The Fight We Cannot Afford To Lose

[Celerity]

The vaccine may be available for younger kids as early as the end of this month. The Koch brothers and the GOP are gearing up to stop them from getting it.

https://thebanter.substack.com/p/the-fight-we-cannot-afford-to-lose



There is a light at the end of the Covid tunnel. Possibly. Vaccines may be available for younger kids as early as the end of this month which would mean tens of millions more vaccinated against this miserable virus. If you do not have kids, you cannot possibly grasp the amount of relief this would provide to parents who love their children. But in MAGAland, where children are disposable pawns, the rage it will inspire will be beyond comprehension. A vaccine for almost every school-age child will kick off a bitter fight between those of us that put the welfare of children (and society) first and a death cult willing to sacrifice human life in the pursuit of political power. It’s a fight we cannot lose.

Russian Roulette No More

When first contemplating sending Jordan and Anastasia back to school without vaccines, Debbie and I simply said, “Nope.” Jordan, 13, has asthma (bad enough to land him in the hospital when he was younger) and Covid was a risk we were not willing to take. As soon as the Pfizer vaccine was made available for kids 12 and up, we had Jordan inoculated and off to summer school he went. We knew that even if he did contract Covid, which would be extremely unlikely, the chances of it developing into something serious were vanishingly small. That left us with Anastasia, 11, who would not be eligible for the shot until February of 2022. Sending her to school would be like playing Russian Roulette. The odds are definitely in your favour but for how long? We made the decision to go ahead and have her get the shot early because, we reasoned (and her paediatrician later confirmed but did not condone), that 10 ½ is no different from 11 when it comes to a vaccine. But millions of other parents were uncomfortable making that choice or their kids were far younger. That left them to either spin the cylinder and pull the trigger every single day or keep their kids home, if they even had the option to do the latter. It hasn’t been easy. As the Washington Post reports:



The peace of mind that comes with a shot cannot possibly be overstated. It was a big F’ing deal when Debbie, with her heart condition, was able to get it. I was pretty happy about that. But I wanted to weep in relief when the kids finally got their second shot. Kyle, 8, my donor son in NY, still does not have his but I’ll take what I can get. Now, millions of parents will be able to send their younger children to school knowing they will be safe. Pre-K is a different story and Kindergarten might be a little dodgy for a while. It varies from state to state, but some Kindergarteners will still be 4 years old as late as December and therefore unable to be vaccinated. From grades 1 and on, however, school will be as safe as the number of vaccinated children. Russian Roulette no more. This is great news for the country which means Republicans are going to be absolutely furious about it. If you doubt this, you really have not been paying attention to how awful these people are:

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The ugliness is going to escalate. Fast.

Astroturf Rage. Again

After the election of Obama, there was a massive “grassroots” movement called the Tea Party. You may have heard of it. The press pretended the Tea Party was 100% organic and not at all made up of Republican paid operatives. Later, when someone bothered to look into who was funding and running the entire thing, it turned out to be completely fake and designed explicitly by the Koch network to push a Republican agenda. Of course, by then it was far too late and the damage was done. Having learned that fabricating a “grassroots” movement of angry people to do the GOP’s dirty work is a successful tactic, the Koch network is at it again. They haven’t come up with a catchy name and their paid operatives and useful idiots are not wearing ridiculous outfits, but it’s almost precisely the same thing. The Washington Post got its hands on a script being widely distributed by the Koch network, thus confirming what we already suspected:



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[Midnight Writer]

1. Professional looking yard signs going up in my neighborhood. "Stop Biden's Vaccine Mandates!"

Just noticed them this morning.

Looks like astroturf to me.