Hope everybody had a merry Christmas.   This is likely the last blog of the year unless something drastic happens.  There are three things that surprised me this year which in retrospect I should not be surprised about.  These three things also caused me distress over the future of the country.

Obviously, COVID-19 is the biggest news of the year.  I am surprised by the number of people who claim that restrictions as a result of the virus are infringements on their freedom.  Decades from now I think people will look back and wonder how badly we responded to the pandemic.  They will wonder that a country that will certainly lose more than half a million people before the vaccine will save it, could have been so selfish to not lose a small amount of freedom to save lives.   This is the same country that was willing to give up a lot more freedom in the Patriot Act after losing 3,000 lives in 9/11.

I should not be surprised that people use the second amendment rights to walk into the capitol of Michigan to protest against restrictions with automatic weapons in hand.  I should also not be surprised that people can walk the streets of Kenosha with automatic weapons and not be stopped by the police except to offer them drinks.  To me, this is not about freedom but about lawlessness and different treatment of races by the police.  While the mainstream media did cover these events, I have not heard many mainstream commentators who expressed shock at these event.  What would happen if a large group of Black men enter a government building to protest police brutality while holding automatic weapons?  I want to see what Fox News would say about that.  Don't worry, no Black group will do such a thing.  They know what the outcome would be.

We may be rejoicing that Trump lost by a landslide of over 7 million popular votes.  But if we take away the margin Biden won by in California (5 million) and in New York (2 million), we can see that in the other 48 states, it was a draw.  Given how poorly Trump has handled everything from the pandemic, to the economy, to foreign policies, not to mention his lack of morality, it distress me that outside the two most populous liberal states, he was able to win 50% of the vote.  This shows how divided we are.  So it is unlikely that Biden or anyone else can get things done in the future.

I think I am done ranting for the last time this year.  Thank goodness this crazy year is ending.  Hopefully 2021 will be much better.  Happy new year, everybody.

 I have not been writing about Trump's obsession of trying to overthrow the election result with ridiculous and false claims.  Those claims are so outrageous that even the justices in the Supreme Court who were appointed by him have ruled against him.  So I figure eventually this will die down and he would have to leave office.  Better spend time worrying about the virus, the economy and all other problems in the nation than worrying about Trump's crazy claims.  But every time it looks like Trump and his allies are coming to the end of the road for them, he will not give up and puts the nation into more danger.

I know Trump does not care about the country and its citizens.  The death rate and hospitalization rate are getting worse.  The economy is plummeting.  Russia is hacking into computers of our companies and government institutions.  Yet Trump just talks about the non existing election frauds.  As our intelligence agencies are accusing of Russia's espionage, he is saying that it is not Russia.  He says it is maybe China even though the evidence is overwhelming that it is Russia.  Why is he so scared of Russia and Putin?  Time after time he has defended Russia over our own intelligence.  Even after Pompeo says it is Russia, Trump tells his staff to stand down on this claim?  Why?

Now there are reports that he wants to appoint Sidney Powell to be special council to investigate election fraud.  The same Powell who was on his team alleging voter fraud.  How is that for a democracy.  Michael Flynn is advocating that Trump declare martial law to prevent the transfer of power?  How is that for a democracy?  It seems like Trump and his supporters think we are a banana republic.  I think four more years of Trump in power will turn U.S into one.

I thought all along that Trump is doing all this even if he knows he can't win is because he can raise millions of dollars.  He loves money and given that he is deep in debt and probably need defense funds after he leaves office, he is trying to get as much money as possible.  Those people who four years ago believed that he will build a wall and Mexico will pay for it, are now contributing money for overturning the election.  Once again these people are taken by this snake oil salesman.

But at least these people taken by Trump are just losing their money.  The really dangerous people are those who threatened the REPUBLICAN election officials in Georgia and other states for not overturning election results.  The idea of martial law is attractive to them.  They think Trump will help them overthrow the government.  They won't be successful.  But I am sure Russia will be willing to lend them a helping hand!

