'The Pretense of Knowledge'
has Cost America Dearly
American Thinker,
by
Nicholas J. Kaster
Original Article
Posted By: Magnante,
4/25/2020 8:00:53 AM
Recently, Brit Hume, the sober and understated Fox News commentator, voiced the thoughts of millions when he said,
“I think its time to consider the possibility… that this lockdown, as opposed to the more moderate mitigation efforts… is a colossal public policy calamity.” (snip) The loss of liberty incurred as a result of shutdown is not as easily quantifiable, but is no less significant. Epidemiological “models” have provided the scientific basis for this large-scale abrogation of personal and economic liberty. Now that the models have been shown to be grossly inaccurate, some are demanding accountability.
Reply 1 - Posted by:
franq 4/25/2020 8:12:40 AM (No. 390879)
After 2 months, what more can be said? You're either a masker or not. Though I know some who take a bold stance firmly in the middle. Many, like me, wonder what they'll pull next.
10 people like this.
Reply 2 - Posted by:
Periwinkel 4/25/2020 8:27:18 AM (No. 390899)
I agree with Mr. Hume. I don't hold the President accountable for this idiocy; but I do look at Fauci and Birx, the two dinosaur bureaucrats foisted on us by, oh, let me guess here...some Swamp Creature.
I often think the President Trump will be dangerous at the end of his second term when he knows all the players and their agendas.
16 people like this.
Reply 3 - Posted by:
Alecto2 4/25/2020 9:09:14 AM (No. 390933)
Just like politicians we are into "designer models". What result do you want and I'll give you that result - for the right amount of course.
Time to go full Luddite on all these models.
12 people like this.
Americans allowed themselves to be buffaloed. Exotic disease...from CHINA...like a Fu Manchu plot against the white, western world. Thousands dead in Wuhan...corpses lining the streets...overloaded crematoriums spewing human pollution the likes of which have never been seen.
Then Milan...thousands dying...again.
And the hysteria was easy to push. The media had its badly needed eyeball grabbing story. Politicians had their crisis that they would not waste. Bureaucrats saw moments in the sun as public guardians. Scientists and medical "experts" saw fame and fortune in their models and vaccines. The public saw the churn of activity...and hysteria ensued.
That "pretense of knowledge" engulfed government from local to White House - it still does, although perhaps to a waning degree. This crisis still has legs, and for that alone will not be "wasted" by those listed above. They have made HEROES of us all, for responding in their fashion to "flatten the curve" and take our government cheese checks as tokens of appreciation. Everyone wants to be a HERO, even if by hiding under the bed waiting for the all clear. It is their finest hours.
In the meantime, Americans have clearly shown that hysteria can easily be manufactured, cloaked in "science", and peddled furiously to no end. Constitution? What's that while we are threatened by such disaster? Sadly, one day sooner than most expect, we are likely to find out.
22 people like this.
Reply 5 - Posted by:
GoodDeal 4/25/2020 9:38:23 AM (No. 390974)
Brit is a hostile Trump hater and will say anything negative to promote his blatant opposition to everything Trump does.
Switch to CNN and feel right at home over there. They will praise you for being so brave and standing up for your values.
9 people like this.
Reply 6 - Posted by:
JL80863 4/25/2020 9:41:42 AM (No. 390981)
The genius of hind sight. Do you have a better model of a pandemic caused by a previously unknown virus? No? I didn't think so. Meh!
5 people like this.
Reply 7 - Posted by:
Strike3 4/25/2020 9:46:37 AM (No. 390988)
Donald Trump would have received ten times as much criticism and democrat outrage if he had gone against the "experts" in his actions. As it is, they are finding fault but they have their own governors to blame for the bad decisions so it was a masterful move on his part. In addition, the rest of the world also shut down so we are not alone in that lunacy. The best part is that the people who have always supported him agree with everything he has done and the rest of them will complain no matter what.
12 people like this.
Reply 8 - Posted by:
bigfatslob 4/25/2020 9:47:55 AM (No. 390993)
Brit Hume doing his best Walter Cronkite, "the war is lost' statement he dislikes President Trump so puts in this little dig.
8 people like this.
Reply 9 - Posted by:
ivehadit 4/25/2020 9:49:44 AM (No. 390997)
Exactly right, #5. Can you imagine the headlines if we had done like Sweden? "500,000 Americans have died due to our government's choice of doing nothing. Many more expected to die. Who will be held accountable?" Or, "Trump allows 1 million to die due to his lack of action."
I, for one, would not want a president who would roll the dice on a million American lives.
Donald Trump has done a magnificent job and he's just getting started.
14 people like this.
Reply 10 - Posted by:
Urgent Fury 4/25/2020 9:50:50 AM (No. 390998)
I know way too many people who think all this necessary or are otherwise OK with it.
11 people like this.
So much for "SCIENCE!"
7 people like this.
