I am now the proud?? owner of HermanCainMedal.com for the next year. I am also an engineer and mathematician, not a graphic designer. Anyone feel inspired to come up with a design for the actual medal? Or to offer advice on how to (cheaply) set up a page for it.
So I am engaging in a touch of schadenfreude, pushing the “Herman Cain Medals”, for those that take a public position against pandemic control measures, and wind up paying for it. As always, its in part to push the idea that they WILL be infecting others, and medical workers will be risking their lives to care for all that are ill.
To earn a medal, you have to use your bully (or real) pulpit to actively denigrate preventative measures, things like premature re-opening, hosting super spreader events, throwing public tantrums about wearing a mask in the supermarket, etc. Followed by acquiring the virus, and managing the third requirement, the whole only awarded posthumously thing.
Given actions like the Florida ending restrictions (including a prohibition on local mask mandates), or Трумп calling out Biden for not hosting his own super spreader events, etc. I decided I need to twist the knife a bit. As a techie sort, the obvious is to grab their domain name, and do something informative with it.
No, I have no intentions of presenting the medals to the families of the recipient. This could just be a wall of shame to call out the people that are using their soapboxes to spread expedient misinformation. (with an dishonorable mention list for those that are responsible for spread, but still around to mislead). The idea of making an actual object available was as a way to raise money for doctors without borders, who are busily trying to help the ill. If a fundraising component doesn’t work out, just having the list, and some valid public health info would be a good use of the attention it could generate.
Also do any US manufacturers of enamel pins exits? How about ethical print on demand t-shirts? Figure this could at least be used to raise some coin for a worth cause. I was assuming proceeds to Medicine sans frontiers but am open to other suggestions. (looks like I found a place that does challenge coins, will keep looking to see if I can find a union shop)
Yes, I am being a bad Buddhist about this, I really know just how much worse dealing with a death sucks right now. I lost my wife in May, (to a long battle with cancer), and when we discussed what she wanted for her memorial event, one fear I had back in May, was that I might not get to hold one until the anniversary of her death. Since then with our horrid response to things, I now know it will be very lucky if I get to hold it as soon as the first anniversary.
Susan was a biostatistican and epidemiologist, working on clinical trials. (For all the trials she worked, she was that lone unblinded statistician reporting to a safety board that Fauchi mentioned)
She was absolutely horrified at how we were handling the response, and how the right wing politicians were treating the directions of the public health experts. (and this was April, and they weren’t so blatant about it). She was trying to finish up two manuscripts days before she passed. I am attempting to raise the awareness of the science of public health, as one more thing she would want to see happen.