 My wife had an experience in the past couple of weeks which illustrates that after almost a year, we still have not figured out how to contain this pandemic.  The scientists have figured out a lot about this virus but we have not used the knowledge we have acquired and turned that into actions that will decrease infections and thus save lives.

My wife volunteers at a free clinic one or two days a week.  She was contacted by the clinic on a Saturday that one of her fellow volunteers had tested positive for COVID.  My wife had last worked at the clinic on Monday before this.  She had brief contact with that fellow volunteer but she believed it was less than 15 minutes and both were wearing masks.  So it is unlikely that my wife would have been infected.

My wife checked the protocol for this and was told that she should quarantine for 2 weeks from that Monday.  If she has no symptoms during the two weeks, then she should get tested after to be sure she is negative.  The quarantine is right, but I don't see the benefit of getting the test after the quarantine is over.  The most infectious time after exposure is from 4 to 10 days.  So ideally she should get tested as soon as she found out about the positive test of her co-worker.  This way, if she is positive, she can warn the people she had contact with from Monday to Saturday of that week.  Getting a test after two weeks of quarantine would not help anyone she had contact with during those first five days.  (The only contacts she had during that time was mainly me.  We saw couple of friends but we were outside and wore masks.)

The ideal thing would have been that we can get quick antigen tests which would give us results right away.  We should have been able to test daily from day 5 (Saturday) until at least day 10.  If there is a positive result then we should have gone in for a PCR test to confirm.  But we cannot get the antigen test and the county told us not to go in for the PCR test until after the quarantine is over.

So after the 14 days was over, my wife went to get tested.  She waited in line for 40 minutes and then was told that they had run out of tests and to come back another day!  Two days later she went back and got tested.  She finally got the expected negative result 4 days after that.  I ask:  What good is it to get a test result 20 days after the exposure?  She was not going to infect anyone after two weeks even if she had been infected herself.  The testing timeline is not according to the best scientific data, in my opinion.  There is not availability of the quick antigen test.  If we are still depending on the PCR tests, at least have them available at all times and have turn around times of no more than one day.  Otherwise, tests are not doing much good.

Also there was no contact tracing.  My wife got the news from her clinic.  There was no contact from the county health department.  We had to inquire ourselves about the protocol, which is not correct, in my opinion.  I am wondering, given this lack of on time testing and contact tracing, if the infection counts in my county or elsewhere in the nation is anywhere near correct.

Well, maybe the vaccines will eventually bail us out.  But meanwhile, unnecessary infections and deaths are bound to continue.  The authorities are still not doing a good job almost a year into this.  A large portion of the public are also not doing their part by wearing masks and social distancing.  This is still going to be a bad winter and spring, unfortunately.

 The inequality of black and white was again vividly on display in Staten Island last week.  The manager of a bar which had defied restriction orders due to COVID, ran away from the police and then drove his car with a cop on the hood of the car.  This was caught on video.  The man said that he was running away from two men who did not identify themselves as policemen.  Yeah, right!  

The guy was eventually arrested without injury.  Not only that, he was released without bond!  Now, what would happen if this guy was black?  A black guy running away from the police?  Probably shot.  A black guy made it into his car and then hit a cop?  Probably shot.  A black guy arrested after above action?  Probably beat up, if not get kneed to death or given an injection of ketamine at a dose twice his weight.  A black guy goes before a judge after hitting a cop with a car?  Certainly he would not have gotten out without bail.  Maybe a black guy could have come out of this unscathed, like this Staten Island guy.  But don't bet on it.  

Those who support this white guy would say the government deprived him of his freedom to operate his bar.  They deprived him of his freedom not to be intimidated by the police.  But do any of these people support black people who are deprived of their right to be treated as equal human beings?

 I was going to write a couple of days ago but there was a power outage our neighborhood from 9 am Monday until 3 am this morning.  So it was about 42 straight hours where we had no electricity or internet.  We also had an outage last Thursday from 5 am to 7 pm.  So a quick calculation: we had no electricity for a total 56 hours in the past 142 hours.

