Trump Announces his Rallies Will Return and the Media Suddenly Remembers Pandemic

Protests in the wake of George Floyd’s death in police custody have been carried out in every state in the nation, in small towns and large cities alike with gatherings of hundreds to thousands of people. In Manhattan on Saturday, police estimated 15,000 people demonstrated.

And through it all, Democratic leaders like Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer who enforced some of the strictest lockdown orders in the country over coronavirus, all of a sudden seemed to not really care about social distancing. And the media who shamed Americans for protesting stay-at-home orders threw their full support behind the demonstrations.

But now that President Trump announced rallies will resume this month, the media suddenly cares about the pandemic again.

NPR: Trump To Restart Political Rallies This Month Despite Coronavirus Pandemic

Rich Lowry: The threat represented by the coronavirus varies depending on which side is engaged in mass gatherings

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The Left-wing Mob is Massive, and Ready for War

2020 has been a clusterf**k of a year, huh? We're in the middle of an election year, then some Chinese plague hits the world and sends us into lockdown. Then, some of us overreacted, as new data shows the virus isn't nearly as bad, but then an unarmed black man was killed in Minneapolis while in police custody. Cue the calls to protest. I mean, there should have been protests over the death of George Floyd. What happened to him was an atrocity.

Those feelings, at least for me, ceased as soon as the looting, rioting, and arson began en masse. Riots engulfed the nation last week. They've calmed down some, but now the experts who told us to stay inside have done a 180-degree turn. We've gone from stay home, don't be selfish to "why aren't you out there protesting racism, you selfish bastard."

The riots have shown how quickly the left-wing mob can mobilize and how far their reach has grown in the past few years. It's massive, and they're ready for war. The unrest has caused some problematic columns to be printed. In The New York Times, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) called for the military to be activated to restore law and order.

In the Philadelphia Inquirer, there was an op-ed about "buildings matter, too" concerning the ongoing rioting. The triggering effect was as devastating as a nuclear blast. The Times was engulfed in a civil war between the liberal and hyper-left, woke wings, with the latter winning. The Times' editorial page editor was forced to resign. One of the Inquirer's top editors was forced to resign as well.

This isn't normal. There was a time when liberals would fight over something that was printed that they found disagreeable. Now, it's this stuff can't be posted, and if it does, we'll destroy that person. The "words are violence" crowd is starting to entrench themselves in some of the most powerful cultural bastions in the country—and we let them.

It's easy to ignore the rantings of some college leftists, but these kids graduate. They have graduated. And they found themselves jobs at major publications. They're even in the sciences. How else can you explain the mass, and wholly laughable, shift on COVID lockdowns?

Protesting to re-open is grounded in white nationalism, but protesting against racism, which I've been told is just as bad as this COVID pandemic, is good. That's pretty much the baseline. It's appallingly biased, transparent, and pandering. Those we entrust to collect data on diseases somehow think people will buy this notion that you're impervious to infection if you protest in support of liberal causes. It's a clown show.

At the Times and elsewhere, we're seeing what liberal reporter Michael Tracey has called a tantrum of the coddled, "cry-bully" wing of the Left, which he wants no part of in any way, shape, or form. While he calls out the Right often, he's never seen anything so unhinged. He plainly said this industry is "f**ked," given the two papers' capitulation to the outrage mob. The activist wing and the media world are fraught with total lunatics—and they're culturally ascendant.

Maybe we took the eye off the ball. Did we willingly give up on key bastions of power because we just thought the crazy would either wear off these kids or that the electorate would dismiss the idea? For sure, voters will reject this "defund the police" nonsense the Left is peddling, but it shouldn't get to this point. It should be squashed with ruthless efficiency.

When fruit snacks fold to avoid being possibly torched by the mob, you know we're in serious trouble. Folks, even Gushers and Fruit by the Foot felt it was in their best interest to come on the side of Black Lives Matter to avoid having legions of woke show up to unleash hell. These are products and companies that should really have no fear about political fallout since a) they're friggin' snacks, and b) sugary snacks tend to have bipartisan support. They felt forced to cower. Also, in doing so, they may still get torched because of the aforementioned, it all looks like a self-serving ploy to increase brand advertising. The far-left will see right through it.

Conservatives are disadvantaged in Hollywood, academia, tech, colleges, major news outlets, and the urban areas. I think we've relied too much on pride in our principles. Our principles will win out. Wrong. They haven't. They're under attack right now, and we seem hesitant to go on the offensive. Until we get a foothold in these cultural areas, we should ignore the rules, attack viciously, and show no quarter. Put the mob down. No prisoners until we've put the mob down.

This will be a long war. We've ceded a lot of ground. Maybe too much out of sheer annoyance from these leftist thugs. We have a media complex that's corrupt, activists that are peddling mayhem and the destruction of law enforcement, and cops themselves being shot at, beaten, and run over with cars. On top of all of this, we have an entire political party—the Democrats—who either defend or excuse the rioters. NFL football quarterback Drew Brees was brought down by these thugs for comments about not disrespecting the American flag. The man has issued what seems like 6,000 apologies. They don't want an apology, Drew. They want to destroy you. As the cities burn, their workers have quietly worked on another leftist pet project: the destruction of our history.

From Confederate war generals to the Texas Rangers, these statues are coming down. Amid the chaos, the mob pulled a flank march and got two birds with one stone, or in this case, one Molotov cocktail. It's going to get dirty. Are we prepared for it? Right now, the answer is hell no. Have we allowed the leftist mob to grow to the point where it's unstoppable? We'll see. Everyone is hiding under the bed right now, so that should tell you something.

