#knows what is and isn't allowed under the hospital policies'

[xenon-demon]

med student steve and nurse eddie who is sick of his shit please <3 from wip wednesday i know it's not wednesday anymore but plz

yessssss i love this AU so much because it's just me projecting onto steve and daydreaming about Eddie Munson, Certified Hot Nurse™

also don't worry i have very little free time and am also australian so for me, WIP wednesday is a state of mind, not an actual time frame lmao

Snippet for you under the cut!

Shaking off the black cloud currently hanging over him, Steve finally lays eyes on the person trying to get his attention. A nurse is leaning over the desk of the nurse’s station a few meters away to look straight at Steve, and– wow, okay. Steve knows damn well what his type is, the kind of person and style he goes weak in the knees for, but this guy is aggressively punching every single one of Steve’s buttons. He’s got dark, curly hair that’s done up in a bun, some small strands of hair hanging out to frame the guy’s face. It gives Steve an eyeful of the guy’s killer jawline and the jewellery glinting in his ears – studs, of course, they are on the job, but at a glance Steve can see at least a couple in each ear. The guy’s arms are spread out on the desk in front of him, and Steve can feel his brain freeze at the sight of dark ink poking out from under the guy’s scrubs. He forces himself to look up and away from those (tempting, deliciously tempting) arms and into the nurse’s face – and okay, that’s not much better. The way this guy is looking at him, big brown eyes locked onto Steve’s face, he feels like he’s getting sucked in.

“Sorry?” Steve says, taking a moment to blink and regain his composure. He hopes to God he doesn’t look as flustered and distressed as he feels. “Are you talking to me?”

“Yup,” the nurse says, popping the p. He gestures at the sample bag Steve’s holding, with a few different vials and one syringe of blood inside, as he continues. The smile he gives Steve is almost apologetic as he says, “Pathology isn’t going to take those bloods from you, sweetheart. Not like that, at least.”

“Excuse me?” Steve instinctively bristles at the pet name, the way it just drips off this guy’s tongue. Just like that, the black cloud is back. He crosses the distance over to the nurse’s desk. “What’s wrong with them? They’ve all been labelled properly, and signed.”

“Well…” The nurse says, drawing out the word. Steve feels himself start to frown, just the tiniest bit. “You left the needle on your blood gas.” With a couple of fingers, the nurse points to the offending syringe in Steve’s sample bag. Sure enough, the needle is still attached to the syringe full of blood, the sharp end embedded in a small piece of foam.

Steve frowns even deeper. “My intern told me it’s fine like this.”

“Yeah, that doesn’t surprise me.” The guy grins and rolls his eyes before giving Steve a ‘what can you do’ kind of expression. “It’s a common mistake to make, actually, since they don’t really explain this stuff officially, but-”

“Listen,” Steve interrupts, gritting out the word between his teeth. He’s sure this nurse, whoever he is, has more important things to do than patronize him. Steve sure as fuck isn’t going to stand here and be made fun of while this guy takes his sweet-ass time to get to his point. “I’m pretty sure my intern knows what they’re talking about, seeing as they’re, you know, a doctor. If you really want to be helpful”–Steve’s eyes flick down to read the nurse’s name badge–“Eddie, then you can point me in the direction of the specimen drop-off.”

Eddie actually rears back at that, straightening up and pulling his arms back so he’s holding on to the very edge of the desk instead of casually leaning over the top of it. If Steve were having a better day, he might feel bad about it. As it is, all Steve feels is a sick sense of satisfaction at the way Eddie’s face has shuttered off, his eyes no longer shining the way they were a moment ago.

“It’s that way,” Eddie says bluntly, pointing back in the direction Steve came. His voice has lost all the character, the theatricality that he spoke with a minute ago. “Turn left once you step out of this ward and follow that hallway straight down.”

“Thanks,” Steve says, trying very hard not to feel like an asshole. He almost succeeds.

Eddie just grunts in acknowledgement. He gives Steve a quick once-over and says, “Good talk,” in a tone that clearly states it was anything but.

As he strides off towards the specimen drop-off, Steve can’t help but agree.

[cherryblossomshadow]

No (Federal) Taxes on Tips

No Tax on Tips by the Daily Show ft Desi Lydic

Desi Lydic: It's weird he's even talking about sending teachers to the gulag, because Trump has more popular policies, like his proposal to end taxes on tips, which is so popular that Kamala Harris now says that SHE supports it. And Trump is not happy about that … Look, to be fair, Kamala did copy Trump's no tax on tips idea,

which would make it the first time in history that a woman got credit for repeating a man's idea.

