Salvation from the Devil
Doing anything LE means someone is getting screwed.
Larry Ellison is not one to let anything get him down, least of all gravity. Grave though the global COVID-19 pandemic may be, the Oracle founder, CTO and chairman is a man who produces. And, as intrepid Forbes reporter Angel Au-Yeung found out, the product is "wellness". Last week's Forbes front cover is graced with the faces …
Um ... it has been governors issuing unconstitutional shutdown orders. Governors reveling in emergency powers.
It was Trump saying we should think about opening ups soon as possible, and said governors having hissy fits.
So Trump plays them like a fiddle (again), knowing they will do the opposite of whatever he thinks/says. Now they want to show how cool and rebellious they are, by opening up (maybe - that extra power just feels so so good to them).
But what do I know, I just live here.
Um ... it has been governors issuing unconstitutional shutdown orders. Governors reveling in emergency powers.
Weirdly, it has been hard to find any constitutional lawyers to support that statement, and in general Trump's assertions that he has that power. But hey, what do I know, I only look at this based on facts..
King Donald d'Orange is appointing his kids to the newly forming econ task force which will guide the King in wisdom and knowledge and will tell us all when the country will reopen.
"Cursed be the scientists." is their motto.
"Cursed be those who say no to the King!"
"Cursed be those States who deny the King's wishes! For he is a Stable Genius with Unmatched Wisdom!"
I think the press are mainly viewing him as the messias of pandemics because of this talk in 2015:
https://www.ted.com/talks/bill_gates_the_next_outbreak_we_re_not_ready
However that doesn't make him an expert, no. He's just repeating what any epidemiologist would have said, but they're not Bill Gates so they didn't have the media exposure. Epidemiology was boring non-news until we found out they could actually happen. I don't think he's the medical genius people claim him to be either.
He's demonstrated his great mastery of cutthroat business practices during his career. Since then he's been putting his money to good work as a medical philantropist. But I don't see any indication of expertise either except for those few comments in an 8 minute TED talk. It's nice of him to donate some of his money for good for a change but he should let the real experts take the lead, IMO. But this is America and fame means more than expertise. Look at their choice of president. Q.E.D.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_&_Melinda_Gates_Foundation#Global_health_division
"Lanai... has become his petri dish of experimentation on health, wellness and sustainability, with data collection and feedback loops underpinning the entire operation. "It's a bit of a laboratory for advanced technology," Ellison says."
Sounds more like a volcanic island lair for someone who wants to take over what's left of the world once it has been ravaged by a plague.......
I'm sure I once saw a movie about something similar.
Does anyone know if oily snakes live on volcanic islands?
To be fair data does have an important part to play in health but it can also send people on wild goose chases and can't replace actual research.
There is, also a risk of large scale health data on everybody being misused.
The risk probability is tending towards 1 at the moment.
A separate not for profit organisation is needed here, ideally with a board made up only from Nobel science laureates to prevent it going 'corporate' after Larry hits the 'stop'.
The 21stCentury needs more billionaires to be like this in the mould of Carnegie & Rockefeller, ok, I admit they stepped on more than a few toes making their fortunes as well.
About the only thing I know about "wellness" is that I keep seeing mentioned on adverts on the back panels of buses which is an odd place to learn about anything, but there you are. And the one thing that strikes me about it is that the easiest people to whom to sell it must be those who are already well. Those who aren't present a much tougher delivery problem.
the easiest people to whom to sell it must be those who are already well. Those who aren't present a much tougher delivery problem.
Such a fine sentence, I'm going to borrow that.
Another one I've come across:
"The kind of people who want to assemble in large groups right now are exactly the kind of people who ought to" - even Twitter can contain the occasional gem..
"The kind of people who want to assemble in large groups right now are exactly the kind of people who ought to"
As you say, a gem; would they please take Eamon Holmes and the like with them.
It's noticeable that those now visiting the countryside are exactly those who shouldn't. We had the numpties from Leeds who reportedly set fire to 4 hectares of moorland with a barbecue. And the other day when I was out for a walk I found somebody who drove a 4x4 up a 30 degree grass bank, apparently for no other reason than because he could. That particular bank has pyramid orchids growing on it.
"Through data, Ellison has partnered with US President Donald Trump and plans to rescue America from the wreckage of the COVID-19 outbreak."
Yeah, right. People like this don't do it for the karma. You just need to follow the money trail. Data is money. You had a disease? You will have 'x' number of side effects. Here, buy this medicine. Oh, medicine 'x' gives you 'y' side effects. Here, buy this medicine. Before you know it, you are on 6 different forms of medication with combined side effects worse that what you started with. The people pay the drug companies, the drug companies pay for the data.
You lost your job because of the pandemic? Here, buy some insurance. Same premise.
Whatever misery these people can find, they will exploit, one way or another.
Larry is probably doing it for the Karma, just like Alfred Nobel did after he read his obit. as a 'purveyor of death & destruction'.
Ego driven persuit of money & power will only take you so far (Larry wouldn't notice another $10Bn dropping in his lap), eventually mortality rears its head and the Ego wants to be remembered for being 'great & good' not money grubbing.
Larry is 75, and right now nature is showing us all that money & power are sometimes no help at all (Unless you want to be the next Howard Hughes)
Reminds me of the old "when you have a hammer . ." adage.
Having data is very nice, Larry, but your data is, at best, the results of researchers doing actual work. So maybe you do have an idea about how to correlate those results, but you're still the end of the chain.
And I'm not sure I want you to be controlling that data anyway. That data belongs in a museum in the hands of proper medical personnel who can make sense of it.
You've got enough hypocrisy, lack of self-awareness and utopian vanity in and around this article for a whole new season!! Maybe they can bring back the Pied Piper gang for a sequel TV movie, like they did with Deadwood, where the crew has been acquired by Ellison and set to work in the bowels of project Sensei.
Bonus points if the pilot project in Lanai has worked out, and Ellison has decided the next phase that the Pied Piper crew are working on should be to revolutionize another island, like New Zealand, Australia or Great Britain.
It was actually six bankruptcies, which misapprehension is classic Trump fudging. Seems that since some occurred in the same year as others, they were combined for the purpose of counting "how many". And that is Trump thrice over on "smart money".
That his seventh bankruptcy is ongoing and terminal (for us) should now be obvious to all.
Like in his press briefing the other night. "All 50 US states,,,and the US territories...we have territories...not everyone knows that...I do..."
FFS man, your the President of the USA. If you didn't know the USA has territories then I'd be even more scared of you than I already am!!
Well, his hated "rival", Bill Gates has Malaria, so Larry has finally got his own disease!
Oh, My! Nice goin', Larry!
You may yet steal that Nobel prize away from the evil anti-Christ Bill !
Keep pluggin' away! If you have to, hock a jet-fighter or two! And don't let some pipsqueak's Maria stop you!