As to ceiling fans, the video remarks that the fan shouldn’t be on because it’s winter. Wrong. That’s why ceiling fans are reversible.
Quick Covid update. It looks like the winter “micro” wave is over. 14 day average new cases have now declined consistently for the last month. Serious cases in absolute numbers, and as a percentage of active cases, declining for the last two weeks. This “wave” maxed out at about 6% of the omicron peak, and about 50% of the August 2022 variant wave. As I keep saying, if there wasn’t any testing for this particular virus, I doubt anyone would even have noticed this “wave” other than the usual winter “flu”. Deaths showed a very minimal rise, maybe 10% above what I now call “background level” which is about 2% of peak during the pandemic.
One nice change here in Florida: I had a medical appt on Wednesday and it looks like all medical facilities have totally dropped any mask requirement. I had one in my pocket but all the mandate signs are gone and I only saw 2 people, who were definitely in their 80s with masks, and none of the health workers.
I’m waiting another few weeks to have a retrospective look at a full 12 months of data on India, Brazil, South Africa, Argentina, and the Netherlands. So far, looks satisfactory.
One comment on the video…the guy complains about lack of privacy in public restrooms in the US. I can counter that complaint with the fact that there’s few to zero public restrooms in Britain, or at least in London when I was there in 2019. I now understand why I saw so few older gents walking around London. There’s no place for them to go! I was in need and went to a Starbuck’s where they told me no restroom unlike the US stores, and then directed me to the nearest which was 5 blocks away and buried on the bottom floor of a large department store. Ridiculous!
My Health Care Provider still requires masks. But I was in an Imaging Center the other day and no masks. Great. Yesterday at the Rec Center after my workout I went to the Spa/Hot Tube. An older gentleman (or not since I am 76) was wearing a mask in the Spa.
On another note, here in CO there is a push to ban NG in homes. Go all electric (which I actually did 45 yr ago when I built my house) but they are banning fracking. We do have 2 NG fireplaces that are seldom used. And several yr ago I talked my Wife into getting a Dual Fuel Range. She was afraid of gas leaks and the house exploding, but with the spark ignitor she agreed and now loves it.
Art Deco, I should have made clear, my data is for the US only.
Something used here on beds but not so much in Germany is the flat sheet. They use a fitted sheet and use a duvet with a cover that gets washed every other week or so. Well, if you have teenage boys it might be every month or so.
not even in the top floor of harrods, next to the flame throwers
Herb Alpert – the reason I started trumpet lessons in the 3rd grade circa 1964. The Tijuana Brass was extremely popular back then. IIRC they had several TV specials way back when. So popular that there was a knock-off novelty act, The Frivolous Five. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GK5nxGVvRt0
And, I nearly went blind starring at the album cover for Whipped Cream & Other Delights – oh yeah!
Yawrate,
Most Germans use single person duvets (135cm) and not double or queen size ones. They fold the little ones in half and turn them sideways when they make their beds.
The litttle ones are much easier to change.I use a queen duvet and sheet.
Michael Barone has become an embarrassment. Sad.
Physicsguy,
“all medical facilities have totally dropped any mask requirement.”
The medical establishment has shredded its credibility. I’ll never understand how so many intelligent people can be so uninterested in being trustworthy. Instead of leading, they have been the champions of superstition, foolishness, and anti-scientific beliefs.
My internist is a mask fanatic. Still wears a plastic face shield like a welder. He has given up trying to get me to take boosters, so we get along. He refused to prescribe premarin for my wife who has taken it for 40 years so her GYN prescribed it and she got it from Canada. I may just be an old grouch but I have not been happy with Medicine lately.
Here in my part of Ky the only place I have to mask anymore is doctor’s offices, hospitals, and some urgent care facilities. I suppose nursing homes as well but I haven’t been in one in years so don’t know for certain.
VA still requires masks. I told my VA doctor I would not come in for a visit, because obviously the VA facility must be unsafe, since I can shop at Fred Meyer without a mask on, but not visit the VA.
I have been in medical and dental facilities several times in the past ten days and I have seen very few people masked up except for dentists working on me. At my MD docs office they never required masks after the first couple of Covid months and the local hospital had signs at the door saying masks were required however very few people, both patients and staff were wearing masks. It’s good to live in Texas where even the Democrats at church no longer wear masks.
“It’s good to live in Texas where even the Democrats at church no longer wear masks.”
Dude…that’s a winner of an observation if ever there was one. Made me laugh out loud. And you know you’re in Texas because even the Democrats attend a church.
Thank you!
Biden has created a new project, called- “The Welcome Corps”.
Under this government project- private, citizens in the USA, groups of 5 or more citizens, can [sponsor refugees for 3 months], + give each refugee person about $2,800.
(Do you think these, “refugees”, will also include illegal immigrant people?)
I think so.
These refugees will use the 3 months, + the $2,800, to “adjust themselves to their new country”, their new country being The US.
OK, and what do you [do], private citizens, if the 3 months runs out, and then your refugees say to you:
“You can’t stop paying us! We’ll starve!” And what if they also say:
“You CAN’T kick us out of your house! That’s cruel. Where will WE LIVE?”
After 3 months- what will you do, if your refugees demand more help from you?
Ditching obedience masks would also be a good idea. That’s a bridge too far for Japan right now, but the more realistic perspective is encouraging.
World Covid rates are highest right now all over Asia. Remember all the reasons why the Asian countries were so much better than their western counterparts.
Mask compliance.
Vaccine uptake.
Prior immunity.
None of that was true.
Laura Ingraham had this doctor on last night to discuss the Covid vaccine’s side effects. Maybe hyperbolic, but certainly something the medical establishment and big pharma need to consider going forward. https://www.foxnews.com/video/6319004321112
‘They’ve been wearing masks in flu season in Asia for years’ was somehow treated as evidence that it actually had any positive effect.
JJ,
The ‘vaccine is killing people’ crowd is quickly becoming as annoying as the ‘take five shots to save grandma’ crowd.
Both are hyperbolic extremists whose stridency does their cause no good.
Doctors here in NC still requiring masks, but not orthopedics or the gyms. Otherwise, I see a few in stores, but not very many.
Griffin: “Both are hyperbolic extremists whose stridency does their cause no good.”
That’s my impression. Dueling extremes. How this has happened does not bode well for the future. Who can the public trust?
The damage to medical credibility, to the economy, to children’s educations, to the unity of the nation, and more have been as damaging or more so than the actual virus. If the virus was loosed on purpose, or even accidentally, China has succeeded in crippling us.
The CDC has a budget of $9.6 billion. Somewhere in there you would think they could find some money to do a definitive study on Covid therapeutics and vaccine side effects such that they could set the public’s mind at ease and redeem a small bit of credibility.
