Posts on Wednesday, May 6, 2020
Transcripts of House Intelligence Committee interviews that have been cleared for release show top law enforcement and intelligence officials affirming they had no evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia during the 2016 election, senior administration and intelligence community officials told Fox News on Wednesday.
This would align with the results of former Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation — which found no evidence of illegal or criminal coordination between President Trump, the Trump campaign and Russia in 2016 — but the numerous transcribed interviews could raise further questions about committee Chairman Adam Schiff’s past statements saying that there was “direct evidence” of collusion.
Netflix hit back at a viral meme on Twitter that criticizes its use of gay characters in series. A Twitter user posted the meme of the Spongebob Squarepants character Patrick Star stuffing a giant pumpkin into a small funnel. The tweet had over 78,000 likes and nearly 22,000 retweets by Wednesday evening. After going viral, Netflix decided to respond. “Sorry you have yet to realize that every gay person is very necessary,” the streaming giant tweeted. Naturally, the reply set off reactions of its own — including a mysterious tweet by “The Walking Dead” account.
A Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools principal apologized for referring to people as “colored folks” during a staff meeting, according to a secretly recorded audio tape recently obtained by The Observer. During a follow-up staff meeting in August, Ardrey Kell High School principal David Switzer apologized for offending anyone with his remarks at the earlier meeting and said that he does not use racially insensitive language. A person in the second meeting recorded it. “I thought I said persons of color,” Switzer said in the recording. “That was my context. And so again, I apologize, I really do… I don’t say that ever.
Senator Richard Burr was not the only member of his family to sell off a significant portion of his stock holdings in February, ahead of the market crash spurred by coronavirus fears, an investigation by ProPublica has revealed. On the same day Burr sold, his brother-in-law also dumped tens of thousands of dollars worth of shares. The market fell by more than 30% in the subsequent month. Burr's brother-in-law, Gerald Fauth, who has a post on the National Mediation Board, sold between $97,000 and $280,000 worth of shares in six companies—including several that have been hit particularly hard
New York — They’re the new wave of front-line workers, vital to New York’s re-opening. One thousand contact tracer jobs are available right now to help the city and state combat COVID-19. After a person tests positive for coronavirus, tracers conduct phone interviews to identify who they’ve been in significant contact with over the last 14 days.
Bloomberg Philanthropies is helping with the hiring and training of contact tracers. In a press conference last week, former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg explained, “to get the contact tracing program up and running, a lot has to happen.”
After Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton called for her “immediate release,” Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said will be covering a fine owed by Dallas salon owner Shelley Luther, who is currently serving a seven-day jail sentence.
Luther, owner of Salon A La Mode, was sentenced Tuesday after judge Eric Moye said she violated statewide stay-at-home orders when she reopened her business nearly two weeks ago. She also publicly tore up a cease-and-desist letter from Dallas County that ordered her to close.
Luther was also ordered to pay a fine of $3,500 along with $500 per day that her salon is open until Friday, May 8.
The increasing possibility of a breakdown in the meat supply chain in the United States due to COVID-19 is prompting Rep. Thomas Massie (R–Ky.) to renew his push for a bill that would make it easier for small, independent slaughterhouses and meat processors to sell directly to consumers.
Large meatpacking plants across the country have shut down due to fears of COVID-19 outbreaks among workers, and less and less meat is making it to grocers and restaurants. Wendy's has run out of beef for hundreds of its restaurants (leading to many Twitter jokes about its most famous commercial).
On Wednesday, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos formally announced the new rules related to Title IX—the federal statute that governs sexual misconduct in schools—thus completing a process that began more than a year ago, when the government first unveiled its proposed changes.
The new rules aim to protect victims of sexual misconduct while also establishing fairer procedures for the accused. The department believes the new rules will "balance the scales of justice on campuses across America," a Department of Education spokesperson said during today's press briefing.
Justin Dillon, an attorney with the firm KaiserDillon who specializes in campus misconduct adjudication, hailed the new rules as tremendously well thought out.
The first deliberate shutdown of the New York City subway system in 115 years was deemed "successful" by transit officials on Wednesday, after a small army of cleaners disinfected trains, and police officers, social workers and nurses helped remove many of the homeless population that had been sheltering underground during the pandemic. The mission to make the normally 24-hour transit service safe for essential workers to ride commenced at 1 a.m., and by 5 a.m. the crews had deep-cleaned all the trains in the system and mobilized alternative shuttle buses during that four-hour window, officials said. The daily cleaning is
President Trump is facing a growing rift with Senate Republicans who are siding with Democrats on the need to provide hundreds of billions of dollars in emergency aid for states and cities that have lost tax revenue during the coronavirus pandemic to pay for first responders and other basic expenses.
Republican Sens. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Marco Rubio of Florida said they are inclined to provide more aid to states, despite the president warning that he opposes giving more money to states that have been “mismanaged” by Democrats. “No doubt states have been hit pretty hard,” Mr. Graham told reporters
It could be more than a year before churches are allowed to resume their in-person gatherings, according to Democratic Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker.Pritzker announced a five-phase plan to reopen Illinois that gives guidance to schools, businesses, churches, and other religious centers about when they will be allowed to reopen. In phase three, gatherings of up to 10 people will be allowed. In phase four, gatherings of up to 50 people will be allowed. Gatherings of more than 50 people will not be allowed until phase five.During a press conference on Wednesday, Pritzker confirmed that churches will be held to the same standards and not be allowed to hold in-person
Joe Biden Says His Administration Will
Fund ‘Regional Sexual Assault
Investigative Training Academies’ replies
Fund ‘Regional Sexual Assault
Investigative Training Academies’ replies
Former Vice President Joe Biden says that if he is elected president the federal government will spend $20 million per year to create “Regional Sexual Assault Investigative Training Academies.”Biden’s idea is laid out in a part of his campaign website that is enitled “The Biden Plan to End to End Violence Against Women.”A section of this plan says it will: “Create Regional Sexual Assault Investigative Training Academies.”“There is still a striking lack of investigative training for law enforcement and prosecutors in units dedicated to sex crimes despite the extreme complexities of sexual assault investigations,”
President Donald Trump honored a group of nurses at the White House on Wednesday, thanking them for their efforts to fight the coronavirus.“America’s nurses are waging a war against the invisible enemy,” he said.”They’re fighting on the frontlines of the battle risking their health to save lives of fellow citizens.”The president signed a proclamation in honor of National Nurses Day and met with six nurses and the presidents of the American Nurses Association and the American Association of Nurse Practitioners.One reporter questioned whether the president was sending the wrong message to Americans for meeting a group of nurses who were not socially distancing in the Oval Office
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is rolling in dough. Her net worth reportedly tops $120 million (not bad on an annual salary of $194,000).We know all about her $25,000 refrigerator stacked to the brim with $12-a-pint gourmet ice cream. But now she’s got a new ostentatious show of her wealth.The California Democrat has been sporting designer masks when she’s at the Capitol (she refuses to call Democrats back to work, despite the coronavirus, but she’s still there from time to time [don’t ask how much it costs U.S. taxpayers to fly her back and forth to her San Francisco mansion]).Price tag: $22 per mask (according to a Washington Post reporter).
Did CBS fake a line of cars in Michigan in order to make it seem like COVID-19 testing was even more difficult? That’s what Project Veritas creator James O’Keefe asserts in a new video. Footage of the May 1 CBS This Morning shows a long line of vehicles waiting for drive-by testing in Michigan. According to O’Keefe, “A CBS News crew pulled medical professionals off the floor at the Cherry Medical Center in Grand Rapids, Michigan, to line up in their vehicles so a CBS film crew would have a long line for their COVID-19 coverage.”
MSNBC: Americans are so ‘freedom
obsessed,’ they are blinded to threats
like virus or climate change replies
obsessed,’ they are blinded to threats
like virus or climate change replies
An MSNBC contributor called out “freedom-obsessed” Americans and their aversion to big government amid the coronavirus pandemic.Former New York Times columnist Anand Giridharadas blamed Americans obsessed with the idea of freedom for creating a vulnerability in the country to threats like climate change, speaking in the topic during an appearance on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” on Wednesday.(Video) “Something has to change so this doesn’t happen again,” MSNBC co-host Willie Geist said to Giridharadas. “What do you think we will learn from this as we look out over the horizon?”“One of the fundamental questions to me is, what’s going to be our relationship to government, the idea of government after this?”
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has called for a salon owner to be released from jail as he slams the judge who locked her up for violating the state's stay-at-home order.
Shelley Luther, the owner of Salon a la Mode in Dallas, appeared in court on Tuesday where she was sentenced to seven days behind bars and $7,000 - $500 for each day she opened her business' doors. Gov Greg Abbott's started phase one of Texas reopenings last week, but did not allow salons to resume business - but that didn't stop Luther from opening up.
The loss of television and ad revenue from the suspension of sports due to the coronavirus, will end up costing at least $12 billion, according to a recent analysis conducted for ESPN. Those numbers, however, could become even dramatically worse if the college football and NFL seasons are seriously impacted by the virus. “As an economist, you stand back, you look at the carnage that’s taking place — dumbfounded, awestruck, mind-numbing,” said Patrick Rishe, who heads-up the sports business program at Washington University.
A big development in the fight over 53 secret interviews the House Intelligence Committee conducted during its Trump-Russia investigation. Acting Director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell has sent a letter to chairman Adam Schiff notifying him that transcripts of all 53 interviews, over 6,000 pages in all, have been cleared for public release. "All of the transcripts, with our required redactions, can be released to the public without any concerns of disclosing classified material," Grenell wrote to Schiff in a letter dated May 4.
The Intel Committee did the first probe into Russia's 2016 campaign interference and allegations of Trump-Russia collusion. Even today, its findings make up most of what we
Drugstore chain CVS Health saw its first quarter profits jump 41 percent as Americans began preparing for the spread of the coronavirus in the U.S. Retail sales at CVS propelled gains for the first three months of the year, when the outbreak prompted panic purchases of items like hand sanitizer and toilet paper.“When facing any health crisis, including this pandemic, we’re uniquely positioned to understand consumer and patient needs and how to address them,” Larry J. Merlo, president and CEO of CVS Health, said in a statement Wednesday.
How would you like to be investigated by the FBI because you disagreed with the president’s policies? Sounds a little KGB-ish, you might think — and you’d be right, because the FBI has zero authority to conduct such an investigation. But the more we learn about the FBI’s investigation of Michael Flynn, the more it appears he was targeted precisely because, as the national security adviser to the incoming Trump administration, he signaled that the new administration might undo Obama administration policies — which is kind of what the American people voted for in 2016.
The Lakefield MN City Council voted on Monday in a 3-2 vote to take a stand against what they say are unconstitutional Executive Orders by Gov. Tim Walz that continue to restrict businesses and the ability of the people to move freely.
The resolution starts out by referencing the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution and highlights the rights of citizens to due process of law before being deprived of life, liberty or property. The resolution states that the City Council opposes any Executive Order that restricts those constitutional rights of the citizens of Lakefield.
A hunter bought a pair of Purdey firearms, thought to be worth around £50,000, in a private deal five months ago, before the couple quit the UK for Canada and later moved to the US, The Sun reports.
A friend of the anonymous buyer said: 'He bought them because he wanted them, not because they belonged to Harry, but he was quite chuffed when he found out.
'They are beautiful examples and he's very pleased with them but he's not the sort of person who wants to boast about the royal connection.'
In response to House Intelligence Committee chair Adam Schiff blaming the coronavirus pandemic on President Donald Trump, Fox News host Greg Gutfeld delivered a fiery rant Tuesday urging Schiff to ditch his “fun house mirror” and take a close look into a REAL mirror.
“We have to remember those who had no skin in this game, who love to play politics and assign blame as a sport, because they were wasting our time when time was so important, which brings me to Adam Schiff,” he said on FNC’s “The Five.”
Schiff had “to create in his mind a working scenario to believe
After a monumental compensatory and punitive damages jury verdict in favor of Gibson’s Bakery and its owners against Oberlin College and its Dean of Students, the college launched a public relations campaign claiming, among other things, that the Gibsons really were racist even though the jury found the accusation of racial profiling false and defamatory.(Snip)As part of that campaign seeking to impugn the Gibsons post-trial, Oberlin College sought to unseal the confidential Facebook records of Allyn D. Gibson, the store clerk whose stop of a black Oberlin College student for shoplifting sparked the protests, accusations of racial profiling, business cut-off, and eventually, lawsuit and jury trial.
A woman who was attacked and killed by an alligator in a gated community in South Carolina on Friday was trying to touch the animal when it grabbed her and dragged her underwater, authorities said today. After briefly getting away from the alligator, the woman stood in waist deep water in the Kiawah Island pond and said 'I guess I wont do this again,' but the alligator grabbed her in its jaws again and took her under the water, according to a supplemental police report released Tuesday.
Supreme Court Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. questioned the scope of the Trump administration’s religious liberty law, which exempts employers with religious or moral reasons to be exempted from providing birth control in health insurance plans. His question about the Religious Freedom and Restoration Act (RIFRA) emerged Wednesday in oral arguments conducted via telephone in the Little Sisters of the Poor v. Pennsylvania case. “I wonder why it doesn’t sweep too broadly,” Chief Justice Roberts asked the federal government’s attorney. “It is designed to address the concerns about self-certification, and what the Little Sisters call a hijacking of their plan,
Michelle Obama admits in the new Netflix documentary Becoming that having children was a 'concession' that cost her her 'aspirations and dreams' after she rose to become Barack's equal. The documentary was released on Netflix on Wednesday and sees the former first lady narrate parts of her life from when she was a child to meeting Barack, their time in the White House and what she now hopes to do with her time. Among the revelations she makes is that when she met her husband, she felt she had to rise to become his 'equal'.(Snip) 'If I was going to have a unique voice
“My Boy Lollipop” singer Millie Small has died from a stroke at age 73.
The Jamaican star passed away in England this week, her heartbroken pal confirmed Wednesday. Chris Blackwell, who co-produced the hit song, said: “I would say she’s the person who took ska international because it was her first hit record,” launching her into the top 20 pop charts at 16 years old.
“It became a hit pretty much everywhere in the world. I went with her around the world because each of the territories wanted her to turn up and do TV shows and such, and it was just incredible
The San Francisco Department of Public Health (SFDPH) confirmed in a tweet Tuesday that homeless people put up in hotels are being given free alcohol and drugs.A Twitter user named “T Wolf” who calls himself a “formerly homeless addict,” sent a tweet this week saying he’s heard reports of homeless people getting free alcohol, marijuana and methadone.“I just found out that homeless placed in hotels in SF are being delivered Alcohol, Weed and Methadone because they identified as an addict/alcoholic for FREE. You’re supposed to be offering treatment. This is enabling and is wrong on many levels,” he said.
If you’re a healthcare worker who went to New York to volunteer to help fight the coronavirus outbreak there, Gov. Andrew Cuomo says you owe New York state income taxes.
Even if you were not working for any pay in New York, but you were still being paid in your home state. Pay that enabled you to volunteer and put your own health in danger to help New York.
That’s classic taxation without representation. Americans have a history of not liking this.
Health care workers that came to New York to help fight the coronavirus pandemic at its epicenter will have to pay state taxes, according to the governor.
The coronavirus shutdown is over by public demand. There are crowds of sunbathers in the parks of New York City and mobs on the steps of the statehouses. Pedestrian and road traffic are rising and businesses are defying orders by informally reopening. The people are speaking — the people who used to work on a hand-to-mouth economy, the people who cannot afford to stay indoors indefinitely, the people who cannot be bothered to stay in when the sun comes out.
These people are not all the people. They are not the doctors, who counsel caution. They are not the state governors, who are terrified of votes being washed
The narrative seemed set: After a brief surge of public support for President Donald Trump in the early days of America's fight against the coronavirus, his approval numbers had settled back into the low 40s.
Right? Right.
Except that in Gallup's latest two-week tracking poll, Trump's job approval is back to 49% -- matching the highest it's ever been -- while his disapproval is at 47%.
That marks a 6-point improvement on Trump's approval number from the last Gallup tracking poll. And that improvement comes exclusively from independents -- 47% of whom now approve of the job Trump is doing, the best he has ever done among that group in Gallup polling.
The Democrats are staking everything on their ability to turn the presidential election into the question: “Do you like Trump?” Their gamble, (and only play at this point) is that an adequate majority will reply negatively, and the Democratic nominee as the only alternative, will win.
Like film versions of World War II Allied bomber pilots returning to England from raids over Germany with flack-riddled airplanes, wings wobbling, engines sputtering, and landing gear not responding, they are gamely repeating to each other “Hang on, Carruthers, this could get a little rough.” In pursuit of this strategy, they have an excellent excuse for keeping their unfeasible candidate
In the latest in an escalating series of legal challenges by Republicans, four Washington state legislators sued Gov. Jay Inslee in federal court on Tuesday, seeking to strike down his stay-home order aimed at slowing the spread of the coronavirus.
A 28-page complaint, filed by the lawmakers and others in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington, contends “the emergency has been contained” and that continuing restrictions for workers, businesses and residents are not legally justified.
(Map) After weeks of shutdown because of the coronavirus pandemic, the nation has begun to slowly open up.
Beaches and state parks are reopening to visitors, spurring concerns about overcrowding. The first barbers have returned to work, masks over their faces. Some restaurants are getting ready to serve customers again.
About half of the states have begun to reopen their economies and public life in some meaningful way, though health experts have expressed concern that a premature opening could lead to a spike in coronavirus infections that would not be detected in official case counts for weeks. Many areas are still seeing cases grow, and the number of known deaths related to
Washington—A Massachusetts woman who accused former Sen. Chris Dodd of sexually assaulting her after a booze-fueled dinner in 1985 is speaking out, saying she can’t understand why the Biden campaign tapped him to lead their vice presidential search. Presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden, 77, was already embroiled in his own sexual assault controversy when the campaign last week announced Dodd, a Democratic former Connecticut senator with a past of misconduct charges, would co-chair his vice presidential selection committee. In a lengthy phone conversation with The Post on Tuesday, Dodd’s accuser, Carla Gaviglio, now 59, said she was stunned
New research out of England suggests the novel coronavirus spread quickly around the world late last year. The study by the University College London Genetics Institute also identified 198 recurrent genetic mutations of the coronavirus — though it’s unclear if the changes are rendering the virus more dangerous. The researchers analyzed the virus genomes of over 7,500 patients infected around the world to draw their results, according to a UCL press release announcing the study, which was published Tuesday in the journal Infection, Genetics and Evolution. A large proportion of the coronavirus’ global genetic diversity was found in all countries
Barry Brownstein’s essays usually bring more light than heat to issues of the day. (Snip)
But in a March 24 essay at the Foundation for Economic Education (FEE), Brownstein tries to make a case for “Why We Should Love China, Not Fear It”—and therein lies the problem: A straw man in a headline never travels alone. Brownstein’s plea for Sinophilia is thick with straw men.
Having mounted his anti-Trump horse, Brownstein goes to the whip hand right out of the gate, planting the idea that tariffs imposed on Chinese imports are monstrously ill-advised. “FEE readers,” he writes, “understand well the destructive effects of Trump’s tariffs.”
Michael Flynn was vindicated last week. While conservatives tend to be pro-law enforcement, here they are reminded of how the government’s criminal justice apparatus can be abused. The Russian collusion hoax weaponized our intelligence agencies and the FBI to spy on a political campaign and ruin the lives of numerous patriots, including decorated American general, Michael Flynn.
Worse, documents obtained by Flynn’s new defense team show the absence of a crime—he apparently forgot some details in an interview with FBI agents, which to their minds became “obstruction” and “perjury”—but also show that the FBI knew there was no crime and still planned to entrap him through an ambush interview in
Flynn bombshells cast doubt on Mueller
prosecutor Brandon Van Grack's
compliance with court order replies
prosecutor Brandon Van Grack's
compliance with court order replies
Explosive, newly unsealed evidence documenting the FBI's efforts to target national security adviser Michael Flynn -- including a top official's handwritten memo debating whether the FBI's "goal" was "to get him to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired" -- calls into question whether Brandon Van Grack, a Justice Department prosecutor and former member of Special Counsel Robert Mueller's Team, complied with a court order to produce favorable evidence to Flynn.
Since February 2018, Van Grack has been obligated to comply with D.C. District Court Judge Emmet G. Sullivan's standing order in the Flynn case to produce all evidence in the government’s possession “that is favorable to defendant
As promised, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer has vetoed legislation that would have shortened the length of some of her executive orders. Senate Bill 858 would have amended Michigan’s Emergency Management Act of 1976, laying out deadlines for when some of Whitmer’s executive orders would end. Notably, it would have allowed restaurants, bars, gyms and other public-facing businesses to open May 15 with social distancing measures in place. (Snip) “I will not sign any bills that constrain my ability to protect the people of Michigan from a deadly pandemic in a timely manner,” Whitmer wrote. Whitmer and the legislature are entangled in
The Great Reset (1)
replies
My county out here in Krazifornia ostentatiously banned single-use plastic bags back in 2012, to “save the planet” naturally. So I whooped a whoop of joy through my mask when the local grocery store bagged my haul in plastic bags over the weekend. My guess is plastic bags will be back for good.
The aftermath of the virus crisis is going to change a lot of things—a process I’m calling “The Great Reset.” A lot of bad things are going to happen. A number of businesses have closed down for good already. Many others are going to shrink.
Hundreds of Missouri residents have had their personal details shared online after the publication of a document that recorded reports made against those flouting lockdown measures.
Some people are now concerned that they will face consequences for ‘snitching’ on coronavirus rulebreakers in St Louis County, Missouri.
An interesting article from Fox News asks the question of whether Mueller’s special counsel attorney Brandon Van Grack misled Judge Sullivan in the Flynn case by not being forthcoming about the background documents under the DOJ Brady obligation.Additionally, as a consequence of the Flynn evidence discoveries people are now asking why the FBI and DOJ did not produce these documents earlier. Representative Jim Jordan is specifically asking these questions of current FBI Director Chris Wray.
In response to the Fox News article the FBI has released a statement which itself is very interesting. Apparently the FBI Director is trying to dig himself and his institution out of a hole;
U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and U.K. Secretary of State for International Trade Elizabeth Truss announced today [joint statement] the beginning of a series of fast-tracked trade negotiations toward a new free trade agreement.[USTR Release] In the foreground is a trade agreement between the U.S. and the United Kingdom. However, in the more strategic background context these negotiations create leverage for the U.K. in their post-Brexit negotiations with the European Union. First from today:
LIGHTHIZER – […](Snip) Over 200 staff from U.S. and UK government agencies and departments are expected to take part in the negotiations. An opening plenary today will kick off the detailed discussions,
With each day that passes, with each new grim death toll, we learn a little bit more about the nature of this ghastly virus.
This week in particular, statistics have come to light showing that obesity is emerging as one of the biggest risk factors for Covid-19.
According to data released by the NHS, being overweight raises the chances of dying in hospital from the illness by 40 per cent.(Snip) This is a very tricky piece of information for the Government to handle. Obesity is a highly politicised issue: ‘fat-shaming’ is one of the more heinous crimes against political correctness.
On Tuesday, Texas may have created the anti-lockdown movement’s first martyr when a Dallas judge sentenced hairstylist Shelley Luther to a week in prison for the crime of trying to provide for her own and her employee’s families.
Texas is home to 28,995,881 people. It’s had 32,879 diagnosed Wuhan virus cases (that is, 0.11% of the population got diagnosed) and 890 virus deaths (0.003% of the population). Most of the cases are linked to nursing homes or people with co-morbidities. Even in nursing homes, though, things needn't be so dire. One doctor’s experiment shows that early intervention with the hydroxychloroquine cocktail can result in a 92% successful treatment rate.
Gov. J.B. Pritzker has announced the state’s framework for reopening which could see dine-in restaurants and bars — closed since mid-March — open in some areas by late June. The plan, called Restore Illinois, is not based on a set schedule, but is a benchmark-based approach to reopening the state. In it, Illinois is divided into four regions (Snip) Pritzker also admitted that the state won’t be considered fully recovered until scientists develop a COVID-19 vaccine or treatment. Until then, conventions, music festivals, and other mass gatherings won’t be allowed. Those events could happen again in the plan’s final state, Phase Five: Illinois Restored.
DURING this entire epidemic, and the response to it, there is a growing tension between front-line doctors and scientific researchers, between people who must use and master numbers in their jobs and university statisticians and modelers, and between the public in general and its credentialed experts.
In a nutshell, the divide reflects the ancient opposition between empiricism and abstraction — or more charitably common sense and practical application versus scientific knowledge.
When the two are combined and balanced, then knowledge advances. When they are not, both are deprived of the wisdom of the other.
Unfortunately, in the present crisis, we have listened more to the university modeler than to a numbers-crunching accountant.
While my inner troll is delighting in Tara Reade exposing the moral bankruptcy of the Democrats’ phony “Believe all women” stance only when political enemies are accused, I am a skeptic. And I fear that her efforts will help the Dem establishment in pulling the plug on Biden, whose declining mental capacity cannot be hidden for the nearly 6 months of presidential campaigning ahead.
Make no mistake: rushing to deny the nomination to Bernie Sanders by backing Biden was a colossal blunder. Shooing his rivals out of the race enabled a big Super Tuesday delegate harvest for Biden, but because the media failed to alert them
Tell A Lie, Win A Pulitzer!
replies
Maybe you missed the news that the august New York Times won yet another Pulitzer Prize, this one for its much-debunked “1619 Project.” If you didn’t, we have a question: Is there any better illustration for why Americans now hold the big media in such low esteem?
Nikole Hannah-Jones of the Times won the Pulitzer for Commentary on Monday, proving once again that the American media and its guiding institutions have continued to move far left, and that includes the Pulitzer Prize judges. Among major media, none have made the sinistral shift more determinedly than the New York Times under
A Texas salon owner was given seven days in jail on Tuesday after she refused to apologize for defying coronavirus related restrictions by remaining open for business.
Dallas business owner Shelley Luther was given a choice: She could offer an apology for selfishness, pay a fine and shutdown until Friday, or serve jail time.
"I have to disagree with you, sir, when you say that I'm selfish because feeding my kids is not selfish," she told the judge. "I have hairstylists that are going hungry because they would rather feed their kids. So sir, if you think the law is more important than kids getting fed, then please go ahead
LONDON: An Iranian airline under US sanctions flew passengers infected with the coronavirus to Iraq and Lebanon and between Iran and China, fueling the spread of the virus across the Middle East. Mahan Air, a private company linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), continued flying to China and elsewhere for weeks after Tehran officially barred flights to and from the country on Jan. 31. The airline lied about these flights taking place, according to an investigation by the BBC. (snip) Planes that went to Tehran from China also made onward travel within 24 hours to Barcelona, Dubai, Kuala Lumpur and Istanbul.
President Donald Trump blasted George Conway and a group of Republicans who launched an ad criticizing his response to the coronavirus pandemic. The president unloaded on the anti-Trump group led by the husband to his Senior White House adviser Kellyanne Conway, calling out the “group of RINO Republicans” in a series of late night tweets. “A group of RINO Republicans who failed badly 12 years ago, then again 8 years ago, and then got BADLY beaten by me, a political first timer, 4 years ago, have copied (no imagination) the concept of an ad from Ronald Reagan, ‘Morning in America’,” Trump tweeted.
Jesse Watters Imagines What The Media
Would Sound Like If Obama Were President
During Pandemic (Video) replies
Would Sound Like If Obama Were President
During Pandemic (Video) replies
The media has been unable to put their hatred of Trump aside, even during a national crisis. For the past several weeks, whenever Trump held a presser, journalists constantly tried to play gotcha with Trump. They really seem to think that is their job.It’s a massive departure from the way these same people covered the Obama administration.This week on The Five of FOX News, Jesse Watters tried to imagine what the media would sound like right now if Obama was still president.
A federal court judge has ordered New York Democrats to reinstate the presidential primary election for June 23 after one-time candidate Andrew Yang challenged its cancellation.Judge Analisa Torres in her decision Tuesday ruled that the New York Board of Elections’ decision to cancel the vote was unconstitutional and that all qualified candidates as of April 26 must be on the ballot.“[T]he removal of presidential contenders from the primary ballot not only deprived those candidates of the chance to garner votes for the Democratic Party’s nomination,” Torres wrote in her opinion.
It is almost worthy of a dark Netflix series to watch how the sins of these people keep coming back and back and back to revisit them. Their sins are like hulking black vultures stooped on the branches of a dead tree outside the front of their bleak, haunted house.All Democrats had to do was come up with a candidate who was, as former President Barack Obama once said of a certain fellow Democrat, “likable enough.” The 2020 presidential election only needed to be a personality test. Find somebody new and shiny and likable enough, and Democrats would easily beat the Orange Monster in the White House today.
In 2003, during the George W. Bush administration, the columnist Charles Krauthammer coined the phrase "Bush Derangement Syndrome" to refer to some of the president's more unhinged critics. It was funny, and given Krauthammer's background — he was a medical doctor specializing in psychiatry — it had the ring of truth.
Now, the nation is in the fourth year of Trump Derangement Syndrome. And there are plenty of indications that the condition, already acute, has been made worse by the coronavirus crisis. Just Google "Trump" and "blood on his hands."
But for some in the media and politics, Trump derangement is more than a syndrome. It is a business — show business.
Why Don't I Hate Donald Trump?
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Why do you not like Donald Trump? I asked my brother. "Because he is a d---" was his reply. Such a deep, meaningful answer!Why I never felt the same way is a question I have often asked myself. Prior to his campaigning and his presidency, I never felt any hatred for the man. Having an interest in property, I read his books and enjoyed watching The Apprentice, and not once did I feel any animosity. Trump was such an admired figure by many businesspeople, celebrities, and politicians prior to his announcement that he was running for president. Yes, he had his detractors, but
The Hidden Victims of COVID-19:
Dem Donors Forced to Spend $100K
for ‘Virtual Dinner’ With Hillary replies
Dem Donors Forced to Spend $100K
for ‘Virtual Dinner’ With Hillary replies
The coronavirus pandemic has unleashed tremendous suffering upon the people of earth. Perhaps the foremost victim of this China-caused crisis is President Donald J. Trump, who has suffered horribly at the hands of the Fake News Media and its relentless barrage of unfair questions. Many have also caught the actual virus.
Some victims are more visible than others. Media reporters such as Brian Stelter and Oliver Darcy of CNN, for example, have used public platforms to express their victimhood. "You really take for granted the office chair, and how much it helps with posture, until you're spending hours and hours working from the dining room chair," Darcy wrote
Rep. John Ratcliffe (R-Texas) promised during a confirmation hearing Tuesday to deliver an objective analysis of U.S. intelligence if he is confirmed by the Senate to serve as President Trump’s director of national intelligence.
Despite a few tense moments, Ratcliffe largely delivered a polished performance, seeming neither to alienate Democrats nor infuriate the White House on a range of divisive topics, including Russia’s interference in the 2016 election.
“I made it clear that if I am in this position, my loyalty is always going to be to the Constitution and the rule of law,”
Shut out of the federal stimulus, illegal immigrants are turning to charity — and California is leading a national charge of state and local governments, as well as nonprofit organizations, asking Americans to help by digging into their own stimulus checks to make tax-deductible donations.
Those behind the push say the community has been among the hardest-hit by the virus, with illegal immigrants often still on the job, performing essential work for low pay, or else left destitute when restaurant and housecleaning jobs dried up.
From coast to coast, calls have emanated for Americans
Letter from Los Angeles: The death
of small business is a tragedy for
Jewish community and democracy replies
of small business is a tragedy for
Jewish community and democracy replies
“Small-scale commercial production is, every moment of every day, giving birth spontaneously to capitalism and the bourgeoisie…wherever there is small business and freedom of trade, capitalism appears.”— V.I. Lenin A great connoisseur as well as sworn enemy of the free market, Vladimir Lenin might smile a bit if he witnessed what is now happening to small businesses in the current Covid-19 pandemic. Even before, America was experiencing falling rates of business formation as well as declining homeownership, particularly among the young. The share of GDP represented by small firms had dropped from 50 to 45% since the 1990s.
Now the current pandemic, and the policies being applied
The Leawood, Kansas, couple whose home was raided in 2012 after sheriff's deputies claimed that loose tea found in their trash was marijuana will receive $150,000 for their trouble under a settlement agreement with the Johnson County Sheriff's Office. The settlement—which caps seven years of litigation, including two trips to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit—falls far short of the $7 million that Adlynn and Robert Harte originally sought. But it represents an implicit acknowledgment that the Hartes and their children suffered an outrageous invasion of their privacy and dignity in the service of a comically inept publicity stunt.
Here are some of the absurd facts that emerged
You can believe whomever you choose in the alleged sexual-misconduct cases of Joe Biden and Brett Kavanaugh, but you can’t revise history to erase your partisan double standards.
One of the most egregious examples of revisionism can be found in a column by the New York Times’ Michelle Goldberg, who employs nearly every attack Americans were warned never to use against alleged sexual-assault victims during the Kavanaugh hearings — questioning their motivations, asking why they didn’t file charges, attacking them for not remembering specifics, etc. And yet, even if we adopt Goldberg’s new standards, Tara Reade still emerges as a more credible accuser than Christine Blasey Ford.
For starters, Ford was unable
Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Calif.) is urging Capitol officials to review the safety of the long-running practice of lawmakers sleeping in their offices, arguing that it poses a public health risk during the coronavirus pandemic.
In a letter made public on Monday, Speier wrote to Architect of the Capitol J. Brett Blanton and attending physician Brian Monahan that lawmakers sleeping in offices should be permanently banned.
In Defense of Joe
replies
Washington-
Where did Sleepy Joe go wrong? Remember what a champion of women or at least of Democratic women he was? Remember the role he played in the Violence Against Women Act? Recall, if you will, how he kissed the Democratic ladies affectionately and smelled their hair, at least until a group of indignant Democratic women publicly objected. Then he promptly ceased and desisted. Now he only gives them a wave, or who knows what is allowed in Democratic precincts. But you can be sure that Joe is observing the latest rules of decorum among the Democratic womenfolk. He is giving this highly excitable
President Trump’s task force has been working hard to fight the coronavirus pandemic and open up America. Meanwhile, the House of Representatives has been silent — AWOL, you might say.
