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Cheryl Rofer

You are here: Home / Archives for Cheryl Rofer

Retired chemist. I've done a lot of chemistry that has to do with policy, particularly nuclear policy.

Cheryl Rofer has been a Balloon Juice writer since 2017.

We’ve Got To Do Better

by Cheryl Rofer|  January 26, 202112:41 pm| 222 Comments

This post is in: COVID-19 Coronavirus, Daydream Believers

I received my first dose of the Moderna covid-19 vaccine yesterday. I’m incredibly grateful and find my free-floating anxiety much relieved. I have an appointment for the second dose. No more reaction than a sore arm so far.

But the method of getting it leaves much to be desired.

New Mexico has a vaccine registration website. If you’re in New Mexico and you haven’t signed up yet, do it now. I’ll wait.

I signed up early and got replies via email and text that I was registered, with my registration number. They added some things to the website and said if you didn’t fill them all out (not onerous), you wouldn’t be contacted. Fortunately, I kept checking and updated my registration.

And then I heard nothing. The state told local media that Group 1A, medical personnel and people in congregate living situations, were completed in early January. But I talked to a friend in a retirement community shortly after that, and she was just about to get her shot the next day.

Further, they were moving on to Group 1B, which should include me. But no notification. I complained on Twitter to tweets from Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham and the New Mexico Department of Health. Letters to the editor from others in Group 1B started appearing in the Santa Fe New Mexican. The New Mexican ran a couple of stories about groups received their vaccine seemingly out of the stated order. They were deserving people – one group that feeds the homeless and teachers. Hard to disagree that they should get the vaccine.

The problem was the seeming disconnect between what we read or heard in the news and what we saw happening. Notification through the registration system what group we were in and an approximate date we might get the vaccine might have helped. But nada. I began to wonder if the registration meant anything at all.

Out of the blue, on Saturday night, I received a text and an email. I could sign up for an appointment! I ran to the computer and got my second choice of time, my priority criterion being AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. That was yesterday at noon.

Snow complicated my plans. I shoveled the driveway, and by eleven it and the uphill road out of my neighborhood were clear.

I expected to see something out of my childhood, updated. Entry personnel with computers to check my registration and appointment numbers. A socially-distanced line of seniors. Multiple vaccination stations, with personnel ready to inject. An area of socially-distanced chairs in which to wait to see whether there would be a reaction. I wondered where that would be at the supermarket, but maybe they had a large back room for meetings and such.

When I arrived, I looked for signs directing me to the vaccination area, but they weren’t there. The man cleaning carts told me it was at the pharmacy, down thataway.

That was it. The usual pharmacy area, enhanced with four chairs for making out the paperwork and sitting afterwards. The usual pharmacy staff, two people behind the counter that I could see, were doing their usual things, plus checking appointment numbers and handing out the paperwork that asked the same questions I had answered on the website. The signatures and paper were probably to absolve the supermarket of responsibility.

The tech called me to the back room and administered the shot. Yay!

There were about four or five of us. Four or five per half-hour. Any more throughput would have required more personnel. I think vaccinations were available for eight hours. That’s eighty people a day.

The population of Santa Fe is 84,000. The surrounding rural areas add up to 100,000. At eighty a day, that will take 1,050 days to vaccinate all of Santa Fe, more to include the surrounding areas. That’s three years. Let’s say that there were three vaccination clinics yesterday in Santa Fe – the state isn’t telling us how many there are. That’s still a year to go. And we don’t know whether the supply of vaccine will be there. Yesterday the Biden team said they didn’t know how much vaccine they had.

Joe Biden has brought a capable team in to manage the response to the pandemic. Because the Trump team would not cooperate during the transition, they are playing catch-up. Biden plans to use FEMA for the kind of vaccine clinic I was expecting to find. FEMA sounds enthusiastic about the assignment. The states depend on the feds for supply and information, both of which have been disappointing.

Delays are baked into the system, but let’s hope things speed up in the next few weeks.

We’ve Got To Do BetterPost + Comments (222)

Good Riddance

by Cheryl Rofer|  January 20, 20218:17 am| 268 Comments

This post is in: Dolt 45, Open Threads

Marine One arrives to pick up POTUS pic.twitter.com/2OSdq3lmJ0

— joe johns (@joejohnscnn) January 20, 2021

Trump’s White House departure has been delayed by about half an hour. He’s still expected to speak at Joint Base Andrews — notably without a teleprompter.