People will forgive errors if the mistakes are admitted and corrected. Continuing to cover up or obfuscate is what destroys credibility.
Griffin; JJ:
Agreed.
I’ve been arguing with both extreme groups for a long time.
Video of Ron DeSantis in attendance at the Jacksonville game in Kansas City, holding his small son’s hand with his left hand and shaking hands with admiring Chiefs fans with his right:
‘They’ve been wearing masks in flu season in Asia for years’ was somehow treated as evidence that it actually had any positive effect.
Griffin:
I recall reading that many Asians like wearing masks because it conceals their facial expressions in public. Could be.
I wonder if that’s a factor among Americans.
During Covid we turned in our homework at UNM by photographing the pages, then uploading the result as a group of jpgs or a single pdf.
Covid is basically over at school. Only diehards continue to wear masks. Yet many Covid practices remain in force.
We’re still uploading images of our homework.
The default for meeting advisors is a Zoom meeting. The days of just walking in and waiting in line are over. One must schedule a meeting and specifically request it be “in-person.”
Also one can’t walk into or out of many buildings without a student ID and valid registration for the current semester.
Methinks they like the control.
Yes concealing my identity when I get an eye exam or have a employee manditory exam (to wear a respirator), makes no sense; are medical personnel uniquely at risk? Or are bureaucrats clinging to power?
But seriously, here in Eastern WA it seems that most of those I see still wearing masks are erlderly (older than me). So I assume they must have a serious health issue.
…most of those I see still wearing masks are erlderly (older than me). So I assume they must have a serious health issue.
om:
I get that. Though at this point I wonder how much actual good that does. I doubt the bandana style mask helps unless one is robbing a 7-11. But how much protection does the N95 offer outside the OR?
My sister, who has real respiratory problems, has been wearing a mask. She hasn’t gotten even a cold and has decided to wear a mask all the time in public.
I wonder if that’s because the world mostly stayed home or kept its distance at that time.
There’s some evidence that a properly fitted N95 mask may provide some protection to the wearer, so if your sister, huxley, is careful to wear one like that in public places it might help. Maybe; but there’s little evidence that masks have helped with respiratory virus epidemics. I hope she stays healthy.
It’s worth learning French, even at my novice level, to participate in this song. It’s like a deeply moving indie film in four minutes. Incredible!
Pomme takes the listener through losing a lover, then revealing bits more of the story, with the ribbon of “Sans toi” (Without You) winding through it all.
And compared to “Without You,” the French “Sans toi” is so much more piercing, heartbreaking, desolated, yet finally ennobled.
Elon Says He Suffered “Major Side Effects” From Booster Shot, and His Young, Healthy Cousin Developed “Serious Case of Myocarditis”
Considering a mask and its results in isolation is not useful.
By implication and avooding the subject altogether, we have been led to believe (“led” is pretty good here)that material “trapped” in a mask is translated to an alternate universe. Never to be seen again.
But what the freak does “trapped” really mean?
In this case, it means accumulating about an eight of an inch in front of your nose and mouth, not that much further from your eyes.
Your stuff going out…piles up there, refreshed with each warm, moist exhalation.
Other stuff, coming in, joins the party.
And you keep breathing through it.
And, unlike the rigorous lab tests, you touch it with your hands a dozen times and hour, thence putting your hands elsewhere; door knobs, stair rails, table tops.
Yeah, I know, the virus only lasts nine hours on a dry surface.
Such as a door knob in an office building where the next person comes along forty-seven seconds later.
Then you stuff it in your pocket for use tomorrow in case you forget to get a fresh one.
Said it before; by this time in the farce, we’ve all seen somebody hock up half a lung, readjust the mask, and take hold of the escalator rail.
Another thing I’ve said before, one way or another, is that the urge; “MAKE ME DO STUPID STUFF!” is underrated as a factor in the current insanity. I may be wrong, but Occam is looking over my shoulder at various of my friends and relations.
Thursday, delivering Meals on Wheels, I stepped inside a home–they’re too infirm to get to the door in any useful time–and was told they have Covid. Chatted briefly. Left. Tomorrow, routine cardio visit. Have to tell them, test tonight, mask tomorrow. This is midwest damp and cold weather. The result is so routine that thinking “COVID!” when you have to get a fresh handkerchief out of the drawer is unlikely. How many carriers have I been in contact with in the last couple of weeks?
Meantime… Went to a New Years dinner with some friends. Got an email later one tested posiitive. Wife went to a meeting at church. Got an email later…. And that’s the folks who are sufficiently symptomatic and interested in taking a test and know our email…..
Wish I could find the article: Seventy percent to ninety percent of hospitalizations showing COVID….are for something else, the COVID being incidental. What number do the panic porn purveyors use?
Those doctors and medical researchers who claim “the vaccines are killing people” have so far demonstrated that they are right about everything else they have claimed over the last three years. Since they have established credibility, I will keep an open mind about their claims. I can’t understand why anyone would consider them annoying.
Those in the medical establishment who have lied about every aspect of covid for three years are annoying.
Along with the people who try to claim equivalence between the two groups.
Mask requirements…a neighbor is a psychiatrist who works with very troubled people. Talking w/his wife while we were walking or respective dogs, she said that the local medical authorities require mask-wearing when he is in sessions with patients, and that he feels this greatly inhibits good communication.
stan can be annoying, but not always nor about everything.
stan,
I was the one who said they were getting annoying so I will respond.
For too many of the ‘vaccine kills’ crowd they offer very little actual evidence let alone proof that it is the vaccine responsible for excess deaths. It may very well be true that they are contributing but just saying they are doesn’t make it so.
Of the two extremes they have been clearly right about more things and that does help their credibility but going around calling the vaccines ‘poison’ is not a very good way to win an argument any more than the pro vax people with their ridiculous claims. A better argument is that they just don’t work that well and the risks from getting the vax are greater (but still low) than getting Covid for virtually every somewhat healthy person under about 70 at this point. That is a winning argument and the booster uptake rates are proving that a huge percentage of the people know this.
And I did get the Moderna vaccine in May ’21 reluctantly because without it I was no longer going to be able to visit my mother but I have never got another one and I likely never will.
Watching the network TV, one sees endless ads for prescriptions. Each is followed by a list of possible side effects including, sometimes, dying. As I’ve mentioned before, none of the PSA–you should get jabbed to protect grandma–listed side effects, although being the closest thing to an actual advertisement.
Why not?
And those who asked were hounded as anti-science, Galileo denying heretics who wanted Grandma to die.
I guess the point is that the medical community, with great help from big pharma and the government and the left in general managed to tar themselves. And, of course, from the Little Hitlers and the make-me-do-stupid-stuff crowd.
The next time we’re expected to believe and do the counter-intuitive…?
