23 minutes ago, BashiChuni said:

masking is not a small nuisance...it is very harmful to peoples psyche

That's a pretty pathetic sentiment. We are the most adaptable species on earth and you're saying we're going to be irreparably damaged by putting some cloth on our faces. You know our ancestors actually used to not have any cloth anywhere on their bodies?! But then we started wearing pants and shirts at some point. I wonder if the cavemen lamented the collective damaging of our psyches when that was implemented. 
 

It is a small nuisance. So much so that multiple Asian cultures (specifically Japan and Korea) have been diligently masking for decades without grave social damage. And guess what, it helped them be more prepared for this pandemic where they have had significantly lower case and death rates than the western world. 

@ViperMan I think people are calling it "a pandemic of the unvaccinated" because it is the unvaccinated who are actually ending up in the hospital and dying from this thing.

In a pandemic I don't care how many people get the sniffles. I care about hospitalizations and death, which are happening in disproportionate numbers to the unvaxxed.

Similarly, you could call it a "pandemic of the obese" or a "pandemic of the elderly" as they're the ones getting the full brunt of the effects. 
 

On mask mandates, I honestly think any tiny shred of efficacy could justify a mandate. Wearing a mask is not an undue burden on you, and mandating you put a tiny piece of PPE on your face is a very far cry from mandating you to get an injection.  Hell, we all wear flight suits that have been washed thousands of times and have long since lost their fire resistance so apparently you guys are okay with some useless PPE but not others.. I guess as long as it looks cool. 

In fact, it might just be the only worthwhile thing to do in del rio 

16 minutes ago, Sim said:

Zelenko protocol pills available in every store for anyone to buy. Just this would save at least 80% (IMHO 99%)  of deaths and keep hospitals from being overwhelmed. This information was available a year ago and ignored. 

 

https://faculty.utrgv.edu/eleftherios.gkioulekas/zelenko/ZelenkoProtocol.pdf

But USG do not suggest out patient treatments of any kind. They also ignore science that natural immunity exist. 

....FJB! (and FDT too) 

 

Your attachment says these protocol recommendations existed in June of 2020. By my count that leaves 7 months of trump presidency to boost manufacturing and distribution of these miracle pills. So why didn't he? They created and distributed a vaccine in a year, shouldn't distributing a cocktail of existing medications be a much easier lift?  It's almost like it's easy to sling crap about what you would've done with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight. 
 

Oh and maybe just maybe people would have taken these therapeutics more seriously at the time if trump's communications hadn't been the clown show of the century. 

1 hour ago, contraildash said:

My biggest beef with the OPR and EPR systems is that the damn thing 'just has to be done' by the closeout date. Once everyone backs up their due dates, you are usually cutting out 2-3 months of data. I've personally seen this 'gap' cause problems for people. I've never understood the obsession with the closeout date as opposed to having a good 12 month picture.

Why can't we do something like this:

1. You cannot start writing a report until the first day after 365 days.

2. From that day, you have 'X' months to close the report out.

This creates a 12 month report followed by a 'X' month window to write/close out. But you are capturing 12 months of data rather than 9-10.

Same theory goes for annual awards too. I put a squadron in for a significant award based on a huge mission they accomplished towards the end of the calendar year. The HAF response: 'oh closeout for submissions was EOM October.' The wing and MAJCOM fought against this, but the HAF people stood by their decision. (this was a few years back, so who knows if they have changed that policy)

 

90% of OPRs are meaningless fluff anyway, so I don't see it making the slightest difference when they close out or what amount of time gets cut off. And any of the HPOs who actually give a shit about strats and capturing the end of year data will just pre-empt the bullets anyway. 

27 minutes ago, Swizzle said:

If neither can control it, why mandate things (i.e. isolation and inthat can hurt people's health/careers/lives? Why control people and instead let people control themselves if it makes little to no difference? Is not freer choice better than lessor, fewer choice(s)?

Absolutely agree. But the wall of text sim so graciously provided us implies throughout that trump could have controlled the virus better.  Which is abject nonsense. 

@Sim As riveting as trump campaign copypasta is, what exactly would he have done differently to prevent the deaths numbers seen over the course of 2021?

What exactly does dick measuring death numbers between trump and Biden accomplish? They had different variants to deal with and the disease wasn't even close to endemic during trump's term.  

In my view the only thing the trump admin did right was funneling money to big pharma to quickly develop and roll out a vaccine.  Other than that his public health messaging was a complete horse abortion.

Bottom line, it's easy to sling shit once you're not in charge anymore. But highly I doubt if we had another year of trump that we'd be in any different of a place than we are now. Republican and Democrat administrations have both shown they are utterly incapable of controlling this pandemic in any way. 

5 minutes ago, Negatory said:

Also nice to see people not engage in any amount of data analysis and instead sit on the sidelines with a sense of smug superiority.

