Science (it’s actually in the URL: https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/science/community-levels.html) says that Middlesex County, Maskachusetts, where the main Harvard campus is located, currently has a “High” level of COVID-19.
How do the geniuses graduating from Harvard respond to this information? By gathering en masse with no masks (source):
Photos on the page show hundreds of Harvard affiliates and just a handful with masks (including in a tent that is mostly enclosed (i.e., indoors but without the benefit of a standard indoor ventilation system)).
Merrick Garland showed up and gave a talk about the January 6 insurrection:
Now that land war is upon us. Russia’s unprovoked and unjust invasion of Ukraine this February has been accompanied by heart-breaking atrocities: murders of civilians, the shelling of hospitals, the bombing of a theater in Mariupol where hundreds had sought shelter, the demolished residential apartment buildings of Bucha and other cities.
At home, we are also facing threats to democracy – different in kind, but threats, nonetheless.
We see them in efforts to undermine the right to vote.
We see them in the violence and threats of violence that are directed at people because of who they are or how they serve the public.
We saw them when a violent mob stormed the United States Capitol in an attempt to prevent the peaceful transfer of power.
Members of Congress had to be evacuated.
And proceedings were disrupted for hours — interfering with a fundamental element of American democracy: the peaceful transfer of power from one administration to the next.
Like the threat to voting rights, this kind of direct attack on an American institution is something I never worried about as I was graduating from college. There had been such attacks on foreign capitals in foreign lands. But a storming of the U.S. Capitol itself had not taken place since the War of 1812.
Finally, the preservation of democracy requires our willingness to tell the truth. Together, we must ensure that the magnitude of an event like January 6th is not downplayed or understated. The commitment to the peaceful transfer of power must be respected by every American. Our democracy depends upon it. (Applause.)
You are the next generation that must devote yourselves to preserving our democracy and helping others protect theirs.
And although what I am asking of you is daunting, I know that you are the next generation that will fulfill the promise this country represents.
In other words, the 20-year-olds who meekly cowered at home for two years to avoid becoming infected with a virus that kills 80-year-olds will bravely defend the nation against enemies foreign and domestic.
(Separately, my mom was walking around Harvard Yard a few decades ago as the workers were setting up chairs for commencement. Potential rain was in the forecast. Mom overhead one of the workers say to another “I hope it rains like hell on those Harvard sons of bitches.”)
Apropos of the rain at Harvard: Annie Lennox was interviewed by the Harvard Business Review in 2010. In the interview she said a lot of things that would undoubtedly still resonate with Harvard graduates today – about sexism, being yourself, not caring about what others think (because it’s their problem, not yours) and so forth. For example:
Q: How did your upbringing as the child of working-class, socialist parents affect who you are today?
“My father was a shipyard worker, and my grandfather was one before him. And in the family there was a very strong moral code about the work, and doing the right thing, and social justice. And that did percolate through and influence my thinking.”
But I loved this line:
“But I’m a little old-fashioned, so I do find it strange when people download something we’ve worked hard on and expect it for nothing.”
It looks like Google finally found a way to address that little discomfort!
Here Comes the Rain Again
Sorry, I omitted the link to the Harvard Business Review interview from October 2010:
https://hbr.org/2010/10/lifes-work-annie-lennox
I’m pretty sure Annie Lennox was able to lift herself (?) out of the hardscrabble, Socialist working-class background she came from and become fabulously wealthy thanks to capitalism, especially as the Harvard Business Review constructs it.
> We see them in efforts to undermine the right to vote.
If Harvard cannot figure this out, let me pontificate smugly from Europe (Germany): We think our politicians are corrupt, we think they work against the people, but we do trust voting.
Of course everyone has to show an ID. Voting machines have been declared unconstitutional, there are simple paper ballots, NOT machine readable (like in the Bush/Gore debacle). You make a cross with a ballpoint pen.
At all times there are representatives of all parties and observers in the election locations. All of these count the ballots for as long as it takes. Results are aggregated and published, so observers can check the results that have been reported.
Instead of complaining about stolen elections, Republicans need to go to the Supreme Court to outlaw voting machines, machine readable ballots, and demand voter ID. This needs to be fixed right now (and Trump needs to shut up about the election).
I agree with that. And this absolutely insane Vote By Mail For Everyone idiocy has to stop.
But I don’t think this country can stop. It’s being run by people who *WANT* to see it break apart.
“Russia’s unprovoked and unjust invasion of Ukraine this February ”
Unjust ? Maybe depending on one’s perspective. Unprovoked? Really? NATO expansion over decades and then in 2008 promising Ukraine and Georgia to one day join (https://www.reuters.com/article/idINIndia-32818020080403). Inciting Maidan – Nuland planning the transfer of power. Yes, totally unprovoked.
“Finally, the preservation of democracy requires our willingness to tell the truth.”
you mean dictate the truth… or in some cases ignore the truth… (e.g. Hunter Biden)
We know Trump lies , but these bastards pass themselves of like saints.
Do not forget provocation of sending Russian many dozens of billions of $$ including cheap food for needy population in aid when oil was $20/barrel and current rulers were fighting to steal the most from per-revolutionary owners and soviet slave labor – producer assets. America and West (NATO and EU) fed Russia for years while Russia did not even bothered to have any significant military instead of harming Russia. I am pretty sure this mistake will not repeated.
“In 2012 there was at a meeting of Donetsk chamber of commerce. The British ambassador to Ukraine gave a speech in which he admonished Ukraine saying in effect: You are quarelling with Russia for gas pipeline transit fees of a few bilion dollars per year. If instead you worked on your economy and dealt with massive corruption, you could be at least at the level of Poland. In 1991 you were at the same level. Now Poles have made real progress and if you took the current (2012) per capita GDP of Poland and applied that to Ukraine, you could have 350 bilion dollars extra.
Well, nothing happened of course and Ukraine, this beacon of democracy, is in deeper hole than in 2012.”
Good luck turning that failed corrupt state into a EU NATO member.
Deutschman, your statement that nothing happened in Ukraine is false. Also you imply that there is 0 economic value in joining EU, saying that Ukraine should be at the same economic level as EU member Poland. By the way, Poland knows what’s going on with Russia war on Ukraine and is the strongest supporter of Ukraine in this conflict despite having strong unresolved issues that go back to WWII.
Since 2012, Ukraine became significant IT outsourcing center, it discovered very large natural gas deposits that can be developed only using fracking and it significantly increased percentage of its GDP that goes for defense since last election. No doubt that Ukraine will become a stronger economy when accepted to EU and a valuable NATO member as well, while retaining its independence and preferred way of life.
“Do not forget provocation of sending Russian many dozens of billions of $$ including cheap food for needy population in aid”
If you think any of that reached needy population you’re way dumber than I thought.
@averros, my intellect notwithstanding nozhki busha https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bush_legs had definitely reached tired and huddled masses. Assuming they did not they still reached thieves in chief who really matter, since tired and huddled masses follow them like sheep, so what is the difference?
And given that thieves from Piter moved onto becoming thieves in chief how and tired and huddled sheep is as tired and huddled as ever how freedomized south-eastern and eastern Ukrainian tired and huddled masses could feel affinity to the new thieves?
Watched Top Gun in a theater where no-one was wearing masks, in the righteous holy land of Calif*. Time for a blog post about re-enacting Top Gun in an SR-20.
Tom Cruise isn’t just good at flying in combat jets. He also flies in the L. Ron Hubbard private aircraft, which is why I won’t pay to see the movie.
will bravely defend the nation against enemies foreign and domestic.
“Forward, the Harvard Graduate cried,
and the front rank died.”