One aspect of the “conspiracy theory” accusation is that even asking for an explication of the inexplicable is considered next thing to a mortal sin and proves you’re a conspiracy theorist.
That refusing to explain the unexplainable is a tell doesn’t seem to occur to the accusers. But it doesn’t need to. Simply screaming “CONSPIRACY THEORY!” is generally sufficient. But then, there are cancellations, bogus fact-checkers, censoring to help things move along.
Griffin, I like your answer to Stan. Hits about the right notes IMO.
What is maddening is that the medical bureaucracy, with its billions of dollars, doesn’t seem interested in getting answers to the many questions we deserve answers to. And they refuse to admit any mistakes. or misleading statements. We need someone like Scott Atlas or Peter McCullough to head up the CDC and get them back on track. Politics should be removed as far as possible from medicine. Well, I can dream, can’t I?
What an amazing shitshow this is: “AG pondering declaring Netanyahu unfit as PM due to conflicts of interest”
The “curious” thing is that all these people who want—essentially—to overturn the election (since the results are not exactly to their liking…IOW they lost) are marching around carrying THE FLAG…as though they’re defending the country….from, from, from…from what they really don’t like.
To be sure that’s also The Narrative(TM)…courtesy of the usual suspects…
Both grounds for Deri’s dismissal were rooted in Hayut’s notion that Supreme Court justices are endowed with special powers to discern right from wrong that mere mortals do not possess. The Deri decision effectively struck down the judgment of four hundred thousand Shas voters. Indeed, it struck down the ballots of 2.3 million Israelis who voted for Likud, the National Religious Party, Shas and United Torah Judaism, with the goal of forming the current Netanyahu government, in which, all concerned assumed, Deri would serve as a minister. The court’s legally unhinged decision also struck down the Knesset’s exclusive power to approve governments, and the prime minister’s power to appoint his ministers in accordance with law.
Rumor has it that the House of Representatives is her next target.
(For Janet Yellen, that day can’t come too soon…)
“Treasury Secretary Yellen calls House GOP ‘irresponsible’ for demanding spending cuts amid shutdown;
“Some Democrats, such as Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin of Illinois, have said that Biden should not negotiate with the GOP on the debt ceiling.”— https://justthenews.com/government/federal-agencies/treasury-secretary-yellen-calls-house-gop-irresponsible-demanding
you would have to salt the clouds with holy water, barry
this is akin to clinton nominee middlebrooks ruling against trump, for challenging the org,
durbin doing the part of dennis hopper in speed,
Since it’s Sunday and an Open Thread: Ukraine war.
How Politics Destroys Armies: Politics, Factionalism & Russia’s war in Ukraine -Perun
I don’t know about public service announcements on TV, because I don’t watch much TV, but there were certainly official websites that talked about side effects and I was given an information sheet with side effects when I got my COVID shots.
Gov. Abbott weighs in: “I swear, I can kick as good as the Dallas Cowboys kicker.”
I assume that’s a joke, sdferr. Tell me, is this a new kicker?
Okay, so I looked him up. Not new. Successful season. My Dallas fan neighbor is probably not going to be happy tomorrow.
Hey y’all
News at American Digest re Gerard Vanderluen is not at all good.
If you pray… peace and strength would be good to ask for. Healing too however it comes.
Neo. That’s the point. No matter what shot you get, there’s a reference to side effects. At the point of shotting, to coin a phrase. In some cases, I think wrt shingles, I had to sign a consent including such references. Or perhaps it was the flu. Can’t recall. Maybe both.
But the PSA on television, which looked exactly like advertisements, as in….do this for your own good and for others–mass advertised just like something for plaque psoriasis with, iirc, even background music. Did not.
Just for research sake, watch one of the news channels. Won’t take long before you’re being exposed to one or another…..and see the lengthy side effects, sometimes with the auto speed up of the narrator to get them all in.
And on line discussions, especially on social media, seemed to be weighted. Just like doctors reporting favorable results with the cheap therapeutics we must not name out loud.
Brian E: “Are we being played about Ukraine?”
Of course. Hard to find truth from either side. Propaganda is plentiful OM tries to bring us some good info, but even much of that is conjecture. There isn’t an Ernie Pyle, or Bill Mauldin reporting directly from the frontlines. We hope our military intelligence knows the real scoop, but what we are being told is most likely dictated by politics.
Why did the war happen? Would it have occurred if Trump was President? Who’s profiting? Why are there little or no efforts to broker a peace agreement? Why aren’t the Code Pink people in the streets protesting the war and our involvement in it? All questions that have occurred to me.
Admittedly, Putin is absolutely wrong and the aggressor. But Ukraine’s infrastructure is being destroyed. While Russia is losing manpower and equipment, their infrastructure remains intact. So, who’s really winning?
Why is there no special envoy or master who is monitoring the billions we are pouring into Ukraine. We’re nearly broke but are sending money over there like we’re flush with cash.
As General Milley said, this war has to end in a cease fire and peace agreement. Why prolong it until Ukraine’s infrastructure is completely flattened? Who’s going to pay to rebuild Ukraine?
Maybe I’m just too dumb to see the answers, but I’m not at all enthusiastic about the war. I believe the Biden admin has played it about as badly as possible. First, they expected Kyiv to fall rather quickly and offered Zelenskyy a way out. What was their plan if that had happened?
Then when the Ukrainians showed their willingness and ability to fight, they slowly, cautiously began giving them weapons and ammo. Last year when both sides seemed willing to negotiate, the NATO allies nixed the idea. They seemed to have decided that Putin was going to be “punished” by prolonging the war. Why did they decide this? Willing to fight on until all of Ukraine has been decimated? Why?
Now, they’re escalating the quality and power of the weapons they’re supplying. It has been a gradualism much as LBJ displayed in Vietnam. Hasn’t this been shown to be a lousy strategy? In for a penny, in for a pound. If its war, go in big and aim for a quick resolution. Quagmires have been our nemesis since WWII. This looks like a quagmire, and the Biden admin has no real plan except fight on to the last Ukrainian and hope Putin gives in.
Fog of war indeed.
If or when the Kerch Bridge to Crimea is dropped how long will it take to expel the Roosians? Another year? Can Vlad launch another invasion from Belarus by then?
How long will the Roosians continue to attack Ukraine with Cold War missiles originally designed to kill US aircraft carriers? Will the Ukrainians be able to do anything in response?
How long will the Russians put up with Vlad?
13 minutes and Azov indeed. It seems some Roosians are quite prepared to fight until there are no more Ukrainians, almost genocidal.
WRT Santos, it seems that every hour is “story hour”….
(“Come, let me entertain you” said the spider to the fly…?)
One wonders what he’ll come up with next.