Reply 12 - Posted by:
LadyHen 4/25/2020 10:28:10 AM (No. 391051)
How about NO models? NONE! How about common sense, feet on the ground experience, and historical knowledge based on present data not projections instead of the tyranny of the computer driven egghead set whose jobs and lives are safeguarded no matter what? Their Science! faith has failed them yet again but they will doubledown on their zealouness scorning the ignorant masses for mocking their god of Science! They just didn't have enough "data." Next time they will do better and their god will reward them.
fta: "How might we have acted if the models didn’t exist? Most likely, we would have chosen a more traditional approach to fighting the pandemic: quarantine and protect the sick and vulnerable, institute some sensible mitigation policies, and otherwise get on with life.
This is essentially the approach Sweden has chosen, and for which it has been pilloried in the American media. Yet, Sweden’s policies are based on thinking that is quintessentially American. "
You apparently really need to NOT be a cloistered bureaucratic "Science!" monastic to understand this pretty simple idea.
10 people like this.
Reply 13 - Posted by:
red1066 4/25/2020 10:52:22 AM (No. 391080)
Blame this over reaction on the idiots in England with their models. Trump was between a rock and hard place. No matter what decision he made, it was going to end up looking bad. He took advise from long time inside the beltway government doctors whose only advice was to lock down the country for two weeks. So Trump did. Then these same doctors started changing the goal posts every time Trump held a new conference. Two weeks then went to a month. Then it became six weeks with these same doctors saying it may take up to 18 months. Meanwhile, the news media was having field day promoting the virus hysteria and blaming Trump for all the deaths. The death count became a daily feature much like the number of Americans soldiers killed in Vietnam. Now people are just fed up with all the virus crap. The mask crap. The nothing is open crap. The can't find anything on the selves crap, and mostly the endless stay at home crap. Patience has finally worn out.
13 people like this.
Reply 14 - Posted by:
Urgent Fury 4/25/2020 11:31:43 AM (No. 391132)
#13 has it, though? I still see idiot maskers everywhere, and nobody I know is as enraged and frustrated as me. Of course, I'm easily enraged and frustrated as a rule. Need to work on that.
6 people like this.
Reply 15 - Posted by:
DVC 4/25/2020 11:41:50 AM (No. 391149)
Let's hope that the climate models, just as incapable of prediction as the pandemic models, are relegated to the dumpster of history alongside these worthless pandemic models.
The root cause is the same - you put together a nice, possibly even valid, set of mathematical equations. And then you DON'T KNOW THE NECESSARY INPUT DATA. And the CRUCIAL coefficients which ARE the functional "guts" of model, effectively, are "guesstimated". So now you may have valid equations....but they are filled with INVALID numbers - the very numbers that drive the equations.
A valid equation with garbage inputs is guaranteed to give garbage outputs. GIGO, garbage in, garbage out. A very old computer business saying. Still true.
Pandemic models, climate models....both failing to predict because there is NO WAY to get valid input data. It is not a failing of effort, it is an unwillingness to admit that you DO NOT HAVE ENOUGH INFORMATION to make a valid model.
8 people like this.
Reply 16 - Posted by:
Bluefindad 4/25/2020 12:02:22 PM (No. 391187)
Bravo #15! No one knew the infection rate, transmission mechanism or mortality rate. But, they wanted answers!
Now we are seeing that the model predictions are garbage. But, we are also counting practically everyone who dies as a COVID-19 victim. They're padding the death toll in order to approach the model numbers just as they padded temperature measurements to support global warming models - in part to justify the actions of the experts and in part to make sure that the government can continue their hysterical policies.
Trump did what he had to in order to survive and bring the country through this. You can bet that, if he didn't, every person who tripped on a sidewalk or slipped in the bathtub would be counted as a COVID-19/Trump victim! Make no mistake, there are two diseases. One is a genuine illness but the other, which is much more serious - is purely political!
7 people like this.
Reply 17 - Posted by:
Citoyen 4/25/2020 12:36:37 PM (No. 391251)
Whether "Brit is a hostile Trump hater" or not is irrelevant. This lockdown is "a colossal public policy calamity." When this is all over that will be the verdict alongside the knowledge that the Swedish response is superior to that of the Americans, British, French, and all the rest. President Trump's reliance on the "experts" was a terrible mistake but, given the panic once the death toll rose in Italy and then New York City, understandable. Unfortunately our president didn't have a spine of steel as did the Swedes.
He needs to distance himself, politely, from Drs. Fauci and Birx and bring on equally qualified people who see the need to reopen this country immediately. Keep the phased opening but junk the obsession with contact tracing. Waiting for universal testing and contact tracing means this country will never open and recover. With very few exceptions this country has not suffered physically from this virus while the shutdown has been catastrophic for the entire nation. We have moved into the strictly political realm and Donald Trump needs to make clear that those governors who are dragging their heels, like my governor, Gavin Newsom, are using the economic hardship to bring our president down. Keeping on the current path guarantees that the senile Joe Biden will win this November and will probably have a Democrat-controlled House and Senate to help him continue the destruction. That scenario petrifies me.
9 people like this.
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