Patterico's Pontifications

9/3/2021

Weekend Open Thread

Filed under: General — Dana @ 7:09 pm



[guest post by Dana]

Hello. Let’s get started!

First news item

If you don’t want a Covid vaccine because you think it’s unsafe, then why on earth would you turn to a drug not specifically designed to treat Covid-19?

Ivermectin, an anti-parasite drug commonly used in livestock, is not approved by the Food and Drug Administration to prevent or treat COVID. The FDA and the CDC have warned against taking the drug in such instances — adding that there has been an uptick in calls to poison control centers across the U.S. by people who have ingested it. Misinformation and unsubstantiated claims touting the drug have spread widely on social media.

While the “FDA has approved it in humans to also treat some parasitic worms and external parasites like lice,” there is no evidence that it helps with Covid-19 but rather it can be harmful when used on humans. Thus, the American Medical Association is calling for an “immediate end” for the use of ivermectin to treat Covid-19:

The American Medical Association (AMA) is calling for the immediate end to the use of ivermectin to treat COVID-19, and for doctors to stop prescribing it for that purpose, amid a spike in the use of the drug.

Ivermectin, often used as a deworming agent in animals and sometimes for humans, is not approved to treat COVID-19 and has not been shown to work for that purpose. Poison control centers have recorded a five-fold increase in calls related to ivermectin, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The AMA, the country’s largest doctors group, is now joining in warning against use of the drug, joining the Food and Drug Administration and the CDC.

“We are alarmed by reports that outpatient prescribing for and dispensing of ivermectin have increased 24-fold since before the pandemic and increased exponentially over the past few months,” the AMA said in a statement, joined by the American Pharmacists Association and American Society of Health-System Pharmacists. “As such, we are calling for an immediate end to the prescribing, dispensing, and use of ivermectin for the prevention and treatment of COVID-19 outside of a clinical trial.”

Convince me that the Egyptian study and the Argentine study demonstrate a majority viability and effectiveness of Ivermectin as a treatment for Covid. Because it seems pretty clear that they don’t. And let’s not forget that we have already learned that Ivermectin really isn’t effective when combatting Covid-19…

Second news item

California residents continue to be harmed by homeless crisis and D.A. Gascon’s policies:

The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department responded to a call on Dan Blocker Beach on Sunday. Deputies were told a man was with four family members when they were approached by two suspects, both believed to be homeless.

The two homeless people confronted the dad, saying they were not allowed in the area, sparking an argument between the three people. One of the suspects, later identified as Richard Franck, whipped out a machete and began slashing the dad multiple times.

The other four family members were chased by Franck and the other homeless person, LASD said.

Both suspects were eventually found and arrested. Both are being charged with attempted murder, assault with a deadly weapon.

NOTE: In April of this year, Franck had pulled a knife on a police officer, but due to Gascon’s new policies, he was released on a lesser charge.

Third news item

Sen. Ben Sasse rightfully shoots a mouthful of sass at President Biden for trying to change the conversation:

President Biden desperately wants to talk about anything but Afghanistan, but Americans who are hiding from the Taliban, ISIS, and the Haqqani network don’t give a damn about news cycles, long weekends, and polling — they want out. The Biden administration has a moral obligation to give a full accounting: What is the exact number of Americans trapped in Afghanistan? What is the exact number of legal permanent residents? How many SIV allies? Without answering those questions, they’re just doing political propaganda.

Fourth news item

Retiring senator says “no” to Trump in 2024:

Retiring Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.)…does not believe former President Trump should be the Republican presidential nominee in 2024, calling his behavior after the 2020 election “completely unacceptable.”

Toomey largely supported Trump and his agenda during his first term, but became one of seven Senate Republicans to vote to convict the former president after he was impeached for his role in the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection.

“I think after what happened post-2020 election, I think the president’s behavior was completely unacceptable, so I don’t think he should be the nominee to lead the party in 2024. I’m a conservative Republican by any objective measure, by looking at the voting record, by looking at my views compared to that of a traditional conservative Republican. It is President Trump who departed from Republican orthodoxy and conservative orthodoxy in a variety of ways. I stuck to the conservative views that I’ve had for a long time, he had a different point of view on matters such as trade and sometimes immigration and other things.”

Fifth news item

O say can you see what’s happening in Texas:

Professional sports teams in Texas will lose out on government funding if they fail to play the national anthem before the start of every home game, per a new law signed by Gov. Greg Abbott (R) on Wednesday, months after the Dallas Mavericks drew scorn from Republicans by briefly taking the song out of its pregame festivities.

Starting in September, the law — known as SB4 — will require all new financial contracts between professional sports teams and government agencies to include a “written verification” promising to play the national anthem at the teams’ home stadiums.

If teams violate these written agreements, their contracts with the government will go into default, possibly leading to financial penalties.

The law doesn’t mention any specific agreements between teams and the government, but it’s fairly common for state and local governments in Texas and elsewhere to lease publicly owned sports stadiums to teams or underwrite arenas’ construction costs.

Sixth news item

Eh, Jesus would like a word with you, Buster:

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

Seventh news item

He understands you can’t maintain control over people and outcomes by loosening things up:

President Xi Jinping has called for a “national rejuvenation,” with tighter Communist Party control of business, education, culture and religion. Companies and the public are under increasing pressure to align with its vision for a more powerful China and healthier society.

The party has reduced children’s access to online games and is trying to discourage what it sees as unhealthy attention to celebrities.

Broadcasters must “resolutely put an end to sissy men and other abnormal esthetics,” the National Radio and TV Administration said, using an insulting slang term for effeminate men — “niang pao,” or literally, “girlie guns.”

That reflects official concern that Chinese pop stars, influenced by the sleek, fashionable look of some South Korean and Japanese singers and actors, are failing to encourage China’s young men to be masculine enough.

Broadcasters should avoid promoting “vulgar internet celebrities” and admiration of wealth and celebrity, the regulator said. Instead, programs should “vigorously promote excellent Chinese traditional culture, revolutionary culture and advanced socialist culture.”

Xi’s government also is tightening control over Chinese internet industries.

Eighth news item

Australia takes pandemic protocol to extreme lengths:

In a bid to keep the coronavirus out of the country, Australia’s federal and state governments imposed draconian restrictions on its citizens. Prime Minister Scott Morrison knows that the burden is too heavy. “This is not a sustainable way to live in this country,” he recently declared. One prominent civil libertarian summed up the rules by lamenting, “We’ve never seen anything like this in our lifetimes.”

Intrastate travel within Australia is also severely restricted. And the government of South Australia, one of the country’s six states, developed and is now testing an app as Orwellian as any in the free world to enforce its quarantine rules. Returning travelers quarantining at home will be forced to download an app that combines facial recognition and geolocation. The state will text them at random times, and thereafter they will have 15 minutes to take a picture of their face in the location where they are supposed to be. Should they fail, the local police department will be sent to follow up in person. “We don’t tell them how often or when, on a random basis they have to reply within 15 minutes,” Premier Steven Marshall explained. “I think every South Australian should feel pretty proud that we are the national pilot for the home-based quarantine app.”

Ninth news item

Apple puts the brakes on:

“Based on feedback from customers, advocacy groups, researchers, and others, we have decided to take additional time over the coming months to collect input and make improvements before releasing these critically important child safety features,” the company said in an update. The company had planned to scan both iCloud photos and encrypted messages for sexually explicit content, but the move drew flack from privacy advocates over concerns the system could be fooled.

Matthew Green, a cryptography researcher at Johns Hopkins University who had criticized the move, told the Associated Press: “You need to build support before you launch something like this. This was a big escalation from scanning almost nothing to scanning private files.”

MISCELLANEOUS

thumbnail_IMG_6581

Have a great weekend.

–Dana

511 Responses to “Weekend Open Thread”

  1. Hello.

    Dana (174549)

  2. OMG, Dana! You have mastered the art of using black and white to showcase light.

    norcal (a6130b)

  3. Australia takes pandemic protocol to extreme lengths:

    Once a continent-sized prison, always a continent-sized prison.

    Hello, Dana. Great photo!

    nk (1d9030)

  4. Dana! Awesome!

    Do you see a windswept-wild-haired-woman slamming a tennis ball in the ghostly swirl?!!!

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  5. Great line, nk. I’m going to use it.

    norcal (a6130b)

  6. Memo to Xi–

    Don’t press your luck:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lWF8iRCan7I

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  7. Would you stay if she promised you Heaven, DCSCA? Could you ever win?

    nk (1d9030)

  8. I might be unfair, I think, norcal. I suspect that both Australia and New Zealand, being closer to China’s sphere of influence than we are, find it easier to believe that the Wuhan virus is a deliberate biological attack by China aimed at their economies and social structures, and have taken wartime measures.

    nk (1d9030)

  9. nk (1d9030) — 9/3/2021 @ 7:45 pm

    Australia and New Zealand … find it easier to believe that the Wuhan virus is a deliberate biological attack by China aimed at their economies and social structures, and have taken wartime measures against themselves.

    Yea, that makes a lot of sense.

    frosty (f27e97)

  10. Another thing is, I don’t know big a Chinese Fifth column like the one we have here, intent on keeping us from achieving herd immunity and in a perpetual state of pandemic, exists in Australia or New Zealand, so that could be one more reason for their draconian measures.

    nk (1d9030)

  11. Memo to Josh Mandel:

    Buckeyes are useless nuts.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  12. Pro choice groups are now inundating texas anti-abortion tip line site with spam messages turning in republicans.

    asset (6c1d5f)

  13. While the “FDA has approved it in humans to also treat some parasitic worms and external parasites like lice,” there is no evidence that it helps with Covid-19 blah blah…

    “The Story Of Ivermectin And COVID-19:”

    https://rumble.com/vlzihf-the-story-of-ivermectin-and-covid-19.html

    BuDuh (fdd65e)

  14. Pro choice groups are now inundating texas anti-abortion tip line site with spam messages turning in republicans.

    asset (6c1d5f) — 9/3/2021 @ 8:48 pm

    Hahahahaha…. hahahahaha!!!! Haha! Hahahahaha!!!!

    That will show them!!! Hahahahaha!!!!

    What an intelligent bunch!!

    BuDuh (fdd65e)

  15. The tip line is a red herring. The real terror will come from thousands, maybe tens of thousands, of fundamentalist sh!tkickers filing in forma pauperis in pro se court against doctors and clinics, who will have to pay to defend themselves and even if they win they lose because they probably could not collect even their court costs from the judgment proofs.

    nk (1d9030)

  16. More on that “Jesus” lecture:

    Afghan Evacuation Raises Concerns About Child Trafficking

    U.S. officials are looking into reports that in the frantic evacuation of desperate Afghans from Kabul, older men were admitted together with young girls they claimed as “brides” or otherwise sexually abused.

    U.S. officials at intake centers in the United Arab Emirates and in Wisconsin have identified numerous incidents in which Afghan girls have been presented to authorities as the “wives” of much older men. While child marriage is not uncommon in Afghanistan, the U.S. has strict policies against human trafficking that include prosecutions for offenders and sanctions for countries that don’t crack down on it.

    One internal document seen by The Associated Press says the State Department has sought “urgent guidance” from other agencies after purported child brides were brought to Fort McCoy in Wisconsin. Another document, described to the AP by officials familiar with it, says Afghan girls at a transit site in Abu Dhabi have alleged they have been raped by older men they were forced to marry in order to escape Afghanistan.

    https://apnews.com/article/middle-east-child-trafficking-27d93a340c4834d497eb36e22bb72f42

    Hopefully someone has a word with your version of Jesus.

    BuDuh (fdd65e)

  17. “they probably could not collect even their court costs from the judgment proofs.”

    Good news! The bounty law explicitly prevents the awarding of court costs to the defendant in the event they win.

    https://twitter.com/Popehat/status/1433441865836097541

    Davethulhu (5f5049)

  18. This is a double-barreled law. Obviously, meant to have the Supreme Court revisit Roe v. Wade while it’s still 5-4 (doubtful Roberts will vote to overrule) before they lose Thomas or Alito while Biden is President.

    But wait, there’s more. Right next to Texas is New Mexico, very abortion-friendly, one of a handful of states that have unrestricted late term abortion. In the event that Roe is overruled and the Texas law upheld, it will be an obstacle to Texas women crossing over to New Mexico to have their abortion.

    Interesting legal questions to look forward to.

    nk (1d9030)

  19. Steve Cortes should know better – he hails from Chicago Heights in far southern Cook County, a suburb described on blue line blogs as half Mogadishu (though with “plain” black people) and half Cd Juarez. That many Afghans would be a wash. He’s bad for the South Chicago (distinct from generic South Side) -East Side – South Suburb -NW Indiana Mexicans.

    urbanleftbehind (165768)

  20. Jesus would like a word with you

    There is some irony in the way that verse is being misused. There are a number of verses that might have been a better fit. Say, 2 Corinthians 9:6-8, Hebrews 13:16, Isaiah 58:7, Matthew 6:2, Luke 12:33, Acts 20:35, Proverbs 21:13, Galatians 6:2, Matthew 25:35, Mark 12:31, etc.

    All of those have a similar problem though. They are directions given to you. They are not there as something you can demand of other people.

    frosty (f27e97)

  21. Texas has gone off the rails with this law. It’s so Orwellian.

    I don’t like extremism on either side of the abortion issue. It’s like Antifa versus the Proud Boys.

    norcal (a6130b)

  22. @10 I don’t mind Australia and New Zealand having strict measures with regard to Covid, but that proposal about responding within 15 minutes with a photo of you and your location is crazy. What if I silenced my phone so I could take a nap?

    I would rather submit to a vaccine mandate than be required to respond to Big Brother within 15 minutes. (Not that I like either one, you reading-challenged folks, and you know who you are.)

    norcal (a6130b)

  23. @20 Exodus 21:23-25 says it isn’t a baby, And it is not ambiguous. That is why bible thumpers don’t thump on exodus 21:23-25!

    asset (6c1d5f)

  24. asset, I just looked that up. I think you are talking about verse 22 in that chapter.

    Thank you for pointing that out. I didn’t know there were Biblical verses against abortion being the equivalent of murder, but looking at it in the context of that chapter, I think you are right.

    norcal (a6130b)

  25. Lovely photo, Ansel.

    mg (8cbc69)

  26. Any chance of sending that plane of Air Mailed brides and the cavemen back to Afghanistan? Oh and take the gosh darn statue of liberty with you.

    mg (8cbc69)

  27. Exodus 21:22-25
    New International Version
    22 “If people are fighting and hit a pregnant woman and she gives birth prematurely[a] but there is no serious injury, the offender must be fined whatever the woman’s husband demands and the court allows. 23 But if there is serious injury, you are to take life for life, 24 eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, 25 burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise.

    That’s not abortion. That’s incidentally inducing birth or miscarriage during an affray. And what happens if there is serious injury or not. The way I read it, you kill the baby or the woman, you die, GI.

    And how do you feel about this passage, since you like the Old Testament so much?

    Leviticus 20:13
    New International Version
    13 “‘If a man has sexual relations with a man as one does with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They are to be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.

    nk (1d9030)

  28. Re Comment 16 by BuhDuh.

    How are you going to keep them in the harem when they’ve seen Paris Hilton? Women are women the world over. These “children” got themselves piggybacked on their husbands’ refugee visas and now that they’re safely here, they discover that they were sex-trafficked and their marriages can be annulled if they want. Well, that’s fine, although I’d recommend divorce, not annulment, so they can also get a property settlement and alimony, cause that’s the way America rolls these days. But more to it than that? Puhleese!

    nk (1d9030)

  29. @20 Exodus 21:23-25 says it isn’t a baby, And it is not ambiguous. That is why bible thumpers don’t thump on exodus 21:23-25!

    asset (6c1d5f) — 9/3/2021 @ 11:46 pm

    And do try not to lie so much, asset, there’s a good chap!

    nk (1d9030)

  30. Texas has gone off the rails with this law. It’s so Orwellian.

    I don’t like extremism on either side of the abortion issue. It’s like Antifa versus the Proud Boys.

    norcal (a6130b) — 9/3/2021 @ 10:15 pm

    This was inevitable after the New York and Virginia abortion laws. If leftists don’t want these kinds of laws to be passed, they shouldn’t try to steamroll a radical agenda of their own down everyone else’s throat, and the reality is that most people want at least some restrictions on abortion. “Abortion up through the moment before full emergence from the Magic Birth Canal” isn’t something that most people want to see. Pre-Roe restrictions aren’t either.

    Maybe the solution is to either figure when a fetus/baby is viable and cannot be harmed outside of certain extraordinary medical circumstances (Praise Science!), or just let all this get hashed out at the state level.

    @10 I don’t mind Australia and New Zealand having strict measures with regard to Covid, but that proposal about responding within 15 minutes with a photo of you and your location is crazy. What if I silenced my phone so I could take a nap?

    I would rather submit to a vaccine mandate than be required to respond to Big Brother within 15 minutes. (Not that I like either one, you reading-challenged folks, and you know who you are.)

    norcal (a6130b) — 9/3/2021 @ 10:28 pm

    There’s no requirement that a government exercising a no-risk public health policy will consider too extreme. In fact, what Australia looks like right now is the logical pathway of this type of paradigm. If you’re so far gone that you’ll shoot service dogs and build quarantine camps, it’s not a much farther leap to justify further eliminationism so that people who “followed the rules” aren’t put at risk.

    Factory Working Orphan (2775f0)

  31. Leviticus 20:13
    New International Version
    13 “‘If a man has sexual relations with a man as one does with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They are to be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.

    Could just send them to Hellas…

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  32. Hellas… where unspeakable acts are frequent and the Beast With Two Hairy Backs is the order of the day.

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  33. The “ordeal of the bitter water” found in Numbers 5 appears to be a Biblical prescription for abortion in the case of a wife’s infidelity:

    “If she has made herself impure and been unfaithful to her husband, this will be the result: When she is made to drink the water that brings a curse and causes bitter suffering, it will enter her, her abdomen will swell and her womb will miscarry, and she will become a curse. If, however, the woman has not made herself impure, but is clean, she will be cleared of guilt and will be able to have children.” (Numbers 5: 27-28 (NIV)).

    It’s been pointed out that this is a more humane test than that of other ancient cultures, like Babylon, where a suspected adulteress could be tossed into a raging river. If she died, well she was guilty and deserved it. If she survived, God had surely intervened to prove her innocence.

    Anyway the “bitter water” only works if God works supernaturally to make it kill the fetus, which, God being God, He wouldn’t do. (would He?)

    JRH (52aed3)

  34. #Australia, #Axios, #Candace Owens, #COVID Immunity, #Fentanyl, #Free Will vs. Addiction, #Gloria Romero, #Larry Elder, #Long-Haul T*S, #Neil DeGrasse Tyson, #Partisan Data Awareness, #politics, #President Biden, #Scott Adams, #Taliban, #UK SecDef Ben Wallace, #Veronica Wu

    https://www.scottadamssays.com/2021/09/03/episode-1488-scott-adams-lets-talk-about-how-well-joe-biden-is-doing-so-far-and-lots-more/

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  35. I’ve read the Texas law and I see several problems

    1. It allows private citizens to sue when they weren’t harmed for actions that are legal. There’s 2 flaws here. First that the action is legal and second anyone can bring suit without regard to standing.
    2. It allows ppl to sue on the basis that the defendant “intended” to facilitate an abortion.
    3. If they win they get lawyers fees. There is no reciprocal if they lose.
    4. They can sue anywhere in the state and venue can’t be changed except by mutual consent.
    5. I didn’t see anything in the law that prevents multiple suites. So a defendant can be sued multiple times in multiple places.

    So, if I’m reading the correctly, with enough resources you can file a claim in every venue in Texas based on a colorable claim of “intent to facilitate” and force the defendant to fight all of them.

    I’m sure if you’re sufficiently pro-life this might not bother you. But I see a lot of problems with this approach.

    Leaving aside the obvious application on guns or other hot button issue this completely destroys the concept of standing. Even the ADA laws in CA required that the claimant be impacted in /some/ way by the issue. Even with that I think those laws are too lax in their requirements for standing.

    Hopefully this crap law gets tossed quickly, before the fact that it’s targeted at abortion moves standing itself into the culture war and another formerly conservative principle is tossed onto that raging dumpster fire.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  36. I’ll bet 10$ Josh Mandel thinks Jesus had blond hair and blue eyes.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  37. More seriously, watching the racist wing of the GOP turn swiftly from “leaving our allies in Afghanistan is a national disgrace” to “we can’t let in all these brown non-Christian people into our country is hilarious.

    I’m looking forward to all of the arguments explaining that it’s totally not based on race.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  38. ‘The Ingraham Angle’ on Biden’s foreign policy, Afghan refugee relocation-August 17, 2021
    ………

    INGRAHAM: The faster they can neutralize all you Trump supporters with government-dependent immigrants, illegal or otherwise, the better. Joining me now, Stephen Miller, former Trump Senior Advisor, founder of America First legal.

    Stephen, again, we want to help the Afghans who helped us in a meaningful way, a verifiable way, and there are many of those. But should we trust the Biden administration to carefully vet these folks?

    STEPHEN MILLER, FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE SENIOR ADVISER: Not only should we not trust the Biden administration to do so, the simple reality is that we no longer are in control of the central apparatus in Afghanistan to be able to vet anybody. The Taliban has all of the control of the government now. So the notion that people could just show up at a checkpoint and demand resettlement into the United States, and we can have any idea about their background, their belief system, where they come from. Now that the U.S. bad government has fallen, it’s just an impossibility.

    But there’s one more important fundamental point that has to be made. Those who are advocating mass Afghan resettlement in this country are doing so for political, not humanitarian reasons. It is extraordinarily expensive to resettle a refugee in the United States. They get free health care, they get free education, they get free housing, they get free food, they get cash welfare. For the price that you could resettle refugees in America, you can resettle 10 times more, 15 times more in their home region. In this case, primarily in Pakistan.

    Resettling in America is not about solving a humanitarian crisis, it’s about accomplishing an ideological objective, to change America. And if we really want to help people in the region, we’ll be working with our partners to find a safe place for people to go. But that’s not America.
    ………
    MILLER: …………But just to get to first principles here. The United States of America never ever made a promise written or unwritten to the people of Afghanistan, that if after 20 years they were unable to secure their own country, that we would take them to ours. That is nonsense. That has never been U.S. government policy.
    ………
    If the United States takes the policy that every person suffering under Sharia law has the right to live in the United States of America, we’re going to need to make room for half-a-billion people. This is just not intellectually serious. And as I mentioned earlier, it’s not about humanitarian relief because it is far cheaper to resettle Afghan refugees in Pakistan and other neighboring countries.
    ………

    MILLER: Don’t repeat the mistakes of Europe.

    INGRAHAM: Well, and Europe doesn’t want them. Europe doesn’t want them. Everyone is like we’ve got to listen to Europe.

    MILLER: They’ve learned.

    INGRAHAM: They don’t want them. I’m sorry, France says no, Britain doesn’t want them, Germany and Sweden are trying to deport migrants and they put a temporary halt on that. They do not want all of this influx of migrants into their countries. And take a poll on Americans, from Americans. What do you think that poll would be, Stephen?

    MILLER: It would be 90-10 no. Here’s the bottom line, to sum it all up, there are a lot of people in Afghanistan, millions and million and millions who don’t like the Taliban, and rightfully so. That doesn’t necessarily mean that all those millions of people are Jacksonian Democrats who are pro-America and who will embrace our way of life. The most logical thing to do for people who don’t want to live in Afghanistan anymore is to find them a home in another country in southeast Asia or the broader Middle East.

    INGRAHAM: Safe home, and we do thank the people who helped us, but not hundreds of thousands of people. That ultimately is what I think the left once. Stephen, thank you.
    ………….

    Rip Murdock (aa9cdc)

  39. American Media Turn Away from Afghanistan
    ……. Mark Thursday, September 2, down as the day that vast swaths of the U.S. national media turned their attention away from the ongoing crisis in Afghanistan, and the Americans stranded there, and returned to familiar and safe news stories. The international news organizations still covering the country paint a picture that gets uglier and uglier……..

    ……. The front page of the New York Times features Hurricane Ida’s rains hitting New York City, and the Supreme Court’s declining to block Texas’s new abortion law. Those are the same two top stories at the Washington Post, CNN, the Wall Street Journal, and USA Today.

    The lead story at MSNBC is, “What Jim Jordan’s phone call to Trump on Jan. 6 reveals about the GOP.” A top item on Memeorandum this morning was the Times story, “Joe Rogan, A Podcasting Giant Who Has Been Dismissive of Vaccination, Has Covid.” After the Texas law, the second story on NPR’s home page is “These Students Grew Up Around Gun Violence. They Decided It Was Time To Talk About It.” The Los Angeles Times home page focuses on the South Lake Tahoe wildfire and the California gubernatorial-recall election; you have to go way down the page to find any news about Afghanistan. Nor are the more Washington- and politics-focused publications still focused on Afghanistan. As I write this, the top item on Axios is, “Private companies are changing who gets to go to space” and the top story on Politico is, “How Covid data gaps allowed Delta to proliferate.”
    ……….
    ……… [Y]ou can almost hear the sigh of relief in big-city newsrooms as the news cycle returns to “normal.” We’ve had about two weeks of brutal coverage for the Biden administration, from which any fair-minded observer could only conclude the withdrawal was a debacle and that Biden’s statements rarely matched the facts on the ground. For any Democrat, this was an intensely uncomfortable experience. But the people with the loudest voices in the national media clearly have concluded that the past two weeks have been enough. Keeping our attention on Afghanistan, and watching the Taliban’s brutal rule of death, might make our national shame intolerable. So it’s time to go back to familiar stories about how bad Jim Jordan is and Joe Rogan is Texas pro-lifers and gun owners are. The mostly urban and blue-state audience for these news organizations like hearing how much more sophisticated and morally superior they are to Republicans.
    ……….
    Apparently, in America’s newsrooms, Afghanistan “was four days ago, five days ago!”
    ……….

    Rip Murdock (aa9cdc)

  40. There we go.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  41. Mark Thursday, September 2, down as the day that vast swaths of the U.S. national media turned their attention away from the ongoing crisis in Afghanistan…

    The front page of the New York Times features Hurricane Ida’s rains hitting New York City, and the Supreme Court’s declining to block Texas’s new abortion law. Those are the same two top stories at the Washington Post, CNN, the Wall Street Journal, and USA Today.

    The lead story at MSNBC is, “What Jim Jordan’s phone call to Trump on Jan. 6 reveals about the GOP.” A top item on Memeorandum this morning was the Times story, “Joe Rogan, A Podcasting Giant Who Has Been Dismissive of Vaccination, Has Covid.” After the Texas law, the second story on NPR’s home page is “These Students Grew Up Around Gun Violence. They Decided It Was Time To Talk About It.” The Los Angeles Times home page focuses on the South Lake Tahoe wildfire and the California gubernatorial-recall election

    More hating on “brown people.” What is wrong with these right-wing publications??!?

    BuDuh (fdd65e)

  42. I’m not sure I’d consider the thoughts and opinions of “the loudest voices in the national media” and the average American to be the same.

    frosty (f27e97)

  43. Told you so. And the week I predicted, before the bugout is forgotten, still has a couple of days left.

    nk (1d9030)

  44. Good one Buduh! You’ve crossed “If they really cared about brown people they’ve cover things differently” off the list. Excellent adaptation of the “Why don’t they do more stories about black on black crime.” One liner.

    I just wish you were being ironic.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  45. NK, when you’re right you’re right.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  46. Meanwhile, back in Chicago…

    https://twitter.com/SteveInmanUIC/status/1432548046936543233

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  47. 37, going by the name, he’s a Millerite Juden, so maybe or maybe not. But this guy didn’t think so.

    urbanleftbehind (70da7c)

  48. I wish I understood what you were saying, Time. It doesn’t come across very clearly and I would like to know exactly what you are saying so I don’t misinterpret what you mean. Sometimes it is difficult for me to grasp your concepts and the concerns you are sharing.

    BuDuh (fdd65e)

  49. @38 i don’t think you’re looking for a serious discussion

    you think the term judeo-christian means something racist

    or he should’ve used judeo-christan-islamic, but you can’t explain what that means either

    JF (e1156d)

  50. Hey, I love Bible-Bingo as much as the next person, but verse-mining an ancient text for pro-abortion or anti-abortion thoughts seems like a fool’s errand……given the limited scientific understanding of the peoples, the general subservient role of women, and the stark brutality that surrounded much of human interaction during those centuries.

    Now one can argue that Jesus re-wrote the script, but it’s inescapable to wonder mightily about the God of the Old Testament….and the proposition of respect for ALL innocent life. We might start with the Great Flood….and the statistical probability that many innocent children, infants, and unborns (!) were annihalated to provide God with a generous re-start. Abraham was told there was not even 10 righteous people in Sodom and Gomorrah for those cities to deserve a reprieve…..still, no children? No unborn? No potential lives with value? No hope of redemption? The story concludes with God even taking care of Lot’s wife for the disobendience of looking back. That’s hard core.

    Then we move on to the slaughter of the Egyptian firstborn sons over Passover. Innocent life indeed, I guess when there’s a bigger plan. More slaughtering of the Canaanites by Joshua and the Midianites by Moses….where we get the memorable celestial command: “kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man.” I guess there was an asterisk after the 6th commandment. Finally (oh, we’ll leave old Job for another day), we get to some pre-medieval questionable respect for life with Saul being told to lay down the smack on the Amalekites: “slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and a$$”. What?! INFANTS!! How am I supposed to unpack that moral conundrum. Well, we can say that Jesus gave us a new path….another re-start button of sorts. Perhaps. But if God is God, the Old Testament gives us a quite speculative blueprint for respecting all innocent life. We might like that conclusion, but the evidence is that Old Testament God played favorites….

    AJ_Liberty (a4ff25)

  51. Afghan refugee debate fractures GOP
    ………
    ……..[O]n the question of the thousands of Afghan refugees looking to flee to the United States, a schism has emerged within the party, pitting immigration restrictionists against those who view the resettlement of individuals and families in the U.S. as a moral charge.

    With the debate featuring some elements of the party’s familiar divide between the base and the establishment — and former President Donald Trump’s position on the issue unclear — some Republicans see the making of an issue that could reverberate in next year’s primary elections.
    …….

    On an issue where the dividing line between the two camps isn’t precise, Trump’s statements to date have provided fodder for each side.

    “Can anyone even imagine taking out our Military before evacuating civilians and others who have been good to our Country and who should be allowed to seek refuge?” he said in a Monday statement criticizing the Biden administration’s approach.

    Yet on Wednesday, Trump issued a statement that took a different tack. Alongside a tweet featuring a much-viewed photo of Afghans packed into a C-17 plane, Trump wrote, “This plane should have been full of Americans. America First!”
    ……..
    Steve Cortes, a former Trump adviser, tweeted an image of a planeload of refugees leaving Afghanistan and asked his 236,000 followers to “Raise your hand if you want this plane landing in your town? America paid unimaginable costs in Afghanistan because of uniparty globalists who dominated the Bush & Obama administrations.”

