Speaker 1: Good morning, peeps, and welcome to Okay f Daily with
Speaker 1: Meet your Girl Danielle Moody once again recording from the
Speaker 1: Brooklyn Bunker. Why because later on in the show, with
Speaker 1: our friend doctor Jonathan Metzel joining us for our continuation
Speaker 1: of the last two years of living in a pandemic,
Speaker 1: the thoughts of del Macron and Flerona entering my system
Speaker 1: keeps me wanting to, you know, self, quarantine, just be
Speaker 1: on my own personal fucking lockdown at this point in time,
Speaker 1: because I find then anytime that I start to muster
Speaker 1: up the strength to say, yeah, I'll go out and
Speaker 1: I'll hang out with this person, then I find out
Speaker 1: that I have been exposed in some way former shape.
Speaker 1: So far, so good, But trying to avoid COVID right
Speaker 1: now is like being a ball in a pinball machine
Speaker 1: trying not to hit the size. Before we jump into
Speaker 1: the latest with COVID, we are coming fastly, fastly approaching
Speaker 1: the anniversary of the one six insurrection, and according to
Speaker 1: the New York Times and a couple of other outlets
Speaker 1: now Politico, Axios and others, there's a new far right
Speaker 1: group that apparently all of us hadn't heard of, hadn't
Speaker 1: been privy too, and as the one six Commission continues
Speaker 1: to quietly do their investigation, as the media is saying,
Speaker 1: I don't know how quiet things can be when it's
Speaker 1: on national television, but I digress. A group called I
Speaker 1: Believe A One, not like the steak sauce because that
Speaker 1: would provide flavor, but A one is a group of
Speaker 1: former military, former intelligence agents of former Coastguard National Guard.
Speaker 1: It's essentially made up of ex military folks. They are
Speaker 1: a far right wing group that has been in close contact,
Speaker 1: close community with the Trump administration, with as many are
Speaker 1: referring to as MAGA celebrities. They apparently acted as their
Speaker 1: own personal bodyguards, and right before the insurrection. On January fourth,
Speaker 1: two days before the insurrection, tweeted out from their official
Speaker 1: Twitter account that some young National Guard captains are going
Speaker 1: to have to make some very tough decisions. On January sixth,
Speaker 1: I want us to sit with that for a moment,
Speaker 1: because now, of course there is more investigation into the
Speaker 1: rise and the prevalence, right, but it's not even the rise,
Speaker 1: because the Rise continues to assume that these groups are
Speaker 1: somehow blossoming out of nowhere, when in fact, and we
Speaker 1: reported on this show a bunch of times that the
Speaker 1: FBI was very well aware of the spreading right, the
Speaker 1: exponential spread of white supremacists, far right nationalist groups blossoming
Speaker 1: with their multiple cells all across the United States for
Speaker 1: roughly the last ten to twelve years. They did a
Speaker 1: whole fucking report on it, except you know, they decided
Speaker 1: that they were not going to put money or resources
Speaker 1: into those kinds of investigations. Instead, they were going to
Speaker 1: put power, intellectual power into black extremist groups, because they
Speaker 1: are the ones that are rampant. Right, Because we have
Speaker 1: to understand why were these agencies created in the first place,
Speaker 1: and what was their function right as a tool of government,
Speaker 1: well throughout the history of these United States, at least
Speaker 1: in modern times. Right, and when modern times, I'm talking
Speaker 1: you know about the civil rights movements, I'm talking about
Speaker 1: you know, the nineteen fifties, sixties, seventies, eighties, I'm talking
Speaker 1: about the crack epidemic, I'm talking about all of these
Speaker 1: different things. Well, these intelligence agencies were functioning as a
Speaker 1: tool of government to assassinate civil rights leaders, to intimidate,
Speaker 1: to put wire taps, to figure out how they were organizing,
Speaker 1: because if they could, in fact get rid of these
Speaker 1: prominent voices, then you know, black people would go back
Speaker 1: to keeping their heads down, saying yes ma'am and no
Speaker 1: ma'am and moving off a sidewalks for white people and
Speaker 1: for whiteness. So it should be of no shock to
Speaker 1: any of us that there are a multitude of people
Speaker 1: that exist inside of these agencies, that exist inside of
Speaker 1: the branches of the military, in large numbers, right, who
Speaker 1: are proponents of white supremacy and far right ideology. What
Speaker 1: is mind fucking boggling to me, though, is that with
Speaker 1: this information mounting in front of us over the last
Speaker 1: four to fucking five years, now, why isn't that we
Speaker 1: are just still pushing paperwork instead of in guiding these groups,
Speaker 1: instead of locking these people up and calling them what
Speaker 1: they are, which is a group of fucking terrorists. Right, Like,
Speaker 1: this is what is getting my blood boiling is the
Speaker 1: amount of oh, well, we need to be told we
Speaker 1: need to have like all of our investigations in a row,
Speaker 1: We need to have all of our paperwork, all of
Speaker 1: our ducks in a row, needs to be meticulous to
Speaker 1: do what exactly because you didn't need any of that
Speaker 1: type of note taking and paperwork and data collection. When
Speaker 1: you decided to use facial recognition on Black Lives Matter protesters,
Speaker 1: you didn't need that kind of energy when you were
Speaker 1: going after the Angela davis is of the world, and
Speaker 1: the Martin Luther Kings and the Malcolm X's at the
Speaker 1: Fred Hampton's none of it right, you just went in.