We did it, girls. And she didn't stop there. Kamala also completely ripped off his idea to lead in the polls by 3 points against a rapidly deteriorating candidate. That was his thing. That was his thing.

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Harris v. Trump on Taxing Tips by Robert Reich

Kamala Harris, Saturday, in Las Vegas: Raise the minimum wage. And eliminate taxes on tips for service and hospitality workers Donald Trump, at Mar-A-Lago: We’re gonna have no tax on tips. Very simple

Ali Velshi from MSNBC: The Trump plan sounds like it's for regular people, but it could easily be a backdoor way to give big tax breaks to rich people who can reclassify their commission income as tips

Robert Reich: You betcha. In fact, we are going to see all kinds of things reclassified as tips. You can bet that private equity managers and hedge fund managers, who are now in the seven or eight digit classification, suddenly a lot of what they earn will become tips. At least under Donald Trump's proposal, because it's not — there are no guardrails. There's no limits to who can declare what as tips Ali Velshi from MSNBC: The key difference in Kamala Harris’ no taxes on tips proposal is that it's only for service and hospitality workers RR: I think it could be helpful if combined, as Kamala Harris wants to do, with a minimum wage hike. And also limit it so that Wall Street commission professionals can't sort of reclassify their income as tips. By the way, let me just say one further thing about this, and that is that the Labor Department under Donald Trump DID change the regulations to allow employers to take the tipped incomes of their employees and use it for their profits.. I mean, it's quite rich that Donald Trump has jumped on this one

.

Americans For Tax Fairness (@/4TaxFairness)

"No taxes on tips" isn't the win you think it is. Most tipped workers wouldn't get much of a tax cut at all. But you know who would? Corporations that employ tipped workers and the wealthy who can relabel their income as "tips" at will. Pass.

(Title of the above image is Table 1: The No Tax on Tips Act would provide no or paltry tax cuts to many tipped employees – far less than restoring American Rescue Plan tax credits)

.

Robert Reich (@/RBReich) quote-retweeted with:

Trump keeps touting plans to not tax tips. But estimates show that a majority of tipped workers wouldn't benefit.  Who would benefit? Big earners like hedge fund managers who could convert their fees into "tips" and get big tax breaks. It's another Trump tax scam.

.

Why Trump's and Harris' proposals to end federal taxes on tips would be difficult to enact

By Dee-Ann Durbin | The Associated Press

Quotes:

Former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris agree on one thing, at least: Both say they want to eliminate federal taxes on workers’ tips.

But experts say there’s a reason Congress hasn’t made such a change already. It would be complicated, not to mention enormously costly to the federal government, to enact. It would encourage many higher-paid workers to restructure their compensation to classify some of it as “tips” and thereby avoid taxes. And, in the end, it likely wouldn’t help millions of low-income workers.

“There’s no way that it wouldn’t be a mess,” said James Hines Jr., a professor of law and economics and the research director of the Office of Tax Policy Research at the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business.

Both candidates unveiled their plans in Nevada, a state with one of the highest concentrations of tipped service workers in the country. Trump announced a proposal to exclude tips from federal taxes on June 9. Harris announced a similar proposal on Aug. 10.

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Harris’ campaign has said she would work with Congress to draft a proposal that would include an income limit and other provisions to prevent abuses by wealthy individuals who might seek to structure their compensation to classify certain fees as tips.

Her campaign said these requirements, which it did not specify, would be intended “to prevent hedge fund managers and lawyers from structuring their compensation in ways to try to take advantage of the policy.” Trump's campaign has not said whether its proposal would include any such requirements.

Even so, Hines suggested that millions of workers — not just wealthy ones — would seek to change their compensation to include tips, and could even do so legally. For example, he said, a company might set up a separate entity that would reward its employees with tips instead of year-end bonuses.

“You will have taxpayers pushing their attorneys to try to characterize their wage and salary income as tips,” Hines said. “And some would be successful, inevitably, because it’s impossible to write foolproof rules that will cover every situation."

.

Though supporters say the measures are designed to help low-wage workers, many experts say that making tips tax-free would provide only limited help to those workers.

The Budget Lab at Yale, a non-partisan policy research center, estimates that there were 4 million U.S. workers in tipped occupations in 2023. That amounted to about 2.5% of all employees, including restaurant servers and beauticians. Tipped workers tend to be younger, with an average age of 31, and of lower income. The Budget Lab said the median weekly pay for tipped workers in 2023 was $538, compared with roughly $1,000 for non-tipped workers.

As a result, many tipped workers already bear a lower income-tax burden. In 2022, 37% of tipped workers had incomes low enough that they paid no federal income tax at all, The Budget Lab said.