The frustrating  thing is that the power outage was not directly caused by nature but intentionally by the Southern California Edison.  We were told last year that Edison have devised a plan to shut off electricity based on factors such as wind velocity and direction, humidity and so on.  The reason being that there has been fires started by wind knocking down powerlines and igniting fires.  The thing is, California has always had strong winds periodically.   There has been practically no rain this season and so things are very dry.  But again, droughts are not unusual in California.  

I think what is somewhat different is that there has been more lawsuits against electric companies for start of fires.  So I can understand that Edison is trying to prevent fire from down lines as much as possible.  But the last few days, the wind conditions were not among the worst I have seen since I moved out here.  And the outages are longer than they need to be given the winds had died down well before power was restored.

I think shutting down power whenever the wind blows is not a solution to fires.  The main problem is that there are too many power lines above ground.  Wind would not affect power lines underground.  Edison and the government is reluctant to spend money to put lines under ground.  I also believe that the upkeep of existing lines is not up to par.  Just turning off electricity cause Edison less.

This is an example of the poor infrastructure of the country generally.  I had been thinking about writing about our infrastructure.  This last few days has been another wake up call for the many things that need to be fixed but there is a lack of political will to do so.  More on this in the future.

 I read yesterday that of the nurses who have died from COVID, 30% of them are Filipinos.  Filipinos make up about 4% of the nurses in this country.  So the death rate of Filipino nurses is more than 7 times of what is expected based on their percentage of the total nurses population.  There are, of course, multiple factors involved.  But the death rate of Filipino nurses, like that of all healthcare workers in this pandemic, could have been much lower if all of us had done better.

I don't have the statistics but based on my own experience, the Filipino nurses tend to work in ER, ICU and nursing homes.  Those are areas that have been hit hardest by the pandemic.  I also think they tend to end up at locations where it is difficult to recruit American nurses.  I also suspect when PPEs and other precautions were lacking, the Filipino nurses were less likely to complain and demand safety measures to be implemented.  

Yes, there may be personal factors also.  Filipinos have a higher rate of hypertension and diabetes which are risk factors of having severe complications from COVID.  As immigrants, they may also have to live in homes with more people.  While these factors cannot be changed easily, the actions of the American government and American people should be improved.  

We, the people, should take all the precautions to prevent the spread of the virus.  The less people end up in the hospital, the less chance healthcare workers will get sick and die.  There are people who still believe this is a hoax.  Some still believe in Trump's version of this disease.  I say to these people:  don't go to  the hospital when you sick if that is your belief.  You can stay home and take hydroxychloroquine and inject disinfectants into your body as Trump suggested.

There are still a few weeks until the Biden administration take over.  Until then, not much will change as Trump has basically checked out.  He even left the G20 meeting about the pandemic and went to play golf.  We can't count on anything done before he is out of the White House.  Biden will do better but I notice that the task force he named for the pandemic does not include a nurse.  I think that is a bad omission.  I think the nurses are the ones closest to the patients and their experience in taking care of these patients will give great insight in the war against this virus.

 As the country reaches 250,00o deaths, it is incredible that a big part of the population does not believe in the science of wearing a mask.  In fact, some of our "leaders" still attack people who advocate wearing a mask.  Ted Cruz, for example, called a fellow senator an ass for asking a fellow lawmaker to wear a mask in the senate chamber.  Shortly after, Senator Grassley of Iowa announced he contracted the virus.  Since then two more Republican Congressmen also got infected.  Attacking someone when you are completely wrong is despicable.  I won't call Cruz an ass because an ass cannot lick somebody else's ass as he has been doing for Trump.  

