Mikey Likes It!: MARVEL and DC

Thursday, August 11, 2022

MARVEL and DC

I want to post this on MARVEL film releases and pay attention to the first film:

Key Release Dates

I have got to get my eyes checked. I read that as BLACK PANTHER: WANDA. I thought, "Huh? They're bringing Scarlet Witch into this one?" :D

Okay, so MARVEL. Does any of that excite you? I don't know about Black Panther without the lead actor, you know what I mean?

What would I see above?

If Sam is now CAPTAIN AMERICA, I will see that film. I know it's not Chris Evans. If it's Sam (Anthony Mackie), I'm on board. If FANTASTIC FOUR brought back Chris Evans and Jessica Alba, I'd be on board. AUNT MAN & THE WASP is a no brainer -- Paul Rudd and (I'm assuming) Michelle Pfeiffer? Those are two actors I try to see everything they're in. Michelle was the best thing about SHOWTIME's FIRST LADY and Stan's right (see "THE FIRST LADY (destroyed by Viola) and HBO MAX (d..") about what killed that show and prevented a second season.

By the way, please read Stan's "Chris Pratt is getting on my nerves" -- I agree with him. I didn't like Mindy Kaling whining that it was sexism if you didn't like her movie and I don't need to hear Chris Pine whining that you must be 'woke' if you don't like his AMAZON series. I don't like his AMAZON series. It's dull and boring. Loved REACHER and can't wait for season two. Anyway, if you want criticism, don't act. You're paid a ton of money. And you want to whine like Mindy, Chris or Viola Davis.

In terms of MARVEL TV shows, they need to bring back IRON FIST and THE DEFENDERS and JESSICA JONES. Glad they're bringing back DAREDEVIL but IRON FIST was my favorite.

Now let's go to DC and FLASH:

Could the stars be aligning just right for Grant Gustin to hop over to the DCEU from the Arrowverse, replacing Ezra Miller as Barry Allen in The Flash? As it stands, Gustin's schedule is about to free up considerably. It was just recently announced that the upcoming ninth season of The Flash would serve as the final season of the long-running Arrowverse series.

Also in recent news, Miller has been arrested once again, this time for felony burglary in Vermont. Miller's multiple arrests and other examples of problematic behavior have reportedly put The Flash in serious danger of getting canceled. Because Warner Bros. Discovery just recently axed Batgirl, even with that movie having completed filming, there is a good chance The Flash could get scrapped, or perhaps even remade with a different actor in the lead role.

Enter Grant Gustin, as far as many fans are concerned. The latest press involving both actors has been seen by fans as a perfect storm to set up the switch for Gustin from the Arrowverse to the DCEU. Whether that will end up happening remains to be seen, but there are certainly a lot of fans clearly hoping this is the direction that Warner Bros. Discovery will take with the film.

They should have immediately started reshoots with Grant. They should have used CGI to put him into the scenes and remove Ezra. Ezra is a trainwreck but it's DISCOVERY and they're idiots (see Ava and C.I.'s "DISCOVERY trashes itself in the entertainment industry (Ava and C.I.)" and "HOUSE OF HAMMER, slum of DISCOVERY").

Here's C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"

Thursday, August 11, 2022. Joe Biden takes a vacation as troubles mount, Moqtada insists on judicial action or else, and much more.

US President Joe Biden is vacationing and he left without coming up with a real plan to address monkeypox in place. This despite the fact that this pandemic is a global issue.

Tamino Dreisam (WSWS) reports on the spread of monkeypox in Germany:

The first monkeypox case in Germany was reported on May 20. Since then, the number has risen steadily, from 28 cases per week in late May to 125 in early June. There are now 300 to 400 cases per week and a total of 2,916 cases have been reported to the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) in Germany to date, corresponding to an incidence level of 3.54 cases per hundred thousand inhabitants. This is more than ten percent of the worldwide cases outside Africa. A recent study estimated the reproductive rate (R-value) of monkeypox in Germany to be 1.21, which is higher than the COVID-19 R-value, which is currently 0.86.

Due to widespread ignorance about the symptoms of monkeypox and generally limited testing facilities, it can be assumed that the actual number of infections is much higher.

Worldwide, Germany is among the most affected countries. In absolute numbers, Germany has the third most infections after the United States with 9,461 cases and Spain with 5,162 cases. On a per capita basis, however, the incidence rate in Germany, at 3.54, is already much higher than in the US, with 2.15 cases per hundred thousand inhabitants. This is despite the fact that the US administration has already declared monkeypox a public health emergency.