    Ohio Senate candidate and “Hillbilly Elegy” author J.D. Vance said on Twitter he’d “like to hear zero about Afghan refugees until we get every single American out first.” Wisconsin Republican Rep. Tom Tiffany fretted in a string of tweets that “The Biden admin’s plan to bring planeloads into the US now and ask questions later is reckless and irresponsible.”
    ………
    On the Fox network, host Tucker Carlson said Monday, without providing evidence, that “millions” may ultimately come to the U.S., warning that “first we invade & then we’re invaded.”
    ………
    “There are people who worked for us as translators who hate us,” said (Ken) Cuccinelli, now a senior fellow with the conservative Center for Renewing America. “There are people working at different times for every side of this conflict. There’s not just us and the Taliban. There are factions, enemies between themselves.”
    ………..
    In Iowa, Republican Sen. Joni Ernst, an Iraq War veteran, told The Des Moines Register that her state should take more refugees, saying it did so after the Vietnam War and that “we have always been very welcoming to those that needed to immigrate and those refugees that were running away from disaster in their own country,” she said. “And I do think that we can play a role and I think it’s important that we do that.”
    ………

    Rip Murdock (aa9cdc)

  52. It is of course crap that Stephen Miller, of all people, ever cared about the Afghans, whether or not there was adequate vetting. He’s one of the principal architects of the trump policy of slow walking refugee claims from Afghanistan, starting way back in 2018:

    Stephen Miller seemed floored by the idea, raised during a fall Cabinet meeting in 2018, of  keeping open the doors for Afghan allies and other Middle East refugees to enter the US. 

    “What do you guys want?” Miller, then a top adviser to President Donald Trump, asked incredulously, according to one person in the room. “A bunch of Iraqs and ‘Stans across the country?”
    His words stunned many in the meeting, but they were no accident. Under Miller’s guidance, several sources told CNN, the Trump administration was purposefully slow-walking the entry of all refugees — including allies who aided American soldiers in Afghanistan.
    Now, after the end of America’s longest war, “the majority” of Afghans who worked for the US during its two-decade military campaign have likely been left behind in Afghanistan, according to State Department estimates, at the mercy of the country’s new Taliban regime. And Republicans are criticizing President Joe Biden for the chaotic withdrawal and for vetting allies too loosely.
    But the mayhem in Kabul, as crowds of Afghans tried desperately to flee the country in the final days of August, was due in no small part to the slowdown during the previous administration, according to former officials who argue more allies could have been admitted in the years prior.

    https://edition.cnn.com/2021/09/03/politics/trump-adviser-stephen-miller-afghan-allies-us-entry/

    As for the theory that somebody else, Pakistan, Europe, anybody but us, should have some responsibility for cleaning up the mess we helped cause, well that’s about the level of moral thinking I’ve come to expect from Trump people and their supporters.

    Victor (4959fb)

  53. several sources told CNN

    LOL

    BuDuh (fdd65e)

  54. We caused no mess in Afghanistan that had not existed since 330 BC, if not earlier. And at least Alexander’s fort at Herat still exists as a city. What we did was build sandcastles which collapsed and we’re supposed to do what? Sweep the sand off the beach?

    nk (1d9030)

  55. As for the theory that somebody else, Pakistan, Europe, anybody but us, should have some responsibility for cleaning up the mess we helped cause, well that’s about the level of moral thinking I’ve come to expect from Trump people and their supporters.

    Victor (4959fb) — 9/4/2021 @ 8:01 am

    “Cleaning up the mess we helped cause” (translation: keep the ex-generals’ wallets fat with contractor cash) is what kept us there for 20 years in the first place.

    Factory Working Orphan (2775f0)

  56. We used to call them master-planned communities, but start-up cities are a way to alleviate our housing shortage. In my county north of Seattle, there’s less than a month of available inventory and still too little new construction.

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  57. And I’m also lukewarm about bringing “our Afghan allies” here, whether with vetting or without. I’ve never thought them better than the Taliban and in some ways worse.

    nk (1d9030)

  58. Argentina’s unusual infestation problem, dealing with 100-pound rodents.

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  59. The Federal Government Cautions Incoming Afghan Refugees Against Moving To California
    ………..
    Many of the Afghans who have been airlifted out of their country in the wake of the Taliban’s takeover will be able to come to America under the U.S. State Department’s Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) program, which provides visas to translators who worked with U.S. forces and helps place them in a new city once they get to America.

    SIV participants who opt to receive resettlement benefits can also choose to be relocated to one of 19 cities identified as having “reasonable cost of living, housing availability, supportive services, and welcoming communities with volunteers and resources.”

    These cities include several in Texas (Houston, Austin, and Dallas), the Mountain West (Salt Lake City and Denver), the Southeast (Raleigh-Durham and Atlanta), and a couple of lower-cost cities in the Mid-Atlantic (Philadelphia and Baltimore).
    ……..
    The much more affordable area of Northern New Jersey, in contrast, is a recommended destination for Afghan refugees.

    One reason for that is that northern New Jersey is much friendlier to new housing development. The Big Apple has added about one unit of housing for every 3.6 jobs from 2009 to 2018, according to one city report. Northern New Jersey, meanwhile, has managed to add more housing units than jobs.

    The State Department’s list of refugee-friendly cities is mostly dominated by high-growth sunbelt cities with high rates of housing construction, including places like Houston, Dallas, Raleigh-Durham that have both added a new unit of housing for every job over the past decade.
    ……..
    ………Fox News host Tucker Carlson, [has] argued that America shouldn’t admit Afghan refugees because the country just doesn’t have enough housing for them. That’s simply not true for many fast-growing cities that are adding more than enough housing to accommodate newcomers, whether they’re coming from Kandahar or Kansas City.

    It’s also not true of low-growth, low-cost cities like Baltimore, Maryland, and Buffalo, New York, which also made the State Department’s list. If anything, these cities have too much vacant housing, and could really benefit from the revitalizing effects of new immigrants.
    ……….

    The full list of recommended cities:

    Phoenix
    Denver
    Jacksonville
    Atlanta
    Chicago
    Baltimore
    St. Louis
    Raleigh-Durham
    Northern New Jersey (to include Elizabethland Highland Park)
    Las Vegas
    Buffalo
    Cleveland
    Portland
    Philadelphia
    Pittsburgh
    Austin
    Dallas-Fort Worth
    Houston
    Salt Lake City

    Another good location would be dying towns in rural areas.

    Rip Murdock (aa9cdc)

  60. @50, I don’t think you’re capable of a serious discussion.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  61. The term “Judeo-Christian” has been claimed to be a rebuff to anti-Semitism — Eisenhower is one famous person who used it as early as 1952 — but I see it mostly from the Congregationalists who emphasize the Old Testament. A/k/a Evangelicals and Fundamentalists.

    nk (1d9030)

  62. EU prepares to keep out Afghan refugees
    EU countries are preparing to stop Afghan refugees from potentially entering Europe en masse, amid fears of a repeat of the 2015 migration crisis, when 1 million people came to Europe.

    “The EU and its member states stand determined to act jointly to prevent the recurrence of uncontrolled, large-scale, illegal migration movements faced in the past,” EU home-affairs ministers will agree to say after an emergency meeting in Brussels on Tuesday (31 August), according to a draft statement, dated 28 August, and seen by EUobserver.
    ………
    ……… [O]ther measures will focus on paying Afghanistan’s neighbours to host refugees instead.

    “The EU should also strengthen support to the countries in Afghanistan’s immediate neighbourhood to ensure that those in need receive adequate protection primarily in the region,” the draft statement noted.
    ………
    “The EU will also cooperate with those countries to … reinforce border management capacity and prevent smuggling of migrants,” it added.

    The EU ministers addressed worries terrorist groups might infiltrate refugees to get operatives into Europe.

    “Exchange of information and intelligence … are of utmost importance. The timely performance of security checks of persons being evacuated from Afghanistan remains crucial,” they planned to say
    ………
    They encouraged “resettlement [to the EU] on a voluntary basis” of refugees from Afghanistan’s neighbours, “prioritising … women and children”.

    And they spoke of harmonising “member states’ practices in the reception and processing of Afghan asylum seekers”, even though the EU has, in recent times, failed to agree any reforms of its asylum laws, which place the burden on front-line countries, such as Greece.

    But for its part, the Taliban indicated that failed asylum seekers deported back home could face reprisals.
    ……….

    Rip Murdock (aa9cdc)

  63. @61 lol

    you never disappoint

    JF (e1156d)

  64. @62 george will among others has used it often, and he claims to be an atheist and nevertrump

    it has many meanings, including secularist

    but i guess it’s racist now

    JF (e1156d)

  65. It is of course crap that Stephen Miller, of all people, ever cared about the Afghans, whether or not there was adequate vetting. …….

    Interesting factoid: Miller got his start by appearing on Larry Elder’s radio show when he was a sixteen year old high school student in Santa Monica.

    ……..
    Even before I had formal scientific evidence of my high school’s hard-left bent, I had resolved to challenge the campus indoctrination machine. It was after my school’s response to the 9/11 attacks that I decided to become involved. During that dreadful time of national tragedy, anti-Americanism had spread all over the school like a rash. The co-principal broadcasted his doubts about the morality of the air strikes against the Taliban to the entire school via the PA system. One teacher even dragged the American flag across the floor-as we were sending off brave young men to risk their lives for it. It was then that I first took action, writing to prized radio personality Larry Elder. He invited me to discuss these issues on his program, which immediately drew the ire of the teachers, administrators, and even my fellow students. Their resistance only strengthened my resolve.

    Soon I was writing articles for the local press and internet news sites. I set-up many meetings with the administration, only to discover that the bureaucrats themselves were part of the problem.

    My friend Chris Moritz and I invited Larry Elder to speak on campus, and he agreed right away but was turned down by the administration. This served only to highlight the dilemma with my high school and to generate more negative press on Elder’s radio program. The administration eventually relented.
    ………..

    Rip Murdock (aa9cdc)

  66. 3rd conservative radio host who condemned vaccines dies of Covid
    ……..
    The death of Marc Bernier, 65, who was a mainstay on talk radio in Daytona Beach, was announced Saturday night by WNDB, the radio station he was affiliated with for three decades.
    ……..
    Bernier was known for inviting differing viewpoints on his show, including Democrats, but had publicly railed against vaccines. The Daytona Beach News-Journal reported that Bernier had been hospitalized since Aug. 7.

    When Florida’s Democratic Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried in July urged people to get vaccines on Twitter by saying the “greatest generation had to defeat the Nazis to preserve our way of life, you’re only being asked to get a shot. So be a patriot,” Bernier replied on the platform: “Should say, ‘Now the US Government is acting like Nazi’s. Get the shot!’”
    ………
    On Aug. 4, another Florida conservative radio host who had criticized the coronavirus vaccine, Dick Farrel, died from Covid-19 complications. …….

    He had strongly condemned the coronavirus vaccine, posting on Facebook on July 3, “why take a vax promoted by people who lied 2u all along about masks, where the virus came from and the death toll?” He also criticized Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infection disease doctor, calling him a “power tripping lying freak,” according to The Washington Post, which reported on his death.
    ………
    Last week, Phil Valentine, a 62-year-old conservative radio host in Nashville, Tenn., who had questioned the necessity of vaccines, also died from the virus. Valentine, the son of former six-term Rep. Tim Valentine (D-N.C.), had a nationally syndicated show.

    “The people who instinctively believe that the government is the solution to everything are already talking vaccination mandates. This should be a personal choice,” he wrote on his blog in December. “I’m not an anti-vaxxer. I’m just using common sense.”
    ……….
    Sad.

    Rip Murdock (aa9cdc)

  67. #57 Paul – In our area, the Growth Management Act is probably the main reason for the housing shortage.

    (In practice, the Act has limited new housing in the greater Seattle area to Seattle and the older suburbs. That didn’t send rents and prices up much until Jeff Bezos decided to put tens of thousands of people in the “isthmus” of Seattle. I often wonder whether he failed geography in grade school.

    One of the most obvious consequences of the Act and Bezos’s policies is the replacement of modest homes by much larger, much more expensive ones. That makes it even tougher for families starting out, of course.

    Our junior senator, Maria Cantwell was one of the principal authors of Washington’s GMA. It would be interesting to know how much she has profited from it personally.)

    Jim Miller (edcec1)

  68. Larry Elder supports Civil War reparations. Who knew?

    Rip Murdock (aa9cdc)

  69. White House admits Biden’s claim he visited Tree of Life in wake of massacre of 11 worshipers in 2018 is NOT true after synagogue revealed the president CALLED instead of visiting in person

    The White House has admitted that President Joe Biden’s claim he visited the Tree of Life in the wake of the 2018 massacre that killed 11 congregants is not true after the synagogue revealed he called rather than visited in person.

    Biden had told more than a thousand Jewish leaders during a virtual event to celebrate the start of the Jewish High Holidays on Thursday that he had visited the Tree of Life synagogue after the mass shooting.

    ‘I remember spending time at the – you know, going to the – you know, the Tree of Life Synagogue, speaking with the – just – it just is amazing these things are happening – happening in America,’ Biden, 78, said.

    But the White House said in statement to the New York Post on Friday that Biden’s comment ‘was referring to a call he had with the Tree of Life rabbi in 2019.’

    glenn kessler’s too busy checking trump’s crowd sizes

    JF (e1156d)

  70. 69. Why did I know before clicking the link that the clown meant compensating the plantation owners for the loss of their slaves?

    nk (1d9030)

  71. @69 unusual for Rip to not paste in a wall of text

    maybe cuz he knew the content doesn’t mesh with his dishonest summary

    “When people talk about reparations, do they really want to have that conversation? Like it or not, slavery was legal,” Elder said. “Their legal property was taken away from them after the Civil War, so you could make an argument that the people that are owed reparations are not only just Black people but also the people whose ‘property’ was taken away after the end of the Civil War.”

    Elder replied that the United Kingdom compensated slave owners for their loss of property, stating that the “substantial amounts of money” they received from the government prevented civil war from breaking out like it did in the US.

    The British Slave Compensation Commission distributed 20 million in compensation to slave owners following the passage of the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833, according to the Centre for the Study of the Legacies of British Slavery .

    can’t have a strong independent black man as governor

    JF (e1156d)

  72. Rip is short for Ripple…

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  73. Jim Miller (edcec1) — 9/4/2021 @ 9:02 am

    I live and breathe the GMA in my profession, Jim. My concern at the time was that it would create a two-tiered society, with the less affluent packed into Urban Growth Areas, while the top-tier gets to live in acred estates in the outskirts. It didn’t quite come true because of Amazon and the general boom in our tech sector, but an easy way to ease our housing shortage isn’t just high-density development but enlargement of all the UGAs. That, and streamlining and deregulating land and building permits, but the deregulating part is unrealistic in the Puget Sound area.

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  74. And France made the Haitians compensate their former masters. Great news for Elder. He can run for either Mayor of London or Mayor of Paris.

    nk (1d9030)

  75. Why did I know before clicking the link that the clown meant compensating the plantation owners for the loss of their slaves?
    Because he’s libertarian talk show host who is concerned mostly with property rights.

    Rip Murdock (aa9cdc)

  76. And the other Republican “celebrity” in the recall is concerned with whether he should use Nair For Men or Original Nair. Trust me on this: Keep Newsom!

    nk (1d9030)

  77. @72-
    You left Elder’s (false) claim that America was one the first to abolish slavery when it was one of the last.

    Rip Murdock (aa9cdc)

  78. That might cost him some “1.No; 2. Larry” votes. I would add that the compensation just as likely prevented a secondary Tory migration into the US states post 1808.

    urbanleftbehind (70da7c)

  79. And France made the Haitians compensate their former masters. Great news for Elder. He can run for either Mayor of London or Mayor of Paris.

    Or Mayor of Chicago… ET phone GO home!

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  80. He has to claim Gangster Disciple or Vice Lords first, cause Mount Greenwood and Edison Park (our Simi Valley and Staten Island) will find an excuse not to vite for him regardless of platform planks.

    urbanleftbehind (70da7c)

  81. can’t have a strong independent black man as governor

    Guy’s a wackadoodle theorist living in Cloud Coocoo Land. Not a practical and pragmatic administrator for the country’s most populous state.

    nk (1d9030)

  82. @78 Rip being dishonest again

    that was Owens’ claim, not Elder’s

    and it’s not false

    JF (e1156d)

  83. @83 when’s the french laundry nomination convention?

    JF (e1156d)

  84. Local Fox News reports Newsom will survive.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  85. I think what some are missing about Afghanistan is that withdrawing and abdicating support for the Afghani army creates serious difficulties for the U.S. to fight terrorism financing that will return to operating with impunity in the country. Even though ISIS-K is a sworn enemy of the Taliban, the Taliban has never really demonstrated a capacity to actually govern or effectively police the illegal markets that ISIS-K uses to create finances. Further, the Taliban do not disavow al-Qaeda or the Haqqani terrorist network, so believing that they will suddenly become meaningfully committed to fighting this terrorist offshoot organization isn’t that credible. And now we have a base for ISIS-K to fund raise throughout the Middle East….on the back of the Aug 26th attack. Add on training camps that are impractical in most other countries and this is a brewing national security threat that was avoidable. The free movement of money matters….and by allowing the Afghan government to fall, we make it harder to starve terrorism.

    Leaving didn’t stop sh*t. It just removes our influence….and places us somewhere over the horizon…where deploying assets just gets more expensive. So we save a few billion here, but it costs a few billion more over there plus an increased threat to manage. We now let China poke its nose into the area….looking for mining opportunities….while the Taliban looks for legitimacy from the relationship. Great. Our presence kept terrorism in a hole. Now the hole is uncovered. Fighting over there…by backing Afghanis….was sustainable. We gave up for political reasons….

    AJ_Liberty (a4ff25)

  86. Lacey should have flipped a la Vernon Jones and ran.

    urbanleftbehind (70da7c)

  87. People aren’t sand, Afghanistan was doing ok until the Soviet supported the coup in 1979, we have a greater responsibility for what happened in Afghanistan than Europe and, above all,

    People on this blog and elsewhere have spent the last few weeks furiously condemning the “putrid” Biden for failing to get enough Afghans out of the country only to, now, start back pedaling furiously about how there are too many Afghans leaving the country.

    Sheer hypocrisy.

    Victor (4959fb)

  88. “Elder replied that the United Kingdom compensated slave owners for their loss of property, stating that the “substantial amounts of money” they received from the government prevented civil war from breaking out like it did in the US.”

    What is this argument? The civil war started before slavery was banned. The planation owners didn’t want reparations, they wanted to keep their slaves.

    Davethulhu (5f5049)

  89. @87. Total Beaush!t. More Neocon creamed-chipped-Cheney on toast.

    Bought or sold any Afghan War Bonds lately?

    Nope.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  90. California Recall Election Survey-Trafalgar Group

    Do you support removing Gavin Newsom from the office of Governor?
    Yes/No
    44/52

    Should Newsom be recalled, who, of the following candidates, would you most likely support to replace him?
    Undecided-30%
    Larry Elder-29
    Kevin Paffrath-22
    Someone Else-9
    Ken Faulconer-4.1
    John Cox-4.1
    Caitlyn Jenner-1
    ……..
    These results are consistent with the recent Public Policy Institute of California poll released this week.

    Rip Murdock (aa9cdc)

  91. @78 Rip being dishonest again

    that was Owens’ claim, not Elder’s……

    My bad.

    Rip Murdock (aa9cdc)

  92. People on this blog and elsewhere have spent the last few weeks furiously condemning the “putrid” Biden for failing to get enough Afghans out of the country only to, now, start back pedaling furiously about how there are too many Afghans leaving the country.

    No.

    Putrid is to kind a term.

    Americans “on this blog” have ‘furiously condemned’ the blatantly inept and imbecilic lack of planning on withdrawing from Afghanistan- [a decision a vast majority of the citizenry supported] -by a plagiaristic, old, brain damaged swamp creature who boasted of 50 years experience in moving the levers of government as a basis for his election but can’t even walk up a flight of stairs. Condemned the lying about driving 18 wheelers; of going to the pokie w/Mandela; of visiting the mass shooting site in Pgh.; of endlessly carting out his damn dead son as a political crutch and tool; of needless getting 13 brave U.S. servicemen men and women killed while leaving 10% of Americans behind and claiming it a success; of failing to ‘stop the virus cold.’ The list is endless.

    He’s incompetent.
    He’s dangerous.
    He’s a bum.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  93. Still being a great Vice President, though, keeping Obama’s skirts clean, you gotta admit that, DCSCA.

    You remember Obama, the guy who withdrew 95% of our troops from Afghanistan, leaving a skeleton force with nowhere to go but out, that guy?

    nk (1d9030)

  94. DCSCA: “Total Beaush!t. More Neocon…”

    Thanks for the reminder to go do something else. Carry on.

    AJ_Liberty (a4ff25)

  95. The law doesn’t mention any specific agreements between teams and the government, but it’s fairly common for state and local governments in Texas and elsewhere to lease publicly owned sports stadiums to teams or underwrite arenas’ construction costs.

    This is of course petty grandstanding by the Texas Legislature, but I have a hard time feeling sorry for billionaire professional sports franchise owners who con municipalities and states into subsidizing their stadiums, ballparks, and arenas.

    JVW (ee64e4)

  96. Rep. McCarthy threatens tech and telecom firms that comply with Jan.6 committee’s request
    …….
    The panel on Monday asked 35 companies to retain phone records and other information related to the attack as it ramps up its investigation ahead of the return of Congress next month. Several of the companies indicated this week that they intend to comply with the panel’s requests, while only one so far has publicly said it will not do so.

    “Adam Schiff, Bennie Thompson, and Nancy Pelosi’s attempts to strong-arm private companies to turn over individuals’ private data would put every American with a phone or computer in the crosshairs of a surveillance state run by Democrat politicians,” McCarthy said in a statement Tuesday night, referring to the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, the chairman of the select committee and the House speaker.

    “If these companies comply with the Democrat order to turn over private information, they are in violation of federal law and subject to losing their ability to operate in the United States,” McCarthy said. “If companies still choose to violate federal law, a Republican majority will not forget and will stand with Americans to hold them fully accountable under the law.”</

    …….
    Mike Stern, a former lawyer for the nonpartisan House counsel office, said there are probably laws that bar phone carriers and other companies from turning over records voluntarily. But if a subpoena is issued those companies would be legally obligated to respond.

    “Even if there is arguably a competing legal obligation or privilege that might trump the subpoena, I know of no principle that requires any subpoena recipient to risk contempt in order to protect the interests of their customers,” Stern said.
    ……..
    The request that went out Monday was sent to tech and social media companies including Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Twitter and Signal, as well as telecommunications companies including Verizon Wireless, AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile.

    The panel is asking the 35 companies to preserve “metadata, subscriber information, technical usage information, and content of communications for the listed individuals.”

    In its letters to the companies, the committee asked for the preservation of material from individuals who were “involved in organizing, funding, or speaking” at January’s “Stop the Steal” rallies, as well as individuals who were “potentially involved with discussions of plans to challenge, delay, or interfere” with the electoral certification process.
    …….

    Related: What federal law is Kevin McCarthy citing when he threatens telecom firms?

    Marjorie Taylor Greene threatened to ‘shut down’ telecoms companies if they hand over Republicans’ phone records to the January 6 commission

    How is this arm twisting different from the Democrats running interference for the Clintons by publicly objecting to the ABC miniseries “The Path to 9/11,” and threatening ABC with the loss of broadcast licenses. (Of course Nixon and Trump did the same thing. It must be in a politician’s DNA).

    Here is one law that might in the process of being broken, and it’s not by the telecoms.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  97. Sorry for the formatting mess.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  98. Wonder what Jesus would think of David French’s article:

    “It’s against this backdrop — savage treatment of women and contempt for Western justice — that I read with alarm a stunning report on “Europe’s Afghan crime wave.” The piece is notable not just for its content, but for its author. Cheryl Benard has worked sympathetically with refugees and was a subject-matter expert at the RAND corporation. In other words, this piece isn’t from the anti-Muslim fever swamps but from the heart of the elite national-security establishment. Her thesis is simple: European nations are grappling with a wave of vicious immigrant attacks against women, and the attackers are coming disproportionately from Afghanistan.”

    https://www.nationalreview.com/2017/07/afghan-refugees-rape-jihad-europe/

    Related:

    “BREAKING: State Department requesting urgent guidance over child brides among Afghan escapees. Staff at Fort McCoy reporting multiple cases of underage girls said to be married to adult Afghan men”

    Obudman (676dac)

  99. Professional sports teams in Texas will lose out on government funding if they fail to play the national anthem before the start of every home game, per a new law signed by Gov. Greg Abbott on Wednesday, months after the Dallas Mavericks drew scorn from Republicans by briefly taking the song out of its pregame festivities.

    Cleary unconstitutional. Government cannot condition benefits on compelled speech.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  100. AJ, great point about the trade off of the pull out.

    Time123 (224669)

  101. @96. Handball w/Kristol?

    Anything to oblige.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  102. AJ, great point about the trade off of the pull out.

    Except it’s not. Bought or sold any Afghan War Bonds lately?

    Nope.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  103. @95. There is nothing ‘great’ about Joe other than he’s a legend in his own mind.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  104. Read any good books, lately? I have, Michael Shellenberger’s Apocalypse Never.

    I like it so much that I just bought two more copies as presents for relatives. I especially recommend it to Californians, by the way, since Shellenberger has much to say about Pat and Jerry Brown.

    (If you are wondering why I linked to Barnes and Noble, rather than Amazon, it’s because Amazon banned a book on transgender issues, and so I have almost entirely stopped ordering books from them. And I can add that B&N is not necessarily more expensive, since they include in their mail order packages coupons that you may be able to use.)

    Jim Miller (edcec1)

  105. To fight the recall, Newsom and allies spent $36 million in August alone
    ……….
    “We had no money and we still got it on the ballot, and some polling showed us even,” said Anne Hyde Dunsmore, campaign manager for Rescue California, one of the main recall groups. She said that even if the effort is unsuccessful, it has many silver linings.

    “We caused [Newsom] to spend, we caused the Democratic Governors’ Assn. to spend. We’re draining resources for 2022, which is promising to be a miserable [election] year for the party that holds the White House,” Dunsmore said.
    ……..
    In late July, the polling was near even. But an average of surveys in August show those opposed to recalling Newsom with a lead of more than eight points, according to Real Clear Politics and 538, two poll aggregators. A poll released Thursday by the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California had Newsom with a 19-point lead.

    Committees that support or oppose the recall can solicit unlimited sums, while candidates are constrained by state campaign finance rules to raising $32,400 per donor.
    …….
    The primary anti-recall committee has raised more than $66 million this year, and other groups that back Newsom brought in an additional $6.4 million through Aug. 28. In contrast, pro-recall groups have raised nearly $10 million, while the major GOP candidates have raised $26.2 million total.
    …….
    The five top Republicans vying to replace Newsom have spent a little over $10 million combined in August…….
    ………
    (Larry) Elder, the front-runner among the candidates who hope to replace Newsom, upended the race when he entered it in mid-July. He has raised more than $13 million, the most among GOP candidates. He spent more than $4.5 million on television and more than $520,000 on online campaigning in August. A total of 46 replacement candidates are on the ballot, though one (Doug Ose) dropped out after suffering a heart attack.
    ……..
    With nearly $8.6 million in donations, businessman John Cox was the next biggest fundraiser because the multimillionaire has largely self-funded his campaign. He spent $2 million in August, including on a television ad featuring a 1,000-pound Kodiak bear.

    Former San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer spent $1.1 million and Assemblyman Kevin Kiley $630,000 in August; they and Cox remain mired in the single digits in the polls.
    ……….

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  106. RIP Willard Scott (87).

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  107. The NYTimes hasn’t updated their “live” tracking of Joe Biden’s approval ratings in nearly 4 months.

    It’s stuck on May 10 and says 63% approve and 36% disapprove.

    The headline btw is Most Americans say things are going right in the country.

    https://www.mrctv.org/index.php/blog/nyt-hasnt-updated-coverage-bidens-approval-rating-nearly-4-months

    In order for those numbers to be true today, they’d have to limit their polling to strictly Never Trumpers.

    Obudman (676dac)

  108. R.I.P. Willard Scott

    Clowny with a 100% chance of sunshine.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  109. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9955079/Florida-diner-owner-turned-away-Biden-voters-troops-says-shes-inundated-support.html

    I don’t think many here appreciate how many are truly sick if business as usual and ignoring the actual citizenry.

    NJRob (64f36c)

  110. Time123 (9f42ee) — 9/4/2021 @ 7:11 am

    completely destroys the concept of standing

    I’m pretty sure legislators have a lot of leeway on these things. Remember when congress decided drug companies couldn’t be sued at all for the covid vaccine? Remember when the executive branch decided evictions we’re on hold and amended rental contracts?

    Of course we “needed” to do those last two and anyone who complained about pesky legal procedures were horrible anti-vaxxers.

    frosty (f27e97)

  111. Remember all the AGs that decided leftist luddite groups could sue to prevent development of lands and destroy property rights. This is just an extension of that.

    NJRob (64f36c)

  112. The lazy-azzed stumblebum is vacationing in Delaware– again.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  113. Frosty, I’ve been nothing but critical of the eviction moratorium. If you want to whine at me at least pick a position I actually hold.

    Time123 (224669)

  114. I’ve learned a lot from NeverTrump and the left this week:

    It was racist and stupid to try to impose our western values on AF. It’s a country of people unwilling or unable to embrace things like democracy and liberal values (and it isn’t racist to say that).

    It was obvious this was going to be the end result and this was the best case scenario. Only right wing Trumpers would believe Biden when he said it wasn’t. Trumpers should have done better in 2016. This inevitable best case scenario wouldn’t have happened if HRC had been elected.

    Only right wing racists have an issue with importing tens of thousands of the people we said are unwilling or unable to embrace western values.

    There’s no such thing as the AF government. It was just a prop created by the US forces in the region.

    It’s not giving weapons to the Taliban if you give them to “the AF government”. Even though you know the Taliban will take them from “the AF government”.

    I’m sure I missed some valuable lessons. It was a busy week.

    frosty (f27e97)

  115. NJRob, Faced with a bad law by your side all you can do is justify it by saying “it’s bad but the other side did it first.” Do you value any principle beyond “us good them bad”?

    Time123 (224669)

  116. @117, good job accurately stating the views of your political opponents. You really seem to get it.

    Time123 (224669)

  117. Time123 (224669) — 9/4/2021 @ 3:24 pm

    No reason to get defensive. I’m not whining at you so much as whining in your general vicinity.

    frosty (f27e97)

  118. Thanks for clarifying. I should show more empathy. Being badly confused by what the other side is saying must be really frustrating.

    Time123 (224669)

  119. Time123 (224669) — 9/4/2021 @ 3:29 pm

    Thanks. NeverTrump is usually a ball of emotionally driven contradictions. Having a running summary can be helpful.

    frosty (f27e97)

  120. JVW @97, if this latest bit of legislative malpractice results in the reduction, end of subsidies for sports teams at least some good will have come from it.

    Time123 (224669)

  121. Time123,

    If a tool is used by one side successfully what makes you think it won’t be used by the other ?

    Do you have any understanding of human nature?

    NJRob (0e3eba)

  122. RIP @98, threatening to take punitive legislative action at companies that cooperate with a valid congressional investigation is garbage. I doubt it could be prove to be criminal obstruction but it’s further evidence that the modem GOP is lawless, corrupt and shouldn’t be supported.

    Time123 (224669)

  123. NJRob, I like limited government. I have no use for a party that wants to make government bigger just to accomplish different things. Removing standing as a barrier to bring suite makes the government bigger.