“If the issue is you’re concerned about low-income taxpayers, there are a lot better ways to address that problem, like expanding the Earned Income Tax Credit or changing tax rates or changing deductions,” Hines said.

In her speech in Nevada, Harris also called for raising the federal minimum wage. (The platform on Trump’s campaign site doesn’t mention the minimum wage.)

Changing federal tax policy on tips would also be costly. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a non-partisan group, estimates that exempting all tip income from federal income and payroll taxes would reduce revenue by $150 billion to $250 billion between 2026 and 2035. And it said that amount could rise significantly if the policy changed behavior and more people declared tip income.

Whether Trump or Harris wins the presidential election, tax policy will be high on Congress’ agenda in 2025. That’s because Trump-era tax cuts, passed in 2017, are set to expire. But Hines said he thinks Congress will be in no hurry to add “vast amounts of complexity” to the tax code.

“A presidential candidate can say whatever they want, but it's the House and Senate that have to do it,” he said.

[itsmaferart]

SxF Theories #1 Garden urban legends

· · · This contains manga content· · ·

Given that the last chapters have given us something to talk about, I think it is a good time to make a theory about the garden, making a compilation of the manga chapters and trying to string together the clues that we have been given based solely on the manga. I clarify that all this is from my point of view and that being a manga in broadcast, all this can be contradicted or change. With all that said, let's get started:

Context:

Although, since the beginning of the manga, it is repeatedly explained to us that Yor is a hitwoman, who is specifically hired by a mysterious subject called Shopkeeper, who assigns "specific clients" to whom she must "attend". But it is not until mission 43, when we have more precise information. Although, Garden is still a mystery, I will try to string together the elements that caught my attention throughout the manga to arrive at this theory:

According to what was said in Twilight and Franky's conversation in this same chapter: Garden is an organization of assassins that is in charge of "purging" those who are considered "traitors of the fatherland" in Ostania, and who work directly for the government of the shadows.

Of which Twilight (and WISE itself) has very little information, considering that organization and its actions as "simple urban myths". Data that Endo himself corroborated, stating that very few know of their existence, even very few members of the SSS know that they exist. So it is very possible that Yuri is also unaware that these exist or has very little information about them due to his age and rank.

After Franky confirms that Garden exists and that they are surely responsible for the death of an informant. Twilight lists them as "an unofficial paramilitary organization".

The secret paramilitary associations are organizations made up of different military bodies and their ideology is reactionary.

With all this context, we can start to speculate a bit:

How does Garden work?

There is currently little information, and canonically we only know of three killers (Yor Forger, Matthew McMahon and Shopkeeper) so I actually have more questions and few answers. But speculating a bit and based on what we have seen, it is implied that Gardin works under a hierarchy. Having Shopkeeper as the main boss, who assigns the clients that must be served and possibly is the one who trains the assassins. Since it is implied that he was the one who surely trained Yor directly.

Then we have McMahon, whose cover is to be the director of city hall policy where he works alongside Yor. During the cruise arc, it is revealed to us that McMahon works alongside Yor at the same city hall. Which surprised me, because it indicates that there may be more murderers working and fulfilling functions.

So… there are more murderers in the city hall? Or are McMahon and Yor the only ones assigned to this area?…Perhaps all of the Garden killers have jobs as civil servants?

I'm curious if anything, Garden, much like WISE, works with a network of undercover agents, running a civilian front. With the spies we have seen all kinds of people, who establish a secret communication with Twilight: From a saleswoman in a kiosk in a subway to a pet store run by WISE. Twilight, unlike Yor, has interacted with other spies in brief encounters, and it is implied that they assign spies to Berlint's Hospital to help with this alibi, plus we met Nightfall.

Do Garden Killers work similarly? Or do they handle a strict law of not getting involved? If that's the case, then possibly Yor isn't allowed to interact with many colleagues and only deals directly with the director when necessary… or maybe Endo has deliberately left this out to give it more relevance and explanation in the future.

Continuing with the Arch in the transept. Shopkeeper refers to McMahon as Yor's "manager" …. Which caused me other doubts:

Does every killer have a manager? Does McMahon Manage Other Assassins? Or is this something exclusive to Yor?

If McMahon has the function of being an intermediary, or someone who manages the details of Yor's work, tying up loose ends and fixing everything so that it does not look suspicious that a city council woman attends exclusive events like the Princess Lorelei cruise. So Yor only has communication with him, which would explain why both assassins seem openly close and know each other quite well. In fact, throughout this Arc it seems that it is not the first time that they have worked together. The director seemed aware of Yor's ability and strength, and he never doubted that she could handle the job, but he also knew how distracted she can be… furthermore, he wanted to reward her by allowing her to be with her family, although there was the possibility that there were more killers. And Yor showed absolute respect and confidence in the professionalism and ability of Dr.

