MY NEW YORK POST COLUMN: Masks are here to stay as long as libs need to shame their political enemies.
WHY SO MUCH OFFICIAL ANTI-SEMITISM IN BLUE AREAS LIKE AUSTIN, TEXAS? Austin ISD ‘holy day’ attendance form raises concerns from some parents.
Highly plausible.
OPEN THREAD: Let us all get to know one another.
Yeah, it’s early tonight.
MEDIA MYTH ALERT: Challenging the media-driven mantra that 9/11 ‘changed everything.’
The attacks of 9/11 certainly led to change — and fresh intrusions — in airport security and personal privacy. The federal government was expanded. The country fought a prolonged conflict in Afghanistan, where al-Qaeda planned the attacks.
But when considered closely, it becomes clear the 9/11 attacks did not “change everything.”
The attacks were not fatal to American political or economic power. Public opinion polls reported that after 9/11 many Americans felt a surge of patriotic fervor, a deeper commitment to the religious and spiritual side of life, and a newfound sense of political unity.
Such responses proved fleeting, however. They faded in time.
They faded, in part, because as Daniel Henninger of the Wall Street Journal noted on the tenth anniversary of 9/11, “For activist and professional Democrats, the most ignominious day in their collective political lives occurred a year earlier—the Florida presidential recount. The 2000 election ended only when the Supreme Court resolved it in favor of George Bush. Republican and independent voters moved on, but many Democrats never did; they were now being governed by an illegitimate president. The chances that any Bush policies would retain their support were minimal, with or without 9/11.”
Thus, by 2004, what the late Charles Krauthammer dubbed “The Pressure Cooker Theory of Hydraulic Release” finally burst:
The hostility, resentment, envy and disdain, all superheated in Florida, were not permitted their natural discharge. Came Sept. 11 and a lid was forced down. How can you seek revenge for a stolen election by a nitwit usurper when all of a sudden we are at war and the people, bless them, are rallying around the flag and hailing the commander in chief? With Bush riding high in the polls, with flags flying from pickup trucks (many of the flags, according to Howard Dean, Confederate), the president was untouchable.
The Democrats fell unnaturally silent. For two long, agonizing years, they had to stifle and suppress. It was the most serious case of repression since Freud’s Anna O. went limp. The forced deference nearly killed them. And then, providentially, they were saved. The clouds parted and bad news rained down like manna: WMDs, Abu Ghraib, Richard Clarke, Paul O’Neill, Joe Wilson and, most important, continued fighting in Iraq.
With the president stripped of his halo, his ratings went down. The spell was broken. He was finally, once again, human and vulnerable. With immense relief, the critics let loose.
The result has been volcanic. The subject of one prominent new novel is whether George W. Bush should be assassinated. This is all quite unhinged. Good God. What if Bush is reelected? If they lose to him again, Democrats will need more than just consolation. They’ll need therapy.
Unfortunately, they’ve never received it.
DON’T UNDERESTIMATE JOE’S ABILITY TO F*** THINGS UP: Biden droned the wrong guy, innocent aid worker killed in Kabul strike: NYT. “A US airstrike in Kabul against a supposed Islamic State bomber actually killed an innocent man who worked for a US aid group and his family, according to newly published testimony and footage — raising the specter that the Pentagon lied to the public about the strike. The reported case of mistaken identity also further tars President Biden for his chaotic pullout of US troops from Afghanistan, which left behind hundreds of US citizens and thousands of at-risk Afghans.”
Which makes yesterday’s speech by Biden seem like more stray voltage: “One wonders if the Biden Admin knew this drone strike story was coming out yesterday.”
(Classical reference in headline.)
DON’T TRY THIS AT HOME, KIDS: A Pilot Spent 17 Years Building a 1:3 Scale Replica of the B-17 Flying Fortress Bomber—and Yes, It Flies. Curiously, the author buries this minor detail a few paragraphs in, instead of putting it in the lede:
The replica has an aluminum-riveted fuselage, retractable landing gear and a wingspan of 34 feet, which is relatively large for a homebuilt plane. It’s also not an inch-perfect replica, as the cockpit had to be made larger so that a full-sized adult could fly the plane.
Unlike Fantastic Voyage, you don’t have to “get small” to fly in this miniature plane.
STRAY VOLTAGE: Department of Education Civil-Rights Arm Launches Investigation into Florida Mask-Mandate Ban.
Critics of the governor’s action claim that it subjects vulnerable students to an unsafe learning environment, giving them justification to levy discrimination complaints against the state and appeal to the Office of Civil Rights. Proponents, however, argue that the measure doesn’t outlaw masks, but merely the mandate of masks for young children on school grounds, deferring to parents rather than school boards to make the decision.
Your body, Biden’s choice.
BLUNT TRUTH ABOUT WASHINGTON DEMOCRATS AND REPUBLICANS: The Federalist Chris Bedford and Conservative Partnership Institute’s Rachel Bovard confirm everything you ever feared explains why Republicans never achieve major reforms and Democrats always do.
I TOO HAVE A VALID ALIBI FOR DURING THIS TIME PERIOD: DC congresswoman bizarrely denies letting zebras loose.
Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton said she has an ‘alibi’ for when the zebras escaped.
As Siraj Hashmi of the Washington Examiner tweets, “exactly what someone who let six zebras loose from the zoo would say.”
ARIZONA SCHOOL SHOWS SHOT MANDATE ABOUT POWER, NOT THE KIDS: If it was about the kids, the building operations director wouldn’t have been demoted to being a (substitute) teacher in the classroom.
LEE SMITH: What Afghanistan Teaches Us About Our Ruling Class.
It was not inevitable that what began in the wake of the Sept. 11 as an act of retribution would end in a theatre of self-pity. With lower Manhattan still smoking, Americans entrusted their political and military leadership with their safety and continued prosperity. Many of the most high-spirited among us offered America their service and some gave their lives.
But as the leadership class foundered in Afghanistan—Osama bin Laden had escaped, Afghan democracy proved to be a fantasy, neither its army nor national police force could stand on its own, and so on—it saw that the failures prolonging the war in fact created opportunities for personal advancement. They used Afghanistan as a financial instrument to launder their spoils and purchase the power and prestige that are naturally owed victors. Like all habitual losers, America’s ruling class escapes the shame and humiliation it merits by forcing others to bear responsibility for the crimes it alone committed.
And that’s the context in which to understand the massive airlift for which the Joe Biden administration keeps congratulating itself. Never mind the thousands of Americans sent to their death for no strategic purpose and the trillions of U.S. taxpayer money wasted on the fantasy of turning Afghanistan into a democratic state. The message is: We’re good guys—we’re rescuing Afghans from the clutches of the Taliban.
The ruling class’ phony atonement comes at the expense of the U.S. taxpayer. No one knows how many Afghans will be coming to the United States. Tens of thousands have been settled already, with others reportedly on their way, totaling according to some reports around 120,000. Government sources say that after refugees start bringing over family still in Afghanistan the final tally will likely reach a quarter of a million, maybe more.
The resettlement abuses the generosity of Americans, most of whom don’t understand that the Afghans sent to their communities are not the Afghans who helped Americans. The media, local political, social, and religious organizations have misled them to believe these are the interpreters and others who assisted U.S. troops and other agencies. But according to reports, the Biden team left many of those Afghans behind. So, who are these people?
No one really knows. The problem is not that they are unvetted but that they are unvettable. The biometric information collected by U.S. authorities—and has now reportedly fallen into the hands of the Taliban—documented the Afghans who worked for them. Those among the warring tribesmen who opposed the U.S.-led coalition are undocumented, unless they are so notorious for shooting at Americans that they wound up on terror lists. Those Afghans are known. There are also records of those who committed crimes during earlier stays in Western countries and were deported. As for the rest, they pushed their way into Kabul airport, forced their way on to planes, and now they’re here.
Gen. H.R. McMaster famously showed Donald Trump a 1970s photograph of young Kabul women in miniskirts to dissuade him from withdrawing forces. Trump’s advisor was trying to show that just underneath the country’s primitive violence was an open-minded and liberal core just waiting to be liberated.
But the type of people in those pictures are not part of this wave of Afghan migrants because all those open-minded and liberal Afghans left for the West years ago. The people coming now are poor and illiterate.
Some will make good citizens. Some won’t. None will trouble our ruling class.
SO MUCH FOR THAT BIG MOMENT HE WAS SUPPOSED TO BUY HIMSELF BEFORE HE BUNGLED THE BUGOUT: Biden Will Not Deliver Live Remarks on 9/11 Anniversary.
RULE OF LAW: Florida Appeals Court Reinstates DeSantis’ School Mask Ban.
Even The Atlantic reports that masking kids is a bad idea.
“DON’T UNDERESTIMATE JOE’S ABILITY TO F*** THINGS UP”: Grateful Migrants in Pennsylvania Send Thousands of Dollars to ISIS.
HMM: Major study finds convalescent plasma doesn’t help seriously ill COVID-19 patients. “A major study has found that convalescent plasma does not reduce the risk of intubation or death for COVID-19 patients. However, the study also revealed that the antibody profile in the blood of people who have had the virus is extremely variable and this may modify the response to the treatment. . . . ‘These findings may explain the apparent conflicting results between randomized trials showing no benefit, and observational studies showing better outcomes with higher titre products relative to low titre products.'”
Well, we have the Regeneron monoclonal antibodies now anyway.
READER BOOK RECOMMENDATION: Larry Correia’s Monster Hunter Bloodlines.
REAL JOURNALISM: RealClearInvestigations’ Jan. 6-BLM Side-by-Side Comparison. “Many in the political and media establishment consider the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol riot to be one of America’s darkest episodes. Others say the nationwide protests last summer over George Floyd’s murder were worse. With polling indicating Americans see two sides to the story – and major media dwelling on only one – RealClearInvestigations has developed the database below allowing readers to draw their own conclusions.”
What a great resource.
BECAUSE OF COURSE HE DOES: Paul Krugman Gushes Over Biden’s Fascistic Vaccine Mandate.
