It's October 2021 And Stupid Dipsh*ts Are Still Being Stupid Dipsh*ts About Masks

Your COVID roundup!

Here we are in the 20th month of the coronavirus pandemic, which we suspect will never end because of Death Cult idiots. And yet we have some good news on the pandemic all the same! Let's cover this in speed-round format, shall we? We'll start with the good stuff, and maybe end with some good stuff too.

National: Biden Ready To Roll Out Kids' Vaccines Once They're Approved

The Biden administration announced today that as soon as the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is approved for use in children ages 5 to 11, it has enough of the vaccine ready to "quickly and equitably distribute doses for the nation's 28 million children" in that age range. It's expected the kid-sized doses will be receive emergency authorization by the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control in the next few weeks. Like real timeline, not what "in two weeks" meant from 2017 through 2020.

Once the vaccine is approved, White House Coronavirus Response Coordinator Jeff Zients said, 15 million doses are ready to be shipped out within the first week.

Wow, how about a Thanksgiving where people won't have to worry as much about the gathering being a superspreader event? Like, among normal people who don't belong to an anti-vax death cult, at least. [ USA Today ]

Texas: Greg Abbott Can't Have A Law Banning Vaccine Mandates, So Sad

The Texas legislature adjourned its third special session of the year without passing any laws that would back up Greg Abbott's garbage executive order banning employers from requiring workers to be vaccinated. Neither the state House nor the Senate passed the legislation, which Abbott added to the special session's agenda after it had achieved its main goal of drawing up gerrymandered voting districts to give Republicans an advantage in most counties while watering down the power of Latinos. (Texas's infamous voting restrictions passed in the second special session this year, if you're keeping score at home.)

Earlier this month, Abbott issued an executive order prohibiting any "entity in Texas" from requiring vaccination for employees, which was of course pretty meaningless when it came to Joe Biden's requirement for vaccinations for healthcare workers, federal employees, and for companies with more than 100 workers, because federal supremacy and stuff. The Lege was unable to move a bill that would have enshrined Abbott's executive order in an equally pointless law, mostly due to pressure from Texas businesses, which don't like being told what to do by "small government" types. So now the inevitable lawsuits will target just the executive order. We don't know if Texas gets a discount on defending that in court, though. [ Texas Tribune ]

California: Anti-Masker Goes On Trial For Being Asshole In Grocery Store

Marianne Campbell Smith has become the only person (so far) to stand trial in Orange County, California, on charges resulting from refusing to cover her stupid face in defiance of an emergency public health order last year. Smith barged into a grocery store in Costa Mesa on August 15, 2020, along with two other women who were part of an anti-mask protest outside the shopping center. One of the women left before police arrived, and the second woman arrested that day took a plea deal.

Smith was very big on stupidly proclaiming her freedom, according to testimony by Eric Katz, who at the time was the store's manager. Katz said he told Smith and the other women at least five times to either mask up or leave as they wandered around the private business. She wasn't interested in freedom-denying services like Instacart, or even handing a list of what she wanted to store employees.

"She discussed doing it for her freedom," Katz said of why Smith told him she wasn't wearing a mask.

Also, she carried a sign reading "Healthy people do not wear masks," which might just undermine her attorney's insistence that she was allowed in the store because she had a card of some kind saying she was exempt from wearing a mask for "medical" reasons. Or maybe not! Also, shortly after Smith and her pals went into the store, a crowd of roughly two dozen fellow protestors rushed the entrance to the market, causing employees to close and lock the doors.

Smith was charged with two misdemeanors, for trespassing and "obstructing a business or customers." The OC Register doesn't actually mention what sort of penalty that may carry, although it did note the woman who pleaded to an infraction for failing to leave got a suspended sentence with no jail time. Smith may end up having to appear on Fox News to whine about her martyrdom. [ OC Register ]

The Internet: No, Anthony Fauci Didn't Do THAT, Either

 Here's a good fact check of a stupid internet hoax about Anthony Fauci. As ever, we shall Truth Sandwich it. Out here in reality, Fauci co-authored a 2008 paper about the 1918 Flu pandemic in which he and his co-authors determined that most deaths in that pandemic resulted from bacterial pneumonia that followed the initial influenza infection. The fact check says Fauci's paper

explains that the influenza virus destroyed cells that line the bronchial tubes and lungs which created a pathway for bacteria that normally inhabit the nose and throat to invade the lungs and cause bacterial pneumonia.

Fauci makes it very clear in his description of the study that bacterial pneumonia was preceded by the influenza virus: "The weight of evidence we examined from both historical and modern analyses of the 1918 influenza pandemic favors a scenario in which viral damage followed by bacterial pneumonia led to the vast majority of deaths. In essence, the virus landed the first blow while bacteria delivered the knockout punch."

Honestly, that's some pretty cool historical forensic stuff if you ask us.

Ah, but then came the online lies, which insisted — again, completely falsely — that Fauci had written that most victims of the 1918 pandemic died of pneumonia, and that the pneumonia had resulted from bacteria in masks. This is, again, bullshit: The paper doesn't mention masks at all.

Really, that's about all there is to it; the naturopathic "doctor" who made the claim has been permanently suspended from Twitter, although there are still loonies repeating her lies. If you see them, report the lying bastards, the end. [ Reuters ]

Yr Wonkette is funded entirely by reader donations. If you can, please support our brand of pissed-off truth telling with a monthly donation of $5 to $10. We'll curse the darkness AND light a fucking candle, thank you very much.

 Do your Amazon shopping through this link, because reasons .