Omicron-Mu-Gamma, Another Variant?
November 29, 2021
The Good News
- 3 men found guilty of murdering Ahmaud Arbery (CBS)
- New law will allow more vets with PTSD to get a specially trained service dog : Shots – Health News (NPR)
“Our decisions about transportation determine much more than where roads or bridges or tunnels or rail lines will be built. They determine the connections and barriers that people will encounter in their daily lives – and thus how hard or easy it will be for people to get where they need and want to go.” — Elijah Cummings
Rocky Roads Ahead
President Biden’s $1.2 trillion infrastructure package puts $110 billion of new spending into roads, bridges, and other megaprojects over the next few years. $66 trillion is earmarked for railways, including potential upgrades to Amtrak. New rail funding seeks to address Amtrak’s repair backlog, improve stations, replace old trains, create a path to modernize the nation’s busiest corridor (Washington-to-Boston), and bring rail lines to underserved cities and towns nationwide. It would be the biggest expansion in Amtrak’s 50-year history. It could also take months, even years, for some of the major undertakings to begin. Why? Because America’s biggest projects have a dismal history of long delays and billions in cost overruns, portending egregious setbacks to delivering on promises.
In recent years those cost overruns, engineering challenges, and political obstacles have made it almost impossible to complete a major, multibillion-dollar infrastructure project in the U.S. on budget and on schedule. In 2008, California voters approved a bond for a high-speed rail system from L.A. to San Francisco at an estimated cost of $33 billion and a completion date of 2020. Construction has encountered serious delays due to land acquisition issues, environmental litigation, permit setbacks, employee turnover, and significant design changes. The job is now projected to finish in 2033 for $100 billion, although those estimates are dated and there is an $80 billion funding gap.
In New York City, the goal of a 2006 construction contract award — to complete the East Side Access extension of the Long Island Railroad — was to cut some 40 minutes off commuter time on the last segment from Queens to Grand Central Station by operating up to 24 trains per hour at peak times. The $4.3 billion project was supposed to be completed by 2011; in 2008, the cost estimate was revised to $6.4 billion. However, additional design changes, underground tunneling problems, and coordination with other agencies means the Metropolitan Transportation Authority now envisions completion in December 2022 at a cost of $11.1 billion.
Central Washington State has been trying to clean up its Hanford nuclear weapons site for decades. But major construction at two partially-built plants to treat and vitrify 56 million gallons of radioactive sludge has been halted since 2013. When an independent review in 2015 found 362 significant design problems, the Energy Department announced a 17-year delay and estimated the system would become fully operational in 2036. The last cost estimate for the plants was $17 billion, up from $12.3 billion in 2013, and $4 billion 20 years ago. Unfortunately, as America begins her national infrastructure spending spree, many projects will likely face the same kind of cost, scheduling, and technical problems that have bedeviled ambitious efforts in the past. (WaPo, NYT)
7.5 Quake Hits Peru
- A 7.5 magnitude earthquake rocked northern Peru Sunday, collapsing a 16th-century Catholic church tower that is part of the oldest Catholic temple in the Amazonas region. At least four people were injured and 220 homes were seriously damaged or destroyed.
- Some roads and other infrastructure were damaged, but no deaths or serious injuries were immediately reported. Social media posts showed damage in other locations as well, including in a church in southern Ecuador; it was also felt in Colombia. The quake emanated from 70 miles below the Earth’s surface, hitting the sparsely populated region at 5:52 am local time.
- The epicenter was 25 miles northwest of Barranca, a coastal city of 63,000 people. Hours earlier a magnitude 5.2 temblor had struck; its epicenter was in the outskirts of Lima. Peru’s President Pedro Castillo Terrones visited the affected areas in the Amazonas region and vowed support for those affected by the quake. (NBC, CNN)
A Fish Come True
- The U.S. Navy reported Sunday it had rescued two Iranian fishermen who were adrift in the Gulf of Oman for eight days. Members of an international naval coalition got distress calls, after which the cargo ship USNS Charles Drew picked up the fishermen and provided medical care, food, and water.
- The Iranians, said to be “in good health and spirits,” were transferred to an Omani coast guard vessel near Muscat, Oman’s capital. Iranian state media didn’t report the news, as tensions continue to run high between Tehran and Washington. The two countries haven’t had diplomatic relations since 1979, although they signed a landmark nuclear deal in 2015 to restrict Iran’s ability to develop nuclear weapons in exchange for the lifting of international sanctions.
- In 2018, the Trump administration withdrew the U.S. from that agreement, and in 2020, Iran announced it would no longer abide by the plan. President Biden hopes to revitalize the deal, and indirect nuclear talks among the U.S., Iran, and other countries are set to restart Monday in Vienna. (NBC News)
Additional World News
- Iran nuclear talks to resume with world powers after five-month hiatus (Guardian)
- Calm returns as clean-up begins in Solomon Islands (Reuters)
- Barbados is ready to ditch Britain’s Queen. For many in the country, the move has been a long time coming (CNN)
- Tensions run high as Swiss vote on Covid vaccine certificate law (Guardian)
- Migrants stuck at Polish border feel cheated by people smugglers (Reuters)
- Deaths in Niger as protesters confront French army convoy (Al Jazeera)
- Hungary to tighten controls on air travel from seven African countries (Reuters)
Omicron-Mu-Gamma, Another Variant?
