For my non bias friends

[g5000]

According to both the CDC and the pharmaceutical companies, you're not protected even with the vaccine.

COVID-19 vaccines are effective at preventing most infections. However, like most vaccines, they are not 100% effective.

COVID-19 Vaccination

COVID-19 vaccines protect against COVID-19. Get safety info and more.

www.cdc.gov

 

[initforme]

Lobbies should be illegal. Case closed.

 

[Unkotare]

Lobbies should be illegal. Case closed.

The Bill of Rights. Case opened.

 

[fncceo]

COVID-19 vaccines are effective at preventing most infections. However, like most vaccines, they are not 100% effective.

COVID-19 Vaccination

COVID-19 vaccines protect against COVID-19. Get safety info and more.

www.cdc.gov

There is a very good reason why COVID, and it's cousins influenza and the common cold don't have effective vaccines. It's the same reason why we don't have a effective vaccine for HIV or herpes.

It's something called an antigen, a protein on the surface of the virus. When our immune system encounters something new it doesn't like, it creates antibodies with receptors that match the antigens on the surface of the pathogen. Introducing dead or weak pathogen cells into a host creates antibodies for the pathogen, without making the host sick (or at least not seriously sick). That is how vaccines work.

That works terrific for measles, mumps, polio and other viruses where antigens don't readily mutate. It totally sucks for corona viruses like the cold, flu, and COVID, where antigens readily mutate.

These mutations are the reason we have variants.

These mutations in antigens are the reasons why we have annual flu shots and there is no cure for the common cold.

Just as getting this years flu shot will do nothing for next years flu, getting the COVID vaccine will do nothing for the next variant.

 

[fncceo]

Lobbies should be illegal. Case closed.

Lobbies are a natural reaction a congress where influence can be bought.

You can hate the game, but don't hate the playa.

 

[YoursTruly]

Lobbies are a natural reaction a congress where influence can be bought.

You can hate the game, but don't hate the playa.

I can personally hate both, if I want to.

 

[fncceo]

I can personally hate both, if I want to.

Not very productive, but whatever floats your boat.

 

[YoursTruly]

Not very productive, but whatever floats your boat.

Hating the system and the people running it, isn't hating on friends, family and life. It's just politics.

 

[fncceo]

Hating the system and the people running it, isn't hating on friends, family and life. It's just politics.

An author named P.J. O'Rourke wrote a book many years ago called "Parliament of Whores" which, very amusingly explained how our government works (or frequently doesn't work).

His conclusion of the book was that the "whores" in our government is us, the voters.

We continue to elect people not on the basis of their qualifications for the job or any expertise they might bring to their field. We elect people based on what they promise to give us.

We want politicians that we can influence to our advantage, or who we believe are already predisposed to act to our advantage.

When we don't like something, like new industries, or public smokers, or loud music in our neighborhoods, we can use can use our influence with politicians to outlaw the things we don't like. We don't have to deal with the things we find offensive and reach a compromise, we can get our hired goons in Congress or city government to make them go away.

So, until we stop giving politicians the power to do our dirty work, we can't, with any shred of personal integrity, complain when they occasionally allow someone else to influence them in a way we don't like.

Limit the power government has and you limit the influence of lobbies. When politicians become powerless, you eliminate any reason someone would have to influence them.

 

[Mac1958]

If you're a Biden or Trump supporter, this thread is not for you. If you think Afghanistan is Biden or Trumps fault, this thread is not for you. If you think Transwomen people should be able to compete with real women, or if transwomen should just keep that crap in their closet, this thread is not for you. If you think BLM has no racist members, or if you think BLM ONLY has racist members/supporters, this thread is not for you.

The point: There are those of us who see through the extremist in each and every party, topic or issue. We're not bias, racist, woke, supremist, bigoted, Or any of those other labeled code words that goes viral through social media.
We don't judge people by anything other than the content of their character.
If you get the vaccine, we don't care. If you don't get it, we still don't care. Because we realize it's your body. And it's up to you as to what you want put in your body or not. We realize that if people want to protect themselves, they'll do what they want to do so. Be it a vaccine or a gun.

Speaking of guns, we realize the importance of it. But also see how the NRA is nothing more than a lobbying group to the keep the gun & ammo manufacturers in business. And they use scare tactics like "The democrats are going to take your guns." We see through that BS too.

Long story short, we see through the BS that's built into most of these issues. We couldn't care less if the Republican and democratic party just disappeared. It wouldn't bother us if Q'anon, BLM, woke, Proud Boys and all the other bias groups just disappeared as well.

Maybe it's a pipe dream, wishful thinking, or hoping for change. But I'd like to see a group with this sort of mindset become popular.

Everyone has biases. That's not the problem. A proper level of bias is perfectly healthy and constructive, for that matter. In order to fix problems, you need to begin with input and biases from all directions. But there is a difference between a healthy bias and abject rigidity.

I think the problem is that adherence to an ideology robs a person of their curiosity. Once that is gone, an individual stops trying to understand the perspectives, life experiences, priorities and opinions of others. Then they substitute all that with their own distorted, ignorant, ugly version of them. The door to their mind is shut. Their world is now binary.

This is why America can no longer fix big problems. Americans don't understand each other, and we no longer even care to.

 

[toobfreak]

Am I supposed to?

I would hope so. What other possible point could you have here other than trying to justify your own ideology publicly to yourself? Mind you, I didn't say I necessarily disagreed with any of it.

 

[Donald H]

According to both the CDC and the pharmaceutical companies, you're not protected even with the vaccine.

Sorry, I didn't know you were a Trumper.
Vaccines don't protect Trumpers.

 

[Donald H]

BS. My immune system may be the ONLY protection I need. You can't say what anyone person will or won't die, or even get severely sick from Covid. I know people who were tested positive who didn't even feel sick at all.
If I got it before I was vaccinated, I didn't know it. I rarely used my mask or didn't get vaccinated until recently. And that was only because I was planning to vacation out of the country.

Well that makes everything different if you're vaccinated. You sort of led me to believe that you weren't and you won't be.
It appears that all the government leaders who are advising against the vaccines, are themselves vaccinated.