(Still would be curious to find out who funded him, though…)
– – – – – – – – – – –
As for Gov. Abbott stepping down to become a Dallas Cowboys place kicker, you gotta admire his spunk; but he really should be a bit more careful here…as he’s sticking his nose—er, his foot—into what is essentially a religious issue and in so doing might be pushing the Establishment Clause a bit further than it was intended.
…Having said that, the Cowboys might think about hiring THIS AMAZING FELLOW—not quite yet, perhaps, as he’s still a bit on the young side…but definitely a person of interest for the future for their organization given the freak show they seem to be running at the moment.
“Boy, 13, born without LEGS wins place on his school’s basketball team – with teammates saying he is great at snatching ball away from rivals while they dribble it across court”— https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11662889/Boy-13-born-without-LEGS-wins-place-schools-basketball-team.html https://www.cbsnews.com/video/teen-born-without-legs-inspires-on-the-basketball-court/
A basketball player, you say?
The guys a natural athlete and can no doubt switch quickly.
Roger Kimball goes out on a limb with some hesitant, qualified, guarded optimism:
“Too Much to Hope?”— https://amgreatness.com/2023/01/21/too-much-to-hope/
H/T Powerline blog.
Alas, WRT the considerable “achievement” of having “elected” Decent Joe Fentanyl to so “competently” “lead” the nation; and taking into consideration (cf. earlier posts) those oh-so-earnest crap artistes at “The View” (who have been working tirelessly for years turning gobsmacking stupidity into an art form), as well as that paragon of confusion, Mona Charen—and not forgetting David Brooks, that opium (or something)-addled op-ed writer-cum-foolish fashionista—one is forced to conclude that a huge, huge predicament facing Kimball (and the nation, generally) is that half of the country (give or take)—even if they READ his post—won’t know WTH he’s talking about…
Indeed, the media and infotech have done their jobs exceeding well….
On vaccine side effects and warnings: My daughter got two Pfizer shots in the summer of 2021 because her employer required them. Her side effects on the second shot were significant and lasted over two weeks. She was not given a paper listing side effects nor a paper on reporting to the VAERS. The shots were administered by a local government; no one else had them in Northern Virginia at that time.
Allowing Putin to prevail–however that’s put–might require looking at the militarization of the Rhineland in 36.
See Sowell on intellectuals and war.
The only intellectual to listen to WRT war is William Tecumseh Sherman.
With George Paton perhaps a close second…
Another case of a British quasi-tabloid outdoing U.S. “papers of record” for completeness and scope of coverage.
Hubert:
Thanks for the links. Daily Mail has been doing actual journalism, US media, not so much.
I second the thanks for the links, Hubert. More info is always welcome.
Barry.
Sowell makes the case that the intellectuals caused, or made worse, or allowed, or something, WW II because of their authoritatively rational and completely wrong insistence on what was going to happen, would happen if….
The problem, currently being faced (though it began more than a decade ago, perhaps even before that) is, it seems to me, that they’re not so much wrong as they are INENTIONALLY pushing, promoting, encouraging, provoking societal destruction and breakdown.
(No doubt for the very best of reasons—after all, they are intellectuals…with all the power of their massive intellects at their disposal.)
If ONLY the problem was that they were wrong…
For example, here’s an analysis—or perhaps prescription—for causing a more-or-less stable society, a society that encourages innovation and hard work, a society based on merit (more or less) to break down; to be destroyed…all in an effort for the group planning and fomenting this destruction to accumulate extensive power, even total power, so as to “transform” the basis of the country.
Call it a cookbook. A “How To” primer… https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/2023-fourth-turning-meets-mass-formation-psychosis
Just another example:
“IF IT SEEMS LIKE THEY ACTIVELY WANT TO MAKE PEOPLE’S LIVES WORSE, IT’S BECAUSE THEY ACTIVELY WANT TO MAKE PEOPLE’S LIVES WORSE”— https://instapundit.com/565720/
Ah, but why might “they” “want” to do that?
Time, I guess, to read/re-read “1984” (that “textbook” of total power) which does appear to be “their’ “How-to Guide” writ large…
The strategy clearly is: Keep the people off-balance, keep ’em afraid, uncertain, insecure and panicky. Keep ’em desperate. keep ’em confused—keep ’em DRUGGED??–.and they’ll be far easier to control.
The way to do this is, among others, endless crises—while finding a suitable target to brand “ENEMY OF THE PEOPLE”, “ENEMIES OF THE STATE”…etc…
Barry Meislin on January 23, 2023 at 2:26 am said:
WRT Santos, it seems that every hour is “story hour”….
(“Come, let me entertain you” said the spider to the fly…?)
One wonders what he’ll come up with next.
(Still would be curious to find out who funded him, though…)
A possible answer to you question is here:
Some interesting points made by J.E. Dyer on the Topics of the Week.
As to ceiling fans, the video remarks that the fan shouldn’t be on because it’s winter. Wrong. That’s why ceiling fans are reversible.
Quick Covid update. It looks like the winter “micro” wave is over. 14 day average new cases have now declined consistently for the last month. Serious cases in absolute numbers, and as a percentage of active cases, declining for the last two weeks. This “wave” maxed out at about 6% of the omicron peak, and about 50% of the August 2022 variant wave. As I keep saying, if there wasn’t any testing for this particular virus, I doubt anyone would even have noticed this “wave” other than the usual winter “flu”. Deaths showed a very minimal rise, maybe 10% above what I now call “background level” which is about 2% of peak during the pandemic.
One nice change here in Florida: I had a medical appt on Wednesday and it looks like all medical facilities have totally dropped any mask requirement. I had one in my pocket but all the mandate signs are gone and I only saw 2 people, who were definitely in their 80s with masks, and none of the health workers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LGmQXuySF28
Neo should devote more attention to Herb Alpert.
Quick Covid update.
I’m waiting another few weeks to have a retrospective look at a full 12 months of data on India, Brazil, South Africa, Argentina, and the Netherlands. So far, looks satisfactory.
One comment on the video…the guy complains about lack of privacy in public restrooms in the US. I can counter that complaint with the fact that there’s few to zero public restrooms in Britain, or at least in London when I was there in 2019. I now understand why I saw so few older gents walking around London. There’s no place for them to go! I was in need and went to a Starbuck’s where they told me no restroom unlike the US stores, and then directed me to the nearest which was 5 blocks away and buried on the bottom floor of a large department store. Ridiculous!
My Health Care Provider still requires masks. But I was in an Imaging Center the other day and no masks. Great. Yesterday at the Rec Center after my workout I went to the Spa/Hot Tube. An older gentleman (or not since I am 76) was wearing a mask in the Spa.
On another note, here in CO there is a push to ban NG in homes. Go all electric (which I actually did 45 yr ago when I built my house) but they are banning fracking. We do have 2 NG fireplaces that are seldom used. And several yr ago I talked my Wife into getting a Dual Fuel Range. She was afraid of gas leaks and the house exploding, but with the spark ignitor she agreed and now loves it.