Even as the Senate returns to work this week, the House remains shuttered. And now, feeling the heat for their prolonged absence, House Democrats are floating plans that would upend centuries of legislative precedent and concentrate power in Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s hands.
One Democratic idea would allow a representative to ask a colleague to cast a vote on her behalf, known as a proxy vote.
When we recently discussed the idea of a “compressed” schedule for the NFL this year, possibly not starting until almost Halloween, all scheduling decisions were still up in the air. As of this date, the league is still holding those alternate scheduling choices in reserve as a backup plan. They plan to release the fall schedule on Thursday, currently slated to start and end on the normal dates. (While we don’t know the exact dates for each matchup yet, the teams each franchise will face is already known. You can check out who your team will be playing here.)
One of the constitutional freedoms liberals are trying to use the Wuhan virus pandemic as an excuse to shred is the Second Amendment’s guarantee that our right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. There is no asterisk indicating an exception in case of pandemic, so when law-abiding gun owners show up to protest a government’s attempt to infringe on their rights, why should they not show up with the weapons the government is trying to curtail their use of, even take them away if the liberals could. Which part of “bear arms” does Sean Hannity not understand?
In a triumphant speech Monday, embattled Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro boasted that two U.S. citizens – in addition to more than 100 "terrorist mercenaries" – had been captured after an ultimately unsuccessful plot to kill him in Caracas a day earlier.
While President Trump insisted the U.S. government had nothing to do with the ill-fated operation, Maduro – who had a $15 million bounty put on his head by the U.S. Justice Department in March – waved two U.S. passports during the state television broadcast. He also displayed photos of alleged assailants sweeping in on fishing boats and claimed the Trump administration "is fully and completely involved in this defeated raid."
Biden allegations reverberate on
Senate campaign trail, as Dems
face accusations of double standard replies
Senate campaign trail, as Dems
face accusations of double standard replies
While the sexual-assault accusation against presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden swiftly dominated the presidential race last week, the case also has had an impact on the Senate campaign trail.
Republicans are accusing Democrats of treating this allegation differently than they did for those against Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh during his 2018 confirmation process, as Democrats largely stand behind Biden and his denials.
"Well, at the very least it's pretty obvious that the same people who were outraged about allegations -- unproven allegations against Justice Kavanaugh when he was in high school -- seemed to have little or no interest, or certainly not as much interest, in suggestions
A University of Pittsburgh researcher “on the verge” of a breakthrough in understanding the coronavirus was found shot dead in his home, according to a report.
Bing Liu, 37, was allegedly killed inside his Pittsburgh-area townhouse Saturday by a man who then went outside to his car and shot himself, WTAE, a local ABC affiliate, reported.
Police believe Liu and the suspected gunman, identified as 46-year old Hao Gu, knew each other — although their connection is not believed to be related to Liu’s research. Liu’s death appears to be a homicide but a motive remains unclear, police told the outlet
New York state is reporting more than 1,700 previously undisclosed deaths at nursing homes and adult care facilities as the state faces scrutiny over how it’s protected vulnerable residents during the coronavirus pandemic.
At least 4,813 people have died from COVID-19 in the state’s nursing homes since March 1, according to a tally released by Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s administration late Monday that, for the first time, includes people believed to have been killed by the coronavirus before their diagnoses could be confirmed by a lab test.
A Sioux Falls meatpacking plant was forced to close when it became the epicenter of COVID-19 in South Dakota. Three weeks after executives from its Chinese owner, WH Group, visited the plant, a month after President Trump's ban on travel from China, nearly 600 of Smithfield Foods' 3,700 employees tested positive for the virus, as have 135 additional people in close contact with employees.
Smithfield Foods was started in 1936 by a family in Virginia. Today, the Chinese own Armour and the famous Smithfield hams, together with the most quintessential American brand of all: Nathan's Famous hot dogs, with its iconic annual eating contest.
In 1992, Ross Perot famously stated that NAFTA would cause a "giant sucking sound" as jobs and industries fled the U.S. for Mexico. For years, progressive Vermont's bloated bureaucracy has increased regulations, social programs, and income and real estate taxes in the fantasy that the rich can just be taxed more to achieve every imagined social good. But the COVID-19 crisis has pulled aside the fiscal veil, and now the Green Mountain State is careening into the red. A "giant sucking sound" is heard from Vermonters fleeing the state.
Vermont has stubbornly avoided funding its state pension system.
Rep. Jim Banks to Introduce Bill
to Stop China’s ‘Predatory’
Acquisitions of American Companies replies
to Stop China’s ‘Predatory’
Acquisitions of American Companies replies
Rep. Jim Banks (R-IN), Navy veteran and House Armed Services Committee member, will introduce a bill on Tuesday to prevent the Chinese government from making “predatory” investments in American companies during the coronavirus pandemic.
Banks said in a statement:
Our job is to ensure the Chinese Communist Party doesn’t profit off a pandemic of their own making. President Trump won an election vowing to stop China from taking advantage of Americans. I am glad to be working with him now to stop Chinese predation.