Notations From the Grid (Special Mid-Week Edition): Out & About On "Virtual Route 66" This Week In America

 

Russia Demands a Re-Write of the West's Security System Three high-stakes meetings took place last week in Geneva, Brussels, and Vienna between Russia and Western allies in an effort to de-escalate the Ukraine crisis. As talks progressed, the situation on the ground remained tense. Russia sent more than 100,000 troops and attack aircrafts, to surrounding regions in the past few months ( with more on the way), and increasingly appears poised to strike. Live-fire drills have been taking place in the area, heightening anxieties. And late in the week, 70 Ukrainian government sites were hit by a cyberattack that displayed "Be afraid and expect the worst” on screen. Menacing stuff. Russia’s aggression may have been the impetus behind last week’s talks, but Moscow has made it clear its demands encompass more than just Ukraine. In December, it published a draft treaty demanding NATO withdraw military personnel and equipment from Eastern Europe and guarantee that it won’t offer membership to Ukraine or Georgia in the future. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov was explicit in his statement: “It’s absolutely mandatory to make sure that Ukraine, never, never ever becomes a member of NATO”. US Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman called these requests non-starters. Sherman underscored the importance of working closely with allies to ensure a unified front for these diplomatic negotiations. Nevertheless, the EU has been notably absent from the week’s talks. Though EU member states have taken part in the NATO and OSCE talks, EU’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell was not at the table (unlike his predecessor in the aftermath of Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014). After some messaging  discord early in the week, however, the EU lined up in solidarity with the United States. During a meeting of European foreign and defense ministers Borrell noted that although Russia seeks to divide the EU and the US, Washington won’t play the Kremlin’s game.

Omicron in four charts The Omicron COVID-19 variant set off an unprecedented increase in cases and hospitalizations nationwide — and after a fall season in which the Delta variant hit the American health care system hard. The latest government data shows how this variant is infecting more young people than previous waves. On January 10, an average of 25,285 adults were hospitalized daily with either confirmed or suspected COVID-19 cases. The previous peak was one year prior: 24,284 daily hospitalizations in January 2021.    More children are also going to the hospital. An average of 1,612 children were hospitalized daily with confirmed or suspected cases on January 10. The previous pediatric hospitalization peak was 1,092 daily in September 2021. The current two-week average of 592,000 cases is 175% higher than two weeks ago. However, the two-week average of COVID-19 deaths is down 91%. In previous surges, deaths increased a few weeks after a rise in cases — whether that will happen with Omicron remains to be seen.  Explore more charts and data on this variant in this new report. Dive into updated data The USAFacts data pages enable readers to compare trends and interact with visualizations to better understand the government's impact on the American people. We've updated dozens of pages with the latest data available, ranging from 2019 to 2021, depending on the topic. Here is a sample of what's new. With layoffs and the uncertainty of the pandemic, thousands of Americans opted to start new businesses themselves. The number of businesses under a year old reached a high of 843,320 in 2021.   See more updated business metrics, including the net change in businesses and business applications by state. Did you know the South had the most business applications of any region in 2020? There's also new insight into how the nation's children are faring. Over 17% of children were in poverty in 2020, up from 15.5% in 2019 but down from a trend seen throughout the 2010s.   We've also updated adoption data and the median age of children in foster care. Explore the data pages for even more, including disaster declarations in your state, 2020 border apprehensions, deaths of armed service members, and many nonpartisan numbers on a variety of issues impacting American life. Tracking voting rights Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day. For years, Dr. King organized to secure African Americans' fair access to the ballot box. And last week, President Joe Biden gave a speech in Dr. King's hometown of Atlanta to urge Congress to pass voting rights legislation. Given both events, we wanted to reshare this article on the more than 30 states that have changed voting laws since the 2020 election. Scroll through the story to see where states have lengthened or shortened the window for mailing in ballots, proposed voter signature bills, and more. One last fact It's taken over Facebook and Instagram, and now USAFacts is joining the #10YearChallenge. In 2019 (the year with the latest data available), federal, state, and local government spending was half a trillion more than spending for the 10 years prior. See more 10-year comparisons throughout the week at USAFacts on Instagram.