You're mistaking the sidelines for the moderate center, which strangely enough is where all the data points to.  

One of the few joys of this pandemic has been watching the pro mandate/lockdown far left bicker with the staunch anti-vax far right while not a single one of them realizes they're two sides of the same coin.. Both wildly misinterpreting the data to arrive at garbage conclusions. 

Believe whatever you want. If you think I'm going to face judgement in front of god because I took a vaccine partially made through stem cell research, that's your prerogative. Just as it is my prerogative to think your beliefs are backward and silly. 
 

But at some point we need to acknowledge the reality that not all beliefs are compatible with military service. 

1 hour ago, DosXX said:

I think it's a generous interpretation of the word 'religious' when I think what you really mean here is ideology. Everyone has an ideology, not everyone follows an organized theistic doctrine, which is what I think most people would agree religion is. 

Exactly. And the important point here is that not all ideologies are created equal.  An ideology based on the scribblings of goat herders from 2000 years ago translated 690 times and then monetized for centuries is far less productive than an ideology based on basic tenets of scientific inquiry and reason.

5 hours ago, GoodSplash9 said:

My opposition is to both fetal stem cell use and RNA/DNA....both or either are a no-go for me. Whether you agree or like it, RNA/DNA/viral vector technology is brand new (logically consistent that this is different) in humans and also brand new as in never been used or injected into my body. Your argument that people can't change, grow, or do better in any type of belief or practice is also false and stupid. I'm not arguing or disputing whether or not it works or if it is healthy (even if it cured death and prevented all sickness I wouldn't be touching it). I'm 100% convinced through prayer and study of scripture that the method for how this technology works is abhorrent and wrong before my God (reference Genesis chapters 6 & 11...topic being humanity thinking it can ignore and do better then their creator). Every one of us will stand before God the creator in judgement and accountability for what we do in this life...your feelings and opinion don't change that. Good luck chasing wealth/health/pleasure in this world and thinking you can live however you want without accountability; I truly hope people like you will wake up to the truth.

Define irony:

The guy who's going to lose his job..

because he's refusing modern medicine..

during a pandemic..

because of something a 2000 year old book told him..

lecturing everyone else on accountability. 

21 hours ago, ViperMan said:

Confirm all those previous studies cited are in reference to mRNA vaccines / therapeutics? Oh, they aren't? So we're applying a meta analysis of apples to oranges. Ok 👍. Just so I'm clear.

More like red apples to green apples. It's still a treatment designed to elicit an immune response to train your body to better fight off a pathogen. It uses a different mechanic than other types of vaccines, of which there are many. Billions of doses have been administered worldwide without a statistically significant serious adverse effect manifesting in a year and a half.

mRNA technology is well understood and was studied for decades which is a huge part of why we saw a vaccine hit the market in under a year.

So what about any of that makes you think think specifically just the new covid shots would suddenly defy all conventional vaccine wisdom?

4 minutes ago, ViperMan said:

This is categorically false.

I agree with the theme of your post, but are you serious with this? Dude, there is no set time limit regarding when a latent effect may or may not show up and under what circumstances or conditions or sub populations. That's not to say it's not a poor excuse to avoid the vaccine (in the military), but it is a valid concern nonetheless.

There actually is significant study on this particular point.  BLUF: serious side effects historically manifest in the short term if at all.  So the idea that a side effect would not present in the short term after billions of doses over a year and a half, and then magically spring into existence 10 years from now doesn't make much sense historically or scientifically.

"Going back at least as far as the polio vaccine, which was widely released to the public in the 1960s, we’ve never seen a vaccination with long-term side effects, meaning side effects that occur several months or years after injection.

And, in every vaccine available to us, side effects — including rare but serious side effects — develop within six to eight weeks of injection."

 

Source:

https://wexnermedical.osu.edu/blog/covid-19-vaccine-long-term-side-effects
 

 

2 hours ago, tac airlifter said:

A paycheck that keeps his family fed.  Tough situation for anyone to be in.

Do you think our military is stronger or weaker now that we’ve forced our members to do this?

Measurably stronger. The vaccines have remained incredibly durable across variants for reducing your chances of hospitalization and death. Even if you are in the young/healthy demographic, the vaccine reduces those risks further.  
 

We are now getting close to a year removed from widespread vaccine implementation and a year and a half from the initial testing. If a statistically significant, concerning long term side effect was going to happen, it would have manifested by now.  The idea of a some completely unseen side effect popping up 10 years from now after not manifesting anywhere after billions of doses, is a silly, unscientific boogeyman.
 

I'm sure it's unpleasant to go against your "convictions" about the vaccine. But frankly, if you signed on the dotted line to serve in the military, I don't give a rats ass about your vaccine convictions.  It's a lawful order and you follow it, or get out.  I have lots of convictions about weed, and facial hair, and wars i don't agree with but I know what I signed up for and I don't have a conniption every time the military tells me to shut up and color. 
 

