What A Day - Our House Is A Very Very Very Vaxxed House

Episode Date: March 9, 2021

The CDC said fully vaccinated Americans can safely gather indoors together, and laid out other guidelines for our current stage of the pandemic. The daily rate of vaccination continues to increase, with a record of 2.9 million shots being given last Saturday.The jury selection process in the trial of Derek Chauvin was delayed yesterday due to a dispute over whether a third degree murder charge can be brought. Finding impartial jurors will also prove to be difficult, considering the high-profile nature of the case.And in headlines: Biden orders the Department of Education to review changes to Title 9 made under Trump, pervert rat Pepe Le Pew won't appear in Space Jam 2, and Papa John's 20-month anti-racism education.Show Links:"Meet the GOP voters who could decide whether the U.S. reaches herd immunity"https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/03/07/republicans-covid-vaccine/For a transcript of this episode, please visit crooked.com/whataday.

It's Tuesday, March 9th. I'm Akilah Hughes. And I'm Gideon Resnick, and this is What A Day, where we are cautioning our listeners against buying DIY vaccines off of Etsy. Yeah, it's really cute to have bespoke things, but is it cute to get a bespoke vaccine that doesn't have any vaccine in it? I don't think so. No. No, it's not. On today's show, an update on jury selection in the Derek Chauvin trial, then some headlines.

But first, the latest. If you and a friend or you and a family member are both vaccinated, you can have dinner together, wearing masks without distancing. You can visit your grandparents if you have been vaccinated and they have been too. Oh my gosh. Did you guys hear the word dinner with other people? That was CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky laying out the new guidelines about what vaccinated Americans can and can't do after their shots, which could also lead to a new kind of spread across the country, FOMO. That's right. Y'all gonna be missing out.

Okay, but seriously, these recommendations were highly anticipated and teased for the past few days. There is nothing crazy surprising in them, but it's good to have official guidance. So, Gideon, how would you break down these rules? I would break them down first by saying seeing a human in my home who does not live here is going to be nuts. I'm going to have to get over that hump at some point. But here are some of the big takeaways from this. For vaccinated on vaccinated situations, the CDC is saying that fully vaccinated Americans, which means two weeks after a second dose of either the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine

or the one J&J shot, can gather with each other indoors without masks or distancing for dinners like we were talking about. For vaccinated on unvaccinated situations, they said that fully vaccinated people can visit indoors with unvaccinated people from one household as long as no one

that is unvaccinated is at risk for serious illness. That point is basically for grandparents or older people generally who might want to see their kids and grandkids. Then for vaccinated on a COVID exposure type situation, the CDC also said that a fully vaccinated person who has been exposed to a suspected or known case of COVID-19 in most cases does not have to quarantine or be tested if they don't develop symptoms. So overall, great, great news, but mostly guidance about what to do in private settings with select people. Yeah, and probably don't go visit someone you know has COVID. It just seems like it goes without

saying. And then what's their guidance about it all in a public setting? It's kind of the same. It didn't really change much here. The CDC is still telling vaccinated people to wear masks in public settings, social distance, and other precautions. Also, that vaccinated people should still avoid gatherings with multiple households as well as large and medium-sized gatherings. But it's still unclear what constitutes those. Then also, the CDC is not updating travel guidance, which basically says people should avoid non-essential trips even if they are vaccinated. Yeah, so it's like they don't want to open the floodgates here, but they also want to give people a little something to look forward to. You know, if you got the vaccine, you don't want to just be

sitting in your house doing the same thing you're doing now. What is the result? Yes, it has to feel like we're going in some direction. I completely agree. Walensky, to that point, characterized all of this as a, quote, first step, and it seems to reflect recent and growing evidence that suggests that fully vaccinated people are less likely to spread COVID, though that has still not been fully ruled out, which is why there's still caution here. The CDC also said that the guidelines could help encourage people to actually get vaccinated. There had been some criticism at how slowly the CDC moved in providing these updates for that exact reason. If people were led to think that getting vaccinated couldn't change their day to day, they might be more hesitant to see the benefits of getting it to your point, Akilah. We can probably expect more updates here as time goes on.