Speaker 1: You took those people out because you did not like
Speaker 1: what they stood for, which was liberty and justice for
Speaker 1: an oppressed people. But when it turns out that you
Speaker 1: don't want to take down your neighbor and your buddy
Speaker 1: and your fucking pastor and your cop and your chief, right,
Speaker 1: this is the problem. The problem that America continues to
Speaker 1: want to turn its back on is white terrorism. That's it.
Speaker 1: All of this stems from the eight the purposeful ignorance
Speaker 1: to the fact that this country is bred and born
Speaker 1: white domestic terrorism. And not only does it breed it, right,
Speaker 1: it celebrates it. It celebrates it with fucking statues, right,
Speaker 1: it celebrates it with naming these traders after schools and
Speaker 1: hospitals and our own fucking FBI agency. So how is
Speaker 1: it that you can even begin right to deal with
Speaker 1: a problem that is so indistinguishable from Americanism. Americanism is
Speaker 1: violence perpetuated by white, aggrieved, rage filled people. Because when
Speaker 1: you have set up a matrix and a system that
Speaker 1: tells you that the rest of the fucking world owes
Speaker 1: you something, that somehow you are special just by virtue
Speaker 1: of your lack of melanin, then trying to paint the
Speaker 1: picture of where all of this ship has gone wrong
Speaker 1: is like trying right, but what is it? Even? Like,
Speaker 1: I don't even know what it's like, because like, eventually
Speaker 1: kids stop believing in Santa Claus, right, Like, eventually they
Speaker 1: recognize that that is mommy, or that is Daddy or
Speaker 1: whomever it is. Right Like, eventually the things that we
Speaker 1: believed right as fantasy is as children begin to dissipate
Speaker 1: over time. The problem with white supremacy is that it exists,
Speaker 1: right like. It isn't the boogeyman, right, It isn't this
Speaker 1: fictitional figure. It is very real. It is very insidious.
Speaker 1: It is a cancer, and a cancer that cannot be isolated.
Speaker 1: It infects a tissue, every cell, every fiber of our being,
Speaker 1: everything that we put our trust and faith in, every agency.
Speaker 1: When we are pledging allegiance to this country. This is
Speaker 1: why Colin Kaepernick and others were taking a knee, not
Speaker 1: just for police brutality, because when you pledge allegiance to
Speaker 1: this country, you are pledging allegiance to white supremacy and patriarchy.
Speaker 1: You are pledging allegiance right to their ability to oppress people.
Speaker 1: And then guests like the fuck out of them. You know,
Speaker 1: I remember, and this is not going to be popular,
Speaker 1: and I don't give a fuck. In twenty fifteen, and
Speaker 1: I've told this story before, in twenty fifteen, I had
Speaker 1: the great fortune to be able to go on a
Speaker 1: journalistic retreat to Israel and Palestine. I am not a
Speaker 1: foreign correspondent. I am not somebody that has been steeped
Speaker 1: in and educated in foreign affairs, let alone the complications
Speaker 1: and the layers of complications in the Middle East. But
Speaker 1: I was invited on this trip because I am an
Speaker 1: activist and I am somebody that has fought for social justice,
Speaker 1: racial justice, LGBTQ quality, women's rights, all of these things
Speaker 1: for a my entire career in different capacities. And I
Speaker 1: remember talking to and head of an organization who was
Speaker 1: in Israeli and he spoke about Israel and the conflict
Speaker 1: as this place that, in the minds of Americans is
Speaker 1: like a moral Disneyland, right, where the picture of Israel
Speaker 1: being this democracy that is above reproach and that needs
Speaker 1: to be protected at all costs because it's surrounded by
Speaker 1: these savage Middle Eastern countries. Right, And he goes, how
Speaker 1: is it that your country that America provides billions of
Speaker 1: dollars for us to displace brutalized and oppressed and not
Speaker 1: even make into second class citizens, right, treat Palestinian people
Speaker 1: like fucking animals. How do you call how do you
Speaker 1: call Israel a democracy in the Middle East when half
Speaker 1: of its population have no rights and not only have
Speaker 1: no rights, but are brutalized and placed and beaten and
Speaker 1: shot and killed on a regular basis. And he referred
Speaker 1: to it as moral Disneyland, this place where Jewish people
Speaker 1: around the world are able to go to, right where
Speaker 1: they are the majority. And I can imagine what that
Speaker 1: feels like, right to be able to go to a
Speaker 1: place where everyone is like you, where you're not the
Speaker 1: only one. And how much pride that that can provide
Speaker 1: you with? Right, how much joy the feeling of safety?
Speaker 1: Right you don't have to explain things. They just are
Speaker 1: Except that isn't Israel, right, just like the United States
Speaker 1: claims to be a democracy, claims to be a country
Speaker 1: that is about being the home of the brave and
Speaker 1: the land of the free. Except if you are a
Speaker 1: person of color, if you are a queer person, if
Speaker 1: you are a person of the Muslim faith, if you
Speaker 1: are Jewish, if you are a woman like you are
Speaker 1: not free here with each and every one of those groups,
Speaker 1: and God forbid you embody multiple identities that are marginalized.
Speaker 1: Your experience is not a freedom. Your experience is not
Speaker 1: necessarily of thriving. It is surviving an institution, a complex
Speaker 1: system that was created for at about your subjugation. This
Speaker 1: is not like conspiracy theory. This is like, learn your
Speaker 1: fucking history here, so you have the realization, once the
Speaker 1: fucking gain that it wasn't just this crazy man Donald
Speaker 1: Trump standing up in front of a crowd telling them
Speaker 1: to go take back their country. That it was an organized, tactical, strategic,
Speaker 1: almost successful strategy to overthrow the government. It wasn't just
Speaker 1: And what pisces me off even more is the constant
Speaker 1: of chattering in mainstream news as if it was about
Speaker 1: overturning an election. No, it wasn't. The election is fundamental
Speaker 1: to a democracy that is about being for and by
Speaker 1: the people. This was about overturning democracy right and ending
Speaker 1: free and fair elections. Like language fucking matters. And I
Speaker 1: can't presume any more that mainstream media just doesn't get it.
