State of emergency
Don't fall for today's `only a test' line -- action most certainly is required.
Later today, for a half-hour span, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) will conduct a nationwide test of the Emergency Alert System.
It will close with this phrase:
“This is only a test. No action is required by the public.”
Three thoughts on these words, and the swirl of disinformation that is accompanying the FEMA test, which begins at 1:20 p.m. Central:
Thankfully, not everyone waits for a test to arrive before taking action.
Recently covered in the news was the proactive persistence of two heroes, Katalin Karikó and Dr. Drew Weissman.
They were instrumental in preventing “tens of millions of deaths and helping the world recover from the worst pandemic in a century,” according to Benjamin Mueller and Gina Kolata of The New York Times.
The above story on the two being awarded the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine led off the Chicago Tribune’s Nation & World section—the 16th page of the 30-page edition.
On the front page? That leads me to my second observation:
Sometimes, it’s not only a test—it’s the real thing. And action is required by the public, and its leadership.
Once again, it was former President Donald Trump’s face splashed across the front page of an American newspaper. His bumbling response to the COVID-19 pandemic is likely what cost him a second term in the White House.
Far more importantly, his ineffective leadership—including his role in stoking misinformation—cost only God knows how many lives. When the actual emergency was upon us, starting in early 2020, too often Trump’s response was in the vein of “no action is required by the public.”
Why can’t conspiracy theorists ever offer up a positive theory?
FEMA’s test, mandated by law to happen no more than three years after the previous one, has been the target of paranoid goofiness on social media.
The Associated Press boiled it down with “NOT REAL NEWS: A look at what didn’t happen this week.” An excerpt:
“CLAIM: An emergency broadcast system test on Oct. 4 will send a signal to cell phones nationwide in order to activate nanoparticles such as graphene oxide that have been introduced into people’s bodies.”
My favorite part of the AP’s extensive debunking of this falsehood was when it quoted Julia Greer, a materials science professor at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, who has used graphene oxide in her research.
“You can’t ‘activate’ graphene oxide,” Greer wrote. “What does that even mean?”
Memo to conspiracy-minded folks—next time the FEMA test comes around, throw us a curve ball and give us something fun and/or positive to bite into. A template to get you started for the October 2026 alert:
CLAIM: An emergency broadcast system test on Oct. 4 will send a signal to cell phones nationwide in order to activate a bipartisan cooperative spirit, led by President Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Vice President Matt Gaetz, that causes elected officials to focus on serving the public. While they will disagree on the best path to achieve progress, they will do so without being disagreeable.
Well there is no doubt that Covid cost Trump the election. But there is also no doubt that some of the "certified approved heroes" were equally flummoxed. Having personally been up close and personal in a front row seat during this pandemic for the first 18 months I vividly recall the Surgeon General of the US mocking people who were requesting masks. And of course Dr. Fauci discounted the efficacy of masks, and the WHO did the same (I think the WHO maintained that position until June 1 2020). Then of course there was Dr. Fauci again saying early on that "... this (SARS-CoV-2) is not a major threat to the people of the United States and this is not something that the citizens of the United States right now should be worried about." The point is Mike, is that we - not just Trump - were (unbeknownst at the time) entering a very fluid, once in a life time event which confounded many folks INCLUDING the so called experts. Furthermore, the Nobel Prize committee cited Weissman and Kariko specifically for developing the vaccine used to mitigate the Covid pandemic. How do you think that this vaccine was commercialized so that said Nobel prize winning vaccine could actually get into the arms of people and in fact save them from this virus? I got news for you. It was called Operation Warp Speed. We went from the mapping of the viral genome in early 2020 to a commercial vaccine late in 2020 (I got my first jab in December 2020). That was unprecedented. Warp Speed was one of the most amazing medical initiatives that I ever witnessed in my long 40 year medical career. I know. So uncomfortable to actually attribute an amazing logistical feat to the evil DT. Hey. Sometimes facts and the truth are inconvenient. But if you claim you're for the truth and mock conspiracies and falsehoods then I suggest you acknowledge this fact. So I wonder do you believe in the conspiracy theory that Warp Speed had nothing to do with bringing those remarkable vaccines to market ... into the arms of folks ... and that DT had nothing to do with any of that? I know. The righteous high priests of the legacy media find such facts most inconvenient. (Note: Pfizer may not have been a "formal player" in Warp Speed, but by Warp Speed (the US Government) placing a multibillion dollar order for Pfizer vaccine after proof of efficacy - and no other guarantees or commitments from Pfizer - Warp Speed mitigated any corporate financial risks Pfizer might have endured going forward).
What concerns me, an old journalism and political science major, is not so much the stuff the AP debunks, but the stories that AP chooses not to cover at all.