"In mid-March, we were told we have to endure a lockdown to ensure that hospitals didn’t get overrun. We did. The hospitals were not overwhelmed. We turned the Javits Center into a hospital. We didn’t need it. We brought in a giant Navy ship to treat New Yorkers. We didn’t need it.
We were told we were moments away from running out of ventilators. We weren’t, and now the United States has built so many, we are giving them away to other countries.
Meanwhile, the Big Apple is dying. Its streets are empty. The bars and jazz clubs, restaurants and coffeehouses sit barren. Beloved haunts, storied rooms, perfect-slice joints are shuttered, many for good. The sweat equity of countless small-business owners is evaporating. Instead of getting people back to work providing for their families, our mayor talks about a fantasyland New Deal for the post-coronavirus era.
Open the city. All of it. Right now. Broadway shows, beaches, Yankees games, the schools, the top of the freakin’ Empire State building. Everything. New Yorkers have already learned to socially distance. Businesses can adjust. The elderly and infirm can continue to be isolated." David Marcus
————-
As you may have noticed, I am not a fan of New York City, but this man understands the truth.
You heard it first here. We understood early at SST that the hysterical, panicked, media driven BS that led to surrender of the course of national life to a bunch of medical academics driven by their professional deformations was simply suicidal.
The Left hates the US, hates the country as "irredeemably deplorable," hates it as stained by the great Faulknerian sins of slavery and colonial creation. In their collective mind the US can only be redeemed by self destruction and a new beginning in socialist rectitude as part of a global state. You get it, America in the Year Zero.
How natural it was for the leftist politicians and leftist media to embrace a medical analysis of the situation that pushed the country into an economic suicide attempt. How natural … And how convenient for the limousine leftists like Pelosi and the Young Pioneer types like AOC to want to keep the economy down long enough to win in November. How natural…
A lot of people die every day of a variety of causes. This virus is a reaper that culls the population, eliminating the weak and the old. The great majority of healthy, productive people survive infection with little or no apparent effect. You may die of the long term damage done to your organs? Yes, well, so what. You are going to die of something no matter what you do. No matter what they think in California we are all mortal.
Re-open the country, all of it! Now! pl
https://nypost.com/2020/05/20/end-new-york-citys-lockdown-now/
long interview Robert Kennedy Jr
as left as you can get
against the left support of big Pharma
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=3164&v=QLi6ZrFp6vQ&feature=emb_logo
The phrase “professional deformations” helped clarify a number of things for me! Thank you for your incisive words, Col. Lang.
But what about the snitches and the virtue signalers and the screamingly fearful faux celebrities, and how can you be so cruel to the currently essential who if we re-open have to return to being just another bunch of working stiffs. Have you not seen the vasty deep outpouring of love and affection we are currently piling on the Nurse Ratcheds and Dr. Evils of the world for their virtuous and self effacing tv commercials and the many glorious PSAs with paeans and “we’re all in this together” sophistries from various health insurance companies and makers of very expensive symptom mollifiers?
I am sorry sir, but I must disagree. We must not only keep closed that which is currently closed, we must use the power of the IC and the various state and federal militaries and national guards to close down all the open and partially opened states and cities and towns and farms and counties and any other political subdivisions of this great nation until we are truly “all in this together”.
Or
We could just open all of it, now.
If we did, we would be back to normal in about 60 days, some places would open with new management, some folks would enjoy continued unemployment until they were called back.
I, personally, expect that except for Ca and NY the country will be reopen about 90 days prior to the election.
The liberal media and legislators applied the 100% solution to 1% of the population, if that much.
That was failed leadership; that was slavish “following orders”. That was a loss of the maxim “trust, but verify” maxim. This powerful legacy of the Reagan era, must be put back at the forefront of any public decision process. Question authority needs repeating as well.
Our public education system failed us completely for too many decades. Teaching generations of Americans to be critical of America, is not teaching them critical thinking skills. We need to own up to that, from our local school boards on up.
These non-science , not thinking, hateful liberal media and politicians deserve the 100% solution – 100% voted out of office in 2020. Liberal media and legislators must get a new message. Voting and boycotting are the two primary tools we have. Some stunning upsets in primary races are already occurring. It will be morning in America again.
But may we never forget why so many were so willing to shoot ourselves in the foot. For what end purpose? Were we ever so collectively scared as a Nation in the past, that we were willing destroy ourselves as we witnessed happening these past few money – no nuance, no graduated response, no scalpel wiled with professional precision.
What happened to our true grit as Americans? How did we get into this devastatingly false dichotomy – total submission or we are all going to die.
Will there be a post mortem examination of the corpse of our once vibrant nation? This requires honest soul searching. I honestly don’t think we have the tools to do this any longer. I hope I am wrong. In fact I would be greatly comforted to be proven wrong.
Will current national leadership rise to this challenge? Or has the Black Swan yet to arrive. Or do we start this soul-searching right here and right now, one by one. “Stronger together”. Will the Karens stop demanding we go through their menopause danger years with them.
It is astonishing that no one is talking about the death profile from covid19 (or as it should have been named – the Wuhan coronavirus). Over there in the UK, the median age of death from covid is 83-84.
There has been a lot of talk about Children dying of covid. Only 2 (two) children under the age of 10 have died from covid since it started and they probably had other conditions. This is in a total population of 65million.
Fully 90% of the deaths from covid19 are in the ages of 65+ and that segment of the population doesn’t, by and large, participate in production in the economy (of goods or services). While death is always sad and it will lead to grieving, we have to understand that people always die, especially the old and infirm. Anyways, no one is suggesting that they should be left to fend for themselves, the older people and those with conditions makes them high risk should be isolated.
The UK closed the massive Nightingale hospitals that were set up to handle thousands of patients. The one in London handled a total of 54 before shutting down. Clearly, we had over-provisioned for the outbreak (as we should) but very clearly we are past the worst.
Please OPEN UP THE ECONOMY. And do it NOW. The deaths being avoided are not worth keeping the economy shut down, not only in the UK but across the world.
People point towards the Spanish flu where most deaths happened in the 2nd wave. Well, most of those deaths would not have happened had antibiotics been invented then. The deaths were due to subsequent bacterial infections (usually pneumonia) after the virus weakened the immune system.
We need to start going back to normal and we need to do it now!
Democrats – the Dream Killers. Meanwhile immigration is our strength, multi-national corporations may operate, private businesses may not – “for the common good” as Deborah Dingell, former GM lobbyist and now successor to John D’s hold on power in Congress and the DNC, likes to repeat daily on her FB stream of concousness – along with exhortations to obedience.
“By prolonging the coronavirus shutdown long after its core mission was accomplished, Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio have plunged tens of thousands of New Yorkers into poverty.”
Poverty apparently doesn’t kill anyone infected with this virus, but it sure is killing our freedoms and thanks to Cuomo and Whitmer it has killed thousands in nursing homes. The press is all praise for them, and tries to gin up stories about other governors, such as De Santis of Florida, or ignores them, as they are going with the story in Georgia.
Sir,
I was a fence sitter/agnostic until the end of February or early March. Then there was enough data in to be able to understand that the elderly needed to be protected and the rest of should go about life as normal. When you first posted about panic, I wasn’t seeing a panic as I would define it. Then a few days later lockdowns were announced. You had the jump on that one!
Just to summarize what I have been saying since the lockdown started, there are going to be more deaths (and many more years of life lost) from all of the people not able and/or too afraid to engage in regular healthcare services than there will be killed by the virus – and from the effects of economic destruction.
The Mayor of Ithaca, NY – not a conservative by any means – made an appeal to Cuomo to open the economy back up and to allow students to return to colleges. He says his college town (includes Cornell U) had the best economy in all of NY up to the lockdown (lowest unemployment, etc). Now he can’t collect enough tax revenue to pay police and other public servants.
And that’s what I don’t get about this scheme to establish a new [socialist] normal. How do the socialists think they are going to generate revenues to pay for everything they want? It’s almost as if they don’t understand economics 101. Will they turn on their limousine faction and confiscate their wealth along with that of conservatives? Do they really imagine that no one is going to fight back (I mean with votes, pitchforks, guns…whatever)? For that matter, same goes for the non-scheming sincere useful science geek/idiots. They are supposed to be engineer types, but where are the sober calculations of costs and benefits? What are they thinking?
Re:
A lot of people die every day of a variety of causes. This virus is a reaper that culls the population, eliminating the weak and the old. The great majority of healthy, productive people survive infection with little or no apparent effect.
The last or only time this brushed me was with polio in Detroit in the 50’s. Following your “re-open the country, all of it” swimming pools and Belle Isle would never have been closed would have remained open in August and September to allow nature to thin-out Detroit’s/the country’s weakest.
That’s your C19 call as I read it.
On the damage the shutdowns and restrictions are causing,
this is a good account:
Doctors raise alarm about health effects of continued coronavirus shutdown: ‘Mass casualty incident’
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/doctors-raise-alarm-about-health-effects-of-continued-coronavirus-shutdown
Yeah, too bad about all those doctors and nurses dying. Easily replaced, I’m sure.
It’s just math, folks. Epidemics are math…you can either go with the math or try to change the equation and the outcome of the math. I, personally, would rather try to change the equation.