    For instance I think civil forfeiture is bad. https://ij.org/issues/private-property/civil-forfeiture/

    I want to see the law reformed to stop the type of abuses they highlight and give the accused more protection. I don’t want to see the abuses better targeted at people I dislike.

    Time123 (224669)

  124. Remember all the AGs that decided leftist luddite groups could sue to prevent development of lands and destroy property rights. This is just an extension of that.

    Those lawsuits aren’t based on “ AGs that decided” but on laws enacted by state legislatures and Congress.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  125. Rip, but those laws do grant the right to sue based on damage to common areas and not specific harm to the individual. They expanded standing. An argument can be made that given the subject is a shared environment the expansion is justified. But that’s a separate argument.

    Regardless the conservative position used to be that standing was a good thing and exceptions needed to be reduced if not eliminated. A principle that I liked.

    Time123 (224669)

  126. Qui tam dates back to the time of Socrates and the Texas court system to the time of Judge Roy Bean*. A bad mix. Add a legislature half of who either need deworming or are overdue for their distemper shots ….

    *Not exaggerating by much. The courts with jurisdiction to hear these cases are the Texas District Courts. 492 of them. Each consisting of one judge. Yes, folks, you heard right. Every Texas District Judge is one whole District Court. Very little centralization, very little supervision.

    nk (1d9030)

  127. Time123 (224669) — 9/4/2021 @ 3:52 pm

    Removing standing as a barrier to bring suite makes the government bigger.

    I haven’t looked at the Texas law so I’m not commenting on that. However, removing standing doesn’t make the government bigger or give it more power.

    When individuals have the ability to use the courts as a neutral arbitrator they aren’t expanding the power of the state as that term is usually used. There may be a lot of reasons to object to this law but I don’t think “bigger” government is near the top of the list.

    frosty (f27e97)

  128. NJRob, I like limited government. I have no use for a party that wants to make government bigger just to accomplish different things. Removing standing as a barrier to bring suite makes the government bigger.

    That’s false. You had no problem with government persecuting Christians to advance leftist social values and creating new “rights” out of whole cloth. It’s why you never mention social leftist attacks on society and then dismiss them when others mention the issues.

    NJRob (a815e4)

  129. Can you name one specific?

    Time123 (224669)

  130. If a tool is used by one side successfully what makes you think it won’t be used by the other ?

    Expanding the principle of the Texas abortion law to issues favored by the left, I expect California, Hawaii, New York etc. to enact gun laws in violation of Heller and allow their citizens to enforce the law by suing gun owners, manufacturers, and retailers.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  131. One specific instance where I’ve supported government persecution

    Time123 (224669)

  132. The qui tam laws that NJRobb is talking about make it clear that the relator is suing on behalf of the government. He gets like 10% to 30% of the take, if any, as his commission and the rest goes to the government.

    That’s not the case with the Texas law. Not so much the payoff part but the government wanting to wash its hands of the whole thing. Which it cannot. Court action is government action. Like in libel cases. New York Times v. Sullivan?

    It’s just that hip boots are needed to get though the Texas court system to a point where the law will be struck down across the whole state. Or upheld by the 5-4 as Texas is hoping.

    nk (1d9030)

  133. Shutting down churches “in the name of covid”

    NJRob (a815e4)

  134. @128-

    My point was they are laws enacted by legislatures, not created out of whole cloth by “ AGs that decided” on their own. Whether granting “standing” is a good or bad idea is another question.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  135. Homosexuals suing private businesses.

    NJRob (a815e4)

  136. Homosexuals suing private businesses.

    NJRob (a815e4) — 9/4/2021 @ 4:16 pm

    Private contract dispute.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  137. @138, the cake thing? I was clear in that thread the state can’t rightly compel speech.

    Time123 (224669)

  138. This map of cities that had 100,000 people but now has less is interesting. Assuming the work was done correctly it says a lot about the rust belt.

    https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/phfpjd/all_us_cities_which_used_to_have_more_than_100000/

    Time123 (224669)

  139. Yes, of course the government can grant private causes of action to injured persons. For employment, for discrimination, for being flashed by Clinton, for being groped by Trump. The key phrase is “injured person”. Here, the Texas legislature gave any mook who does not need a guardian ad litem the right to sue to enforce a government policy even though he suffered no injury.

    nk (1d9030)

  140. To enforce an *unconstitutional* government policy. That’s even more key.

    nk (1d9030)

  141. To enforce an *unconstitutional* government policy. That’s even more key.

    nk (1d9030) — 9/4/2021 @ 4:38 pm

    Murdering the unborn is unconstitutional just like Dred Scot was unconstitutional even though it passed muster in the court.

    NJRob (8aef2f)

  142. @136, applying laws about crowd size that are viewpoint neutral are ok. (e.g. fire code and covid restrictions that apply equally to all businesses). Putting stricter rules on churches violates the first amendment and such rules should be struck down.

    Again, I’m not in favor or persecuting religions.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  143. @141-

    Neat map. Those communities would benefit from refugees.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  144. Rip, Probably would.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  145. @144, as I said, the sufficiently pro life will find ways to overlook this laws flaws.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  146. College football is back! Yeah, baby!

    And, my BYU Cougars are on the verge of joining the Big 12 Conference, helping fill the void created by the planned departure of Texas and Oklahoma to the Southeastern Conference. BYU has been an independent for the past decade, getting by with the equivalent of one-night stands. It has tried joining the B12 before, but was rejected like a leper.

    Once Texas and Oklahoma decided to bolt, the remaining B12 members became desperate. As one cougarboarder put it before the decision was made to invite BYU: “Well, the hot girl who stood us up before has now had two failed marriages, has tracks on her arms and is living in a motel with her five kids. If she doesn’t show up this time, its not because she’s too hot.”

    There is no greater sport than college football. (However, JVW is correct about it having issues, one of which is its caste-like structure. That’s an issue for another day, though. In the meantime, Mormons are partying in Vegas like the Mormon Tabernacle Choir singing AC/DC’s “Shook Me All Night Long” in anticipation of tonight’s game against Arizona, to be played in the Las Vegas Raiders stadium. And by partying, I mean wearing knee-length shorts, drinking caffeinated sodas, and yelling “We’re going to kick your hind ends” to any Arizona fans they happen to encounter, followed by a quick apology.)

    norcal (a6130b)

  147. So, what you guys think? “Don’t mess with Texas!” is going to get a companion? “Don’t f*** in Texas?”

    nk (1d9030)

  148. “Don’t kill your children in Texas” has a better ring to it.

    “How dumb/lazy do you have to be to not practice contraception” is too long winded.

    Obudman (676dac)

  149. Oh, heavens no, nk. I almost lost my best friend, a devout Mormon, when I jokingly told him to “Shut the f*** up”, and then gave him some pushback when he asked me to stop using that word. Recent, true story.

    norcal (a6130b)

  150. @150 It always makes me shake my head when people commit capital offenses in Texas. Don’t they realize that Texas carries out the death penalty on a regular basis? I mean, if you want to murder someone, go to Illinois.

    norcal (a6130b)

  151. Nah, just be rich. Remember the “affluenza” case in Texas? The rich kid who killed four people while driving drunk and got probation? That’s what you get with unaccountable judges and now with unaccountable plaintiffs.

    nk (1d9030)

  152. @154 Yikes! I think I’ll pass on ever moving to Texas. Other no-state-income-tax places are still in play, however. Well, probably not Wyoming.

    norcal (a6130b)

  153. Don’t mistake psychologists for scientists. Expert testimony my a$$
    I think the affluenza brat did a couple years for violating terms of probation.
    Confidence is high he will see prison again

    steveg (ebe7c1)

  154. @28 New jeruslem bible says she not the fetus and k.j.v says mischief to women.

    asset (a0268a)

  155. Wyoming is cold. Rode an empty coal car through the prairie in late summer and nearly froze. Found a cozy refrigerator box
    Don’t buy a cabin within a snow mobile ride from a reservation unless you want to refurnish every spring

    steveg (ebe7c1)

  156. @157 Yeah, I was looking at the KJV also. It’s what I grew up with in the Mormon church. Any other versions just seem weird to me.

    norcal (a6130b)

  157. Dont mess with texas its messed up enough already.

    asset (a0268a)

  158. @158 Yes. Colder than a witch’s t!t in a brass bra.

    norcal (a6130b)

  159. Don’t mistake psychologists for scientists. Expert testimony my a$$

    I agree. It was only something for the judge to hang his hat on.

    nk (1d9030)

  160. More bad news.

    My fear is that if production stays low for too long it will drain cash reserves unless cuts in product development are made.

    Looks like chip capacity is still being impacted by covid.

    https://www.autonews.com/manufacturing/now-its-toyotas-turn-crucible

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  161. @163 I’m so glad I flew back to Miami in February and bought my Mustang when I did. I could sell if for more now, with 6,000 miles on it, than I paid for it new.

    norcal (a6130b)

  162. Norcal, did you get the electric? If so how has it been treating you?

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  163. If you like going to funerals, you’ll love Florida Governor DeSantis

    Florida is in the grip of its deadliest wave of COVID-19 since the pandemic began, a disaster driven by the highly contagious delta variant.

    While Florida’s vaccination rate is slightly higher than the national average, the Sunshine State has an outsize population of elderly people, who are especially vulnerable to the virus; a vibrant party scene; and a Republican governor who has taken a hard line against mask requirements, vaccine passports and business shutdowns.

    As far as I can tell, Governor DeSantis believes his policies are making him a strong candidate for the Republican presidential nomination. (Although his popularity in Florida has taken a hit.)

    Jim Miller (edcec1)

  164. Jim, I think he’s correct about the primary. A lot will depend on how northern states do in fall when flu season starts.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  165. Why Congress keeps giving the Pentagon more money than it needs.

    https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2021/08/03/why-congress-keeps-giving-the-pentagon-more-money-than-it-needs/

    So they can abandoned $85 billion worth of toys.

    This, alone, can fuel true insurrection.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  166. Random observation of a Kim Crawford wine commercial: They hire teeny tiny actresses to make the bottles look bigger.

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  167. @171. An old ploy. MadMen 101:

    You do realize they’ve been putting marbles in Campbell Soup print and TV ads for decades so the contents, like alphabet soup letters and various veggies “float” on top.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  168. I realize nothing, DCSCA, I’m just a malleable thing, vulnerable to whatever my telly tells me, with no knowledge of any history or marketing or any of that stuff.

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  169. @173. Then won’t spoil your appetite– or belief system– by revealing what is put on hamburgers and other assorted foods to make them appear tasty.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  170. Byron York
    @ByronYork
    ·
    39m
    The great ‘horse dewormer’ absurdity continues. Oklahoma doctor makes wild claim–no beds for gunshot victims because so many people are being treated for ‘horse dewormer’ OD. Hospital scrambles to clarify: It’s not true. https://rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/gunshot-victims-horse-dewormer-ivermectin-oklahoma-hospitals-covid-1220608/… and https://nhssequoyah.com

    https://twitter.com/ByronYork/status/1434342610039095297

    Clearly York isn’t up to date on urinal cake analogies.

    BuDuh (fdd65e)

  171. “I realize nothing, DCSCA, I’m just a malleable thing, vulnerable to whatever my telly tells me, with no knowledge of any history or marketing or any of that stuff.”

    That’s more ‘anybody who jumps on the DENOUNCE EVIL GENERIC DRUGS media bandwagon whenever revolving door drug company reps use their agents in the CDC and FDA to do so.’ Has nk made his alloted quota of HORSE DRUGS LOL cracks in the thread yet?

    Horse Enhancer (9e8f31)

  172. I found a lot to agree with in this article. Damon Linker poses the age-old question, is rock and roll really music for young people?

    https://theweek.com/feature/1004474/what-rock-fans-dont-want-to-admit

    Gawain's Ghost (c6fd3b)

  173. @165 No, Time123. I got a 2020 (built on 12-3-20 due to Covid delay) V8 Mustang GT in Velocity Blue. It’s a dream. 460 horsepower, and I get 28-29 MPG on the highway.

    norcal (a6130b)

  174. Well, this is interesting.

    https://reason.com/2021/09/03/as-twitter-sex-trafficking-case-proceeds-platforms-face-an-impossible-dilemma/

    Apparently, a couple of teens made a sex video and posted it on Twitter. Now they’re suing Twitter for sex trafficking. Isn’t that a strange twist on the law?

    Look, what these two teens did was really stupid. But I fail to see how Twitter can be held responsible for their irresonsible behavior. It’s an open platform. What did these two kids think would happen if they broadcast a video of themselves having sex to the world?

    I was a teen once, about 45 years ago, and I did some stupid things, but nothing this stupid.

    I had a motorcycle before my freshman year. I had a car before my sophomore year. So I had an independent means of transportation, when I was fourteen and fifteen. I also had access to a private pool, plus my own room, which was totally secure–I had the only keys–in a condo. I had it all.

    That’s why I passed a law on the first day of high school. Do not date any girl at this school. Of course, I, my sister and brothers had friends, boys and girls, who were always coming over on the weekends to go swimming. I’m not talking about that.

    I’m talking about dating. First day of school, 9th grade, I’m sitting in the cafeteria with the band and drama squads–at the elite table, where only the popular kids sat–and these teens are going on and on, gossipping. “Do you know who so-and-so went out with? She’s such a sl#t! Do you know what so-and-so did? He’s such an @sshole.!”

    So I passed a law in my kingdom–do not go out with anyone from this school. I had already seen the list of tournaments the drama squad was going to–30, plus one-act play. I decided, right then, right there, that I would only date girls from other schools I met on drama tournaments.

    I certainly had the means. Hey, a motorcyle ride on a Sunday morning, an afternoon at the pool, and an evening spent making out on a love seat in a secure room with a stereo and an album collection. Or a car ride to the beach! I was the baddest bad boy in the state the summer of ’78. So many girls, you have no idea. It helps if you’re an award-winning actor.

    As long as these girls understand the law. Where we go, what we say to and do together, is between us, and us alone. Our relationship is not the subject of cafeteria gossip.

    If you doubt my method, look at Mark Harmon and Pam Dawber. This guy, he was the quarterback of the UC Trojans, lead them to a national championship, before he went into Hollywood. This girl, she was a Broadway actress, who also did voice overs for children’s cartoons, before she went into TV. She had the No.1 show on network, as the co-star of Mork and Mindy.

    Somehow they met. He’s this championship quarterback and Hollywood star; already named the Sexiest Man in the World on the cover of People Magazine. She’s this star actress, of such great beauty and talent. They fell in love, got married and started a family.

    And that’s the end of the story. You don’t ever hear or see anything controversial about them in the news. They don’t show off at the Academy Awards.

    They don’t do that. They just love each other. And that’s what it’s all about. Loving each other, forming a family, building a life together. Gossip at the cafeteria is absolutely meaningless.

    Gawain's Ghost (c6fd3b)

  175. Love it, GG. It’s good to see you return in fine form. I’m getting back into the dating game soon, and I haven’t forgotten your advice. I copied and pasted it so I have easy access to it.

    I really need to stop this all night movie watching.

    norcal (a6130b)

  176. Another great story GG!

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  177. BuDuh, So there aren’t enough members of team MAGA eating horse deworming paste to /actually/ use up all the hospital beds?

    If that’s not a heartwarming example of the movements greatness I don’t know what is. 😂

    Kidding aside Rolling Stone should fire the reporter that got this story wrong if they didn’t ask the hospital for a comment.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  178. I’m kind of flexible (but not malleable) about ivermectin.
    No, no, no, not for treatment of Covid! It’s no good for that.
    For the parasites you might get from the same people that gave you Covid.
    I think I’ve said that before.
    The chances are high.
    Should you test positive for Covid, do take care of it with the treatments and medications your doctors recommend.
    But also do get yourself checked for the trailer park pestilence.

    nk (1d9030)

  179. And that’s the way it is, on this, the sixth day of forgetting the Kabul Cockup.

    nk (1d9030)

  180. Time123 (9f42ee) — 9/5/2021 @ 4:00 am

    Have you seen any news stories that tell you how many people are self medicating with ivermectin?

    frosty (f27e97)

  181. Frosty, I haven’t. Don’t think it matters. We already have policies that people shouldn’t take animal medicine. If morons want to eat horse deworming paste rather then take medicine that will actually prevent or treat covid I don’t know that we need new policy. Just shake your head, hope for the best, or laugh at the village idiot. However you like.

    Time123 (224669)

  182. It was the UCLA Bruins, Gawain’s Ghost, and there is a lot of scenery waving poms and sitting in the stands, even in v.2021 southern California (I watched UCLA upset LSU), still Harmon did the wise thing.

    urbanleftbehind (4a9941)

  183. Kidding aside Rolling Stone should fire the reporter that got this story wrong if they didn’t ask the hospital for a comment.

    Time123 (9f42ee) — 9/5/2021 @ 4:00 am

    The US government can’t even plan a properly-executed withdrawal from a foreign country anymore without botching it. The press mostly passes around stories on Twitter like the little gossip queens they are until the stories become conventional wisdom, and are easily duped due to their confirmation bias, as journalism schools teach their graduates to be activists in the interests of left-wing causes, not objective thinkers and investigators.

    The people running these institutions are all part of the same class of overeducated, arrogant, fart-sniffing popinjays who think their every utterance is distilled wisdom. It’s not a surprise that a reporter for a mainstream mag like Rolling Stone would be too lazy to actually bother with verifying their just-so story; this is the same mag that published the UVa rape story that read like it was a rejected Law and Order: SVU script.

    Factory Working Orphan (2775f0)

  184. Damon Linker poses the age-old question, is rock and roll really music for young people?

    Going by the musical preferences of my kids, the answer is no. There’s a Woodstock-live concert in my area, and it’s mostly old hippies.

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  185. I didn’t know Harmon and Dawber were married. They were in a few NCIS episodes last season.

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  186. there is no evidence that it helps with Covid-19 but rather it can be harmful when used on humans.

    You have to twist the evidence to say it may be harmful. This is black propaganda, no more valid than saying the vaccine is harmful or that booster shots are useless.

    What maybe might be harmful is too large a dose (and of course they’re not telling people what the proper dose of commercially available veterinary ivermectin might be because their goal is not to tell the truth but to deter people from using it and to scare people and they need to lie a little if they want to be more effective) or not carefully prepared ivermectin, since drugs for humans are prepared under more sterile conditions or are supposed to be but they don;t want to kill animals either..

    There are clinical trials running to test it for use in preventing Covid. Which are however coming under attack but we get these kinds of attacks against medical treatments or diets that work. he food pyramid, as a good diet, was a BIG LIE. Not a mistake.

    One study with problems or with fraud doesn’t make all the other studies go away/ (what’s unique about the possibly fraudulent studies should be suspect, but not what is not.

    https://www.thelancet.com/journals/eclinm/article/PIIS2589-5370(20)30464-8/fulltext

    It seems to merely shorten recovery time and relieve symptoms. Ivermectin is supposed to be more useful for prevention. (it’s too weak tea for much benefit in treatment at least at standard doses)

    https://www.nature.com/articles/s41429-020-0336-z

    Ivermectin proposes many potentials effects to treat a range of diseases, with its antimicrobial, antiviral, and anti-cancer properties as a wonder drug. It is highly effective against many microorganisms including some viruses. In this comprehensive systematic review, antiviral effects of ivermectin are summarized including in vitro and in vivo studies over the past 50 years. Several studies reported antiviral effects of ivermectin on RNA viruses such as Zika, dengue, yellow fever, West Nile, Hendra, Newcastle, Venezuelan equine encephalitis, chikungunya, Semliki Forest, Sindbis, Avian influenza A, Porcine Reproductive and Respiratory Syndrome, Human immunodeficiency virus type 1, and severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2. Furthermore, there are some studies showing antiviral effects of ivermectin against DNA viruses such as Equine herpes type 1, BK polyomavirus, pseudorabies, porcine circovirus 2, and bovine herpesvirus 1….Ivermectin has been used for several years to treat many infectious diseases in mammals. It has a good safety profile with low adverse effects when orally prescribed. Ivermectin was identified in late 1970s and first approved for animal use in 1981. Its potential use in humans was confirmed a few years later. Subsequently, William C. Campbell and Satoshi Ōmura who discovered and developed this medication received the 2015 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine…

    …A recent in vitro study showed that ivermectin was active against COVID-19-infected cell lines [15].

    Later we read:

    https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02081-w

    Some view it as a stopgap until vaccines become available in their areas, even though it has not yet been proven effective; scientists worry that it will also be seen as an alternative to vaccines, which are highly effective.

    So let’s lie or make up accusations to prevent that. Vaccines are effective, but nor immediately. In the world of medicine, “not proven” doesn’t mean what you might think it means. They mean not proven beyond a reasonable doubt complete with trial delays and exclusionary rules of evidence.

    Ivermectin has no special properties with regard to parasites, It was approved for that but it’s generally accepted that can fight or prevent many viral infections as stated in my first Nature reference.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  187. Of course, for Covid, no matter what, much better are the Regeneron monoclonal antibodies, or similar antibodies produced by other companies, unless the virus mutates around that.

    It’s being tested (half get placebo) for prevention and for cure.

    https://investor.regeneron.com/news-releases/news-release-details/regenerons-regen-cov2-first-antibody-cocktail-covid-19-receive

    This is what DCSCA is waiting for. Periodic pills given every three months or so, might be better , I think, for children aged 6 months to 4 or 5 years than to try to vaccinate them. And if someone doesn’t want to take the vaccine, offer this.

    The only argument for ivermectin might be that it’s more available than the monoclonal antibodies, and maybe cheaper. Of course, too much demand might create a shortage.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  188. Afghans for the most part are ethnically Caucasian. Problem is they are members of a 7th century death cult and given to clannish cousin marriage that makes them ill-suited for assimilation. Unless you like more Omar Mateens.Nonetheless, I nominate Pacific Palisades, the Hamptons, the West Village, Park Slope, The Upper West Side, Georgetown, Chevy Chase, Martha’s Vinyard, the Chicago neighborhood where Valier Jarrett, Obama and Farakhan have luxury homes paid for by Tony Rezko, Malibu, Chappaqua and Cupertino as great places to establish refugee camps. Give the elite the diversity they profess to love, and give it to them good and hard. Life is not all flavorful hummus and exotic cheap lawn care. Embrace it.

    Something to behold is the Biden MisAdminstration hectoring Americans to no end with COVID restictions and vaccine beggary while allowing Afghans and the southern border mad dash of untested and uvaccinated future Dem voters.

    Pat Toomey takes his one vote(probably in a DC exburb going forward) with him to a desk down at the Chamber of Commerce. At least he will no longer have to pretend to care about the great unwashed rubes in PA. What has he ever really conserved?

    Bugg (024e40)

  189. Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-Insurrectionist) falsely suggests elections are ‘rigged,’ says there will be ‘bloodshed’ if system continues on its path
    ……..
    “The things that we are wanting to fight for, it doesn’t matter if our votes don’t count,” Cawthorn told the crowd, according to a video of the event posted by the (Macon County (NC) Republican Party) on its Facebook page and circulated on Twitter by a Democratic congressional staffer. “Because, you know, if our election systems continue to be rigged and continue to be stolen, then it’s going to lead to one place — and it’s bloodshed.”

    The video has been taken offline as of (August 31st).

    Cawthorn suggested that he was prepared to take up arms against his fellow Americans if necessary to combat voter fraud. There is no evidence that widespread fraud took place in the 2020 election.

    “I will tell you, as much as I am willing to defend our liberty at all costs, there is nothing that I would dread doing more than having to pick up arms against a fellow American. And the way that we can have recourse against that is if we all passionately demand that we have election security in all 50 states,” Cawthorn said, to applause from the crowd.
    ……….
    Cawthorn told the crowd, “I will remove Joe Biden from office, and then, when Kamala Harris inevitably screws up, we will take them down, one at a time.”
    ………
    Cawthorn also used the terms “political prisoners” and “political hostages” to describe those who arrested in the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.

    At one point, a member of the crowd asked Cawthorn, “When are you going to call us to Washington again?”

    In response, Cawthorn appeared to suggest that plans for a gathering were in the works, although he did not provide details.
    “That — we are actively working on that one,” he said. “I don’t have an answer to that one right yet. But we are actively working on this. We have a few plans in motion that I can’t make public right now.”
    >>>>>>>>>>>>

    Luke Ball, a spokesman for Cawthorn, said in a statement (on August 30th) that the lawmaker was “in no way supporting or advocating for any form of violence.”

    Uh-huh. Right. Either he has the courage of his convictions or he’s just a blowhard.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  190. Go-to Lawyer for Capitol Riot Defendants Disappears
    The mysterious disappearance of the lawyer John Pierce began (August 24th) prosecutors say, when he missed a hearing for one of the many cases where he is representing a defendant in the Capitol riot investigation. The young associate who took his place said that Mr. Pierce had a “conflict.” At the time, no one seemed to give it much mind.
    ……….
    On (August 25th), his associate told a judge in one case that Mr. Pierce had gotten Covid-19 and was in the hospital on a ventilator — but only after telling a prosecutor in another case that Mr. Pierce had been in a car accident. That same evening, a different associate told a reporter that Mr. Pierce had in fact been hospitalized, but was getting care for “dehydration and exhaustion.”

    Finally, on (August 30th)— after Mr. Pierce had still failed to emerge — the government got involved. Federal prosecutors issued letters to several judges in 17 Capitol riot cases, informing them that no one in the Justice Department had heard from Mr. Pierce in a week and that “multiple” phone numbers for his law firm appeared to have been disconnected.
    ……….
    Mr. Pierce’s unexplained absence was only the latest twist in his outsized role in defending those accused of participating in the Capitol attack. His clients — among them members of the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers militia — have stood out not only for their number, but also for the scorched-earth battle that he has vowed to wage on their behalf.
    ………
    While the government has not yet weighed in on the merits on his claims, prosecutors did express concern in their letters filed on Monday about the young associate, Ryan Joseph Marshall, who has been standing in for Mr. Pierce at the hearings he has missed.

    For one thing, Mr. Marshall is not a licensed lawyer, prosecutors said, and has taken actions on behalf of clients “that he is not permitted” to take. Moreover, they went on, it remains unclear if and when Mr. Marshall will be able to get his law license given that he is under indictment in two criminal cases accusing him of corruption, theft and fraud in Pennsylvania.
    ………
    Perhaps the best example of ….his plan to raise a so-called public authority defense for some of his clients, arguing that they cannot be held accountable for the Capitol attack because they were following official U.S. policy.

    But Mr. Pierce will most likely not point to the role that former President Donald J. Trump had in whipping up supporters to storm the building. Instead, he has said that he believes that F.B.I. operatives and intelligence personnel, working undercover, incited the crowd to violence. And he has urged other defense lawyers to help him find proof.
    ………..

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  191. The photograph Rolling Stone used for their false ivermectin ER story is from January, via the AP and was for a vaccine drive for African Americans by a church.

    https://twitter.com/fuzzytaylor235/status/1434330689273536512?s=21

    The original RS smear/article is still up.

    Trump D Syndrome’s Delta variant is anti-vax D Syndrome.

    Obudman (676dac)

  192. joe cellar surrenders to the tally band and the republicans surrender to joe cellar
    cave man education for the victory
    lowest point education for the big spending woke bastiges

    mg (8cbc69)

  193. @196, the RS piece should stay up, with the update showing the article is crap. Taking it down would make it easier for them to hide their screw up.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  194. States That Cut Unemployment Benefits Saw Limited Impact on Job Growth
    …….
    Nonfarm payrolls rose 1.33% in July from April in the 25 states that ended the benefits and 1.37% in the other 25 states and the District of Columbia, the Journal analysis of Labor Department data showed. The payroll figures are taken from a government survey of employers. The analysis compared July totals with April, before governors in May started announcing plans to end or reduce the benefits during the summer.
    …….
    “If the question is, ‘Is UI the key thing that’s holding back the labor market recovery?’ The answer is no, definitely not, based on the available data,” said Peter Ganong, a University of Chicago economist, referring to unemployment insurance.
    ……..
    Economists at Goldman Sachs analyzed the behavior of workers in the July jobs report after adjusting for age, gender, marital status, education, household income, industry and occupation of a respondent’s current or prior job. They said they found “clear evidence that benefit expiration increased the rate at which unemployed workers became employed.”
    …….
    Economists generally agree the enhanced benefits caused some people to stay out of the labor market, but they also point to several other factors that have held back job growth this year, including family-care responsibilities, school closures, an imbalance of available jobs and worker location and skills, fear of Covid-19 and employee retirements.
    …….
    State-level comparisons show how states that cut off benefits and those that didn’t have so far seen roughly similar job growth.

    Take Texas and California, two states with large populations and diversified economies. Texas, which reopened in March and terminated benefits at the end of June, saw 1.45% payroll growth in July from April. California, which lifted all restrictions in mid-June and has maintained enhanced benefits, saw a 1.73% gain.

    Arizona, which cut the extra $300-a-week benefit in July, and New Mexico, which maintained all federal benefits, saw payroll employment gains of 2.63% and 2.50%, respectively, over the April-to-July period.
    ………

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  195. Judge Dismisses Hunter Biden Laptop Guy’s Defamation Lawsuit with Prejudice, Forces Him to Pay Twitter’s Attorneys’ Fees Under Anti-SLAPP Law
    ……..
    …….. The lawsuit was dismissed with prejudice, meaning it cannot be filed again, and the plaintiff was ordered to pay Twitter’s attorneys’ fees.

    John Paul Mac Isaac sued the technology giant (and a wholly-owned subsidiary) in February. He argued that Twitter’s decision to lock The New York Post‘s account while Post staffers “attempted to post and disseminate its exposé [about the lurid contents of the laptop] on the social media platform” was akin to calling him a hacker because Twitter cited its rationale for the time-limited ban as a violation of Twitter’s rules against “distribution of hacked material.”

    “Further actions taken by Defendant Twitter in response to the NY Posts’s story included limiting the distribution of the story by others on its social media platform pursuant to the same policy thereby spreading the belief among its users, including Florida resident users, that the Plaintiffs is a hacker,” the lawsuit, filed with the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, alleged.
    ……..
    ……..“ As a result of [Twitter’s] conduct, [Mac Isaac] received threats to his person and property, and was forced to close his business.”
    ……..
    The court ruled in Twitter’s favor and granted their motion to dismiss the case because none of Twitter’s explanations identified Mac Isaac.
    ………

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  196. Let’s listen to some kooks talk about that “horse de-wormer drug.”

    felipe (484255)

  197. 193. Bugg (024e40) — 9/5/2021 @ 7:45 am

    Afghans for the most part are ethnically Caucasian.

    They are, but I am not sure the United States Census Bureau would classify therm as that, since Afghanistan is outside the usual boundaries of the Middle East, which ends with Iran. They might be considered Asian.

    Problem is they are members of a 7th century death cult and given to clannish cousin marriage that makes them ill-suited for assimilation.

    Not true about the death. Cousin marriage and polygamy happens but depends where. Some girls were given in marriage to get them out of the country but evidently did not expect their husbands to accept that as real and complained in Qatar of being raped by their “husbands”

    You talk like everybody would be against it, and everyone agrees that it would be harmful. It’s not like letting criminals out of jail.

    The refugee camps in the United States are being established at military bases – one in New Jersey. More than Biden wanted.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  198. The United States did not give the Taliban a full list of people they wanted to take.

    I think Biden authorized the names of some people in convoys the United States wanted to take out to be given to the Taliban And the reason was in order that the Taliban should not let through others in their party.