Art Deco, I should have made clear, my data is for the US only.
Something used here on beds but not so much in Germany is the flat sheet. They use a fitted sheet and use a duvet with a cover that gets washed every other week or so. Well, if you have teenage boys it might be every month or so.
not even in the top floor of harrods, next to the flame throwers
Herb Alpert – the reason I started trumpet lessons in the 3rd grade circa 1964. The Tijuana Brass was extremely popular back then. IIRC they had several TV specials way back when. So popular that there was a knock-off novelty act, The Frivolous Five. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GK5nxGVvRt0
And, I nearly went blind starring at the album cover for Whipped Cream & Other Delights – oh yeah!
Yawrate,
Most Germans use single person duvets (135cm) and not double or queen size ones. They fold the little ones in half and turn them sideways when they make their beds.
The litttle ones are much easier to change.I use a queen duvet and sheet.
Michael Barone has become an embarrassment. Sad.
Physicsguy,
“all medical facilities have totally dropped any mask requirement.”
The medical establishment has shredded its credibility. I’ll never understand how so many intelligent people can be so uninterested in being trustworthy. Instead of leading, they have been the champions of superstition, foolishness, and anti-scientific beliefs.
see here,
https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x85vlvr
you need a dose of the purposefully absurd
My internist is a mask fanatic. Still wears a plastic face shield like a welder. He has given up trying to get me to take boosters, so we get along. He refused to prescribe premarin for my wife who has taken it for 40 years so her GYN prescribed it and she got it from Canada. I may just be an old grouch but I have not been happy with Medicine lately.
Here in my part of Ky the only place I have to mask anymore is doctor’s offices, hospitals, and some urgent care facilities. I suppose nursing homes as well but I haven’t been in one in years so don’t know for certain.
VA still requires masks. I told my VA doctor I would not come in for a visit, because obviously the VA facility must be unsafe, since I can shop at Fred Meyer without a mask on, but not visit the VA.
I have been in medical and dental facilities several times in the past ten days and I have seen very few people masked up except for dentists working on me. At my MD docs office they never required masks after the first couple of Covid months and the local hospital had signs at the door saying masks were required however very few people, both patients and staff were wearing masks. It’s good to live in Texas where even the Democrats at church no longer wear masks.
“It’s good to live in Texas where even the Democrats at church no longer wear masks.”
Dude…that’s a winner of an observation if ever there was one. Made me laugh out loud. And you know you’re in Texas because even the Democrats attend a church.
Thank you!
Biden has created a new project, called- “The Welcome Corps”.
Under this government project- private, citizens in the USA, groups of 5 or more citizens, can [sponsor refugees for 3 months], + give each refugee person about $2,800.
(Do you think these, “refugees”, will also include illegal immigrant people?)
I think so.
These refugees will use the 3 months, + the $2,800, to “adjust themselves to their new country”, their new country being The US.
OK, and what do you [do], private citizens, if the 3 months runs out, and then your refugees say to you:
“You can’t stop paying us! We’ll starve!” And what if they also say:
“You CAN’T kick us out of your house! That’s cruel. Where will WE LIVE?”
After 3 months- what will you do, if your refugees demand more help from you?
Here’s an article about The Welcome Corps:
https://www.koat.com/article/biden-admin-unveils-program-to-allow-private-citizen-groups-to-sponsor-refugees/42598872
OK, to be fair:
The article I’ve posted, above, doesn’t say that this [Welcome Corps] project has started yet.
I just wanted to mention that.
Cheers.
A very good Neil Oliver commentary.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9OFTzdLLLOU
More promising Covid news:
Japan to lower COVID-19 to flu status, further easing rules
Ditching obedience masks would also be a good idea. That’s a bridge too far for Japan right now, but the more realistic perspective is encouraging.
World Covid rates are highest right now all over Asia. Remember all the reasons why the Asian countries were so much better than their western counterparts.
Mask compliance.
Vaccine uptake.
Prior immunity.
None of that was true.
Laura Ingraham had this doctor on last night to discuss the Covid vaccine’s side effects. Maybe hyperbolic, but certainly something the medical establishment and big pharma need to consider going forward.
https://www.foxnews.com/video/6319004321112
‘They’ve been wearing masks in flu season in Asia for years’ was somehow treated as evidence that it actually had any positive effect.
JJ,
The ‘vaccine is killing people’ crowd is quickly becoming as annoying as the ‘take five shots to save grandma’ crowd.
Both are hyperbolic extremists whose stridency does their cause no good.
Doctors here in NC still requiring masks, but not orthopedics or the gyms. Otherwise, I see a few in stores, but not very many.
Griffin: “Both are hyperbolic extremists whose stridency does their cause no good.”
That’s my impression. Dueling extremes. How this has happened does not bode well for the future. Who can the public trust?
The damage to medical credibility, to the economy, to children’s educations, to the unity of the nation, and more have been as damaging or more so than the actual virus. If the virus was loosed on purpose, or even accidentally, China has succeeded in crippling us.
The CDC has a budget of $9.6 billion. Somewhere in there you would think they could find some money to do a definitive study on Covid therapeutics and vaccine side effects such that they could set the public’s mind at ease and redeem a small bit of credibility.
People will forgive errors if the mistakes are admitted and corrected. Continuing to cover up or obfuscate is what destroys credibility.
Griffin; JJ:
Agreed.
I’ve been arguing with both extreme groups for a long time.
Video of Ron DeSantis in attendance at the Jacksonville game in Kansas City, holding his small son’s hand with his left hand and shaking hands with admiring Chiefs fans with his right:
https://twitter.com/1010XL/status/1616902002918801408?s=20&t=6M8VcHTNCugL6vbub5WYxg
‘They’ve been wearing masks in flu season in Asia for years’ was somehow treated as evidence that it actually had any positive effect.
Griffin:
I recall reading that many Asians like wearing masks because it conceals their facial expressions in public. Could be.
I wonder if that’s a factor among Americans.
During Covid we turned in our homework at UNM by photographing the pages, then uploading the result as a group of jpgs or a single pdf.
Covid is basically over at school. Only diehards continue to wear masks. Yet many Covid practices remain in force.
We’re still uploading images of our homework.
The default for meeting advisors is a Zoom meeting. The days of just walking in and waiting in line are over. One must schedule a meeting and specifically request it be “in-person.”
Also one can’t walk into or out of many buildings without a student ID and valid registration for the current semester.
Methinks they like the control.
Yes concealing my identity when I get an eye exam or have a employee manditory exam (to wear a respirator), makes no sense; are medical personnel uniquely at risk? Or are bureaucrats clinging to power?
But seriously, here in Eastern WA it seems that most of those I see still wearing masks are erlderly (older than me). So I assume they must have a serious health issue.
