Covid and the End-of-the-World Behavior

 After about 500 days of observing the Covid-19 crisis, one comes to the conclusion that we have a lot of people who now see in some strange way....Covid being the end-of-the-world type of chaos.

You could walk into an arena with 500 people now infected with Covid, and find 495 people recovered.....four folks having spent a week in a ICU situation, and one guy/gal either died or came pretty close to death (from pneumonia, not Covid).

The 495 folks will want to talk about their fever, their aching joints, or their severe cough.  

The problem is that thousands of folks from outside of the arena will want to talk about the virus from a life or death prospective....confusing themselves, and those listening to them.

Did the outsiders ever chat over flu in this way?  Well....no.

If people would take this behavior into Chicago and talk about weekend shootings in the same way.....as being a end-of-the-world situation?  Maybe they'd accomplish something (maybe).  

Going to Mandatory Covid Shots for Military?

 Oddly enough....the Pentagon said early on....they weren't going to make the Covid shots mandatory.  If you go asking how many folks have been vaccinated...the Pentagon says (around the 1st of July) that it's up near 70-percent.  

The Navy ranks near 77-percent.....the AF sits at around 60-percent.  I should note that the Marines are a good five or six points under the AF.  

Well....rumor has it that the Pentagon is discussing a August-September 'order' mandating this....no exceptions.

Counter-chatter?  Some Army folks have been direct....they won't agree to it.  Numbers?  Unknown.  

What'll happen?  I expect the order to arrive before October, and they try to quickly push out a thousand folks....to show they 'control' the problem.  Once you get to around 3,000 folks dismissed....Congress will step in and ask questions.

In the case of the Air Force?  You have a fair number of people with unique skills that you can't readily replace quickly.  My humble guess is that they will hire up contractors (with the vaccinations) at a fair sum of money, and just hand the bill back to Congress to pay.

If they dismiss more than 10,000 total....across the four services?  It'll turn into a scandal situation that can't be explained in public.  

But here's the curious thing.....these statistics I quote...are active-duty only.  No one is talking Guard or Reserve.  My humble guess is that they are closer to 40-to-50 percent, and they really won't be agreeable to a mandated shot.