March 29, 2020

Kentucky Governor's Christmas

Timothy Birdnow

Never let a good crisis go to waste. Kentucky's Democratic Governor Andy Beshear has gone on a rampage, signing all manner of laws under cover of Corona.

From the article:

In the midst of leading Kentucky’s response to a worldwide pandemic that has infected more than 300 Kentuckians, Governor Andy Beshear signed more than 35 bills this week.

They include the laundry list of goodies the Governor has put Kentucky on the hook for funding.

If this is the emergency we have been told it is, why are Democrats across the country sneaking all sorts of new laws onto the books? Shouldn't they be concentrating on protecting the public?

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Chinese Stole COVID 19 from Canadian Lab?

Timothy Birdnow

Here is an article at Zerohedge from January that claims the Wuhan Coronavirus is a Chinese import by way of a Canadian lab. It was an act of Chinese espionage.

From the article:

In March 2019, in mysterious event a shipment of exceptionally virulent viruses from Canada’s NML ended up in China. The event caused a major scandal with Bio-warfare experts questioning why Canada was sending lethal viruses to China. Scientists from NML said the highly lethal viruses were a potential bio-weapon.

Following investigation, the incident was traced to Chinese agents working at NML. Four months later in July 2019, a group of Chinese virologists were forcibly dispatched from the Canadian National Microbiology Laboratory(NML). The NML is Canada’s only level-4 facility and one of only a few in North America equipped to handle the world’s deadliest diseases, including Ebola, SARS, Coronavirus, etc.

The NML scientist who was escorted out of the Canadian lab along with her husband, another biologist, and members of her research team is believed to be a Chinese Bio-Warfare agent Xiangguo Qiu. Qiu was the head of the Vaccine Development and Antiviral Therapies Section in the Special Pathogens Program at Canada’s NML.

Coronavirus arrived at Canada’s NML Winnipeg facility on May 4, 2013 from the Dutch lab. The Canadian lab grew up stocks of the virus and used it to assess diagnostic tests being used in Canada. Winnipeg scientists worked to see which animal species can be infected with the new virus.

Research was done in conjunction with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency’s national lab, the National Centre for Foreign Animal Diseases which is housed in the same complex as the National Microbiology Laboratory.

Read the rest at Zerohedge. It is food for thought.

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Oops; My Bad!

Timothy Birdnow

Here is an essay that argues we have hopelessly failed to use actual knowledge and reason in this Coronavirus pandemic.

We Were Wrong; So Sorry We Ruined Your Life

Definitely worth your time.

As he points out:

On Thursday March 26, Cuomo dared question the orthodoxy that has wrecked countless businesses and lives. He revealed what actual experts are saying quietly all over the world but had yet not been discussed openly in the endless public-relations spin broadcast all day and night.

He said the following:

"If you rethought that or had time to analyze that public health strategy, I don’t know that you would say quarantine everyone. I don’t even know that that was the best public health policy. Young people then quarantined with older people was probably not the best public health strategy because the younger people could have been exposing the older people to an infection. "

Further:

"What we did was we closed everything down. That was our public health strategy. Just close everything, all businesses, old workers, young people, old people, short people, tall people. Every school closed, everything.”

It’s true that anyone following the unfolding fiasco and the gradually emerging data behind it knows that Cuomo is right. The response has not been modern and scientific. It has been medieval and mystical. The theory behind the policy has been nothing but a panicked cry of run and hide before the noxious gas gets you. Lacking reliable data – which is the fault of the CDC and FDA – we replaced knowledge with power.

In the end, this fiasco is an epistemic crisis. As Ed Yong has written in a beautifully detailed articlefor The Atlantic, "The testing fiasco was the original sin of America’s pandemic failure, the single flaw that undermined every other countermeasure.” Even the wide acceptance of social distancing as a norm, however much it helps curb the spread, presumes this absence of knowledge. Stay away from everyone as much as possible: a slogan that reveals how little we know.

And yet lacking that knowledge, the politicians, cheered on by the media, acted in ways that have fundamentally wrecked life as we knew it, all in the course of a couple of weeks.