    Otherwise they could have just said let this bus through without identifying who was important to the United States.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  199. 34. JRH (52aed3) — 9/4/2021 @ 6:31 am

    Anyway the “bitter water” only works if God works supernaturally to make it kill the fetus, which, God being God, He wouldn’t do. (would He?)

    At some point in the second temple era they said it didn’t work because (of if) the man had ben unfaithful.

    In the vast majority of cases (and remember this is a case where a ma is suspicious but there is no proof) the woman wouldn’t have cheated so it served to prevent a man from possibly killing his wife.

    One of several commandments that are there because of what the effect of having such a law would be and not for itself.

    had beeen unfaithful.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  200. 142. nk (1d9030) — 9/4/2021 @ 4:35 pm

    the Texas legislature gave any mook who does not need a guardian ad litem the right to sue to enforce a government policy even though he suffered no injury.

    The key thing about this is that it is enforced by the abortion provider’s own lawyers and there is not a lawsuit in sight. Texas Right to Life has no plans to bring any lawsuits.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  201. “the RS piece should stay up, with the update showing the article is crap. Taking it down would make it easier for them to hide their screw up.”

    Wrong on just about every level.

    On the original tweet, which is the only thing most people see (still up and still being re-tweeted across the internet) it’s still the original bulls**t headline and hoax photo that fills the screen. This is what you see:

    Gunshot victims left waiting as horse dewormer overdoses overwhelm Oklahoma hospitals, doctor says

    No mention of the ‘screw up’

    For the 5% of people who click on the link and go to the Rolling Stone site you also only see the original expanded headline:

    Gunshot Victims Left Waiting as Horse Dewormer Overdoses Overwhelm Oklahoma Hospitals, Doctor Says
    The ERs are so backed up that gunshot victims were having hard times getting to facilities where they can get definitive care and be treated,” Dr. Jason McElyea said

    without any mention of the correction, you have to scroll down past two ads to see it.

    In other words, the smear is still doing the job for which it was intended, which is all that matters to RS.

    Don’t let anyone ever accuse you of understanding journalism or journalistic ethics.

    Obudman (cb4106)

  202. Another example of a bad infrastructure project:

    https://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/ny-edit-gateway-20210829-sgmv33d3gvfd5eumjzunjjsn2u-story.html

    Hochul, stop Gateway con: Governor must swim against the current on the multi-billion-dollar infrastructure boondoggle

    The logic of Uncle Sam footing half of Amtrak’s proposed Gateway Hudson rail tunnel (now costing $10.1 billion), and New York and New Jersey equally splitting the other half, falls in the river when New York is forced to pay $700 million more because Jersey is wasting that much on a vastly overpriced bridge on which New York had zero say.

    Gov. Hochul, new to the Gateway boondoggle shenanigans of Amtrak and Trenton, should fund 50% of the local expense of the new tubes and fixing the current tubes — that would be just over $2 billion — and no more. And she must insist the rehab begins immediately using repair-in-place.

    NJTransit’s Portal North Bridge is pegged at $1.8 billion, even though NJT is envisioning a twin Hackensack River span for just $431 million. “Scale it back,” we’ve said many times, as the law puts New York on the hook for half the local share, but have been told equally many times by both states that Jersey was going it alone. Until now, it appeared that Gov. Phil Murphy was only going to waste Jersey taxpayers’ money and Washington’s on a bridge that costs four times as much as it should. Hochul must not allow New Yorkers to subsidize that foolishness….

    Beside ripping off New York, we’d bet Gateway’s full price, $34.4 billion, that the submission also claims that one of Amtrak’s current Hudson tubes is being closed for repairs frequently on weekends for 55 hours, from 10 p.m. Friday until 5 a.m. Monday.

    For years, Amtrak has lied to the feds in filings, claiming full closures “each” weekend or “many” weekends. The truth, proved by Amtrak’s own tunnel logs, is that in the last four years, there have been full closures for repairs almost never — just four weekends, 2% of the time. Let’s see what they submitted.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  203. Massive randomized study is proof that surgical masks limit coronavirus spread, authors say
    ……..
    The preprint paper, which tracked more than 340,000 adults across 600 villages in rural Bangladesh, is by far the largest randomized study on the effectiveness of masks at limiting the spread of coronavirus infections.
    Its authors say this provides conclusive, real-world evidence for what laboratory work and other research already strongly suggest: mask-wearing can have a significant impact on limiting the spread of symptomatic covid-19, the disease caused by the virus.
    ……..
    The researchers estimate that among a group of Bangladeshi adults in the study that were encouraged to wear masks, mask-wearing increased by 28.8 percentage points after the intervention. When tracked, this group saw a 9.3 percent reduction in symptomatic covid-19 seroprevalence, meaning the virus was confirmed by bloodwork, as well as a further 11.9 percent reduction in covid-19 symptoms.

    The study’s authors………. a globe-spanning team that includes researchers from Yale, Stanford and the Bangladeshi nonprofit GreenVoice, emphasized that this did not mean masks were only 9.3 percent effective.
    ………
    Independent experts that were asked to look at the research praised its scale; some suggested that it might be the most convincing argument yet for mask-wearing.

    “This is an incredibly challenging but important study to pull off,” said Megan L. Ranney, an emergency medicine physician and professor at Brown University who was not involved with this research. “Anti-mask people keep saying, ‘Where’s the randomized controlled trial?’ Well, here you go.”

    “It’s not just modeling or looking back at studies,” said Lawrence Gostin, faculty director of the O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law at Georgetown University, who also was not involved. “This is the gold standard of scientific knowledge.”
    ………
    ………. About 178,000 Bangladeshi villagers were in an intervention group and encouraged to use masks. An additional 163,000 were in a control group, where no interventions were made.

    The project assessed the levels of mask-wearing and physical distancing through direct observations from plain-clothed staff in the community at mosques, markets and other gathering places.

    Mask-wearing had been mandated in Bangladesh since March 2020, though adoption remained limited. The researchers found that they were able to increase mask-wearing in the intervention group from 13 percent to 42 percent — an increase of 28.8 percentage points. The effect was observed and found to be consistent over 10 weeks and persisted after the interventions ended.

    The group credited a “cocktail” of four interventions that helped substantially increase mask usage in the community: providing no-cost masks delivered door to door; offering information about the benefits of masks; reinforcement of mask-wearing; and endorsement of masks by trusted local leaders.
    ………..
    Link to study.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  204. Regeneron.
    Monoclonal antibodies.
    Made from 6 to 9-week old aborted fetuses.
    Aborted, not miscarried.
    Healthy fetuses, elective abortions.
    Abbot took monoclonal antibodies after he signed the new Texas no-abortions-after-6 weeks-law.
    DeSantis who does not like masks and vaccine passports is promoting monoclonal antibodies like his top donor is heavily invested in them.
    Trumpcakes, hypocrites and worse, much worse.

    nk (1d9030)

  205. The United States did not give the Taliban a full list of people they wanted to take.

    Just $85 billion worth of equipment — that they’re willing to admit to. Total fvck-ups and wholly unacceptable. Heads must roll at the Pentagon and Central Command.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  206. The total cost of the Afghanistan war, not including the bugout, is $2.3 trillion. $85 billion, which is really $24 billion to people who care what the number really is, is a pittance.

    With “only” 13 dead, Biden’s casualties are the lowest of the last four Presidents, with the most by far under Obama.

    See all good people turn their heads away sooo satisfied … I’m on my way.

    nk (1d9030)

  207. $85 billion, which is really $24 billion to people who care what the number really is, is a pittance.

    Except it’s not.

    Like $2000 is $1400; Like 90% is 100%; like drivin’ 18 wheelers; like goin’ to a mass shooting site in Pittsburgh; and to prison w/Mandela; like plagiarism across the board; like faking law school standings; like being a ‘lying dog-faced pony soldier’ ’bout Corn Pop; like using your damn dead kid, who died of natural causes, as a crutch when confronting families of 13 American military service personnel he got killed… while leaving 10% of Americans behind and claiming it a success; like failing to ‘stop the virus cold.’ Like looking at your watch whern the dead come home to Dover… The list is endless.

    He’s incompetent.
    He’s dangerous.
    He’s a bum.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  208. FoxNewsSunday
    @FoxNewsSunday

    STUCK ON PLANES:
    @RepMcCaul
    says Americans and Afghan interpreters have been held hostage by the Taliban for days at the Mazar-i-Sharif International Airport in Afghanistan.

    https://twitter.com/FoxNewsSunday/status/1434518364597198850?s=20

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  209. https://www.forbes.com/sites/adamandrzejewski/2021/08/23/staggering-costs–us-military-equipment-left-behind-in-afghanistan/?sh=7ef1eef741db

    The ‘Commander In Chief’ owes the American people- taxpayers in Scranton and Wilmington, too- an explanation.

    Hey Mushhead McSquinty: ‘C’mon, man: what’s the deal????’

    “I trust his judgement.” – Nancy Pelosi 8/25/21

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  210. New: CBS has learned multiple flights are being held on the ground at the Mazar-i-Sharif airport in Northern Afghanistan… by the Taliban. 1/

    Ruffini
    @EenaRuffini
    An email from the State Department to members of congress — and viewed by CBS — acknowledged that charter flights are still on the ground at the Mazar-i-Sharif airstrip and have permission to land in Doha “if and when the Taliban agrees to takeoff. 2/
    7:54 AM · Sep 5, 2021

    Ruffini
    @EenaRuffini

    Sep 5, 2021
    Replying to @EenaRuffini
    “The Taliban is basically holding them hostage to get more out of the Americans,” a senior congressional source told CBS News. 3/

    Ruffini
    @EenaRuffini
    The group Ascend, an NGO that teaches young women leadership through athletics, told CBS News they have two planes that have been waiting for six days ready to take between 600 and 1200 people — including 19 American citizens and two permanent residents. 4/
    7:54 AM · Sep 5, 2021

    Ruffini
    @EenaRuffini
    ·
    Sep 5, 2021
    Replying to @EenaRuffini
    “The U.S. airfield in Qatar that has been standing by, ready to receive, is now beginning to pack up,” Marina LeGree, the executive director, told CBS News. “We hope visibility will add pressure to force a solution. Six days of talks are not encouraging.” 5/

    Ruffini
    @EenaRuffini
    The State Department advised members of congress to tell groups seeking to evacuate out of Mazar-i-Sharif that the US does not have personnel on the ground in that location and does not control the airspace. 6/
    7:54 AM · Sep 5, 2021

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  211. After the 2016 election, the left spent four years casting doubt on the outcome in order to make Trump’s win look illegitimate. After the 2020 election, the left’s allies in social media made it a thought crime to question Biden’s win.

    In the California recall election, the media is already setting up a narrative to question the outcome in case Larry Elder wins.

    https://legalinsurrection.com/2021/09/media-setting-the-table-to-question-outcome-of-california-recall-if-larry-elder-wins/

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  212. Thought I would put out some comments about the recent Texas abortion decision as I’ve not seen much at this site yet.

    The law bans abortion around six weeks of pregnancy (no exceptions for rape or incest) and deputizes any private citizen in the country who thinks an abortion has taken place in violation of this rule to sue abortion providers or anyone who has facilitated the procedure (yeah even someone who offers a ride or volunteers a shift at work). If they win in civil court, they get at least $10,000 per illegal abortion. So the wrinkle is that it’s not the state tasked with enforcement….which would quickly get challenged in federal court….but private citizens making claims in civil court. The state then makes it so the claimant does not have to show a particularized harm, eliminating any question about standing. The idea is that the threat of suits will shutdown 85% of abortions as the law also removes the usual conservative proviso that loser pays the winner’s legal fees. So an abortion provider could face an avalanche of suits….perhaps even multiple for a single abortion procedure.

    I suspect that the underlying law will be found unconstitutional soon enough (I mean it directly imposes an “undue burden” and goes against Casy), but it seems to be inspiring similar nutty bounty laws which will create a mess for state courts. It’s disappointing that the Supreme Court has effectively said that if you create a Rube Goldberg enforcement mechanism for a facially unconstitutional law….be it right or left leaning….we’ll let it push forward and give the thumbs up for whatever mischief occurs in the interim…before it ultimately gets shut down. For instance, natural miscarriages in Texas after 6-weeks that require a D&E are now against the law…as are cases where severe fetal defects make a live birth impossible.

    Could we see similar private-attorney-general laws in Massachusetts targeting gun purchases to scoot around Heller and MacDonald? Can we see it for mask compliance? It’s nutty….and won’t take off (likely) but it’s interesting that the SC majority endorsed this near-term uncertainty. I’d say it’s not the way to go. I guess we’ll learn more with Dobbs next year…..

    AJ_Liberty (a4ff25)

  213. It’ll die of exsanguination after the lawyers do what they’re best known for.

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  214. People are sharing posts with misinformation claiming that Trump’s monoclonal antibodies were made from fetal stem cells. This is not accurate. The treatment was not made from fetal stem cells. The efficacy of the antibodies were tested with a cell line that was originally derived from human fetal tissue cells.

    Rumors are circulating claiming that President Donald Trump‘s monoclonal antibody treatment from Regeneron was made with human fetal or embryonic stem cells. Regeneron told Heavy that their antibody cocktail was not developed using human fetal or embryonic stem cells, but it did use “immortalized epithelial cells” that were originally derived from human embryonic kidney cells at Stanford in the 1980s. Regeneron told Heavy that these were “immortalized epithelial cells” and not stem cells. These cells weren’t used to create the antibody cocktail itself, but they were used to test its potency. Those HEK293T cells were originally derived from fetal tissue from “a healthy aborted fetus of unknown parenthood,” according to the HEK293 website.

    Alexandra Bowie of Regeneron told Heavy that Regeneron did not create its REGN-COV2 treatment using human embryonic stem cells.

    She wrote: “This particular discovery program (REGN-COV2) did not involve human stem cells or ESCs.”

    According to a September 29 statement from Regeneron, the antibody cocktail has been shown to reduce viral load and alleviate symptoms in non-hospitalized patients. It’s showing positive trends in reducing medical visits, according to Regeneron. Regeneron wrote: “This trial is part of a larger program that also includes studies of REGN-COV2 for the treatment of hospitalized patients, and for prevention of infection in people who have been exposed to COVID-19 patients.”

    Another question circulating involves the use of HEK293T cells in the production of the REGN-COV2 antibody cocktail. Two publications in Science Magazine discussed the creation of antibody cocktails for SARS-CoV-2 and mentioned HEK293T cells.

    Bowie clarified for Heavy how the HEK293T cells were used:

    They are referring to use of the 293T cell line, which was made at Stanford in the ‘80s and was originally derived from human embryonic kidney cells. These are immortalized epithelial cells – not stem cells. These are very commonly used cells in research, and most published research involves use of 293s. In our case, these 293T cells were transfected and used in production of a ‘pseudoparticle’ that mimics the virus’ Spike protein and allowed us to test neutralization ability of our antibodies against the virus.

    The HEK 293T cells were used in testing the potency of the treatment, though not used in the development of the treatment itself.

    Regeneron told Technology Review that the HEK 293T cells weren’t used to create the antibody cocktail itself, but they were used to test the potency of the antibodies. The HEK 293T cells originated from kidney tissue from an abortion in the Netherlands in the 1970s. The cells have been dividing in a lab (thus “immortalized”) since the 1970s, Technology Review noted.

    You can learn more about the HEK293 cell line here. The cells are commonly used in cancer research, for example. The HEK293 website notes the origin of the cell line:

    The line was cultured by scientist Alex Van der Eb in the early 1970s at his lab at the University of Leiden, Holland. The transformation was executed by Frank Graham, another scientist Van der Eb’s lab who invented the calcium phosphate method for transfecting cells. The source of the cells was a healthy aborted fetus of unknown parenthood. The name HEK293 is thusly named because it was Frank Graham’s 293rd experiment.

    You can see a description of the 293T cell line here, provided on the Millipore Sigma website. It notes:

    293T cell line is a stable clone derivative of the human embryonic kidney (HEK) 293 cell line. It expresses the large T antigen of simian virus 40 (SV40)… The 293T cell line was created in the laboratory of Michele Calos by transfection of a sub-line of adenovirus-immortalized human embryonic kidney cells with a gene encoding the SV40T-antigen and a neomycin resistance gene. The cell line is competent for replication of vectors carrying the SV40 origin of replication. The line also has favourable tissue culture, transfection, DNA replication, gene expression, and protein production properties. It gives high titres when used to produce many viral vectors such as oncoretroviruses and lentiviruses… HEK293T is used for large-scale vector production, displays increased cell growth and is efficient for transfection experiments when compared to HEK293 cells.”

    Regeneron told Technology Review and Heavy that many labs use these 293T cells to create virus-like particles with a spike protein similar to SARS-CoV-2. Bowie said that the cell lines aren’t considered fetal tissue because they are divided cells that grew from a cell line from the 1970s.

    Bowie told Technology Review: “It’s how you want to parse it. But the 293T cell lines available today are not considered fetal tissue, and we did not otherwise use fetal tissue.”

    Dr. Pamela Bjorkman, Professor of Biology and Biological Engineering at the California Institute of Technology, told Heavy: “It is accurate to say that the cell line was originally derived from human fetal tissue cells (HEK means human embryonic kidney), but these are NOT embryonic stem cells. They’ve been used for many research purposes, including early studies of gene expression, They are now mainly used to produce proteins, so my lab and many others use them to make a variety of proteins (in our case, mainly antibodies and viral proteins).”“

    https://heavy.com/news/regeneron-monoclonal-antibodies-not-from-human-fetal-embryo-stem-cells/

    Obudman (cb4106)

  215. Col.
    One would think silicone valley already has this taken care of.

    mg (8cbc69)

  216. Now hostages?

    Paging James Earl Biden.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  217. Like Florida Governor DeSantis, Texas Governor Greg Abbott is trying to entice Trumpistas to support him. It’s not working out well for Abbott, either:

    New polling conducted in August by the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas at Austin found that just 41 percent of state residents approve of Abbott’s job performance. Meanwhile, half (50 percent) said they disapprove of the Republican governor’s leadership.
    . . .
    Texas currently leads all U.S. states with the highest average number of new daily COVID-19 infections. Over the past two weeks, the southwestern state has averaged well over 19,000 new daily infections, according to The New York Times tracker. More than 14,500 people are hospitalized in the state, and an average of about 240 Texans are dying per day.
    . . .
    “Governor [Greg] Abbott has failed us. A Republican state legislature has failed us,” David Portugal, a cardiologist in Sugarland, Texas, said during a Committee to Protect Health Care webinar, Houston Public Media reported on Friday.

    “These leaders should be held accountable and be asked to explain how they can justify taking actions that are killing their fellow Texans,” Portugal added.

    Voters, even in Florida and Texas, object to policies that lead to unnecessary deaths.

    Who could have guessed that?

    Jim Miller (edcec1)

  218. 217. AJ_Liberty (a4ff25) — 9/5/2021 @ 1:08 pm

    The idea is that the threat of suits will shutdown 85% of abortions

    It worked. It maybe could also jeopardize insurance coverage.

    as the law also removes the usual conservative proviso that loser pays the winner’s legal fees. So an abortion provider could face an avalanche of suits….perhaps even multiple for a single abortion procedure.

    But somebody has to finance the other side.

    I suspect that the underlying law will be found unconstitutional soon enough (I mean it directly imposes an “undue burden” and goes against Casey)

    But for that Planned Parenthood has to gamble in court,

    It’s disappointing that the Supreme Court has effectively said that if you create a Rube Goldberg enforcement mechanism for a facially unconstitutional law….be it right or left leaning….we’ll let it push forward and give the thumbs up for whatever mischief occurs in the interim…before it ultimately gets shut down.

    The Supreme Court likes to drag things out, not generally a good thing except maybe for lawyers.

    For instance, natural miscarriages in Texas after 6-weeks that require a D&E are now against the law…as are cases where severe fetal defects make a live birth impossible.

    No, its’s not illegal, but just what is ultimately going to be held unconstitutional is up for grabs. It kind of sets the clock back to 1966.

    Could we see similar private-attorney-general laws in Massachusetts targeting gun purchases to scoot around Heller and MacDonald? Can we see it for mask compliance?

    We could also have laws that let people sue YouTube for xensoring – AND for not censoring.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  219. Three “very stable geniuses” in a row?

    Those who followed Barack Obama know that he once claimed to be the smartest guy in his political team, the best at a whole variety of tasks. Donald Trump claims to be a ” very stable genius” — and inspired cartoons, books, and a proposed law.

    Now, I learn from Peggy Noonan’s column in the weekend Wall Street Journal that Joe Biden is as deluded as his two predecessors:

    A longtime friend of his once told me Mr. Biden’s weakness is that he always thinks he is the smartest guy in the room. I asked if the rooms are usually small, and the friend didn’t bristle, he laughed.

    (No link, since it is behind a paywall.)

    No wonder all three of them screwed up our strategy in Afghanistan. (Granted it is a difficult problem, but all three of them made elementary errors.)

    I beg of you; next time, let’s not nominate, and let’s not elect, another deluded narcissist.

    Jim Miller (edcec1)

  220. and to prison w/Mandela;

    Biden didn’t say he visited Mandela in prison, but that he wanted to, and get arrested in that connection in 1977 in South Africa, and that later Maandela thanked him for having tried to visit him.

    Biden claimed and maybe still claims that his son’s disease was brought on by being in Iraq – and that it happened to others too.

    Soeone posted here a lnk to afact check run on that n December, 2019:

    https://www.factcheck.org/2019/12/biden-exaggerates-science-on-burn-pits-and-brain-cancer

    Don;t forget his (false) claim to have gotten a Ukrainian prosecutor fired, which Russian intelligence, that is Putin, almost certainly ran with but they turned it into a claim to have fired the prosecutor to stop and investigation, which Biden never said. And we have Trump in September 2019 at a press conference held at the United Nations saying he heard the tape and marveling how Biden could admit that.

    And we have the idiots in Congress not asking the right questions of George Kent so that it never came out that Biden made the whole story up!

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  221. Re; Biden’s speech and Q&A to the Council on Foreign Relations on January 23, 2018:

    Biden and his defenders couldn’t dwell on what he actually did and actually said in the Q&A because what he actually said wasn’t true.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  222. It’s always amusing when those involved with ushering Biden into the office of POTUS express shock/surprise when they discover how execrable their judgment is.

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  223. The group Ascend, an NGO that teaches young women leadership through athletics, told CBS News they have two planes that have been waiting for six days ready to take between 600 and 1200 people — including 19 American citizens and two permanent residents.

    Satellite images show 6 planes on the ground.

    (Maybe they might take off and see what the Taliban do to stop them, but there are six planes.)

    Previously, other people got ot through the airport at Mazar-i-Sharif but it didn;t get any publicity at the time.

    In other news there was a women;s demonstration in Kabul. The Taliban stoped them with tear gas and shooting in the air.

    They did separately, kill a prominent pregnant woman who had many children but the Taliban disclaim responsibility.

    They held a soccer match between Taliban and regular Afghan players.

    The other day they killed a leading music star. He gave a meal for some Taliban (presumably with the idea of showing loyalty to the new government) but some other Taliban came back later that day, took him away and shot him in the head, according to his son..

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  224. The other day they killed a leading music star. He gave a meal for some Taliban (presumably with the idea of showing loyalty to the new government) but some other Taliban came back later that day, took him away and shot him in the head, according to his son…

    Boo-hoo-Joe. Speaking of music and sons, did you know his Beau played the radio?

    If not, he’ll remind you.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  225. … Or was it that famous record player he referred to? 😉

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  226. #227 It isn’t at all funny; it is instead terribly sad to see Trumpistas ignore the thousands of COVID deaths occurring every week because of the governors trying to follow the lead of the “very stable genius”.

    (Over at Political Betting, one of the contributors speculated recently that Trump was a Democratic agent, trying to kill off Republican voters. I think the contributor was joking. Mostly.)

    Jim Miller (edcec1)

  227. Degenerate gamblers are the best!

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  228. 228/229 that sounds like some rapper beef over here.

    But moreover, will defending the border against fentanyl became cause celebre now?

    https://www.tmz.com/2021/09/04/comedian-fuquan-johnson-dead-drug-overdose-kate-quigley/

    urbanleftbehind (927c30)

  229. “JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — In an article published Aug. 23, 2021, about people taking livestock medicine to try to treat coronavirus, The Associated Press erroneously reported based on information provided by the Mississippi Department of Health that 70% of recent calls to the Mississippi Poison Control Center were from people who had ingested ivermectin to try to treat COVID-19. State Epidemiologist Dr. Paul Byers said Wednesday the number of calls to poison control about ivermectin was about 2%.”

    https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Health-Dept-Stop-taking-livestock-medicine-to-16405982.php

    Notice also how ‘ingested’ became ‘calls about’

    Obudman (cb4106)

  230. Obudman, your summary is wrong.

    2% of calls were about ivermectin.
    70% of those calls were about idiots who had invested it.

    Not 70% of calls were about it.

    Not a huge error. But good to keep the numbers straight.

    Time123 (224669)

  231. As I said, they had to change it to ‘calls about’ to even reach 2%.

    Obudman (cb4106)

  232. #232 Colonel – Here’s the link to the post, for you.

    Jim Miller (edcec1)

  233. https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-marine-corps/2021/08/28/here-are-the-names-of-the-13-service-members-who-died-in-afghanistan-attack/

    Proud Dad: a Beauing C-17 Globemaster III returned the 13 Americans you killed, eh Joe.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  234. As I said, they had to change it to ‘calls about’ to even reach 2%.

    Obudman (cb4106) — 9/5/2021 @ 4:39 pm

    Exactly. Because the whole point of these bad-faith propagandists was to get the “hurr horse dewormer HERPITY DERPITY DOO!” talking point out in the wild so it would become established as the narrative.

    Factory Working Orphan (2775f0)

  235. …and look at all who’ve assisted with spreading the lies.

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  236. Former Trump officials praise Biden for carrying out ‘Trump-Biden withdrawal’ from Afghanistan
    It’s no surprise that former President Donald Trump and his former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo have condemned President Joe Biden’s messy withdrawal from Afghanistan — after all, the chaotic exit from Kabul has been deadly and deeply unpopular — but the truth is that Biden accomplished exactly what Trump had tried to do in his final year in office.
    ……..
    “The fact is this was the Trump-Biden withdrawal,” said William Ruger, tapped by Trump to be U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan in September 2020.

    Picking Ruger was one of several personnel moves Trump made during his final months in office to put in place a team committed to one of his top policy goals: a complete U.S. military withdrawal. When the Pentagon announced the last U.S. troops had departed just before Biden’s Aug. 31 deadline, Ruger tweeted a one-word response: “Finally.”
    ………
    “I am not critical of President Biden’s decision. And if you listen to his speech, he said, ‘I ended the war.’ Bravo! Well done! Get out! This has been an enormous waste of time, money, resources and blood,” (retired Army Col. Douglas MacGregor MacGregor, a senior adviser to Defense Secretary Esper) told ABC News after Biden’s speech on Tuesday. “So the president is 100 percent correct.”
    ……..
    MacGregor believes a withdrawal on Trump’s timetable would have been less dangerous because it would not have been done during the fighting season in Afghanistan.

    He also believes the Taliban would have been much less aggressive with Trump in office, fearing how he would react. But he does not blame Biden for the chaos of the withdrawal.

    “I’m glad President Biden made the decision. He is not responsible for the details of the withdrawal,” MacGregor said. “That is the job primarily of the secretary of defense — and General McKenzie and General Milley certainly should have been involved.”

    And, as MacGregor pointed out, two of the three people responsible — Milley and McKenzie — were appointed by Donald Trump.
    >>>>>>>>>>

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  237. Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 9/5/2021 @ 5:31 pm

    The tweet from Jason Johnson in that thread is emblematic of the failure of democratizing college education, and trying to make everyone an elite with a college degree. Even a professor in an otherwise useless major like political science should at least have enough curiosity to have researched that ivermectin is not only off-patent (and thus dirt-cheap), but that nations throughout Africa have used it regularly as a prophylactic against parasites for decades now. Of course, being a partisan Democrat, he can’t help inferring that Inhofe is benefitting from an increase in ivermectin sales.

    Unfortunately, we’ve tried to cram as many people as possible through the college pipeline, and the result is that some very dull, incurious, stupid people are starting to dominate academia.

    Factory Working Orphan (2775f0)

  238. We all have our own priorities. You can see what’s important to Factory Working Orphan in #244.

    For me, this story seems more important:

    As Florida appears to be turning the corner from a coronavirus rampage that fueled record new infections, hospitalizations and deaths, its residents and leaders are surveying the damage left from more than 7,000 deaths reported since July Fourth and the scars inflicted by feuds over masks and vaccines. New infections were averaging more than 22,000 a day in the last days of August but have fallen to about 19,000. Yet recovery could prove fleeting: Holiday weekends such as Labor Day have acted as a tinderbox for earlier outbreaks, and late summer marks the return of students to college campuses.

    But, opinions will differ, as they should in a free country. Though I would be happier if more of us agreed that saving lives was more important than quarrels about small stories.

    (“Czar” Putin and “Emperor” Xi would be less happy, of course.)

    Jim Miller (edcec1)

  239. We all have our own priorities. You can see what’s important to Factory Working Orphan in #244.

    Passive-aggressive comments seem to be at the top of your chain.

    Factory Working Orphan (2775f0)

  240. ‘Biden is not a Gold Star father and should stop playing one on TV’: George W. Bush speechwriter pens scathing Op-Ed criticizing President for repeatedly invoking son Beau’s death

    ‘Mr. Biden is not a Gold Star father and should stop playing one on TV.’

    McGurn’s criticism of Biden comes as The New York Times was blasted by Twitter users for a headline which read: ‘Biden, Still Grieving His Son, Finds That Not Everyone Wants to Hear About It.’

    In response to the online backlash, the Times ended up changing the headline to: ‘In Invoking Beau, Biden Broaches a Loss That’s Guided His Presidency.’

    The Times’ story quotes the father of Lance Cpl. Jared Schmitz, 20, a Marine who was one of 13 killed in a suicide bombing last week in Kabul.

    Schmitz’s father, Mark, told the Times that he spoke to Biden at Dover Air Force Base to observe the dignified transfer of the remains.

    According to Mark Schmitz, Biden turned the conversation to Beau. Schmitz told the Times that the president’s reference to his late son was ‘too much’ to bear.

    ‘I respect anybody that lost somebody, but it wasn’t an appropriate time,’ Schmitz said.

    Schmitz said that he was so alienated by Biden that when asked by the Times if he would be open to receiving a phone call from the president, he declined.

    JF (e1156d)

  241. Virginia Isn’t Bound by 1890 Deed to Perpetually Display Robert E. Lee Monument
    ……
    In 2020, Governor Ralph Northam decided to remove the Lee Monument from the donated land, and plaintiffs objected. The court concluded, in part:

    The merits of the arguments for and against the retention of the Lee Monument in its present location are for the political branches to consider. Our function as a Court is to address the legal claims before us. The essence of our republican form of government is for the sovereign people to elect representatives, who then chart the public policy of the Commonwealth or of the Nation. Democracy is inherently dynamic. Values change and public policy changes too.

    The Government of the Commonwealth is entitled to select the views that it supports and the values that it wants to express. The Taylor Plaintiffs erroneously assert that the Commonwealth is perpetually bound to display the Lee Monument because of the 1887 Deed, the 1890 Deed, and the 1889 Joint Resolution.

