WHAT IS THE STATUS OF COURT CASES ON MANDATORY VACCINATIONS?

(Below will be photos I took of the Tokyo Summer Olympics Opening Ceremonies.  The first is Tokyo Tree that night.)

Simply, there are at least two recent court judgements on cases regarding the right of government to mandate vaccinations:

• An Indiana court supported Indiana University requiring all students, faculty and staff to be fully vaccinated before returning to campus in August, save for those with religious/medical exemptions and students taking online courses.  
• The ruling, though, only applies to this university.  
• Hundreds of other colleges have also taken certain steps, and they all remain open to challenge.
• The University of Hawaii has indicated that vaccinations are not required until the Federal Government officially approves those vaccines, something that won't happen until later this year.
• The bottomline situation nationally, thus, remains murky.

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  In a rather confusing set of decisions and changes, the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals a week and a half ago sided with the CDC over the State of Florida to allow cruise lines to make it mandatory for passengers to be vaccinated before boarding a cruise ship.  Then, this past Friday, this same court indicated that the CDC had failed to demonstrate an entitlement to stay pending appeal.  (Misia singing the Japan National Anthem.)

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  What this means is that pandemic restrictions on Florida-based cruise ships are no longer required, and un-vaccinated passengers will be allowed to board.  (Drone show at the Tokyo Olympics Opening Ceremony.)
• The CDC remains committed to following through on its judicial rights, and this could just as well be reversed again.
• What makes it all the more confusing is that most cruise lines would rather have the CDC prevail, and Governor DeSantis is pushing his cause mostly to allow un-vaccinated customers to be served alcoholic beverages in bars and restaurants in the state.  His contention was that he had to extend this right to cruise passengers.
• If you are totally lost with all this illogic, join the crowd.
• The crux of the issue is that everyone, here and elsewhere, will continue to be confused until the virus goes away, which will certainly not be this year, and maybe the next.

On the op-ed page this morning in the Star Advertiser was an article by Stephen Carter, a Yale professor entitled:  Vaccine Mandates and Personal Liberty Can Coexist.  While he makes a bit more sense than the above, only slightly, for the subject matter is rather arcane, and, for some reason, he brings in the libertarian philosophy, which to me obscures the topic even more.

It would be wise for me to stop here, but I'll take a chance and add a few of my thoughts:

• Sure, this is a land of personal freedom, but as Presidents with Congressional approval can declare war, Joe Biden can, should he wish, make vaccinations mandatory, for looming disaster is a good reason for such a step.  The Senate could be fussy, and maybe this is why he has chosen not to do this, letting the CDC take the heat.
• The sudden uptick in COVID-19 cases is due to this Delta variant being, perhaps, twice as contagious as the original.  Here is a graph from the New York Times this morning:

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  Even though those under 12 have not been approved for vaccination, their incidence of contraction is lower than those who were.  I guess younger people have a kind of natural immunity.
• Those older types, like me, have reached the 80% level of completed vaccination, and are now unlikely to be infected.  
• If the average rate of the nation stood at 80%, the number of cases would be at our level, cutting incidence by a factor of ten, and probably more.

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  But here is a scary thought.  If we don't stop the Delta variant, there is a Lambda variant out of South America that could infect vaccinated individuals.

People like me continue to wear masks even though it should not be necessary.  I haven't caught a cold or the flu since 2019, so that is another reason why I do.  There will need to be a decision-making point when I board the Island Princess in January.  By then I hope a sufficient number will have been vaccinated, and the cruise industry settled as to safe policy.  Yes, I'm a dreamer.

Changing subjects to the Tokyo Summer Olympics, Americans are not doing as well as in past competitions.  By the end we will no doubt still win more medals than anyone else, but some losses are surprising and a few results shocking.  I won't say what happened so you can safely watch events throughout the day.

When you look at that Olympic gold medal, your first thought is, wow, it must be really heavy.  Well, it turns out that this GOLD medal only has 6 grams of gold and 550 grams of silver.  Silver has a density a bit more than half that of gold.  The price of gold when that article was written was $353 (today it really is $358 with gold at $58/gram, but why quibble) and with the silver worth $466.  So a gold medal has $820 of precious metal.  The silver would be around $450 and bronze less than $5.  Of course, the value of each is priceless.  During the Winter Olympics the composition was slightly different and the value less, so a gold medal then was worth $555.

Here is something you might not have known.   That graphic is from the Rio Olympics in 2016.  An American in  Tokyo would get:

• Gold:  $37,500
• Silver:  $22,000
• Bronze:  $15,000

This payment comes from the U.S. Olympic Committee, meaning your tax dollars.  Further, some sports pay training athletes.  For example, swimmers who are ranked in the top 16 in the world in an Olympic event earn $40,000/year.  Some sports offer nothing, and, of course, there are marketable individuals getting endorsements and other perquisites.  Notice how prominent some of them are in commercials you watch between events.

The amount varies with country.  If from the UK, zero pounds for winning a medal.  A gold medalist from Singapore wins a tax-free million dollars in Singapore currency.  Of course, this almost never happens, except in the Rio Olympics five years ago 21-year old Joseph Schooling beat Michael Phelps in the 100-meter butterfly and got $750,000.  American's need to file their win with the IRS.  Schooling swam for the University of Texas, and is back in Tokyo.  The 100-meter butterfly final will be at 3:30PM EDT later this week on Friday.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average broke its all-time record for the second day in a row, rising 83 to 35,144.

I get sent a lot of good stuff, so here is one showing how tiny the Titanic looks relative to a modern cruise liner:

A regular size apple from a bonsai apple tree:

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