Binoculars
Looking down into the canyon.
Tuesday November 9, 2010 — Tioga State Forest
The Polls Weren’t Great. But That’s Pretty Normal. | FiveThirtyEight
I’m not a pollster, although I’m often misidentified as one on TV. I wanted to get that out of the way because while, in practice, our lives probably get easier in a year where the polls are spot-on, FiveThirtyEight’s mission is really to take the polls as they are — for better or worse — and understand the sources of error and uncertainty behind them. This is true for both the probabilistic forecasts that we build and the reporting that we do. We’re also interested in how polls are perceived by the media and the public and how that sometimes conflicts with the way we think polls should be viewed.
Goats and Soda : NPR
One early November morning, a Peking duck cook, several construction workers and a software engineer patiently lined up outside a Beijing vaccine facility, awaiting their turn to be injected with a coronavirus vaccine still awaiting regulatory approval.
As countries around the world race to develop the first viable coronavirus vaccine, China's two biggest vaccine firms have already begun inoculating hundreds of thousands of mostly state workers in a bid to get a head start. But deploying unproven vaccines carries huge risks – both for those receiving the vaccination and epidemic control efforts. The major worry is that vaccinations will give people who've had them a sense of invincibility that is not warranted – and that could help spread the virus.
Shots – Health News : NPR
Wearing a mask protects the wearer, and not just other people, from the coronavirus, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention emphasized in an updated scientific brief issued Tuesday. And the protective benefits of masks are stronger the more people wear masks consistently and correctly, the agency says.
When the CDC first recommended that Americans wear cloth face coverings back in April, it cited evidence that the coronavirus could be transmitted by asymptomatic people who might not be aware of their infectiousness – a group estimated to account for more than 50% of transmissions. The agency said masks were intended to block virus-laden particles that might be emitted by an infected person.
Cuomo signs law making it harder to file lawsuits to stifle free speech
Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed a new law Tuesday making it harder for the rich and powerful to file nuisance lawsuits to stifle free speech and intimidate critics.
The new law targets “strategic lawsuits against public participation,” known as SLAPPs, usually brought forth by wealthy plaintiffs to hamper free speech.
Typically expensive and time consuming, these filings have been wielded by individuals seeking to oppress free speech, like Harvey Weinstein — who threatened to sue the New York Times for defamation after the newspaper published an expose on the disgraced movie tycoon’s history of sexual harassment.