— Kaitlan Collins (@kaitlancollins) January 20, 2021

Typically Trump is late for departure. No truth to the rumor that they’re having to pry him from the bedpost pic.twitter.com/QAY2BBvRtI

— Brian J. Karem (@BrianKarem) January 20, 2021

The scene at JBA pic.twitter.com/y7p8bpajwT

— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) January 20, 2021

Donald Trump has left the White House pic.twitter.com/qm8hA1Mqdu

— Tom Namako (@TomNamako) January 20, 2021

Good RiddancePost + Comments (268)

Afternoon Open Thread – Tomorrow Will Be Bad

by Cheryl Rofer|  January 18, 20214:02 pm| 190 Comments

This post is in: Open Threads

Prepare yourselves.

The Senate comes back into session, with Trump’s trial ahead of it and who knows what from Mitch McConnell. Maybe he has a few more judges to slam into the system.

Trump will issue pardons to 100-200 loathsome people, so we will hear their names and relive their crimes.

But at 5:30 Eastern, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris will host a memorial to remember and honor the lives lost to COVID-19. As much as we need a light at the end of the tunnel, we need to mourn and observe the lives of so many who have been lost to the pandemic, exacerbated by the US government.

Here’s how you can participate:

  • Light a candle in your window and join fellow Americans for this national moment of remembrance.
  • Light up city buildings at 5:30 local time in a light amber color.
  • Ring a bell at 5:30pm ET on January 19 during the national ceremony to join us in a collective moment of remembrance.

You can tune in at 5:30pm ET for the ceremony featuring the first-ever lighting of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool to honor those who have died. Also on Facebook and other usual suspects.

Afternoon Open Thread – Tomorrow Will Be BadPost + Comments (190)

Light At The End Of The Tunnel

by Cheryl Rofer|  January 18, 202111:46 am| 163 Comments

This post is in: Biden-Harris 2020, COVID-19 Coronavirus

One of the things that has made endurance difficult through the pandemic is the lack of an endpoint. A great many yardsticks are available from many sources – cases by day or month, numbers of hospital beds available, hospitalizations, deaths – but not when things are likely to get better, when we can see our friends and family in person again, when children can return to school, when we can feel safer.

The measures we have go up and slightly down, then up again. They can be tied to the early call to “open things up” long before it was wise to, with no plans for stopping the spread. They can be tied to the politicization of measures, like mask-wearing, that might have helped to stop the spread. The general movement in numbers has been upwards, to our current state of almost 4000 deaths daily and a total of 400,000 dead, a medium-sized city of Americans gone forever.

In New Mexico, we’ve seen a bump up from the holidays, and the numbers seem to be going down again, but we don’t know whether that will last.

The lack of an endpoint results from the lack of a plan. So parents feel like they will be teaching their children at home forever. Senior citizens feel like they will be isolated in their homes or retirement communities forever. Young people feel like they will never be able to go to a restaurant again or have a party. It is not surprising that they take any excuse to break the rules, which feel arbitrary because there are so many voices.

But Joe Biden has plans for addressing covid-19 and for vaccinating people quickly. The plans contain markers that we will see being met (or not). One hundred million vaccinations within the first 100 days. Make vaccines more available in more places, like through mobile vaccination clinics. Hire people to trace contacts. Provide funds to schools to prepare for safe in-person learning.

If everything in these plans is carried out, we will begin to see an endpoint. Case numbers and deaths will decrease. We will be able to do some normal things, like go to the store, without feeling that we are endangering our lives. Children will go back to school.

The virus is so widespread now that nothing will happen quickly. We’ve watched the maps turn redder and redder with uncontrolled community spread. Time delays are built into decreases in numbers, just as they are for increases. Ron Klain, President-elect Biden’s chief of staff and manager of Barack Obama’s response to the Ebola virus, says that we will see a total of a half-million dead by the end of February.

We're not going to "happy talk" this virus away. It's time for being straight with the American people about the crisis we are facing. When people say that the Biden "American Rescue Plan" is "too big," ask them if they appreciate just how big a mess we are facing. https://t.co/9ebKxCAx1B

— Ronald Klain (@RonaldKlain) January 17, 2021

The pandemic has momentum. But if we mask up for 100 days, if Congress grants a more appropriate level of support, the Biden plans will work. We can start to see a turnaround by the end of February, slow at first, then gathering speed. For now, that turnaround is my light in the tunnel. Once we get there, we will start to see the light that is the end of the pandemic.

