Navigating Fox News

Did a lot of nyt.com and foxnews.com during the elections. NYT’s deceptions are subtle, usually with the data. Sometimes the chart timeline is specifically cut to prove their point, sometimes Y axis is exaggerated to show the inflection points. 

Foxnews.com on the other hand is the opposite. Typically the main page will have an explosive headline, featuring AOC, Pelosi or anyone to catch the reader. (one example that got me to click before inauguration was - 'Pelosi made national guard sleep on the Capitol floor'), then you click in and read the actual (and very factual I must say here) article (this will have the details of NG sleeping on the floor, had nothing to do with Pelosi) and if required at the very end a kind of legal captcha. 

This video (https://youtu.be/nA-10vPcA-4) is a screengrab taken on November 19. 

1. Main page headline - Giuliani detailing election fraud.

2. Click through and article headline is different - Trump campaign is dropping the lawsuit - that was what Giuliani said in that press conference

3. Read through what was said in that conference (and a lot of hook ads) and get to last two paragraphs where they put the legal captcha - ‘Trump lost MI by 155k votes & nobody has found any evidence of election fraud’

🙂

Green New Everything Deal

One habit I've tried to carry on from the 2020 elections is to look everything up at the source where data is available. Pretty much all election count information and details were posted on the respective county websites. 

The Green New Deal - have been hearing about it for ever. Had an idea it is about addressing climate change, probably by some extreme measures. Never gave much attention to it given everyone dismissing it as far left and will never pass. 

The congress website has all these and you can read the green new deal as introduced HR109 here: https://www.congress.gov/116/bills/hres109/BILLS-116hres109ih.pdf

I do see why so many folks are opposed to it. The bill covers the damage climate change causes and goes about setting goals to address this. But then, it also reads like a bucket list of everything else that was ever on the table which may or may not have anything to do with climate change. Just pasting a few from the bill: 

 - ensure prosperity and economic security for all people of the US

 - promote justice and equity

 - repair historic oppression of indigenous people......etc.

 - cleaning up hazardous waste sites

 - guarantee a job with a family sustaining wage

 - strengthen and protect the right of all workers to organize unionize and....

 - strengthen workplace health safety anti discrimination....

 - provide high quality healthcare for all people of the US

 - affordable housing

 - economic security

So is this something cleverly devised to call me a climate denier or an actual plan to fight climate change? 

    

Mask Mandate!

After losing my Dubai Malayalam radio station on TuneIn, I recently started listening to Radio Malayalam 98.6FM from Qatar. Heard them go "Remember to wear your masks. We still have the 200,000 Fine and 3 year prison term in effect". 

So obviously googled it up and found a press release on 17 May 2020 with the $55,000 fine and 3 year jail term. 

And the next thing I thought was how did COVID do in Qatar. And I really do not have to say anything about this next chart and what happened to it in June 2020 :) 

Persistence!

Our 6 y/o: Can I play on the iPad please?

Mom: No

6yo: Let me know when you change your mind

Mom: I am not planning to change my mind. 

6yo: Well, you can always change your plans! 

Vaccine News

 Vaccine news: it started with the trials and things that went wrong...and once vaccinations started, it switched to who is refusing to get vaccinated, who got an adverse reaction...new strains...etc.

More than 68 million vaccine doses have been administered in the United States so far and the count of vaccinated people who got hospitalized for / who died of COVID-19 is ZERO!

It has been 100% effective at preventing serious illness and death.

Am sure whenever the first vaccinated patient is hospitalized, the news will be there, having a field day with it...till then they will try their best to stay away from that one stat that really matters

Voting Trends

Looking through our county (Galveston) votes here: https://results.enr.clarityelections.com/TX/Galveston/106269/web.264614/#/summary and one can see slight traces of the overall national trend even in this mostly red county.

1. More people voted for the presidential election than the senator race 2. Even with less total votes, the Republican Senator took in more votes than the Republican President. So folks stayed true to their party on senate race, but quite a few have voted the other way in presidential race. 3. Mail in votes are significantly higher for democrats (60:40) while in person votes are significantly higher for republicans. Notes: - Data as of Thursday, November 5, 2020, 1:21:02 PM - votes may still be getting tallied - Unofficial results - has not gone through their full audits/checks & balances.

Rent car seats or check them in?

When you are traveling with kids and renting a car at another airport, do you take your car seats with you or do you rent them with your car? 

We travel a lot (back when we could travel) and have tried both options. Over time though, we have moved towards taking the car seats with us almost every trip. Now it's just a booster seat for the younger one and is not much trouble to check that in. 

First question for us has always been the cost. Is the airline going to charge for the extra check in bags? If so, then how does that cost compare with what the rental company is charging? If you are on any of the super budget airlines, make sure to read through their fine print and baggage size policies. 

Your 'status' with the rental car company is also another factor to consider. If you are used to regularly seeing your name up on the board with the car location and you just get in and drive out, then be prepared to spend some extra time at the airport getting car seats. I've never had a car ready to go with seats waiting for me with any rental company here or abroad. Once we even thought about taking the car and buying a seat at a local store while waiting for rental car folk to find us seats. 

If you are taking the car seats with you, you do have the option to take it on the aircraft if the kid has a seat booked. We have never tried this option, so I will leave it at that. I would definitely factor what all you are carrying through security and the airport (including kids and carry on bags) before adding another item to that list. 

If you are checking the car seat, here are some considerations: 

 - Protection: Some airlines bag the car seat. Some just load it as is. In heavy rain, we have had the seats come drenched out for an hour drive and the kids sat on those all the way. If you are flying into some locations (India for us), expect some dirt added to the mix. A car seat bag can help quite a bit (link to the one we use below).

 - Baggage Claim: At some airports, car seats will come out on a different baggage belt along with special items. Just ask at the baggage service desk of your airline if you get your other bags first and not your car seats.   

 - Carrying the Seats: It is usually a short haul from car to check in and baggage to rental car. However with 2 kids and quite a few other bags, we often found ourselves short handed. Kids are usually quite helpful at the beginning of a trip, but quite a handful towards the end of the trip! Again a car seat bag can help with extra straps and even shoulder straps to carry like a backpack. See how it fits in your overall bags and kids carry scheme. What goes on whose shoulder or roller suitcase. 

This is the only carry bag we ever tried. (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01M2A4IK1/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1). Not the best looking one, just a big nylon bag. By the time we decided to get a car seat bag, we just had one infant seat and one booster seat. Both fit into one bag. The sheer size of it looked odd on my back, but it was lightweight with the seats in it.