32% is such a strange cut-off point that it ought to make anyone immediately suspicious that they're being tricked. What happens to the data if you make it a round 30% or 35%? And how many counties are there that are that dramatically lopsided?
It's depressing how easy it is to lie to people with numbers, declare it "SCIENCE!", and have them gobble it up.
I would debate you that the NY Times is any better than Fox News at this point.
But reading your article, I had a small epiphany. My father was "working class." He was also self-educated and knew words I didn't know with an English lit education. We didn't always equate "working class" with dumb. Only the silly European "nobility" did that because many of the American self-made wealthy people came from the working class. Working class people were considered clever, driven, and resourceful, perhaps more so than those who grew up with "silver spoons" in their mouths. That had always been the American narrative. But that narrative has changed. Working class people now deserve their squalid lives because they are not smart enough to live any better. Guess which party is pushing that line, implied or outright? Not the Republicans, who have in the past equated working class with not driven enough to get really wealthy but still, I think, bore them some grudging respect. But the Democrats, who see them as too stupid to figure out things for themselves and therefore in need of stronger, wiser people to force them into conformity for their own and society's "greater good."
Granted, this attitude has not developed overnight. It's been developing for a while. But the Democrat Party, with their condescending attitude and ignoring of the reality that economics unites people far more than race, religion, gender, etc., has bred an incredible mistrust in not just conservatives. I'm a liberal, but I have no faith in the Democrat Party or the media because they are not liberal. They look down on the very people they should be showing the most understanding to and then they lump us "questioning" liberals in with the "dirty, bigoted" conservatives.
The working class knows that the Democrats and the media look down on them, like the nobility used to look down on the peasants. It's becoming more and more clear. And until that changes (fat chance), we're going to live in chaotic, if not dangerous, times. They should go read a little Marx. He did have it right about what happens when you treat your laboring class like they're doing.
Trump was the country's foremost vaccine advocate, even to a fault. Ironic that news media and social media totally censor him and are shocked and appalled that people aren't taking well to the threatening propaganda.
PS - the "fox is worse" disclaimer every time a prominent liberal rag lies is lame. At this point, it's arguably not even true.
This is a good essay, but between the lines you seem to be suggesting (correct me if I'm wrong) that vaccine hesitancy must be based on misinformation. I think most of us have seen Jonathan Isaac's explanation for why he's not getting vaccinated. Was there any misinformation there? If so, I didn't catch it.
Okay, so I'm still trying to learn how to do the whole 'distinguish significant confounding variables' thing, and I understand how death rates don't skew republican, but what about vaccine hesitancy? Older people are more likely to get the jab, and republicans skew older, yet they are also much more likely to be un-vaxxed than dems -- doesn't this show the most significant factor of vaccine hesitancy is partisanship? This is the main argument I'm getting from libs who desperately want to blame R's for vaccine hesitancy
32% is such a strange cut-off point that it ought to make anyone immediately suspicious that they're being tricked. What happens to the data if you make it a round 30% or 35%? And how many counties are there that are that dramatically lopsided?
It's depressing how easy it is to lie to people with numbers, declare it "SCIENCE!", and have them gobble it up.
I would debate you that the NY Times is any better than Fox News at this point.
But reading your article, I had a small epiphany. My father was "working class." He was also self-educated and knew words I didn't know with an English lit education. We didn't always equate "working class" with dumb. Only the silly European "nobility" did that because many of the American self-made wealthy people came from the working class. Working class people were considered clever, driven, and resourceful, perhaps more so than those who grew up with "silver spoons" in their mouths. That had always been the American narrative. But that narrative has changed. Working class people now deserve their squalid lives because they are not smart enough to live any better. Guess which party is pushing that line, implied or outright? Not the Republicans, who have in the past equated working class with not driven enough to get really wealthy but still, I think, bore them some grudging respect. But the Democrats, who see them as too stupid to figure out things for themselves and therefore in need of stronger, wiser people to force them into conformity for their own and society's "greater good."
Granted, this attitude has not developed overnight. It's been developing for a while. But the Democrat Party, with their condescending attitude and ignoring of the reality that economics unites people far more than race, religion, gender, etc., has bred an incredible mistrust in not just conservatives. I'm a liberal, but I have no faith in the Democrat Party or the media because they are not liberal. They look down on the very people they should be showing the most understanding to and then they lump us "questioning" liberals in with the "dirty, bigoted" conservatives.
The working class knows that the Democrats and the media look down on them, like the nobility used to look down on the peasants. It's becoming more and more clear. And until that changes (fat chance), we're going to live in chaotic, if not dangerous, times. They should go read a little Marx. He did have it right about what happens when you treat your laboring class like they're doing.
Trump was the country's foremost vaccine advocate, even to a fault. Ironic that news media and social media totally censor him and are shocked and appalled that people aren't taking well to the threatening propaganda.
PS - the "fox is worse" disclaimer every time a prominent liberal rag lies is lame. At this point, it's arguably not even true.
This is a good essay, but between the lines you seem to be suggesting (correct me if I'm wrong) that vaccine hesitancy must be based on misinformation. I think most of us have seen Jonathan Isaac's explanation for why he's not getting vaccinated. Was there any misinformation there? If so, I didn't catch it.
Okay, so I'm still trying to learn how to do the whole 'distinguish significant confounding variables' thing, and I understand how death rates don't skew republican, but what about vaccine hesitancy? Older people are more likely to get the jab, and republicans skew older, yet they are also much more likely to be un-vaxxed than dems -- doesn't this show the most significant factor of vaccine hesitancy is partisanship? This is the main argument I'm getting from libs who desperately want to blame R's for vaccine hesitancy