There are quite a few politically-charged subjects around these days. I’ve done the required digging on three of those subjects, and the truth about each is summarized below.
Ivermectin
While the two wings of mainstream media argue about whether ivermectin is a horse dewormer or a miracle cure for COVID-19, the truth is something quite a bit different. Ivermectin is used as a dewormer, but also bears interesting characteristics regarding viruses. Specifically, some researchers believe that ivermectin may interfere with a virus’s ability to connect to the cells in your body and if it can’t connect, it can’t deliver it’s destructive payload into your cells. At the moment, however, no studies have been able to prove that it works, which means one of two things: Either the researchers were wrong about ivermectin interfering with the viral process or the effect of ivermectin is very small. All this means that at human-safe dosages, ivermectin is safe to use, but probably won’t make a noticeable difference in your COVID-19 illness. At a larger (i.e., large animal) dose, ivermectin can be harmful, particularly to your digestive system, so if you take ivermectin for any reason, you should do so with the guidance of a doctor.
Instead of relying on an experimental application of a drug, you’d be much better off relying on one of the available COVID-19 vaccines which all show strong protective effect on people who receive them. Though you can still catch COVID-19 after vaccination, your illness will be far less severe than if you had not been vaccinated. If you do get a serious case of COVID-19, there are other treatments (like monoclonal antibodies) that have been proven to be effective.
Source: Can Ivermectin be used to treat COVID-19? (content approved by a licensed pharmacist)
The Shipping Crisis
Another current issue that Republicans and Democrats are arguing about is the shipping crisis, with Republicans trying to blame Biden, and Democrats claiming that Biden can fix it. While there are still supply problems directly related to COVID-19 breakouts at factories, the biggest problem in the US is now at our ports and appears to be caused primarily by the pay structure for truckers. Specifically, there’s always been a lot of congestion at our ports and that meant that even before COVID-19, truckers who haul shipping containers in and out of ports were not making a lot of money because they are paid per container rather than hourly. Then, when COVID-19 disrupted the process, the ports became much, much more congested; now, it just isn’t worth it for truckers to pick up those containers.
This speaks to a larger problem in the US which is that corporations simply are not choosing to pay workers enough. Not only are regular employees not paid enough, but many workers (like truckers picking up shipping containers) are contractors who are paid per unit. In both cases, the cost of working is just the tiniest bit less than what they get paid even on the best day. In the case of the port problem, shipping companies are making up financially for the slower movement of goods by simply charging more for shipping rather than paying drivers what they are worth. There’s nothing Biden can do to fix this (outside of something radical, which he would never do), but there’s also no reason to blame him for it.
Republicans are also trying to blame “central planning” but the only central planners who have any power here are those at the major shipping companies who are paying truckers per load rather than a fair hourly wage. It is a matter of fact that every single corporation in the US uses “central planning” and yet Republicans want us to simultaneously never centrally plan anything and also run the government like a corporation. That said, if I were the central planner in charge of fixing this problem, my solution would be to require shipping companies to pay every trucker what they’re worth; is that something either the Democrats or Republicans are willing to do?
Update (November 2, 2021): There’s news today that the city of LA-Long Beach is going to start fining the importers for the containers sitting there. That’s only going to make things worse as it still doesn’t create a way for truckers to make a living off of getting those containers moved out.
Source: I’m A Twenty Year Truck Driver, I Will Tell You Why America’s “Shipping Crisis” Will Not End (an inside view of the problem from a trucker)
Adrenochrome
Here’s another issue where Democrats and Republicans are at odds with one another. On one side are the Republicans, who say that the Democratic party is controlled by pedophilic Satanists who like to steal children, and then frighten them, which increases the production of adrenochrome in their brains. The pedophilic Satanists then kill the child at the height of fear and harvest the adrenochrome from their brains. This is basically the plot of Monsters, Inc. On the other side are Democrats who say, “Nuh uh!” If only we could tell which side is correct!
Well, it turns out that adrenochrome is a real biological chemical, and that it is formed by the oxidation of adrenaline — so, some points to the Republicans there. However, in real life, it is sometimes used to promote clotting in open wounds, but never as a recreational drug, and if you wanted something to use recreationally that feels like adrenaline, you’d take epinephrine (this would not be safe). You can buy a synthetic form of adrenochrome that works just fine without killing any children, and if you don’t believe me, I suggest that you do just that and report back (please consult with a physician before ingesting any drug).
Where did the confusion come from? Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas references recreational use of adrenochrome, but is probably just bullshit; similarly, the book Legal Highs talks about adrenochrome, but is probably using “adrenochrome” as a cool way to talk about DMT, which is a completely different thing which can only be made through a synthetic process. There’s a long history of people mixing adrenochrome up with hallucinogens like DMT; adrenochrome is not a hallucinogen. As I mentioned before, it is similar to, but far less effective than, epinephrine (a synthetic adrenaline), which is why it is only used occasionally in medicine and only for promotion of clotting in open wounds. Adrenaline/epinephrine is to adrenochrome what coffee is to whatever you call that shit you made out of yesterday’s used coffee grounds today.
Also, the Democrats are not Satanists, and they aren’t pedophiles. It’s true that they are a big problem, but not for either of those two reasons. I’m glad we’ve straightened that out.
Source: The truth about adrenochrome
Nailed it on all three counts
TY