The massive knowledge gap was filled by a cascade of predictive models made possible by modern statistical packages readily available by subscription to any member of the clerisy. If this, and this, and this, and if this and this and this, then ENTER. Out pops what appears to be a precise presentation of our future under the following conditions, along with an overlay of embedded cause-and-effect assumptions about certain policies followed or not followed. Day after day we were bombarded with such predictions, and we paid close attention because we had little in the way of actual on-the-ground facts that have been available to us in previous disease panics.

While I do quibble with a few points I have to say this guy pretty much nails it. Do read it all.

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Chinese Buying Up Australian Water Rights

Timothy Biirdnow

This is disgraceful.

China and U.S. are Biggest Investors in Water Entitlements

Apparently the U.S. and China have been buying up water rights in Australia.

How can you say a nation has sovereignty when it doesn't own it's own water? 

There is an old theory called the Hydraulic Empire or Water Monopoly Empire. It says that a state that owns all the water is absolute and can strangle any opposition. Egypt was one such. Another was....China. The Chinese understand the importance of controlling the water supply.

So if they are investing in water there is a reason. And in Australia water is life itself for the people there. The Chinese have no major agricultural interests in Australia, so why buy up all the water?

Seems to me they seek control.

During the First World War the Germans had to pay Britain royalties on every machine guy and every case of ammunition they used; the patent was held by the British and the Germans had to PAY for the privilege of owning weapons to kill Limeys. One wonders if that isn't the reason they lost the war. At any rate, when your enemies own something that valuable they can bleed you.

Clearly China is doing this to the Australians. We are too, apparently, but for different reasons. (Most likely for agricultural purposes.)

From the article:

"At the moment, there's a small percentage of water owned by foreign interests and much of that is by one property — Cubbie Station," Mr Littleproud said.

However, the Conservative Party's South Australian Senate candidate Rikki Lambert said it was a major concern to see China as one of the major investors in Australian water entitlements.

"Chinese foreign ownership is different to other forms [like British foreign ownership] because it is state-based," Mr Lambert said.

"The Chinese Government has effective control of any [Chinese] company that operates around the world."

"It's strategic because these countries are wanting to shore up their own food security and growing food in another country so they're not using their own water resources at home."

The Chinese aren't doing this for "food security"; they aren't growing food in Australia. It's for power and control.

Which is likely the reason we are doing this too.

If you own the water rights you can shut off the tap.

A nation that allows itself to be owned and controlled by a foreign power cannot be said to be sovereign. That doesn't mean aliens can't be allowed to own some property, but something as fundamental as water rights should never be sold to foreigners, unless they have a specific purpose for those rights and there is a sunset clause.

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Wuhan is Making Europe More Healthy

This from Dr. Roy Spencer:

My latest blog post, on the notable downturn in virus-related mortality in Europe this flu season.

COVID 19 Deaths in Europe: Excess Mortality is - Down

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March 28, 2020

WHO chief's questionable past comes into focus following coronavirus response

Dana Mathewson

Tell me you're surprised. Then try to get me to believe that you really are!

The head of the World Health Organization, in charge of making life or death decisions on a grand scale, has been accused of covering up cholera epidemics, supporting a terrorist organization and inflating his resume to claim he conquered malaria and HIV.

Tedros Adhanom Ghegreyesus' campaign to rewrite his questionable past has some wondering whether he is the right fit to lead the global agency through the coronavirus pandemic.

"Tedros is the second-to-last person who should be heading the world World Health Organization at this time," foreign affairs expert Gordon Chang told Fox News. "The last person is (Chinese President) Xi Jinping."

The Ethiopian official, who was elected to lead the WHO in 2017, has been accused of cozying up to countries like China that have pledged millions of dollars to the agency.

Last week, Tedros applauded Xi for his efforts to contain and control the novel coronavirus that is widely thought to have originated in a Wuhan, China seafood market.

"For the first time, #China has reported no domestic #COVID19 cases yesterday. This is an amazing achievement, which gives us all reassurance that the #coronavirus can be beaten," Tedros tweeted.

Beijing has been accused of multiple cover-ups related to COVID-19 and health experts have said China's decision to suppress information about the virus has endangered the lives of millions around the world.

"Tedros permitted Xi Jinping to make public health decisions for the World Health Organization, and that slowed down the global response to the coronavirus outbreak at crucial moments," Chang said. "Moreover, Tedros, by making comments supporting the totalitarian form of rule over democracy, made himself a part of Xi's campaign to bring despotism to the planet. Democracies should defund WHO if Tedros stays."