    A restrictive covenant against the government is unreasonable if it compels the government to contract away, abridge, or weaken any sovereign right because such a restrictive covenant would interfere with the interest of the public. “[T]he State cannot barter away, or in any manner abridge or weaken, any of those essential powers which are inherent in all governments, and the exercise of which in full vigor is important to the well-being of organized society.” “[C]ontracts to that end are void upon general principles,” and they cannot be saved from invalidity by the constitutional prohibition against laws that impair the obligation of contracts.

    Governor McKinney had no power to contract away the Commonwealth’s essential power of freedom of government speech in perpetuity by simply signing the 1890 Deed. Similarly, the General Assembly of 1889 had no authority to perpetually bind future administrations’ exercise of government speech through the simple expedient of a joint resolution authorizing the 1890 Deed. …….
    ……..
    Therefore, any restrictive covenant purportedly created through the 1890 Deed, which would prevent the Commonwealth from moving a monument owned by the Commonwealth and on property owned by the Commonwealth is unenforceable because, at its core, that private property interest is the product of a nineteenth-century attempt to barter away the free exercise of government speech regarding the Lee Monument in perpetuity.
    ………..

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  242. That is one weak restrictive covenant! I would have put in “No Lee statue, property reverts to heirs of donor”. In pretty much those words. Oh, well!

    nk (1d9030)

  243. Virginia Supreme Court opinion in Taylor v. Northam.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  244. I confess that I only skimmed the opinion but it looks to me like there was no reversionary clause and the plaintiffs were looking for specific performance. A hard row to hoe as they say, them that has et cornbread.

    nk (1d9030)

  245. State Dept blocking private rescue flights from leaving Afghanistan, organizers say: ‘Blood is on their hands’

    The State Department shouldn’t interfere with private rescue operations, but the government should have the groups sign waivers absolving the US of any responsibility if they are captured or killed. Does anyone think the Taliban will allow private groups (many with ex-Special Forces members) just land and take-off without any problems?

    “As always, should you or any of your IM Force be caught or killed, the Secretary will disavow any knowledge of your actions.”

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  246. nk (1d9030) — 9/5/2021 @ 8:12 pm-

    You are correct, there is no reversion clause.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  247. ‘Mr. Biden is not a Gold Star father and should stop playing one on TV.’

    Jesus, Mary and Beau-seph; such a phony Beau-lony. Joe pulls a Beau-ner; has Beau regard for the truth. Such a Beau-life scumbag.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  248. nk (1d9030) — 9/5/2021 @ 7:35 pm

    Virginia Supreme Court opinion in Taylor v. Northam.

    Shorter: Never trust the government.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  249. 227- Col.
    It is all on purpose. The mcconnell/pelosi conglomerate got this.

    mg (8cbc69)

  250. soldiers killed by
    joe and jill
    hostages next
    you bet

    mg (8cbc69)

  251. Shorter: Never trust the government.

    Or a lawyer who does not include a claim of failed gift and an implied reversionary interest. Land is special, though, and I don’t know Virginia’s laws.

    nk (1d9030)

  252. Exactly. Because the whole point of these bad-faith propagandists was to get the “hurr horse dewormer HERPITY DERPITY DOO!” talking point out in the wild so it would become established as the narrative.

    Factory Working Orphan (2775f0) — 9/5/2021 @ 5:16 pm

    All of the following are true:

    Eating horse de-worming paste you bought at TSC is stupid.
    The Rolling Stones badly overstated the impact of this on hospital admissions.
    The fact that the Media jumped on a bad story doesn’t make eating horse de-worming paste you bought at TSC less stupid.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  253. Heh! You can have an “action monument”. Like the raising of the flag at Iwo Jima. Maybe the neo-Confederates can commission a sculpture of the taking down of the Lee statue, as the latest monument to “The Lost Cause”.

    nk (1d9030)

  254. nk (1d9030) — 9/6/2021 @ 5:47 am

    That’s clever! Almost – too clever. Some one will not be amused.

    felipe (484255)

  255. 259–They didn’t “overstate” it–they took the word of a single, unchecked source without a sliver of follow-through to determine the facts. The reason they did so, like the UVa story, was because it fit a narrative they wanted to push, and were looking for *anything* to validate it. The people on their side, looking for the same thing, boosted the signal.

    They lied. And the reason they lied is because if it gets out that ivermectin might actually have unexpected prophylactic benefits to mitigate Covid infections or symptoms prior to getting sick, then it nerfs the “take these vaccines or you’ll die!” narrative they’ve been pushing for 8 months. So they have to poison the well by associating ivermectin as nothing more than “horse dewormer” in the popular imagination, even though you can buy it over the counter in African nations as a medication.

    Factory Working Orphan (2775f0)

  256. FWO, vaccines work for covid. Horse deworming paste doesn’t

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  257. The NPDS [National Poison Data System] says 1,143 ivermectin exposure cases were reported between Jan. 1 and Aug. 31. That marks an increase of 163% over the same period last year. There was a 245% jump in reported exposure cases from July to August — from 133 to 459. I don’t excuse sloppy journalism intended to sensationalize the matter further….at all….but where’s the evidence that ivermectin has “prophylactic benefits” against Covid (vice head lice, parasitic worms, and some skin conditions)? It seems like there is a story here of internet hustlers, talk show hosts, and some politicos intentionally spreading false and misleading information….in a desperate attempt to show that the “government’s” solution isn’t the only solution. There’s always some homebrew approach….that unfortunately many will unfortunately fall for. The numbers certainly don’t make for a crisis…but objectively, which side is spreading more misinformation and distorting probabilities more?

    AJ_Liberty (a4ff25)

  258. Time, Rolling Stone lied

    Factory Working Orphan (2775f0)

  259. AJ, where’s the evidence that it doesn’t? The studies done vis a vis ivermectin and Covid were all done long after the subjects had been hospitalized. By the time that happens, it’s too late.

    That’s the whole point of a prophylaxis. It’s why Pfizer is now developing a pill that you take between your quarterly booster shots, similar to PreP pills that people in high-risk groups for AIDS take. What’s cheaper, an off-patent medicine that has human applications, or a brand-new pill made by the same people who made the vaccine?

    Perhaps expecting the medical industry to do a good-faith study is too much to expect these days, since there’s now the threat of being branded a quack if you try anything outside the government-prescribed narrative.

    Factory Working Orphan (2775f0)

  260. FWO, they did. As I said upthread; they should fire that reporter.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  261. Perhaps expecting the medical industry to do a good-faith study is too much to expect these days, since there’s now the threat of being branded a quack if you try anything outside the government-prescribed narrative

    Why is everyone being mean a d calling people pushing cures without proof “quacks”. Stupid cathedral with their love of western medicine. You know it’s a conspiracy because they haven’t disproven urinal cakes or magic crystals yet. .

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  262. “American Journal of Therapeutics

    Review of the Emerging Evidence Demonstrating the Efficacy of Ivermectin in the Prophylaxis and Treatment of COVID-19

    Pierre Kory, MD, Gianfranco Umberto Meduri, MD, […], and Paul E. Marik, MD”

    “Conclusions:

    Meta-analyses based on 18 randomized controlled treatment trials of ivermectin in COVID-19 have found large, statistically significant reductions in mortality, time to clinical recovery, and time to viral clearance. Furthermore, results from numerous controlled prophylaxis trials report significantly reduced risks of contracting COVID-19 with the regular use of ivermectin. Finally, the many examples of ivermectin distribution campaigns leading to rapid population-wide decreases in morbidity and mortality indicate that an oral agent effective in all phases of COVID-19 has been identified.”

    “Exposure prophylaxis studies of ivermectin’s ability to prevent transmission of COVID-19

    Data are also now available showing large and statistically significant decreases in the transmission of COVID-19 among human subjects based on data from 3 randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and 5 observational controlled trials (OCTs) with 4 of the 8 (2 of them RCTs) published in peer-reviewed journals.40–46

    Elgazzar and colleagues45 at Benha University in Egypt randomized 200 health care and household contacts of patients with COVID-19 where the intervention group consisted of 100 patients given a high dose of 0.4 mg/kg on day 1 and a second dose on day 7 in addition to wearing personal protective equipment, whereas the control group of 100 contacts wore personal protective equipment alone. They reported a large and statistically significant reduction in contacts testing positive by Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) when treated with ivermectin versus controls, 2% versus 10%, P < 0.05.

    Shouman conducted an RCT at Zagazig University in Egypt, including 340 (228 treated and 112 control) family members of patients positive for SARS-CoV-2 through PCR.44 Ivermectin (approximately 0.25 mg/kg) was administered twice, on the day of the positive test and 72 hours later. After a two-week follow-up, a large and statistically significant decrease in COVID-19 symptoms among household members treated with ivermectin was found, 7.4% versus 58.4%, P < 0.001.

    Recently, Alam et al from Bangladesh performed a prospective observational study of 118 patients who were evenly split into those who volunteered for either the treatment or control arms, described as a persuasive approach. Although this method, along with the study being unblinded, likely led to confounders, the difference between the 2 groups was so large (6.7% vs. 73.3%, P <0.001) and similar to the other prophylaxis trial results that confounders alone are unlikely to explain such a result.47 Carvallo et al also performed a prospective observational trial where they gave healthy volunteers ivermectin and carrageenan daily for 28 days and matched them to similarly healthy controls who did not take the medicines.40 Of the 229 study subjects, 131 were treated with 0.2 mg of ivermectin drops taken by mouth 5 times per day. After 28 days, none of those receiving ivermectin in the prophylaxis group had tested positive for SARS-COV-2 versus 11.2% of patients in the control arm (P < 0.001). In a much larger follow-up prospective, observational controlled trial by the same group that included 1195 health care workers, they found that over a 3-month period there were no infections recorded among the 788 workers who took weekly ivermectin prophylaxis, whereas 58% of the 407 controls had become ill with COVID-19. This study demonstrates that remarkable protection against transmission can be achieved among high-risk health care workers by taking 12 mg once weekly.40 The Carvallo IVERCAR protocol was also separately tested in a prospective RCT by the Health Ministry of Tucuman, Argentina, where they found that among 234 health care workers, the intervention group that took 12 mg once weekly, only 3.4% contracted COVID-19 versus 21.4% of controls, P < .0001.46

    The need for weekly dosing in the Carvallo study over a 4-month period may not have been necessary given that, in a recent RCT from Dhaka, Bangladesh, the intervention group (n = 58) took 12 mg once monthly for a similar 4-month period and also reported a large and statistically significant decrease in infections compared with controls, 6.9% versus 73.3%, P < 0.05.47 Then, in a large retrospective observational case–control study from India, Behera et al41 reported that among 186 case–control pairs (n = 372) of health care workers, they identified 169 participants who had taken some form of prophylaxis, with 115 participants that had taken ivermectin. After matched pair analysis, they reported that in the workers who had taken 2 dose ivermectin prophylaxis, the odds ratio for contracting COVID-19 was markedly decreased (0.27, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.15–0.51). Notably, one dose prophylaxis was not found to be protective in this study. Based on both their study finding and the Egyptian prophylaxis study, the All India Institute of Medical Sciences instituted a prophylaxis protocol for their health care workers where they now take two 0.3 mg/kg doses of ivermectin 72 hours apart and repeat the dose monthly.

    Data that further illuminates the potential protective role of ivermectin against COVID-19 come from a study of nursing home residents in France which reported that in a facility that suffered a scabies outbreak where all 69 residents and 52 staff were treated with ivermectin,41 they found that during the period surrounding this event, 7 of the 69 residents fell ill with COVID-19 (10.1%). In this group with an average age of 90 years, only one resident required oxygen support and no resident died. In a matched control group of residents from surrounding facilities, they found 22.6% of residents fell ill and 4.9% died.

    Further evidence supporting the efficacy of ivermectin as a prophylaxis agent was published recently in the International Journal of Antimicrobial agents where a group of researchers analyzed data using the prophylactic chemotherapy databank administered by the WHO along with case counts obtained by Worldometers, a public data aggregation site used by among others, the Johns Hopkins University.42 When they compared the data from countries with active ivermectin mass drug administration programs for the prevention of parasite infections, they discovered that the COVID-19 case counts were significantly lower in the countries with recently active programs, to a high degree of statistical significance, P < 0.001.”

    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/labs/pmc/articles/PMC8088823/#!po=0.641026

    BuDuh (fdd65e)

  263. The commenting style of Time and Jim Miller turned out to be the most effective in my decision making about wasting anymore effort to have conversations with them. I would have thought the it would have been a couple of the more offensive posters that would have swayed me to take a long break from this forum.

    BuDuh (fdd65e)

  264. Ivermectin for preventing and treating COVID-19 July 2021
    ………
    We found 14 studies with 1678 participants investigating ivermectin compared to no treatment, placebo, or standard of care. No study compared ivermectin to an intervention with proven efficacy. There were nine studies treating participants with moderate COVID-19 in inpatient settings and four treating mild COVID-19 cases in outpatient settings. One study investigated ivermectin for prevention of SARS-CoV-2 infection. Eight studies had an open-label design, six were double-blind and placebo-controlled. Of the 41 study results contributed by included studies, about one third were at overall high risk of bias. Ivermectin doses and treatment duration varied among included studies. We identified 31 ongoing and 18 studies awaiting classification until publication of results or clarification of inconsistencies……..
    ………
    We are uncertain whether ivermectin compared to placebo or standard of care reduces or increases mortality……..
    ……..
    Ivermectin may have little or no effect compared to placebo or standard of care on clinical improvement up to 28 days …….
    ………
    We are uncertain whether ivermectin compared to placebo or standard of care reduces or increases mortality up to 28 days ………
    ………
    We are uncertain whether ivermectin compared to placebo reduces or increases viral clearance at seven days…….
    ……..
    Ivermectin may have little or no effect compared to placebo or standard of care on the number of participants with symptoms resolved up to 14 days……….
    ……….
    None of the studies reporting duration of symptoms were eligible for primary analysis. No study reported hospital admission or quality of life up to 14 days. …………
    ………
    We are uncertain whether ivermectin reduces or increases mortality compared to no treatment………
    ……….
    No study reported SARS-CoV-2 infection, hospital admission, and quality of life up to 14 days.
    ……….
    Based on the current very low- to low-certainty evidence, we are uncertain about the efficacy and safety of ivermectin used to treat or prevent COVID-19. The completed studies are small and few are considered high quality. Several studies are underway that may produce clearer answers in review updates. Overall, the reliable evidence available does not support the use ivermectin for treatment or prevention of COVID-19 outside of well-designed randomized trials.
    >>>>>>>>>

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  265. Ivermectin for Covid-19: abundance of hype, dearth of evidence
    ……….
    Several ivermectin champions, boosted by the internet, have been promoting the drug as a cure or preventive for Covid-19. But promoting is not the same as knowing. Knowing requires testing in well-designed clinical trials.

    Ivermectin proponents haven’t been content to wait for that research. In striking testimony before the U.S. Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee in December 2020, Pierre Kory, a critical care physician who formerly worked for the University of Wisconsin Health University Hospital, described the “immense potency” of ivermectin, characterizing it as effectively a “miracle drug.” “All studies are positive,” he testified, “with considerable magnitude benefits, with the vast majority reaching strong statistical significance.”
    ………..
    ………Kory cited several non-randomized observational studies, in which patients can receive non-standardized treatments, as well as many poor-quality controlled trials.
    ……….
    One of these was a trial by Ahmed Elgazzar from Benha University in Egypt. In this trial of patients with severe Covid-19, one group received ivermectin while the other, the control group, received hydroxychloroquine (people in this group should have received a placebo). According to the researchers, there was a 90% reduction in deaths in the ivermectin group, a degree of effectiveness strikingly at odds with most other studies of ivermectin and considerably better than even FDA-approved therapies for Covid-19.

    A British medical student, Jack Lawrence, was assigned to evaluate the Elgazzar paper for a course and encountered a potpourri of apparent plagiarism and data fabrication. The Elgazzar paper had not been formally published in a medical journal, but had appeared instead on a preprint website called Research Square. Upon learning of Lawrence’s analysis, Research Square promptly retracted the paper.

    ……… Researchers often summarize large bodies of literature by statistically synthesizing trials in what are called meta-analyses. “If you remove this one study from the scientific literature,” he told The Guardian “most meta-analyses that have found positive results would have their conclusions entirely reversed.”
    ………..

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  266. Full text of Rip’s study:

    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/labs/pmc/articles/PMC8406455/#!po=0.168919

    The more you read the details, the more obvious theIr “conclusion” becomes.

    BuDuh (fdd65e)

  267. Time123 (9f42ee) — 9/6/2021 @ 6:57 am AJ_Liberty (a4ff25) — 9/6/2021 @ 7:11 am et alii

    The media “blackout” on Ivermectin’s successful use as aprophylactic is very real. There are many recent studies that demonstrate Ivermectin’s efficacy as a prophylactic when used with proper dosage and in conjunction with other meds, but only a few studies, which were actually designed to fail, have been reported because they reinforce the emphasis on the use of novel vaccines . Here is an easy to watch video talking about the current climate constructed around Ivermectin, a well studied and understood drug with an outstanding safety profile established over several decades of proper medical use in humans.

    Do yourselves a favor and watch both videos before responding to this comment. Pay especially close attention to the second video and the extreme caution in which the data is presented. It will be inevitable that once the message cannot be credibly attacked, the messengers will be attacked, then adherents, and on down the line, in a futile attempt to prolong a dying narrative.

    It is madness to exclude any effective treatment that can be a complement to the complete spectrum of care that can be brought to bear on this complex health crisis. The truth will, in the end (possibly after much more unnecessary delay)come out, and the medical practitioners will throw off all the propaganda and, once again, be able to use all the many meds at their disposal and by their own counsel and with certain knowledge about their own patients. In short, MDs will be able to freely practice medicine.

    felipe (484255)

  268. STAT news is a propaganda site:

    https://www.classaction.com/news/stat-news-credibility-problem/

    Peter G. Lurie is just another conflicted author.

    BuDuh (fdd65e)

  269. The commenting style of Time and Jim Miller turned out to be the most effective in my decision making about wasting anymore effort to have conversations with them. I would have thought the it would have been a couple of the more offensive posters that would have swayed me to take a long break from this forum.

    BuDuh (fdd65e) — 9/6/2021 @ 8:15 am

    It’s probably because I’m often willing to listen, view data and respond reasonably. So when I treat things like they’re just a joke (such as the horse deworming paste) it feels jarring.

    Ivermectin may turn out to be a viable treatment or preventative. It’s still being studied. But the quacks who sold it without proof deserve no respect. Nor do the conspiracy minded morons who ate animal medicine with the same ingredient in it. The first are grifters, the second are fools so desperately captured by tribalism they walked past a treatment that has been shown to work to shop at TSC for something never intended for human consumption.

    Plus it’s really funny because it’s horse de-worming paste.

    Maybe when you come back we’ll find something we can talk about again.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  270. No, Time. We will have nothing to talk about.

    BuDuh (fdd65e)

  271. BuDuh (fdd65e) — 9/6/2021 @ 8:11 am (and following comments)

    Good work today, thank you.

    felipe (484255)

  272. AJ_Libbety, people eating hors de-worming paste isn’t a crisis. It’s unfortunate, topical to current events and funny. Like sadder tide pods.

    It’s a little hard to understand people who get so worked up over it. It seems like the obvious response. Is “That’s dumb. Ivermectin may be useful but it’s still being studied. Either way see a real doctor who you trust enough to listen to and don’t eat animal medicine.”

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  273. What difference does it make?
    What difference at this point does it make?
    Operation Warp Speed to develop a vaccine had one ONE job: To get Donald Trump reelected!
    It failed!
    Biden stole the rigged election that Donald Trump won in a landslide anyway!
    So the finger to vaccine!
    And the finger to the Americans who will get sick and die!
    And the biggest FINGER to the Biden administration whose problem Covid is now and who we want to fail.

    Don’t say no.
    It’s the end of the world.
    It ended when we lost Trump.
    (Sniff) Sincerely yours,
    (Sob)
    The Trumpcakes (Sniff)

    nk (1d9030)

  274. Thank, felipe. You posted two high quality links. But don’t get your hopes up that they will be viewed by this gallery.

    Take care.

    BuDuh (fdd65e)

  275. BuDuh (fdd65e) — 9/6/2021 @ 8:44 am

    I’m sure the study you cited is as pure as the driven snow, even with the criticism of Kory in my post #272. In his meta-analysis, does he consider the impact of the scientific fraud of the Elgazzar study? What weight was given by Kory et. al. to that study?

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  276. Felipe, I have no opinion on the efficacy of ivermectin taken under the care of a physician. Seems like it’s being debated and I’m going to let the professionals work that out. In your own post you say that the data is inconclusive at this point. I hope it turns out to be highly effective. The more tools the better.

    I do think the vaccine has been shown to work and people should take that.

    I also think taking horse deworming paste because it has ivermectin in it without medical supervision is really stupid, and kind of funny.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  277. @275-

    Shooting the messenger.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  278. Prophylactic! Prophyshmatic! Next to moving to a cave high up on a mountain in Tibet, the best prophylaxis is from vaccine. Good grief!

    nk (1d9030)

  279. You’ve got free galoshes, and you’re doing studies on how well plastic breadbags work to keep your shoes dry as you walk to school!

    nk (1d9030)

  280. please, oh please someone please take up the cause of urinal cakes and horse deworming paste and magic crystals and dune spiceworms or whatever so that Time123 can have a fair debate

    JF (e1156d)

  281. Time123 (9f42ee) — 9/6/2021 @ 8:49 am

    Oh time, penicillin is also formulated to treat horses. I am sure if penicillin were to be made as unavailable for use by doctors to treat covid in humans as Ivermectin is, then those humans would also go to a vet or feed store to obtain it if they objected to a different med. Then people of ill-will can mock the suffering of those people as they mock the suffering of anyone who ingested Ivermectin formulated for livestock.

    The tragedy of people, reducing themselves to the use of vet-meds, should point our minds to the outrage of denying people the use of meds designed for human use, not mockery of human suffering.

    Some meds where developed for humans and proved effective in animals, and others were developed for animals and proved effective in humans; this is a blessing of good medicine.

    felipe (484255)

  282. The FDA has not approved ivermectin for treatment or prevention of Covid. It does acknowledge that there are on-going studies but believes that there is insufficient evidence at this point to change its recommendation. The American Pharmacists Association and American Society of Health-System Pharmacists have joined the AMA to release a statement that strongly opposes the ordering, prescribing or dispensing of ivermectin to prevent or treat COVID-19 outside of a clinical trial. The CDC, NIH, and Infectious Disease Society of America have all weighed in against using ivermectin outside of a clinical trial. That’s a lot of experts.

    I am not a pharmaceutical scientist and will not pretend to be qualified to assess preliminary clinical trial results/data…though I have previously stayed at a Holiday Inn Express. This is also a peculiar web blog to initiate this discussion. I’m fairly certain that Stephen, Dana, or JVW don’t have any expertise in this arena….and anonymous commenters with unknown credentials….aren’t exactly where I want to go for cutting-edge health research analysis. I appreciate people’s passion on the topic….but I would also want to err on the side of conventional thinking….as I would hate for an impressionable reader to do something unhealthful based on my ill-considered or off-hand comment.

    There’s no doubt that covid-mania is dripping with politics….who is over-reaching…who is being nutty….who is being like nazi’s. I get it. I also note that we’ve lost a lot of regular commenters here over the past year….with a number of others contributing less and less. Part of it is just the toxic state of politics….which makes it harder and harder to find civility and good faith….but part of it is the impersonal nature of the internet. There’s too much gotcha and those engaged in a sort of weird performance art. It is what it is…we all come for different reasons…..and leave for different reasons…

    AJ_Liberty (ec7f74)

  283. I also think taking horse deworming paste because it has ivermectin in it without medical supervision is really stupid, and kind of funny.
    Time123 (9f42ee) — 9/6/2021 @ 8:59 am

    I do not find it funny in any way. I hope that, in time, you will also not find it funny any longer.

    felipe (484255)

  284. Penicillin is fermented from corn steep liquor. The process originated in Peoria, Illinois, but they make it in other places too. Just have a shot of good Tennessee sour mash.

    nk (1d9030)

  285. You’ve got free galoshes, and you’re doing studies on how well plastic breadbags work to keep your shoes dry as you walk to school!
    nk (1d9030) — 9/6/2021 @ 9:04 am

    If I thought those “free” goloshes came from anothers death, then h3ll no, I wouldn’t wear them, or allow any of my loved one to wear them. If someone offered me a breadbag to cover my bare feet, I’d first bless that person, then put the bag on.

    felipe (484255)

  286. Penicillin is fermented from corn steep liquor. The process originated in Peoria, Illinois, but they make it in other places too. Just have a shot of good Tennessee sour mash.
    nk (1d9030) — 9/6/2021 @ 9:26 am

    And that’s why they call it a “shot.”

    felipe (484255)

  287. I’m all for Darwinism; you don’t want Bill Gates chips in your vaccine, don’t get it, you probably won’t die, but you may.

    You don’t want the vaccine because it hasn’t been approved (wait, at least one has, 2nd coming soon), or was rolled out too quickly, don’t get it, you probably won’t die, but you may.

    You want to take horse dewormer, go for it, you probably won’t die, but you may.

    Etc.

    Thin the herd.

    Colonel Klink (Ret) (1367c0)

  288. felipe, the YouTube video involves Dr. Kory, a well-known crank and part of the discredited Frontline Doctors that earlier tried to pass off HCQ as some sort cure or effective treatment for CV19. Questionable credibility at best. I didn’t say anything the first time you linked it, but it needed to be answered.
    The meta analysis has been trotted out in various places, but there are questions.
    There is no doubt that ivermectin is an established drug that has been used to treat various maladies, including breast cancer, but there are no randomized clinical trials showing it to be effective for CV19, which is why the FDA is discouraging its use. There are better alternatives.

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  289. Speaking of randomized clinical trials, there is a brand new one on masking, and the sample of over 350,000 people across multiple villages in Bangladesh is impressive. The conclusion is that masking works.

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  290. There is always some crank with an Ph. D., and always some quack with an MD. There are always some people seeking “alternative facts” who make a beeline for these folks.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  291. Judge orders (Cincinnati) hospital to treat COVID-19 patient with Ivermectin, despite CDC warnings

    A Butler County judge ruled in favor of a woman last week who sought to force a hospital to administer Ivermectin — an animal dewormer that federal regulators have warned against using in COVID-19 patients — to her husband after several weeks in the ICU with the disease.

    Butler County Common Pleas Judge Gregory Howard ordered West Chester Hospital, part of the University of Cincinnati network, to treat Jeffrey Smith, 51, with Ivermectin. The order, filed Aug. 23, compels the hospital to provide Smith with 30mg of Ivermectin daily for three weeks.
    ……..
    Julie Smith filed the lawsuit on behalf of her husband of 24 years. He tested positive for COVID-19 July 9, was hospitalized and admitted to the ICU July 15, and was sedated and intubated and placed on a ventilator Aug. 1. He later developed a secondary infection he’s still wrestling with as of Aug. 23, court records say.

    The lawsuit doesn’t mention whether Jeffrey Smith is vaccinated against COVID-19. …….

    Julie Smith found Ivermectin on her own and connected with Dr. Fred Wagshul, an Ohio physician who her lawsuit identifies as “one of the foremost experts on using Ivermectin in treating COVID-19.” He prescribed the drug, and the hospital refused to administer it.
    ………
    In an interview, Wagshul said the science behind Ivermectin’s use in COVID-19 patients is “irrefutable.” The CDC and FDA engaged in a “conspiracy,” he said, to block its use to protect the FDA’s emergency use authorization for COVID-19 vaccines. He said the mainstream media and social media companies have been engaging in “censorship” on Ivermectin’s merits, and that the U.S. government’s refusal to acknowledge its benefits amounts to genocide.
    ………
    Dr. Leanne Chrisman-Khawam, a physician and professor at the Ohio University Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine, called the (Front Line Covid-19 Critical Care Alliance) “snake oil salesmen.” She reviewed the association’s research on the drug’s uses and said there are some serious problems with its cited studies: many of them don’t show positive results, and those that do bear design flaws like small control groups, unaccounted for variables, non-blinded studies, not accounting for mitigations like vaccines and masking practices, and others.

    “Based on evidence-based medicine and my read on this large number of small studies, I would find this very suspect, even the positive outcomes,” she said.
    ………
    Update:
    Butler County judge modifies Ivermectin treatment order for COVID-19 patient
    ……..
    “The order issued Monday, Aug. 23 is hereby modified to permit the defendant (the hospital) to cease administration of Ivermectin, at its discretion, if Mr. Smith’s treating physicians at West Chester Hospital determine that Mr. Smith is experiencing any life threatening side effects due to administration of Ivermectin,” (Judge Michael Oster Jr) wrote.
    ……….

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  292. AJ_Liberty (ec7f74) — 9/6/2021 @ 9:25 am

    That is well stated, AJ. There are many FDA approved meds (Ivermectin is FDA approved and is included in the World Health Organization’s list of essential medicines.) that are routinely prescribed “off-label” by doctors for different conditions, and this practice is not only legal but critical in the practice of medicine.

    felipe (484255)

  293. rolled out too quickly

    The point where a vaccine should be rolled out is when the protection it provides will save an order of magnitude more lives than deaths that could occur if all the untested corner-cases proved a problem.

    IMHO, that was a few months earlier than what happened. But it would have helped Trump, so the preliminary results just had to wait until mid-November, no matter how many lives that cost.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  294. Paul Montagu (5de684) — 9/6/2021 @ 9:41 am

    I agree that he is called a “crank.” So what? The truth is the truth. All were cranks who called attention to the lab-outbreak theory. Were you one of them? Or were you one of those who joined in the name calling? I was neither.

    “Discredited.” Oh the horror! – Oh brother.

    felipe (484255)

  295. A 3-part series on ivermectin here. The author is an epidemiologist.

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  296. felipe, he’s a crank because he’s not credible. You should be skeptical of his “truth”.

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  297. felipe, he’s a crank because he’s not credible. You should be skeptical of his “truth”.

    Not every crank is the next Galileo.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  298. but there are no randomized clinical trials showing it to be effective for CV19, which is why the FDA is discouraging its use. There are better alternatives.
    Paul Montagu (5de684) — 9/6/2021 @ 9:41 am

    There have also been no such trials for the many drugs that are routinely prescribed “off-label,” so the need for such trials is window-dressing. I willl offer a one-word explanation for the FDA’s position on Ivermectin: Money.

    Ivermectin can be made by any lab for pennies a pill. Gee why wouldn’t big pharma want to get behind that? Or better, why would big pharma (or anyone at all) want to spend millions conducting such rigorous trials only to get pennies per dose after approval especially if any lab could produce them?

    felipe (484255)

  299. someone seems cranky, take a cramping pill

    mg (8cbc69)

  300. https://apnews.com/article/europe-business-climate-environment-and-nature-united-nations-9bdd2ef7d2c32b6ea1c13f06f034f415
    Put the woke generals from lowest point on this. It will crumble quicker than Afghanistan.

    mg (8cbc69)

  301. Paul Montagu (5de684) — 9/6/2021 @ 9:59 am

    Oh I’m skeptical, plenty skeptical, especially of your “truth.”

    Kevin M (ab1c11) — 9/6/2021 @ 10:03 am

    He’s called a crank, Kevin, the first question is “who calls him a crank?” Then “why?” Then I listen to to the crank. Then I make up my mind. I find Dr. Kory credible and the many studies credible, and the opposition predictable.

    felipe (484255)

  302. Felipe, ivermectin hasn’t been made unavailable. If your doctor wants to prescribe it there’s nothing stopping them.