Joe's 'plan' is to take a vaccine and divide it into fifths and then use the diluted form on Americans. Supposedly, it may work -- based on a single study done seven years ago. We noted that yesterday as did Trina. At THE ATLANTIC, Katherine J. Wu reports:

Once again, the United States is messing up its approach to vaccines. Three months into its monkeypox outbreak, just 620,000 doses of the two-injection Jynneos shot—the nation’s current best immune defense against the virus—have been shipped to states, not nearly enough to immunize the 1.6 million to 1.7 million Americans that the CDC considers at highest risk. The next deliveries from the manufacturer aren’t slated until September at the earliest. For now, we’re stuck with the stocks we’ve got.

Which is why the feds have turned to Inoculation Plan B: splitting Jynneos doses into five, and poking them into the skin, rather than into the layer of fat beneath. The FDA issued an emergency-use authorization for the strategy yesterday afternoon.

This dose-sparing tactic will allow far more people to sign up for doses before summer’s end; if successful, it could help contain the outbreak in the U.S., which currently accounts for nearly a third of the world’s documented monkeypox cases. But this decision is based on scant data, and the degree of protection offered by in-skin shots is no guarantee. The FDA is now playing a high-stakes game with the health and trust of people most vulnerable to monkeypox—an already marginalized population. Call it a bold decision; call it a risky gamble: It may be the best option the country currently has, but one the U.S. could have avoided had it marshaled a stronger response earlier on.

Little is known about how Jynneos performs against monkeypox even in its prescribed dosing regimen, the so-called subcutaneous route; the new method, intradermal injection, is a murkier proposition still. “We are in a very data-thin zone,” says Jeanne Marrazzo, an infectious-disease physician at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

The shot was approved for use against smallpox and monkeypox in 2019. But to date, researchers don’t have a strong sense of how well it guards against disease or infection or how long protection lasts. Although scientists know that two doses of Jynneos can elicit similar numbers of antibodies as older poxvirus vaccines, no estimates of the vaccine’s true efficacy, from large-scale clinical trials, exist; a human study in the Congo hasn’t yet reported results. And though firmer data have shown that the vaccine keeps lab monkeys from getting seriously sick, “I don’t necessarily trust making the clinical decisions” based just on that, says Mark Slifka, a vaccinologist at Oregon Health & Science University. It’s not even clear if Jynneos can stop someone from transmitting the virus, especially now that many cases seem to be arising via skin-to-skin contact during sex, an understudied form of spread.

Some real leadership would be nice right about now. Hope Joe's enjoying that vacation. A case of monkeypox has been discovered at Detroit's Sterling Heights Assembly Plant. In response, Will Lehman, a candidate for the presidency of United Auto Workers issued the following statement:

I call for an immediate shutdown of all production until the spread of the infection is isolated and contained, with all workers affected receiving full pay. The companies, which are making record profits based on our exploitation, can afford to take the necessary measures to save our health and lives.

We need to break through the misinformation and disinformation that is being put out by the White House, the UAW and corporate media.

All workers need to be made aware that monkeypox is a potentially deadly virus with a case fatality rate similar to COVID. It can cause disfiguring lesions and excruciating pain that in 10 percent of cases requires hospitalization. The experience of Africa shows that it has a particularly severe impact on children.

The official number of monkeypox cases, 7,500 in the US, is likely an undercount, since testing is a complicated and long process. The vast majority of individuals currently being tested are gay men, based on the false claim that the virus is primarily transmitted through sex. In fact, studies have shown that monkeypox can spread through aerosols that linger in the air like the coronavirus. It can also spread through skin to skin contact as well as contaminated fabric and surfaces. The virus can remain alive for weeks outside the body, meaning all potentially contaminated areas need to be regularly disinfected with appropriate cleaning supplies.

Given this, it is highly probable that there are more cases in the auto plants than the single reported case at SHAP, where 7,000 work. For more than two years, management and the UAW have systematically covered up the spread of COVID-19 in the plants, forcing workers to rely on word of mouth.

Giant auto plants with thousands forced to stand close together for hours on end are primary vectors for the transmission of disease that can infect the entire community. The danger will be multiplied when schools reopen in a few short weeks under conditions where nothing is being done to halt the spread of COVID-19 or monkeypox.

No confidence can be put in the profit hungry Stellantis management or their lackeys in the UAW bureaucracy to deal with this emergency. The last two and a half years of the COVID-19 pandemic show they could not care less about workers’ health or lives.

When COVID was first detected in auto plants, it was workers who halted production, not the highly paid UAW bureaucrats. If it wasn’t for the action of workers on the shop floor at SHAP and other auto plants, who stopped production as the pandemic spread in March 2020, there would have been no temporary lockdowns or other limited safety protocols put in place. The UAW worked to prematurely reopen the auto plants before the virus was contained and then steadily removed all the other protocols while covering up its spread.

Now the UAW simply parrots all the corporate and government lies that we must accept mass infection, that COVID will be here forever, killing hundreds of thousands every year and inflicting millions with debilitating “long COVID.”