Yeah. And on that note, vaccinations are still ramping up. So as we get further along in all of this, what numbers are you currently tracking? The number one, obviously, is the total vaccination number. That is the biggie I think we're all looking at. According to the CDC, as of yesterday, about 60 million people have gotten at least one dose, and over 31 million are fully vaccinated, which is about 9% of the population. That is great, great stuff. The second is that daily number. The daily numbers are climbing with a new record hit on Saturday of 2.9 million and a daily average recently over 2 million, so also moving in a good direction.

And then another thing that I've been sort of kind of obsessing over is vaccine hesitancy. So the Census Bureau did a survey that looked at responses of about 80,000 people in early February. It found that the number of people who said they will get vaccinated has gone up, which is good, but that younger people are more hesitant than older groups. So something like 70% of people 65 and older who haven't been vaccinated say they will versus less than half of people aged 18 to 39. The Wall Street Journal did a write up on this and noted that converting people who answered probably to definitely would make a very big difference in getting to herd immunity. So that is actually the good part of this. It is just one snapshot, but something to keep an eye on. Yeah. And as we learn more about this hesitancy, age is potentially a factor you

mentioned, but also political affiliation. Unsurprising. Uh-huh. It always is. Some polls have shown that Republican voters are less into the vaccine at this point. Almost a third in some of them say they don't want to get the shot. The Washington Post recently talked to some of those voters, and we'll put a link in our show notes if you want to read more about why these folks are hesitant. One thing going forward here in the Biden administration's public messaging, we'll be figuring out how to get hesitant people on board and make sure we get to that herd immunity. Biden is also speaking in his first primetime presidential address later this week to mark basically a year since this all began in earnest in the United States. Crazy stuff. March 11th, the day of Biden's address is actually when the

World Health Organization called the spread of the coronavirus a pandemic last year, and then travel suspensions and lockdowns, Tom Hanks, all that stuff shortly followed. Yep, we don't need to relive all of that today. But we'll keep you updated, not yet, on the speech later in the week. But returning to a story we discussed last week, jury selection in the trial of Derek Chauvin, the police officer who killed George Floyd, was set to begin yesterday, but there was a delay in the process. Akilah, what happened there? Okay, so it has to do with an ongoing dispute about whether or not to include a third charge against Chauvin. That would be third-degree murder. He's already facing two other charges,

those being second-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter. Basically, on Friday, a court of appeals ruled that a third-degree murder charge could be brought, and Chauvin intends to appeal that to Minnesota Supreme Court, so jury selection is on pause until then. And then let's talk about this third-degree murder charge. Why is it so important in this case? So adding the charge could make getting a conviction on at least one charge easier for the prosecution. Third degree

murder carries up to 25 years in prison, so it's definitely going to be important moving forward. Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, who is leading the prosecution, is doing his due diligence and finding every single possible thing they can throw at him to get justice here. It was Ellison's team, actually, that filed to delay jury selection because Chauvin is in what they called a, quote, heads-I-win, tails-you-lose scenario. Because say Chauvin takes his chances at trial. He could fail to be convicted, but he also could be convicted and then appeal that outcome by saying that the judge lacked jurisdiction when the jury selection began because of this outstanding murder charge situation. So, you know, damned if you don't, damned if you don't. And just FYI, it could take 30 days for the Supreme Court of Minnesota to rule, which inevitably pushes the trial all the way into the spring.

Yeah. And so let's talk about the jury selection part of this. This is one of the most high profile cases in the country's history. Chauvin killed a man on video, a video that has been seen hundreds of millions of times and aired on TV news networks on a loop. How do they think they'll find impartial jurors for this? Well, yeah, that's the entire challenge here. So the courts are tasked with compiling an impartial jury. And unless you live under a rock, it's kind of hard to have not formed any opinion whatsoever about this case unless you're just deeply uninformed. Prospective jurors have been sent a questionnaire asking for views on Black Lives Matter, Blue Lives Matter, policing and more.

It was 16 pages and went as far as to ask if you attended a protest, and if you did, if you carried a sign, and if so, what your sign said. So it's unclear what would be seen as disqualifying, but in any case, the defense and the prosecution both have the power to request dismissal of any potential juror that they don't see fit to weigh in. The jury selection process is supposed to resume today at 8 a.m. local time, but it absolutely could be delayed again. We'll let you know what happens here. But one last thing.

