the waffle waivers

"up, it being a publique fast, as the first wednesday of the month, for the plague, i within doors all day..." samuel pepys diary 2 august 1665.

i spent the day "within doors" yesterday perusing thomas more's "utopia" and looking around the media...something i have been doing this morning as well and as a result i am undecided about content and motive...could be that the wheels of bureaucracy grind slowly...cold be that the media mavens are as human as the rest of us and so, at times, as readily confused by events which are almost always more complex than they appear with variables that easily escape limited human cognition...still...one would think they'd get their story straight...then again that is difficult when the politicians that use the media are seemingly dithering...

if "the administration" has been sending " conflicting messages" and doing so "for weeks", the media have readily propagated the confusion...

on line the n y times is right there purporting an imminent change in policy at the cdc for days...

al jazeera is chimes in with them...the times influence on the news? or just something to write about ( yes you could accuse me of that as well )...

at the beeb it is confined to the opinion pages...

even people magazine is weighing in...a trusted source...

and in the meantime cbs news has tacked in the opposite direction which serves to exacerbate the confusion...

then again, cbs may just be following the lead of the cdc which...as of 6:27 a.m. today is still telling people that if they are not ill with covid-19 they do not "need" to wear a mask unless caring for someone with the disease who cannot wear one...saving the masks for caregivers..who, again, do need to be protected...however the difference in efficacy of masks for them versus the general public is still a matter that only adds to the confusion out there...one could wish for consensus...one also realizes that in this sort of situation in a trumpist america, consensus could be soothing propaganda rather than something factually useful in making decisions in the face of a pandemic that now officially infects 1/7600 of the world's population...that this number is untrustworthy is obvious...no one knows the actual total...supposition is the root of the confusion...there is little doubt in my mind that the confusion will go on..look for the cdc to change its face mask recommendations sometime or other...look for the suggestion to be cloth masks, not n95...and look for the chinese to be relieved that we are finally covering up.