Laura Wilson
“The greater good …” How many doctors and nurses really? How many? You should remember about me that I am accustomed to sacrificing people for the greater good. That is MY professional deformation.
TedBuila
This plague actually kills few outside the legion of the old and infirm. Polio kills the youngest first. Yours is a false comparison.
Eric Newhill
What were the Khmer Rouge thinking in the Year Zero when they systematically destroyed Cambodia and killed millions?
New York City is still getting hundreds of new cases and hospitalizations a day. How many people will want to go to crowded indoor places? If there is social distancing with lots of empty chairs and spaces, how many closed places could make any money if they opened?
There’s been a lot of uncertainty and guesswork involved with this new virus and that will continue. We came through the first round with some hotspots but most places doing OK. I think we were right to shut down when we did and that we need to be careful in opening back up. I still trust Dr. Fauci and Dr. Birx.
Certainly it’s time to start relaxing restrictions in most places. But we need to remember that this is a new virus with many unknowns and that we are all vulnerable because there’s no proven ttestment that works, cure or vaccine.
I have to say that this crisis has taken on a symbolic importance for some. It has not for me. I think this will lead to a lot more disagreement about what should be done in the future, particularly if we have addition waves. That makes me feel uneasy — very uneasy. I am not assuming we’re going to have a very effective vaccine within a year so we may be living with this threat for a long time.
Eric, socialists in California have one standard answer when confronted with funding for their schemes: They’ll find the money. .
End of all practical discussion. When asked for details, they will invariably add .. “you had money for the Vietnam war …. the military etc. Just use that money.”
Only two decades of total socialism in this state has this done to our fiscal literacy. “Just tax the rich” gets anything passed. Cruel fact in this state, the rich – just the top 1% in this state pay 50% of all state revenues. Only a handful of people pay half the bills.
Should any of this top 1% leave, like Musk recently threatened, shock waves will reach the state’s executive suite. But this threat will fall on deaf ears in the state’s Democrat super-majority legislature.
Voters finally are catching on – they lost their livelihood due to government actions, but government employees never missed a paycheck. How this translates at the ballot box remains to be seen. Two Democrats getting recently tossed out is a good start, but is it a trend?
My own local city council yesterday just gave all SEIU employees a raise; while our entire economy, much of it dependent on tourism, has been totally trashed. This is what a Democrat one party state looks like.
jerseycityjoan
Timid. Will you like living in a dying metro area?
“How do the socialists think they are going to generate revenues to pay for everything they want?”
Eric,
Simple. Print money. As they’ve been doing since the GFC at scale. The added benefit is that the biggest beneficiary of socialism – the titan of capitalism – Wall St – will get the lion’s share as they’re getting now with the Wuhan virus lockdown. Average Joe peon should be thankful they got $1,200.
Powell on 60 Minutes says there’s no limit to the Fed printing money. He like Bernanke loves to click Print on the keyboard. And no pesky Congressional authorization either. MOAR & MOAR!!
It’s feeling pretty normal here in SW Florida now, rumor is Jun 1st the bars will open up and that makes it 100% normal. I know of at least 6 restaurants in Port Charlotte/Punta Gorda that will not re-open. We go through the restaurant closings every year anyway, “Season” ended early this year with the lock down. Memorial Day usually is when we get the closings. But, they will reopen with new owners who have recently retired and “have always wanted to own a restaurant” not understanding that the restaurant business is for the younger, just as life is.
I feel awful when I see the little old ladies driving alone in their cars with their masks on, victims of the MSM that are truly a national security threat.
Sir,
The fact of the Khmer Rouge and the mentality behind it (at bottom, same as Mao, same as Stalin same others that brought death, destruction and misery to their societies) is another reason to get back to normal in this country – and accept any casualties that might result. This has become a war for the heart and soul of the country. Actually, it’s a war for everything; even material prosperity. Whatever the casualties might be in the short run, they will be far less than the long run if we allow the Khmer Rouge to continue (which, of course, is one of your key points).
One of my objectives on social media has been to try to gain insight into the Khmer Rouge and young pioneer psychology. I can now recognize it when I see it; even when it tries to disguise itself, but I truly don’t understand such people. IMO it is some kind of twisted spiritual illness that seeks dominance as it replaces God with themselves. That much I can see. I guess it has to do with the battle between good and evil. Evil always seeks to control and manipulate and disrespects the sanctity of each soul. It seeks to enslave and cut off from freedom and recognition of divinity around each of us and in each of us. Its sycophants are attracted to the sense of power; false as it may truly be.
At least that is the way I best understand it.
jerseycityjoan
Our natural capacity for threat perception and assessment is warped by the media’s need to generate headlines. The virus is a gift to them which they have enthusiastically embraced. Most of us have a vanishing small chance of it killing us off, yet this single risk dominates the public discourse to the exclusion of almost all else.
Social media is particularly insidious, the effects of which far too few are prepared to counter. The feedback loops of hysteria it generates must be assessed as a threat in their own right – to our ability to make sound judgments.
A destroyed economy is not a direct threat to any one individual’s survival, but it’s collapse is an inevitable consequence if the lockdowns are allowed to continue. In this case many will die and very many more will experience a great deal of misery. Sadly the headlines carrying these stories will only come after it is far too late.
Turn off the Tee Vee news, treat social media ‘news’ with great skepticism and read the opinions of people who see the bigger picture. You are in the right place for the last of these.
Open it up-It never should of closed. What we have done is to prolong the inevitable. You either get it or you don’t but it is still here waiting for those cowering in their homes. Prudent actions and awareness of your situation will get one through most of life’s events.
The next thing we will here is Oh Folks, get out there and enjoy the summer while you can as it’s coming back in the fall. No schools, Sheltering in Place, minimize the essentials, where are those ships and tent hospitals, we need PPE, start the printing etc etc cause the vaccine ain’t ready Folks.
It will all be fine, don’t worry. Keep in mind it has only taken a 100,000 out 330,000,000 a very low ratio.
“How do the socialists think they are going to generate revenues to pay for everything they want?”
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/goldman-spots-huge-problem-fed
The US government will issue 3 trillion $ of new debt in this quarter alone. The banks will buy these bonds, then sell them back to the US Central Bank (that’s called “quantitative easing”, the quoted article talks about the expectation that the central bank will announce a new bond purchasing program soon because the current one is far too small to absorb all the new debt), and the cycle repeats.
That’s not sustainable, but that’s the only plan that exists. If the shutdown of the economy continues indefinitely, it will end in economic collapse by bankruptcy of the federal government, or hyperinflation, which is really just a different way to reach the same painful end point.
Same story here in Europe, just with the added complication that there are conflicts between the different national governments of the Eurozone when the European Central Bank does the very same thing.
You can open up the city when everyone starts to wear a mask. Covid-19 is proving to be an airborne killer… which simplifies things enormously. Consider it an instance of CBW. And of course the children’s inflammatory syndrome is just collateral damage.
Master Slacker–And now there is some evidence that the inflammatory syndrome is hitting teenagers and young adults, too.
turocpolier–The numbers aren’t comprehensive (or even good) on the national toll of doctors and nurses and aides and CNAs, etc. in health care/hospitals. Too bad our government can’t get everyone to report in a uniform manner!!!! (Not that any other administration has been successful with this either.) It certainly would be helpful in the middle of a novel pandemic to know if we were going to have enough front line responders to stay in the fight.
And I NEVER forget that you are a professional “sacrificer for the greater good.” That is why I appreciate what you have to say…it is a worthy perspective and not one that I default to!
Master slacker,
So “my body, my choice” is for abortion only now, because your fear is greater than my rights? “stay home, stay safe” negates my need to wear a gag in your presence. I reccomend Kevin Drum go out and drum up some antifa support for the socialist distancing policing. They ought to be well rested and ready for some agit-prop and agent provocateur actions by now.
“children’s inflammatory syndrome” – is a miniscule risk to a minimal risk pool. It’s like the CDC’s mentioning legionaire’s disease in their school opening guidlelines – meant to invoke fear. More civil servent “resistance”. Trump should reform the civil service. Perhaps he should revoke EO 10988,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_10988
His initial order was upheld, I’m sure this one would be too.
https://www.politico.com/newsletters/morning-shift/2019/07/17/executive-orders-limiting-federal-employee-unions-reinstated-458951
Laura Wilson
Business Insider – run by a NY City type wrote on 3 May that there had been about 50 medical professional deaths. 50 divided by what denominator equals what? Times 100 would be the % of deaths by COVID-19 among medical professionals. Do the math.
jerseycityjoan,
To leave your home on any given day and to live any semblance of a worthwhile life is to be in some degree of peril from any number of threats much of the time. You just don’t notice them because the news isn’t cramming them down your throat day in and day out. That’s all there is to it.
I couldn’t agree more. The virus is much more serious than the flu for older individuals and individuals with comorbidities.
But if you are younger than 50 and especially 40 the risk is very low. And non-existant pretty much for under 30 compared to the flu.
This virus is peculiar in that kids are pretty much not affected minus the hysteria the media is trying to cause with the diagnosis of pediatric inflammatory multisystem syndrome.
Why is that? They are being exposed to a virus and have no immunity to it from previous infections. The reason there is a pandemic is humans have no natural immunity to this novel coronavirus.