And all right, I'm sorry to be up on the soapbox again. I really am. But when we talk about this trial, please, please, please remember that this is the Derek Chauvin trial. It's not the George Floyd trial. Though they will likely be putting George Floyd's character and past on trial, the charges are against Chauvin because he's the one who killed a man on video. And it really does matter how we frame the discussion. Looking at you, media, looking at you, individuals. And that's the latest for now. It's Tuesday, WOD Squad. and for today's Tim Check

we're talking about Sunday night's Oprah interview with Harry and Meghan. There were some major revelations involving issues of racism within the royal family, shock, surprise,

mental health, and more. 17 million people tuned in and we haven't really had a chance to discuss it yet so Giddy, what were your thoughts? Oh,

it was a lot. I didn't watch the whole thing. I've mostly like read highlights after the fact. I will say as a person who doesn't really follow royal family stuff, it still was so shocking to me. Like even not knowing the ins and outs of it, just like every single, even just the two or three accusations that you just referenced like were crazy um i firmly defend uh megan markle

as a northwestern alum more than any other northwestern alum including myself um there you go that's that's the one point of pride i will always come back to whenever there's megan markle news but yeah i mean the stuff that the stuff that she was saying was awful. And like the moments where Oprah had the different headlines about like, you know, the way that she's been written about versus the way that Kate has been written about and stuff. It was damning. It was awful. And it's awful to see a person go through that. Yeah.

Totally. Yeah. Totally. Yeah. I also think, like, we were saying this before, but when you watch just two hours of somebody doing an interview that is as talented as Oprah, you start to, like, understand a little bit of, like, how it is that she is so good at this. Yeah.

She has, like, every single, like, human like human like instinct when talking to people. It's just like it was really amazing to watch that. Yeah. Yeah. Well, OK. I've I've I've said six thousand things. What were your takeaways from this? So many things. Yeah. I think to your point about just like how damning it is, it's also really wild that they had this interview at all. I mean, Princess Diana did not do a lot of interviews. Famously, there was the one that happened before she died where

she, you know, alluded to the problems within the royal family. But, you know, we all know how that ended. And she was absolutely not as like blunt as this interview was. So I think that, you know, just in that regard, I'm like, that's a real risk. But also they already fled the country. So it's like, that's a real risk. So it's shocking. the country. So it's like, that's a real risk. So it's shocking. One thing that stood out to me that I didn't see a lot of people talking about was the fact that when they like, you know, sort of ended up moving to America after they were in Canada, that Tyler Perry was the one to like put them up and like protect them. And like, there's plenty of, you know, jokes about like medea and the royal family whatever but like the real thing that's so striking to me is you have like a black man who is incredibly successful against every odd in america i mean this is a person from like the south um

and he's the one who's saving the black princess not you know the the royals who have all the protections on earth. She doesn't. And she gets to have this interview with Oprah, who is like, arguably at the top of this profession. Right. It's just like, it's amazing that it was black people who protected her when, you know, she wasn't embraced by England. Also, I just think like really upsetting that her kids weren't going to be offered security. Like how can you even rectify that? Like that's Princess Diana's grandson. Like how do you, I mean, I guess, you know, we can come to our own conclusions about how they actually feel about Princess Diana when you think about it that way. But I just can't imagine being that craven to be like, we have all all this power and we can't spare a moment for you harry the kids none of it you're an afterthought and

you know obviously the whole thing about them worried about how dark the baby would end up oh yeah oh my god beyond the pale no pun intended um yeah just like really fucked up and look i made a joke on twitter i stand by it but like yeah just like worry about your own weird looking family like prince charles has like those weird sausage fingers maybe that's the concern instead of the fact that the kid might be darker than megan marco like yuck all of it well just like that i'd say just but uh you know at length uh we've checked our tips. Stay safe. Maybe avoid the royal family for a while. They seem to have a lot of like reflection to be doing.

And we'll be back after some ads. Let's wrap up with some headlines. Headlines. President Biden ordered the Department of Education yesterday to reassess how college campuses handle sexual assault. This executive order is the first step in undoing rules finalized by Betsy DeVos that gave more protections to students accused of sexual assault and narrowed the scope of cases that schools were required to address. Biden's education secretary, Miguel Cardona, was directed to suspend, revise, or rescind changes that Trump's administration made to Title IX. Some advocacy groups are happy about the order, but they say that it doesn't change anything immediately.