Cross-posted to Nuclear Diner

Light At The End Of The TunnelPost + Comments (163)

Major Biden’s Indoguration Party – Sunday!

by Cheryl Rofer|  January 15, 20215:17 pm| 59 Comments

This post is in: Pet Blogging, President Biden, Something Good Open Thread

Major Biden leading his chosen human. Taken at Delaware Humane Association

Major Biden will be the first shelter dog to live in the White House. His shelter, the Delaware Humane Association, is having a Zoom party on Sunday to celebrate. You and your dog are invited, for a contribution of $10.

‘Zoom’ in with your pup to:

Major Biden’s Indoguration Party 

Hosted by the Today Show’s Jill Martin with special guest Sir Darius Brown 

Sunday, January 17 at 3pm EST

A $10 minimum donation is required to attend this event.

100% of donations go to DHA’s relief efforts during this difficult time.

RSVP here and Claim Your Spot Now

That last link should take you to the registration page.

Major’s backstory (adorable picture of puppies at link):

In early 2018, the shelter received a litter of six German shepherd puppies, including the future first dog. The puppies were in a medical crisis.

“They were very sick,” said Patrick Carroll, executive director of the Delaware Humane Association. “They had gotten into a toxic substance. We’re not sure what.

“The dogs were lethargic, vomiting and hospitalized for a few days,” Carroll says.

The pups bounced back. They recovered with fluids and medication. The shelter posted to Facebook in March 2018 in search of foster homes. According to Carroll, Ashley Biden sent the post to her father, knowing he was looking for a companion for the aging Champ.

Joe Biden showed up.

“He just dropped in on Easter Sunday of all days,” Carroll said, “and wanted to meet the puppies.”

Soon, Major was in foster with the Bidens. Within months, the news broke that he had found his forever (fur-ever?) home. Biden returned to the shelter with a grown Major to officially adopt him in November 2018.

Open thread for pleasant stuff.

Major Biden’s Indoguration Party – Sunday!Post + Comments (59)

A Statement From The President

by Cheryl Rofer|  January 13, 20217:01 pm| 211 Comments

This post is in: Impeachment, Open Threads, Trumpery

Twitter allowed him to put it on The White House account.

pic.twitter.com/FIJbvCYGJ6

— The White House (@WhiteHouse) January 13, 2021

1. The right words (mostly)

2. Two months too late

3. Usual insipid delivery

4. Didn’t say Biden won in a free and fair election.

5. Mentioned cancel culture (wants his Twitter back)

6. A pinch of bothsides thrown in.

Must have taken a lot of repeating that he’s gonna be a private citizen a week from now and subject to arrest to get him to do that speech.

Open Thread, ’cause that’s all we’ve got these days.

A Statement From The PresidentPost + Comments (211)

William Burns To CIA Director

by Cheryl Rofer|  January 11, 202112:19 pm| 47 Comments

This post is in: President Biden, Rofer on International Relations

Auto Draft 37

President-elect Joe Biden’s nomination of William Burns to be director of the CIA is an inspired choice.

Burns is the most senior and most respected diplomat in the US today. He is currently president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, one of the think tanks to which experts go when they are out of government. It’s also the sponsor of the Carnegie Conference on Nuclear Policy, which I’ve attended for the past decade or so, also known as #nukefest. It’s THE gathering for experts on international nuclear issues. The next one will be virtual, in June.

Burns has been ambassador to Jordan and to Russia and has held a number of high posts in the State Department. He and Jake Sullivan (who is to be Biden’s National Security Advisor) laid the groundwork for the JCPOA agreement with Iran.

Why CIA? Many people expected Biden to name him as Secretary of State, but Antony Blinken will serve there. The head of the CIA is usually chosen from within the organization.

Gina Haspel is currently the director of the CIA. She is one of the few Trump appointees who actually has a background in and commitment to her agency. But she also was chief of a black site in Thailand during the Bush 43 administration. It’s time to repudiate the role of torture in intelligence gathering.

Diplomats are not strangers to the world of intelligence. Every embassy abroad includes CIA employees along with those from the State Department, the Russian embassy more than most. The State Department uses intelligence generated by the CIA, its internal agency, and other government intelligence agencies.

Burns is one of the best analysts of foreign affairs the country has. Here’s what he had to say about Russia in 2017. He’s also written a series of articles for The Atlantic.

We can read a number of messages into Burns’s nomination:

  • Competence is back (This is a general message across Biden’s nominations)
  • No more torture
  • Tilt toward State Department as maker and executor of foreign policy
  • Russia, we’ve got your number
  • Allies, you can begin to trust our intelligence services again.

Photo: The Guardian

Cross-posted to Nuclear Diner

William Burns To CIA DirectorPost + Comments (47)

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