But kids and young people are not affected. This is great news. Maybe there are less ACE2 enzymes in younger people. I doubt it. I believe their immune system is just more efficient in eliminating this virus. But a strain of Flu B hit kids extremely hard this past flu season due to no previous immunity while most adults had been exposed to this strain previously.
It is a peculiar virus. The heat is already causing the diagnosis of the virus to decline. Why the hysterical SJWs medical establishment dismissed this is due to arrogance.
They still debate why the flu disappears during the warmer months. Some hypothesis Vitamin D, lifestyle change, warmer humid weather causing the virus droplets to stay in the air a lot less longer than cold dry air.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-do-we-get-the-flu-mos/
“The answer as to why flu is a winter disease is not fully known.”
http://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2014/the-reason-for-the-season-why-flu-strikes-in-winter/
Bottom line is nobody knows why the flu disappears during the warmer months. I believe the virus will continue to dissipate as it warms up.
But I also believe it will re emerge this coming respiratory seasonal flu season.
The Globalists/Democratic Party intention is to destroy the US no doubt. Most/ALL of the Democratic voters are clueless they are voting for the destruction of the United States of America. They don’t matter in the end. On the big issues.
Republicans are really not much different. The true power hates Nationalism. And Christ.
“….economic collapse by bankruptcy of the federal government, or hyperinflation,…”
rho,
Before this happens we’ll see a collapse of the EU, emerging markets and of course China. All of them are way more leveraged. We have many experts here at SST who can suggest if this will lead to the next Great War.
No doubt printing money by central banks to monetize government debt and over the past decade even corporate, asset-backed and municipal debt is both unprecedented and completely insane. However, since there have been no immediately apparent deleterious impacts the Ph.Ds have convinced the people with their econobabble that these emergency financial operations are necessary and very salutary.
In the US unlike now in the U.K., there is no direct monetization. Here, the Fed buys securities from primary dealers and has now followed the BoJ to even buy ETFs. Since this is illegal they use technicalities like creating SPVs housed at the Treasury to do it. The problem as we have seen over the past decade is that once the rubicon is crossed there’s no turning back. It only gets bigger and even more brazen.
The consequence is that bankruptcy which is in reality a restructuring of the balance sheet can keep getting postponed as there is endless financing. This leads to zombie companies, municipalities and even governments. This means more capacity, more production, more white elephants and more boondoggles. Of course more speculation and speculative profits for financial speculators as their losses are always socialized. IMO, we’re building more and more instability financially, socially and politically.
When this changes is purely a function of psychology. The parable of the emperor with no clothes is most apt. No one knows when mass psychology changes.
From a century ago:
https://youtu.be/b-QlCXThsgE
Colonel,
The FBI and CISA issued a joint public warning earlier this month warning that the CCP was targeting U.S. medical research cures for the CCP Virus.
Also Gordon Chang is warning that the CCP is comparable to the Nazi Third Reich racist outlook with its Han Nationalistic Ideology.
https://www.cisa.gov/sites/default/files/publications/Joint_FBI-CISA_PSA_PRC_Targeting_of_COVID-19_Research_Organizations_S508C.pdf.pdf
Friends,
All throughout this, the lack of tests for infection, and more crucially, the testing itself has led to several catastrophic errors: 1) Not knowing the prevalence of infection has led to a disasterously low, genuine knowledge of an important fraction, the numerator of which is all of those whose deaths can reliably be attributed to the virus (not gamed by attributing deaths of all those infected by the virus to the virus, please), and the denominator is the total number of those known to have been infected with the virus. That fraction is the genuine fatality rate, but you only get this if the denominator is correct. Then one needs to correlate this data with the demographic information to find out which groups (age, ethnicity, lifestyle, preexisting conditions) are most vulnerable in order to take effective measures to protect those people as the highest priority, This is Epidemiology 101, for God’s sake; 2) The emerging knowledge, anecdotal as it often was due to the lack of widespread testing, was revealing that the old mostly with co-morbidities, or those with compromised immune systems WERE the groups needing protection, but lockdowns were only applied to families, while the facility staff, largely untested or monitored for common symptoms, were not affected by lockdowns in the same manner. Here in NJ, this led to raging epidemics in nursing homes, and rehabiltation hospitals just full of these vulnerable people. A very high percentage of deaths attributed to the virus came from these populations. And consequently, these numbers, preventable had the facts been actively sought and acted upon appropriately, wound up driving the panic and community-wide lockdowns; 3) Because testing was not there, contact tracing to contain hotspots was not possible. Guess we just have to all go into quarantine then, eh?
Too bad about the lost school year. Tough break when the small businesses who don’t have the flywheel of capital available have to go under, taking with them the savings of their owners (and maybe those of their supportive family members), and throwing their employees into the abyss, into the bargain.
Concerning the economy, most of the damage was caused by a significant portion of the population staying home prior to any lockdown. Ending lockdowns and telling people to be good consumers isn’t going to get enough people shopping to fix the economy.
Currently, 1.5 out of every 1,000 residents of New York State has been killed by Covid. That’s not so good. The US and South Korea reported their first case of Covid on the same day. Today, the US has had more than 90,000 people killed by Covid while South Korea has less than 275.
A sane country should done what South Korea did, instead of allowing tens of thousands of people to die. I get that many of the dead were older or had conditions like high blood pressure, but if I intentionally killed any of those people, I’d still be charged with murder.
The economy isn’t coming back until Covid is crushed. The government telling people its OK and opening up everything isn’t going to work. No one trusts the government, especially now after it just let 90,000 Americans die.
Concerning the Khmer Rouge:
A somewhat uncommon interpretation is that their auto-genocide was a neo-religiously enforced Scorched Earth policy (to prevent or make more difficult an incoming Vietnamese invasion) that went completely out of control because Khmer Rouge leadership essentially lost control of their own movement. Scorched Earth policies going out of control is a thing that happens pretty often historically.
This included random attacks by the Khmer Rouge on Vietnamese Soil, which gave Vietnam a pretty excellent Casus Belli to do what it probably wanted to do anyway. Historically, speaking, whenver Vietnam is strong it goes on to beat up Cambodia and/or Laos.
There are some parallels there, the US democratic party (I am a leftist, I do not consider Obama to be left) apparently wishes to burn (more precisly smother) the economy in order to deny Trump a victory (if they werent so fucking corrupt and enthralled to pretty toxic policies in the first place, they would not need such stunts to contest Trump), it could well go out of control.
President Trump said yesterday that we won’t be closing down the country if there is a 2nd wave, “we’ll put out the fires if they pop up, we’re not closing down”.
Remembering Pol Pot brings back bad memories for me, lost 2 good friends, both dog handlers with the 56th Security Police Sq, Nakhon Phanom Thailand. The CH-53 chopper they were on with about 16 others was either shot down or crashed over Laos on their way to the Cambodian island where the merchant ship Mayaguez was captured by the KR.
LA Sox Fan
“especially now after it just let 90,000 Americans die.” How did the “Government” (federal?) let them die. What should Trump (your target) have done to keep them from dying that he did not do? You think he should have acted more quickly? Would the Democrats have acted more quickly? Pelosi’s foot dragging does seem to indicate that to be true.
jersey jeffersonian
We had a doctor insist yesterday on SST that the denominator should be the total population.
J
“targeting U.S. medical research cures for the CCP Virus.” How do you do that?
https://www.npr.org/2020/05/02/849535944/south-koreas-tracking-of-covid-19-patients-raises-privacy-concerns
“KUHN: “Even though Korean society is industrialized,” he says, “we still consider interpersonal relationships more important than individuals, so we try to avoid actions that harm others.” The downside, he says, is that anyone seemed to be out of line with the majority can be stigmatized.”
By releasing more social information than necessary it would get people to work very hard about conforming to the policy implemented.
Watching the anti smoking commercials here where the smoke travels between apartments to kill/maim a baby gives one the impression it is more about social outcasting of the smoker than the reality of second hand smoke.
A nudge isn’t as good as a 2×4 to an obtuse man
All:
Sweden (population 10.23 million, 2019) vs. Michigan (9.987 million, 209)
Michigan (with a 2-month lock-down):
Confirmed 53,510
Deaths 5,129
=======================
Sweden (soft lock-down)
Confirmed 32,172
Deaths 4,971
(I am assuming the reliability of Swedish data – unlike those of UK)
Rick,
I’m in the Finger Lakes region of NY. So I don’t live near NYC, but I was going there on business right before the lockdown. If NYC opened tomorrow I wouldn’t hesitate to resume business trips, go the bars, restaurants, etc. Nor would I wear a damn useless mask.
If I was 20 years older and sickly, I’d refrain from making the trips.
Colonel,
As to the deniminator being the entire population, well, that might not be possible, but having testing be dramatically higher would approximate that situation, at least to the point that actionable statistics would have become a possibility.
The CDC screwed the pooch right out of he gate when, after insisting that all the kits requisite for testing for infection would originate with them, they bungled the process of fabricating the tests so badly, and consequently the results were so undependable, that the nation lost weeks of time in aggregating actionable statistics against which comparisons with the demographics of those infected with the virus could have clearly been done, and unambiguously identify risk factors and at risk groups. And any hope of using testing results to do contact tracing to focus in on hot spots of infection was gone, gone, gone.