I loved these panels 🔪 

It is possible that McMahon and Yor are the assassins with the highest level of Garden, or at least, they part of this elite knowing that they were the only ones sent by Garden to fight a whole wave of assassins. Knowing that Shopkeeper was aware that the bounty on Olka was huge and that the call was so widespread to the point of having foreign assassins, and that the whole decision of which Yor and McMahon were the only ones, and did not send others to support them. Which became evident, Yor is practically invulnerable, and although she received fatal injuries she could survive and only get out with a slight sprain in a finger…. If it wasn't because Yor was so distracted with her internal conflict maybe she could get out a lot best of these battles.

Do you think Shopkeeper taught Yoru how to fight? and McMahon how to clean up the crime scene? … Or is everyone in Garden an expert in cleaning? That man fights with a gun and a mop at the same time xD

Something that Dr. McMahon explains is the perspective he has on the war and current events. Although the war officially ended ten years ago, the battles continue inside and outside the countries, and as long as people remain the same, they, the soldiers of Garden, will continue to fight to protect their country. In fact, the enemy hit man quickly assumed that McMahon has the mentality of a veteran soldier. It would not be surprising if many of the assassins were ex-soldiers from the Ostanian ranks.

Moving on to the civilian identities…

It caused me concern if Garden itself will be in charge of assigning Yor's decks or if this is something that is left to her as long as she asks the Shopkeeper for permission?

Let's remember that Yor in the past used the cover of being a "masseur" to be an assassin, even later working at the town hall…. But why this change? Was her identity at risk or was this cover somewhat risky? On the one hand, being a masseuse is for many a euphemism to refer to working with "the body". Which, was what Camila inferred during the party. However, beyond being a lie, I don't know if Yor could really be a simple masseuse. Yor is somewhat clumsy and very nervous when it comes to physical contact and her inexperience in relationships makes her turn into a whirlwind at the slightest touch. Adding to a huge force that sometimes she does not control… Would she break more than one back? xD

All of this intrigues me, given the idea that Garden controls the facades of their killers. McMahon reminded Yor that if she were to die in combat or be seriously injured, Yor would be forced to separate from her family and Loid would be told that she would be transferred elsewhere, disappearing from the Forger family for good without further explanation.

Was this the reason why Yor stopped being a masseur in the past? Did Yor have many fake jobs up to the present depending on the convenience of her real job? —I don't think Yor has gone through as many professions as Twilight, who has a wide experience and ability to adapt—. However, assuming she had one or more professions for her cover, maybe being a masseuse was unbelievable and they would prefer to assign Yor to the town hall, up to the present… or maybe her identity was briefly at risk.

Going to the commissions….

In the bonus chapter of Yor and Loid's date.They say in the news that Twilight watches, that a group of terrorists called the "red circus" that were "financed in part by foreign interests", which defines the concept well of traitors to the country. Since they can be groups of Ostanian criminals who, by receiving income from abroad, caused terrorist acts in their own country…

or the informant that Franky mentioned, whom he assured was Garden (surely this was done by another murderer) Possibly, the informants trade information that is not allowed and therefore, the murderers are also assigned to kill them, in addition to the police.

All that said…

Though we don't explicitly know the inner workings of Garden yet, and we don't know what the Shopkeeper's genuine intentions are beyond making the world a better place. We can say that these organizations of assassins work under a clear ideology and a rigid obedience system, where the important thing is not to question whether what they are doing is correct or not, but to believe that what they are doing is to purge the world of so much dirt and maintain crime up to certain limits, classified as "traitors". And although it sounds like a very pure ideal, it sounds questionable given that they are hit men, we don't know Tendero's background.

Seen this way, Yor becomes the perfect assassin by having an innate talent for fighting, martial arts and superhuman strength and endurance. But that being raised by them, and being a vulnerable girl with a younger brother to raise, she has become dependent on the orders she receives. Yor was not trained to question the world around her (unlike WISE that forces agents to question everything) her goal is to eliminate whoever is ordered and hinders the purposes.

It is clear that although Yor is seen as naive and clumsy, her sense of morality is seen to be quite complex. Although, many believe that Yor does not feel remorse, and that he should not hide his face because he should not feel "ashamed" of what he does (Although I think this is more of a weak argument. And surely the assassins show their faces to force them not to leave victims).

