Sunday, November 22, 2020
What they DON'T tell you about Covid: Fewer beds taken up than last year, deaths a fraction of the grim forecasts, 95% of fatalities had underlying causes
How accurate were the Government’s grim predictions?
The short answer is: not very. In a July report commissioned by Chief Scientific Adviser Sir Patrick Vallance, scientists estimated that there could be 119,000 deaths if a second spike coincided with a peak of winter flu. Yesterday, that figure stood at 54,286 – less than half that.
In fact, the second peak seems to have passed – over the past week there has been an average of 22,287 new infections a day, down from 24,430 the week before.
In mid-September, Sir Patrick made the terrifying claim that the UK could see 50,000 new coronavirus cases a day by mid-October unless more draconian restrictions were introduced. Yet we have never got near that figure.
What about its prophecies on deaths?
Ditto. Its warnings simply don’t bear any relation to reality.
During the ‘Halloween horror show’ press conference used by Sir Patrick and Chief Medical Officer Professor Chris Whitty to scare the Government into implementing a second lockdown, one of their slides suggested that daily Covid-19 deaths could reach 4,000 a day by December.
With ten days to go, we’re still at less than 15 per cent of that figure. In fact, as the graph above shows, the current death rate is significantly below almost every modelled winter scenario.
Are hospitals close to full capacity?
The answer is ‘no’ – contrary to what the Government experts would have you think after they last month published a chart that gave the impression that hospitals were close to overflowing, when at least half didn’t have a single Covid-19 patient.
Currently, only 13 per cent of NHS beds are occupied by patients with Covid-19.
On Monday this week, 16,271 hospitals beds across the UK were taken up with patients who had tested positive for Covid-19.
This did show a steady rise from the previous Monday, when there were 14,279 patients with Covid.
But to put this figure into perspective, the NHS in England had 101,255 general and acute beds available in March of this year plus 15,392 in Scotland and 10,563 in Wales.
How does it compare with last year? Remarkably, as the graph shows, the number of NHS England beds currently occupied is lower than last year’s average.
On November 5, the most recent date available, there were actually 1,293 fewer patients in hospital beds than last year’s November average.
Surely intensive care beds are full?
Some hospitals are under pressure but that is not the picture everywhere as the chart above shows. On Wednesday, 1,430 people with Covid-19 were occupying beds with mechanical ventilation.
Given that before the crisis there were 4,119 intensive care beds in England plus 269 in Scotland and 153 in Wales, roughly only 31 per cent of ICU beds – not including those which have been recently converted from normal beds – are currently occupied by patients with Covid.
In fact, on November 8, the number of occupied critical beds was actually lower than five-year average for 2015-19.
Even at the height of the first wave in the spring, the percentage of mechanical ventilation beds in existing NHS hospitals that were used never exceeded 62 per cent, according to a study by University College London.
But wasn’t that because of the Nightingale hospitals?
Not at all. In fact, despite all the fanfare surrounding the Nightingale hospitals’ rapid construction, they were never more than 1.23 per cent full.
Moreover, doctors are now far better prepared to treat Covid-19, such as knowing when and when not to put patients on ventilators.
So who is Covid-19 killing?
To put it simply, the victims are overwhelmingly the elderly and those with pre-existing conditions.
Of the 37,470 Covid-19 deaths recorded by NHS England up to November 18, 53.7 percent were of people aged over 80.
In comparison, there have been just 275 deaths (only 0.7 per cent of the total) in people under 40.
And crucially, those who have died from Covid-19 are overwhelmingly likely to have suffered from a pre-existing condition.
Of those who have died from coronavirus, 35,806 people (95.6 per cent of the total) had at least one pre-existing serious medical condition.
In fact, there have been just 42 deaths of people aged under 40 without a pre-existing condition.
Some 27 per cent of them had diabetes, while 18 per cent had dementia – both of which render a person extremely vulnerable to any viral infection.
Are more dying now than in the first wave?
No. The number of Covid-19 deaths is significantly lower than the peak in April as the graph above shows. On April 21, for example, there were 1,224 Covid-19 deaths, and a daily average for the week of 838. Yesterday, 511 new deaths were reported.
Are more dying now than last year?
Despite what the fear-mongers would have you think, deaths are not far above average for this time of year as the graph above shows.
But that hides the fact that in contrast to the spring, when deaths from non-Covid-19 causes were running above average, non-Covid-19 deaths in recent weeks have actually been running substantially below average.
Surely more elderly people are dying than normal?
It doesn’t look like it. According to the latest Office for National Statistics (ONS) figures – for October 2020 – in spite of all the Covid-19 deaths, the average death rate in the over-75s was significantly lower this year than it was last October – 6,901.7 per 100,000 people, compared with 7141.7 for last year.
But isn’t the infection rate now going up?
The latest ONS estimate shows that in the week ending November 14, new infections were already levelling off: one in 80 people in England had the disease that week, compared with 1 in 85 the week before.