Speaker 1: I think that they absolutely do. But they are also
Speaker 1: part of the fucking problem. You know, when I interviewed
Speaker 1: Congressman Jamal Bowman right before the holiday break, you know,
Speaker 1: we were talking about how much money is in politics,
Speaker 1: and how both groups, Democrats and Republicans both serve the
Speaker 1: same fucking master, which is capitalism, which is money. Right,
Speaker 1: And so when your interests right are not actually about
Speaker 1: the people, when your interests are better aligned with profits,
Speaker 1: then you get really hazy and the types of things
Speaker 1: that you're willing to support and admit. Mainstream media isn't
Speaker 1: going to come out and do the quote unquote right thing.
Speaker 1: And I say consistently and tell I'm horse in the
Speaker 1: fucking throat, like tell the truth, because where do they
Speaker 1: get their money from other people that are invested monetarily, emotionally,
Speaker 1: spiritually in white supremacy. So it does not behoove them
Speaker 1: to tell the truth, because then they'll lose their sponsors,
Speaker 1: they'll lose their ads. This is the line that they
Speaker 1: tell themselves. I don't want to see more headlines about
Speaker 1: extremism unless we're gonna be honest about who the fuck
Speaker 1: the extremists are. I don't care about their sob story
Speaker 1: of how they fucking got that way. They got that
Speaker 1: way because America has created a public education system that
Speaker 1: is more about propaganda about how great America is rather
Speaker 1: than telling the fucking truth that we are able to
Speaker 1: build upon. We sing hymns and songs, right, we talk
Speaker 1: about apple pie and baseball and football. We waive flats
Speaker 1: on the fourth of July, without actually having any fucking
Speaker 1: context as to what it means to be independent, about
Speaker 1: what it means to be free. So now you're in
Speaker 1: a situation where you have these white far right extremist
Speaker 1: terrorist organizations that are co opting language about patriotism and
Speaker 1: freedom and the choices about how they're going to fight
Speaker 1: and show up, and they are fucking telling us in
Speaker 1: broad daylight what they are doing. They're telling us on
Speaker 1: every social media platform what their plans are, what their desires, are,
Speaker 1: and we're still sitting around going, oh, we need more information.
Speaker 1: It's like we're waiting for the bullets to fly and
Speaker 1: from the bombs to drop, and then in that dusk
Speaker 1: coming down much like and don't look up, it'll be like,
Speaker 1: oh shit, we should have done something. Every day, every
Speaker 1: day that goes by that the architects behind the attempt
Speaker 1: to overthrow our democracy are not in jail, is another
Speaker 1: day lost, and another day they win and gain on
Speaker 1: their side. Right now, there is a court case in
Speaker 1: North Carolina about the Republican parties lying as jerrymandering that
Speaker 1: they are doing to ensure that North Carolina remains a
Speaker 1: Republican by adding additional seats right and taking away democratic
Speaker 1: democratic seats. Three panel judges right, who are elected by
Speaker 1: God knows who get to decide. We still think that
Speaker 1: we're functioning in this place where justice is actually blind,
Speaker 1: where these judges are beyond reproach. When I am telling
Speaker 1: you these same judges, these same people are a part
Speaker 1: of these fucking groups, y'all. I can't you know. Some
Speaker 1: days I tell you that I feel crazy, like I
Speaker 1: feel like I am seeing the end, and it's like
Speaker 1: you are just screaming into a black hole for people
Speaker 1: to wake the fuck up before the comment actually hits,
Speaker 1: and everybody is just staring at the goddamn floor. We
Speaker 1: are in serious fucking trouble. We have but a handful
Speaker 1: of months, and I'm listening to Joe Mansion. Talk to
Speaker 1: me about the filibuster and how he is beyond changing
Speaker 1: the rules of the Senate. Then start calling the man
Speaker 1: the fucking grim reaper of democracy, the executioner of democracy.
Speaker 1: Start using language that expresses the urgency of the moment
Speaker 1: that we are in, and it presents to the public
Speaker 1: exactly what this man is doing. Don't ask him questions
Speaker 1: about the childcare tax credit and build back better. Don't
Speaker 1: ask him bullshit policy questions. Ask him why he doesn't
Speaker 1: care about democracy. Ask him if he's caught a deal
Speaker 1: with Republicans that when they take over with their Authoriturian regime,
Speaker 1: right when they take over with their fascism and their kleptocracy,
Speaker 1: was he cut into the deal. Let's just get real
Speaker 1: about what the fuck is going on and stop pretending
Speaker 1: like we don't know or that we need more information.
Speaker 1: I don't know how much more information the Department of
Speaker 1: Justice needs in order to take action, or Joe Biden
Speaker 1: needs in order to get the fuck rid of Merritt Garland,
Speaker 1: who's sitting around like doing what exactly unclear. If the
Speaker 1: people that we elected are not going to take action,
Speaker 1: then it is time that the people start to take action.