…most of those I see still wearing masks are erlderly (older than me). So I assume they must have a serious health issue.
om:
I get that. Though at this point I wonder how much actual good that does. I doubt the bandana style mask helps unless one is robbing a 7-11. But how much protection does the N95 offer outside the OR?
My sister, who has real respiratory problems, has been wearing a mask. She hasn’t gotten even a cold and has decided to wear a mask all the time in public.
I wonder if that’s because the world mostly stayed home or kept its distance at that time.
There’s some evidence that a properly fitted N95 mask may provide some protection to the wearer, so if your sister, huxley, is careful to wear one like that in public places it might help. Maybe; but there’s little evidence that masks have helped with respiratory virus epidemics. I hope she stays healthy.
Meanwhile,
Pelosi is now homeless?
My Saturday night listening is another from Pomme.
–Pomme, “Sans toi — Without You”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BANetE-zYx4
It’s worth learning French, even at my novice level, to participate in this song. It’s like a deeply moving indie film in four minutes. Incredible!
Pomme takes the listener through losing a lover, then revealing bits more of the story, with the ribbon of “Sans toi” (Without You) winding through it all.
And compared to “Without You,” the French “Sans toi” is so much more piercing, heartbreaking, desolated, yet finally ennobled.
Well, at least Twitter won’t ban him for saying this now.
https://notthebee.com/article/elon-musk-booster-felt-like-dying
Considering a mask and its results in isolation is not useful.
By implication and avooding the subject altogether, we have been led to believe (“led” is pretty good here)that material “trapped” in a mask is translated to an alternate universe. Never to be seen again.
But what the freak does “trapped” really mean?
In this case, it means accumulating about an eight of an inch in front of your nose and mouth, not that much further from your eyes.
Your stuff going out…piles up there, refreshed with each warm, moist exhalation.
Other stuff, coming in, joins the party.
And you keep breathing through it.
And, unlike the rigorous lab tests, you touch it with your hands a dozen times and hour, thence putting your hands elsewhere; door knobs, stair rails, table tops.
Yeah, I know, the virus only lasts nine hours on a dry surface.
Such as a door knob in an office building where the next person comes along forty-seven seconds later.
Then you stuff it in your pocket for use tomorrow in case you forget to get a fresh one.
Said it before; by this time in the farce, we’ve all seen somebody hock up half a lung, readjust the mask, and take hold of the escalator rail.
Another thing I’ve said before, one way or another, is that the urge; “MAKE ME DO STUPID STUFF!” is underrated as a factor in the current insanity. I may be wrong, but Occam is looking over my shoulder at various of my friends and relations.
Thursday, delivering Meals on Wheels, I stepped inside a home–they’re too infirm to get to the door in any useful time–and was told they have Covid. Chatted briefly. Left. Tomorrow, routine cardio visit. Have to tell them, test tonight, mask tomorrow. This is midwest damp and cold weather. The result is so routine that thinking “COVID!” when you have to get a fresh handkerchief out of the drawer is unlikely. How many carriers have I been in contact with in the last couple of weeks?
Meantime… Went to a New Years dinner with some friends. Got an email later one tested posiitive. Wife went to a meeting at church. Got an email later…. And that’s the folks who are sufficiently symptomatic and interested in taking a test and know our email…..
Wish I could find the article: Seventy percent to ninety percent of hospitalizations showing COVID….are for something else, the COVID being incidental. What number do the panic porn purveyors use?
Those doctors and medical researchers who claim “the vaccines are killing people” have so far demonstrated that they are right about everything else they have claimed over the last three years. Since they have established credibility, I will keep an open mind about their claims. I can’t understand why anyone would consider them annoying.
Those in the medical establishment who have lied about every aspect of covid for three years are annoying.
Along with the people who try to claim equivalence between the two groups.
https://alexberenson.substack.com/p/a-nurse-speaks-out
Mask requirements…a neighbor is a psychiatrist who works with very troubled people. Talking w/his wife while we were walking or respective dogs, she said that the local medical authorities require mask-wearing when he is in sessions with patients, and that he feels this greatly inhibits good communication.
stan can be annoying, but not always nor about everything.
stan,
I was the one who said they were getting annoying so I will respond.
For too many of the ‘vaccine kills’ crowd they offer very little actual evidence let alone proof that it is the vaccine responsible for excess deaths. It may very well be true that they are contributing but just saying they are doesn’t make it so.
Of the two extremes they have been clearly right about more things and that does help their credibility but going around calling the vaccines ‘poison’ is not a very good way to win an argument any more than the pro vax people with their ridiculous claims. A better argument is that they just don’t work that well and the risks from getting the vax are greater (but still low) than getting Covid for virtually every somewhat healthy person under about 70 at this point. That is a winning argument and the booster uptake rates are proving that a huge percentage of the people know this.
And I did get the Moderna vaccine in May ’21 reluctantly because without it I was no longer going to be able to visit my mother but I have never got another one and I likely never will.
Watching the network TV, one sees endless ads for prescriptions. Each is followed by a list of possible side effects including, sometimes, dying. As I’ve mentioned before, none of the PSA–you should get jabbed to protect grandma–listed side effects, although being the closest thing to an actual advertisement.
Why not?
And those who asked were hounded as anti-science, Galileo denying heretics who wanted Grandma to die.
I guess the point is that the medical community, with great help from big pharma and the government and the left in general managed to tar themselves. And, of course, from the Little Hitlers and the make-me-do-stupid-stuff crowd.
The next time we’re expected to believe and do the counter-intuitive…?
One aspect of the “conspiracy theory” accusation is that even asking for an explication of the inexplicable is considered next thing to a mortal sin and proves you’re a conspiracy theorist.
That refusing to explain the unexplainable is a tell doesn’t seem to occur to the accusers. But it doesn’t need to. Simply screaming “CONSPIRACY THEORY!” is generally sufficient. But then, there are cancellations, bogus fact-checkers, censoring to help things move along.
Griffin, I like your answer to Stan. Hits about the right notes IMO.
What is maddening is that the medical bureaucracy, with its billions of dollars, doesn’t seem interested in getting answers to the many questions we deserve answers to. And they refuse to admit any mistakes. or misleading statements. We need someone like Scott Atlas or Peter McCullough to head up the CDC and get them back on track. Politics should be removed as far as possible from medicine. Well, I can dream, can’t I?
What an amazing shitshow this is: “AG pondering declaring Netanyahu unfit as PM due to conflicts of interest”
No soup (justice) for you Bibi.
https://m.jpost.com/israel-news/article-729141
The “curious” thing is that all these people who want—essentially—to overturn the election (since the results are not exactly to their liking…IOW they lost) are marching around carrying THE FLAG…as though they’re defending the country….from, from, from…from what they really don’t like.
