It’s About Calming Down

I am so sick of the news on COVID-19. I have decided to shorten the acronym to CD-19 so I don’t use up so much space in writing about it.
 I am getting far more information about the disease from my friends, who have taken the time to do their own analysis of the data being presented, what I get from Statistica (a website that provides excellent charts) and my own knowledge of wargaming, modeling and statistical analysis. What I am hearing on the news, when I happen to buzz through it when channel surfing in my palatial hospital room, is total, absolute, unmitigated bull hockey. I am shocked the President is believing any of what is being fed by these “experts.” What a crock!!

Indecisiveness has cost our country countless lives and trillions of dollars in US treasure


I know the President. I have not had any interaction with him for years, but I know how he operates. What I fear is that he has surrounded himself with these “experts,” sent to him by folks who have little understanding of statistics, surveying, etc., and who really do not understand the American people nor how we perceive those who are in DC. He gets to hit the refresh button every time he does a rally, but right now, he is not getting that kind of feedback. He is getting advice from 20-somethings who have never had a job and from people who are Democrats (The Secretary of Commerce). Those folks are getting advice from—you guessed it— other Democrats. What a mess. But I digress.
 Let me discuss a little about wargaming. This one of more disturbing aspects of what is unfolding in DC. When one war games, one builds out scenarios about which the key players must make decisions to move the game along. If the game is well structured, there a series of branches and sequels one has ready to go. If a particular decision is made, then one set of consequences is then laid out and branches and sequels are built off of that. A poor game is built when the designers “lead” the principals to a certain outcome. What designers really want is the principals to follow through with things to their logical conclusion. This should be part of the dynamic of with what the principals must deal. The game goes on until things arrive at the end-game. In war games, the principals must always decide on what the end-game should be. They should only change the end-game when things happen that force them to change things. In Vietnam, the overall object end-game was never really decided upon (It changed at least 22 times). Thus, that is why the United States never really resolved to “win” the war. Our country has had a bad habit since World War II of not deciding on end-games for our conflicts. This indecisiveness has cost our country countless lives and trillions of dollars in US treasure.


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I do not know what type model(s) is being used by the CDC or HHS or Dr. Fauci, but OMG, let’s get a handle on what is going on!!

Now let’s talk about modeling. There are two types of mathematical models—deterministic and stochastic. In deterministic models there is one set of data and one output. Change one variable and the output changes. These models are pretty useless, in my opinion. In stochastic models, the variables have ranges of variation that randomly change. Thus, one gets varied outputs with each run of data through each run. The more runs one does, the more likely one is to get an idea about where the “center of mass” might be. This is the type model one uses when analyzing weapons effectiveness and the use of various weapons in wargaming. The consequence of using these type models is that one not only gets the probable likely output but also the extremes.
 I do not know what type model(s) is being used by the CDC or HHS or Dr. Fauci, but OMG, let’s get a handle on what is going on!! When one goes from 2.2 million, to 240K, to 80k, to 60k, one has to wonder what the heck is going on. Would it be too much to ask that we keep the panic and death mongering down to a dull roar? Over time, this will die down, I am sure. I remember the great line out of one of the Abraham Lincoln movies where our 16th President, in talking to his cabinet, related that in ancient times, a Pharaoh asked his priests for the wisest thing ever uttered. The priests studied all the ancient texts (We are talking about a Phar- aoh from before the common era) and came back to the Pharaoh and stated, "And this, too, shall pass.” To my friends and family—And this, too, will pass.