Speaker 1: That's where we are moving. Coming up next, friends, is
Speaker 1: my conversation with our in house doctor, doctor Jonathan Metzel
Speaker 1: to bring us the latest on COVID nineteen, on Omicron,
Speaker 1: on Flerona, on del Macron, and whatever the fuck else
Speaker 1: is going to be coming down the pike. Folks. It
Speaker 1: is the new year, but we have some of our
Speaker 1: favorite familiar faces. Doctor Jonathan Metzel is back with us
Speaker 1: for another round of who's got COVID? Coming up in
Speaker 1: the year twenty twenty two. Jonathan, Happy new year to you,
Speaker 1: Happy happy New Year, and happy new year everyone out there. So, Jonathan,
Speaker 1: we ended last year with talking about Omicron and you
Speaker 1: giving once again. You're very and you know, I want
Speaker 1: to tell you this. Folks who listen to the show
Speaker 1: woke a f audience members DM me or message and
Speaker 1: they say, you know what, Jonathan hasn't been wrong in
Speaker 1: two years. They and they're like, I listened to him.
Speaker 1: I pay attention when he says this is going to
Speaker 1: take over. I pay attention when he says folks need
Speaker 1: to change out their masks and wear better masks. I
Speaker 1: listen to him when he tells us that we need to,
Speaker 1: you know, self test and like be a lot more
Speaker 1: conscious of who we're engaging within house. So I want
Speaker 1: you to know, just as we start this new year,
Speaker 1: that you have been giving some sage advice, some funny jokes,
Speaker 1: and just like helping people feel a little bit more
Speaker 1: sure in this very uncertain times. And I just want
Speaker 1: to appreciate you for that and continuing to ride with
Speaker 1: us here on woke app So let me let me
Speaker 1: just say before you go on, well, thank you everybody.
Speaker 1: I mean, I've been getting nice messages on Twitter DM
Speaker 1: also that are just about that. But you know, it's
Speaker 1: it's we're all dealing with the same information, they all
Speaker 1: same uncertain and stuff like that. So it's such a
Speaker 1: function of like our conversation, right in other words, I
Speaker 1: feel like between you and I we come up with reason,
Speaker 1: We try to make reason out of all this chaos.
Speaker 1: And so right back at you, because I think it's
Speaker 1: really a function of our of our conversation and the
Speaker 1: way we're kind of on the same wave length about
Speaker 1: just trying to make sense of all this for people. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, and I think that you know, as we're
Speaker 1: moving on, what are we seeing that, like, things aren't
Speaker 1: really getting that much better? Right? And so the most
Speaker 1: sense that we can make to give you all that
Speaker 1: are listening a little bit more peace of mind or
Speaker 1: at least feeling like you're not alone when you're feeling crazy,
Speaker 1: I think is going to be key to our emotional, physical,
Speaker 1: and mental well being. So, Jonathan, at the end of
Speaker 1: twenty twenty one, just a couple of weeks ago you
Speaker 1: came on, omicron was not in our lexicon the way
Speaker 1: it is now. It also didn't infect three hundred thousand
Speaker 1: plus people a day in the United States the way
Speaker 1: that it is now. I want to ask you first,
Speaker 1: I mean, for you, for your friends in the medical community.
Speaker 1: Are you just like dumb struck by how fast this
Speaker 1: variant has moved. It's funny. When I first saw the
Speaker 1: mutation profile of this, this one mutation, in other words,
Speaker 1: having over thirty mutations on the spike protein alone, I
Speaker 1: knew we were in trouble. Like, this is the kind
Speaker 1: of this. It's not the worst case scenario. It's the
Speaker 1: next or worst case scenario that people have been worried about,
Speaker 1: which is the spike protein is kind of like where
Speaker 1: it hooks into your body, right, And so all the
Speaker 1: vaccines that we have target for the most part, the
Speaker 1: spike protein, not the body of the virus. And so
Speaker 1: when I thought, man, this spike protein is so changed
Speaker 1: that it's just, you know, we don't have a defense
Speaker 1: against this thing quite yet, right. It's it's it's almost
Speaker 1: a totally different virus. And so in the very beginning
Speaker 1: when I first read about it, I thought, oh, that's
Speaker 1: not good. We're in trouble. And the other part, of course,
Speaker 1: is with that many mutations, it also it hangs in
Speaker 1: the air longer, It is much more. It just hooks
Speaker 1: on to any mucosa much more intensely, and so you
Speaker 1: don't just have mucosa in your mouth, you have it
Speaker 1: in your eyes, you have it in your nose. And
Speaker 1: so it can also kind of not to be too graphic,
Speaker 1: get in different ways. And so part of the issue
Speaker 1: is this was just like a monster mutation. Now that
Speaker 1: you know, the relatively good thing, which doesn't feel very
Speaker 1: good on a day to day level. Is it's non lethal,
Speaker 1: right because it happens to the mutations made it less
Speaker 1: likely to hook into your lungs, but it still can
Speaker 1: get into your brain, get into your heart, get into
Speaker 1: all these other areas that do make you worry about
Speaker 1: long COVID, which I think is the main issue. But
Speaker 1: it's not going to suffocate you, and so that's a
Speaker 1: good thing. But I will say, oh micron just you know,
Speaker 1: that's what I call it, still the big oh Oscar Robertson.
