Feest Isolation Days – 19 August
Scapegoat. Surely there will be a few more around this week. First off there’s PHE. Public Health England. They have indeed become the go to for the Health Minister to get rid of as a demonstration of how he gets things done! There is a problem with the response to Covid so let’s play the blame game.
You may recall my deep love and appreciation for the Track and Trace minister Dido Harding? She of the head of the less than perfect organisation dealing with the not quite sorted it out yet track and trace? Dido, you may recall, is married to John Penrose MP for Weston Super Mare, who sits on the advisory board of think tank 1828 which calls for “the NHS to be replaced by an insurance system and for Public Health England to be scrapped.”[ Well guess who is going to be the new interim head of the new agency called the National Institute for Health Protection. I must admit I don’t feel very protected with that woman in charge. One aim achieved Penrose and pals. So insurance system for the NHS? I didn’t used to think so given the NHS response to Covid. Now, I’m not so sure….
I don’t know about all of the ins and outs of Public Health England’s response to Covid, but I do know that the agency answers directly to the Health Minister. So who got what wrong? This pandemic is far from over. So is this government. It continues to be a wild ride.
Students up and down the country who have received their A level results are now able to get the original grades their teachers set for them. The algorithm some bright spark came up with to decide their grades was so dreadful that thirty-six per cent of teachers predicted grades were downgraded. The algorithm used information about the schools not the pupils. Several days after the results were announced, it has finally been agreed that the maths were wrong for many students- just a tad late – and it’s been scrapped. However, offered places at university fill up fast, and a large number of students now can’t get on the course they desired and let’s face it deserved. In an attempt to right the wrong, the government has removed the cap on student numbers. Universities though rightly say they can’t just take more people on courses that are full without more money to pay more teachers and provide more space to do the teaching. I wonder if Gavin Williamson will become a scapegoat? He says he is very sorry that this happened. And no, he has no plans to resign. Who will they find to blame?
Where do these goats come from, I wondered? The etymology not the people or institutions themselves.
Unusually it would seem we have William Tyndale to thank for that! Remember him? He the Protestant Reformation leader and bible translator who was eventually strangled then burned at the stake? When he translated the bible from the Hebrew apparently he got something slightly wrong. In Hebrew, the ritual of the Day of Atonement, or Yom Kipper, one of two goats was chosen by lot to be sent alive into the wilderness, the sins of the people having been symbolically laid upon it and the other was to be slain. The Demon goat sent away was called Azāzel. And that was mistranslated from Demon goat into scapegoat…or the goat that escapes. It isn’t found in other translations. But the word, and its meaning, has stuck,
On the other side of the Atlantic, the democratic virtual convention has begun. Bernie Saunders points out that Nero fiddled while Rome burned…Trump golfs. Michele Obama says Trump is in over his head. Post boxes in America are locked shut or taken away. And the Republicans insists the only way he will lose is if the election is rigged. It seems to me the entire population of America are becoming the Republicans scapegoats!!
People have been having trouble pronouncing Kamala Harris’s name. Not, it seems the Donald. For once he’s got something right. He seems to have fancied her in the past, and in previous times donated to her campaign. Now that she’s become a nasty woman he probably won’t fund her anymore. I leave you with a song that will ensure you never forget how to pronounce her name again. From my favourite parody artist Randy Rainbow.
Enjoy!
STOP PRESS! There is another Dr. Feest in the family. Alexander received his PhD today from the University of Kent. To say we are thrilled is putting it mildly. Yea!!!!!
With love,
Kathy x