Good article. For the rest, go here: https://www.foxnews.com/world/who-chief-tedros-questionable-past-coronavirus

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Urn deliveries in Wuhan raise questions about China's actual coronavirus death toll

Dana Mathewson

Let me get this straight: you mean the ChiComs may have lied to the world about the number of deaths due to the "WuFlu?" My, my. Don't tell that to the Leftists in this country, who are still in love with Socialism and firmly believe everything's just fine in the land of Xi!

Massive deliveries of urns in Wuhan have raised fresh skepticism of China’s coronavirus reporting.

As families in the central Chinese city began picking up the cremated ashes of those who have died from the virus this week, photos began circulating on social media and local media outlets showing vast numbers of urns at Wuhan funeral homes.

China has reported 3,299 coronavirus-related deaths, with most taking place in Wuhan, the epicenter of the global pandemic. But one funeral home received two shipments of 5,000 urns over the course of two days, according to the Chinese media outlet Caixin.

It’s not clear how many of the urns were filled.

Workers at several funeral parlors declined to provide any details to Bloomberg as to how many urns were waiting to be collected, saying they either did not know or were not authorized to share the number.

The photos surfaced after both the United States and Italy have reported significantly more cases and than China. Italy has reported just shy of three times the fatalities.

But see below Tim's article about the dodgy way Italy counts the deaths! the MSM does not acknowledge that because (sigh) it doesn't fit their agenda, which is more of a "WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE! Women and minorities hit hardest. Trump to blame. Details at 11:00." kind of thing.

The article is here: https://www.foxnews.com/world/urn-deliveries-wuhan-china-coronavirus-death-toll

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The Latest on Wuhan

Timothy Birdnow

Here are the latest graphs from Willis Eschenbach:

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No photo description available.

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Get Out of Jail Free Means Crime

Timothy Birdnow

San Francisco's "no arrest" plague policy is leading to looting.

Thugs in San Fran Loot Cosmetics Store After "No Arrest" Policy

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Good Money After Bad for Wind Industry

Timothy Birdnow

"Green energy" was always a con to force people into having and using less. That's why it always has needed subsidies.

Never Competitive: Britain's Wind Industry Begs for Even More Massive Subsidies

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What Hath God Wrought?

This from Joseph Bast:

Great piece from a week ago. Some of it may be wishful thinking, but if the American people are paying attention, COVID-19 will trigger the end of many of the Left’s most destructive campaigns

When Wuhan Virus Departs World Will be Changed

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Sadistic Torture of Stats

This from Stephen Heins:

"It’s no se­cret that the press’s rep­u­ta­tion has taken a cred­i­bil­ity hit in this cri­sis. Nor is it any se­cret why: In­stead of a pre­sen­ta­tion of what we know and don’t, too of­ten the fo­cus has been po­lit­i­cal scape­goat­ing or sen­sa­tion­al­ iz­ing.”

Wall Street Journal Editorial

P.S. Torture statistics long enough and they become sadistic.

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No Net Increase in Mortality in Europe

This from Dr. Roy Spencer:

I previously predicted we might actually see a reduction in virus-related deaths due to more people being careful about spreading germs, thus reducing the number of seasonal flu deaths. It turns out, in COVID-19 hard-hit Europe, there has been (as of yet) no increase in total mortality. Their explanation that it is related to high total population in the denominator makes zero sense... that division is done every year... if mortality increases, the statistics will show an increase averaged over ANY population group. (H/T Bryan Lambeth)

https://www.euromomo.eu/index.html?fbclid=IwAR2EJXTj1t_YBFt-eTIoU8VS7ZygDAy-GFHyxmhclRUcsfG8QJojoVeVV0s

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Et Too Boobie? Extinction Rebellion Morons

Timothy Birdnow

I had an argument with a member of Extinction Rebellion. Here is how it went:

Ian Too said:

From where I'm sitting you're both wrong:

i. Humanity, along with other life, is the point.
ii. Wanting the climate crisis treated with the seriousness it deserves is not a form of fascism.
iii. Very few of us receive money from Charles Koch, so we're able to maintain a sense of proportion.
iv. Is there any evidence at all that this sticker is genuine?