To be sure that’s also The Narrative(TM)…courtesy of the usual suspects…
Ayep: “Esther Hayut’s war against democracy”, C. Glick. https://www.jns.org/opinion/esther-hayuts-war-against-democracy/
Looks like Pelosi’s decided to get serious about taking care of the really important stuff:
“Nancy Pelosi had priests perform ‘exorcism’ on home after husband’s attack…”—
https://justthenews.com/government/congress/nancy-pelosi-had-priests-perform-exorcism-home-after-husbands-attack-daughter
Rumor has it that the House of Representatives is her next target.
(For Janet Yellen, that day can’t come too soon…)
“Treasury Secretary Yellen calls House GOP ‘irresponsible’ for demanding spending cuts amid shutdown;
“Some Democrats, such as Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin of Illinois, have said that Biden should not negotiate with the GOP on the debt ceiling.”—
https://justthenews.com/government/federal-agencies/treasury-secretary-yellen-calls-house-gop-irresponsible-demanding
you would have to salt the clouds with holy water, barry
this is akin to clinton nominee middlebrooks ruling against trump, for challenging the org,
durbin doing the part of dennis hopper in speed,
Since it’s Sunday and an Open Thread: Ukraine war.
How Politics Destroys Armies: Politics, Factionalism & Russia’s war in Ukraine -Perun
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hx5mTslkUBs
Not that politics is a problem in the US DOD …..
mostly peaceful
https://twitter.com/JackPosobiec/status/1617255868692561920?cxt=HHwWgICwxZvp0vEsAAAA
he:
I don’t know about public service announcements on TV, because I don’t watch much TV, but there were certainly official websites that talked about side effects and I was given an information sheet with side effects when I got my COVID shots.
Gov. Abbott weighs in: “I swear, I can kick as good as the Dallas Cowboys kicker.”
I assume that’s a joke, sdferr. Tell me, is this a new kicker?
Okay, so I looked him up. Not new. Successful season. My Dallas fan neighbor is probably not going to be happy tomorrow.
It’s Abbott’s true feeling: https://mobile.twitter.com/GregAbbott_TX/status/1617318243043086337?cxt=HHwWgsC81fCX7_EsAAAA
Harsh, but hilarious. Thanks.
It’s unfortunate the media can’t be bothered with any facts in the debt ceiling fight.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ut1yQg2qA4
A field goal! Hang on Cowboys, perhaps all is not lost …
Are we being played about Ukraine?
Zelensky thinks they can end the war by the summer.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/ukraine-reveals-end-date-for-war-with-russia/ar-AA16162i?
ocid=msedgntp&cvid=67bc6d8cd5dd4143bd3a5e36d2edae78
Meanwhile, Gen. Mark Milley says it would be very difficult to eject Russia this year.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYscbQYS3Bg
Who is this we, Kemo Sabe?
Meanwhile, the Santos saga gets better:
Santos: Okay, I dressed like a woman but I wasn’t a drag queen
Soooo no story hour?
Hey y’all
News at American Digest re Gerard Vanderluen is not at all good.
If you pray… peace and strength would be good to ask for. Healing too however it comes.
Neo. That’s the point. No matter what shot you get, there’s a reference to side effects. At the point of shotting, to coin a phrase. In some cases, I think wrt shingles, I had to sign a consent including such references. Or perhaps it was the flu. Can’t recall. Maybe both.
But the PSA on television, which looked exactly like advertisements, as in….do this for your own good and for others–mass advertised just like something for plaque psoriasis with, iirc, even background music. Did not.
Just for research sake, watch one of the news channels. Won’t take long before you’re being exposed to one or another…..and see the lengthy side effects, sometimes with the auto speed up of the narrator to get them all in.
And on line discussions, especially on social media, seemed to be weighted. Just like doctors reporting favorable results with the cheap therapeutics we must not name out loud.
Brian E: “Are we being played about Ukraine?”
Of course. Hard to find truth from either side. Propaganda is plentiful OM tries to bring us some good info, but even much of that is conjecture. There isn’t an Ernie Pyle, or Bill Mauldin reporting directly from the frontlines. We hope our military intelligence knows the real scoop, but what we are being told is most likely dictated by politics.
Why did the war happen? Would it have occurred if Trump was President? Who’s profiting? Why are there little or no efforts to broker a peace agreement? Why aren’t the Code Pink people in the streets protesting the war and our involvement in it? All questions that have occurred to me.
Admittedly, Putin is absolutely wrong and the aggressor. But Ukraine’s infrastructure is being destroyed. While Russia is losing manpower and equipment, their infrastructure remains intact. So, who’s really winning?
Why is there no special envoy or master who is monitoring the billions we are pouring into Ukraine. We’re nearly broke but are sending money over there like we’re flush with cash.
As General Milley said, this war has to end in a cease fire and peace agreement. Why prolong it until Ukraine’s infrastructure is completely flattened? Who’s going to pay to rebuild Ukraine?
Maybe I’m just too dumb to see the answers, but I’m not at all enthusiastic about the war. I believe the Biden admin has played it about as badly as possible. First, they expected Kyiv to fall rather quickly and offered Zelenskyy a way out. What was their plan if that had happened?
Then when the Ukrainians showed their willingness and ability to fight, they slowly, cautiously began giving them weapons and ammo. Last year when both sides seemed willing to negotiate, the NATO allies nixed the idea. They seemed to have decided that Putin was going to be “punished” by prolonging the war. Why did they decide this? Willing to fight on until all of Ukraine has been decimated? Why?
Now, they’re escalating the quality and power of the weapons they’re supplying. It has been a gradualism much as LBJ displayed in Vietnam. Hasn’t this been shown to be a lousy strategy? In for a penny, in for a pound. If its war, go in big and aim for a quick resolution. Quagmires have been our nemesis since WWII. This looks like a quagmire, and the Biden admin has no real plan except fight on to the last Ukrainian and hope Putin gives in.
Fog of war indeed.
If or when the Kerch Bridge to Crimea is dropped how long will it take to expel the Roosians? Another year? Can Vlad launch another invasion from Belarus by then?
How long will the Roosians continue to attack Ukraine with Cold War missiles originally designed to kill US aircraft carriers? Will the Ukrainians be able to do anything in response?
How long will the Russians put up with Vlad?
13 minutes and Azov indeed. It seems some Roosians are quite prepared to fight until there are no more Ukrainians, almost genocidal.
WRT Santos, it seems that every hour is “story hour”….
(“Come, let me entertain you” said the spider to the fly…?)
One wonders what he’ll come up with next.