ANALYSIS: TRUE. Yes, Biden blew it. “Biden set an artificial deadline and sleepwalked toward it, igniting a frantic effort in which NATO and non-NATO nations engaged to transit as many of their citizens, residents, and terrified Afghan allies as possible out of the country while Biden contracted with the Taliban to provide perimeter security at the Kabul airport. Over 100,000 people got out, but many more were left behind, including American citizens and permanent residents. Biden congratulated himself. ”
Read the whole thing.
I DARE YOU TO IDENTIFY WHAT HARVARD THINKS IS OFFENSIVE IN THIS NICKI MINAJ POSTER. Seriously, we need to know. Harvard didn’t say.
LIKE CHLOROQUINE AND IVERMECTIN? Some FDA-approved drugs could be repurposed to treat people infected with COVID-19.
NO, BUT BOTH ILLUSTRATE OUR CRONYIST, SELF-DECEIVING, CORRUPT RULING CLASS: Did Theranos Lose Afghanistan?
The San Jose courtroom where Holmes is being tried is a long way from Kabul, where U.S. citizens are still being evacuated following the withdrawal of American forces last month.
But there’s a tighter link than meets the eye. Like the Afghanistan debacle, Theranos is a horror story of wishful thinking, credulous media, and celebrity impunity. Whether or not intentional deception was involved, both episodes display the dishonesty and incompetence of interlocking tech, finance, media, and military elites.
The connection is personal. Among the expected witnesses in the trial is former Marine Gen. Jim Mattis, who fought in Afghanistan as a brigadier general, later oversaw the war as head of Central Command, and finally served as former President Donald Trump’s secretary of defense. Mattis became involved with Theranos while still in uniform. After retiring from the armed forces, Mattis joined Henry Kissinger, George P. Shultz, and other national security eminences on Theranos’ board, lending the company a gravitas that few startups enjoy.
Mattis denies any wrongdoing, claiming he was taken in, too. Even if that’s true, his role is discreditable. Mattis’ association with the company began in 2011, when he met Holmes at a Marine Memorial event in San Francisco. According to author John Carreyrou and other journalists, he immediately began campaigning for military adoption of Theranos’ ostensibly innovative bloodtesting technology. Mattis was not deterred by the lack of FDA approval and mounting doubts about whether the technology actually worked. After his retirement in 2013, Mattis also ignored legal advice that it would be improper to join the board while the company was seeking procurement of its products for use in Afghanistan.
Our “warrior monk” also hasn’t been heard on the Afghanistan debacle, though he was happy to express his displeasure regarding Trump.
Plus:
Finally, the overlap between Theranos and Afghanistan demonstrates both the interlocking character of the American ruling class and the impunity that its members enjoy until their conduct becomes literally criminal. The same people who make decisions in Washington end up sitting on the same boards in Silicon Valley and appearing on the same New York-based cable channels. In the grand scheme of things, it’s not such a big deal that Mattis suffered few consequences for his involvement with Theranos. It’s hugely important, though, that he and other celebrity officers were not only promoted for their roles in losing a two-decade war, but that they continue to be celebrated and richly compensated as authors, management consultants, and national security wisemen.
In his farewell speech as president, Dwight Eisenhower worried about the influence of the “military-industrial complex.” The entanglement continues, as retired officers continue to take lucrative positions with defence contractors. Over the last 70 years, though, “the blob” has extended its tentacles into finance, the media, academia, and beyond.
Consequences are for the little people. And Eisenhower actually did warn about the academic-industrial complex in that speech, too.
HE’S AN INTERNATIONAL EMBARRASSMENT: Taliban Planning to Steal Joe Biden’s 9/11 Anniversary Thunder. “While the White House insists the Taliban is ‘businesslike and professional,’ the Taliban is going about the rough business of re-establishing a hardcore Islamist Emirate atop the rubble of Biden’s bungled bugout.”
WE WERE PROMISED MIRACLES: Experts offer ‘weak’ support for marijuana to treat chronic pain.
WORKPLACE: California passes landmark bill targeting Amazon’s algorithm-driven rules. “Under the bill, warehouses will be required to disclose to government agencies – and to the employees – the quotas and metrics used to track workers. It would ban penalties for ‘time off-task’, which discourage workers from using the bathroom or taking other necessary breaks. It also prohibits retaliation against workers who complain.”
WOOF, WOOF, BIG FELLA: Very Large Telescope captures best images yet of ‘dog-bone’ asteroid.
BIDENFLATION: Producer inflation accelerated in August, as wholesale prices rose record 8.3% from a year ago. “The data comes amid heightened inflation fears fed by supply chain issues, a shortage of various consumer and producer goods and heightened demand related to the Covid-19 pandemic. Federal Reserve officials expect inflationary pressures to ease through the year, but they have remained stubbornly persistent, with Friday’s numbers indicating that the trend likely will continue.”
Previously: Federal Reserve calls inflation ‘transitory’ as it keeps interest rates near zero.
#1 ON AMAZON CHARTS: Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones.
NOW APPLY THIS TO BLACK LIVES MATTER: California Law Would Define “Harass” to Include Approaching Within 30 Feet to Give Leaflets to Strangers, or to Try to Speak to Them.