For want of that horse shoe nail, well, The Experts were functionally flying blind and, perforce, lunged toward universal lockdown as their only recourse.
As soon as the Democrats figured out that they could weaponize this policy to try to tie the can to the President’s tail, sedulously aided by the screaming meemies of the MSM, we were off to the races.
The ass covering has been epic by these self-described Experts. And the Democrats have been moving the goal posts as much as they can, now advancing the “policy imperative” of keeping everything frozen in place until some vaccine is universally administered. But this is a coronavirus, notoriously difficult to develop vaccines for, so the timeline for their open-ended “policy imperative” is oh so convenient to the Democrats aims, not to mention that some of The Experts are way too cozy with big pharma to be able to rely on the objectivity of their pronouncements.
For want of the horse shoe nail…
For want of massive, trustworthy testing early on, we lost all prospect of getting inside of the OODA loop (Observe, Orient, Decide, Act) of our antagonist, the epidemic.
Losing that initiative made all of the difference. Serious nations, confronted with the virus, made accurate and wide-scale testing to give them an edge a top priority.
Different nations chose different responses, but responses at least informed by data.
The childlike faith some still repose in Our Experts, given their abject failure in the Observe and Orient phases, leaves me aghast.
Thank you,
JJ
JerseyJeffersonian,
“nursing homes, and rehabiltation hospitals”
Florida did pretty much the opposite of what NY and NJ did, much to the benefit of people at risk, even with the contemptuous flight to safety of North-Easterners into the state.
LA Sox Fan,
“No one trusts the government”
That’s why the free people of America are telling Newman, Whitmer, DeBlasio et. al to go F themselves. What were people dying of in NY, before they started dying of policies enacted because of leftist b.s.? This virus isn’t the only thing that kills human beings.
jerseyjeffersonian
I question whether or not having better data does much for you in the absence of cures for those infected who are in the killable classes of the population. We must remember that if you are in other than those groups you will very likely recover from the infection.
MSM’s latest Fear Du Jour – an extremely rare condition in children not even confirmed to be linked to covid – Johns Hopkins provides more information about this latest MSM headline grabber: “Covid Kills Children”:
https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/coronavirus/coronavirus-in-babies-and-children
Covid-19 Testing was easily accessible in Florida in March as in my town there were 5 drive-in testing sites. SWMBO was not feeling well in mid March and insisted on getting tested on a Sunday morning. Drove her down town, got in line, an hour later the test was done and Monday night the results were on-line. My New Jersey living Daughter paying 50K+ in State & property taxes cried as no test sites were available in Jersey at the time. Had to send here a care package (Toilet paper, hand sanitizer, N-95 masks etc) cause there was noting left or coming in Jersey.
Why, the Florida Governor brought the National Guard in to do the tests & assist the nursing homes. The Jersey governor twiddled his thumbs and cried like his neighbor and tossed the Covide-19 people into the nursing home.
Guess you get what you pay for does not apply in this case. If you liberal state voters vote in the same people again you need more than your heads examined……
The United State was founded on the principle: never trust the government.
That is why the Founders granted only limited express powers to the government; built in a system of checks and balances; and reserved the most important powers inalienable to those who consented to be governed.
To say we don’t trust the government is a virtue; not a failing. It is not even an insult. It is a badge of American exceptionalism.
The recent rise of the unelected fourth branch of government – the massive regulatory and administrative agencies, is reason enough to value the enduring wisdom of our nation’s founders.
The Founders expected government to renew itself at two, four and six year cycles. Never did they contemplate this noble experiment would turn into an entitled, tenured class of unionized government employees holding power over everyone, including all provisions of the US Constittion.
This trend was started by JFK who unionized government emplyees after the 1960’s. You can measure the dysfunctional alienation of the people from their own government from that time forward.
Just watched the President in a press conference opening the places of worship nationwide effective now. He spoke briefly and took no questions, then scarf lady droned on for half an hour. The press secretary then took a few questions, got angry that the right questions were not being asked and then gave the press the right questions to ask (unmasking of Gen Flynn and such) and told the press they had 3 days to figure out the right questions to ask. Things are looking up.
Deap
The leftist media have pretty much transcended parody. Their descent into madness seems complete. They are in a self-induced ecstatic frenzy of fear – unhinged.
I look around at my fellow citizens and discern two categories; those who have been entranced by fear and those who have not. The two occupy parallel realities. The spell must be broken if we are ever to return from beyond the looking glass.
https://local.theonion.com/depraved-masochist-enjoys-following-the-news-1819575570
@Eric Newhill
“IMO it is some kind of twisted spiritual illness that seeks dominance as it replaces God with themselves.”
Intolerance of the Godless is the one thing that Muslims do completely right. Those without God are dyscivilizational cockroaches who bring suffering and death to everyone around them.
It is our great misfortune that our forebears allowed interpretation of separation of church and state to be warped from its original purpose of preventing one Protestant sect from establishing itself as the state religion at the expense of the rest [Note 1] to meaning that no religion should be allowed to be present in the public sphere. Diversity is not a strength and has to be managed. When it is managed badly, everyone suffers especially “the diversity”.
1. The religious wars of Europe were recent history to our founding fathers. We real Americans were AND ARE a confederation of European tribes/nations with different Protestant denominations. (some Catholics too, including a few of my own ancestors, but a clinical assessment is that we were founded as a Protestant country. Catholics, Jews, and the rest were here in politically inconsequential numbers and were ‘along for the ride’.)
Rick,
Will those who don’t have to pay NYC’s bills? Will those who do pay for the “disparate impact” of having New Yorkers cause immense economic damages due to the political decisions of New York politicians or for those who fled to their locales?
Horace,
I think the separation of church and state is necessary and good and I don’t like Sharia. That’s not what I’m talking about. Personally, I could care less about Protestants, Catholics, Muslims or other faiths, though those can be paths that lead people to a more spiritual life when not used as just another excuse to kill each other. I’m referring to the truth that we are first and foremost spiritual beings having an experience of a physical reality for a while. That and the knowledge that there is spiritual good and spiritual evil that are reflected through all layers of reality, including this physical one. Evil lies, confuses, enslaves, pathologically controls, smashes down hope and pumps up the ego with a false sense of power. With those techniques it denies the light, peace of mind, the love that is our natural heritage as immortal souls from that which cannot be named, fully understood or described in a book. This worship of “science” is based on the incorrect and sinister idea that we are just meat robots the will die and rot and that will be the end.
Nothing but whiners here… Where are the calls for massive civil disobedience ala MLK, Gandhi and Thoreau. Complain, complain, complain. To the Barricades, comrades! Enough whining!
I’ll stay home and watch, thank you.
Eric Newhill
“Meat robots.” I like that. Looks like the sage Fauci, heir of Averroes and Avicenna is afraid to get caught with his fly unzipped. https://www.businessinsider.com/anthony-fauci-irreparable-damage-stay-at-home-too-long-2020-5
Eric Newhill:
Being “spiritual” is not synonymous with being righteous or otherwise ethical.
Animals, per your comments, are spiritual beings as well. Yet they engage in public sex.
“Evil Lies”? How quaint to encounter a Zoroastrian belief on this forum; endowing evil with essential existence.
What is this vaunted separation of Church and State that has not prevented the Old Testament Folksy Protestant Churches to go to war against Islam for Israel?
What gives?
Horace
I agree with your historical assessment.
In your view, why is the United States at war with Islam?
I agree, the USA may as well end the lockdown.
The USA and South Korea reported their 1st covid case on the same day.
The South Koreans acted swiftly and decisively, and as a result South Korea has the virus under control to the point where it is now able to relax the lockdown rules.
The USA acted neither swiftly nor decisively, and as a result the disease is now well-entrenched. All that lockdown is doing is causing the disease to continue on a slow-burn.
Which, basically, means a never-ending lockdown, which is pointless.
Trump is correct: the USA may as well end the lockdown and let the existing slow-burn erupt. That means 60-80% of the population – whatever is needed to get to herd-immunity – will be infected and the elderly will die sooner rather than later.
May as well. The alternative gets to that same point anyway, only longer.
Eric Newhill,
“If NYC opened tomorrow I wouldn’t hesitate to resume business trips, go the bars, restaurants, etc. Nor would I wear a damn useless mask.
If I was 20 years older and sickly, I’d refrain from making the trips.”
That’s the wrong attitude, and unfortunately is very typical in this country (US). Has it occurred to you that wearing a mask is to protect others, not yourself? Collectivism is the only way to fight against a pandemic. We value our freedom to do as we please, but individualism has its drawback in time like this.
Look at the success of Asian countries (Taiwan, S Korea, Vietnam, Singapore…). Wearing mask is mandatory now to prevent another wave.
We can open the nation businesses tomorrow if everybody is wearing masks, and practice hygienne religiously.
So for the sake of all others, I hope you will wear a mask when you go out to public places.
I would say let’s make it a moving traffic violation. You will be fined a few hundred bucks if caugth not wearing a mask!