And it could now be falling: according to research published this week by scientists at Cambridge University – whose data is used by the Government’s Sage advisory group – infection rates of Covid-19 have actually stopped growing across England.
Indeed, they claim, the R rate – the average number of people infected by somebody with the virus – has fallen to one.
If the figure is below one, the epidemic subsides; above one and it grows; and if it is one, infection rates stay the same.
Couldn’t that just be an anomaly? Actually, that figure for the R rate tallies with a number of other studies.
The Government’s latest estimate – derived from Imperial College London’s REACT study, which has been swabbing tens of thousands of people every week – is that the R number for England as a whole is currently between 1 and 1.2.
Meanwhile, the Covid-19 Symptom Study run by King’s College London, even puts the R number at 0.9 – the lowest it has been since August.
Whatever the truth, data released by the ONS yesterday confirmed that infection rates are levelling off in England and Scotland.
Does it matter when the elderly are more likely to be infected?
That’s the claim of critics of the Great Barrington Declaration – which in October called on governments to abandon one-size-fits-all lockdowns in favour of targeted shielding – who believe that the current wave of infection will tear through the elderly.
Yet the infection rate is actually highest in school-age children and students – the least vulnerable demographics – and lowest among the over 70s.
In the week to November 14, the infection rate among secondary school pupils was 2.03 per cent, while in those over 70 it was just 0.48 per cent and falling.
What about the areas seeing a spike?
There is certainly a regional variation when it comes to rates of infection – with the North generally seeing higher levels than the South.
One of the reasons the figures may seem particularly striking is because, embarrassingly for the Government, the same figures over the autumn were based on a data error, which reported student infections as happening at their parents’ address – predominantly in the South.
At the height of the problem, in September and October, one in eight cases was reported to the wrong local authority.
Isn’t mass testing going to fix all this?
Don’t bet on it. The Government has put a lot of faith in Operation Moonshot – its plan to test the entire population once a week using ‘lateral flow tests’, a type of Covid-19 test that give results in only an hour.
Yet their rapidity comes with a cost: they are not very reliable.
According to a recent study by the University of Oxford and Public Health England’s Porton Down laboratory, the LFT being used in the pilot scheme across Liverpool succeeded in detecting Covid-19 in only 79.2 per cent of cases even when performed by laboratory staff.
Is that really so bad?
Just wait. When used by trained health professionals in the community, the detection rate fell to 73 per cent and when used by self-trained members of the public it fell to just 58 per cent.
Worse, in a way, were the false positives. Overall, 0.32 per cent of people given the tests were falsely told they had the virus.
If the entire population were obliged to take the tests it could mean that 200,000 – a city the size of Portsmouth – would be ordered to self-isolate when they don’t actually have the disease.
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Biden COVID Advisory Board Member says Indoor Dining, Gyms, and Gatherings in Homes Should Be Targeted ‘for Closures’
During an interview aired on Friday’s broadcast of the Fox Business Network’s “WSJ at Large,” Biden COVID-19 Advisory Board member Dr. Celine Gounder stated that “places that we know are big contributors to transmission are indoor restaurants, bars, gyms, and also private social gatherings of friends and family in the home” “are really the places we need to target for closures” while prioritizing keeping other services, like schools, open.
Gounder said that the advisory board’s “consensus” is that “the draconian lockdowns, shutdowns that we had in the spring,” are unneeded, and that increased knowledge means we can “be much more targeted about how we tighten up some of our measures. I think of it like a dimmer switch, whereas before we had an on and off light switch. So, we can dial up and dial down in a much more granular fashion. So, some of the places that we know are big contributors to transmission are indoor restaurants, bars, gyms, and also private social gatherings of friends and family in the home. So, those are really the places we need to target for closures while keeping other services, for example, schools that are — have not been major contributors to transmission, they’re not zero-risk, but they are much lower risk, and they’re an essential service. And so, we’re really prioritizing keeping schools, for example, open.”
Gounder also emphasized the importance of measures like masking, socially distancing, meeting outdoors instead of indoors, getting tested, and cooperating with contact tracing and stated that it’s “really in everyone’s power to prevent a shutdown if they take those measures.”
