PhineasC

I find it hard to believe at this point there are still people out there clinging to the idea that if only we jab every man, woman and child in this country the pandemic will miraculously end, even if cases still exist. How does that even make sense now?

But those rednecks in FL, amirite?

How often do you leave your house? Serious question. You sound like a hermit guy I know who is really into lockdowns, mandates, and the like. He isn't even affected because he is always home. He has been "on lockdown" for like 25 years straight already. 2020 was like a dream year for him. He was finally the normal one.

The issue with the logic here is that making people wear masks and socially-distance at work actually encourages teleworking, so that offsets any supposed gain to be had in reducing teleworking by mandating vaccines. I don't think people are not coming back to work due to vaccine status. I am not seeing that.

LOL It's still a huge thing down off the mountain. I can't get some people to come back. They simply refuse.

But again, very few businesses have mandated vaccines yet. I don't think this is as widespread of an issue for Americans as the media paints it. Most Americans received the vaccine to protect themselves and are not trying to force others to get it. If this was a widespread concern, we would have seen businesses doing this all along since January.

There is definitely some of that. I make the comment here sometimes that no matter what stance I take on this issue, 50% of my staff will be outraged and some will threaten to quit. That being said, since May we have had no issues with COVID concerns amongst the employees. Everyone seemed satisfied with where things landed after mask mandates were lifted. It's only recently that this issue has resurfaced. For my staff, mandating the vaccine would cause many more issues than it would solve and put me squarely in the middle as the bad guy.

This is one of those times I wish I was a lawyer who specialized in wrongful termination cases. They are going to have a field day with this. Many easy settlements coming now. Just send a letter to the employer who fired your client over vaccination status and demand $100k.

You seem to enjoy hygiene theater. I guess it makes sense to you for vaccinated people to mask up around each other indefinitely?

Certainly looks that way at first glance! Some really bad messaging out there right now if the goal is to convince skeptics to get the vaccine and reassure those who already got it that they made a good decision.

Masks, I agree with you. I could see that being done to reduce liability. Making someone wear a mask does not potentially endanger their well-being or violate their private medical self-determination. Or at least that would be easier to argue in court. But forcing a medical procedure on someone who did not have that in their employment agreement (with the alternative being termination) is hugely problematic in my experience with labor laws. Many lawsuits are going to come out of this.

I'd be curious to know what your employment agreement says about mandatory vaccines, if anything. I assume the flu vax has always been mandatory there?

Also, I don't think most businesses are viewing a vaccine mandate as a means to reduce liability. If you force someone to get a medical procedure that was not agreed to in their employment agreement, and they get sick from it, you can be sued for a lot of money. It is probably also going to be really problematic to fire someone for refusing the vaccine. This is definitely not something a company would do to lower liability, IMO. If you look at how few companies had done this up until now, that's pretty telling, I think. It's not a great business decision unless you are a hospital or something like that. Those places have mandated the flu vax for years so there is precedence there. Did the typical hair salon mandate the flu vaccine before? No, of course not.

The Federal government is putting a lot of pressure on companies to take this action. They have been talking about it non-stop. It's not even clear if the Federal government has the authority to "force" private companies to mandate vaccinations, but it looks like it might happen to some degree via this method. Large businesses like Pfizer and big defense companies have lobbyists on the Hill who hear the chatter that if businesses don't comply they will face penalties or other restrictions on their ability to do business. This is the "soft mandate" I have always talked about. "Force your employees to get vaccinated or else you will no longer be eligible to apply for Federal grants or bid on government contracts." Someone might try to weasel word that and say, "Well that company could always just choose to go out of business instead!" but come on. It's a false choice and essentially extortion.

I have been warning people about the government outsourcing certain functions and responsibility to private industry so they can get around legal restrictions, but people call that a "conspiracy theory" too.

I love the fresh smell of virtue signaling and pointless hygiene theater in the morning.

The government is using private industry to enforce rules they legally/constitutionally cannot. You see it with free speech all the time. The government can ask the largest online platforms to silence anyone who speaks out of turn against the narrative. It's literally happening all the time now. Now they are doing it with physical access to major businesses. A couple years ago, this would have scared the crap out of Americans. The issue of equal access and protection under the law was settled decades ago during the civil rights movement. But now we are moving backwards on it and no one seems to care because COVID is super scary.

There is now a thread in OT for COVID where she is posting (along with Hoosier shaking in his boots over the latest case numbers out of Bulgaria and Bahrain). Her thoughts on COVID are just about what you'd expect. LOL

Isn’t that what they mean by a “booster shot”??

I was crying more for their 40k employees who are probably all vaxxed and still need to mask and distance and eat alone.

We finally heard something from one of our prime contractors (a top three worldwide defense and aerospace company) on the Biden announcement. It was a stock letter sent to all of their vendors. It basically said people in the prime's buildings need to mask up all the time regardless of vaccination status. Meeting size limits. No eating or drinking at meetings. Otherwise, they are still "assessing the implications" of the "very complex" vaccine mandate. Doesn't change much on our end yet. One way I could see them doing this is to say we can't bill them for our time until we show "compliance" with all of this nonsense. They recently tried to pull that same move over a cybersecurity certification the Federal government is requiring every business to have. That's a lot less personal than this issue, though. It's definitely hilarious to have a situation now where in the same 20 seconds people are saying the vax works and will set you free and if you are vaxxed you can't eat, drink, or breathe near anyone else. LOL

What happens when the scientists aren't even following the science? Micro black holes? Total collapse of spacetime?

And to think these are the same politicians we expect to give up the power they have been given during the pandemic and go quietly...

The CDC really has lost the plot if that's truly all they used. I assume they are also looking at the data from Israel on the Pfizer vax, though. If all they used to make such a far-reaching announcement was some COVID numbers from a gay orgy weekend, I am not sure what to even say about that... LOL