US deaths hit lowest level in 10 months

COVID-19 deaths in the U.S. have tumbled to an average of around 600 per day — the lowest level in 10 months — with the number of lives lost dropping to single digits in well over half the states and hitting zero on some days.

Confirmed infections, meanwhile, have fallen to about 38,000 day on average, their lowest mark since mid-September. While that is still cause for concern, they have plummeted 85% from a peak of more than a quarter-million cases per day in early January.

The last time deaths were this low was early July, nearly a year ago. COVID-19 deaths in the U.S. topped out in mid-January at an average of more than 3,400 a day, just a month into the biggest vaccination drive in the nation’s history.

Kansas reported no new deaths from Friday through Monday. In Massachusetts, the Boston Herald put a huge zero on Wednesday’s front page under the headline “First time in nearly a year state has no new coronavirus deaths.”

And from the Public Health and the Karens did a mighty “REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!” rise.

 

Gal Godot Still Incapable of Acknowledging the Existence of Palestinians

Mounting violence between Israelis and Palestinians has left hundreds—mostly Palestinian—injured and 56 killed, including 14 children in Gaza. This comes at a moment of an almost palpable seachange in the discourse surrounding Israeli state violence and Palestinian resistance. The popular concept of a perpetually victimized Israel is in stark contrast to the graphic images that have come out of the region in the last week: Palestinians getting roughed up by Israeli police for opposing forced evictions and Israeli cops bombarding a mosque with stun grenades as worshipers prayed.

But Gal Gadot hasn’t received the memo. Or, more likely, she has, but doesn’t really give a shit.

No real substantive argument about Israeli policy or anything just the fashionable opinion of the woke left and ganging up on a pretty actress who is Jewish and just didn’t do enough performative kowtowing.

Jezebel isn’t anti-Jew, they just some have some Jew Hesitancy.

Hey! [jumps up and down] Hey! Pay attention to this! Hey! There’s no gas shortage or any inflation!

The Jan. 6 Insurrection Takes Down Liz Cheney

House Republicans on Wednesday morning fired their No. 3 leader, Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney, for her persistence in pushing back against former President Donald Trump’s continued claim that the 2020 election had been stolen from him, a lie that sparked a violent riot aimed at disrupting congressional certification of the presidential election results on Jan. 6. Her devotion to that cause had made her, in her colleagues’ eyes, a distraction, and an impediment to their return to power.

Cheney, as conference chair, runs the weekly conference meeting whose sole item of business that day was her removal. She told members that she had “tremendous affection and admiration for many of you in this room,” but argued that “we cannot let the former president drag us backward and make us complicit in his efforts to unravel our democracy. Down that path lies our destruction, and potentially the destruction of our country.”

Artist Maya Lin plants 49 dead trees in Manhattan to raise climate change awareness

Brave.

The Passionate, Lightly Rabid Subculture of Jen Psaki Superfans

Psaki nation is in mourning. Last week, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said she will likely leave her post by next year to spend more time with her family, including her two young children. “I don’t want to miss moments. I don’t want to miss things, and I’m very mindful of that as well,” Psaki told CNN’s David Axelrod. The White House Press Secretary gig is notorious for burnout, and Psaki made it clear from the jump that she didn’t intend to hold on to the post for very long, telling the New York Times in January, “I think there frankly needs to be diverse spaces and voices as communicators. Women, certainly, but beyond that.”

Despite the predictability of it all, Psaki’s biggest supporters are voicing what might best be described as grief, an outpouring that’s representative of an emergent online subculture: Jen Psaki superfans.

These are the online subset of Democratic Party loyalists acting as resident Twitter cheerleaders for all things President Biden, including Psaki. Their mission is simple: Gas up the major players of the Biden White House and snarl at its enemies, whether they’re Republican politicians or right-wing journalists. With Biden busy behind the scenes (and refraining from tweeting out every little thought, unlike his predecessor) and Vice President Kamala Harris focused on meeting world leaders and walking a lot, Psaki—the most front-facing representative of Biden’s administration—has become a natural figure to latch onto, in the most extreme cases inspiring memes, fevered tweets, and even a small but surely growing bit of Psaki fanfiction.

The lack of self-reflection of this is like a lulz buffet. Do they not remember Obama? Do they no remember RGB? Or the bloody cult of I’M WITH HER? I hurt myself laughing. I hurt. Die, shitknuckles.

 

The generous and handsome Gustave Lytton found my theme music.

Midweek Glibs Zoom Meetup link

12:00 AM Thursday, Greenwich Mean Time

WHYCOME I DON’T HAVE NO BLINK TAG ON HERE?