Five Questions for Oregon's Governor Kate Brown

Since Oregon's governor is spending her days in the bunker, sheltering in place against uncomfortble questions, I would like to take a moment of everyone's time to ask her five questions that should be asked.

This is in response to Governor Brown extending the dire state of tragic emergency to July 6th. https://www.oregonlive.com/coronavi...coronavirus-state-of-emergency-to-july-6.html

First Question:

The state of dire and tragic emergency was declared when epidemiologists predited that the deaths in Oregon alone would be 458,000. The predicted death rate was then reduced to 22,000 in Oregon, then 1,800, then to 500, and the latest estimate is now 171. For prespective, the Oregon death toll from the flu last year was 572. https://www.livestories.com/statistics/oregon/influenza-flu-pneumonia-deaths-mortality

In retrospect, if you knew the covid 19 pandemic was only going to be one-third less deadly than the flu, would you have still wrecked the Oregon economy? (The corollary question is knowing that next flu season will be three times more deadly than Covid19, are you going to wreck Oregon's economy every flu season?)

Second Question:

Out of Oregon's 36 counties, 26 counties had either no or one covid19 deaths. Does a one size fits all closure of the state make any sense whatsoever? Is Wheeler County (Population 1,366) so much like Multnomah County (Population 812,855) that statewide revocation of people's rights make sense?

Third Question:

Why were golf courses the first thing that opened up in the State of Oregon? Well, aside from the fact that golf is the sport of the affluent elite. Why weren't hospitals opened up for non-life saving procedures, including mammograms, first in light of the fact that hospitals are now laying off staff because the tidal wave of people dying from covid129 never materialised. Why is health and medicine taking a back seat to golf?

Fourth Question:

How many business are being wrecked by extending an unneeded abbrogation of citizen's rights and do you really expect those businesses to come back? https://www.oregonlive.com/coronavi...osed-permanent-during-coronavirus-crisis.html

Is the crushing of small business owner's financial lives and dreams worth the over-reaction to an illness one-third as deadly as the flu?

Fifth Question:

Is there any empirical evidence that the draconian shutdown of the State saved any lives? How many lives were truly spared? I am not referring to those individuals in hospice care who were given 30 days to live if covid 19 wasn't present, which seem to be the bulk of covid 19 deaths in Oregon. I am referring to people who would probably have lived another 15 years if not for the coronavirus.

 

Would you be so kind as to point out the exact words I used to state that I was dissappointed that not enough people died. You can't? Why is that? Because I have never expressed that. It is simply a clumsy attempt at a strawman argument. Perhaps a little introspection would be in order to understand why one would assume another is in favor of more death. Do you believe that it isn't possible to disagree with your personal position and not be in favor of a lot of people dying? Are you creating a false dichotomy? Perhaps there is a possibility of something other than binary thoughts. Maybe there is an area where agreement could occur somewhere in the middle, between the most extreme positions. Is it possible that one could hope for intelligent, carefully crafted Emergency measures that actually do the most good in saving lives while trying to minimize the destructive collateral damage to people's livelihoods, the economy, and the hopes and dreams of the hardest working people in the country?

 

The 458,000 number was a number dreamed up by alarmists using computer modelling. The number was almost immediately discredited by most epidemiologists within days of the Oregon Governor locking down the state. Since most Oregon Covid19 deaths occured in nursing homes after the lockdown was already in place, and more than 14 days after the lockdown, there is no evidence that the lockdown did anything other than give government officials a warm fuzzy feeling.

County lines are nebulous things but geographic reality is very real in Oregon, which would explain the vast disparity in infection rates in different parts of the state. There are also counties in Oregon that were always praticing social distancing based on geographic distance long before Covid 19 ever occured. It does no good to lock down areas of the state that have never been and never will be at risk.

Its about priorities. But I drive by a golf course twice a day to get to work, there is no social distancing happeneing on the golf links.

We do have states and countries that didn't lock down and there were no bodies piling up like cordwood. Many jurisdictions locked down access to convalesence centers only and had better outcomes than places with draconian lockdowns. Viruses always spread like wildfire. Covid19 is no different. If the death rate is less than or about equal to the flu, then why are special takings of your rights necessary.

The fact of the matter is; nobody knows what would have happened if there wasn't a lockdown, or even if an intelligent lockdown was implemented. Certainly those epidemiologists who predicted 22 million deaths in America alone cannot be taken seriously anymore.

The world is sadly run by lemmings. Much of the world, but not all of the world, were stampeded by supposed experts who came before us and predicted a billion deaths in the world and 22,000,000 million deaths in the United States. Those numbers were off by several orders of magnitude. Perhaps putting faith in the most hysterical rantings of supposed experts, in retrospect, was an unwise venture.