I replied:

Ian Too Humanity is the point - one that ER would like to eliminate. Climate Change deserves little respect as it has been ginned up from the beginning. Why have NASA and NOAA and the Hadley Center had to tamper with data? Why did Michael Mann? Why were scientists trying to subvert peer review and bully journal editors into keeping research that did not support AGW theory out of print? The Global Warming types receive far, far more money from governments, from the U.N., and from industries than do the skeptics. Even Exxon Mobile donates money to them. You mention Charles Koch, but how about George Soros? How about Michael Bloomberg? Tom Steyer? Bill Gates? I think you are the one who is wrong.

He shot back:

Timothy Birdnow

Seriously, you have to have holed yourself up in some sort of feedback hell to consider that a reasonable proposition. Anything but listen to the other side, eh?

Then, sans evidence, you slander NASA, NOAA, the Hadley Centre, Michael Mann and then hilariously, 'scientists'.

This Timothy, is when you need to go into the bathroom, gaze long into the mirror and ask yourself: 'Am I a conspiracy nut?'

I'm not just pissing with you here, I'm serious. When you've got to the point where you've basically lumped all climate scientists into a conspiracy, what you're doing is righting off the critical faculties of literally thousands of people smarter by orders of magnitude than you and me combined. People unlike us, who are speaking within their field of expertise. If that isn't setting off alarms in your head, then you need to call an engineer.

You see, what's happening is that 'scientists', especially those within the field, have reached a consensus and rather than accept that, cognitive dissonance has driven you into the wilds of conspiracy theory echo-chambers where they have the gall to call themselves sceptics.

I have to declare skin in this game now: I have been a member of the Skeptic's (Note the spelling) movement since the mid nineties, when I discovered The Skeptic's Guide to the Universe. Since then I've done what I can against 'psychics' who use Cold Reading to bilk grieving people out of money and stood against quacks, who sell people bleach to drink to cure their ills and by such actions we have given the word skeptic its standing. I was describing myself as a skeptic long before it became fashionable and I'm not very happy that people who deny the climate crisis are co-opting it. And this is where I bring this back on point:

When you're dealing with a conspiracy, you have to be able to answer another pesky little question: What do they stand to gain?

The person who sells diluted bleach as medicine does it for money. The ghoulish medium uses a parlour trick for money. These individuals bring no real benefit to anyone but themselves. If only they were harmless.

Charles Koch and his late brother did and do what they do for money. Koch is an oil billionaire, he stands to lose massively if people stop burning oil. It's in his interests to cast doubt on the science and he may be clever, but he's not picky about how he does it. He doesn't shy away from calling people's competence or integrity into doubt by inflating the slightest sliver of doubt into a whole ship of conspiracy foolishness. Look what they did to Phil Jones. Despicable.

Finally, you compare people like George Soros, Michael Bloomberg, Tom Steyer and Bill Gates with Koch. I'm not in the business of defending billionaires, but I ask: What do these people stand to gain from their stance? Make your case.

In the case of Bill Gates, we're talking about someone who, with his wife Melinda, is actually giving away a lot of their fortune to among other things, eradicate polio. Are you sure you want to slander them?

This is where I stop. You've got an appointment with a mirror.
"Humanity is the point - one that ER would like to eliminate" - It's best, when starting your argument, not to lead with an unsupported assertion which is quite so ridiculous.

My reply:

Ian Too, you truly amaze me. First, what is Extinction Rebellion? It is a radical organization whose purpose is to reduce industrial civilization. To do that it is necessary to radically reduce the population. That is in itself anti-humanist. And what do you people want to do? You don't seem to realize that people are going to die - lots of them - as a result of your insane policies. People are going to get sick from lack of energy to heat homes. Cold weather kills. https://friendsofsciencecalgary.files.wordpress.com/2015/09/cold-weather-kills-macrae-daleo-4sept2015-final.pdf The drop in food production will lead the poor to starve. But you don't care; you would rather cower from fear of the possibility of a degree or two warmer weather. And your group is not radical? Co-founder Roger Hallum called the Jewish Holocaust "just another fuckery” and that doesn't bespeak a radical? He also said at an Amnesty International conference that he wants to "bring down governments" and "some may die in the process". Not radical? Pro-human? #ExtinctionRebellion-Gründer Roger Hallam: »We’re going to force the governments to act. And if they don’t, we will bring them down and create a democracy fit for purpose. And yes, some may die in the process.« pic.twitter.com/z8FjFlEIFq — Rüpelhorst™ (@Ruebenhorst) October 8, 2019 Tell me, where is the damned missing heat? The planet HASN'T WARMED since the '90's. Nobody has found the missing heat. Why hasn't the rate of sea level rise increased? It's been rising pretty much at the same rate since the end of the Little Ice Age. Why has Antarctica ice mass remained pretty much stable? Here are four links with stories about data manipulation. https://notrickszone.com/2017/02/13/more-data-manipulation-by-noaa-nasa-hadcrut-cooling-the-past-warming-the-present/ https://arizonadailyindependent.com/2017/02/19/noaa-caught-manipulating-temperature-data-again/ https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/feb/5/climate-change-whistleblower-alleges-noaa-manipula/ https://principia-scientific.org/nasa-exposed-in-massive-new-climate-data-fraud/ NASA and NOAA have both been caught - repeatedly - downgrading planetary temperatures in the past to make it appear the planet is warming. Why, if the "science is settled"? And what of the "climategate" e-mails? Top climate modelers were caught red-handed strategizing how to fake data, manipulate peer review, bully journal editors, blacklist uncooperative scientists, etc. This included top people - Kevin Ternbreath, Phil Jones, Michael "Nature Trick" Mann, etc. Why do this if the "science is settled"? In fact it's not. There are hundreds of top scientists who have expressed disagreement with the radical version of the theory. People like William Happer, or Judith Curry, or Dr. Spencer. See this list. https://electroverse.net/the-list-scientists-who-publicly-disagree-with-the-current-consensus-on-climate-change/ For that matter, read the Oregon Petition for a much longer list of scientists who disagree with the alarmist view being promoted. Even Roger Revelle did not think this was going to be catastrophic but rather simply a modest 2 degrees C. warming. The fact is there are a lot of young scientists who think this is hockum but are afraid for their careers. Google Joanna Simpson; she said she feared for her job and only expressed her reservations about the theory after she retired from NASA. Your "concensus" is based on what? The work of John Cook - a cognitive professor and radical environmentalist who runs the alarmist website Skeptical Science and who claims his study of a few papers "proves" there is no longer any debate - and Naomi Oreskes, a Communications professor who simply looked at paper abstracts and said there was no obvious denial of AGW theory. Both were active environmentalists working out of their fields. Cook looked at a little over a thousand papers - out of tens of thousands. And you don't think he cherry-picked? But none of that seems to interest you. Governments all are behind this because it allows them to tax more, to enlarge their regulatory authority, and to control people. And the U.N. REALLY loves this because they can promote world government and socialism. Big corporations like it too because an artificially suppressed economy means they are the only game in town. So vast sums of money go into promoting this. And people like Soros have plenty to gain, chum. Soros managed to stop the Keystone XL oil pipeline, for example, during the Obama Administration on the basis of climate change. Well, he just so happened to own considerable stock in Petrobras, the Brazillian oil company. Warren Buffet was on board with this too and he owns the railroad that was shipping the oil. Nice. Don't you think these liberal billionaires have investments? Bill Gates is up to his eyeballs in "green energy" investments and wants to make money selling this unneeded and idiotic snake oil. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/jun/26/gates-to-invest-2bn-in-breakthrough-renewable-energy-projects Friend, you have fallen for a con. These people are laughing all the way to the bank at your expense. I would argue you are a gullible person seeking the thrill of fear of doom. Like people in the old days who thought the Apocalypse was nigh, you are eating up the thrilling fear of a pseudo-doomsday. It really is a fake form of the Chrisitian Apocalypse, a neo-pagan form. You guys have eschewed Christianity and now worship a nature god. Whatever your motivation you seem to be willing to childishly believe whatever someone who tells you he is an authority says. I don't agree with your assessment that we mere mortals must stay out of the way of these intellectual titans. They are often wrong. They were wrong about Alar, about dioxin, about global cooling, about nuclear winter. They were wrong about eugenics. (I rather suspect Extinction Rebellion has a touch of eugenics believers in it and want to purify the human race of the degenerate bloodlines.) They were wrong about ozone depletion. They were wrong about so many things, but you meekly want to believe what some with an agenda tell you. God gave you a brain for a reason - try using it yourself. Quit letting others do the work of thinking for you.If you are a skeptic then act like one. You've bought a major bill of goods. That the climate changes is a given. That human activity plays a minor role is also a given. Roger Pielke Sr. thinks the primary source of human induced warming is from land use changes - deforestation for example. He would agree carbon dioxide plays a small role. It undoubtedly does. But it is not bringing about doomsday. If co2 were the primary driver of warming Mars would be a HELL of a lot warmer than it is - it's atmosphere is 95% cp2. But Mars is bitterly cold, so cold much of the atmosphere is frozen out. Why do you suppose that is? Try doing some real research and do less marching and protesting.