(Still would be curious to find out who funded him, though…)
– – – – – – – – – – –
As for Gov. Abbott stepping down to become a Dallas Cowboys place kicker, you gotta admire his spunk; but he really should be a bit more careful here…as he’s sticking his nose—er, his foot—into what is essentially a religious issue and in so doing might be pushing the Establishment Clause a bit further than it was intended.
…Having said that, the Cowboys might think about hiring THIS AMAZING FELLOW—not quite yet, perhaps, as he’s still a bit on the young side…but definitely a person of interest for the future for their organization given the freak show they seem to be running at the moment.
“Boy, 13, born without LEGS wins place on his school’s basketball team – with teammates saying he is great at snatching ball away from rivals while they dribble it across court”—
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11662889/Boy-13-born-without-LEGS-wins-place-schools-basketball-team.html
https://www.cbsnews.com/video/teen-born-without-legs-inspires-on-the-basketball-court/
A basketball player, you say?
The guys a natural athlete and can no doubt switch quickly.
Time for some “compare and contrast”:
‘WSJ Shreds Vaccine Makers, Biden Admin Over “Deceptive” Booster Campaign’–
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/wsj-shreds-vaccine-makers-biden-admin-over-deceptive-booster-campaign
“Kerry on how to keep climate goals alive: ‘Money, money, money….”—
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/kerry-on-how-to-keep-climate-goals-alive-money-money-money-money-money-money-money-01673958211
And another round (“Democrats are the Party of Law and Order” edition):
https://nypost.com/2023/01/22/george-soros-spent-40m-getting-lefty-district-attorneys-officials-elected-all-over-the-country/
https://nypost.com/2023/01/22/nyc-shoplifting-has-never-been-worse-say-weary-bodega-owners/
https://nypost.com/2023/01/22/pelosi-faults-hochul-ny-pols-downplaying-of-crime-for-democrats-house-loss/
Pelosi is a hoot. She really oughta do standup.
https://nypost.com/2023/01/22/fox-news-weatherman-beaten-on-nyc-subway-train/
File under: “You don’t need a weatherman…”
+ Bonus:
The Philadelphia Story (Updated)…Also known as “The World According to Krasner”…
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11655809/Philadelphias-Kensington-neighborhood-looks-like-scene-WALKING-DEAD.html
Roger Kimball goes out on a limb with some hesitant, qualified, guarded optimism:
“Too Much to Hope?”—
https://amgreatness.com/2023/01/21/too-much-to-hope/
H/T Powerline blog.
Alas, WRT the considerable “achievement” of having “elected” Decent Joe Fentanyl to so “competently” “lead” the nation; and taking into consideration (cf. earlier posts) those oh-so-earnest crap artistes at “The View” (who have been working tirelessly for years turning gobsmacking stupidity into an art form), as well as that paragon of confusion, Mona Charen—and not forgetting David Brooks, that opium (or something)-addled op-ed writer-cum-foolish fashionista—one is forced to conclude that a huge, huge predicament facing Kimball (and the nation, generally) is that half of the country (give or take)—even if they READ his post—won’t know WTH he’s talking about…
Indeed, the media and infotech have done their jobs exceeding well….
On vaccine side effects and warnings: My daughter got two Pfizer shots in the summer of 2021 because her employer required them. Her side effects on the second shot were significant and lasted over two weeks. She was not given a paper listing side effects nor a paper on reporting to the VAERS. The shots were administered by a local government; no one else had them in Northern Virginia at that time.
Allowing Putin to prevail–however that’s put–might require looking at the militarization of the Rhineland in 36.
See Sowell on intellectuals and war.
The only intellectual to listen to WRT war is William Tecumseh Sherman.
With George Paton perhaps a close second…
(No doubt there are several others…)
Leonard Cohen.
Again.
(Some of you may enjoy this….)
“The Various Positions of Leonard Cohen;
“REVIEW: ‘Leonard Cohen, Untold Stories: That’s How the Light Gets In’”—
https://freebeacon.com/culture/the-various-positions-of-leonard-cohen/
JJ et al.–I check Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty for news on Ukraine:
https://www.rferl.org/
They have reporters on the ground and post on-site videos, some of which are pretty grim.
I also check the Russia-Ukraine section in the Daily Mail:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/russia-ukraine-conflict/index.html
Another case of a British quasi-tabloid outdoing U.S. “papers of record” for completeness and scope of coverage.
Hubert:
Thanks for the links. Daily Mail has been doing actual journalism, US media, not so much.
I second the thanks for the links, Hubert. More info is always welcome.
Barry.
Sowell makes the case that the intellectuals caused, or made worse, or allowed, or something, WW II because of their authoritatively rational and completely wrong insistence on what was going to happen, would happen if….
The problem, currently being faced (though it began more than a decade ago, perhaps even before that) is, it seems to me, that they’re not so much wrong as they are INENTIONALLY pushing, promoting, encouraging, provoking societal destruction and breakdown.
(No doubt for the very best of reasons—after all, they are intellectuals…with all the power of their massive intellects at their disposal.)
If ONLY the problem was that they were wrong…
For example, here’s an analysis—or perhaps prescription—for causing a more-or-less stable society, a society that encourages innovation and hard work, a society based on merit (more or less) to break down; to be destroyed…all in an effort for the group planning and fomenting this destruction to accumulate extensive power, even total power, so as to “transform” the basis of the country.
Call it a cookbook. A “How To” primer…
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/2023-fourth-turning-meets-mass-formation-psychosis
Just another example:
“IF IT SEEMS LIKE THEY ACTIVELY WANT TO MAKE PEOPLE’S LIVES WORSE, IT’S BECAUSE THEY ACTIVELY WANT TO MAKE PEOPLE’S LIVES WORSE”—
https://instapundit.com/565720/
Ah, but why might “they” “want” to do that?
Time, I guess, to read/re-read “1984” (that “textbook” of total power) which does appear to be “their’ “How-to Guide” writ large…
The strategy clearly is: Keep the people off-balance, keep ’em afraid, uncertain, insecure and panicky. Keep ’em desperate. keep ’em confused—keep ’em DRUGGED??–.and they’ll be far easier to control.
The way to do this is, among others, endless crises—while finding a suitable target to brand “ENEMY OF THE PEOPLE”, “ENEMIES OF THE STATE”…etc…
Barry Meislin on January 23, 2023 at 2:26 am said:
WRT Santos, it seems that every hour is “story hour”….
(“Come, let me entertain you” said the spider to the fly…?)
One wonders what he’ll come up with next.
(Still would be curious to find out who funded him, though…)
A possible answer to you question is here:
Some interesting points made by J.E. Dyer on the Topics of the Week.
https://theoptimisticconservative.wordpress.com/2023/01/14/two-pings-on-potuses-with-classified-docs-and-the-riddle-wrapped-mystery-of-george-santos/
You have discovered Lost In the Pond! I think you’d the rest of his videos appealing as well.
Thanks much, AF…