Sir,
I know where Fauci’s wavering on his original message comes from. The insurance companies, who have the best data and best analysts – and who are regulated by the cool rationality of profitability, have been sending delegates to Washington to inform the doofii of what is really going to happen in terms of health consequences. The socialists might imagine that insurance would be happy because claims (and therefore “medical loss”) are way down in 2020, but, like I said, insurance has to get this right because $billions are riding on doing so. I’d say also because we care, but I know no one would believe that. There will be a wave of serious [non-covid] illnesses and expensive claims when the system open up again because of the lack of preventive and diagnostic medical encounters during the lockdown. Also, due to the damaged economy, much fewer people will be insured; whether through employer groups or the ACA (pay the premium or the rent and car payment?). Sate Medicaid systems will be stressed to the max. And I suppose the threat that the covid death counts are obviously artificially inflated and insurance knows it floats around the room unspoken.
Tony L,
De Blasio is giving NYC collectivism good and hard. It’s killing jobs and futures faster than AOC. Has “For the sake of others” replaced “We’re all in this together”? I would hate to be behind on party slogans.
For anyone interested in the videos removed from You Tube for violating something or other regarding the currently “correct” appreciation of whatever is currently fashionable:
https://altcensored.com/
which now has over 40K censored videos.
Horace
“Those without God are dyscivilizational cockroaches who bring suffering and death to everyone around them.” Could this be remedied by a Crusade and forced conversions?
Eric
The spiritual illness of which you speak is important insomuch as it impinges on the lives of others. If the spiritually ill do not harm to others then I have no beef with them.
Your observation on the evils of the “worship of science” suggests Counter-Enlightenment thinking. This is an area I am trying to read up on, as I think it critical to properly understanding the existential angst which grips our civilization. Enlightenment-era political philosophies like Utilitarianism are alive and well and have many liberal adherents, whether they know it or not.
I, like you, am a firm believer that rationalism alone (or indeed at all) is not the route to happiness, but even if I wasn’t, I would not seek to force this view on others. As Richard Sale observed, we live in an age of intolerance.
Babak
You know the answer to your questions concerning the US going to war with Islam on behalf of Israel; the failure to separate the interests of one state from those of another. A three letter acronym beginning with the letter “Z” describes it well.
Colonel
You have described yourself as an “original intent constitutionalist”. Have you written anywhere on your wider political philosophy? If so I would like to read it.
TonyL,
Mere virtue signalling and desperation.
Wearing a mask to protect against covid is like erecting a chain link fence to keep mosquitoes out of your yard.
I see people wearing bandanas for masks. I see people fiddling with their masks with their naked hands that have touched all manner of surfaces in public places. I see people pulling down their masks to sneeze. The mask is brought into the home along with the naked hands. The mask is then reused in public many times over.
I don’t think you understand how PPE is supposed to be used. In a hospital the PPE is dropped into a special disposal unit before the staff leave the room.
Babak,
I don’t understand your point.
Evil is as spiritual as good. Animals have spirits too. What isn’t spiritual in a universe that is made of mind and soul?
What does public sex have to do with anything?
This is why I have no use for dogma or sharia. It blinds and confuses in its artifice of definitions and judgments.
Babak,
Sorry. I got focused on your hang up with animals and missed your point.
I agree that spiritual /= righteous. Satan is spiritual too, after all. My point is that with spiritual realization comes the ability for more to recognize righteousness versus lack of it. Otherwise it’s just meat robots to be programmed by social scientists and everything is relevant and meaningless.
Both of our father’s people were Zoroastrians before they became dedicated to new angles thinking. Is newer always better?
Colonel,
The PRC/CCP is targeting those businesses and facilities that are working on virus cures. They’ve been observed using traditional and non-tradition collection methods, targeting U.S. business related intellectual proprietary information, as well as all venues of U.S. public data associated with virus cures research.
Colonel,
Trump on Friday appointed Mont Slaoui to head vaccine developments. Slaoui is connected to several companies he has worked with or sits on the Board of Directors that are funded in part by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. One of these companies, Moderna, is conducting research on RNA vaccines in partnership with DARPA. DARPA has developed a hydrogel biosensor that will combine with your body to provide data on a person down to the cellular level. In short an implantable information gathering permanent tracking device within the human body. A human cattle tag. Now ‘who’ will be ‘receiving’ the biosensor’s information is the 64 dollar question, and for ‘what purpose’.
Could the Apostle John have been given time-travel to observe the ‘mark of the beast’ in our modern times?
https://abc7news.com/suicide-covid-19-coronavirus-rates-during-pandemic-death-by/6201962/
This is a hospital in California. The story that was peddled was that the wave was going to hit in 2 weeks. But the timeline of the 2 weeks kept getting shifted like the Friedman Unit in the disastrous Iraq occupation.
The infection began much earlier than stated. There’s a lot of traffic between China and the West Coast. And even with Trump’s travel ban many people who had visited China were coming in. Yet the fatality rate in California is a minuscule 0.005% of the population. With the vast majority in nursing homes.
What this episode shows IMO are a few things. 1. Americans are easily scared. 2. Many elected officials will use any excuse to get all authoritarian. 3. Government officials and institutions established to handle crises are incompetent beyond belief. (This should be obvious after Katrina & Puerto Rico) 4. Americans may be heavily armed but they have no ability to challenge authoritarian government 5. Americans will toe the line of authoritarian government diktats. 6. Any and all issues will only be examined through a partisan lens. 7. Any crisis is an excuse to transfer future generations wealth to the politically well connected Top 0.01%.
Barbara Ann
I have an opinion.
I would like to know of others’.
What is your’s?
Barbara Ann,
Right. “Science” is a system of rational thinking for solving problems and application of it has improved the material world; which is a really good thing.
Where things have gone off the rails is that certain “scientists” with a certain message are stood up as high priests – and their message is that we are programmable meat robots and that the material world is all there is and ever will be. I think that the love of power and money is behind this selection process. Of course there are people that use the scientific method to observe the world and they come up with totally different outlooks, but they are shut down as heretics by the high priests.
When I was in my early 20s I went through a warrior monk phase. All I did was train and I met a Navy SEAL out of Norfolk that introduced me to a traditional Chinese martial arts instructor. Part of that extracurricular activity involved a kind of meditation. As I am wont to do, I over did it; maybe. Maybe six months into it, I began to experience what I learned are called “out of body experiences”. Scared the crap out of me the fist time it happened because I thought I had literally died from a heart attack(or something) and was stuck in limbo – no St Peter. Anyhow, as they kept happening and I always “came back”, I figured I’d learn what it is and how to use it., if possible. My instructor said that such experiences were well known in Chinese spiritual circles, but that he had never had them personally. I am satisfied that I was able to gain accurate verifiable detailed information beyond the proximity of my physical body (and temporal location – much future vision was involved) that I could not have obtained by any normal means. I learned that there are others able to do the same thing. I used science. I went about testing from the perspective that what I was experiencing was false (null hypothesis).
I volunteered for about 5 years at a local hospice and saw several things that defied the material paradigm.
More recently I had a conversation with a deceased family member that was as real as talking to any friend in “real life”. This conversation also yielded detailed specific personal information that could not have been obtained via normal processes. Then it happened one more time with the same results. I am beyond faith now. But I am not crazy. I work in an extremely logical field. I am respected, well paid, get promoted, etc. the scientific method has led me to understand that the material world is not the end all be all. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.
Well, we have certainly strayed well beyond covid and Fauci. So I’ll drop it now.
Eric Newhill:
Good, good, so we agree that Ethics and Spirituality are different.
But, not everyone is capable of exercising or undergoing spiritual training and bearing that level of awareness.
That is when the Law comes into play, or as you call it dogma and Sharia.
Your opposition to both is curious, are you also against the 613 rules of Orthodox Judaism? Or is your animus reserved only for Islam and Catholicism?
Are you also opposed to dogmas and cannon laws of the Greek and Armenian Orthodox Churches; which had sustained the Helenes and the Armenians throughout all those brutal centuries that they endured?
To your last question, there is nothing in Christianity and in Islam that is against Zoroastrian Teachings, as I have come to understand two those religions as an outsider.
Thus, Christianity and Islam have further developed and amplified the message of Zoroaster, in my opinion.
Rick,
So sorry that words like “disparate impact” are difficult to understand, especially for someone who claims to live in New York’s capital. I have great respect for residents of NYC; none for their current mayor and a rapidly deciling one for the state’s governor. It would seem you are studiously avoiding understanding that the main media sources in the US are based in NYC and have repeatedly reported on the impact of the China virus in the city, especially the death rate, while avoiding mentioning the impact of public policy decisions of their reporting. That has had a great impact economically across the entire country.
Perhaps those “firefighter/EMT’s and nurses” that you get to talk to at work could fill you in on NYC’s problems, if that is where they are working. The one’s I’ve spoke to – or electroniclly messaged – are in Detroit, which I’ve mentioned here before. They are no longer talking about the death rates, or treatments, or recoveries. I suspect they have been ordered not to by their employer, especially since the hospitals are no longer publicly putting out that information either. The Michigan State AG’s threats to Ford after Trump’s visit last week kind of make that obvious. I am happy for my friends in nursing though, they are making a bundle in OT pay, and I will gladly give them the “Thank you for your service” response, I’m sure it will help end that foolishness. Special thanks for the vietnam meme, that didn’t gain much traction last time out, but good try.