That's it for now.

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March 27, 2020

Obama Holdover Brought Wuhan to America

Timothy Birdnow

Check this out; an Obama holdover at the State Department was responsible for bringing people with COVID-19 into the U.S. - after President Trump ordered that nobody be allowed in with the infection.

Daniel Greenfield Dishes:

According to the Washington Post, as unfriendly an outlet to the administration as there is, "Trump has since had several calls with top White House officials to say he should have been told, that it should have been his decision and that he did not agree with the decision that was made."

Who in the State Department actually made the decision? That’s a very good question.

According to a State Department briefing, the missions were carried out by the Directorate of Operational Medicine within the Bureau of Medical Services. You might think that sounds like it would be part of HHS or NIH, but the Bureau of Medical Services is actually an arm of the State Department.

The Directorate of Operational Medicine is a part of the Bureau assigned to deal with crisis response with a $250 million portfolio and a lot of employees that almost no one outside D.C. ever heard of. At least unless you remember an eventat which Barack Obama honored Dr. William Walters, the head of the Directorate, for evacuating Ebola patients to the United States.

"Now, remember, the decision to move Kent back to the United States was controversial. Some worried about bringing the disease to our shores. But what folks like William knew was that we had to make the decisions based not on fear, but on science," Obama said.

By "some”, Obama meant, among others, Trump, who had been a strong critic of the move.

Despite Obama’s end-zone dance, the State Department had badly botched the Ebola evacuations.

Under Bush, the CDC had prepped an evacuation aircraft for flying out contagious Americans. The Obama administration shelved the gear because of the cost, and then failed to make use of it. The evacuation process led to the same infighting between the State Department and the CDC as now.

Dr. William Walters is still on duty. In 2017, Walters was boasting of prepping more Ebola evacuations even over President Trump’s opposition to the practice. And he was once again at the wheel now.

"The question was simply this: Are these evacuees?” Walters explained the decision to evacuate coronavirus patients to the United States. "And do we follow our protocol? And the answer to that was yes on both accounts.”

Consulting President Trump was not part of the protocol even on a major national security issue.

In a Congressional briefing, Walters boasted that, "the Department executed the largest non-military evacuation of U.S. citizens in its history. The safe and efficient evacuation of 1,174 people from Wuhan, China and people onboard the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan is a testament to the agility, proficiency, and dedication of our workforce to accomplishing our core mission – advancing the interests of the American people.”

So this guy just made an end-run around his boss. But that's the way it works these days:

Walters got his job in 2011. He’s a relic of the Obama era. That doesn’t mean that his politics are those of his former boss. But this is not about him. It’s about the reality that the White House doesn’t make many of the most vital decisions and doesn’t even know that they’re being made until it’s too late.

And what that means, beyond the politics of the moment, is that the people don’t decide.

You can vote one way or another and the real decisions that matter will still be made by the head of a directorate that is a subsection of a bureau that you never heard of, but that has a budget in the hundreds of millions, a small army as its disposal, and will follow whatever the protocol is.

This is how the country is really run. And that’s the problem.

I bitterly opposed the idiotic policy of bringing Ebola patients to the U.S. There was no good reason to jeapordize Americans. But Obama's people believed we have no right to not experience what everyone else is experiencing. If Ebola is in Africa who are WE to hide from it!

We got lucky then. Not looking so lucky now.

There should not be such a thing as a career bureaucrat.