I don't think that's entirely true… Yor herself has been hesitant about her work, and has even admitted in the early chapters to being overwhelmed by it at times, but remembering that she has a noble purpose to protect someone (her family) It is what has kept it going.

However, it is inevitable that being an assassin has caused her to develop a cold and ruthless side of her personality that she has struggled to channel and control. Yor is someone deep down, powerful, determined and focused on her goals, and she is aware of her own abilities, to the extent that she merely considers killing innocent people who get in her way and who she cares about. But she herself refuses to do such a thing. So Yor, deep down, is aware that much of what she does is wrong and she should not abuse her strength. So her morality is subject to the defenseless/innocent and those who decide to wield a weapon, becoming dangerous.

Maybe in the future, we can see Yor grow much more, and he can channel that "inner security and determination". And she can get rid of the control that Shopkeeper has over her.

It's very possible that if Donovan, Melinda, or the guy with glasses (Happon), or whoever is behind the war. Very surely they will enter the black list of these murderers.

But many secrets may begin to be revealed now that Loid Forger may pass into the eye of the storm after the Shopkeeper begins to suspect him…. So the theory that other Garden killers are revealed seems very possible. And with it, knowing more about the relationship that Yor manages with other colleagues.

However, I think obviously Garden are not necessarily villains of the story. And there is still the possibility that they could become an ally of WISE if their purpose is really to make a better world without war.

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What do you think about it?

[bolontiku]

"The Aftermath"

Quick Fic

Characters: Billy Hargrove, Susan H., Max H., Hopper, others mentioned

Posted: Aug 19th

A/N: for @magellan-88 I cleaned and edited it but here is what grew out of our chats. Stepping out of my regular fandom, but I love Stranger Things and I want this to include Harringrove eventually... so here goes.

WARNINGS: NO UNDER 18. mentions of abuse, mental and physical abuse. Memory loss.

Like, Comments, & Reblogs are always appreciated and loved.

**Please Do Not Repost My Work**

Billy didn't remember much since he woke up. 

The lady with the red hair kept telling him her name was Susan. He was tired of hearing her apologize over and over, telling him how she had been trying to get away from his dad, but she was just so scared.

Honestly, it didn't surprise him.

He understood that.

Neil is a scary motherfucker.

He sleeps. 

Wakes up to find the room full of a buncha kids. Sleeps some more.

The redhead girl is there. Mad Max. He's pretty sure he gave her the nickname back.. in… where was that again?

Billy sleeps some more. 

He's allowed to go home. He's still healing, but some nurse is supposed to come help. Driving up he grips the cushion of the car. Sure Susan is nice and came to visit, even came to get him, there was no way Neil was gonna do that he understood that but now with the car making its way up the driveway he feels panic setting in. Now he would be within arms reach of Neil and behind closed doors. 

Chief Hopper is there though and he helps Billy into the house. Hes waiting, not sure when the shoe will drop. Man, Neil was gonna be so angry, the hospital bills were gonna be insane. He remembered the one time he broke his arm and his dad got the bill for it, Billy had gotten beaten black and blue, 'to make it worth it'. 

But Hopper is sitting down in a chair across from him and that looks says there's gonna be a serious conversation, Billy knows that.

"Ah, alright," the man exudes nervous energy, if anything Billy knows this kind. The man isn't used to these kinda talks. He waits as Hopper wipes a hand across his face. "None of this is your fault you know?" Billy holds his breath, he watches Hopper shift in that stupid orange plastic chair. Susan NEEDED them to fit the kitchen and it was the week his dad had given him a new shiner for griping about babysitting Max…

"Neil was unstable, what he did to you- I know what you did- what I am saying is thank you. You and Steve did a great job looking after the kids."

"Steve?"

Hopper looks at him, pats a beefy hand on his knee. "Steve, ah, yeah, he's… your," he grimaces and looks away.

Steve. Billy likes the sound of that name, his stomach flutters at the thought. Sunshine. Steve was sunshine. He flinches. If Neil found out… his head hurt. 

"Look, you don't have to worry about him anymore, 'kay? Get some rest, I'll swing by in a week or so yeah?" Hopper stands and stops by the door, the kid is already laying back. He wonders if he will remember any of it? The way Neil was possessed by that thing, how he beat Billy within an inch of his life trying to get to Eleven. The others had put up a good fight but it had been a close call.

Hopper had nearly died himself. By the grace of some god he hadn't. He wasn't clear on that himself just yet. But he got to go home and share an eggo tower with El and he would forever have the sight of Steve and Max huddled over Billy for the rest of his life. 

When had that happened? 