As a resident of NYC, I agree entirely with the post. It’s as though Cuomo, with Gates and that Google douche-bag, have decided to kill every small business in the city that pays rent. Even a small space here rents for $15,000 and up per month. How many months can most small businesses carry that cost without income? It’s really remarkable to see people out at 7:00 p.m. every evening out cheering in the air for the supposed front-line folks as the life-blood of the city drains into the sewers.
Babak
Not to duck your question, but as I am not sure of the subject on which you are asking for my opinion (the war on Islam?) I think it best we save this for another, more appropriate thread.
Eric
That you feel the need to state that you are not crazy for having had first-hand experience of spiritual phenomena is a sad indictment of the age in which we live.
I am currently reading Isaiah Berlin’s Freedom and its Betrayal – a critique of 6 political philosophers/philosophies around the time of the French Revolution. He deals with Helvétius (the father of Utilitarianism) in a mere 16 pages. “Programmable meat robots” is a pretty accurate description of Berlin’s take on this philosophy’s attitude to the human cattle its enlightened scientific technocrats are to herd. This is not the vision of he Framers.
Babak,
I have no animus toward anyone devoted to any of those religions or sects within religions *as long as they are not using their path as an excuse to inflict oppression, pain, suffering and death on others who have taken a different path*. And yes, that includes Islam. I am actually somewhat sympathetic towards the Druze and Sufis.
Nor do I oppose dogmas as long as they aren’t causing people to be blinded to reality their entire lives.
Allow me to use a military analogy. Col Lang recently wrote about a lack of vision and his father’s words about cutting off anything that sticks out in the regular Army. Real issues. On the other hand, the military cannot be herding a million cats. So conformity becomes a priority. Traditions are critical for cohesion and continuity. Yet, there are men like Col Lang and TTG in SF that go through the regular by the book corps, absorb and embody it all, and then emerge to transcend that level of soldiering. They have a rare spark within them that drives them to accomplish challenging missions in novel ways. They are self-directed to a larger extent. They can embrace unorthodox thinking. They can see paradoxes and not become confused or paralyzed by them. They have a rare cannot quit attitude. They have equipment, weapons and tactics available to them that the regular troops do not. They grow beards, can have long hair, go native in their dress when it makes sense. They are more fluid and adaptable because that’s their nature – and it’s a rare nature. None of that makes the regular Army (or USMC or Navy) wrong per se. Each is an expression of its purpose and the people comprising the organizations.
So it is, IMO, with the religious traditions you mention versus how someone like me approaches spirituality.
Thank you Eric Newhill for responding.
Since the criterion is “blindness to reality”, it follows that there is a Reality and there exist people who can percive it, evidently one such as yourself.
Which begs the question how you could be seeing the Reality and not, others, such as the Orthodox Jew who requires me to obtain sealed disposable plates in order to host him and his family for dinner.
Who is the Blind here and what is Reality?
Your references to Col. Lang etc., in my opinion, is an allusion to a concrete achievement of the Western Diocletian Civilization, viz. Freedom in its various manifestation, that it enables that ‘spark’ to exist.
That is indeed a unique achievement of that civilization that none other has yet been to reproduce, in my opinion.
However, there is no Justice nor any Justification to use the continued existence of the spark as a wedge against people with whose practices, however barbaric in your opinion they may appear, unless you be willi ng to go, conquer them, and rule over them; and over the centuries, beat some ‘spark’ into them. That is, you are advocating perpetual war against the other 7 billion people that inhabit this planet.
That is why it is an Injustice, not putting things in their proper place.
Barbara Ann
So you are uncomfortable with answering with a simple yes or no.
All right.
US is fighting in 10 Muslim countries, her posture on the question of Palestine speaks for itself, and she has sunk $ 50 billion dollars in Syria to unseat a legitimate government.
An you are tellimg me you do not have enough information.
Eric Newhill,
As most infectious disease experts agreed about mask wearing:
“It’s going to cut down 95 percent of the breathing that sends the virus up to 6 feet away in a room”
Basically, you don’t need to wear mask when you are in open space such as parks, or inside your car. But when other people is around nearby, wearing a mask is protecting others from you (if you have already infected and showing no symptom).
The main mode of COVID-19 transmission is through coughing, sneezing, and even the air that an infected person exhales.
Babak,
You really don’t understand, Imam. Perhaps in a few more lifetimes.
Babak, don’t you mean Obama’s government and activist friends sunk $50 billion dollars in an effort to unseat Assad? Trump has not carried out this overt or covert action.
We do change administrations and foreign policy depending on recent elections. There is no monarchy in the US that survives these shifting policy moves. Since Malaysia and Indonesia (etc) retain relatively good relations with the US, there is no “war on Islam” per se. Growing disinterest in intractable regional issues among who refuse to help themselves might be the better description.
Too bad in the past certain Islamist terrorists tried to make their problems, our problems in the US. It distorted the dialogue.
Fred,
“De Blasio is giving NYC collectivism good and hard. It’s killing jobs and futures faster than AOC. Has “For the sake of others” replaced “We’re all in this together”? I would hate to be behind on party slogans.”
I know. That’s a bad way to get your message across: “We’re all in this together”. We are divided in this country. Not possible to be “together”. However, we should appeal to the common decency in all citizens of this country.
It’s an implicit agreement/deal between sane people, really. You’ll scratch my back, and I’ll scratch yours. You are protecting me and my elderly relatives by wearing mask, and I’ll do the same for you. Simple. Not even remotely has anything to do with ideology, i.e. left vs right. Not at all.
Would you entertain having a beer with Eric, knowing that he never wears a mask in public? would our Colonel do that? no way.
TonyL
Not so! I would sit out in the garden with anyone a suitable distance apart.
Babak,
I should have said what you don’t seem to understand is Freedom.
If I read you clearly, you want to impose The Law on every aspect of people’s lives. That is the same as the Neo-Bolshies.
TonyL,
There are lots of diseases out there – and that have have been out there a long time – that kill people, especially older people. You’re acting like this one virus changes everything.
Many are beginning to open their eyes and see what’s at play, the national (and international) brainwashing taking place by the globalists who fear our U.S. Constitution and our Bill of Rights, globalists who fear an awakened U.S. psyche and spirit of freedom, who fear nationalism and populism, and globalists who are using tried and true brainwashing methods dating back to Goebbels and before.
Tell a lie often enough and then the public starts to believe it. The mantra of how the hospitals will be overwhelmed if we don’t flatten the curve. Stay in your home, stay out of the sun, stay off the beach, stay off the play grounds, stay safe, social distance, at least 6 feet between individuals, wash your hands for at least 20 seconds, etc.. The agendas all are basically the same, the conditioning of the human mind for the many globalist intersecting agendas at play that include the U.N. Agenda 21 aka 2030, Rockefeller Foundation’s advice to those in government, Bill and Melinda Gates and their foundation mantra where the planet has to be depopulated and tracked through implanted vaccinations, vaccines that also trigger on hormone levels when certain levels are reached triggers cancers, artificially inducing death-knells to take place within the human body.
One must comply, one must not dissent. Isn’t it interesting how tyranny will use all means to suppress truth, as truth has been shown through the ages to be tyranny’s greatest enemy.
The movie 1984 where big brother repeated words and phrases over and over and over again on the loudspeakers to condition mass obedience. The ‘words’ of the Psyop that is at play today include:
The New Normal;
Just stay home, stay home;
Essential purchases only, no garden seeds, no books, no movies, etc.;
Six feet rule mandate, (even though when this crap started the WHO only ‘suggested’ three feet apart). Guess they forgot that a cough or a sneeze travels farther than their six feet agenda;
You must live in a personal prison, AKA Social Distancing. Forbid that human to human relations take place;
Essential workers, essential products, ‘essential’, ‘essential’. Notice how ‘essential’ was different in each state.;
These are just some examples of the Psyop of mass conditioning at play.
Tony L
“You are protecting me and my elderly relatives by wearing mask, and I’ll do the same for you. Simple. Not even remotely has anything to do with ideology, i.e.” Just like all the years when you endangered your relatives by allowing them to be exposed to respratory viruses because of people not wearing masks? You should be ashamed of yourself for endangering their lives that way. In fact, now that I think about it, we need to fire Fauci and the CDC chair for endangering lives that way. Why oh why didn’t they suggest we impose a face mask requirement years ago, before Trump was in office; think of the thousands of lives lost in the Obama era due to their failure….
In the name of common decency I have an appeal to you, a modest proposal for an agreement/deal between sane people: YOU STAY HOME. Stay safe; You wait there, the government declared “essential” businesses and their hereos are at your beck and call for the things you value more than your liberty.
Eric, come on down, I’ll buy the first round.
Eric Newhill
And you clearly do not understand the idea of the Law, in its various incarnations.
Without the Law, the United States will cease to exist.
Without the Law, human beings will be like wolves unto other human beings.
Without the Law, no distinction can be made between License and Liberty.
I find your approach to the udea and ideals of Freedom highly threatening: “We are Free, you are not, therefore we will bomb you: un-Free people deserve to be bombed.”
It reminds me of the discourse of many other Western Diocletian people: “We are Strong, you weak, therefore we walk all over you. And do not complain since you chose to be weak.”.
