Alex Bregman said:

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HtownAg92 said:

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rudy99 said:

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ChampagneAg said:

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You're being facetious if you can't differentiate that from a virus, aren't you?

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No, I'm not. Just wondering why we as a collective being just now started being worried about such a viruses that kill such a small percentage of the general population? Why weren't you scared last year during flu season?

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The flu has been around forever, and it is a bad-mf'ing-killer, but we've had measures and controls and medicines in place for years to help minimize the damage, and experience on how to handle it. So it is like this:

Say that you have a large pride of lions in your backyard. You've been raising lions in your yard for 100 years, and although they are wild killers, you have learned to keep them fairly in check. Once a year, seasonally, the lions go a little nuts and kill some family pets and a few household members. But you take extra precautions and keep the damage to a minimum, and eventually the crazy season ends and the lions go back to normal.

This year, just as you were about to finish the crazy season, someone drops a herd of velociraptors in your yard with the lions. You've never dealt with raptors before and they are doing some damage on top of what the lions already did. They are not doing as much damage proportionately to what the lions do, but it is still additional damage. You are learning how to control them on the job, in real time, but there is no precedent for raptors in your yard to look to for guidance. And these raptors seem to have ways to get around the lion-proofing that you do during the crazy season.

You cannot just sit back and say "well the raptors don't do as much as the lions, so I can ignore them". They don't stop killing and when you leave them unchecked, they seem to multiply. Eventually, though you cannot be certain, it looks like they can do as much damage as the lions if they aren't reined in. You have to do something to deal with this new raptor problem. And you have to do it fairly quickly, because you look at the calendar and crazy lion season is approaching again. The lions aren't going away and they are going to do their thing. Having raptors and lions joining together is a cause for concern.

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Does this mean Lina is our Chris Pratt?

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then Sly is the guy that gets eaten off the toilet.

CDC has a pretty nice visualization tool here:

https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid19/excess_deaths.htm



The Texas numbers will go up a bit as more recent data is included, but you can see that the 2017-2018 flu season was particularly intense, and the more recent two were not.

lunchbox said:

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TEA released school re-opening guidance today.

Summary...

• In order to receive funding for virtual students, the school building has to be open for those who want to go.
• The bldg has to be open 5 days a week for anyone that wants it - that ruins lots of plans already announced around the state for every other day, etc.
• You can't limit the number of students in a bldg. if every family wants to send their kid to school, they have to take them.
• The first 3 weeks can be used to phase in in-person learning.
• If there is a positive in the a school bldg, you can only close it for up to 5 days to clean. This can be superseded if the Governor shuts things down.
• Social distancing not mandatory, just recommended.
• Masks required for students 10+ due to Abbott's order last week.
• No guidance for how to handle staff/students who come down with COVID.

So...I would think a lot of ISDs are tossing out their plans and going back to the drawing board.

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TEA can EAD. I don't care so much about the rules themselves, but thanks for waiting until school districts had made serious plans, then wreck them all six weeks before school starts. Mike Morath makes Lina seem like a competent public official.

BBRex said:

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lunchbox said:

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TEA released school re-opening guidance today.

Summary...

• In order to receive funding for virtual students, the school building has to be open for those who want to go.
• The bldg has to be open 5 days a week for anyone that wants it - that ruins lots of plans already announced around the state for every other day, etc.
• You can't limit the number of students in a bldg. if every family wants to send their kid to school, they have to take them.
• The first 3 weeks can be used to phase in in-person learning.
• If there is a positive in the a school bldg, you can only close it for up to 5 days to clean. This can be superseded if the Governor shuts things down.
• Social distancing not mandatory, just recommended.
• Masks required for students 10+ due to Abbott's order last week.
• No guidance for how to handle staff/students who come down with COVID.

So...I would think a lot of ISDs are tossing out their plans and going back to the drawing board.

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TEA can EAD. I don't care so much about the rules themselves, but thanks for waiting until school districts had made serious plans, then wreck them all a six weeks before school starts. Mike Morath makes Lina seem like a competent public official.

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Hey I don't envy their job here either. I don't have any experience dealing with the TEA, but we have here a once in a lifetime event with lots of stakeholders. It's easy to get p-ssed at the people making the decisions, but frankly whatever they decided, whenever they decided it, someone was gonna be mad.

I'm not saying it is an easy call, but TEA pretty much has left districts to their own devices throughout all of this COVID stuff. Districts have spent time and money making plans for re-opening since May, and didn't get much at all in the way of guidance from TEA. And now, after the stakeholders have been surveyed, plans have been made, the technology purchased, the bus routes planned, NOW TEA wants to make some rules? It's ridiculous. Why bother planning? Districts that did nothing in the way of planning are rewarded for sticking their heads in the sand. The prudent, the cautious, the planners all get screwed.

That's why you let the districts start the year with the plans they have in place without penalty. Give them a timeframe to meet the guidelines, say by October or November. This is more about getting kids out of the house so parents can work than it is about anything else.

Only 204 new cases today

todays death was from two months ago

neat

Hospitalizations down also

terradactylexpress said:

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Those are massive drops, hopefully it's not a mountain of backlog

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There will be a big backlog spike in 2 weeks, just in time for 2 more weeks

It's almost as if the cases from the protests and funeral have run its course.

aTm2004 said:

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It's almost as if the cases from the protests and funeral have run its course.

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Just shut up and look the other way

jetch17 said:

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terradactylexpress said:

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Those are massive drops, hopefully it's not a mountain of backlog

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There will be a big backlog spike in 2 weeks, just in time for 2 more weeks

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I think the best part of COVID-19 has been do you giant decrease in number of "best dry cleaners in this neighborhood?" threads

When are the bars gonna open back up? I'm certainly ok having a drink at a "restaurant" (I put that in quotes bc it's questionable what qualifies these days), but just curious as I have a lot of friends who own and/or run them & they're going crazy. Don't really understand why restaurants can continue to operate at 50% capacity but bars cannot. You can sit at a table of 6-10 people at a restaurant with the tables spread out to keep people 6 feet apart, but can't do the same at a bar? Makes 0 sense to me.

Have students submit questions on the side or in the messenger during the meeting, not a free for all of interruptions. Mute all speakers except the teacher. Teacher reviews questions at the end and answers what they can. Get with others off line if they didn't get answer or still don't understand.

GOP convention cancelled!

schmendeler said:

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GOP convention cancelled!

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Dumb.

SirLurksALot said:

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schmendeler said:

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GOP convention cancelled!

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Dumb.

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Turner, a Democrat, cancels the GOP convention, but allows protests/demonstrations with fewer precautions than were going to be required at the convention.

Hmm

RVAg02 said:

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SirLurksALot said:

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schmendeler said:

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GOP convention cancelled!

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Dumb.

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Turner, a Democrat, cancels the GOP convention, but allows protests/demonstrations with fewer precautions than were going to be required at the convention.

Hmm

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My hope is that history will judge the lockdown crowd harshly as the hysterical hypochondriacs that they are.

F Sly.

These ****ing urban dim tyrant mayors are out of control. Protest where and when you want but don't you dare try to peaceably assemble and make your voice heard.
Where you at Wheels? This **** has got to stop.

schmendeler said:

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GOP convention cancelled!

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Just hold it as a march. Sly might even join like last month