Hopper didn't really care but that was something else to worry about another day. He checked in on Max quickly and reminded Susan to call him if anything weird came up. The woman was nice enough and they'd be alright with Neil's life insurance policy. Starcourt would be paying as well as the labs. 

Yeah, that guy was nice enough, Billy didn't understand it all. He wanted to remember who Steve was. He felt important. But there was that fear again. Fear of Neil and fear for Steve if Neil found out. 

It was all his fault. Neil had beaten that into him till it was engraved in his bones.

Billy pulled the covers up, wincing as the pain bit in a little more. Billy missed the morphine the hospital gave him already. Blonde eyelashes swept down and he sank into dreams of warm hazel eyes that shone like honey in the sunlight.

[iceflame14rulez]

Here's an idea, and, it may sound crazy, so bear with me... why don't we have an electoral debate where ALL the candidates for presidency are able to participate? There were at least four people up for presidency, not two in the 2020 election. There are at least four parties, if not more, in the United States, not two. Trump and Biden were up for presidency, obviously, but there were more people on the ballot.

To those of you who don't know, the libertarian candadate, Jo Jorgensen, had this platform, which the media covered very little of.

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Healthcare and social security

Jorgensen supports a free-market healthcare system financed by individual spending accounts that could keep any savings, which she believes would increase healthcare providers' incentive to compete by meeting consumer demand for low-cost services. She opposes single-payer healthcare, calling it "disastrous".

Jorgensen supports replacing Social Security with individual retirement accounts.[25] In the final debate of the primaries, candidate Jacob Hornberger accused Jorgensen of "support[ing] the welfare state through Social Security and Medicare". In response, she called Social Security a "Ponzi scheme" and said she would allow people to opt out of the program on her first day in office. But she emphasized the constitutional inability of a president to unilaterally end the program without Congress's support, as well as the need for the government to fulfill existing Social Security obligations. Under Jorgensen's plan, those who opt out would put 6.2% of their payroll taxes in individual retirement accounts and receive prorated Social Security benefits for existing contributions as zero-coupon bonds for retirement.

Criminal justice and drug policy

Jorgensen opposes federal civil asset forfeiture and qualified immunity. She opposes the war on drugs and supports abolishing drug laws, promising to pardon all nonviolent drug offenders. She has urged the demilitarization of police.

Foreign policy and defense

Jorgensen opposes embargoes, economic sanctions, and foreign aid; she supports non-interventionism, armed neutrality, and the withdrawal of U.S. troops from abroad.

Immigration, economics, and trade

Jorgensen calls for deregulation, arguing that it would reduce poverty. She supports cutting government spending to reduce taxes.

Jorgensen supports the freedom of American citizens to travel and trade, calls for the elimination of trade barriers and tariffs, and supports the repeal of quotas on the number of people who can legally enter the United States to work, visit, or reside. In a Libertarian presidential primary debate, Jorgensen said she would immediately stop construction on President Donald Trump's border wall. During another primary debate she blamed anti-immigration sentiment on disproportionate media coverage of crimes by immigrants. She argued that immigration helps the economy and that the blending of cultures is benificial.

COVID-19

Jorgensen has characterized the U.S. government's response to the COVID-19 pandemic as overly bureaucratic and authoritarian, calling restrictions on individual behavior (such as stay-at-home orders) and corporate bailouts "the biggest assault on our liberties in our lifetime".

Jorgensen opposes government mask mandates, considering mask-wearing a matter of personal choice. She argues that mask-wearing would be widely adopted without government intervention because market competition would drive businesses to adopt either mask-required or mask-optional policies, allowing consumers the freedom to choose their preferred environment. Jorgensen has invoked the analogy of dollar voting to argue that consumer preferences would shape businesses' policies on face masks in the absence of a government mandate.

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The Green party's candadate, Howie Hawkins, was ALSO up for presidency. This was his platform.

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COVID-19 EMERGENCY MEASURES FOR THE DURATION OF THE CRISIS

Medicare to Pay for COVID-19 Testing and Treatment and All Emergency Health Care. Defense Production Act to Rapidly Plan the Production and Distribution of Medical Supplies and a Universal Test, Contact Trace, and Quarantine Program to Safely Reopen the Economy. An OSHA Temporary Standard to Provide Enforceable PPE Protection for Workers. $2,000 a Month to All Adults Over Age 16 and $500 per Child. Loans to All Businesses and Hospitals for Payroll and Fixed Overhead To Be Forgiven If All Workers Are Kept on Payroll. Moratorium on Evictions, Foreclosures, and Utility Shutoffs. Cancel Rent, Mortgage, and Utility Payments; Federal Government Pays Those Bills; High-income People Pay Taxes on this Relief. Suspend Student Loan Payments with 0% Interest Accumulation. Federal Universal Rent Control. Aid to State and Local Governments Sufficient to Keep Essential Services Running. A 10-Year, $42 Trillion Ecosocialist Green New Deal for Economic Recovery through a Just Transition to 100% Clean Energy by 2030. Universal Mail-in Ballots for the 2020 General Election.