**Huge caveat: Civilian side mandates are a completely different debate, and generally speaking, I think they're wrong. 

4 hours ago, glockenspiel said:

when some people dissent from social norm the rest of the flock will say “Politics” regardless of the reason for dissent. 
 

what can ya do? Here’s to another 50 pages lol

Actually, we've heard the reasons and they're hot garbage. So all that's left is to assume you're buying into the current political food fight and hanging your hat on whatever the reason of the day is. 
 

But go ahead and keep thinking you're some kind of edgy free thinker. You and *statistically speaking* about 100 million of the least educated people in the country. 

2 hours ago, FLEA said:

This doesn't make it political though. You've listed symptoms not causes and you seem to be jumping to a  conclusion based on an internal bias. You're not even understanding the facts you stated correctly. The Cominarty argument is not new. I posted about it back in September. There is an existing class action law suit against Austin on it. The fact that you just woke up to the realization that this has been ongoing does not mean people migrated, it means YOU weren't paying attention. 

As said before, the fact that the majority of people against the jab are conservative is a correlation but its not causation. Most republican voters are generally more cautious of authority. Additionally, conservative Protestants are usually Republican voters. So that comes as no surprise either. This goes deeper than politics but if you are going to hang up on that than just admit you don't care and move on with your life. 

Oh don't worry we are all well aware you guys have been banging the comirnaty drum since September.  It's actually become ridiculously tiresome. And no matter how many times the literal people who made the vaccine say it's chemically and effectively identical that's simply not good enough for you.  Oh and don't forget the best part.. that this is likely the first medicine in your life you've ever given a shit about the branding. Weird how that happens..
 

But yes, you're right. Nothing about your specific vaccine refusal overtly points to politics.  It's more of a deduction that I made for the following reasons:

a) none of your reasons for refusal make any sense

b) it's a white hot political food fight culture war issue right now

 

1 hour ago, FLEA said:

Can you explain how this is political? People keep parroting that without demonstrating what political victory comes out of this? I realize there is a divide in political affiliation between people who got the vaccine and didn't, but correlation does not mean causation. I think you are just searching for a rational reason to justify this without following that thought all the way through. 

It's blatantly political because each time the quoted "reason" for not getting the shot falls flat on its face, or becomes invalidated, the whole crowd migrates to a new reason.

Now we're stuck on "EUA vs comirnaty" despite them being completely identical from a chemical, safety, and effectiveness perspective. The fact that people are hanging their hat on branding semantics and the specific wordings of military orders tells me their vaccine refusal is grounded completely in ideology.

I would bet everything I own that the moment appropriately branded "comirnaty" shots become widely available, people will have magically found a new reason not to get it. 
 

And anecdotally, everyone I know refusing the shot were the annoying social media right wing political crusader "gubment can't tell me what to do" blowhard types before all of this started. But maybe you're right and they all suddenly found Jesus and/or became a FDA branding experts in the last few months purely by coincidence. 

First it was "I'm waiting on FDA approval" then it was a religious exemption, and now it's marketing name brand semantics.  It has become clear this is 100% political and nothing will ever be good enough for these people. They're doing a bad job of hiding the ball, and it's fun to watch the Air Force call them on it. 
 

A big part joining the military is putting duty  above political affiliation. But some of you have gotten so wrapped up in this vaccine debate that it's become a part of your political identity, and by extension, your personal identity. At that point you are putting your political priors ahead of duty and country, so I won't lose a wink of sleep when the military shows you the door. 

9 hours ago, brabus said:

Over the course of the last year, the vaccines have reduced the death rate by 0.16% (averaged over all age groups/total US population).

 

2. The vaccines have hardly moved the needle, despite what the MSM, gov reps, and Pharma say. Last 30 days death rate is only 0.16% less than the day prior to EUA. 

What are you talking about dude? Why are we comparing a single cherry-picked time interval from 2020 to our current 30 day rolling average? Let's look at the charts.
 

EUA was issued on Dec 11 2020

Current 7 day rolling average 

Weird.. Because the 7 day rolling average looks like a decrease of over 50 percent. Well, we'd better expand that to 30 days to encompass more of the 2020 trough and more of the 2021 spike. Isn't data fun?!
 

This methodology makes no sense because comparing two brief snippets in time tells you basically nothing. 
 

If we want to determine how well the vaccines prevent death, what if we compared the.. oh I don't know... 

DEATH RATES BETWEEN VAXED AND UNVAXED PEOPLE??

https://www.bmj.com/content/374/bmj.n2282

Turns out, you're 11 times more likely to die from delta if you're unvaccinated.  It's almost like you're ignoring the obvious data and doing calendar fuckery to come up with a reason to hate the vaccine. 