Cruz is such a little man that he kisses Trump's ass even though Trump called him all kinds of names and belittled him during the 2016 campaign.  But Cruz has no pride and he resorted to kissing Trump's ass in order to survive his Senate campaign last time.  But even though he won't be up for reelection until way after Trump is out of the office, he is still one of Trump's sycophant.  That is because he thinks he can win the nomination for president in 2024 so he doesn't want to lose Trump supporters.  Everybody, including Trump supporters, know that he is a weak man in 2016 and today.  He has no chance to get the nomination.   And according the GOP thinking, he is not eligible anyway.  He was born outside of the U.S. and if the GOP think that Obama was not eligible because he "may" have been born outside of the U.S., shouldn't Cruz be ineligible since he was definitely born outside of the U.S.?   But then the Republicans are hypocrites, of course.

 I have obtained a copy of another letter from Xi Jinping to Donald Trump congratulating him on his reelection.  This is obviously quite different from most world leaders who have congratulated Joe Biden.  So lets see what Xi has to say.

Dear President Trump

Congratulations to your win last week.  I know the fake press in the U.S. have declared Sleepy Joe as the winner but we both know better.  I understand you are heroically fighting to retain your job and I have great admiration for your courage.

I see that there are many traitors in your country who are trying to undermine the will of the people.  So I think you are doing the right thing by ignoring your own Department of Homeland Security which has declared that this election is the most secure.  Putin has information that this is not so.  So I think you should fire your DHS staff for not announcing that the election was a fraud.  

You have taken the right step of firing you Secretary of Defense.  I believe you will also fire your head of the CIA and FBI.  You don't need these people to run your department.  Put in your friends who will defend you against traitors in your country.  If you need help with world order, I will be glad to run things for you in Asia and Putin will run things for you in Europe.  No hurry to hire new heads for your departments.  And don't share intel with Biden.  Who knows what he will do with the info?  In any case, why would he need those?  You will still be president for the next four years at least.

It seems to me there were a lots of fraud in your election.  If I were you, I would call for recounts in all the states you "lost".  I am sure the UN will be happy to send election watchers to all your states to monitor the situation, making sure all the recounts are done correctly.  The UN, under the direction of the U.S. has sent many teams to various banana republics in the past to monitor elections.  So I am sure they can return the favor this time.

I know you have been preoccupied with the COVID situation in your country.  No need to worry, I am sure Doctors without Borders and other organizations will be happy to come here to help your health workers.  They have experience going to third world countries for decades.  Given your situation, though not due to your fault, they will come to the U.S. to help instead of Africa soon.

Due to leaders like Mao Zedong in my country, we have become the number 2 power in the world in a short time.  I am sure with your similar leadership, after your next 4 years as president, you will be able to make the U.S. the number 2 power in the world!  Such an achievement in such a short time!  Much admiration!  Good luck.

Your comrade in power play

Jinping

 After three days and nights of watching the election playing out, I finally got some decent sleep and exercise over the past couple of days and can now look back at this roller coaster ride.  Amazingly, even though my predictions were not as accurate as I would have liked, if things hold as it is now, the finall tally will be 306-232, exactly as I had predicted!  Basically, I got wrong on NC and a district in Maine wrong but that was balanced on the opposite wrong call from Georgia.  It balanced out!.  So now let's review the past 5 days.

November 3rd started well for the Democrats as Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania were all going Biden's way.  But the jubilation quickly turned into despair as those three states along with Wisconsin and Michigan all seemed to be going Trump's way.  The only bright spot was Arizona which may flip to Biden.  I stayed up until 1:30 am Pacific time with not much hope.  Trump declared victory even as pundits say that mail-in ballots will go toward Biden.

November 4:  I woke up at 6 am and checked the tv wearily.  Surprisingly, Biden had overtaken Trump in Wisconsin and Michigan.  Pennsylvania was still in Trump's column but the margin had decreased from over 700,000 to a little over 200,000.  Even though North Carolina didn't look good, Georgia began to look more promising.  