    Time123 (224669)

  303. felipe, hydroxychloroquine is also FDA approved….to prevent malaria….but that doesn’t mean that it’s approved to prevent Covid. Same with ivermectin. I’m curious, have you personally taken either one…..or have any of your close family members? Would you view taking it as more or less risky than the approved vaccine?

    AJ_Liberty (ec7f74)

  304. So, I was in L.A. last week and happened to drive past Westchester Park, where the far-left Councilman Bonin has his offices. It was wall-to-wall homeless tents, making the park unusable for the local residents. I am regretting my move less and less each time I return.

    I’m sure the councilman looks upon his pets through his office window each day, and sees his vast Goodness, but every resident who goes past probably has some other thoughts in mind.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  305. someone seems cranky, take a cramping pill

    Physician, heal thyself!

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  306. 228 229. Here;s one account of the story: This happened a day or two before the last American soldier left Kabul

    https://nypost.com/2021/08/30/afghan-folk-singer-fawad-andarabi-killed-by-taliban-for-playing-music

    An Afghan folk singer has been executed by the Taliban just days after the Islamic fundamentalist group declared that “music is forbidden in Islam,” according to his family.

    Fawad Andarabi’s family told the Associated Press that he was shot dead Friday when enforcers returned to his home after earlier searching it and even drinking tea with him.

    “They shot him in the head on the farm,” his son, Jawad, said of the killing in the Andarabi Valley for which he was named.

    “He was innocent, a singer who only was entertaining people,” the grieving son said of his dad, who played a bowed lute called a ghichak and sang traditional songs about his country.

    Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid told the AP that the insurgents would investigate the incident, but had no other details on the killing in the area about 60 miles north of Kabul.

    It came just days after Mujahid told the New York Times that music was being outlawed, just as it had been during the group’s brutal rule from 1996 until 2001.

    In their version of slam, music is forbidden. I don;t know how they would explain the chanting of the Koran – maybe they don’t do it, or maybe it is an exception.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  307. He’s called a crank, Kevin, the first question is “who calls him a crank?” Then “why?” Then I listen to to the crank. Then I make up my mind. I find Dr. Kory credible and the many studies credible, and the opposition predictable.

    Because your 2-hour internet search is just as good as his critics lifetime of learning and experience?

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  308. 234. Obudman (cb4106) — 9/5/2021 @ 4:26 pm

    Notice also how ‘ingested’ became ‘calls about’

    When there are both people recommending something, and warnings about it, people call wat they hope is an impartial source before </b? taking something.

    Somebody had to be lying for that 70% figure to come in.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  309. Time123 (224669) — 9/6/2021 @ 10:12 am

    You are absolutely wrong, Time. I have asked my doctor about prescribing Ivermectin as a prophylactic and he refused citing the FDA. And when I pressed him on the matter, he confessed that he was constrained from doing so his employer*. That is the very definition of unavailable. My doctor is not alone in taking this stand, Not one MD in his employer’s vast network is willing to prescribe Ivermectin. You see, the order is from above. If he defies it, he gets canned, or worse, called a “crank” who will never be hired again.

    This is big medicine in conjunction with big pharma. Do. Not. Underestimate. The. Love Of. Money.

    felipe (484255)

  310. Oops, I forgot *

    * I know better than to expose myself to litigation by naming such a large healthcare player, on the interwebs where everything is forever.

    felipe (484255)

  311. I am not a pharmaceutical scientist and will not pretend to be qualified to assess preliminary clinical trial results/data…though I have previously stayed at a Holiday Inn Express. This is also a peculiar web blog to initiate this discussion. I’m fairly certain that Stephen, Dana, or JVW don’t have any expertise in this arena….and anonymous commenters with unknown credentials….aren’t exactly where I want to go for cutting-edge health research analysis. I appreciate people’s passion on the topic….but I would also want to err on the side of conventional thinking….as I would hate for an impressionable reader to do something unhealthful based on my ill-considered or off-hand comment.

    This is an interesting comment. In the first news item, I clearly state my inability to understand why one would refuse a Covid-19 vaccine, and yet turn to a drug clearly designed for ailments which have nothing to do with the disease. I also asked someone to convince me that the two leading studies used to support and promote ivermectin are viable. While not epidemiologists or virologists, we are still responsible for being as informed as we possibly can about Covid-19 and which drugs and vaccines are available and work to treat or help minimize symptoms in order to make the best determination about what we are willing to put into our bodies. I don’t have a problem with people discussing the issue at all. It can be helpful. I do have a problem with anyone putting out what we have learned is misinformation or encouraging anyone to take an unproven drug/medication to treat/prevent Covid-19. (I haven’t kept up with the comments and don’t know if anyone has done that. Please point it out if they have.)

    Consider this a warning not to tell anyone to take ivermectin, or any other unverifiable drug/medication, etc., not approved by the CDC/FDA. I think that our host already made this very clear last year some time.

    Dana (174549)

  312. 252. The State Department shouldn’t interfere with private rescue operations, but the government should have the groups sign waivers absolving the US of any responsibility if they are captured or killed.

    Why> To encourage the Taliban to kill them or hold them hostage?

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  313. BTW, and I’ve posted this before, Galileo’s critics were opposing him on valid scientific grounds. They examined his arguments and proposed a logical test of the the heliocentric theory: the stars should appear to shift a bit as the earth moved around the sun.

    Readings taken six months apart should show a clear shift in position (after adjusting for the earth’s rotation), and no such shift had ever been seen. Galileo acknowledged this weakness in his theory and could not explain why the phenomenon was not seen.

    Today we know that the starts are much much much further away than anyone then suspected and the measurement sensitivity you would need to see them did not exist at that time.

    So, by the standards of the day, Galileo WAS a crank and modern cranks should find a better example. Maybe Katalin Kariko.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  314. I do not find it funny in any way. I hope that, in time, you will also not find it funny any longer.

    felipe (484255) — 9/6/2021 @ 9:26 am

    I know you mean this so it’s worth a serious response.

    The people taking Horse deworming medicine aren’t forced into the veterinary section by desperate circumstances.
    There’s a free preventative available that has been show to work well. Also, doctors can prescribe Ivermectin for them.

    These are people choosing to take horse medicine for political reasons. It’s a self inflicted wound and while I feel bad for people who are harmed, even by their own stupidity, my pity is diminished by the fact they did it to themselves.

    Time123 (224669)

  315. JF @9:18am and felipe @9:20 and 9:26, well said!

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  316. My doctor is not alone in taking this stand,

    They also refuse to co-sign other bullsh1t. It must be a conspiracy.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  317. AJ_Liberty (ec7f74) — 9/6/2021 @ 10:13 am

    You are not listening AJ. I know what uses drugs are approved for and what they are not approved for by the FDA. You seem to ignore that many drugs are routinely prescribed for other uses that are not approved by the FDA. This is also the case for HCQ and Ivermectin which are prescribed as a prophylactic in other countries by MDs, and who knows, maybe even somewhere in these United States, where a fearful prescribing MD might be carefully guarding this information in hopes of avoiding the scandal of being the next DR. Kory.

    Now that fully vaccinated persons are being infected and getting sick, I have an interest in taking Ivermectin under the careful eye of my own physician, because of my advanced age and co-morbidities.

    Not that this is any of your business, mr, nosey!

    felipe (484255)

  318. You are absolutely wrong, Time. I have asked my doctor about prescribing Ivermectin as a prophylactic and he refused citing the FDA. And when I pressed him on the matter, he confessed that he was constrained from doing so his employer*.

    Your medical provider can choose to prescribe it. They have not chosen to do so because it’s not recommended for that by the FDA.

    Our medical system doesn’t allow people to choose their own medications. A doctor has to do that. If you don’t think your doctor is honestly trying to give you effective treatment you should look into finding one that you trust. I’m not trying to be snarky. Being able to trust your doctor is extremely important in getting effective care. I like you and want you to be well.

    Time123 (224669)

  319. He’ll pull a “beau” in a few…

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  320. I am sure if penicillin were to be made as unavailable for use by doctors to treat covid

    My doctor will refuse to prescribe penicillin for me to treat Covid. Part of this is because I don’t have Covid and part of this is because I am allergic to penicillin, and part of this is because it doesn’t work on viruses.

    Now, I suppose that I *could* evade this conspiracy and get some veterinary version of the drug, but I don’t see it as the liberating action you suggest. The law makes some things available only be prescription because people do stupid things.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  321. 252. The State Department shouldn’t interfere with private rescue operations, but the government should have the groups sign waivers absolving the US of any responsibility if they are captured or killed.

    Why> To encourage the Taliban to kill them or hold them hostage

    To protect the government from lawsuits by their heirs. I think it is a given the Taliban will try to take them hostage or kill them.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  322. I have asked my doctor about prescribing Ivermectin as a prophylactic and he refused citing the FDA.

    I’m sure you can find a “doctor” on the Internet who will write a scrip without even seeing you.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  323. Bold and emphasis, mine.

    my pity is diminished by the fact they did it to themselves.
    Time123 (224669) — 9/6/2021 @ 10:31 am

    I know, time. More is the pity.

    Let me speak to you as a friend, Time. One who would be brave enough to voice something you may not wish to hear, and thus, risk your good opinion of me.

    The irony you miss in your statement, above, is that you are diminishing your own pity not “they”, you are doing this to yourself. My only reason for saying this, is that because I respect you I wish only that you grow in love, in such a way that it will show in your comments about the unfortunate in our world.

    ok, enough sappy talk.

    felipe (484255)

  324. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, granted an interview to Jennifer Griffin of Fox News Channel. Maybe he thought he would find a sympathetic ear. Maybe Griffin just let Milley talk and he hung himself with his words. Milley confirmed in the interview that he doesn’t give a spent shell about our military personnel, our national reputation, or his honor.

    On his chest, Mark Milley wears an enormous amount of “fruit salad”. Fruit salad is military slang for the amount of ribbons, medals and devices on the dress uniform. With that many colorful ribbons, the public would be led to believe that Milley is possessed of intestinal fortitude. Maybe when faced with bullets on foreign soil, he is. He has proven time and again that against the vipers in the swamp that is Washington, D.C., he sinks like a leaky canoe.

    He walked across Lafayette Square, with President Trump, to the Church damaged by BLM and Antifa and apologized for it, unnecessarily. Milley also talked about a “Reichstag moment”, according to a book by two Washington Post staffers:

    “This is a Reichstag moment,” Milley told aides, according to the book. “The gospel of the Führer.” …
    If someone wanted to seize control, Milley thought, they would need to gain sway over the FBI, the CIA and the Defense Department, where Trump had already installed staunch allies. “They may try, but they’re not going to f—ing succeed,” he told some of his closest deputies, the book says.

    Worse than that, Mark Milley denigrated all of our military personnel with his “white rage” testimony. Since Joe Biden became the Oval Office resident, Milley has gone along with every thing President Asterisk wanted. No push backs. No leaks. No plotting. No throwing his rank on the desk and saying, “Not on my watch.”

    In the last couple days, our Victory Girls Blog writers have told you about child brides being imported into the United States, Americans held hostage in Afghanistan, and the brave Afghan Special Forces still fighting after our Pentagon abandoned them.

    Apparently, nowhere in Milley’s military education did they cover the First Law of Holes. Mark Milley just keeps digging and digging. And, Jennifer Griffin handed him the shovel in her interview. Griffin interviewed Milley at Ramstein Air Base where the Afghan refugees are being vetted in a tent city built by the U.S..

    Milley told Griffin that he is “comfortable” with the vetting of the Afghan refugees:

    So I talked to the security folks. You saw it. So what they’re doing as people come in, they’re getting their names registered. They’re doing the biometrics. They check their irises. They do their fingerprints. They take a full facial photo. They run that against the 20 years of databases that we have in the interagency. They run it against the NCTC checks and the FBI checks.

    FBI and the NCTC (National Counterterrorism Center)? Excuse me, but these people are not exactly the gold standard of competency. Many of these people don’t have a passport or a birth date.

    Next Griffin asked about the possibility of a civil war in Afghanistan. His answer:

    Well, you know, this is something that I’ve thought a lot about. And – and I personally think that my military estimate is, is that the conditions are likely to develop of a civil war. I don’t know if the Taliban is going to able to consolidate power and establish governance. They may be maybe not. But I think there’s at least a very good probability of a broader civil war and that will then in turn lead to conditions that could, in fact, lead to a reconstitution of al Qaeda or a growth of ISIS or other myriad of terrorist groups.

    So I think the short answer to your question is we don’t know yet. But the conditions are very likely, in my opinion, that – and I’ve testified this and I’ve said it in public – that you could see a resurgence of terrorism coming out of that general region within 12, 24, 36 months. And we’re going to monitor that.

    Given that Milley thought the Afghan Regular Army would last longer than 11 days. That means his estimate of terrorism from the general region is worth jack. So let’s make that 12 month minimum about three months.

    https://victorygirlsblog.com/mark-milley-jen-griffin-interview-goes-pear-shaped/

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  325. it’s all in due time
    but time’s just a wounded heel
    he ‘bates for no one

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  326. Music for times such as these… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7yN77cNM_uk

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  327. The State Department shouldn’t interfere with private rescue operations,

    Mariel boatlift, anyone? The State Department, the FAA, Homeland Security, and the Air Force F-35s had darn well better “interfere” with any private rescue operations.

    nk (1d9030)

  328. Just judging from those excerpts, Gen Miley sounds more reasonable than the Victory Girls.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  329. Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 9/6/2021 @ 10:32 am

    Thanks, Colonel, your words of encouragement are much appreciated. I have avoided commenting, not because of the push-back I knew would come, but because Of the effort that might be wasted in fruitless dialogue. But expecting fruit to ripen, today, is like a child staring at a barren apple tree.

    First, one must see blossoms, then, like an insect, an idea might fly about with purpose, among the petals. Instead, the thoughts of our best commenters (they know who they are) are squashed. -SMACK!-

    Ha! I sound like Chance the gardener.

    felipe (484255)

  330. Shocker!

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  331. Mariel boatlift, anyone?

    The Mariel boatlift was an outlier — it was a Castro operation from start to finish, with our Useful Idiot president along for the ride. Castro sent us his actual criminals, not his political ones.

    An analogous operation would be for us to empty our maximum security prisons and dump these folks in Afghanistan, armed with automatic weapons.

    Wait, that’s not a terrible idea, actually.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  332. Yes, you do, felipe!

    Some hear “be fruitful and multiply” and then live their lives as if they’ve forgotten the math…

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  333. Excellent comment expressed in 331 Filipe. Thank you for sharing it. If I don’t find it wholly persuasive I do appreciate it and the spirit in which it’s offered.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  334. Time123 (224669) — 9/6/2021 @ 10:37 am
    I appreciate your good will, Time.

    Yes, my MD could choose, but to him it was choosing to throw away his job, not letting me decide my care. Which, by the way I do.

    You see, when you grow to an advanced age, many things become clear. I can refuse care and ask for care. Yes, only my doctor can prescribe what I want, but I do not take anything I am not comfortable taking.

    Like others of my generation, I have decades of history with my Primary care Physician. We’ve seen and dealt with a great deal over the years. I know that he would like to prescribe Ivermectin to me, but he would like to keep his job even more. I am not going to “shop” for an MD who does my will, over this. I am not so foolish. My Doc knows me well, but, since the insanity of covid, he is hardly “free” to practice as he sees fit.

    With so many being cancelled right before our eyes, is it such a leap that MDs are just as easily intimidated?

    felipe (484255)

  335. Mariel boatlift, anyone?

    Non-sequitur. The article and my comment dealt with private groups flying to Afghanistan to retrieve Americans left behind. If they want to go, fine, but don’t expect to be rescued or ransomed if they are taken hostage.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  336. Betting markets swing in favor of Gov. Gavin Newsom as California recall effort enters home stretch
    ……..
    On Thursday, a bet on a successful recall (meaning a wager that Newsom would be ousted) cost 10 cents on PredictIt, down from 26 cents a week earlier and a high of 34 cents in early August. As of Sunday, the price had risen slightly to 14 cents.

    Correct bets on PredictIt redeem at $1, so a wager at 10 cents would earn 90 cents should the recall prevail. The price of a bet in favor of a recall hasn’t closed below 10 cents since May 20, according to PredictIt. The low of the campaign was 8 cents, a few days earlier in May.
    …….
    The betting markets don’t have much confidence in any of (the recall candidates).

    Bets on Larry Elder, a conservative radio talk show host, have fallen to 13 cents from 25 cents on Aug. 24. A bet on YouTube star and real estate entrepreneur Kevin Paffrath, who’s running as a Democrat, costs 4 cents, down from 13 cents in mid-August. None of the other candidates are over 1 cent.

    A wager on Newsom to keep the gig fell as low as 68 cents in early August. It now sells for 89 cents.
    >>>>>>>>>>

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  337. Kevin M (ab1c11) — 9/6/2021 @ 10:41 am

    I completely agree with you Kevin! I knew Penicillin was a terrible drug to use in my comment – for the very points you made, but I was too lazy (typical of me) to to be bothered to remember the different drugs that are used for the Wu-flu, then decide which of them was as recognizable as penicillin, then type it out! I knew the risk, but the point is valid none the less.

    felipe (484255)

  338. Blinken Hostages to reality:

    The State Department says it has no one on the ground in Afghanistan to confirm or deny any Americans are being ‘detained’ aboard six aircraft denied release by the Taliban.

    Duh.

    Meanwhile, CIC Beauzo is glad handing labor leaders near his Wilmington bunker.

    “What? Me worry?” – Alfred E. Newman, MAD Magazine

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  339. Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 9/6/2021 @ 11:02 am

    Excellent choice!

    felipe (484255)

  340. There is more on that drone strike on the ISIS-K car. They had watched it all day. The reason it was hit where it was was fear by the tactical commander that there wouldn’t be a better place (and that it might be heading for the airport soon and wasn’t going to stay where it was for very long. Women and children were defined automatically as non-combatants, men not so.

    Only after the drone was launched were figures seen moving toward the car. The NYT did not get an evaluation as to what they were, but the story told at the scene was that some were wee children. Thus making that a very bad place to hit the car with a Hellfire missile.

    It is hard to figure out what happened. It is still a half story.

    I think it is too far fetched to say that Zemari Ahmadi was a member of ISIS under deep cover as a technical engineer for Nutrition and Educational International, an American NGO, but also to say that he was a totally uninvolved person doesn’t make sense either.

    But perhaps plotters had hired him as sort of a taxi driver. Maybe he even was going to unknowingly drive explosives to the airport and get killed when they got triggered by a cell phone or such. Or maybe e was just transfer the packages to another car the next morning.

    According to the New York Times, which says it spoke to four United States officials briefed in whole or n part on at least some of the preliminary military analysis, the United States was watching a compound abut five kilometers northwest of Hamid Karzai International Airport, which they believed, for a variety of reasons, including informants, electronic eavesdropping and pictures, was being used by ISIS-K. (whatever those people may really be)

    And they also had information that an attack was imminent, and knew that an attacker would assume they had only two more days to do it. It was Sunday August 29, 2021.

    At 9 a.m. a white sedan, probably a Toyota Corolla, (like the car that belonged to Ahmadi), pulled out of the compound. (There was a MQ-9 drone sending a live black and white video feed.)

    It turned out the driver was being continuously directed where to go. One thing that confirmed that that car was the one that was being directed from the compound was that the driver was told to meet a motorcyclist, and lo and behold: He did just that.

    These directions evidently were being given in the clear.

    For several hours the car made all kinds of different stops in Kabul, picking up and dropping off passengers.

    Just before 4 pm, the car pulled into a compound about 8 to 12 kilometers southwest of the airport that was unfamiliar to the United States. A couple of minutes later the driver and three other men loaded wrapped packages into the trunk of the car. From the way they handled them in the video the packages appeared to be heavy.

    Therefore maybe explosives.

    They drove away, heading north, while the driver dropped off his three passengers at various places.

    He arrived at what we now know to be his home at 4:45 pm. A small courtyard 2.5 kilometer west of the airport, just south of where he had started that day. (that makes a case for that he was random local, hired by the day by the bombers, as does his getting piecemeal directions in the clear)

    One man came out to greet him and that’s apparently when the commander made the decision. From his point of view they were maybe lucky that the car had stopped off on the way to airport, away from traffic.

    It took a minute for the Hellfire missile with 20 pounds of explosives to arrive. They could see other figures now approaching the car, but it was too late. It exploded at 4:50 pm and then, an even larger fireball appeared. This did not look like a gas tank exploding but explosives contained in the car, so they think they were probably right about that.

    Immediately after the explosions, “chatter” (chatter may mean or include encrypted communications) from ISIS-K went dead. It usually does after a drone strike, or maybe they knew more.

    It remained dead at least through Friday. September 3, 2021,

    They’re going to do more detailed analysis of the video feed of the strike and its aftermath to see if reports from the family are correct. So far they only have determined that three civilians besides the ISIS facilitator (that is the driver, classified as such because of what he did all day. They knew nothing about him before.)

    https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/05/us/politics/military-drone-strike-kabul.html

    The headline says it raises questions, but actually it answers questions.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  341. @ felipe: “You are not listening AJ… You seem to ignore that many drugs are routinely prescribed for other uses that are not approved by the FDA. Now that fully vaccinated persons are being infected and getting sick….”

    You appear to be ascribing some pretty negative ethics for the researchers at the FDA, CDC, and NIH…who you believe are all compromised because of big-pharma money. I can’t join you in that conspiracy. The implications….of keeping low-cost treatments under wraps during a world-wide pandemic….are staggering. The evidence of this must rise above mere internet gossip.

    It’s important to recognize though that the unvaccinated are getting sick at much higher rates than the vaccinated. At an institution that I’m familiar with, let’s say there are 400 individuals (scaled for convenience of discussion). The vaccination rate is 90%, so 360 are vaccinated and 40 are unvaccinated. There are 12 current cases of Covid: 11 were unvaccinated and 1 was vaccinated. So out of the 40 unvaccinated, 11 got sick. Out of the 360 vaccinated, 1 got sick and was not seriously sick. So at minimum, make sure you’re vaccinated. Keep wearing a mask when indoors with other people. Be safe!

    AJ_Liberty (ec7f74)

  342. . And – and I personally think that my military estimate is, is that the conditions are likely to develop of a civil war. I don’t know if the Taliban is going to able to consolidate power and establish governance.

    And they thought the Bolsheviks in Russia wouldn;t last long. There was aCivil War, and awar with Poland, but Lenin;s rule was consolidated.

    The Taliban now claim to have wiped out the last bit of resistance but what really happened was that they captured the last provincial capital.

    You would think he would know from Colonel Blotto that unsupported resistance can’t sustain itself.

    Last time, 1996-2001 the Northern Alliance got some help from India and from Russia. Right now international aid groups want to get out. The Taliban come in armed, and they want them to hire Taliban people, and work in long controlled Taliban areas, and females not to work there.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  343. RIP Jean-Paul Belmondo (88).

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  344. 249. AJ_Liberty (ec7f74) — 9/6/2021 @ 11:51 am

    You appear to be ascribing some pretty negative ethics for the researchers at the FDA, CDC, and NIH…who you believe are all compromised because of big-pharma money.

    So does the New York times in a signed editorial by Farhad Manjoo, posted online on September 2.

    Although, like too many people, because that;s what the only well organized critics say, he seems to think the only thing the FDA does wrong is approving drugs. This misses the point that essential to the scheme is delaying approval of drugs and trying to stop the use of cheap generics, and that it is more extortion than bribery.

    I can’t join you in that conspiracy.

    The New York Times editorial traces the conspiracy to a 1992 law. Basically, they accuse the FDA of being corrupt or having been corrupted. It’s now getting money directly from big pharma and people depend on that money. There may be a strong element of extortion here. The analysis of how it works may not be right, but that;s what they have here..

    https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/02/opinion/fda-drug-approval-trust.html

    In 1992, Congress allowed the agency to collect fees from the industry it oversees to pay for the high costs of drug approvals. These fees pay for much of the salaries of F.D.A. review workers responsible for the approval of new drugs….The fees are set by negotiation between the agency and the drug industry; negotiations set the amount the industry pays the agency and also set certain “performance goals” the agency must adhere to, among them commitments on the speed of its reviews…

    …And there is a lucrative reason to try to make it as a senior official at the F.D.A.: It could lead to a cushy second career as a consultant to the drug industry. The revolving door between the F.D.A. and the industry spins so fast, we could tap it as a source of renewable power. Between 2001 and 2010, according to one study, 26 F.D.A. reviewers who worked on cancer and hematology drugs left the agency; more than half of them went on to work or consult for the drug industry. Scott Gottlieb, who ran the agency from 2017 to 2019, is now on the board of directors of Pfizer.

    He points out a study that says that one-third of the drugs approved from 2001 to 2010 were found to have major safety issues years after approval; the probably useless and even harmful Alzheimer’s drug aducanumab, based on a wrong theory, that is listed at $56,000-per-year Alzheimer’s drug that the agency approved end OxyContin.

    the The implications….of keeping low-cost treatments under wraps during a world-wide pandemic….are staggering. The evidence of this must rise above mere internet gossip.

    That has been going on since the 1960s. And it got criticized for delaying AIDS drugs in the 1980s.

    Farhad Manjoo says the FDA is now faster than Europe, but that would only be with the expensive new drugs.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  345. The problem pf not recognizing what works is actually much bigger than the FDA and goes back maybe to about 1948, in its beginning.

    And now the FDA is wrong in both what they don’t approve and what they do

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  346. 339. Kevin M (ab1c11) — 9/6/2021 @ 11:07 am

    Castro sent us his actual criminals, not his political ones.

    No, he sent political prisoners, adnd some of his criminal ones turned out to be political.

    Any time the son of an official struck up a relationship with a female whom the father did not approve of, she was accused of prostitution and sent to jail. And any time the daughter of an official got involved with someone he considered unsuitable, he was accused of rape and sent to prison. And then there were people who stole small amounts from the government, where they working which the United States did not consider really criminal.

    Castro was interested in sending people whom the United States would reject, so that it would end its open asylum policy, and pay him to keep Cubans from escaping. He sent a lot of homosexuals, because at that time immigration of homosexuals was illegal. (of course it didn’t do a lot of good for many of them in the end – they gotr infected with AIDS and died)

    The people on the Mariel boatlift knew who the real criminals were – they had tattoos for one thing or had people from the same prison with them who knew what they were and what they were like, or just from the way they talked and acted maybe, and they told immigration, but they were ignored.

    INS acted only on the basis of self-admission, so real criminals were passed through while those with technical violations, and who were honest, had their admission delayed.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  347. There have also been no such trials for the many drugs that are routinely prescribed “off-label,” so the need for such trials is window-dressing. I willl offer a one-word explanation for the FDA’s position on Ivermectin: Money.

    There is an issue of money, and it deals with Kory’s own conflicts of interest.
    I think you’re making a mistake, felipe, because the trials that proclaim ivermectin to work are observational and third-rate. When put to a real test such as randomized clinical trials, every single one failed or was fraudulent. To me, it’s preferable to go with the best information available than choose questionable “information” that tells you what you want to hear, no?

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  348. I missed comment this earlier:

    Because your 2-hour internet search is just as good as his critics lifetime of learning and experience?
    Kevin M (ab1c11) — 9/6/2021 @ 10:19 am

    First: I have had it emblazoned into my mind that counting hours of study whether many or few is not only vulgar but prejudicial; not everyone can read/study at the same speed, much less spend the same time on any point. You should know this.

    To answer you, I arrive at my position because of the studies that these videos provide a link for, and then studying them. How many studies specific to Ivermectin have you read, Kevin, before making a comment? Also, I do not discount as “krank” the lifetime of learning and medical practice of Dr.Kory and his fellow MDs just because an invested detractor spits it out, as well as all the meta analysis that Dr. Tess Lawrie and others have published.

    You’ve been dealing with only your peers for so long that you forget that there are others who approach questions with a greater criterion and who exert greater industry for nothing more than curiosity; how embarrassing it should be to identify yourself as one who is used to expecting so little. I rarely pound the table with lofty cut and pastes, instead, I choose to provide simple, easy to digest, videos that provide a springboard for those who will look at the studies for themselves and make up their own mind.

    Here, start with the abstract, and if you are inclined, download and read the whole thing at your leisure. You’re welcome.

    felipe (484255)

  349. I missed comment this earlier:- felipe (484255) — 9/6/2021 @ 12:45 pm

    That’s weird. I could have sworn I typed “I missed this comment earlier:”

    felipe (484255)

  350. You appear to be ascribing some pretty negative ethics for the researchers at the FDA, CDC, and NIH…

    On the contrary, I ascribe them none at all.

    I can’t join you in that conspiracy.

    I respect you for that.

    The implications….of keeping low-cost treatments under wraps during a world-wide pandemic….are staggering. The evidence of this must rise above mere internet gossip.

    Indeed, I completely agree. It is important, to protect fee speech, especially speech with which we disagree. If a crank speaks, and is condemned, I wish to read for myself what those words were. I will accept no assurances that I do not need to see the evidence. I will decide, as all who are free, what I shall read or not.

    I echo your sentiments: Be safe, everyone!

    felipe (484255)

  351. Sammy, that’s the official story alright. Just like the official one in Afghanistan is “some Americans didn’t want to leave.”

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  352. felipe, you Cochrane link went 404, but here’s a link. The conclusion:

    Based on the current very low‐ to low‐certainty evidence, we are uncertain about the efficacy and safety of ivermectin used to treat or prevent COVID‐19. The completed studies are small and few are considered high quality. Several studies are underway that may produce clearer answers in review updates. Overall, the reliable evidence available does not support the use of ivermectin for treatment or prevention of COVID‐19 outside of well‐designed randomized trials.

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  353. First: I have had it emblazoned into my mind that counting hours of study whether many or few is not only vulgar but prejudicial; not everyone can read/study at the same speed, much less spend the same time on any point. You should know this.

    Filipe, you do not have, nor will you ever have, the knowledge or experience needed to sort sh1t from Shinola as far as biochemistry and physiology are concerned. Neither do I (but I may have a bit more than you, having actually studied chemistry and physics).

    Your ONLY potential argument is that “this guy is telling the truth and those other tens of thousands are all conspiring to lie.”

    Me, I tend to think that the “lone guy on the Interwebs” is as cracked as every other one. No, people aren’t allergic to radio waves; no, if you divide 1000 molecules of a solution a million times, you don’t have a million solutions with 1/1000 of a molecule; no, the earth is not flat and gravity is not optional.

    Maybe this means I have a closed mind, but maybe it means that facts are stubborn things.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  354. Update: Judge reverses order forcing hospital to give ivermectin to COVID-19 patient
    ……..
    After two days of testimony and arguments, Common Pleas Judge Michael Oster issued an order Monday siding with West Chester Hospital. He said the hospital bears no duty to honor a prescription written for Jeffrey Smith, 51, for ivermectin, a drug used as a dewormer in horses and an anti-parasitic in humans.
    …….
    “This Court is not determining if ivermectin will ever be effective and useful as a treatment for COVID-19,” Oster said.

    “However, based upon the evidence, it has not been shown to be effective at this juncture. The studies that tend to give support to ivermectin have had inconsistent results, limitations to the studies, were open label studies, were of low quality or low certainty, included small sample sizes, various dosing regiments, or have been so riddled with issues that the study was withdrawn.”