A group of students and sexual assault survivors wrote a letter to Biden urging him to immediately suspend parts of the current policy that students and advocacy groups are challenging in court. Hear, hear. A reporter in Iowa who was arrested while covering Black Lives Matter protests last spring began her trial yesterday. Andrea Sahuri of the Des Moines Register faces charges including the failure to disperse and interference with official acts. She was covering a demonstration when officers deployed tear gas into the crowd. Her lawyers say she was running from the tear gas when an officer pepper sprayed her and arrested her, even though she identified herself as the press. The officer's body camera was off shock.

Zahouri's case has garnered international attention from journalists and human rights groups, including Amnesty International and employees from the U.S. newspaper chain Gannett. Over 100 journalists were arrested in 2020 during Black Lives Matter protests, but Zahouri is among 13 journalists who are currently facing criminal charges. TV's most iconic cartoon rodent pervert, Pepe Le Pew, has been cut from Space Jam 2. Just an easy transition from the last one into this headline.

That's according to the Deadline, which published details yesterday about what would have been Pepe's big scene in the movie. In that scene, the French skunk apparently kissed a bartender character against her will, got slapped, and then got dressed down by LeBron James. For the raw footage of LeBron explaining consent to a tennis ball on a string, I have been authorized by Crooked Media to offer $1 million. This update comes after a New York Times op-ed last week said Pepe's actions normalized

rape culture, but apparently he's been out of this movie for months. If any Tucker Carlson producers want pitches on his angle for getting absolutely furious about this news, one option is to say, my life is meaningless without the pathologically horny rat. Yeah, you gotta just have that horny rat, I guess. Honestly, he's not a big enough star to have a scene. I agree. Over the past year, we've seen more and more people take steps to confront their own internalized racism.

Now they've been joined by the founder of Papa John's, who bravely told an interviewer yesterday he spent the last 20 months learning not to say the N-word. Here's John Schnatter in his own words. And we've had three goals for the last 20 months to get rid of this N-word in my vocabulary and dictionary and everything else. Okay. I can't imagine why it would take more than the one time you had to stop being the CEO, but okay, 20 months, somebody better be getting paid. All right. Well, in his defense, we're talking about the Michael Jordan of racial slurs. I'd love to know the techniques and strategies he used for his not saying the inward training regimen.

I hope he gets up at 4 a.m. just to remember not to say it. Schnatter resigned from his role as CEO of Papa John's Pizza in July 2018 after he used the inward on a conference call. He insists he is not racist, though, of course. And one of his other goals is to clear his name. Personally, I'm going to spend the next 20 months trying to forget the words Papa John. Yeah, I think I can do it next 20 months trying to forget the words Papa John. Yeah, I think I can do it a little bit faster,

but we'll see. We'll see how it goes. Yeah, you know, Domino's is right there, and those are the headlines. One last thing before we go, Crooked's new sports podcast, Take Line, premieres next Tuesday, March 16th. Each week, Emmy Award-winning host Jason Concepcion

and two-time WNBA champion and new co-owner of the Atlanta Dream, how about that? Renee Montgomery will host a fast, funny, smart, thoughtful conversation about sports, culture, politics, and all the ways they intersect on and off the court. Yeah, they are so much fun to listen to, and it's going to be your new favorite show besides ours.

Come on, WODheads. WOD Squad, let's just stick around. But listen to the trailer and subscribe to take line on apple podcast spotify or wherever you get your podcasts that is all for today if you like the show make sure you subscribe leave a review cancel horny rats and tell your friends to listen and if you're into reading and not just pizza menus at non-Papa John establishments like me, what a day is also a nightly newsletter. Check it out and subscribe at crooked.com slash subscribe. I'm Akilah Hughes.

I'm Gideon Resnick. And avoid eBay vaccines also. You know, don't bet on those things. Just get the Pfizer, Moderna, or J&J. I know you have like a really good bid and you think you're going to get this one. You didn't get the last one, but it won't work out. Right. The shipping alone, guys.

The shipping alone. What a Day is a production of Crooked Media. It's recorded and mixed by Charlotte Landis. Sonia Tan is our assistant producer. Our head writer is John Milstein and our executive producers are Katie Long, Akilah Hughes, and me. Our theme music is by Colin Gilliard and Kshaka.