- Anthony Fauci, President Biden’s chief medical adviser, said Sunday that the newly discovered Omicron variant of Covid-19 shows signs of increased transmissibility. Omicron originated in South Africa, and cases have shown up in the U.K., Germany, Czech Republic, the Netherlands, Australia, and Canada.
- Countries have begun imposing travel restrictions in an attempt to slow the spread of the new variant. Israel is barring entry to all foreign nationals and Morocco is suspending all incoming flights for two weeks. Fauci said the mutations in Omicron are troublesome because “there are about 32 or more variants in that very important spike protein… which is the business end of the virus.”
- He warned that the U.S. could see a potential fifth wave of coronavirus infections amid rising cases and stagnating vaccination rates. The White House said President Biden, who has reiterated the importance of vaccinated people getting a booster shot, would “provide an update about the new variant and the U.S. response on Monday.” (Guardian)
Boebert The Clown
- A video surfaced over the Thanksgiving holiday showing Colorado’s far-right, self-adulating 35-year-old Republican representative Lauren Boebert apparently auditioning as a standup comic at a campaign event. Boebert, in a T-shirt emblazoned with “Guns Don’t Kill People, Alec Baldwin Does,” told her audience a story in which she and fellow House Representative Ilhan Omar (D-MN) were on an elevator.
- She says that a Capitol Police officer with “fret all over his face” ran toward it, arms outstretched as if to warn about something. Boebert said she looked over at Omar, then told the officer “Well, she doesn’t have a back pack. We should be fine.” Grinning broadly, Boebert doubled down with “Oh look. The jihad squad decided to show up for work today.”
- Rep. Omar said the incident never happened and that Boebert’s Islamophobic remarks are “no laughing matter.” After facing widespread condemnation, Boebert apologized “to anyone in the Muslim community I offended with my comment,” but House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) refused to criticize Boebert. On Sunday, Arkansas Republican Governor Asa Hutchinson said McCarthy was going in the “wrong direction” by not condemning Boebert’s anti-Muslim remarks. (Guardian, Yahoo News)
Additional USA News
- The Missouri auctioneer bidding it all for Trump’s backing (Politico)
- Schiff: January 6 committee decision on criminal contempt charges for Mark Meadows could come this week (CNN)
- No one seems to like the Lincoln Project anymore (Politico)
- Voluntary evacuations requested due to potential flooding in Northwest (The Hill)
- Supreme Court set to take up all-or-nothing abortion fight (AP)
- Man hid in plane’s landing gear from Guatemala to Miami, officials say (WaPo, $)
A Thanksgiving To Remember
At the opposite end of the civility spectrum is a Los Angeles woman, Kiki Nagy, who volunteers for Miry’s List, a Southern California-based group that helps refugee families settle in the U.S. Nagy wanted to host an Afghan family for their first Thanksgiving. She was connected with Wahidullah Asghary, and promptly invited the family over for their first Thanksgiving meal.
Asghary, a former translator and interpreter for the U.S. military in Afghanistan, came to the U.S. on a special immigrant visa in September 2020. He brought his four children, who tried learning English while enrolled in what at the time was an all-virtual school, and his wife five months later. Thursday was the Asgharys’ first American Thanksgiving.
Nagy made a big turkey, cranberry sauce, potatoes, and spinach. She also prepared a halal lamb to make sure the Asghary family could have something familiar to eat. The Asgharys arrived bringing dishes they, too, had prepared for the occasion. Asghary said his daughter, especially, liked all the food. “Every homeland, every nation, every people, every person, they have got a culture or tradition, right? So it is our first time, and now we want to learn a little bit about what this is, really,” Asghary said.
Nagy was eager not only to introduce the family to Thanksgiving dishes, but also to show them the tradition of giving thanks. “In the midst of this conflicting cultural moment, this narrative of division that we hear so much about … there is something essential to the American experience that is rooted in gratitude [and] volunteerism … you leave your country … and you come here with sometimes very little — sometimes with nothing. And you start over [and] create this opportunity for your family.”
The image of families trying to escape Afghanistan especially resonated with Tam Van Tran, another guest at Nagy’s Thanksgiving table. Tran was a refugee from Vietnam in 1975. He and his siblings arrived in the U.S. without their parents, one week before the fall of Saigon, when Tran was about the age of Asghary’s oldest children. They were welcomed into the home of another foster family in Mountain View, California.
Asghary said he tells his children about the opportunities they have in the U.S., and that what they must do is study. Nagy hopes one of their first lessons would be from their first Thanksgiving: “To see that … tolerance is really possible in the United States… I would want them to feel … that Americans are at heart, really a generous people.” (CNN)
Additional Reads
- The Arctic Ocean Was Invaded by Its Neighbor Earlier Than Anyone Thought (NYT, $)
- Great Barrier Reef: how a spectacular coral spawning event is helping to breed heat-tolerant corals (Guardian)
- Venus may be volcanically active (The Verge)
- Humans Have Broken a Fundamental Law of the Ocean (Wired)
- The ancient origins of glass (Ars Technica)
- A 3D ink made of living cells for creating living structures (Phys.org)
- Sappy ending: Canada digs deep into strategic reserves to cover maple syrup shortage (Guardian)