    Julie Smith brought the lawsuit on behalf of her husband, Jeffrey Smith, who tested positive for COVID-19 and was admitted to the ICU July 15, where he remains today. He has been sedated, intubated and on a ventilator since Aug. 1.
    ………
    Julie Smith testified that neither she nor her husband were vaccinated against COVID-19. She said it was “experimental,” so she didn’t trust it.

    “We didn’t feel confident it had been out long enough,” she said during a hearing Thursday.

    She later connected with Dr. Fred Wagshul, a founding physician of the Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance, a nonprofit that touts ivermectin as a wonder drug. Wagshul is a licensed physician but is not board certified within any specialty and hasn’t worked in a hospital for 10 years, according to his testimony.

    He prescribed Jeffrey Smith 21 days’ worth of ivermectin without reviewing Jeffrey Smith’s clinical information or talking to any of his treating physicians. ………

    However, when asked if it had benefitted Smith, he hedged.

    “I honestly don’t know, but the rule of thumb is, when something is working, you don’t stop it,” he said.

    Several witnesses for the hospital cast doubt on Wagshul’s testimony and credibility as a physician. ……..
    …….
    A review of available literature conducted in August by the journal Nature found there’s no certainty in the available data on potential benefits of ivermectin.
    ………

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  355. filipe, you may have all the time in the world to study nonsense, but I have a nonsense-detector that saves me from going there.

    Here’s an idea: Look at the studies, tests and results — including what mush be a billion case histories by now — and tell me Why The F anyone would not get the first free vaccine shot they could find?

    But no, let’s head for fringe “science.”

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  356. I think you’re making a mistake, felipe, because the trials that proclaim ivermectin to work are observational and third-rate. When put to a real test such as randomized clinical trials, every single one failed or was fraudulent. To me, it’s preferable to go with the best information available than choose questionable “information” that tells you what you want to hear, no?
    Paul Montagu (5de684) — 9/6/2021 @ 12:43 pm

    I understand from where you come, Paul. After studying some of the details of the one particular CDC approved trial that demonstrated no efficacy for Ivermectin, I confirmed the allegation, made by doctors who regularly prescribed Ivermectin in covid, that, absurdly low dosages* of Ivermectin were given in their blind randomized trial to the test subjects. The trial also used some subjects that were already past the initial stages of infection, advanced cases which MDs in the field would not treat with Ivermectin. Doctors who prescribe Ivermectin do so only for patients in the early stages of infection and as a prophylactic to help prevent infection, not as a late stage treatment.

    I am persuaded that the trial was “designed to fail”

    * I will not discuss the dosages used, either in the study or dosages used by prescribing MDs, in order to prevent misuse of this information. I encourage those interested to go to the CDC site and read the details of the study for specifics. Sorry, no links for bullies. (I learned that from our esteemed host!)

    felipe (484255)

  357. And, calling the mainstream opposision “invested” is just pathetic. Of course people who spend their entire lives in a profession are invested. Also, they know what they are talking about.

    Even if this de-wormer happens to help some patients (likely with a co-morbidity involving worms) that does not change the basic argument, to wit: Bullsh1t.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  358. Paul Montagu (5de684) — 9/6/2021 @ 1:10 pm

    Your link also doesn’t work, try this (assuming this is the study you want):

    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/labs/pmc/articles/PMC8406455/#!po=0.168919

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  359. the trials that proclaim ivermectin to work are observational and third-rate. When put to a real test such as randomized clinical trials

    Paul Montagu (5de684) — 9/6/2021 @ 12:43 pm

    Yes, absolutely, they were observational! That is Real-world cases where doctors gave the drugs to patients and then reported the results in real-time. “Third-rate?” I think you mean third-world! These studies were conducted in third-world countries, with no money, in the most demanding of environments, and at the expense of actual practicing MDs. If we were to speak of only one such study, that would be one thing. But 31 studies? Instead of attacking the data, they attack poverty.

    felipe (484255)

  360. filipe, you may have all the time in the world to study nonsense, but I have a nonsense-detector that saves me from going there.

    “non-sense detector” Now that’s evidence of a truly open mind steeped in scientific curiosity.

    felipe (484255)

  361. And, calling the mainstream opposision “invested” is just pathetic.

    Kevin M (ab1c11) — 9/6/2021 @ 1:24 pm

    But “invested”, is accurate in every sense of the word. Proponents and opponents of every issue are invested. Saying so is just being honest, not pathetic.

    felipe (484255)

  362. Putin’s people are posting in comment sections, now:

    Russian internet trolls are targeting British, as well as other Western, media outlets to promote Vladimir Putin’s administration and Kremlin policies, research has revealed.

    Cardiff University’s Crime and Security Research Institute discovered 32 mainstream media websites in 16 countries were targeted, including the UK’s Mail Online, the Daily Express and the Times.

    Presumably they see this as a supplement to their main efforts on social media.

    For America, now, I think these Russian propaganda efforts are the most important:

    It turns out that the anti-vaccine sentiment is the product of what can only be described as an industry whose principal protagonists are an organized group of professional propagandists. As recently reported in the science journal Nature, they are people “running multi-million-dollar organizations, incorporated mainly in the USA, with as many as 60 staff each.”

    Moreover, the source of much of the misinformation about vaccines comes from an unobvious source: the Russian government’s propaganda apparatus, which cultivates and exploits foreign anti-vaccine “useful idiots,” causing palpable harm to Americans and citizens of other Western countries.

    Are Russians involved in the ivermectin debate? I haven’t seen any evidence of that — but I haven’t looked for any either.

    But I do know that “Czar” Putin is delighted when he sees us quarreling with each other.

    (You probably have heard the famous story from Texas, where Russian trolls managed to inspire two opposed demonstrations, confronting each other.)

    Jim Miller (edcec1)

  363. Filipe, you do not have, nor will you ever have, the knowledge or experience needed to sort sh1t from Shinola as far as biochemistry and physiology are concerned. Neither do I (but I may have a bit more than you, having actually studied chemistry and physics).

    “Studied” Comedy! Peculiar, this position, particularly because it was ascertained (discerned?) exactly how? Icarus descending haphazardly, confessing the importance of sorting shoe-polishing product from evacuation might possibly be someone’s idea of engaging, valuable, enterprise, certainly not mine.

    felipe (484255)

  364. Maybe this means I have a closed mind, but maybe it means that facts are stubborn things.
    Kevin M (ab1c11) — 9/6/2021 @ 1:15 pm

    Honesty is becoming to you. If I know one thing about you, Kevin, it is that you are honest.

    felipe (484255)

  365. Science has become woke,sophisticated and infested with karenitis.

    mg (8cbc69)

  366. Guam is profiting from “vaccine tourism.

    While an increasing number of tourism-reliant countries, such as Italy and Thailand, recognize vaccination records for travel, a vacation abroad remains off-limits for millions of the unvaccinated. Enter Guam, a U.S. territory with ample vaccine supplies and no quarantine restrictions, where more than 80 percent of the eligible population is fully vaccinated. For residents of Taiwan, South Korea and elsewhere, three weeks on a tropical island plus the chance to get doubly dosed equal an opportunity they can’t always get at home because of supply shortages and access issues.

    Sounds like an excellent idea (but I would like to see them get that 80 percent up even higher).

    Jim Miller (edcec1)

  367. Paul Montagu (5de684) — 9/6/2021 @ 1:10 pm

    I appreciate that, Paul. I think it an anomaly on your end, I tested the link in my comment, and it works.

    Also, I hope you will take the time to read the entire piece, before making up your own mind about Ivermectin. I wouldn’t be surprised if you come to a different conclusion than I did, but I would respect you for putting in the work. And I would not question you ability to understand what you read. But rather, I would listen to your informed thoughts.

    felipe (484255)

  368. You know you are old when typing (even slowly) becomes an exhausting exercise. Goodnight all.

    felipe (484255)

  369. In tribute to mother jones. Happy labor day. It came about so workers would stop celebrating may day as workers day.

    asset (fde52c)

  370. Doggonit! My Guardian Angel will not let me be until I apologize to you, Kevin for vexing you in the way I did:

    I’m sorry, Kevin, for abusing you in such a manner that engendered, in you, your understandable response. I was wrong to engage in such uncharitable behavior. I ask for your forgiveness and I will endeavor to not repeat my grievous error against you, or anyone else.

    felipe (484255)

  371. Give this a listen, it’ll perk you up, felipe!!!

    https://youtu.be/mxtfdH3-TQ4

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  372. Did you have the early bird special, felipe?

    mg (8cbc69)

  373. RIP Michael K. Williams (54).

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  374. Thanks be to G*D! Now I will take my nap of the ancient ones.

    felipe (484255)

  375. LOL, mg! It doesn’t take much to knock me out.

    felipe (484255)

  376. Ok, now I really am outta here.

    felipe (484255)

  377. Any of you SOBs start dropping and scooting your asses around on your carpet like terriers, we got a problem…

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  378. Good one, Col. Been listening to that for over 50 years.

    mg (8cbc69)

  379. “Third-rate?” I think you mean third-world!

    No, third rate. And don’t presume I haven’t read up on the subject, because I have. Over the span of months. The real question is why you’re dismissive of higher-standard studies that show ineffective, inconclusive results. Your conspiratorial answers about “money” and “big Pharma” aren’t convincing, and sound vaguely like some OccupyWallStreet guy talking.

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  380. 355. Paul Montagu (5de684) — 9/6/2021 @ 12:43 pm

    . When put to a real test such as randomized clinical trials, every single one failed or was fraudulent.

    I think te sdame knd of trial proved Regeneron doesn’t work.

    I’ve heard of a trial that did work but now see this:

    https://bmcinfectdis.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12879-021-06348-5

    But this one gave it after they positive. A big question yo mr is: what was the standard of care?

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  381. 364. felipe (484255) — 9/6/2021 @ 1:22 pm

    After studying some of the details of the one particular CDC approved trial that demonstrated no efficacy for Ivermectin, I confirmed the allegation, made by doctors who regularly prescribed Ivermectin in covid, that, absurdly low dosages* of Ivermectin were given in their blind randomized trial to the test subjects. The trial also used some subjects that were already past the initial stages of infection, advanced cases which MDs in the field would not treat with Ivermectin. Doctors who prescribe Ivermectin do so only for patients in the early stages of infection and as a prophylactic to help prevent infection, not as a late stage treatment.

    I am persuaded that the trial was “designed to fail”

    This happens with a lot of diet studies.

    And if the “standard of care” included monoclonal antibodies, which work better, it’s even more of a joke. But low dosage is more than enough to rig a study to fail.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  382. Nicaragua is becoming more of a tyranny.

    https://news.un.org/en/story/2020/03/1059051

    No previous association with Daniel Ortega helps.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  383. A Generation of American Men Give Up on College: ‘I Just Feel Lost’
    ………
    At the close of the 2020-21 academic year, women made up 59.5% of college students, an all-time high, and men 40.5%, according to enrollment data from the National Student Clearinghouse, a nonprofit research group. U.S. colleges and universities had 1.5 million fewer students compared with five years ago, and men accounted for 71% of the decline.

    This education gap, which holds at both two- and four-year colleges, has been slowly widening for 40 years. The divergence increases at graduation: After six years of college, 65% of women in the U.S. who started a four-year university in 2012 received diplomas by 2018 compared with 59% of men during the same period, according to the U.S. Department of Education.

    In the next few years, two women will earn a college degree for every man, if the trend continues, said Douglas Shapiro, executive director of the research center at the National Student Clearinghouse.

    No reversal is in sight. Women increased their lead over men in college applications for the 2021-22 school year—3,805,978 to 2,815,810—by nearly a percentage point compared with the previous academic year, according to Common Application, a nonprofit that transmits applications to more than 900 schools. Women make up 49% of the college-age population in the U.S., according to the Census Bureau.
    ……..
    The gender enrollment disparity among nonprofit colleges is widest at private four-year schools, where the proportion of women during the 2020-21 school year grew to an average of 61%, a record high, Clearinghouse data show.……..
    ……..
    Social science researchers cite distractions and obstacles to education that weigh more on boys and young men, including videogames, pornography, increased fatherlessness and cases of overdiagnosis of boyhood restlessness and related medications.
    ……….
    Men in interviews around the U.S. said they quit school or didn’t enroll because they didn’t see enough value in a college degree for all the effort and expense required to earn one. Many said they wanted to make money after high school.
    ………
    Many young men are hobbled by a lack of guidance, a strain of anti-intellectualism and a growing belief that college degrees don’t pay off, said Ed Grocholski, a senior vice president at Junior Achievement USA, which works with about five million students every year to teach about career paths, financial literacy and entrepreneurship.
    ………

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  384. I welcome our new female overlords.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  385. Transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg and his husband have adopted two infant children. Good for them. Nice to get some good news into the cycle.

    https://www.foxnews.com/politics/pete-buttigieg-shares-picture-twins-thanks-well-wishers

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  386. 392
    Perhaps the young lads are tired of paying the high cost for the the woke diatribe of the college agenda.

    mg (8cbc69)

  387. 394 –
    I’ll bet Ford gives them a fleet of the gay pride vehicles.

    mg (8cbc69)

  388. Germany protests Russian attacks on national election:

    Germany has protested to Russia over attempts to steal data from lawmakers in what it suspects may have been preparation to spread disinformation before the upcoming German election, the Foreign Ministry in Berlin said Monday.

    Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Andrea Sasse said that a hacker outfit called Ghostwriter has been “combining conventional cyberattacks with disinformation and influence operations,” and that activities targeting Germany have been observed “for some time.”

    (The German and Canadian elections both deserve more attention than they have been getting from our news organizations. Even before this protest.)

    Jim Miller (edcec1)

  389. Transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg and his husband have adopted two infant children. Good for them. Nice to get some good news into the cycle.

    https://www.foxnews.com/politics/pete-buttigieg-shares-picture-twins-thanks-well-wishers

    Time123 (9f42ee) — 9/6/2021 @ 3:26 pm

    MAGA land not amused.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  390. Why did Pete and his husband pose on a hospital bed with their adopted kids like a mom and her newborn?

    kaf (f4e7a8)

  391. I think te sdame knd of trial proved Regeneron doesn’t work.

    Regeneron finished a phase 3 trial with proven effective results last April, Sammy.

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  392. The rules and regulations in the adoption business are tough.

    mg (8cbc69)

  393. Why did Pete and his husband pose on a hospital bed with their adopted kids like a mom and her newborn?

    It’s a #NeverTrump Left Wing Communist Liberal Democrat Pro-Vaccine conspiracy to promote the LGBTQ agenda.

    Or it could be that it’s a childbirth adoption and the hospital will not let the newborns be anywhere except in a clinical setting until they are discharged. And there are no couches for two people holding two babies to sit and pose for pictures in a maternity room.

    nk (1d9030)

  394. Forget ivermectin, how about llama antibodies?

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  395. I think te sdame knd (sic) of trial proved Regeneron doesn’t work.

    It was also part of kitchen sink of treatments given President Trump.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  396. Kaf, who cares. New parents took a cute picture. Maybe there was a need to be there. Maybe it was just a setting. Either way they look like they’ll be good fathers. Try not to hate on family.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  397. @398, Focus on the positive and ignore the bigots. They’re less relevant every day and soon enough their views will get the same reaction as someone angry over interracial marriage.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  398. @405. They’ll certainly have the bases covered when it comes to teaching baseball w/t kids: one parent pitching, the other catching.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  399. Jim Miller, I haven’t had time to read the links you’ve posted but they look interesting. Thank you for sharing.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  400. Any of you SOBs start dropping and scooting your asses around on your carpet like terriers, we got a problem…

    Which of course, instantly brings Beau to mind at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  401. Five children on my block, just on my side of the street, were adopted at birth. Through Catholic Charities. As an alternative to abortion. And that’s a fact.

    So clowns making snide comments about the Buttigiegs adoption should go stick their heads in the nearest toilet. And then flush it.

    nk (1d9030)

  402. House Republicans wrote a letter to Yahoo ‘Chief Executive Officer’ Marissa Mayer, but she hasn’t been CEO since 2017
    ……..
    The letter is one of 13 that GOP congressional leaders sent to telecommunication giants, threatening “legal remedies” should they comply with the House Select Committee, which is investigating the early January insurrection at the US Capitol.
    ………
    The Republican architects of these new letters say that would violate federal law and “would put every American with a phone or computer in the crosshairs of a surveillance state run by Democrat politicians,” House Minority Leader Kein McCarthy said last week.
    ………..
    There are no “legal remedies” nor would the telecoms be violating any law in response to a subpoena.

    This group is just the gang that couldn’t shoot straight.

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  403. And for crying out loud, comrades, we already have more farts than we can stand on these threads from DCSCA’s Beau Biden comments. Don’t add more from Fox News. The only thing you can rely on to be true in a story from Fox News right now is that there is a place called Afghanistan.

    nk (1d9030)

  404. more orange man bad posts, eh comrade?

    mg (8cbc69)

  405. N “loveislove” to the K giving me a strong STDH vibe.

    “Five children on my block, just on my side of the street, were adopted at birth. Through Catholic Charities. As an alternative to abortion. And that’s a fact.”

    Were they all adopted by stylish gay dads? Did everyone clap afterward? Did your 8-year old tearfully ask why these budding sex workers were denied their right to competetive wages and self-determination by the racist Republican party?

    The only thing you can rely upon to be true in an nk story is that it probably appeared on #Resistance Twitter somewhere.

    SupportiveFather (ec3648)

  406. Heh! Just yesterday I was talking with somebody about how Biden won by hunkering down and letting Trump be Trump. You’re not going to upstage Moe, Larry and Curly, and the more people see of them the less likely they are to want them for President.

    nk (1d9030)

  407. And idiots who don’t know that it was Trump’s CDC who locked down football stadiums last year and Biden’s CDC who opened them this year should not be in college.

    nk (1d9030)

  408. #408 Time123 – You’re welcome.

    And here’s one more.

    Russia is facing a dire demographic crisis, and it doesn’t seem to be going away anytime soon.

    The country’s dramatic natural population decline in the past six months—more than double the rate from the same time period last year—is so severe that it prompted President Vladimir Putin to come out with a rallying cry in support of larger families last week. “A strong family bringing up two, three, or four children,” he said, “should be the image of a future Russia.”

    Among the many reasons for that demographic crisis is that too many Russian men are unwilling to treat women with respect and kindness.

    (Those who want to see many more numbers should read this Wikipedia article, Demographics of Russia.)

    Jim Miller (edcec1)

  409. @412. And for crying out loud, comrades, we already have more farts than we can stand on these threads from DCSCA’s Beau Biden comments.

    Hold your breath- we’re less than a year into: The Beauseidon Adventure!

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  410. Heh! Just yesterday I was talking with somebody about how Biden won by hunkering down and letting Trump be Trump. You’re not going to upstage Beau, Larry and Curly, and the more people see of them the less likely they are to want them for President.

    FIFY

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  411. Records rebut claims of unequal treatment of Jan. 6 rioters

    It’s a common refrain from some of those charged in the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol and their Republican allies: The Justice Department is treating them harshly because of their political views while those arrested during last year’s protests over racial injustice were given leniency.
    …….
    An Associated Press review of court documents in more than 300 federal cases stemming from the protests sparked by George Floyd’s death last year shows that dozens of people charged have been convicted of serious crimes and sent to prison.

    The AP found that more than 120 defendants across the United States have pleaded guilty or were convicted at trial of federal crimes including rioting, arson and conspiracy. More than 70 defendants who’ve been sentenced so far have gotten an average of about 27 months behind bars. At least 10 received prison terms of five years or more.
    ……..
    ……. President Joe Biden’s Justice Department has continued the vast majority of the racial injustice protest cases brought across the U.S. under Trump and has often pushed for lengthy prison time for people convicted of serious crimes. Since Biden took office in January, federal prosecutors have brought some new cases stemming from last year’s protests.
    ………
    Just this month, a man was sentenced to four years behind bars and ordered to pay what his attorney said is likely to exceed $1.5 million in restitution after pleading guilty to inciting a riot last spring in Champaign, Illinois.
    ……….
    In another case this month, an Illinois man was sentenced to nearly nine years behind bars for lighting a Minneapolis cellphone store on fire in June 2020. A Charleston, South Carolina, man who livestreamed himself looting a store downtown was sentenced to two years in prison.

    In the Capitol riot, dozens of defendants have been charged only with misdemeanors, and a standard plea deal has allowed many to plead guilty to a single count of demonstrating in the Capitol.
    ……….
    Garrett Miller, of Texas, was wearing a T-shirt that said, “I Was There, Washington D.C., January 6, 2021,” when he was arrested. Prosecutors say Miller posted threatening messages on Twitter directed at Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a New York Democrat, after the riot. His lawyer said Miller isn’t trying to excuse his actions.
    …….
    Federal prosecutors say Miller hasn’t presented any evidence that his case was politically motivated.

    They also rejected comparisons between Miller’s actions and those of the Portland defendants, “who — despite committing serious offenses — never entered the federal courthouse structure, impeded a congressional proceeding, or targeted a specific federal official or officer for assassination.”
    ……….
    ………. Other cases (in Portland) were dismissed after defendants agreed to plead guilty to similar charges in state court, records show.
    ………

    Rip Murdock (8210ad)

  412. We pay the Beaupa $400,000/year so what does he do today as Americans he left behind try to flee Afghanistan?

    Deliver cold-cuts to New Castle; freebee deli sandwiches to well-paid union dudes.

    But Beau tip, eh Joe?

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  413. So clowns making snide comments about the Buttigiegs adoption should go stick their heads in the nearest toilet. And then flush it.

    ‘Flushed with Pride: The Story of Thomas Crapper’
    eh, nk?

    Guess what he invented: the flushing Beaulet.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  414. @421 selective editing by Rip conveniently omitted this:

    In Portland, Oregon — where demonstrations, many turning violent, occurred nightly for months after a white Minneapolis police officer killed Floyd — about 60 of the roughly 100 cases that were brought have been dismissed, court records show.

    Most of those defendants received deferred resolution agreements, under which prosecutors promise to drop charges after a certain amount of time if the defendant stays out of trouble and completes things like community service. Some Jan. 6 defendants have complained it’s unfair they aren’t getting the same deals.

    the “APnews” authors had to grudgingly include that, otherwise it’s nothing more than your usual ridiculously slanted opinion piece

    that multiple riots occurring over several months in several large cities resulted in more prosecutions than one riot on one day in one jurisdiction is noteworthy only to the severely math challenged

    and “largely peaceful” makes an appearance in the piece, of course

    JF (e1156d)

  415. “non-sense detector” Now that’s evidence of a truly open mind steeped in scientific curiosity.

    Yes, and while watching Fringe, I regularly said that Dr Walter Bishop was completely out to lunch. However, the show’s writers always had him turn out to be right. Sadly for some, Hollywood writers do not control God’s world, and bullsh1t CAN be detected without intensive investigation.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  416. “I had a brother at khe son or kabul fighting off the viet cong or taliban. Their still there, he’s all gone.” Some things never change. Thanks bruce.

    asset (e8ee0d)

  417. Kevin M (ab1c11) — 9/7/2021 @ 12:41 am

    Good morning, Kevin. Peace be with you. It is possible you may have missed my heartfelt apology to you. Here it is again:

    I’m sorry, Kevin, for abusing you in such a manner that engendered, in you, your understandable response. I was wrong to engage in such uncharitable behavior. I ask for your forgiveness and I will endeavor to not repeat my grievous error against you, or anyone else.
    felipe (484255) — 9/6/2021 @ 2:57 pm

    I hope you will accept it.

    felipe (484255)

  418. Felipe,

    I have no animus toward you. I do wish that you would look more critically at outlier claims and not attempt to discredit a clear scientific consensus as “invested”, which is lawyer-talk for “We need to find some way past their mountain of facts.”

    The irony here is that there is a mountain of data showing that vaccines work, and work well, yet some folks insist on trying unproved (and likely unproveable) cures instead, based on poorly-sourced claims. Two reasons: distrust of science and scientists (who perhaps should be protecting the brand better), or being at death’s door and grasping at straws (see: Laetrile).

    Sometimes they are true — Barry Marshall proved that most ulcers were caused by a parasite, not by stress or diet, and that a simple course of metronidazole would cure many ulcers. They all laughed, right up to the time he proved it and won his Nobel.

    But that really isn’t the way to bet. For every Barry Marshall, there’s a thousand quacks, and it isn’t limited to Covid, or even medicine. Sometimes they get a good run (the Dean Drive, Cold Fusion, most anything involving Tesla) and the better ones get a good look, right up to the point where the results aren’t reproduced.

    And sometimes, no matter how well debunked, some things (seances, homeopathy, astrology) just won’t die. That does not mean that more research needs to be done, just that it’s not going to do any good. At some point you don’t even argue, as it’s like trying to teach calculus to a horse.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  419. Israel and Iceland are having issues with the china flu. The most vaccinated countries in the world. I’ll ride with my antibodies.

    mg (8cbc69)

  420. https://townhall.com/columnists/salenazito/2021/09/07/the-negligence-of-joe-biden-n2595317
    How can all those sob’s in d.c. not be impeaching this pos?

    mg (8cbc69)

  421. I do wish that you would look more critically at outlier claims and not attempt to discredit a clear scientific consensus as “invested”, which is lawyer-talk for “We need to find some way past their mountain of facts.”

    I do look very critically at all claims. You simply do not agree with my assessment. That’s fine. You are mistaken to put so much stock in “scientific consensus” as though consensus is integral to good science. No, consensus is social rubish, a show of hands, and a trade-off between truth and desire. I do not accept it, and neither should you. All scientific claims are either proven true, proven false, or in rare instances remain (for the time) formally undecidable. If true, then results can be recreated and verified by anyone willing to put in the work. If false, then failure to obtain results by others in identical conditions can also be recreated by those willing to put in the work. No less than 31 studies have persuaded me that Ivermectin is a valuable tool for doctors to use as a prophylactic in the fight against covid. Not to use every tool available is just bad medicine, bad science, bad stewardship.

    “Peer reviewed” used to mean “vetted,” but today that phrase has just become code for “ideology tested.”

    You are reading way too much of your own prejudice into my open mindedness. In giving credit to the Doctors who obtained good results, you think I must be deaf to the opposition. I am not deaf, I am unpersuaded. You think I an wrong? Then make a good-faith effort to persuade me.

    The irony here is that there is a mountain of data showing that vaccines work, and work well, yet some folks insist on trying unproved (and likely unproveable) cures instead, based on poorly-sourced claims. Two reasons: distrust of science and scientists (who perhaps should be protecting the brand better), or being at death’s door and grasping at straws (see: Laetrile).

    Why are you telling me what I already know? Do you think I oppose a working vaccine? You would be wrong. Do you think I believe Ivermectin to be a “cure” for anything? you are wrong. Your entire paragraph seems to be a strawman. This is why I find your comments to be unpersuasive. Not once have you accurately described my position.

    The first step in persuasion is to recognize you opponent’s true position. If you see your opponent as a problem, then you must first be able to clearly state what the problem says. Otherwise you are just throwing out blind guesses and hoping to hit upon a solution. Let me help you, by repeating my position, then you can attempt to persuade me that I am wrong by pointing out my mistakes:

    Ivermectin is a valuable tool for doctors to use as a prophylactic in the fight against covid. Not to use every good tool available is just bad medicine, bad science, bad stewardship.

    But I am not a problem to solve. I am a mind to persuade. So far your efforts do not persuade.

    The rest of your comment is simply travelogue.

    felipe (484255)

  422. mg (8cbc69) — 9/7/2021 @ 3:33 am

    Same here, mg. And I wash my hands!

    felipe (484255)

  423. mg: “Israel and Iceland are having issues with the china flu…”

    Still, Iceleand has had only 30 deaths since the start of the pandemic and only ONE this year. Those vaccinated are not going to the hospital or to the morgue. Compare that with Wyoming (comparable population size) and 858 deaths…82 alone in August….from the onset. Sounds like a lot of tough guys wanting to do it their way…..it’s a shame

    AJ_Liberty (a4ff25)

  424. Rip, there’s strong evidence that the government tried in good faith to prosecute people who rioted during the BLM protests last summer. But that doesn’t mean the efforts and outcomes were the same as those taken to arrest and charge the terrorists who assaulted the capitol on Jan 6.

    In addition to differences in illegal action there’s also a substantial difference in evidence, part of this is due to efforts by LEO and part of it is due to actions by terrorists and rioters themselves.

    The ANTIFA criminals appear to know they’re breaking the law and take steps to keep from being identified. The pro-Trump insurrectionists appear to believe that they were the vanguard of a justified movement to put the rightful president back in office and bragged openly about their actions.

    I think the argument that the federal government let Antifa rioters go because they’re ideological allies is dumb. But that’s not the same thing as saying both groups were treated the same.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  425. AJ, The link below is from a KFF study of breakthrough cases. It was done in June, but I’m not aware of any more recent data or any newer data that would change the conclusion that the vaccine greatly reduces the chance of infection with covid and reduces even more the chance of being hospitalized or dying.

    Wyoming isn’t in the study because they don’t report breakthrough cases but Montana is.
    Data for 2/15 – 7/20

    Total Hospitalized 2203
    Vaccinated people hospitalized 51
    Total Dead 324
    Vaccinated people who died 10

    https://www.kff.org/policy-watch/covid-19-vaccine-breakthrough-cases-data-from-the-states/

    There plenty of ways this could be improved, but there are limits to the data set. Every state that reports breakthrough cases showed a similar improvement in outcomes for vaccinated people.

    I think one things (among many) the Biden administration should be doing is mandating reporting of breakthrough cases into a common format for all states and making that information readily available.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  426. “I can smell the sea air. The rest of my time I’m going to spend on the sea. And when I die, I’m going to die on the sea. You know what I will die of? I shall die of eating an unwashed grape one day out on the ocean.”

    —- Blanche Covidian

    Colonel Haiku (9a8c5f)

  427. One of the flaws with the link I popped in in 435 is that it’s data from July.

    Oklahoma provides weekly updates and that show breakthrough cases. It’s a nice report that again shows the vaccine is very effective at preventing people from getting covid and having serious illness if they do.

    https://oklahoma.gov/content/dam/ok/en/covid19/documents/weekly-epi-report/2021.09.01%20Weekly%20Epi%20Report.pdf

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  428. https://therightscoop.com/rand-paul-was-right-newly-released-documents-prove-fauci-lied-about-nih-supporting-gain-of-function-research-at-wuhan-lab/

    FOIAs show incriminating information about funding gain of function research using spike proteins on humanized mice in China. Fauci testified under oath that this did not happen.

    NJRob (eb56c3)

  429. The CDC changes the definition of vaccination on Sept 1st. Replaces the word “immunity” with “protection.”

    http://web.archive.org/web/20210826113846/https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vac-gen/imz-basics.htm

    Obudman (cb4106)

  430. The sophisticated vaccinated may feel a bit uneasy about giving up body rights for some just made serum. Thus justifying the belittlement of others.

    mg (8cbc69)

  431. Compare the photographs of the Jan 6 mob with the BLM riots in Washington DC and try and tell us again with a straight face who the terrorists in the nation’s capital were. Then multiply the BLM arson/looting/mayhem/destruction/murder by all the riots across the country last summer.

    You can’t compare video though, they won’t release the unedited Jan 6 footage.