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Was the Shutdown Worth It?

A new German report has folks questioning the prevailing wisdom in our own country.

A leaked report out of Germany is causing all sorts of problems for its government and media because it portrays the handling of the coronavirus shutdown as a failure. The 93-page report, “Analysis of the Crisis Management,” was written by a team of scientists from several German universities appointed by the Interior Ministry.

The scientists take the German government to task on several points. Among them:

The danger posed by COVID-19 was overestimated and did not cross a threshold that went beyond normal levels for a new virus.

People who died from COVID-19 were statistically more likely to die this year anyway due to poor health and ancillary conditions.

The (now 400,000) deaths worldwide due to COVID-19 is eclipsed by the 1.5 million deaths caused by influenza in 2017-18.

The COVID-focused German healthcare system has postponed life-saving surgeries and treatments, making the overall health picture in the country worse, not better.

The embarrassed German government and its friends in the media there have closed ranks to minimize the damage done by the report. The first move in its damage-control strategy was to shoot the messenger, figuratively speaking. Stephen Kohn, who is identified with leaking the report to the press, has been suspended from duty and is currently having his name dragged through the mud by willing members of the media. Isn’t it telling how we’re seeing more instances of journalists in Western societies gleefully operating as the lapdogs of government?

The report is out there, though, and while German politicians remain committed to burying it and moving beyond the issue, citizens have grown irate about the news, taking to the streets to voice their concerns. This is part of a larger international backlash against governments’ imposition of national quarantines and economic shutdowns to contain the virus.

The accusation that the total shutdown was an overreaction, or even a government power grab, is one that the federal and state governments are facing here in the United States. Around the country, states have begun shedding draconian virus restrictions, allowing people to move about more freely and businesses to open. Responses to the reopening have been predictable on a scientific and political level.

Georgia and Florida, among the first states to ease their quarantine rules, have seen an uptick in the number of confirmed positive cases but a drop in the number of hospitalizations. In both Republican-run states, there are plenty more available hospitals beds than virus patients. Texas has experienced a bigger jump in confirmed cases, but its medical system is currently equipped to handle the case load.

All but seven states have rolled back or completely abandoned their quarantine lockdowns. Leftist politicians, who would prefer the lockdown to run indefinitely or at least until President Donald Trump is out of office, have attacked decisions to ease restrictions. The New York Times did its part by producing a hit piece that claimed Georgia’s rollback was equal to a racial attack on the minorities who ostensibly would be hardest hit. As one might imagine, no such racial genocide has materialized in Georgia, or elsewhere for that matter.

The rise in confirmed cases post-lockdown was widely predicted and expected as people began emerging from their homes and congregating in public again. The surge, however, also comes in the wake of broader testing to identify cases, so it’s difficult to determine just how much of a rebound the virus is having.

Two separate reports released by the journal Nature and by the Imperial College London put forth the idea that the shutdown prevented an additional 60 million infections in the U.S. and elsewhere. Scientists did find that school closures did not have an appreciable impact on preventing the spread of the virus, but claimed that further study was needed.

The timing of these additional reports that essentially praise the quarantine efforts of the federal and state governments is a bit suspect, as much of the data reached in the reports is still in play. There may be a time when we can accurately determine whether the lockdown and the price we paid for it was worth it, but it’s too early to tell that now. Leftists are mainly looking for any vindication in their efforts to close down the country, and maybe even an excuse to go back to that at some point.

The question that will be on many minds, and already posed here, is this: What do we do if there are no significant spikes in COVID-19 cases after opening the states? How should we interpret that information? Were we overly cautious? Was it a government power grab in disguise? Is government capable of handling a major national emergency? Only time will tell.

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IN BRIEF

Political theater: Congressional Democrats kneel as they unveil Justice in Policing Act to rein in cops (The Daily Wire)

Economy entered recession in February, the National Bureau of Economic Research says, concluding a historic 128 consecutive months of growth (Washington Examiner)

Joe Biden rejects calls to defund police departments, plans increased investment in "community policing" (National Review)

CBS deceptively edits William Barr interview, leaving out key details on violent riots and police oversight (The Federalist)

Aide says the New York Times's claim that former President George W. Bush won't support Trump is "completely made up" (The American Spectator)

The WHO just gave us another great reason to end the lockdowns right now (PJ Media)

Coronavirus may have been in China in early fall, satellite data suggests (ABC News)

China May exports slip back into contraction, imports worst in four years (CNBC)

Pandemic accelerated decline in church funding and membership (Washington Examiner)

Why GDP metrics won't tell us much about the post-COVID recovery (Mises Institute)

Illiterate rioters deface monument honoring all-black regiment of Union Civil War soldiers (Disrn)

Virginia judge halts Governor Ralph Northam's decision to remove Robert E. Lee statue (National Review)

Eighteen murders in 24 hours: Inside the most violent day in 60 years in Chicago, where the outrage mob wants to defund the police (Chicago Sun Times)

If you want to know what disbanding the police looks like, look at Mexico (The Federalist)

Iran says it will execute man who allegedly provided U.S. with information on Qassem Soleimani (Fox News)

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For more blog postings from me, see  TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH,  POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, and Paralipomena (Occasionally updated), A Coral reef compendium and an IQ compendium. (Both updated as news items come in).  GUN WATCH is now mainly put together by Dean Weingarten. I also put up occasional updates on my Personal blog and each day I gather together my most substantial current writings on THE PSYCHOLOGIST.

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