CHANGE: Texas Gov. Abbott signs law against tech firms banning users for content. “Texas Gov. Greg Abbott signed into law a bill that prohibits large social media companies from banning users over their political opinions, attracting the criticism of free speech activists.”
TOKEN: Wells Fargo hit with new $250 mln fine for failure to pay back wronged customers. If you don’t hold individuals in the company accountable, it doesn’t mean much. $250K each from some key executives means more than $250M from the company.
FREUD CALLED IT DISPLACEMENT:
Or as Jim Treacher writes: Biden Commemorates 9/11 By Getting Tougher on Americans Than on the Taliban. The ol’ divide-and-conquer technique.
Meanwhile, when it comes to the actual Taliban, “We’re in a weird place when we’re officially more concerned about the lack of gender diversity at the top of a terror state than we are about, you know, a terror state.”
(Classical reference in headline.)
PJ MEDIA VIP ROUNDUP: Don’t forget that VODKAPUNDIT promo code if you’ve been thinking of joining us.
Matt Margolis: Joe Biden Makes Me Wish I Hadn’t Take the Vaccine. “I chose to get vaccinated, but I’d never want anyone to get vaccinated against their will—which is essentially what Biden is proposing here. Maybe people will still technically have a choice, but who wants to choose between employment or vaccination? No one should have to be put in that position.”
Paula Bolyard: The Dirty Little Secret About Biden’s Vaccine Mandate That No One Wants to Talk About. “While I’d love to believe that Americans will finally rise up and say ‘enough is enough,’ there’s a problem: Americans want a vaccine mandate. In fact, millions of our fellow citizens have been begging the government to force shots into all our arms.”
Stacey Lennox: Why Does the U.S. Ignore Data on Kids and COVID-19 From Other Nations? “The CDC owes parents the data to make appropriate risk-based decisions for their children before getting them vaccinated.”
Yours Truly: You Say Tornado, I Say Trunalimunumaprzure: Embarrassed Biden Aides Put Boss on ‘Mute.’
BIDEN TO DESECRATE 9/11: Part One and Part Two (remote desecration).
DEMS’ FAVORITE TARGET WHEN THEY AREN’T GOING AFTER THE MIDDLE CLASS: Biden’s Vaccine Mandate Is an Attack on the Working Poor.
FROM MY EXCELLENT COLLEAGUE, VEJAS LIULEVICIUS: Communism in Power: From Stalin to Mao.
HMM: Yale study identifies those at risk of breakthrough COVID-19 infections.
The new study, published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases, looked at around 1,000 hospitalized COVID-19 patients admitted to the Yale New Haven Health System between March and July this year. Only 54 of those admissions were fully vaccinated, affirming the strong protection vaccines offer against severe COVID-19.
Of those 54 fully vaccinated patients, around half were completely asymptomatic, having been admitted to hospital for other reasons and their COVID-19 status only being picked up through incidental SARS-CoV-2 testing. Fourteen patients ended up critically ill, requiring oxygen support, and four ended up in intensive care. Three of these patients ultimately died from COVID-19.
The median age of those 14 severely ill COVID-19 patients was 80, and several pre-existing co-morbidities were noted in the study. Twelve of those patients were suffering cardiovascular disease, nine were overweight, seven had diabetes and seven had some kind of pre-existing lung disease.
So the same people as you’d see getting non-breakout infections.
SCIENCE AND POLITICS ARE THE SAME NOW: Changing The Norms Of Science.
ACTUALLY, BIDEN AND BLINKEN AND MILLEY AND AUSTIN ARE THE FACE OF THIS DEBACLE: Brokering exit from Afghanistan, U.S. envoy Khalilzad became face of diplomatic debacle. They’re just trying to make Khalilzad the fall guy.
JOHN LUCAS: Biden Administration Orders Ideological Purge Of U.S. Military Academies. “There is no greater danger to the country than this effort to politicize the military by ensuring that all officers hew to the political party line of this administration.”
PREVIOUS TOTALITARIAN GOVERNMENTS AT LEAST ALLOWED HEAVY DRINKING AS AN ESCAPE: Now they’re confiscating alcohol delivered to locked-down Australian apartments if booze volume exceeds state-sanctioned limits.
THE HYPE HAS ALWAYS BEEN ARTIFICIAL: Bucknell University’s new Intro to Trans Studies class attracts five students.
IT’S SUCH A RELIEF HAVING THE GROWNUPS BACK IN CHARGE: Amid Disasters at Home and Abroad, Biden White House Staffers Busy Choosing ‘Magic Spirit Animals.’
EVERYONE IS CONSERVATIVE ABOUT WHAT HE KNOWS BEST: Students aren’t concerned about inflation…until they hear about the price of beer.
I’M NOT READING TOO MUCH INTO STORIES LIKE THIS ONE UNTIL THERE’S A REPUBLICAN CONGRESS: Fissures grow in House Democrats’ support for Biden’s $3.5 trillion social welfare bill.
GIVEN THE BLATANT FBI MISCONDUCT NEEDED TO BRING CHARGES, THIS WAS THE RIGHT OUTCOME: Chinese researcher accused of spying under DOJ initiative acquitted of all charges.