Speaker 1: It hangs out, it hangs in the air, it's transmissible,
Speaker 1: It takes hardly any contact to spread, and so in
Speaker 1: a way, it's kind of a perfect storm of a
Speaker 1: bunch of different things that make it just I mean,
Speaker 1: look at the infection ratio in a place like Nashville
Speaker 1: right now. It's it's we're at Bangladesh levels, We're at
Speaker 1: Measles levels. So yeah, it's it's one of the more
Speaker 1: transibissimal things we've ever seen. Really, So when we you
Speaker 1: know here in the media right that O macron is spreading,
Speaker 1: and at the rate it's spreading, it's going to burn
Speaker 1: itself out. And you and I have had this conversation
Speaker 1: offline about it burning itself out, meaning that it's spreading
Speaker 1: so fast. There's only so much any hosts, right, so
Speaker 1: many bodies that it's going to be able to enter
Speaker 1: before it has infected everything. Talk to me more about this,
Speaker 1: and also about the fact that you know what the
Speaker 1: news has been is that, well, the symptoms are mild,
Speaker 1: but the symptoms are only mild caveat if you are
Speaker 1: vaccinated and boosted. Correct. I still don't think we know
Speaker 1: what it means to have mild symptoms. We all know
Speaker 1: people who have COVID who have had a headache for
Speaker 1: three weeks and can't catch the rest quite yet, and
Speaker 1: stuff like that. So I don't think we quite know.
Speaker 1: I don't think we quite know what mild means. Certainly
Speaker 1: people are I mean I follow hospitalization rates and those
Speaker 1: are going crazy, and I want to know how many
Speaker 1: people who are hospitalized are vaccinated and boosted. I bet
Speaker 1: you it's not zero. And so I think we're still
Speaker 1: in the same calculus in a certain kind of way.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's certainly better to have than the other
Speaker 1: versions if you weren't vaccinated, but there it raises as
Speaker 1: many questions as it answers how long is the booster
Speaker 1: good for? How long has the vaccine good for? Will
Speaker 1: this thing find escape mutations, which I'm sure it will,
Speaker 1: that will get around all that, what's the rate of
Speaker 1: infection vaccinated versus non vaccinated people? And so I don't know.
Speaker 1: There's a lot, there are a lot of questions right
Speaker 1: now that I think we don't know the answer to.
Speaker 1: And I still am going to say. I mean, for me,
Speaker 1: the existential question is should people just run out and
Speaker 1: get it because it's mild and then have some body defense.
Speaker 1: That's kind of what rents through my mind all the time.
Speaker 1: And I still think, if you can help it, it's
Speaker 1: better to not get it until we know some of
Speaker 1: these answers and until some other better treatments come along
Speaker 1: the pike, you know, And you know, to your point,
Speaker 1: one of the things that you had been saying on
Speaker 1: this show, and it sticks with me and I regurgitate
Speaker 1: it often is that when there's so much virus that
Speaker 1: is in the air, right, when so much virus is
Speaker 1: in the air, you say that it's more likely it's
Speaker 1: more likely to mutate like continue like we will. It's
Speaker 1: more likely that we will get a new variant quicker
Speaker 1: than if not. So can you just speak to that again,
Speaker 1: that like that rationale of how much virus is in
Speaker 1: the air and what that actually means. Well, I get
Speaker 1: the most terrifying, daunting and just kind of awesome part
Speaker 1: of all this, right, is that the virus. I mean,
Speaker 1: think about it. When we started talking six weeks ago,
Speaker 1: there was like one pellette of omicron in the world,
Speaker 1: and now it's in every room in every house on
Speaker 1: the entire planet. Like that's some pretty impressive lilypad math, right,
Speaker 1: And so part of the story is this, this thing
Speaker 1: is dividing so quickly, and it doesn't always divide at
Speaker 1: a perfect copy of itself. It divides with a little
Speaker 1: you know, when I got eighty percent there, or the
Speaker 1: whole thing didn't download there. It's that's always happening, and
Speaker 1: and it's mt It's mutating all the time right now.
Speaker 1: M But the issue is every once in a while,
Speaker 1: one of these mutations will will give it a strategic
Speaker 1: advantage in terms of what it it's main goal is,
Speaker 1: which is to um more people. It infect more people. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was going to use the dolomite ffa mother efforts
Speaker 1: but I think that's that's kind of that, that's what
Speaker 1: it does. Um. And so when it gets an advantage,
Speaker 1: then it pushes out the other one. Usually usually that's
Speaker 1: what happens. And so it's more like the engagement of
Speaker 1: the virus and the host. We're the host. Um, you know,
Speaker 1: we should put out cocktail napkins. Yeah, that kind of thing.
Speaker 1: So so yeah, so it's always mutating, and the question
Speaker 1: is does one mutation give it an advantage over over
Speaker 1: the other. And the reason I say that is because
Speaker 1: think about other terrible virus as you know, al stuff
Speaker 1: like that. Um, they mutate to the point where they
Speaker 1: become super lethal, but they become so lethal that they
Speaker 1: just kill the host and then they don't they don't spread,
Speaker 1: they're easier to contain. In a way, the fact that
Speaker 1: the big oh Oscar Robertson is not lethal and is
Speaker 1: mild actually gives it an advantage because it's not killing
Speaker 1: people and so it has zillions of different hosts and
Speaker 1: stuff like that. So that's kind of the trade off.
Speaker 1: Uh huh huh. Either way, it doesn't sound really great. Um. Okay,
Speaker 1: so I learned two new words yesterday, UM that I
Speaker 1: never actually wanted to learn. Wasn't looking for new words
Speaker 1: to stop my vocabulary at all. I thought I was
Speaker 1: fairly good, But yesterday I learned about del macron and
Speaker 1: flew Rona, both uh discussed in the Daily Beast and
Speaker 1: in the Israeli Times where flew Rona was found and
Speaker 1: flew Rona, folks, as I said yesterday, is basically a
Speaker 1: combo effect of the flu and covid, and then delmicron
Speaker 1: is a combo effect of having both delta and amicron
Speaker 1: at the same time. Jonathan, can you shed any light
Speaker 1: on these combo variants that we're looking at? And right
Speaker 1: now there was only one case of flu orna in
Speaker 1: Israel and they have also, at the same time, are
Speaker 1: rolling out a fourth shot, a fourth shot. They were
Speaker 1: the first to roll out the third shot, the booster shot.