9 hours ago, FLEA said:

I would say your social circle is by far an outlier than and you all should probably take social distancing measures more seriously than lol. Either way, the argument still stands that the risk of myocarditis is about the same in either population sample. 

Why would my social circle be the outlier if it much more closely aligns with the CDCs total case estimate?

 

But fair enough, you did your risk analysis and made your decision. I don't think your methodology is sound (taking 1 day's risk level and extrapolating over 3 years) but let's assume for the sake of argument your estimate is correct and myocarditis risk is roughly equivalent. 
 

Wouldn't that still favor the vaccine? If it's basically a wash on the myocarditis front, you're getting the added protection from the vaccine with no net loss. 

16 hours ago, FLEA said:

Woah are we actually debating this again? Baseops crashed for 48 hours and I thought we all went through a day where we felt lost and helpless, followed by another day where we reconnected with our families and remembered there was a life outside of BO.net and arguing on the internet. 

 

I've posted this before but 19andMe has done one of the leading calculators for estimating cumulated risk of contracting COVID-19 based on a meta analysis of dozens of studies followed by a pretty impressive mathematical model. 

I ran the model for a 26 year old slightly healthier than average male in my zip code, unvaccinated, but taking basic social distance precautions based on the current local measures we had in place. This represents the average US Armed Forces enlisted service member.

Since the calculator only predicts risk in a 24 hour window, I had to accumulate that risk over a period of 1,095 event occurences to build a 3 year risk model. 

https://19andme.covid19.mathematica.org/

To your other point, I do not believe the occurrence rate will approach 100% as that is not what historically happens with viruses. There is a mathematical model that explains the waves and valleys of virus transmission and even during some of the most infectious pandemics in human history, the vast majority went without ever being exposed. 

 

Edit: rereading your post your method is flawed for several reasons. 1.) If the CDC estimate is really so far under you would then need to extrapolate that reduced risk to your remaining risk because people who are not reporting COVID-19 are not doing so because they do not have symptoms, hence, no problems. 2.) I don't think your risk is correct. If we just estimate 44% is ~1/2, bro, I've only known of like 6 people with COVID the whole pandemic. That's my whole base population since anytime there is a positive case here we shut down literally half the base and it's rather obvious. Do you really know that many people dropping off left and right that this passed your common sense test? 

Yeah the data passes the common sense test for me. I think most people know way more than 6 people who have had covid. I can name six in my squadron alone, and multiple in my immediate family. 
 

That is a cool risk calculator though. Haven't seen one with that much granularity before. I don't think sampling one day of risk and multiplying it by 1000 is going to be super accurate because community spread levels fluctuate massively. You could skew your risk estimate a lot in either direction by picking a day on a crest vs a trough and it's hard to know what a "standard day" if you will.. of covid risk really is. 

On 11/10/2021 at 11:41 AM, glockenspiel said:

Chances of contracting covid≠ 100%. 

chances of being vaccinated if you are vaccinated = 100%. 

Doesn’t seem like you are talking apples to apples. Not trying to do a gotcha or defending the article. It’s kind of like when people say 80% of patients who died in X hospital were vaccinated/unvaccinated without at minimum providing the population vaccination rate which that hospital serves. It doesn’t really mean anything.

Your chances of contracting the virus will absolutely approach 100% over time.  Especially when most of the vaccine hold outs choose to intentionally disregard the other mitigation measures as well.

On 11/10/2021 at 11:44 AM, FLEA said:

Actually the risk is exactly the same, 76 million vs 77 million. You forgot to multiply 450 time .17 to account for the fact that you have less than a 1/5 chance of actually getting COVID over a 3 year period. 

Where are you getting that 1/5 number in a 3 year period? If it's going off confirmed cases it is likely a gross underestimate of your actual risk because of reporting problems. The CDC estimates only 1 in 4 infections are reported which puts the total case estimate at 146 million infections from February 2020 to September 2021.

Based on my rough math that puts your chance of getting it around 44% for the last 1.5 year period, keeping in mind the majority of that timeframe was before the more contagious delta variant was the dominant strain. 

So to your point, yes you do need to multiply those risk numbers by your odds of contracting the virus. But your odds are a significant under-estimation. If we're already at 44% penetration in a year and a half, we can safely assume your risk of getting covid over a 3 year period would be well over 50%. Meaning the myocarditis risk calculation still falls well in favor of the vaccine. 

This is what we're talking about with you guys continuously posting and making life choices based on dumpster-tier information. So Forbes is saying that the Germans are saying that scientists are saying something? Cool. If you're such an independent thinker go find the study and see for yourself. 
 

You saw a headline you agreed with and posted it without looking into the associated data whatsoever. 
 

This tells me:

a) you aren't actually concerned about myocarditis

and 

b) apparently a MSM headline can be taken as gospel, but only when it conveniently aligns with your pre-existing biases.