PEACE POLICIES

Pledge No First Use of Nuclear Weapons. Unilaterally Disarm to a Minimum Credible Deterrent. Negotiate with Nuclear Powers to Enact the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. End the Endless Wars—US Troops Home. Cut the Military Budget by 75%. Invest the Savings in a Global Green New Deal. Use Diplomacy and International Law to Promote Peace, Human Rights, and Democracy.

ECONOMIC BILL OF RIGHTS

Job Guarantee. Guaranteed Minimum Income Above Poverty. $20 Minimum Wage. Affordable Housing for All through Universal Rent Control and Public Housing. Medicare for All—A Community-Controlled National Health Service. Lifelong Free Public Education—Pre-K through College. Secure Retirement—Double Social Security Benefits

POLITICAL DEMOCRACY

Ranked-Choice National Popular Vote for President. Proportional Representation in Congress. End Party Suppression—Fair Ballot Access. End Voter Suppression—Restore the Preclearance Provision to the Voting Rights Act. Right to Vote Constitutional Amendment. Automatic Voter Registration. Voting Rights for Felons. Auditable Paper Balloting. Full Public Campaign Finance. We The People Amendment to End the Corporate-Personhood and Money-Is-Speech Legal Doctrines. DC Statehood

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Had i known about this, about them, I would have proudly voted for Jorgensen or Hawkins, because, instead of being "the lesser of two evils", they actually sound like someone we genuinely need right now. We need to stand up for the people not getting their voices heard. I want a presidential election that has EVERYONE'S voice heard. To those of you who have been oppressed, beaten down, and learned to cope with being ignored just because someone didn't like what you had to say, you need to help the other candidates get their voices heard in the future. I don't know about you, but I want a United States that is concerned about the true freedom of speech, one which is fair and actually willing to hear what all our people have to say.

It's a dream that even Martin Luther King Jr. had. He saw the oppression of African Americans, and spoke out about having a dream that everyone could be heard.

When our country was founded, we were all immigrants. Everyone came from another place, even those we call Native Americans. Why is it that today, people are being rejected simply for needing to take refuge from a government abuser in some other country? We have lost sight of what our great nation is all about. We need to have our voices heard.

The next time there's a government position to replace, remember what I had to say. We are not sheep, who are to be headed toward the majority just because it's easy. We are human beings. We need to stop this suppression of the people's voices. We need to stand up to the government, to the media, to let everyone be heard.

Our nation is on the verge of a civil war, in part due to the oppression of the people. If you want to be heard, you need to stand up for what you believe in. Violence isn't necessary, but your right to free speech is. DO NOT LET THEM SUPPRESS YOUR VOICE.

EDIT: I would like to add, that in order for our POLITICAL voices to be heard, there is still something we need to change. If you would like to hear what is needed, there's a list of videos on the subject. If you really want to have your voices heard, we need to start here, with ranked voting. For more information, click this link.

[brajeshupadhyay]

India isn't flattening the COVID-19 curve; Health ministry must stop making this claim, test more, raise healthcare capacity

On 4 May, 2020, a day before India recorded the highest single-day jump in COVID-19 cases and deaths with 197 new fatalities and 3,900 infections, Lav Agarwal, Joint Secretary, Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare claimed during a press briefing that the “(COVID-19) curve is relatively flat as of now”. He went on to add that “If we work collectively in that direction, then the peak may never come.”

This large discrepancy between the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare assessment of the situation and the reality of the ongoing pandemic in terms of lives lost to the disease leads one to question: Is India really flattening the curve? Or is this a classic case of cherry-picking data to fit a particular narrative?

The answer to this question lies in the definition of the term: “Flattening the Curve”.

Definition of flattening the curve

In epidemiology, the curve (also called the epidemic or epi curve) refers to the projected number of new cases over a period of time.

Originally shared by Dr Drew A. Harris, a population health analyst at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia in the form of two epi curves, flattening the curve is a public health strategy to stagger the number of new cases over a more extended period. Flattening allows people to have better access to care, hospitals and vaccine-manufacturers to have more time to prepare, and healthcare workers and police to take a breather.

In the above graph, both curves show the number of new cases over time — one without any protective measures (the red one) and other with it (the blue one).