This means that we workers must act independently to protect the health of ourselves, our families and our communities.

I call for the formation of rank-and-file committees in every auto plant and workplace to oversee health and safety and other workplace conditions.

We need to build a network of rank-and-file committees to link up autoworkers everywhere, including with our brothers and sisters overseas. We cannot allow COVID and now monkeypox to continue to spread in our workplaces and society as a whole.

Medical science has the tools like vaccines, mass testing, quarantine, isolation, and rigorous contact tracing to contain and eliminate these diseases. Workers must not be allowed to continue to die simply to grow the profits of the auto companies and Wall Street.

If you support what I am saying, I ask you to contact my campaign and learn how you can become more involved.

AP Tweets:

President Joe Biden has arrived in South Carolina with members of his family for what is expected to be at least a seven-day vacation.

apnews.com

Biden begins summer vacation with family in South Carolina

NORTH CHARLESTON, South Carolina (AP) — President Joe Biden arrived in South Carolina on Wednesday to begin what is expected to be at least a seven-day vacation with members of his family outside of...

6:30 PM · Aug 10, 2022

As Joe enjoys his vacation, Marcus Day (WSWS) notes:

Annual price increases for US consumer goods remain at their highest level in nearly 40 years, according to the latest inflation data released Wednesday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). Prices for items in the Consumer Price Index rose 8.5 percent in the 12 months ending in July, down slightly from the 9.1 percent rate reported in June, but still the second-largest yearly increase since December 1981.

Food prices in particular have surged in recent months. The BLS’ overall food index rose 10.9 percent year-over-year in July, while the cost of food at home increased 13.1 percent, the biggest increases since May 1979.

Amid a heat wave which has blanketed much of the US this summer and broken records in a number of regions, electricity costs rose 15.2 percent compared to last year, increasing by 1.9 percent over the last month alone.

The cost of shelter also pushed higher, with rent rising 6.3 percent nationally since 2021, with increases far greater in many major metropolitan areas, forcing large numbers of young people to live with their parents, and threatening others with eviction and homelessness. In California, 1.5 million households are behind on their rent, according to Census Bureau data released in late July.

Although the cost of gasoline, which is more volatile, fell somewhat from June, down 7.7 percent, it remained 44 percent higher than a year ago. The national average price for a gallon of gas is hovering near $4, compared to $3.18 in 2021.

The Biden administration and sections of the corporate media nevertheless seized on the latest data to claim that inflation is easing and that a corner being turned, with Biden misleadingly asserting that the BLS report showed “zero percent inflation in the month of July—zero percent.”

In a two-minute appearance, Biden painted a fantastical picture of a booming economy, but the reality facing masses of workers is one of increasing desperate struggle for daily existence. According to a separate BLS release Wednesday, real average hourly earnings for production and non-supervisory employees fell 2.7 percent year-over-year in July.

Over in Iraq, cult leader Moqtada al-Sadr has failed at forming a government so he now demands new elections. Amr Mostafa (THE NATIONAL) reports:

Iraqi Shiite cleric and political leader Moqtada Al Sadr on Wednesday called on the country's judiciary to dissolve parliament by the end of next week.

“I address the competent judicial authorities, particularly the head of the Supreme Judicial Council, hopefully so they correct the path, especially after the constitutional deadlines for the parliament to select a president and task a prime minister have passed,” Mr Al Sadr said in a statement.

Mr Al Sadr also called on the judiciary to give the Iraqi president the task of setting a date for early elections that will be held “under a number of conditions we will announce later”.

Called on? Mild language. PRESS TV gets to the point in their opening paragraph, "Prominent Iraqi cleric and seasoned politician Muqtada al-Sadr has given the country's apex court a one-week ultimatum to dissolve the parliament amid a deepening post-election political crisis gripping the country." It's an ultimatum from a man infamous for his tantrums. TRT reminds who caused the political stalemate in Iraq:

Sadr has called for early elections and unspecified changes to the constitution after withdrawing his lawmakers from parliament in June.

The withdrawal was a protest against his failure to form a government despite holding nearly a quarter of parliament and having enough allies to make up more than half the chamber.

So Moqtada screaming for the judiciary to act and? AL-MONITOR explains:

Judiciary head Faiq Zaidan said earlier this year in an article that the constitution did not set any punishment for the parliament when it fails to form the government within the constitutional deadlines.

The only way to dissolve the parliament is for two-thirds of its members to vote for the dissolution.

Zaidan asked to add a new mechanism for dissolving the parliament, specifically for the time it fails to form the government within the constitutional deadlines.

The suggested mechanism is to dissolve the parliament by a request from the prime minister approved by the president, after the deadlines meet.

The only way to amend the constitution is to return the parliament sessions and votes for this amendment, which it does not seems possible now due to Sadr objections to return the parliament sessions.

The following sites updated: