I should probably start off today by talking about the election.
Trump and Biden...Gianforte and Cooney...Bullock and Daines…
Who gives a shit?
We all voted, and no matter which of those clowns gets in...here in Missoula we’ll still be in lockdown mode well into January and probably beyond.
Right now we have a voluntary stay at home order, which is about as meaningless as you can get.
Here’s a question: what happens if I don’t stay home? What are you going to do to me? Who’s going to do it?
There’s no teeth to this order.
It’s like keeping prisoners in jail cells with no locks; using guns with no bullets to guard them.
Who’s pretending what here?
The hypocrisy of the second round of Missoula lockdowns was put on display over at RD today in regards to the airport.
It seems that being above average on passengers coming into Missoula is alright; being above average on new virus case counts is not.
And is there a possibility that the two could be related?
According to the health department, no - this is just community spread. But what do they know? They’ve admitted they’re so overworked that they can’t keep up with contact tracing.
I don’t think they know anything; I think they’re grasping at straws. That’s what the second round of lockdowns are - hoping against hope that some kind of restrictions will reduce the spread.
They won't.
The health department admits we’ll see two weeks of increased cases before we begin to see anything go down.
Isn’t it convenient that the new lockdown won’t be looked at again for two weeks...a time when the health department itself admits that cases will be even higher than now.
Do you really think the second lockdown will end on November 12?
I don’t.
And what about the Missoula Economic Partnership, which is headed up by failed congressional candidate and Colorado transplant Grant Kier?
He admitted the other day that Missoula will lose some small businesses with this second round of shutdowns.
And then we get these wise words from Mayor Engen.
“Businesses that have been leaders in best practices won't see much change in their operations," Engen said. "Businesses that have been largely ignoring guidelines and directives will see a change but their employees, customers and suppliers will be safer."
Typical politician bullshit.
The business I worked at followed all the guidelines and never once got a warning from the health department...but we’re forced to shutdown anyway.
And Engen is also giving us the kind of logic we can expect from a $100,000+ a year politician - why does he care about workers? He actually thinks that by eliminating a worker’s job, those workers will be safer.
Safer from what....a virus that had a 0.5% chance of killing them, if even that?
Now they have two weeks of lost wages, no federal unemployment to make it up, and rent due the first of the month same as always (let’s not talk about food, transportation, or even a little bit of entertainment).
I worked in a bar, seeing hundreds of different people a week while just wearing a polyester, gator facemask (you know, the ineffective ones?).
Never caught it.
The unelected health workers and department heads are a much greater threat to my safety, health and livelihood than the virus ever was or ever could be.
More and more people in Missoula are beginning to realize this.
Trump and Biden...Gianforte and Cooney...Bullock and Daines…
Who gives a shit?
We all voted, and no matter which of those clowns gets in...here in Missoula we’ll still be in lockdown mode well into January and probably beyond.
Right now we have a voluntary stay at home order, which is about as meaningless as you can get.
Here’s a question: what happens if I don’t stay home? What are you going to do to me? Who’s going to do it?
There’s no teeth to this order.
It’s like keeping prisoners in jail cells with no locks; using guns with no bullets to guard them.
Who’s pretending what here?
The hypocrisy of the second round of Missoula lockdowns was put on display over at RD today in regards to the airport.
It seems that being above average on passengers coming into Missoula is alright; being above average on new virus case counts is not.
And is there a possibility that the two could be related?
According to the health department, no - this is just community spread. But what do they know? They’ve admitted they’re so overworked that they can’t keep up with contact tracing.
I don’t think they know anything; I think they’re grasping at straws. That’s what the second round of lockdowns are - hoping against hope that some kind of restrictions will reduce the spread.
They won't.
The health department admits we’ll see two weeks of increased cases before we begin to see anything go down.
Isn’t it convenient that the new lockdown won’t be looked at again for two weeks...a time when the health department itself admits that cases will be even higher than now.
Do you really think the second lockdown will end on November 12?
I don’t.
And what about the Missoula Economic Partnership, which is headed up by failed congressional candidate and Colorado transplant Grant Kier?
He admitted the other day that Missoula will lose some small businesses with this second round of shutdowns.
And then we get these wise words from Mayor Engen.
“Businesses that have been leaders in best practices won't see much change in their operations," Engen said. "Businesses that have been largely ignoring guidelines and directives will see a change but their employees, customers and suppliers will be safer."
Typical politician bullshit.
The business I worked at followed all the guidelines and never once got a warning from the health department...but we’re forced to shutdown anyway.
And Engen is also giving us the kind of logic we can expect from a $100,000+ a year politician - why does he care about workers? He actually thinks that by eliminating a worker’s job, those workers will be safer.
Safer from what....a virus that had a 0.5% chance of killing them, if even that?
Now they have two weeks of lost wages, no federal unemployment to make it up, and rent due the first of the month same as always (let’s not talk about food, transportation, or even a little bit of entertainment).
I worked in a bar, seeing hundreds of different people a week while just wearing a polyester, gator facemask (you know, the ineffective ones?).
Never caught it.
The unelected health workers and department heads are a much greater threat to my safety, health and livelihood than the virus ever was or ever could be.
More and more people in Missoula are beginning to realize this.
Us Suckers
Dr. Scott Gottlieb was the head of the FDA from 2017 to 2019 and he’s one of the biggest voices of fear on covid right now.
Every chance he gets, he goes on TV and tells us this virus is out of control and that we need to race to that cure.
He says we’re a couple weeks away from looking like Europe, with huge case increases and more lockdowns. His friend Fauci today said we need a national mask mandate.
I hope you take what these men say with a huge grain of salt.
Fauci’s been in government for 40 years, and I don’t think you can trust people like that.
Gottlieb is a different breed of sinister.
He wants more lockdowns and more fear, but he also wants to see cases go up. And of course he wants a mandatory vaccine. Think how much money he’d make!
After all, he is on the board of directors for Pfizer.
Pfizer is currently doing a 44,000-person vaccine study for covid, hoping they’re the one that comes up with the primary vaccine that’ll be used around the world.
Imagine the money!
The stock is only worth $35 right now, but should that vaccine prove the one, it’ll be worth hundreds if not thousands.
Gottlieb will become ultra-rich overnight.
And that makes me wonder...is this really about our health, or just about the money?
$100,000 Transplants
The University of Montana doesn’t care about Montanans.
If they did, they’d hire a Montanan for their latest $100,000+ job opening, this time their dean of the College of Arts and Media.
Why does she deserve that much?
She knows how to play the flute.
The woman came here from Colorado where she was working at some university, and before that she was at a Michigan school.
Just another example of higher education’s revolving door.
Get bored or fuck up or just didn’t bring in the high-enough numbers at your school this year?
Hey, just move to some other university where you can start fresh, make bank, and when they find out in a few years that you aren’t worth an asshole on an elbow, just move to another school!
Here in Missoula, we’re stupid enough to pay these transplants to come here and tell us what we should think and say and believe.
Then after a couple years they move on to some other college town that they can ruin.
I feel sorry for any Montana parent that sends their kid to Missoula to go to university.
What a waste of money! It’s clear the university places no value on the money you give them, just handing it away to some transplant that doesn’t know anything about our state.
Be smart - don’t send your kid to a 4-year-school. Those days are over. Society has moved on...it’ll just take the universities four years to a decade to learn this.
Killing Time
I was locked down and locked out of work for 101 days last time, and I figure it’ll be about the same this go-round.
That’ll take me to early-February.
By then the election will be long over, most of the riots will have faded away, and the inauguration will have come and gone.
Where will the virus be by then?
I suspect Montana will be like New York is now - over it via herd immunity. Here’s how the Empire State is looking these days:
New York Covid deaths
New York has a 66% herd immunity rate, second behind New Jersey’s 71% (Montana is at 11%).
New York is the worst state, with one of the worst governors overseeing the problem. I mean, who else sent infected seniors into nursing homes? I don’t know how many Cuomo killed with that move, but one day we’ll find out. It’s sad how the media portrays him as a hero.
Here’s a look at the covid deaths seen across the country. As you can tell, without New York, America wouldn’t be doing so bad.
Without Cuomo, I should say.
US Covid deaths
Covid deaths by state
Anyways, here I am in the second lockdown and there’s nothing I can do about it.
I suppose I could go get another job working nights a few days a week, one that’ll allow me to keep watching the kids during the day.
But I probably won’t do that until I’m about out of money.
What I will do is try to focus a bit more on exercise this second go-round than I did the first. Gyms are still open, after all.
I think I’ll cut out the beer until the bars open up full-time again, which probably won’t be until next year sometime.
I’m going to focus more on video games, and beating some that I’ve had sitting around for awhile.
I just do PC gaming, as my wife doesn’t want a TV in the house.
PC gaming is a huge deal, representing $35 billion of the $150 billion overall gaming market.
In fact, it’s the biggest entertainment sector, by far. People spend two hours watching a movie, but dozens if not hundreds of hours playing a game.
I primarily use Steam for my gaming, and you can see the most played computer games around the world right now on their site.
Those are the top 20 PC games being played right now. As you can see, the main one - a first-person shooter game - has nearly a million people playing it each day, at all times.
And that’s not even getting into games like World of Warcraft or League of Legends, which are played on a different platform (it’s figured 4.8 million play the former, though how many at the same time I dunno).
Since we’re heading into the holiday season, most of the major publishers are putting out new games.
The big news this week was the delay of Cyberpunk 2077 for another three weeks after multiple delays already. This game is going to be a huge game. It’s already gone gold even before release, selling 500,000 copies.
The company’s last game - Witcher III - came out four years ago but is still played by tens of thousands each day. The game sold 25 million copies and made $250 million for its publisher.
The game Grand Theft Auto V came out five years ago but still has 100,000 people play it each day. That game made its publisher $6 billion...so far.
With Cyberpunk delayed, I think a lot more people will jump onto Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, which comes out November 9. I’m gonna play the hell out of that game on that day.
Hey, gotta do something to keep sane in these crazy times, right?
Two Campaigns
I’ll leave you today with images from both presidential campaigns at their Arizona rallies yesterday.
Still believe the polls?
Trump vs. Biden
