A chaotic scene unfolds in Albuquerque. A crowd of protestors who were intent on pulling down a statue of one of conquistador founders of New Mexico were met by a group from a far right militia which goes by the name ‘New Mexico Civil Guard.’ Precise chain of events is unclear. But one militia member opened fire and hit one protestor. The militia members have been taken into custody by police who arrived on the scene. The condition of the shooting victim is unknown.

Momentarily, President Trump will head out to the White House Rose Garden, parading out a group of families whose loved ones were victims of police violence, and announce a set of executive order reforms that will do little but appease the police.

Another bizarre incident in the evolving story of New York and its relationship with the NYPD. Last night three NYPD officers went to a Shake Shack in Lower Manhattan, got shakes and then became ill after drinking the shakes. They either went to or were taken to the hospital, treated and then released. This quickly led to suspicion that the officers had been intentionally poisoned by one or more Shake Shack employees as part of the purported left-wing, Antifa, civilian “war” on the NYPD. An investigation was commenced. But before anything was established the NYPD’s police unions went into overdrive accusing one or more Shake Shack employees of attempting to assassinate the officers.

I have spent a lot of time analyzing the New York COVID epidemic both because it was the center of the storm in the United States and because it affects me, my loved ones and coworkers so directly. The graphed shapes of the New York outbreak and the nationwide outbreak are quite different. The former rockets upward and falls down again at a slower but still comparable arc. Nationwide it’s quite different. The numbers rocket upward and then basically plateau. It’s not a proper comparison. The epicenter of an outbreak has different dynamics than the more rolling spread of contagion in less hard hit areas. This is why the proper comparison is not New York vs the United States or the United States versus any European country, all of which are dramatically smaller than the US, both in geography and population. The proper comparison is the United States (~330 million) vs the EU (~440 million). This brings together hotspots and peripheries, urban and rural and all the mix of population densities into one. As you can see here the progress has been very different and not at all good for the control of the epidemic in the United States.

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The expectation of loyalty has never been more transparent than now.

When the Justice Department shows up to court on Friday to argue in favor of blocking John Bolton’s book, it will have in front of it a very daunting — if not impossible  — task.

Yesterday was the first day in the history of the COVID epidemic when the percentage of positive tests returned in New York State fell below 1%. You can see the trend here. Red is New York State and blue is the rest of the United States excluding New York State.

The Justice Department’s extraordinary effort to block the publication of John Bolton’s book goes before a judge for the first time at the top of the hour. Full coverage of the hearing right here.

It’s Juneteenth and President Trump is, predictably, handling the day that marks the liberation of slaves in the United States poorly.