Ophthalmologists, optometrists, opticians report significant regional increases in patients no longer seeing “because they don’t want to,” FDA specialists say; researchers looking into origins of “willful blindness” in GOP-controlled states where truth generally faces uphill battles; CDC sees potential link between low rates of Covid 19 vaccinations and nearly two-year-old epidemic of refusal to accept 2020 presidential election result; Jan 6th congressional committee seen as best hope of breaking back of dangerous condition
July 27, 2022
By Andrew Squibley and Arthur Bushwhacker, Cruising for Hot “Thumbs” with Matt Gaetz
“Democracy Dies in Darkness…but Not, Apparently, Tony Dow”
WASHINGTON (Rueters) – The nation’s community of eye doctors and other specialists are facing “an unprecedented and absolutely confounding” outbreak of vision loss they attribute to millions of Americans’ refusal to accept that Joe Biden won the 2020 presidential election, a special report from the US Department of Health and Human Services said today.
“Willful blindness is no longer simply a legal term,” the report said in its introduction. “Willful blindness is now a real physical peril as well as a threat to U.S. democracy, to all that most Americans hold dear.”
An estimated 20 million Americans — that is, half of all registered Republicans — have reported vision loss since late 2020, according to the report which further noted that subsequent eye examinations in 99.9% of the cases found no organic cause for blindness.
“This is an unprecedented and absolutely confounding epidemic that has no apparent physical cause,” according to an HHS spokesman. “People aren’t seeing because they just don’t want to.”
In the absence of physical reasons for the epidemic of vision loss, the HHS spokesman said, scientists and researchers now are focusing on potential geographic, demographic and other non-organic causes for the outbreak of “willful blindness.”
The epidemic has been found in roughly half the country, researchers told Rueters. “There’s a strong alignment between blue states, which have reported no significant uptake in vision loss, and red states which in most instances are experiencing a plague of this likely psychological trauma.”
Researchers have uncovered what the HHS report has termed “disturbing patterns” of linkage to Covid 19 vaccine skepticism and low vaccine rates with subsequent regional spikes in “willful blindness.”
“Maybe it’s a coincidence, but Trumpism remains very strong in many states,” the report noted, “and this massive epidemic of willful blindness shows no signs of loosening its grip in these regions. Perhaps the findings of the House Select Committee investigating the January 6th insurrection will restore vision to many of these blind citizens.”
“But how can we be hopeful,” it concluded.
MONKEYPOX FROM MONKEYS? NATION’S UNION OF SIMIANS FIGHTS BACK; CLAIMS “BEASTISM” BY MEDIA AND MEDICAL COMMUNITY
CLARENCE CENTER, NY (Rueters) – In the wake of the World Health Organization declaring a global emergency due to widespread monkeypox outbreaks, the head of the country’s largest union of simians has charged “plain, unvarnished beastism” is behind the name of the disease even though medical researchers agree monkeys aren’t the source of the potentially deadly virus.
“Researchers have known virtually from the start that monkeypox isn’t caused by monkeys,” Caesar, president of Simian ExPats (SEX) USA told Rueters from union headquarters outside Buffalo after the WHO announcement. The outbreak, discovered in Europe earlier this year, originated in rodents, Caesar said, adding, “Suggesting otherwise is just plain, unvarnished beastism.”
WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus recently told reporters, “We have an outbreak that has spread around the world rapidly through new modes of transmission about which we understand too little.”
But what is understood, said the articulate, four-feet tall Bonobo chimpanzee, is that labelling the deadly virus “monkeypox” is bad for human-simian relations and leads to violence and repression against members of the ape family in many societies.
“Calling the disease monkeypox not only is wrong but dangerous for my kind,” the native of the Congo told Rueters. “I thought the World Health Organization, of all organizations, would be sensitive to that.”
The move to label the outbreak a Public Health Emergency of International Concern, the highest level of alert the WHO can issue, is expected to marshal new funding to fight the outbreak and to pressure governments into action. Some 20,000 cases of monkeypox have been reported in 74 countries, WHO reported.
Since it was first identified in a colony of monkeys in Copenhagen in 1958, monkeypox has been largely overlooked in the West, but that changed this past spring when the disease starting appearing in Americans, primarily residents of New York, researchers told Rueters. Monkeypox causes fever, chills and rashes, but is rarely fatal, WHO has reported.
“It probably won’t kill you,” a specialist in infectious diseases told Rueters. “It just looks really gnarly.”
As for negative publicity for simians, Caesar said, “We’re urging WHO to rename the disease. We’re looking for separation. We (simians) don’t want to be associated with it. Chickenpox is taken, as is the mumps. So I’ve suggested ‘the Trumps.'”
ASK SQUIBLEY
Dear Mr. Squibley: I don’t consider myself prejudiced against old people. I’ve always loved my grandparents but they’re getting up there in years and have trouble figuring things out. For example, the other day I found Gramp trying to tune in his favorite “swing music” AM station ON THE TOASTER. Yes, you read that right. On the toaster. He’s 80 and needs supervision daily. Gran, who’s 79 this year, isn’t much better. She uses my iPhone to try changing tv channels. My point is this: How can this enormous, powerful, rich nation continue to rely for leadership on people born during the last world war? How can we get them to move into assisted living? Signed, TUNING THE TOASTER
Dear Tuning: I understand your concern, although at nearly 120 myself, I can look at people like Pelosi (82), Biden (80 in Nov), McConnell (80), Hoyer (83), Clyburn (82), even Trump (76) and consider them mere kids. Do we even want to discuss Diane Feinstein (89) or Chuck Grassley (88) who said he’s running for another six-year term? Yikes!
Still, at my age, I admit I’m not trying to run the most powerful country in the world. I agree we should have some kind of age limit on public servants, at least at the federal level. But, if we can’t achieve that, let’s try something more basic: soup. Everyone knows old folks love soup. Take it off the menu at the White House and the House and Senate office buildings. The old-timers just might quit in protest. Also, pesto. Add pesto to every dish. Old folks can’t stand pesto. It makes a complete mess of their dentures. At least it’s a start.
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I see what you’re saying about “willful blindness”
Jim, you may be on to something! Senate Bean Soup has been served on the Hill for many, many, many years! Get rid of it and you may solve several problems at once! 🙂 https://www.southernliving.com/recipes/capitol-hill-bean-soup-recipe
Willful Blindness being properly identified, and deemed to be cure-able, is a breakthrough!
The first step to recovery is acknowledging one may have it, and then accepting hard truths as the cure.