“[E]ven viewing all the evidence in the light most favorable to the government, no rational jury could conclude that defendant acted with a scheme to defraud NASA” in failing to disclose his affiliation with the Beijing University of Technology to UTK, U.S. District Judge Thomas A. Varlan wrote in the decision.
The judge added “there was no evidence presented that defendant ever collaborated with a Chinese university in conducting his NASA-funded research, or used facilities, equipment, or funds from a Chinese university in the course of such research.”
Will there be consequences for this misbehavior? Will anyone be charged, or even fired?
And will the University of Tennessee give him his job back? I think it should.
UPDATE: Here’s the opinion. Note that the defense motion for acquittal was opposed by the Justice Department. Some local media — cough, The Knoxville News-Sentinel, cough — is trying to spin this as some sort of racist Trump prosecution, but the Biden Administration didn’t drop it. In fact, they planned a retrial. They just lost. And the notion that the FBI was a willing tool of Trump seems . . . dubious anyway.
MY NEW YORK POST COLUMN: Masks are here to stay as long as libs need to shame their political enemies.
BIDEN’S BUNGLED BUGOUT: Afghanis Selling Their Kids to Buy Food.
NON-COMPLIANCE IS AN AMERICAN VIRTUE going back before abolitionism.
MISANDRY: “Teenage boys are six times more likely to suffer from heart problems from the vaccine than be hospitalised from Covid-19, a major study has found.” Because it is happening to boys, will anyone other than their parents care?
BITE ME, BIDEN: More Biden: Wear your mask while flying or you’ll face steeper fines — and show some respect while you’re at it.
UPDATE: A friend comments: “Chris Plante points out today that President Trump was often angry on our behalf, but Joe Biden is angry AT us.”
WHY ARE SO MANY AMERICAN INSTITUTIONS RUN BY PEOPLE WHO HATE AMERICA? National Archives and Records Association puts “harmful content” label on Constitution, founding documents.
But they’ve backed down now that they’re under the spotlight.
MARK PULLIAM: California and Texas: The Blue and the Red? “Once a state reaches a certain degree of political uniformity, it tends to repel those who disagree and attract fellow adherents, reinforcing its identity, but California only recently attained this monolithic status.”
THAT’S NOT GOOD: Smoke detected in Russian module on space station. “Roscosmos said a smoke detector and an alarm were set off on the Zvezda service module, which provides living quarters for crew members on the ISS, when batteries were being recharged overnight.”
MOVING AN AIR FORCE SUPER BIG GUY: Good photo of an airman directing a C-5M Super Galaxy transport prior to takeoff. Photo snapped Aug. 21, 2021, at Travis Air Force Base, California.
TO BE FAIR, HE’S TERRIBLE: Oh Joe: More Americans ‘than ever’ turn against Biden, Democrats sour.
OILY ANTONY AND JAW DROP JEN MIMIC “THE BIG GUY” BIDEN: Biden Administration Word Games Cannot Hide Prolonged Hostage Crisis — but they’re trying.
Blinken and Psaki mimic President Joe Biden’s repugnant example. On Aug. 31, Reuters published a July 23 telephone exchange between Biden and Afghan then-President Ashraf Ghani. Biden told Ghani that ” … the perception around the world and in parts of Afghanistan, I believe, is that things aren’t going well in terms of the fight against the Taliban. And there’s a need, whether it is true or not, there is a need to project a different picture. ”
The Reuters report has decisive historical importance. Biden knew his clumsy, incompetent and haphazard withdrawal was failing. However, instead of assisting the Afghan government in order to safely and successfully evacuate U.S. citizens, Biden wanted Ghani to use word and image perception gimmickry to conceal Biden’s real-world leadership, policy and battlefield failure.
My latest Creators Syndicate column (bumped).
KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEF: Biden Takes His COVID Tyranny to a Disturbing New Level. “Biden would never have gotten to play Occupy Oval Office had the Wuhan Chinese Bat Flu not arrived in America during a presidential election year. He knows that and has been conducting himself as if he owes the virus a debt of gratitude and is determined to keep fear of it alive. It’s his Precious.”
#1 IN KETOGENIC DIETS: The Complete Ketogenic Diet for Beginners: Your Essential Guide to Living the Keto Lifestyle. (Bumped)
WANTED: A JAMMER FOR THIS. Facebook on your face.
Starting Thursday, the first pair of smart glasses made by Facebook and Ray-Ban are going on sale for $299. They’re called Ray-Ban Stories, and you’ll be able to find them pretty much anywhere Ray-Bans are sold, including LensCrafters and Sunglasses Hut stores.
The frames feature two-front facing cameras for capturing video and photos. They sync with a companion camera roll app called Facebook View, where clips can be edited and shared to other apps on your phone (not just Facebook’s own). There’s a physical button on the glasses for recording, or you can say “Hey Facebook, take a video” to control them hands-free.
I’d be genuinely shocked if these glasses weren’t uploading to Facebook more or less continuously.
DICTATORIAL CORPORATISM: Jen Psaki Just Confirmed the White House Is Going to ‘Force’ Vaccine Mandates on Private Enterprise.
GEORGE KORDA: Mixed messages in 2020 may be behind some ongoing vaccine resistance.
The people who got it wrong owe the country either a non-self-defensive admission of their error, or an apology.
Throughout the summer of 2020, President Donald Trump predicted that a COVID-19 vaccine would be ready by year-end. Trump’s expectation was met with a wall of skeptical political, medical, and media reaction. One wonders especially about the effect on Americans predisposed to vaccine hesitancy, regardless of race, age, gender, or political party.
For example, a Sept. 16, 2020 Associated Press story quotes then-candidate Joe Biden saying, ’I trust vaccines. I trust scientists, but I don’t trust Donald Trump, and at this moment, the American people can’t, either.” As Trump told Americans a vaccine would be ready by year-end, Biden was telling American to not believe him – and that’s what dominated the headlines.
The publication Scientific American weighed in with a June 22, 2020, commentary headlined, “The Risks of Rushing a COVID-19 Vaccine, Telescoping testing time lines and approvals may expose all of us to unnecessary dangers.”
Among the article’s points: “But there are risks that come with a fast-tracked vaccine delivered end of this year, not the least of which are the risks related to the safety of the vaccine itself … Aside from questions of safety that attend any vaccine, there are good reasons to be especially cautious for COVID-19. Some vaccines worsen the consequences of infection rather than protect … As recently as 2016, Dengavxia, intended to protect children from the dengue virus, increased hospitalizations for children who received the vaccine.”
A Sept. 3, 2020 CNN Health Report headlined blared, “Doctors warn against rushing a COVID-19 vaccine as Fauci says it’s critical to have a safe Labor Day.” The report said many health experts thought a safe and effective vaccine could be ready by early 2021, but added warnings. A graphic illustrating five phases of vaccine development included, “Typically each step can take two years or more to complete.” The graphic was followed by this: “Some doctors say they’d rather see a vaccine go through all the rigors to get a full FDA approval.’
‘”How can you justify a substandard or lesser review for something that would be injected in tens of millions, maybe hundreds of millions of Americans?’ said Dr. Peter Hotez, dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine.”
Speaking of Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, his changing comments on masks and other subjects, including Emergency Use Authorizations (EUA) for COVID-19 vaccines, did little to build confidence.
An August 2020 Newsweek article on EUAs for COVID-19 vaccine began: “Dr. Anthony Fauci has said experimental coronavirus vaccines should not be given emergency use authorization (EUA) — especially if their effectiveness has not been proven — as it could undermine the development of others.” In Dec. 2020, the Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines were issued EUAs from the Food and Drug Administration.
The Trump-related nature of some of the vaccine-wariness articles was encapsulated in two national stories in May 2020: “Trump promises coronavirus vaccine by end of the year, but his own experts temper expectations – A vaccine has never been developed so quickly,” ABC News, and “Fact check: Coronavirus vaccine could come this year, Trump says. Experts say he needs a ‘miracle’ to be right,” NBC News.
That doesn’t matter now because shut up.
YES. NEXT QUESTION? Will Biden Continue Down the Path of the Democratic Party’s Lunatic Wing?
DON’T TRUST BIG TECH: California Bar to Attorneys: Disable Alexa When Working From Home.
September 9, 2021
MY NEW YORK POST COLUMN: Masks are here to stay as long as libs need to shame their political enemies.
FROM THE THE-WORSE-IT-GETS-THE-BETTER PERSPECTIVE: Oh Noes, Don’t Throw Me in The Briar Patch Mr. Biden.
The White House claims that 80 million Americans are unvaccinated, and we are now the enemy of the state. OK, whatever. When you get all done with the teeth gnashing part, I’m still unvaxxed. And if I’m no longer permitted to engage in a social construct that I have been studiously avoiding for the past few decades, well, meh…. a’right then, punish me by barring me from living life amid the Federal Moonbats. The federal compliance and enforcement part of the mandated worker vaccination will be fun to watch.
I have serious doubts that only 80 million Americans are unvaccinated, but fair enough; if that’s your number, okay then. However, consider this…. Assuming we are the minority group, the non-vaxxed crew breaks down into two broad segments: (1) The extremely well-educated who carry commonsense and are in a social strata where they remain quiet about it; and (2) The skeptical productive class of similarly disposed commonsense blue-collar workers who are the backbone of American productivity.
The comfortable existence for the rest of “polite society” is dependent on the scruffneck working class, the dirty fingernail folk who know what Lava soap feels like, and the industrious service sector workforce who fulfill the needs of those who hold out their pinky fingers when they drink from a glass.
If this non-vaccinated ‘minority group’ stops fulfilling the needs of the vaccinated ‘betters’, guess what happens?
Well, stay tuned. It won’t be fun for anyone. Plus: “Chin up folks, this announcement by Joe Biden is a Hail Mary reflecting just how desperate they are.”
WELL, SURE.
Democrats always hate Americans who won’t bend the knee more than foreigners who want Americans dead.
Plus, from the comments: “Delta spike appears to be fizzling. So Biden demands mass vaxxing right away, so he can claim his plan broke a spike that appears to be fizzling on its own.”
We are ruled by hacks, opportunists, and incompetents.
RELAX ABOUT THE PUSH FOR VACCINE MANDATES. The Supreme Court said more than a hundred years ago in Jacobson v. Massachusetts that vaccine mandates are constitutional. Indeed, vaccine mandates might even improve your liberty. The idea that such rules could set a dangerous precedent is simply paranoid. As one of America’s most famous jurists once pointed out,
The principle that sustains compulsory vaccination is broad enough to cover cutting the Fallopian tubes. Jacobson v. Massachusetts, 197 U. S. 11. Three generations of imbeciles are enough.
Oh.
Well, crap.
UPDATE (FROM GLENN): The Horrific Outcomes of the Jacobson Case You’re Using to Justify Biden’s Vaccine Mandates.
Plus: The Irrepressible Myth of Jacobson v. Massachusetts. “During the COVID-19 outbreak, Jacobson v. Massachusetts became the fountainhead for pandemic jurisprudence. Courts relied on this 1905 precedent to resolve disputes about religious freedom, abortion, gun rights, voting rights, the right to travel, and many other contexts. But Justice John Marshall Harlan’s decision was very narrow. It upheld the state’s power to impose a nominal fine on an unvaccinated person. No more, no less. Yet, judges now follow a variant of Jacobson that is far removed from the Lochner era decision.”
“MOST RELEVANT,” INDEED:
OPEN THREAD: Consenting to blow your mind.
I’M NOT SAYING THAT IT’S ALIENS, BUT IT’S ALIENS: Strange, repeating radio signal near the center of the Milky Way has scientists stumped.
2022 NOT LOOKING GOOD FOR DEMS: Polls, Biden approval tanking and solid candidate recruitment point to a solid GOP year. But don’t get cocky just yet.
TRUMP REACHES OUT TO THE FAMILIES OF MARINES KILLED IN AFGHANISTAN: “It was just very cordial, very understanding. He was awesome. He was just talking about the finest of the finest. He said he heard and saw everything that we had said, and he offered his condolences several times, and how sorry he was.”
Plus: “I’m blogging this mainly because it’s positive coverage for Trump that is appearing in The Washington Post. I read The Washington Post every day, and I find it blogworthy that The Washington Post would treat Trump this well. Maybe it’s just pure empathy for the Gold Star father, and I should just stop there, but I read on. . . . WaPo is monitoring the 2024 election, and this connection with the Gold Star families shows Trump making a politically powerful move that Democrats should not ignore. . . . Imagine Trump at that funeral and then Chappell’s “Lions” driving across the country — some sort of caravan? — to demand Biden’s resignation.”
WORTH YOUR TIME: The History of the Americans Podcast, from Jack “Tigerhawk” Henneman.
COMPARE TO THE WASHINGTON POST’S MONTHS-LONG “MACACA” FRENZY: Media ignore racial attack on Larry Elder because he’s a black Republican.
When the press talks about racism, it’s always a scam. This is just more proof.
FLASHBACK: Taking Sarah Palin’s Ideas Seriously. “Strangely, she was saying things that liberals might like, if not for Ms. Palin’s having said them.” That’s why it was so important to thoroughly demonize her right up front.
Ten years ago, today.
JOEL KOTKIN: The Fading Family.
Margaret Mead once said, “no matter how many communes anyone invents, the family always creeps back.” But today’s trajectory is not promising. Even before the Covid-19 pandemic, family formation and birth rates were declining throughout much of the world, not just in most of the West and East Asia, but also in parts of South American and the Middle East.
The ongoing pandemic appears to be driving birth rates globally down even further, and the longer it lasts, the greater possibility that familial implosion will get far worse, and perhaps intractable. Brookings predicts that COVID will result in 300,000 to 500,000 fewer U.S. births in 2021. Marriage rates have dropped significantly to 35 year lows.
It’s been a half century since Stanford biologist Paul Ehrlich’s Population Bomb (1968) prophesied a surge of population that would foster Malthusian mass starvation, which echoed the premise of lurid book called Famine 1975! Ehrlich and his acolytes urged extreme measures to stave off disaster, including adding sterilant into the water supply. Similar conclusions were drawn four years later in the corporate-sponsored Club of Rome report, which embraced an agenda of austerity and retrenchment to stave off population-driven mass starvation and social chaos.
These predictions turned out to be vastly exaggerated, with a rapid decline in global hunger. The anticipated population explosion is morphing into something more like an implosion, with much of the world now facing population stagnation, and even contraction. As birth rates have dropped, the only thing holding up population figures in many places is longer lifespans, though recent data suggests these may be getting shorter again .
These trends can be felt in the United States, where the birthrate is sinking. U.S. population growth among the cohort aged between 16 and 64 has dropped from 20 percent in the 1980s to less than 5 percent in the last decade. This is particularly bad for the future of an economy dependent on new workers and consumers.
This demographic transition is even more marked in Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and much of Europe, where finding younger workers is becoming a major problem for employers and could result in higher costs or increased movement of jobs to more fecund countries. As the employment base shrinks, some countries, such as Germany, have raised taxes on the existing labor force to pay for the swelling ranks of retirees.
Similar patterns can be seen in China.
In retrospect, Ehrlich’s book was probably a big psyop against China, but while it produced the crippling one-child policy there, it also produced a lot of collateral damage.
Meanwhile, as James Taranto noted in “The Roe Effect,” the effects are not felt equally throughout society, with groups favoring reproduction gaining an advantage. The future, as they say, belongs to those who are born:
It is a statement of fact, not a moral judgment, to observe that every pregnancy aborted today results in one fewer eligible voter 18 years from now. More than 40 million legal abortions have occurred in the United States since 1973, and these are not randomly distributed across the population. Black women, for example, have a higher abortion ratio (percentage of pregnancies aborted) than Hispanic women, whose abortion ratio in turn is higher than that of non-Hispanic whites. Since blacks vote Democratic in far greater proportions than Hispanics, and whites are more Republican than Hispanics or blacks, ethnic disparities in abortion ratios would be sufficient to give the GOP a significant boost–surely enough to account for George W. Bush’s razor-thin Florida victory in 2000.
The Roe effect, however, refers specifically to the nexus between the practice of abortion and the politics of abortion. It seems self-evident that pro-choice women are more likely to have abortions than pro-life ones, and common sense suggests that children tend to gravitate toward their parents’ values. This would seem to ensure that Americans born after Roe v. Wade have a greater propensity to vote for the pro-life party–that is, Republican–than they otherwise would have.
And the religious would, on average, increase their share of the population compared to the non-religious.
Answer: When the black candidate is a Republican, and the protester is a progressive. Had the affiliations been the other way around in this encounter caught on video, the media would have feasted on it for weeks, and reporters would have demanded answers for it from every GOP candidate for office.
However, since it happened to my friend and Salem Radio colleague Larry Elder while walking through progressive Los Angeles, the media instead reported it as a “hostile confrontation.” Watch the video and judge for yourselves. The egg attack comes from the right side of the screen:
* * * * * * * *
Now imagine if this had happened to a black Democrat touring a suburban district or the Central Valley. Would ABC and the LA Times retreat to passive voice in that instance? Would the New York Times bury it in the 14th paragraph of an election round-up? Nonsense. It would be headline news in every national news outlet, and people would be screaming at prosecutors to charge the woman with a hate crime.
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Ed Morrissey concludes, “Addendum: Well put:”
THIS MAY BE THE MOST BEAUTIFUL NATIONAL ANTHEM RENDITION EVER: But fans attending and tuning into tonight’s NFL season opening game between the Super Bowl Champion Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Dallas Cowboys won’t get to hear it.
Victory Boyd, the songwriter/singer, declines to get the Covid vaccine, for religious and medical reasons. So, after agreeing to pay her $20,000 plus expenses for the appearance, the NFL refused her request for an accommodation. Why? Because the NFL insists the national anthem be sung on the field.
THEY’RE ALWAYS IN THE LAST PLACE YOU LOOK: Paleontologists find massive half-billion-year-old fossil species in Canadian Rockies.
BLOWBACK: Top Biden Officials Backed the 2014 Bergdahl Deal. Now, the Terrorists Released Are Taking the Reins in Afghanistan. “Blinken and Psaki said prisoners posed no threat.”
Previously: McCain’s 2014 attack on ‘dangerous’ Tony Blinken reemerges amid Afghan exit chaos.
RICH LOWRY: The Real Biden Presidency Emerges.
The best case for Biden was that he could ride in the slipstream of good economic growth and a receding pandemic, beaten back by the vaccines that began to be administered before Biden took office. Instead, the labor market is still rocky and the Delta variant has surged, leading to headlines about overstretched health care systems that most people assumed that we’d left behind in the spring of 2020.
With his honeymoon gone, with Trump less of a factor, with economic conditions and the state of the virus not as favorable as expected, Biden had been stripped down to a more natural level of support and sliding in the polls since around June.
Then, he made the first major, historic decision of his presidency, and completely botched it. Biden has tried to deflect responsibility for his exit from Afghanistan onto Trump and his execrable deal with the Taliban. Yet, the decision to quit when he did and how he did was all on Biden.
He hasn’t shown a hint of doubt or regret. The notion of leaving Afghanistan is popular in theory; the way Biden did it is radioactive in practice. The White House may tell itself that Biden’s decision will come to seem farsighted, and its possible that the harmful political effect will wear off over time.
Leaving Americans behind in a foreign country after an enemy of the United States swept to power and chased us out with our tails between our legs, though, is not likely to be forgotten, certainly not in 2022 or 2024, if ever.
The prime directive for any president is, to the extent possible, to seem in control. Biden failed this test repeatedly during the evacuation crisis. Events moved faster than he did and his rationales for what was happening had to be constantly revised, until he settled on the explanation that it is impossible to end any war in good order.
Or to put it another way, unexpectedly:
DISPATCHES FROM THE MINISTRY OF TRUTH: China erases billionaire actress Zhao Wei from history.
She has millions of adoring fans. She’s worth billions of dollars. But Beijing has all but erased actress Zhao Wei from history. And they won’t say why.
Zhao’s name won’t be immortal. Her entire internet existence has been scrubbed.
All serials and chat shows featuring her have vanished from major Chinese online streaming sites. She no longer even appears in the online credits for the movies she appears in.
Discussing why is being censored on social media.
Winston Smith, call your office:
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