Speaker 1: Now they're rolling out a fourth shot that was just
Speaker 1: approved for those that are over sixty five, I believe,
Speaker 1: and those with serious immunodeficiency. Can you speak to what
Speaker 1: you've heard thus far on that, well, it's not surprising,
Speaker 1: and I think I want to just say to everybody first,
Speaker 1: this strategy really should be the same, which is, if
Speaker 1: there's a way to night get this stuff, which is
Speaker 1: to trust the people you trust, wear a mask around
Speaker 1: everybody else, have a good mask and N ninety five mask,
Speaker 1: or what I do when I go out, which is
Speaker 1: an N ninety five with a K on ninety five
Speaker 1: on top. Surprisingly not that hard to breathe, relatively speaking.
Speaker 1: In that wash your hands all that stuff. Now it
Speaker 1: seems like, oh my god, that crap advice again. But
Speaker 1: the point is that there, as I was saying before,
Speaker 1: there flu is seasonal, right, so we know that flu
Speaker 1: is going to get bad for the next couple of
Speaker 1: weeks and then it'll dip down, and there are there
Speaker 1: is hope on the horizon. One about the speed at
Speaker 1: which the Big O went up and then went down
Speaker 1: in South Africa, and so it seems like it burned
Speaker 1: itself out in South Africa. That might be happening in
Speaker 1: the UK also, And so in that sense, this isn't
Speaker 1: like a permanent state of emergency. It's something that should
Speaker 1: be improving this part of it by by mid February.
Speaker 1: And the other part that's important is that there are
Speaker 1: new anti viral drugs coming out from Visor and other
Speaker 1: places that actually could be effective treatments for people who
Speaker 1: get it and then can take the pills and it
Speaker 1: won't lead to serious illness. And so if you can
Speaker 1: hold on for another couple of weeks, I actually think
Speaker 1: there's going to be you know, some some better news
Speaker 1: coming down the way. And so again it's it's it's
Speaker 1: almost impossible for a lot of people to avoid this
Speaker 1: because people are in and out of their house and
Speaker 1: they have kids going to school and stuff like that.
Speaker 1: But if you can just hold on for another couple
Speaker 1: of weeks, I do really think that we're going to
Speaker 1: turn the corner on a couple of these things. Now
Speaker 1: getting to your question, why why is that important? Right? Um,
Speaker 1: there are a couple of reasons. One is because again
Speaker 1: we're going into flu season. And as if you need
Speaker 1: more good, cheerful stuff, I'm and again I love puppies,
Speaker 1: peonies smell wonderful. I love you know, a sunny day.
Speaker 1: But I don't love the flu vaccine this year because
Speaker 1: they got the wrong strain of the flu, and so
Speaker 1: the flu vaccine is important to get it, but it
Speaker 1: just ain't going to work, and so and so we
Speaker 1: really don't help work. Well, it's like a crapshoot. It's
Speaker 1: kind of like the lottery the flu vaccine like they're
Speaker 1: nine zillion. It's like trying to predict how the flu
Speaker 1: is going to mutate, right, and it's changing all the time,
Speaker 1: but you're trying to do it in advance of the flu.
Speaker 1: And so our flu vaccines, kind of similar to our
Speaker 1: covid vaccines, are trying to anticipate what kind of mutation
Speaker 1: is going to be and then targeting just that one
Speaker 1: specific mutation. And now there are new kinds of vaccines
Speaker 1: that people are experiment rending with that are PAN category
Speaker 1: PAN coronavirus PAN flu vaccine. So there might be a
Speaker 1: new kind of vaccine coming as soon as next year.
Speaker 1: But in the meantime, but they just have to guess
Speaker 1: which which strain it is, and this year they happen
Speaker 1: to gets wrong. Now it's it's like a crapshoot, right,
Speaker 1: And so we don't have a ton of defense against
Speaker 1: the flue. We do have, you know, lovely things about
Speaker 1: our species again, you know, um, black light posters, um,
Speaker 1: you know the el Um you know ced nightclubs, the
Speaker 1: Elton John ninth Reunion tour. All these things are all
Speaker 1: great about humanity, But predicting the flu vaccine this year
Speaker 1: was not our strong suit. And so the point is
Speaker 1: we don't have a ton of defense. You should get
Speaker 1: the flu vaccine, but it's not it's going to be
Speaker 1: like thirty percent effective as opposed to better than that.
Speaker 1: So this is a totally different virus. And so it's
Speaker 1: not surprising that you could get the big O and
Speaker 1: the Big F together. UM. And I bet we'll I
Speaker 1: bet we'll see more of it um neither or lethal.
Speaker 1: But I hate to think what they're like together now, Um,
Speaker 1: Delta and the big Oh, that's a different story. UM.
Speaker 1: And again the advice is the same, get vaccinated because
Speaker 1: the vaccine is super effective against Delta UM and it
Speaker 1: has I think the potential to be helpful for against
Speaker 1: illness for Oscar Robertson also UM. And so I would say,
Speaker 1: you know, I just I bet we'll be seeing more
Speaker 1: of this kind of thing because all these vas, all
Speaker 1: these viruses are circulating. Now. If you want the take
Speaker 1: home point, that's the pessimistic takeome point. Sorry, was I
Speaker 1: was I supposed to be looking for good news and things?