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More Proof Wuhan Leveling off

Mark Musser

It looks like, hopefully, some pretty good news for a change no matter which way you want to spin it politically that you can see for yourself with two articles posted below. The UK scientist who was at the heart of the panic virus projections that became an economic inferno in the West, has now scaled back the doomsday numbers way down and then assured Britain that there will be enough beds for people after all. This, at a time, when the UK is being hit pretty good with this flu.

They were unaware that so many people had the virus already, which will bring the death toll percentages way down the more information is known. Both the scientist himself and even Prince Charles have it now too, including Boris Johnson now too. Meaning that, if this flu is as contagious as the experts say it is, then that must mean that many, many more people already have this flu than otherwise is/can be known, particularly in Europe.

By the way, testing on this not easy, requires a lab, and is not cheap, and so I am not sure how the home testing kit that was being offered to Americans would work? But regardless, the more that is known, it looks like the more this virus will be downgraded.

One of the biggest problems all along in this whole mess is that no one was trusting the Chicoms with their numbers.

However, the numbers coming out of South Korea are trustworthy. South Korea was hit pretty good with this flu too a few months ago, but is now well on its way out of this, and did not lockdown the country to do it. From my several visits there in the past, it was obvious they already have some stricter protocols already in place with regard to such health concerns that is part of their daily routine. Regardless, those who are recovering now in South Korea are eating deeply into with those now getting the flu, and so are sliding downhill out of this on their own natural bell curve that is routine with the flu season - and this particular flu is looking to be just a little bit worse than others. This is not to say this virus cannot be a killer in certain targeted people, and is doing this more than usual, sometimes even the young in limited numbers, but we are slowly confirming this is not the Spanish Flu - far from it.

However, all of this also brings up the potential specter that the Spanish Flu pandemic scenario in full panic mode requiring lockdown house arrest measures in order to stop, might be looking more and more like another hoax coming from our elites?

Time will tell, and if so, much more propaganda will be coming out to cover everyone's tracks. The UK scientist already admitted it will take decades to pay for this particular lockdown. Wonderful. Yet common sense strongly suggests that totalitarian solutions never work anyway because they cannot target the problem as they try to take care of everything rather than what specifically needs to be dealt with. This is precisely why socialism never works. It requires a total solution - a secular salvation that is impossible to obtain this side of the grave. As such, totalitarian solutions have a miserable historical record, and actually make the problems far worse than they actually are. Secular idealism in the mind distort the ability to resolve specific problems as they conjure up total solutions which are impossible to execute.

The other article comes from a more liberal 'scientific' persuasion with a liberal spin on it that touts social distancing (lockdown is not being touted) that will spare the overcrowding of the hospitals to level off the spiking of numbers that also helped foster much panic inside the hospitals and clinics themselves - but the message is pretty close to the more conservative one I posted above that this particular flu is in the process of being downgraded the more is known about it. The UK scientist's computer models now are showing that at worst, 20,000 in the UK may die, but the number of deaths will likely be even considerably lower the more information comes in.

Let us hope and pray this is indeed the case, and again, if so, this also reveals the great problem with postmodern science these days where scientists are virtual Chicken Littles who "Cry Wolf" all the time for any number of different problems and reasons, particularly those of the environmental persuasion. They claim to be secular empiricists, but always come up with semi-apocalypti c scenarios to scare people into economic and political actions they would never otherwise take. So far, this latest scare is the biggest, most expensive, and most dangerous one we have ever seen in the history of the West.

Scientists are not prophets. Yet they routinely take this mantle upon themselves, but amazingly never take responsibility when they are wrong, nor suffer the consequences accordingly. They seem, however, to be well paid with cush jobs. The scientist in the New Scientist article  is now in self-isolation. How can it be that individual isolation is the answer to a socialist problem?


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In Israel, a surprise government

Dana Mathewson

Ho! Lee! Cow!

In a logical and therefore surprising conclusion to Israel’s long-standing political paralysis, Benny Gantz has agreed to form a unity government with current Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. As I understand the status of the agreement, the details are being worked out and the parties to the agreement have yet to sign on the dotted line. This JNS report by Dov Lipman relates details and wrinkles. Here is Lipman’s opening:

After nearly a year of political paralysis, Israel is finally on its way towards a national unity government as the nation battles against the unprecedented coronavirus pandemic. Benny Gantz, who has stood as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s chief rival through three consecutive election cycles, announced that his party faction would join Netanyahu’s right-wing coalition to form a new government.

