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I'd proffer that these occurrences may happen when a TV reality star, with no apparent experience in transportation, is named as the Sec of Transportation for the Country.

Sean Duffy
en.wikipedia.org

... Sean Patrick Duffy (born October 3, 1971) is an American politician, lawyer, former prosecutor, and former television personality who has served as the 20th United States secretary of transportation since 2025. A member of the Republican Party, he served as the U.S. representative for Wisconsin's 7th congressional district from 2011 to 2019.

After graduating from Saint Mary's University of Minnesota and William Mitchell College of Law, Duffy first gained fame as a cast member on The Real World: Boston, Road Rules: All Stars and Real World/Road Rules Challenge: Battle of the Seasons, before going on to serve as district attorney of Ashland County, Wisconsin, from 2002 to 2010, and as congressman from Wisconsin from 2011 to 2019. After resigning from Congress, he became a lobbyist and a Fox Business television co-host.

On November 18, 2024, President-elect Donald Trump named Duffy to be his nominee for U.S. Secretary of Transportation in his second presidency. He was confirmed by the United States Senate to the office on January 28, 2025 by a vote of 77"22 and was sworn in later that day.[1] ...


So, I guess Pres Trump seems to think that participating in MTV's "Road Rules" show is the experience he desires in the Sec of Transportation for the United States?

A text version ...

Murphy To Secretary Of Homeland Security Kristi Noem: Your Department Is Out Of Control
www.murphy.senate.gov

... "I say this with seriousness and respect, but your department is out of control," Murphy said. "You are spending like you don't have a budget. You are on the verge of running out of money for the fiscal year. You are illegally refusing to spend funds that have been authorized by this Congress and appropriated by this committee.

You are ignoring the immigration laws of this nation, implementing a brand-new immigration system that you have invented that has little relation to the statutes that you are required -- that you are commanded -- to follow as spelled out in your oath of office.

You are routinely violating the rights of immigrants who may not be citizens, but whether you like it or not, have constitutional and statutory rights when they reside in the United States.

Your agency acts as if laws don't matter, as if the election gave you some mandate to violate the Constitution and the laws passed by this Congress. It did not give you that mandate.

You act as if your disagreement with the law -- or even the public's disagreement with the law -- is relevant and gives you the ability to create your own law. It does not give you that ability."

Murphy explained how Noem's reckless spending of federal funds is going to bankrupt the Department while leaving the U.S. vulnerable to cyber-attacks and putting communities at greater risk for severe storm damage:

"You're on track to trigger the Anti-Deficiency Act. That means you are going to spend more money than you have been allocated by Congress. This is a rare occurrence, and it is wildly illegal. Your agency will be broke by July, over two months before the end of the fiscal year. You may not think that Congress has provided enough money to ICE, but the Constitution and the federal law doesn't allow you to spend more money than you've been given, or to invent money.

And this obsession with spending at the border, as the Chairwoman mentioned, has left the country unprotected elsewhere. The security threats to the United States are higher, not lower, than before Trump came to office. To fund the border, you have illegally gutted spending for cybersecurity.

As we speak, Russian and Chinese hackers are having a field day attacking our nation.

You have withdrawn funds for disaster prevention. Storms are going to kill more people in this country because of your illegal withholding of these funds.

Your myopia about the border, fueled by President Trump's prejudice against people who speak a different language, has shattered many of this country's most important defenses. ...


The text version goes on ...

Tangentially related ...

New RSV vaccine, treatment linked to dramatic fall in baby hospitalizations
arstechnica.com

...

Far fewer babies went to the hospital struggling to breathe from RSV, a severe respiratory infection, after the debut of a new vaccine and treatment this season, according to an analysis published today by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

RSV, or respiratory syncytial (sin-SISH-uhl) virus, is the leading cause of hospitalization for infants in the US. An estimated 58,000"80,000 children younger than 5 years old are hospitalized each year. Newborns"babies between 0 and 2 months"are the most at risk of being hospitalized with RSV. The virus circulates seasonally, typically rising in the fall and peaking in the winter, like many other respiratory infections.

But the 2024"2025 season was different"there were two new ways to protect against the infection. One is a maternal vaccine, Pfizer's Abrysvo, which is given to pregnant people when their third trimester aligns with RSV season (generally September through January). Maternal antibodies generated from the vaccination pass to the fetus in the uterus and can protect a newborn in the first few months of life. The other new protection against RSV is a long-acting monoclonal antibody treatment, nirsevimab, which is given to babies under 8 months old as they enter or are born into their first RSV season and may not be protected by maternal antibodies.

For the new study, CDC researchers looked at RSV hospitalization rates across two different RSV surveillance networks of hospitals and medical centers (called RSV-NET and NVSN).

They compared the networks' hospitalization rates in the 2024"2025 RSV season to their respective rates in pre-pandemic seasons between 2018 and 2020.

The analysis found that among newborns (0"2 months), RSV hospitalizations fell 52 percent in RSV-NET and 45 percent in NVSN compared with the rates from the 2018"2020 period.

However, when the researcher excluded data from NVSN's surveillance site in Houston"where the 2024"2035 RSV season started before the vaccine and treatment were rolled out"there was a 71 percent decline in hospitalizations in NVSN. ...



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