    Obudman (cb4106)

  432. Obudman (cb4106) — 9/7/2021 @ 8:18 am

    Right before they made that change it was considered antivax to say that. It still will be until enough people have applied the code patch.

    frosty (f27e97)

  433. https://asiatimes.com/2021/09/stagflation-rears-its-ugly-head-in-us-payroll-data/

    As labor becomes scarcer and more expensive, employers stop hiring, either because they can’t find workers or because they can’t afford them. This is a classic symptom of an inflationary cycle.

    The average rent on a newly-signed lease is up 12% year-on-year as of August, according to Apartmentlist.com.

    Home prices are up 20% year on year, the biggest jump on record, according to the Case-Shiller Index.

    Used car prices are up 25%, and new car prices are probably up 10% after dealer discounts have dwindled.

    Manufacturing jobs rose by 37,000, driven mainly by a 24,000 jump in automotive jobs.

    But the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ survey of establishments was conducted in the middle of August before major auto companies announced production shutdowns to the global chip shortage.

    Vote for Carter 2.0 get Carter 2.0.

    NJRob (eb56c3)

  434. Yikes, stagflation. I knew it would return to bight me again.

    felipe at a different terminal (084d77)

  435. Very interesting, nj Rob and Obudman.

    Colonel Haiku (9a8c5f)

  436. filipe, I think we should talk about other things.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  437. The biggest economic problem we have is the impact from Covid. Infraction is being driven by lack of supply on lots of key goods; Cars, housing, lumber, Fuel etc. Many of those are limited by Covid. Best thing we can do to get past that is get everyone vaccinated who can safely be vaccinated.

    Automotive especially is mostly being impacted by a shortage of microchips that’s a hold over from the shutdowns last year. it’s also a global problem that impacts world wide auto capacity.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  438. @441, I’m good with both.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  439. Kamala teh Joker…

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P1xYKiIi0MA

    Colonel Haiku (9a8c5f)

  440. Media narrative right now: “The only reason Covid isn’t over is because a bunch of dumb anti-vaxxer Trumpian hicks from rural America refuse to get vaccinated, and instead are taking horse dewormer that they read about on the internet!”

    Complex realities of why Covid isn’t over:
    1. The vaccines, though effective, are not nearly as effective as they were initially depicted last winter, meaning there are and will continue to be breakthrough cases (albeit fortunately milder).

    2. Vaccination does lag, but it is not primarily where the media claims. Rather, the biggest gaps in vaccination are in lower income and minority communities (stats here: https://www.kff.org/…/latest-data-on-covid-19…/). The reasons for this lag are complicated, but mainly amount to the transaction costs of access, including the free time needed to get vaccinated. If the media and political class focused their attention on positive messaging and improving access in these communities, they could potentially make a sizable dent in the gap. Instead, they’ve chosen to ridicule and blame it all on a tiny fringe of anti-vaxxers.

    3. The horse dewormer thing is at most a side-show that the media has pounced upon because it allows them to ridicule people they don’t like, as we saw yesterday with the fake ivermectin overdose story. It has next to zero bearing on ending the pandemic, and the only response it warrants is caveat emptor.

    4. The public health messaging from Fauci et al continues to be atrocious, and is likely doing more harm than good because of all the deserved distrust it has accumulated. Insofar as public health officials have a role in ending this thing, the best thing they could do right now is shut up and contemplate how they destroyed their credibility over the last 18 months. Anything else they say at this point is counterproductive.

    5. At the end of the day, Covid is becoming endemic so it will technically never “end.” Instead it will just enter the realm of the common cold. Unfortunately much of society and almost all of the political class continue to treat any Covid case it as if it’s still March 2020, which means absurd overreactions and policy driven by alarmist hype are still the dominant narrative. This will likely remain the case as long as mandatory testing regimes aimed at “discovering” covid among non-symptomatic people in the general public are common.“

    https://www.facebook.com/phil.magness/posts/4661575467228595

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  441. Kevin M (ab1c11) — 9/7/2021 @ 9:16 am

    Yes, sir. I concur.

    felipe at a different terminal (084d77)

  442. @450, yes, let’s make it easier and incentivize vaccinations among low income communities. That’s a great suggestion. I don’t think the people who have made a conscious choice not to get vaccinated are persuadable at this point, but someone concerned about lost income from going to get the shot or a couple of days of side effects is a possible get.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  443. ” At the end of the day, Covid is becoming endemic so it will technically never “end.” Instead it will just enter the realm of the common cold. Unfortunately much of society and almost all of the political class continue to treat any Covid case it as if it’s still March 2020, which means absurd overreactions and policy driven by alarmist hype are still the dominant narrative.”

    Missing contributing factor: insistence on minimizing the effects of covid by the right wing, like this post excerpt. For example: Florida is running 250 deaths per day. Not quite the common cold.

    Davethulhu (5f5049)

  444. The “horse dewormer thing” is a cause célèbre among the MAGA throng, so it’s not really a side show.

    Rip Murdock (0aa613)

  445. @454 if not for Rip and Time123, i never would’ve come across the term “horse dewormer”

    it’s certainly a cause celebre for some here

    JF (e1156d)

  446. @455, City boys have to learn somewhere.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  447. Wait until I tell where milk comes from.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  448. “Whoever you are…I have always depended on the kindness of teh CDC.”

    —- Blanche Covidian

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  449. Time123 (9f42ee) — 9/7/2021 @ 10:05 am

    I don’t think the people who have made a conscious choice not to get vaccinated are persuadable at this point, but someone concerned about lost income from going to get the shot or a couple of days of side effects is a possible get.

    That 2nd group is a complete subset of the 1st group. In other words, the group you think might have persuadable people you’ve also described as not persuadable.

    Did you mean “people who have made a political choice”? If so, I suspect that is a mythical group. I don’t know anyone not getting a covid vaccine for political reasons. The concerns I’ve heard are over short or long-term side effects.

    frosty (f27e97)

  450. All of these non-responses deserve but a single rejoinder:

    “The irony here is that there is a mountain of data showing that vaccines work, and work well, yet some folks insist on trying unproved (and likely unproveable) cures instead, based on poorly-sourced claims.”

    Doc-aganda. Stolen Medical Valor. What has medicine done for us lately?

    Vaccines worked well way back when the medical establishment was actually trustworthy and focused on preventing disease rather than run by people who spend all their public time quibbling over the precise meaning of ‘is’ or ‘gain of function research’ rather than answering direct questions. They are not trustworthy now, and what they’re pushing isn’t “vaccines” in any historical sense.

    In any case even if the vaccine was 100% safe and effective I still wouldn’t take it because the pressures and institutions being used to force that compliance are far more sinister and consequential than any cycle of the Chinese flu.

    Health Dewormer (ae5b86)

  451. ‘Plagiarizing a line from ‘Annie,’ Squinty McStumblebum actually said, “The sun will come out tomorrow.”- to suffering storm victims who heckled him while touring wreckage in Manville, NJ, 9-7-21. Attaboy, Broadway Joe.

    Attaboy, Broadway Joe; save ‘Somewhere, over the rain-Beau, skies are blue’ for the next storm.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  452. Congratulations to Texas and Governor Abbott for signing the voter integrity bill into law in spite of the left trying to obstruct the legitimate desire to protect our elections from fraud.

    NJRob (77fa54)

  453. Frosty #459:

    You are not quite accurate. Time talks of people concerned about people being sick a couple days. You throw in folks concerned about long term VAX effects — not a subset of Time’s group.

    What would be interesting is a survey of vaccine hesitant showing (i) their mask hostility (ii) socioeconomic status (iii) race and (iv) their choice in the 2020 election.

    Appalled (1a17de)

  454. What would be interesting is a survey of vaccine hesitant showing (i) their mask hostility (ii) socioeconomic status (iii) race (iv) their choice in the 2020 election and if a resident of Georgia

    Weed out the rubes…

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  455. What would be interesting is a survey of vaccine hesitant showing (i) their mask hostility (ii) socioeconomic status (iii) race and (iv) their choice in the 2020 election.

    KFF COVID-19 Vaccine Monitor

    Rip Murdock (0aa613)

  456. Appalled (1a17de) — 9/7/2021 @ 12:05 pm

    group 1 – people who have made a conscious choice not to get vaccinated for whatever reason (Time’s group)
    group 2 – people who made a conscious choice not to get vaccinated because of concern about lost income from going to get the shot or a couple of days of side effects (Time’s group)
    group 3 – folks who made a conscious choice not to get vaccinated because of concern about long term VAX effects

    Both groups 2 and 3 are people who have made a conscious choice not to get vaccinated. There are other people in group 1 who may have other reasons than the group 2 and 3 people. Group 1 is larger and completely includes groups 2 and 3. Therefore, Time’s group 2 is a complete subset of the 1st group.

    frosty (f27e97)

  457. Appalled, The study below is from early summer and updates a similar study that was done in June. It’s a scientific survey that followed best practices for public sentiment research. Sample size is really good (5,123) and because they asked asked the same questions at different times they’re able to show changes in perception. They also have qualitative responses that are useful to understand that raw numbers. I’m not aware of a better data set on the subject.

    https://www.prri.org/research/religious-vaccines-covid-vaccination/

    Here’s what the executive summary had to say about party affiliation. But it’s a pretty interesting study if you’re interested in the data so I encourage you to take a look at the entire thing.

    Partisanship, education, and age remain key dividing factors in vaccine attitudes.

    Republicans remain less likely than independents or Democrats to be vaccine accepters but have increased from 45% accepter in March to 63% in June, a larger gain than independents (58% to 71%) or Democrats (73% to 85%).

    However, Republicans remain divided by what media they trust. Those who most trust far-right news outlets (46%) have become more likely than they were in March (31%) to refuse vaccination.

    Majorities of Americans without college degrees in all race and ethnic groups are vaccine accepters, whereas most were below 50% accepter in March.

    Black and Hispanic Americans without four-year degrees have increased most—about 20 percentage points (40% in March to 59% in June for Black Americans; 49% in March to 69% in June for Hispanic Americans).

    Republicans, Americans under age 50, and rural Americans remain among the most likely to be hesitant or refusers, but about one in five of those who are vaccinated in each of these groups—those under 50 (19%), Republicans (20%), and rural Americans (20%)—say one or more of these faith-based approaches helped convince them to get vaccinated.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  458. The lead proponent of Newsom’s recall has been sidelined with the coronavirus
    ………
    Orrin Heatlie, 52, a retired Republican sheriff’s sergeant from Yolo County, said he was at home recovering from a bout of the coronavirus.

    “Thought I was immune as I’ve had it before,” Mr. Heatlie said in a text message, adding that he is unvaccinated. “Then spent 13 hours in a warm truck traveling back from Wyoming with a friend who came down with it on the trip.”
    ………
    Throughout the campaign, the recall supporters have blasted the governor’s mandates to get vaccinated, socially distance and wear face masks. Mr. Heatlie said his wife, who is vaccinated, had caught the virus from him.
    ………

    Rip Murdock (0aa613)

  459. Frosty, Let me be more clear. I think most of the people who have decided to refuse to get vaccinated have made up their minds. They might be forced to get it if their job requires it but I don’t think they’re persuadable.

    I think people who are hesitant to get the vaccine because of reasons such as laziness, concerns about how the vaccine might affect them, or lost income due to side effects are open to persuasion and we should take steps to help them get vaccinated.

    I don’t think of group 2 (the vaccine hesitant) as a subset of group 1 (vaccine refusers).

    I hope this clears up what I was trying to say.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  460. PRRI: “A research center whose subject is religion doesn’t take seriously the actual religion of its subjects.”

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  461. Florida doctor to refuse in-person treatment for unvaccinated patients
    ………
    Linda Marraccini, a family medicine doctor in South Miami, sent a letter to patients informing them that because the Pfizer vaccine has been approved for general use by the Food and Drug Administration, unvaccinated individuals will no longer be allowed to attend in-person appointments at her practice.

    “This is a public health emergency — the health of the public takes priority over the rights of any given individual in this situation,” Marraccini wrote in the letter, obtained by NBC Miami. “It appears that there is a lack of selflessness and concern for the burden on the health and well-being of our society from our encounters. ”
    ……..
    Marraccini’s policy is scheduled to go into effect Sept. 15, but she told Newsweek she will continue to see unvaccinated patients who have not found a new practice by that date via telehealth visits, particularly those who need prescriptions or who have not received the vaccine due to hardships.
    …….,,
    ………. Marraccini told Newsweek that the (Hippocratic) oath also emphasizes prevention. She said she has patients who are immunocompromised or undergoing chemotherapy and are therefore at higher risk of having a severe or deadly case of COVID-19, so limiting their exposure to unvaccinated people protects them from harm.
    ………..
    Two questions: How is this different from a doctor refusing to perform abortions based on ethical or religious concerns; and is the Hippocratic Oath legally binding on doctors?

    Rip Murdock (0aa613)

  462. Rip Murdock (0aa613) — 9/7/2021 @ 12:21 pm

    The KFF stats show an improvement. It’s important to keep an eye on which stats are which though. Some of those percentages are of a smaller group or subset. For example, the “WHO REMAINS UNVACCINATED?” section is giving you a breakdown of the “wait and see” and the “definitely not” groups and that is 27% of the people who remain unvaccinated. It also looks like the “Race/Ethnicity” data isn’t adjusted for population size.

    frosty (f27e97)

  463. Rip Murdock (0aa613) — 9/7/2021 @ 12:59 pm

    Two questions: How is this different from a doctor refusing to perform abortions based on ethical or religious concerns; and is the Hippocratic Oath legally binding on doctors?

    It’s not different and I’m not aware of any law making the Hippocratic Oath legally binding. The public perception of both doctors and journalists is the result of a very effective PR campaign. Journalists have squandered that on a political agenda. Doctors are in the process of doing that as well.

    I will say, as a different matter, statements like “health of the public” and “well-being of our society” are empty cliches. I wouldn’t pick Marraccini as my doctor. I’m not sure I’d trust her with anything important at all.

    frosty (f27e97)

  464. Two questions: How is this different from a doctor refusing to perform abortions based on ethical or religious concerns; and is the Hippocratic Oath legally binding on doctors?

    Rip Murdock (0aa613) — 9/7/2021 @ 12:59 pm

    From the original article

    The doctor insisted the policy doesn’t violate her Hippocratic Oath, a set of ethical standards doctors pledge regarding the obligations to their patients, noting she’s still offering the option of telemedicine or helping with referrals to other doctors. She also said she would make exceptions for people who could not get vaccinated for health reasons.

    Marraccini said only about 10% to 15% of her patients were vaccine hesitant. She gave them a month to help them work out a plan moving forward.

    I think providing telemedicine, an exception for people who can’t be vaccinated for health reasons, a 30 month window, and referrals to other doctors meets her obligation of care

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  465. @459: “I don’t know anyone not getting a covid vaccine for political reasons.”

    @460: “…even if the vaccine was 100% safe and effective I still wouldn’t take it because the pressures and institutions being used to force that compliance are far more sinister…”

    Well, maybe at least one….

    AJ_Liberty (ec7f74)

  466. AJ, I saw that. But it’s totally new handle and in a large country there are individual nuts.

    The link i posted to the PRRI study has actual data. It’s a sizable chunk of people.

    https://www.kff.org/coronavirus-covid-19/poll-finding/kff-covid-19-vaccine-monitor-july-2021/

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  467. Time123 (9f42ee) — 9/7/2021 @ 12:35 pm

    All of those religious leaders promoting the vaccine must hope there are no unexpected long-term effects from the vaccine. They’re putting a lot of faith in people who have a less than stellar track record.

    frosty (f27e97)

  468. Time123 (9f42ee) — 9/7/2021 @ 1:19 pm

    A different standard of care for similarly situated patients is still a different standard of care. I’m surprised at how readily this is given a pass when it would be flagged if the decision was based on race, class, or income.

    frosty (f27e97)

  469. Frosty, When should religious leaders encourage people to get medicine? I’m curious what your guidelines are.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  470. AJ_Liberty (ec7f74) — 9/7/2021 @ 1:20 pm

    Fair enough. If someone told me that though I’d presume they didn’t actually consider the vaccine 100% safe.

    frosty (f27e97)

  471. @479, Refusing to get vaccinated isn’t a protected class such as race. It’s just a stupid personal decision. We’re free to judge her a bad person for this just like we could if she refused to take medicaid, raised her prices, or moved her practice to a swanky part of town.

    Unless her former patients will be without care ( which it doesn’t sound like they will) I think this is a decision she has a right to make.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  472. Time123 (9f42ee) — 9/7/2021 @ 1:34 pm

    Frosty, When should religious leaders encourage people to get medicine? I’m curious what your guidelines are.

    I’ve said this before and I’m guessing it’s been misunderstood. I don’t think it’s ethical or wise for anyone to give someone else unsolicited medical advice. This is made worse when it’s from someone with no medical experience. I’m constantly amazed at people who keep saying “GET VACCINATED ALREADY” as a general statement to people they don’t know.

    When should religious leaders tell people to get a vaccine? Presumably, you mean as a public statement in their capacity as religious leaders. Possibly as part of a mass or sermon and done in such as way as to leverage their religious authority? Almost as if this is a message from God, through them, to the congregation? If that’s what you mean I’d say never.

    frosty (f27e97)

  473. So only doctors and medical professionals should give medical advice. Makes sense. We should listen to them. Religious leaders should tell people to listen to doctors.

    It ends up the same place because doctors are also encouraging vaccination but your process is better.

    Time123 (224669)

  474. “The hardest part of 14 days to flatten the curve is the first 18 months.”

    —- Kevin Sorbo

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  475. AOC new the drill before getting to d.c. A waitress who brings nothing to the table.

    mg (8cbc69)

  476. Time123 (9f42ee) — 9/7/2021 @ 1:39 pm

    Refusing to get vaccinated isn’t a protected class such as race.

    Protected classes are a legal fiction that has nothing to do with my point.

    Unless her former patients will be without care (which it doesn’t sound like they will)

    There is a lot here not related to my point. She is giving similarly situated patients a different standard of care. Separate but equal wasn’t a problem because of protected classes. It was a problem because it wasn’t equal. Protected classes were invented to help mitigate the problem.

    I could list a number of “stupid personal decision[s]” that might be grounds for a medical malpractice suit if she’s not careful.

    I think this is a decision she has a right to make.

    I agree.

    frosty (f27e97)

  477. Time123 (224669) — 9/7/2021 @ 2:21 pm

    So only your doctors and medical professionals should give you medical advice. You should listen to them. Religious leaders should tell people to listen to their doctors.

    Small but very important distinction.

    frosty (f27e97)

  478. 20 years later KSM is still awaiting trial. WHY? Am curious as to what the legal mindset is. They put away Trumps buddy in no time. Must be a sophisticated system.

    mg (8cbc69)

  479. mg (8cbc69) — 9/7/2021 @ 2:29 pm

    Fauci outsourced gain-a-function research to China and they created a virus that escaped the lab due to poor containment protocols. I get why people directly involved are doing their best to cover that up. I’m not surprised by the other groups helping but it is unfortunate.

    frosty (f27e97)

  480. 20 years later KSM is still awaiting trial. WHY? Am curious as to what the legal mindset is. They put away Trumps buddy in no time. Must be a sophisticated system.

    Trump’s buddies?? Hell, look at the how quickly the Nazis were dispatched at the Nuremberg Trials.

    20 years of war; 20 years incarceration. It’s a safe bet KSM has better healthcare, eats better and sleeps safer than many kids in Chicago, retirees in New Orleans or vets snoozing under overpasses in Detroit.

    20 years of war; 20 year anniversaries… 20 years incarceration… this nation bleeds incompetence, which seeds and nourishes insurrection.

    “I trust his [Biden’s] judgement.”- Nancy Pelosi, podium humper, 8/25/21

    ________

    America is developing a bad habit– modern media driven BTW, especially since the yellow ribbon days of the Iran hostage crisis– of celebrating ‘failures’ and ‘disasters’ as some worthwhile and glorious ‘anniversaries’— such are yet another symptom of a declining empire in search of glories past. The British began to do this as well in their twilight times.

    For example, those of us alive in December, 1961 -20 years after Pearl Harbor- were not subjected to a relentless media bombardment about the sneak attack for days on end. In fact, the PH Memorial itself wasn’t even completed and dedicated until 1962 [my grandfather travelled to Hawaii to visit it that year] and it took many years to even generate interest and $ to construct it. Look up news events on December 7, 1961, and you’ll learn the ‘big new’ was the announcement by NASA of the second phase of American manned spaceflight, the Gemini program- with plans for a two-man version of the one-man Mercury capsule. The focus was on the future, not the past. Not much else was the news of the day.

    “Hello, I’m Ted Koppel and this… is Nightline.” – ABC TV, 1979

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  481. Two questions: How is this different from a doctor refusing to perform abortions based on ethical or religious concerns; and is the Hippocratic Oath legally binding on doctors?

    No, the Hippocratic Oath is not legally binding on doctors, and since it is sworn to Apollo and attendant Greek health deities any attempt to make it legally binding would be unconstitutional.

    And it expressly forbids abortions, BTW. No, not the “do no harm” everybody cites:

    I will give no deadly medicine to anyone if asked, nor suggest any such counsel; and in like manner I will not give to a woman a pessary to produce abortion. With purity and holiness I will pass my life and practice my Art.

    nk (1d9030)

  482. Idaho hospitals begin rationing health care amid COVID surge
    ………
    The Idaho Department of Health and Welfare quietly enacted the move Monday and publicly announced it in a statement Tuesday morning — warning residents that they may not get the care they would normally expect if they need to be hospitalized.

    The move came as the state’s confirmed coronavirus cases skyrocketed in recent weeks. Idaho has one of the lowest vaccination rates in the U.S.
    ……….
    The move allows hospitals to allot scarce resources like intensive care unit rooms to patients most likely to survive and make other dramatic changes to the way they treat patients. Other patients will still receive care, but they may be placed in hospital classrooms or conference rooms rather than traditional hospital rooms or go without some life-saving medical equipment.
    ………
    “Crisis standards of care is a last resort. It means we have exhausted our resources to the point that our healthcare systems are unable to provide the treatment and care we expect,” Idaho Department of Health and Welfare Director Dave Jeppesen said in a statement.
    …….
    The designation will remain in effect until there are enough resources — including staffing, hospital beds and equipment or a drop in the number of patients — to provide normal levels of treatment to all.

    More than 500 people were hospitalized statewide with COVID-19 on Sept. 1 and more than a third of them were in intensive care unit beds.
    ……….
    “More Idahoans need to choose to receive the vaccine so we can minimize the spread of the disease and reduce the number of COVID-19 hospitalizations, many of which involve younger Idahoans and are preventable with safe and effective vaccines,” said (Governor Brad) Little, who is a Republican.
    ……. .

    Rip Murdock (0aa613)

  483. “20 years later KSM is still awaiting trial. WHY? Am curious as to what the legal mindset is. They put away Trumps buddy in no time. Must be a sophisticated system.”

    The answer is simple. It’s because they tortured him.

    Davethulhu (5f5049)

  484. Sarah Palin was mocked for her “death panels” Now never trumpers and the left are full of ideas and volunteering to serve.

    150 years from now the US COVID story line will be: Some people died and everyone panicked.
    God forbid we ever face a real emergency like Global climate change. Oh. Wait The world will have ended by 2035 unless I am issued a Chevy/Trabant Volt and a fire extinguisher by our government, so there will be no history.

    steveg (2c7127)

  485. There are a couple ways to look at the use of ICU beds.
    If they are available, why not use them for COVID. It helps with Federal reimbursement at a higher rate.

    steveg (2c7127)

  486. Heh! And LOL too! I was going to put it on on the DeSantis thread, but didn’t know if it was worth the bother. I’ll just not bother with links:
    — 78% of Covid deaths are people over 65
    — 1,350,000 Floridians are over 75
    — 330,000 of them are over 85
    Who needs death panels when you governors like DeSantis in charge of “God’s waiting room”?

    nk (1d9030)

  487. you *have* governors

    nk (1d9030)

  488. The answer is simple. It’s because they tortured him.

    Sort of like being burned alive or jumping from a building…

    Dead men tell no tales: drop him from a helicopter hovering 110 stories up over New York Harbor. Can’t think of a better way to “celebrate” the 20th anniversary of 9/11.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  489. Another feather in the cellar dwellers headdress – China will eventually take over Bagram Air Base.

    mg (8cbc69)

  490. @501. Practice for Taiwan.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  491. DCSCA @492:

    “Hello, I’m Ted Koppel and this… is Nightline.” – ABC TV, 1979

    “America Held Hostage, Day ??? ” didn’t get re-named “Nightline” until March, 1980.

    It’s not clear to me who is holding up departure of the planes on the tarmac at Mazar-i-Sharif in northern Afghanistan, but somebody wants to make a selection, (all those without proper travel documents) and the people in charge of the planes are refusing to allow people to be removed from the planes. Blinken says it is not the Taliban who don’t want all passengers to leave. I guess that leaves…

    (f4c5e5) — 9/7/2021 @ 3:40 pm

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  492. 495. Davethulhu (5f5049) — 9/7/2021 @ 7:47 pm

    It’s because they tortured him.

    If there can be testimony about that is one of the issues. They are not going to use anything he said against him (as far as I know).

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  493. 450 Colonel Haiku quoting Phil Magnus

    ” At the end of the day, Covid is becoming endemic so it will technically never “end.” Instead it will just enter the realm of the common cold.

    It has to mutate for that to happen. There;s atheory about disease that that sort of thing is the mutation most likely to spread.

    There’s a theory that the 1890 “flu” was realy a coronavirus, that later became thee OC43 version.
    flu

    https://ec.europa.eu/research-and-innovation/en/horizon-magazine/qa-why-history-suggests-covid-19-here-stay

    Could you tell us about your work showing that a coronavirus called OC43 may have caused the ‘Russian flu’ pandemic of the 1890s, which spread from St Petersburg across Europe to the US?

    Yes, the first study was in 2005. We redid the genetic analysis (of OC43 evolution) to see at what point the bovine and the human viruses started to diverge (which indicates OC43 jumped species) and we found exactly the same date (as the Russian flu epidemic). Even at the time people were debating about the cause of this weird flu, though they did not even know about viruses. But it was striking even then that this might be something different.

    In recent months, journalists have searched through archives and, especially in Russia, they found old newspaper articles with references to the loss of taste and the loss of smell, which is definitely not characteristic of an influenza pandemic (but is a symptom of Covid-19). It fits with a coronavirus origin for this pandemic too. This wasn’t a pandemic with a clear beginning and end, and it probably lasted a fair number of years.

    Is there a way to be absolutely certain that a specific coronavirus caused the 1890 pandemic?

    There is no doubt that it was caused by a virus. I don’t think we will be able to recover the virus from corpses frozen in the permafrost, which is what we were able to do for victims of the Spanish flu in 1918. The timeframe for the 1918 pandemic was short, while the Russian flu was much wider and people would have died for other reasons too. But if someone is patient enough to try, then I hope someday someone will find more evidence. It won’t be easy. If I had time, I would love to dig into the archives myself.

    What has happened to the virus that likely caused this 19th century pandemic?

    OC43 is still around. It is now responsible for common colds, albeit the more severe common colds. And probably in some elderly people it can lead to severe illnesses. We might want to look more for OC43 in weird pneumonias in the elderly. This is because before last year, if an elderly person had pneumonia, only in a university hospital would they have been tested for OC43. A person could have been sick from it in intensive care in a local hospital but they would never know.

    Now though, we are extremely motivated to hunt for coronaviruses in the elderly. These coronaviruses are not a major cause of mortality, but elderly people can die from them. SARS-CoV-2 is now the most intensely studied virus ever. These other viruses received far less attention.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  494. 431.

    “Peer reviewed” used to mean “vetted,” but today that phrase has just become code for “ideology tested.”

    Albert Einstein was against peer review.

    Fortunately for him, it didn’t exist in 1905.

    https://theprint.in/science/einsteins-contempt-for-peer-review-wasnt-misplaced-it-is-something-of-a-lottery/356462

    https://theconversation.com/hate-the-peer-review-process-einstein-did-too-27405

    For instance, the Annalen der Physik, in which Einstein published his four famous papers in 1905, did not subject those papers to the same review process. The journal had a remarkably high acceptance rate (of about 90-95%). The identifiable editors were making the final decisions about what to publish. It is the storied editor Max Planck who described his editorial philosophy as:

    To shun much more the reproach of having suppressed strange opinions than that of having been too gentle in evaluating them.

    Many of the core scientific discoveries were not peer reviewed to modern standards. For example, the publication of the foundational paper describing the double helical structure of DNA by James Watson and Francis Crick in 1953 would have been jeopardised in the context of the classic review system as we know it, because of its speculative nature.

    At the prestigious journal Nature, the peer-review system was only formally introduced in 1967. More recently, the discovery of distortion in gravitational waves by a telescope at Harvard – which has crucial consequences for our understanding of the formation of the universe – was presented as preliminary and treated with extreme caution and even sometimes with denigration, because it had not been peer-reviewed.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  495. Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c) — 9/8/2021 @ 11:39 pm

    I always appreciate your due diligence, Sammy. My presenting the same information in my earlier comment ran, in my opinion, the unfortunate risk of being perceived as … Yikes! I’m having a “senior moment” … “an appeal to authority.”

    You do me, and all our community, a service in presenting it now. May The Lord bless and keep you safe in this time of plague, Sammy.

    felipe (484255)

  496. 507. Thank you.

    The editors of the journals apparently used to determine for themselves what articles to accept. They didn’t outsource it, often different journals sending it to the same people, or to people with the same line of thinking, and they certainly didn’t give anonymous reviewers a veto.

    That said, someone can of course find problems or criticisms, which originally used to be delivered in the form of a printed letter to the editor..

    Peer review doesn’t usually check for the worst problem, which is outright fraud, (which sometimes can be detected simply from the article because of copying of pictures or of data) and they find many non-problems.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  497. Words that should scare you: “But don’t worry: There’s no need to fear if you’ve got nothing to hide.

    Matt Welch at Reason.

    The administration’s proposed “comprehensive financial account reporting regime” would dramatically increase the types of financial institutions and transactions exposed to the feds’ prying eyes. “All business and personal accounts from financial institutions, including bank, loan, and investment accounts,” would be forced to “report gross inflows and outflows” to the IRS. And not just bank accounts: The dragnet would now include PayPal, settlement companies, and “crypto asset exchanges,” for starters.

    The new domestic surveillance program, which requires congressional approval, is one prong of a tripartite strategy for transforming the entire global financial system into a harmonious, haven-free collection funnel to the IRS.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  498. Albert Einstein was against peer review.

    And it fails today sometimes, too; usually for things that are too new or advanced for the reviewers. Few were Einstein’s “peer.” I know someone who had her math PhD thesis rejected (at Stanford!) because it was based on computational theory the advisor didn’t understand. Imagine the peer review of general relativity, a topic that requires skill in several areas of really hard math.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  499. Einstein didn’t even get the Nobel Prize for general relativity (even more than fifteen years later)

    It was awarded to him in 1922 for 1921 “for his services to Theoretical Physics, and especially for his discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect..”

    https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/09/einstein-didnt-win-a-nobel-for-relativity-he-won-it-for-this/380451

    One of three significant papers he authored in 1905. The third one explained Brownian motion. (he followed up on it in 1908)

    Wait, I read that actually there were four groundbreaking papers he published in Annalen der Physik in 1905.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)


Powered by WordPress.

Page loaded in: 0.2792 secs.