A steep curve (shown in red) indicates that the virus is spreading fast, and more people are seeking treatment at any given time. A steep fall often follows curves with a steep rise after the virus runs out of fresh hosts to infect. The catastrophic consequences of misinterpreting a false-positive result are all too evident in Italy, and indeed it represents a risk not worth taking. Not following a containment measure might result in a higher death toll alongside the risk of further loss of life caused by a health care system that is overloaded beyond its capacity.

On the other hand, a gentler curve (shown in blue) lower than the dotted line indicates that fewer people are infected with the virus, preventing a surge that will overwhelm the healthcare system.

Simply put, moving from the curve Red to Blue is flattening the curve. But to achieve that, we need to draw these two curves while keeping our local healthcare system capacity (the important dotted line) in mind.

So, is India "flattening the curve"?

The short answer is NO.

While the stringent containment measures implemented by the central government have certainly slowed down the growth of COVID-19 during the lockdown but is that growth rate manageable by our health care systems? The answer is no.

Let’s dive in to understand why.

First, let’s look at the rate of increase of COVID-19 cases in India, week by week. For the last two weeks (22 April- 5 May), the growth rate of COVID-19 cases in India is constant at 40 percent (compared to 250 percent the week before the Government of India ordered the lockdown on 25 March).

The decreasing rate of active cases alone doesn’t indicate that India is flattening the curve, although it definitely suggests that the growth has slowed down. To identify whether we have flattened the curve or not, we need to draw the two epi curves.

Let’s draw the blue curve first — an epi curve with protective measures like a lockdown, as we already have the data for this.

Drawing the red curve is trickier, as one needs to identify a projection model, in a hypothetical scenario if there was no lockdown or containment measure. Most of the COVID-19 projections are based on the ‘SEIR’ model, which tracks the flow of individuals through four stages: susceptible (S), exposed (E), infectious (I) and recovered (R).

Different models use different assumptions and techniques — which means that they give us different insights. However, since COVID-19 is still an unclear infectious disease, which means we can only obtain an accurate prediction AFTER the outbreak ends. Consequently, the multiplicity of unknown variables indicate that most projections currently employed at this moment are at best, a pure guess.

Despite this, for the sake of simplicity, let’s assume that the cases increase at the same rate as it was growing before the lockdown - meaning that it is doubling every three days. Based on this assumption, a straightforward statistical model, also used by Shamika Ravi, Former Member, Prime Minister's Economic Advisory Council, can be applied to create a projection curve.

In that case, here is how the graph looks like, with a projected number of around 38,83,316 cases on 5 May:

As of today, COVID-19 cases in India are doubling every 12 days (as compared to 3 days before the lockdown). But we still can’t say that we have flattened the curve because of three big reasons:

1. Low Testing 2. Lack of an efficient healthcare system 3. Unreliable data to determine how COVID-19 will shape up after the lockdown

Low Testing

This is no hidden fact that India is testing way less than most countries of the world — 1 test per thousand people (compared to Italy, which is conducting around 32 tests per thousand people).

But the most jarring fact is that India has also dropped testing rates as the number of cases in the country have increased. The testing rate has decreased from 150% (from 28 March - 3 April) to around 50 percent this week. So this could mean that the curve is not flattening and we are blindfolded by unreliable information about the COVID-19 cases in India.

Lack of an efficient healthcare system

Apart from the two epi curves, another critical component of the graph is the dotted line representing our Healthcare system capacity.

According to an estimation by The Center For Disease Dynamics, Economics & Policy, India has approximately 1.9 million hospital beds, 95,000 ICU beds, and 48,000 ventilators.

Even if we keep India under lockdown forever, with the current reproduction rate (R0 or R nought) — defined as the average number of people who get infected by an already-infected person — of 1.36, close to two million people will be infected in about 9 months when the peak arrives (analysis applied to one billion Indians below the age of 50).

We also don't know how the rate will fare when India removes the lockdown given that the virus has an approximately two-week incubation period.

So, without any information on how many people we can treat, how many doctors we are testing, and how many of them are affected, we cannot determine the load on our healthcare system and hence cannot say conclusively that we are flattening the curve.

If you’re still not convinced, here is an example from Kerala which shows precisely what flattening the curve looks like — when the number of active cases becomes equal or less than the number of recovered patients.

At this moment, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare should stop claiming every day that they have flattened the curve and focus on raising the line of healthcare system capacity and increasing the testing. That is because, even as we flatten the curve, there remains a dearth of testing kits, beds, ventilators, PPE Kits, in other words, the essentials needed to treat patients.

Now, is not the time for rhetoric, it is a time to save lives.

The author is a data scientist and researcher with Reuters

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