According to the terms of the agreement, Netanyahu will serve as prime minister for 18 months before handing the premiership as part of a rotation to Gantz, who will serve under Netanyahu as deputy prime minister and defense minister for the first 18 months, and then become prime minister in September 2021.

This last part bothers me no end. From what I know about Benny Gantz, I would not want him in charge of anything more important than sweeping the street in front of the Parliament building(s). But if Netanyahu trusts him enough to agree to this, who am I to object? They didn't ask me, after all.




David Dickinson makes this short but to-the-point comment: "Based on what Bibi had to say about Gantz in his interview with Mark Levin a couple of weeks ago, I can't imagine he's too thrilled with having to make this deal."

Bingo! But I can't imagine Bibi letting Benny Gantz get away with any shenanigans. Gantz strikes me as having the astuteness of a Joe Biden.

I should add that a very, very sharp analyst of today's scene, blogger William Stroock, has the following entry on his blog in comment on this situation:

Ladies and Gentlemen, the Once and Future Israeli PM

Bibi you magnificent bastard! You did it!

Benny Gantz blew up his own Blue and White Party for the sake of stability and will be Netanyahu's Defence Minister. In eighteen months the premiership will rotate to him. Yeah, sure. Though that may just be for how long Bibi wants to hang on.

Of course a good deal of this has to do with the Wuhan Chinese Virus from Wuhan China, and there is the matter of Netanyahu's upcoming corruption trial, but still.

The PM, now and always.
Stroock's blog, which I commend to your attention, is http://williamstroock.blogspot.com/

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Victory is sweet: Toilet Paper is too!

Timothy Birdnow

So, I'm down in Dogpatch, the one horse town (sans horse) near the Ozark Hilton, my famous trash dump in the pines. Dogpatch may be a one horse town but it is a TWO Family Dollar town. Anyway I go in hoping to score some toilet paper. I go to the empty shelf and gaze forlornly when a voice whispers from the shadows:

"Psst...Hey buddy!"

"Who, me?"

"The other Family Dollar just restocked. If you hurry you can score some. Everything you want...Charmin, Northern, Cottonelle...all sizes and shapes and colors. Much as you want!"

"Thanks!"

"Tell 'em Joe sent you."

Well that last was for literary effect but the rest of the conversation pretty much went that way.

I sprinted to my pickup and roared down the road, slinging gravel. Fishtailed into the Family Dollar and did my best Batman imitation into the store.

And there it was! An overhead light giving the appearance of Heaven! My heart lept for joy; it was like finding the 7 cities of Cibola, or at least El Dorado. The colors! Shapes! Sizes! Textures! All there just for the taking!  Now I know how Soviet citizens felt when they first immigrated and were overwhelmed by the sheer bounty (they had Bounty too in the towel section!)

I scooped as much as I could.

The teenage girl checking me out was taking all this in stride "Mama said we'd just jump in the shower when we run out". The young are so much more adaptive. Of course her shower drain is apt to get clogged.

The real danger was getting it into the house when I came home. I didn't like letting people see me with toilet paper; larceny may creep into the hearts of my neighbors. But have gun will travel...or have toilet paper at any rate. Nobody better lay a finger on my Charmin.

I feel like a man reborn!

Dana Mathewson adds:

My wife's siblings were all texting each other this morning and her sister, who's lived in the Deep South most of her adult life, said "What's the big thing about TP? Use a wash rag."

Sometimes it's hard to tell when Nancy's kidding. . .

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March 26, 2020

Congress Remains on the Job

Timothy Birdnow

Looks like Congress won't to remote voting after all.

 Seems the Democrats in the House have agreed to make Representatives show up for a vote rather than set up a remote system. Congress is the geriatrics' club and many would be at risk - especially since Rand Paul wound up with the WuFlu. (Paul is a Senator but many reps were in contact with him.)

Question; are House Democrats just brave or do they know something they aren't telling us?

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 10:20 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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Coal Companies get Nada

Timothy Birdnow

Billions for everyone, but not a penny for coal companies who are hard hit by this virus.

https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/coronavirus/article241506176.html#cardLink=row2_card2

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 10:09 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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