Fred, regarding the sick children at Yale Med Center —
On Sept 29 2019 the Boys & Girls Club of Greenwich, CT held its 8th annual MuddyUp 5k
145 photos here:
https://fairfieldcountylook.com/parties/bgcg-muddy-up-5k-2/
Look at the photos to see how MuddyUp is the antithesis of Covid Lockdown, social distancing, sanitizing (the fire department hosed down MuddyUp contestants after their run).
I was there. Two days later, I had a cold — runny nose, congestion, sore throat, muscle aches. It lasted about 2 weeks. Only the first 2 or 3 days were debilitating, then, just getting better bit by bit.
I wonder if anyone else who was at MuddyUp got sick shortly afterward.
I also wonder if anyone who was at MuddyUp has had Covid. I have not.
Seems to me those kids, and the adults, would make an interesting control group for the “threat” to children of Covid.
Babak,
I think the Constitution of the US is good law. I think prosecuting objectively quantifiable tresspasses against the rights and property of others is also good law (e.g. murder, rape, theft). Beyond that, it’s all just an oppressive hustle from the top down. When you start talking about shutting down the economy, hate speech law, quotas, stoning people for dancing to western music and assorted moral crimes, taxing the living daylights out of businesses for contributing to global warming, then I’m against you. If someone wants to be a homosexual, then be a homosexual. I get to say I think it’s weird, but they get to do it. What should either of us care what the other thinks about it let alone their being laws governing the situation.
When did I ever say that people should be bombed for being “unfree”? You want Sharia? Have at it. Enjoy. Keep it away from me, but knock yourself out in your own land. I seem to recall The Prophet converting non-believers by unpleasant means. Wasn’t he the perfect man? What would he have done if he had bombs instead of just swords? And you’re lecturing me?
All I ever said about Iran getting bombed is that they should shut up already about wiping out Israel because they will get destroyed one day by a paranoid Israel and its friend the US. I neither said I agreed nor disagreed with that result. I just said that it is reality. I would also tell you to not chew rocks because you’ll break your teeth, not because I want your teeth to break. The US govt doesn’t call me to consult over foreign policy. I did vote for Trump in part because he said he would get us out of wars in the Muslim World. So I have done my part.
Eric and Fred,
This virus is a new corona virus. Nobody has immunity to it. So it is much more contagious than the normal flu viruses. We know this new corona virus is lethal to older people. And young peole can be infected and have no symptom (and some only have symptom after a few days, but already spreading it before seeing symptom).
So before we have some prophylactics that definitely can prevent it, and before we have vaccine, the only way to slow and stop the pandemic is physical distancing.
In order to have businesses opened, and get the economy going again, people need to wear masks. This is a form of physical distancing while people being close to each other to do their jobs.
Colonel,
Yes. I know you would “sit out in the garden with anyone a suitable distance apart”. That was just a rhetorical question for Fred 🙂 My Mom is 92, and I bring groceries to her in the back yard. But I always wear a mask during our chat, even while keeping a distance.
TonyL,
Communism forbid that the old be at risk of a “new” virus, just as they are at risk to all the other ones that have come from communist China and killed them in their thousands annually.
“the only way to slow and stop the pandemic is physical distancing” Feel free to intern yourself and your 92 year old mother in your socially distant sanctuary, then you will be safe. That, however, is not what you are suggesting nor what most of our politicians are demanding of others. They demand conformity to their civilization killing policies that have killed thousands in nursing homes, an ever growing number by suicide and drug abuse, of undetected cancer, heart disease and untreated strokes. But by all means blame the youth, the future of mankind, because they aren’t dying but may unintentionally infect your dear old mum, unless all the young obey the edicts of the elected excutives who have so willingly followed the lead of “scientists” who have repeatedly been shown to be wrong.
How much of Western civilization must we allow our politicians to kill off with their policies so your mother can have another year or more of life and die from something other than this particular virus? How many more years of life for ninety year olds are essential while the futures of the young are irrevocably altered to ensure the elderly of a death by some other cause than from the virus the communsist government of China helped spread around the world? And let us not forget the increased power of government and of unelected government officials; we must certainly not forget that. They are going to keep us safe, just like China’s communist government keeps the Chinese people safe.
Eric Newhill:
So it all boils down to: “This is good because I said so.”
Attacking the Prophet of Islam is not going to get you out of your own knots.
The Prophet was not a dead-dog liberal, offering the other cheek.
Babak,
It’s because I said so. I’m pretty much just repeating the principles upon which the USA was founded. I happen to agree with them and they are under attack from all sides these days.
I did not attack your prophet. I merely pointed out that you speak of The Law and Justice and bombing other societies is against those things, but your prophet did those very same things.
I offered a live and let live approach. You made it clear that you do not accept such a notion because, as becoming abundantly clear, you are a hardcore believer in the unique righteousness and superiority of your way. You are just like all the rest of the manically control seeking souls that want to impose on our freedoms.
Babak
You know the answer to your questions concerning the US going to war with Islam on behalf of Israel; the failure to separate the interests of one state from those of another. A three letter acronym beginning with the letter “Z” describes it well.
I agree BA, it seems a more provocative question. But I wish I were as sure as you seem to be that a thorough discussion of US versus Israeli national interests would get us any further. Not least with Trump in mind.
What is the acronym you are alluding to?
Zoa?
https://zoa.org/
I see pattern here. People who fear will try to hide it by imposing their own vision of fear eliminating control – and it’s not rational. Fear the virus? We must all wear masks! Even though, if masks are effective, the person wearing one should be safe from those who do not. Fear secular freedom? Then everyone must be subjected to the fearful ones’ vision of religious Law and Justice, even if we have to put you to the sword to accept it. Fear “hurtful” things being said about you? Then everyone’s first amendment rights must be denied in favor of hate speech laws and people with certain thoughts are deemed deplorable and irredeemable. And so on and so forth.
Then there are the profiteers and political power seekers that manipulate all of the fearful people to achieve their self-enrichment schemes by promising fear reducing laws.
Control freaks should be aware that some of us are beginning to become fed up with people imposing their neuroses and money making schemes on us. We would prefer to be left alone to pursue our happiness as we see fit and allow you to do the same. Keep pushing. You will soon enough have something very real to fear. Your devious and pathetically ironic cries of “Injustice”, already the subject of jokes, will fall on deaf ears.
Fred,
You are seeing communists and liberals everywhere in your imagination! It’s hard to discuss a simple issue, and that is how to slow and stop the pandemic. Wearing mask is a proven strategy in East Asian countries. They are fully opened now. Tests, contact tracing, wearing mask. Some authoritarian countries also force infected people into quarrantined hotel (that’s not going to happen here in a free country like ours).
All large US defense aerospace companies have made it a company policy to require employees to wear mask on campus. It is a sensible and the safe way for 2 or more people sitting in the same room discussing works.
By the way, wearing mask will not make you a liberal or communist.
TonyL
This is a political position that you are taking. You want to keep the country shut down to create discontent with Trump so that your side will take control of the country. To argue on the basis that this is just a medical emergency is disingenuous. You know very well that it is also and more importantly a political and economic situation.
IMO, TonyL is probably not in NYC and doesn’t have a poor old Momma Mia he takes food to every day.
If he’s in NYC at all, he is in China Town, but more likely he is in China. His insufficiently developed English as a second language supports that. Try harder CCP!
TonyL,
You are responding with a strawman argument, then doubling down on the requirement that I give up my liberty. Quarantine of people has happened here, a young man quarantined by Michigan beat the hell out of an elderly resident just days ago.
https://www.wxyz.com/news/region/detroit/20-year-old-beating-suspect-was-moved-to-nursing-home-because-he-has-covid-19-says-father
The authoritarian nations you conveniently don’t name – China and Vietnam, are communist; Japan, an asian nation and a democratic one, never locked down and has ended its state of emergency.
https://www.newsweek.com/japan-ends-coronavirus-emergency-850-deaths-no-lockdown-1506336
Companies are making company policy- how is that relevant to my public conduct?
You stay home, I’ll go about my life. My rights don’t end where your fear begins. These new found demands for masks are just another variation in the cultural revolution demanded from the left and are very reminiscent of Mao’s actions in China and are about control and conformity, not health.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-19807561
Colonel,
Not my side. I’m neither Democrat or Republican. I only vote for candidate who has policy that I agree with. FWIW, I voted for Reagan, and Bush Sr, and Obama. I cannot see myself voting for Trump or Biden.
I know it is both a political and economic situation. I’m just trying separate the politics from it, and only want to voice my opinion that this emergency (medical and economic) can be solved if we are willing to look past the political aspect.
Eric,
Most of my professional life has been in the Defense and Aerospace industry. I might have built systems that Fred and Tyler have heard of or actually used in their tour. And I live in California. So please pardon my grammar, it has a liberal bias.
Fred,
I hear you. “Companies are making company policy- how is that relevant to my public conduct? You stay home, I’ll go about my life”.
No, I am not staying home, I have been working as a consultant in the same business since I retired. And I did not stop going to work in company campus when I was needed. Just an example of sensible policy from some of largest corporations (rarely seen, but when it is worthy we should praise it).
