths are over-counted, with financial incentives to report ordinary deaths as covid
* Trump has be thwarted in trying to deploy life-saving medication
* Democratic Governors are whiners and don't need all they ask for
* Out in the heartland (read red states) hospitals are empty (cleared out to prepare)
* My county only has 10 cases and no deaths (so far, just wait)
* Suicides and depression will kill more people than any virus (nonsense)
* Trump put America First by ramping up manufacturing in the US fast
* Trump got tests going after the WHO sent defective tests (some defective, not much tRump tests)
and more
Good counter-propaganda is: Fast, True, Clear, and targeted at the audience that got the propaganda.
But, as the OP suggests, Democrats and Biden need to be pro-active, highlight success stories like California is so far and be forward-looking and positive with important useful programs and agendas.
Yes. Better comparisons are log-scale charts from 100 or 30-cases-day. Compare Canada
Canada got its first case 3 days after US. Countries are similar but different in some important ways.
Remember to breathe & that all things pass. Do what you can, don't worry about the rest.
Get rid of hate and replace it with cold loathing, which is just as determined but is a calm emotion. Hate amplifies stress and attacks rationality.
Sometimes distractions help, like entertainment or games or cooking, etc. But they can't be a crutch for too long. If other stress reduction techniques are being used, then those activities and work and housework will be more effectively done and more effective at reducing stress.
Integrate stress reduction into everything you do for maximum synergistic effect.
There is some utility to worrying as an incentive to tuning in and thinking. Of course, it is important to stay in touch and read and watch and listen to news. It is something you can do. It is hard not to worry while listening to the news.
It is possible to listen to the news calmly and taking it all in. Do some research until you understand it well to some level, however shallow or deep, as suits you. Then sort out what you can do and do it. Let the rest go. Really. It works.
For example: Do you have a relative suffering that you can't reach or help directly? (from disease or economic stress or worry) Call them, help as you are able with money or even just with empathetic words and information. Help them understand. Don't worry that you can't be there, because you can't. Accept the fact and feel peace that you have done something, done what you can.
Don't fret about what you can't do or control.
It takes practice but you get good at it by doing.
Do it by changing what you can, accepting what you can't change, and thinking about the difference (thinking some, but not too much).
He's withholding medical supplies from Canada at border at tRump's orders. Canadian docs still
Canadian doctors and nurses still cross the border at Windsor, Ontario to work in Detroit, Michigan.
Even medical trade is a two way street.
Especially for neighbours.
Most especially for allies.
Or is tRump inviting Russia into Alaska and Canada? (asked half seriously)
Two Canadian citizens are being held in Chinese PRISONS in retaliation for the Huawei executive that Canada has no beef with.
They just recently had their food upgraded out of fear their immune systems might be lagging.
It is that bad.
The Huawei CFO is living in her mansion in Vancouver, British Columbia, that she owns while she awaits on the US to extradite her. The US has been dragging it out as slowly as they can.
While two Canadians rot in jail in China. Because tRump.
Which is a shitty way to treat an ally who is holding up their end of the bargain.
And now, blocking shipment of medical masks. That are needed in Ontario.
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