November 5:  Wisconsin and Michigan are called for Biden.  Pennsylvania and Georgia continue to tighten.  I feel much better because if Arizona and Nevada remain with Biden, he gets to 270.  But Arizona is tightening  and so Pennsylvania and Georgia maybe our plan B.  A sign that is good is that Trump is threatening lawsuits in states that he is leading.  He seems desperate so he must know things are turning against him.  

November 6:  Biden has taken over the lead in Pennsylvania.  Georgia is also closing in.  Arizona is tightening up.  Nevada looks to be staying with Biden.  While this is looking good and I am more relieved, it looks like the so called blue wave is not happening.  In fact, the GOP will gain in the House, even though the Democrats will stay in power.  The Senate will not flip to the Democrats.

November 7:  Finally, Pennsylvania is called for Biden and it is over except for the final margin.  It is a great day for America and the world.  Trump had not conceded and who knows if he ever will.  He wants to litigate all the way to the Supreme Court even though he has not presented any evidence of fraud that changed the election.  Biden and Harris make good speeches to try to unite the country.  The feeling is that they have a hard road ahead of them.

The first tough task for the new administration is the pandemic.  Five straight days of record breaking cases with the last 3 days recording over 120,000 cases.  I don't envy Biden and Harris.  Without the Senate and the Supreme Court on their side, it will be tough to implement their strategies.  Good luck to them.

 It is time for the AAAA, ie, the Angry Asian Accurate Assessment.  Usually this is a prediction of the Big Ten football bowl games results.  But we have a much more important topic today:  the American presidential election.  So here we go.

It is obvious there are states that are in the pockets of either the Democrats or the Republicans.   So off the bat, Biden has 216 votes in his pocket and Trump has 125.  I will also give Biden Minnesota and Nevada even though Trump thinks it is competitive.  So that means Biden has 16 more votes and a total of 232 so far.  I will give Trump Texas even though Biden camp thinks it can flip it.  I don't think so.  So Trump gets 38 votes and now has 163.

Florida 29 votes, Trump wins by 1 percentage point, 

Georgia 16 vote, Trump wins by 1.5 points

Ohio 18 votes, Trump wins by 2 points

Iowa 6 votes Trump wins by 2 points.  So Trump total 232.

Wisconsin 10 votes, Biden wins by 6 points

North Carolina 15 votes, Biden wins 1 point

Pennsylvania, 20 votes, Biden wins by 4 points

Michigan 16 votes, Biden wins by 6 points

Arizona 11 votes, Biden wins by 1.5 point

District in Maine, Biden wins by 3 points

District in Nebraska, Biden wins by 2 points  So Biden has  a total of 306

What is amazing is that this is exactly total that Trump beat Clinton in 2016:  306-232!  Basically, I am predicting that Biden flip the "blue wall" back to the Democratic column and add North Carolina, Arizona and the the two districts.  I will also predict that Biden wins the popular vote by 6 points.

I will also predict that the election won't be decided tomorrow.  Florida maybe able to finish counting tomorrow and if Biden wins there, it will be all over.  But I think Trump will win it and then we have to wait of the blue wall results.  Pennsylvania isn't even allowed to start counting early ballots till tomorrow and the urban votes will come in even later than the rural votes.  So it is likely that Trump maybe ahead there at end of tomorrow night.  If North Carolina and Arizona comes in for Biden, it also will be over but both will be close and unlikely decided tomorrow.

So Trump may declare victory tomorrow night without any neutral sites agreeing.  By Wednesday night, I think the tide will turn and Biden will look like the winner.  There maybe litigation as Trump had promised.  But I believe that results will be decisive enough to prevent the country from getting into chaos.  Otherwise we will look like a banana republic.

I will also predict that the Democrats will win the senate.  They will lose Alabama but flip Arizona, Colorado, Maine, and North Carolina.  That will give them a net gain of 3 which is enough if Biden wins.  I also think they will flip Iowa, although that will be very close.  They may flip one of the Georgia seats but it is likely that nobody will get 50%, leading to a runoff later.  Without a presidential election, the Democrat candidate will be at a disadvantage.