Yes, Fred, masks do work. The Japanese didn’t have to shut down their economy with a lock down because they wear masks. It slows the spread of the virus. Steve Sailor in the following article in Taki Magazine claims the Orientals wear masks out of a patriotic duty. I always thought it was consideration of others, a virtue of living in a cohesive society. In America some think it’s patriotic to not wear a mask,and wearing one a sign of communist indoctrination.
https://www.takimag.com/article/the-high-price-of-cheap-chinese-masks/
@ Eric Newhill,
Masks can be used again if washed in hot water and soap. Even without washing, the virus will not last more than 24 hours on cloth. My wife has discovered a talent for making masks and has spent many lockdown hours contentedly snipping and sewing away. She makes them with an internal pocket for a coffee filter to be stuffed in, making it comparable to an n-95 in efficiency. I have a selection of colors to choose from. I’m going to see if I can’t get her to make me one with a Chicago Cubs logo on one side and an Eagle Globe and Anchor on the other. Cheers.
Optimax,
I never stated masks did not work. Thanks the public shaming. Feel free to provide some data on what kind of mask, how it should be fitted and how it should be worn to provide a level of safety beyond the public ridicule of not conforming to a political requirement of wearing one.
TonyL,
“No, I am not staying home”
Thanks for the struggle session.
K/4/11,
I’m a lot younger than you and I’m very healthy for my age. When you were receiving your first set of bird, ball and hook, I was working on mastering how to walk. If I were older – and especially if I had underlying conditions – I’d give more serious consideration to voluntarily wearing a mask.
I object to all of the demands for conformity, all of the browbeating, all of the lack of “science” from people claiming to be directed by “science”. I think there needs to be a balance between reasonable precautions for those at risk and dancing to a tune just because the band says you must.
I have to ask, again, why, if masks work, is it necessary for me to wear one as long as you are?
I agree that masks can be washed to remove the virus, but you have to touch the mask to take it off your face and wash it and it is in your home having returned from the outside. As are all of the items you purchased when you were out shopping.
Ultimately, it’s your choice and handling the mask properly is your responsibility. Most people are doing a poor job in that area. As I said somewhere up thread, I see people pulling their masks down to sneeze, I see people fiddling with their masks. Thus putting their hands to their faces more than they would if not wearing a masks. Those hands have touched all manner of public surfaces. I see masks that in no way could filter out a virus (viruses are really small, you know).
There is still the fact that many covid cases and deaths have occurred to people that were sheltering at home the entire time. That needs to be explained.
Eric Newhill
I will let you have the last word.
Fred, I didn’t mean to shame you. Sorry if it came off that way. I agree that that in the US we have a right to wear or not wear a mask. I don’t shame people for not wearing a mask at the store and I do not wear one when walking on the street. My neighbors and I frequently talk outside while staying a safe distance apart and don’t wear masks, even when we gather in a “circle of love” on the lawn, in our own chairs.
It’s funny how the “experts” demand we follow the guidelines despite the guidelines changing all the time: don’t wear masks, wear masks; the virus easily spreads by contact with contaminated surfaces, it doesn’t spread easily by touching objects; we need to shutdown everything to flatten the curve, can’t open up until we have a vaccine, blah, blah.I didn’t believe Birx or Fauci when they stated masks don’t work because I know the virus barely touched the Chinese community in SF and wasn’t rampant in most of the Asian nations.
The real Chinese communist conspiracy is they hoarded the PPE they made and bought back the PPE from the US, Australia, France, wherever they could get it. As Sailor said this exposes the stupidity and danger of globalist ideology. The msm is mute on this fact.
ALL
If you think that I assign the faucibirx crown to the ranks of the Globalists you are wrong. They are “professionally deformed” and did their damage in blissful ignorance of the real world.
Optimax,
“It’s funny how the “experts” demand we follow the guidelines despite the guidelines changing all the time:”
Fauci, Birx and company are only expert at academic exercies and bureaucratic maneuvering. The entire field of expertise has been shown lacking in many fields. We should be grateful to Donald J. Trump for ripping away the thin vereer of convention that has for years shielded innumeral protected classes; starting with the “conservatives” he defeated to become nominee, their ‘democratic’ colleagues he defeated to become President, and most of all the “fake news” media.
Thanks to this Chinese virus the academic establishment is being show for the incompetent, greedy and corrupt people they allowed themselves to become. We should cut their collegiate funding, tax exemptions, and institute student vouchers at the K-12 grades – just to level the “playing field”. These people can then compete in the marketplace with their superior abilities. I’m sure they’ll do fine without their tenure, grants or other federal funding.
Fred,
I agree with all you wrote. My neighbor is a union pipe fitter who didn’t vote for Trump but now has a Trump/Pence sticker on his truck. His sky rocketing 401k convinced him knowing the Dems will never match the last few years performance and the blame for its recent downturn is due to the virus and not Trumps fault.
The academic brainwashing has been going on for so long and infected so many of the young I don’t know how it will end. It picked up intensity in the late 60s and early 70s when college presidents gave in to the student demonstrators demands opening the door to critical theory and all its destructive power plays.
Machiavelli in THE DISCOURSES points out the danger of a state strengthening its enemies. Sending our manufacturing to China for 4 decades has allowed China to build its economy and military to the point that endangers us. Hopefully, people will wake up to the danger of depending on China goods we depend on for national security, like PPE, and that even cheap teevees aren’t worth feeding the beast to make it stronger. Of course the msm doesn’t point this out, instead blame Trump.
Now for some levity (with Colonel Lang’s permission).
In my dream…
Today in the press conference, president Trump surprised the nation by wearing a mask. He announced… All you fakenews media out there, listen! I’ve decided that wearing a mask during this pandemic is a patriotic duty. See the American flag I put on it? is this a beautiful mask? yes, it is most beautiful mask ever!!! I know some of you will say I’m a communist because I’m wearing mask. WRONG!!! this a tremendously well built mask, stupendously beautiful mask. BEST ever!!! No communist can make beautiful masks like we can. Now, I have ordered all governors to wear a mask like mine. But you know what? Some of the wimpy liberal governors objected to my order and say “Who are you to order us to wear mask? we don’t have a king in this country”. So I’m calling on all my supporters in those wimpy liberal states (you fakenews media should know I have tremenduos support there, more than 90%…), wear a mask like I do. And make sure you have a beautiful mask with the flag.
And I woke up.
Colonel,
Since your email address bounced, my reply did not go through. Here is the content.
“Sir, I am just a great admirer of what you have been doing on SST. I’ve been reading your blog since the day of “Drinking the Kool-Laid”. I have learned so much from your knowledge, so sometime I cannot resist posting on some issues. But I know full well that I am just a student who wants to understand the affairs of the States. And I got that education from your knowledge and experience.
If I had offended you and others, I could go back being a reader (if you think I did not contribute anything to the conversation).”
It’s your call whether to post this message, or consider it a private conversation and not posting it.
The link provides the science that demonstrates that masks don’t work as well as some scientific speculations why they don’t. It also contains Synopses of several studies on mask effectiveness in preventing viral infections. Author claims there are no studies anywhere showing that masks have any significant effect in preventing viral infections.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/340570735_Masks_Don't_Work_A_review_of_science_relevant_to_COVID-19_social_policy
Surgeons began wearing masks well over a hundred years ago for the purpose of preventing bacterial infection (much larger than a virus). However, even the effectiveness against bacterial infection of a patient with an open surgical wound is questioned in this article by the British national health program.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4480558/
Repeating what the news or FauciBirx say at a press conference is not science or knowledge.
The masks are a form of social control – or at least a symbol of it. Nothing more.
My dream take 2 (with Colonel Lang’s permission).
Falling asleep again…
Today in a virtual press conference, Democratic candidate Joe Biden was asked “Vice President, Vice President!!! what do you think about President Trump wearing a mask yesterday in the White House press conference? is he stealing your talking points?”. Biden, … has been dozing off for a few seconds, said “what what? ah of course, Trump is wearing a mask? what a joke! we Democrats have been wearing masks forever! Trump doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Back in the days I was a lifeguard, we wore masks already. You know Corn Pop? he was a bad dude. And I kicked him out of the pool for not wearing mask. Corn Pop asked me “why, are you communist, man? you know who I am?”. I calmly explained to him “Nah, man, we have rules here, and we are very proud of the fact that we are practicing sex.. um social intercourse the right way. See all the young folks here in this pool wearing masks? especially the girls, I have to explain to them when they first showed up here”. And his voice trails off, eyes glazed over… Reporters yells, “Sir Sir!!! how did you convince the girls that they must wear masks?”. Biden smiles (showing off his perfectly whiten fake teeth) “you know, I just put my arms around them, squeeze a little, whisper in their ears: you must learn to practice sex…um social intercourse the right way, wearing mask is your patriotic duty.”
And I woke up.
Brushing teeth, making a pot of coffee. Checking on my stack of clean masks. Picking out one with a perfectly aligned hole for a straw (it’s better be.. long commute to the office).
eric newhill,
FauciBirx are are lying now but told the truth when they said masks didn’t work? There are studies that show they work also.So what. If you don’t want to wear a mask, don’t. But why worry about people who do. I think you’re obsessed.
TonyL,
That was funny.