Speaker 1: You just said over black light posters? Got it? Yeah? Um?
Speaker 1: And uh I've got over here after we're done I've
Speaker 1: got a jar of peanut butter and jelly mixed together
Speaker 1: in the same in the same thing, virtually symbolizing the
Speaker 1: end of humanity. What I mean, I'm like, this is,
Speaker 1: this is not a high po This is human ingenuity.
Speaker 1: This is what people can do when they put their
Speaker 1: minds to it. I mean, we made this as humans,
Speaker 1: you know, like we we did this. So we did
Speaker 1: a bunch of great things, but predicting the flu vaccine
Speaker 1: was not one of those great things. And and the
Speaker 1: other thing is I guess the other concerning thing. Again,
Speaker 1: I'm not sponsored by Goober, Goober Goober, I'm not sponsored
Speaker 1: by Googer, but I will say that just like peanut
Speaker 1: butter and jelly coexist in Goober, apparently Delta and the
Speaker 1: Big O can coexist out there in the world. And
Speaker 1: to me, the concerning part about this, and they're very
Speaker 1: different viruses, so we have different viruses circulating all the time.
Speaker 1: But what's concerning is that you would think the Big
Speaker 1: O would come and push out Delta Delta, but that's
Speaker 1: not what happened. They actually can co exist. And so
Speaker 1: that's the concerning part is we're actually seeing a twin twins,
Speaker 1: right now again, get vaccinated and wear masks. I just
Speaker 1: I like, at some point, at some point, this all
Speaker 1: has to stop, right So okay, so here's the question
Speaker 1: for you. Oh yeah, let me say I'm optimistic. I'm
Speaker 1: optimistic mid February mosh pit. You know, like I'm I'm optimistic.
Speaker 1: You know that until the next variant comes, we're developing
Speaker 1: a lot of species immunity, and we are also working
Speaker 1: on pan pan category vaccines that I think will also
Speaker 1: became changers. So yeah, I think, I think believe it.
Speaker 1: And how how often am I optimistic? Like once every
Speaker 1: three years, and I would say I'm actually optimistic right now. Okay.
Speaker 1: So the last thing is the CDC, who I no
Speaker 1: longer have faith in and can't fucking stand. And the
Speaker 1: reality is to me that the CDC is, much like
Speaker 1: every other place and space, a bunch of humans that
Speaker 1: are pushed by capitalism and you know, and are making
Speaker 1: decisions based on capitalism and politics and not necessarily the
Speaker 1: public health. I say all this to say because the
Speaker 1: decision that Wilenski and others made to make a pivot
Speaker 1: from the ten day quarantine to five days so that
Speaker 1: Americans could get right back to work to me, signals
Speaker 1: that we are not as the Biden administration told us
Speaker 1: when they took over, following the science, that instead we
Speaker 1: are following what CEOs need? What were your what are
Speaker 1: your thoughts about the move from ten to five days?
Speaker 1: And also right now thousands of schools are out of session,
Speaker 1: but thousands more remain in and we know that there
Speaker 1: was no barrier that was created between the massive gathering
Speaker 1: holiday season and our kids are returning to school and
Speaker 1: folks are returning to war. I tweeted earlier in the week.
Speaker 1: I don't understand this shouldn't have been rocket science. Why
Speaker 1: didn't we just have remote learning for two weeks? People
Speaker 1: be at home for two weeks for work and then
Speaker 1: like lesson right, even if you were sick, you would
Speaker 1: have been home and then you test in to go back. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean I think we got caught with a kind
Speaker 1: of exponential spread that we did not anticipate. Right. We
Speaker 1: were our system was great for the last for Delta.
Speaker 1: We were we were just rocking Delta, right, and so
Speaker 1: everything we built, everything we strategized was for Delta, and
Speaker 1: then um oh Microme came and it just it was
Speaker 1: like a I just don't even think, you know, you
Speaker 1: put you put ten thousand virologists in a room and
Speaker 1: tell them to predict what's the next mutation going to be.
Speaker 1: I bet nobody would have predicted this. It was just
Speaker 1: so out of the blue, out of the ordinary, unexpected,
Speaker 1: and so I think there was a scramble because they
Speaker 1: were and I'm saying this, you know, is the positive spin.
Speaker 1: And I have no idea that the CDC was being
Speaker 1: forced to be experts about a virus that it did
Speaker 1: not know anything about. It just didn't It didn't know
Speaker 1: the spread, it didn't know the incubation period, it didn't
Speaker 1: know the infection ratio. And so I think there's a
Speaker 1: lot of ketchup because on one hand, people demand answers,
Speaker 1: you know, these are existential issues, and on the other hand,
Speaker 1: people the CDC is flying. It's it's flying blind in
Speaker 1: a way, and it's also decimated from the years of
Speaker 1: neglect and everything the Trump administration did to it. And
Speaker 1: it's also terrible at messaging, right and so and so
Speaker 1: it does seem to have made the same mistake that
Speaker 1: it did when it just told everybody masks and then
Speaker 1: no masks, like these these announcements come out of nowhere,
Speaker 1: and they seemed to. They seem to just catch everybody
Speaker 1: by surprise and have and there's no lead up to
Speaker 1: it and things like that, And so I think really
Speaker 1: that's the issue is if you can transparently explain to
Speaker 1: people what's happening, I think you'll just get a lot
Speaker 1: more support, because without that it opens the door to
Speaker 1: all kinds of concern, resentment, conspiracy, you know, valid and
Speaker 1: and in this case, I do think it's fair if
Speaker 1: the CDC said to people, we're balancing the economy versus
Speaker 1: the health or something like that, and we can't have
Speaker 1: one with the other, and they both go together. And
Speaker 1: if somebody is asymptomatic and test positive, and five days
Speaker 1: after they test positive, if they can then test negative,
Speaker 1: they can come out of quarantine, and that's our plan.
Speaker 1: Something like that. Just you know, what would Trump do.
Speaker 1: He'd have a big, big carnival, you know, press announcement
Speaker 1: or something like that. And so they didn't do any
Speaker 1: of that stuff. But again, the knowledge is changing every day,
Speaker 1: so I think I can see why it's hard. But
Speaker 1: I would also say I with you at the end
Speaker 1: of that long preamble that I do think that their
Speaker 1: messaging is still bad after all this, I mean, I
Speaker 1: just think it's atrocious and I and I also it
Speaker 1: does not help that then you have the AP and
Speaker 1: and routers, you know, coming out with the letter that
Speaker 1: the Delta CEO wrote that says I'm losing my staff, right,
Speaker 1: So it's it's not as if we're we're and I
Speaker 1: keep telling people, we're at a time when you need
Speaker 1: to be intellectually nimble, but the CDC is making it
Speaker 1: really difficult for you to trust them, right and trust
Speaker 1: that they have your best interests in mind. And I'm like,
Speaker 1: we're already at a time when misinformation has won over, right,
Speaker 1: when lies are just are rampant, and we have distrust
Speaker 1: in all of our agencies thanks to Trump. I think
Speaker 1: that the reality is is that you it's not okay
Speaker 1: for us to keep saying like, oh, their messaging is
Speaker 1: just bad. Messaging is everything. And that's that they that
Speaker 1: like Democrats don't get the CDC doesn't get this administration
Speaker 1: doesn't get is like messaging matters. This is the thing
Speaker 1: that Republicans are really great at. And it doesn't matter
Speaker 1: that they don't tell the truth because they know how
Speaker 1: to get the information out, And I just I really
Speaker 1: worry because one, I do think that you're right. I
Speaker 1: think that by you know, mid February, early early March,
Speaker 1: I think that Omicron will have burned itself out. I
Speaker 1: think that, you know, we will have a better understanding
Speaker 1: of the booster rate. Do we need them every four months?
Speaker 1: Do we need them every six months? You know, if
Speaker 1: you get a booster once a year, like, you're good
Speaker 1: to go. But I also know that if we're following
Speaker 1: the patterns from twenty twenty till now, that by the
Speaker 1: time summer comes, there will be another fucking variant, right, Like,
Speaker 1: that's the way that we have been working, is that
Speaker 1: we have these short couple of months of good times
Speaker 1: are here again, and then we fall off a cliff. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, this is what happens. This virus is becoming endemic, right,
Speaker 1: So that's what happens, right, That's the pattern. And I
Speaker 1: do think that if there's anything of what we're saying
Speaker 1: right now that we can do as a species in
Speaker 1: a country is to improve the science communication. Like I
Speaker 1: think there's a kind of universal need for that. Now.
Speaker 1: It's hard, of course, because if you're in New York,
Speaker 1: if you also have state communication, whereas if you're in
Speaker 1: Florida you have you know, the Coco Pebbles organization or whoever.
Speaker 1: And so but I do think that the need for
Speaker 1: I mean, it's weird because like when I interview conservatives
Speaker 1: and Trump supporters and everybody like that, they all say,
Speaker 1: we want objective, we want objective communications. So I do
Speaker 1: think there's a need for communication right now that there
Speaker 1: is better. We need to improve our science communication infrastructure.
Speaker 1: I don't know how that happens in this environment. But again,
Speaker 1: because this is because because this is an endemic situation
Speaker 1: where this is not our last rodeo, I think you're
Speaker 1: you're absolutely right well, Jonathan, as always, we appreciate you
Speaker 1: so much. We are happy to have you back in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty two. We will continue this conversation as we
Speaker 1: learn more. Folks. And I haven't said this in a while,
Speaker 1: but if you're not following Jonathan on social media, you
Speaker 1: should be. He tweets, he shares articles, he writes articles,
Speaker 1: He pushes out content on a regular basis so that
Speaker 1: you can keep up to date outside of just our
Speaker 1: weekly wonderful conversations. Jonathan, thank you, thank you, thank you,
Speaker 1: and and let me just say in closing that I
Speaker 1: think it's such a weird time for expert knowledge. Like
Speaker 1: three years ago, it's like you go to the doctor,
Speaker 1: the doctor diagnoses you, you get the treatment, you'll even now,
Speaker 1: it's kind of like we have to be very humble
Speaker 1: about what expertise is at this moment right because there
Speaker 1: are so many paradigms and there's so much uncertainty, and
Speaker 1: expert knowledge changes every five seconds along with every mutation
Speaker 1: and everything that happens, and so humility is I think
Speaker 1: the key right now. And again we'll just keep figuring
Speaker 1: this out together because again, this issue unfortunately is not
Speaker 1: not going anywhere anytime soon. No, it is not. That
Speaker 1: is it for me today, Dear friends on Woke app,
Speaker 1: Let's take a collective breath. Power to the people and
Speaker 1: to all the people. Power, get woke and stay woke
Speaker 1: as fuck.