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IN BRIEF
Biden declares there will be "no national shutdown" (Examiner) | He also discussed a national mask mandate with governors (NR)
Biden transition adviser wanted Congress to probe Brett Kavanaugh last year (Fox News)
Palestinians eagerly anticipate Biden "reset" — by which they mean "anti-Israel policies" (Washington Times)
Nearly a third of Democrats believe the election was stolen from Trump (PJ Media)
Trump tax write-offs are ensnared in two New York fraud investigations (NY Times)
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac overseer seeks to end federal control (WSJ)
CDC pointlessly warns Americans not to travel for Thanksgiving (NR)
Hypocrite Gavin Newsom orders one-month curfew in California (The Hill)
Georgia's Floyd County terminates election director after state audit uncovers uncounted votes (Fox 5)
California school replaces third-grade math class with "anti-racist" curriculum (Not the Bee)
A NYC fight club was broken up by the cops for not social distancing (Not the Bee)
German police arrest popular protester for COVID crimes (Not the Bee)
Chalk sketch found in Italy could be a Da Vinci depiction of Christ (Disrn)
Policy: The pandemic isn't killing cities. Housing regulations are. (NR)
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http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://john-ray.blogspot.com (FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://awesternheart.blogspot.com.au/ (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)
https://heofen.blogspot.com/ (MY OTHER BLOGS)
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Friday, November 20, 2020
Rigorous New study: Lockdowns & masks are useless and might even increase COVID-19 spread
A recently completed research study by Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in cooperation with the Naval Medical Research Center and published in the New England Journal of Medicine has found that strict quarantine, tightly controlled social distancing, and continuous use of masks did absolutely nothing to contain the spread of COVID-19, and might even have increased its spread.
First, the study used 1,843 Marine volunteers, individuals well trained to follow orders as well as the required procedures. Second, their quarantine took place at Marine facility under the supervision of the military. Both factors meant that the volunteers were going to follow procedures much more correctly than the general public.
Third, no one could enter the study without undergoing 14-days of quarantine beforehand, plus a test to prove they were negative of COVID-19 at the study’s start. The study itself was held in a tightly controlled quarantine campus run by the Marines.
The volunteers then had to follow this incredibly strict quarantine regiment:
All recruits wore double-layered cloth masks at all times indoors and outdoors, except when sleeping or eating; practiced social distancing of at least 6 feet; were not allowed to leave campus; did not have access to personal electronics and other items that might contribute to surface transmission; and routinely washed their hands. They slept in double-occupancy rooms with sinks, ate in shared dining facilities, and used shared bathrooms. All recruits cleaned their rooms daily, sanitized bathrooms after each use with bleach wipes, and ate preplated meals in a dining hall that was cleaned with bleach after each platoon had eaten. Most instruction and exercises were conducted outdoors. All movement of recruits was supervised, and unidirectional flow was implemented, with designated building entry and exit points to minimize contact among persons. All recruits, regardless of participation in the study, underwent daily temperature and symptom screening. Six instructors who were assigned to each platoon worked in 8-hour shifts and enforced the quarantine measures. If recruits reported any signs or symptoms consistent with Covid-19, they reported to sick call, underwent rapid qPCR testing for SARS-CoV-2, and were placed in isolation pending the results of testing.
Instructors were also restricted to campus, were required to wear masks, were provided with preplated meals, and underwent daily temperature checks and symptom screening. Instructors who were assigned to a platoon in which a positive case was diagnosed underwent rapid qPCR testing for SARS-CoV-2, and, if the result was positive, the instructor was removed from duty. Recruits and instructors were prohibited from interacting with campus support staff, such as janitorial and food-service personnel. After each class completed quarantine, a deep bleach cleaning of surfaces was performed in the bathrooms, showers, bedrooms, and hallways in the dormitories, and the dormitory remained unoccupied for at least 72 hours before reoccupancy.
The result? The virus still spread through this population. As they noted in the paper:
Epidemiologic analysis supported multiple local transmission events, including transmission between roommates and among recruits within the same platoon.
None of these strict lock down mandates, including continuous mask use, did anything to prevent transmission.
More significantly, the control group of Marines who did not participate in this study, and thus were not under the same strict lock down rules, actually saw FEWER infections, as shown on the table from the study. While the difference wasn’t very large, it existed nonetheless. One could argue that the overuse of masks probably contributed to the higher numbers in the study group, since even in this tightly controlled setting it is still impossible to expect people to wear masks properly. Even if they replaced them regularly, it is unrealistic to expect people to never touch them while they wear them. Over long periods the masks will become havens for the virus, where the person breathes.
The study also demonstrated once again the relative harmlessness of the disease. Almost all of these young healthy Marine recruits who tested positive were ASYMPTOMATIC, meaning that they wouldn’t have even known they were infected if they had not been participating. Furthermore, it appears no one even got very sick.
Once again, this data continues to reinforce the very very early data from March. COVID-19 is not dangerous to the young or healthy, and it will spread no matter what you do. The best way to beat it and thus protect the vulnerable older and sick population is to have it spread as fast as possible through the young and healthy population, so that it will die out quickly and thus no longer be a threat.
This is how humans have handled these respiratory diseases since time immemorial. Darwin’s rules made us do it that way, with good results. Too bad our bankrupt political leaders and health officials have decided to abandon these well-proven practices. The result has not only been more COVID-19 deaths, but more deaths overall, from the bad consequences of economic loss, depression, reduced medical treatment available for other illnesses, and numerous other issues caused by the lock downs, not the virus..
Sadly, I fully expect that our fans of lock downs and masks will either refuse to read this study, or if they do, will find any excuse to dismiss it.
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Immunity to the coronavirus may last years, new research indicates
In a study, which has not yet been peer-reviewed, researchers found that the amount of “B Cells” in patients infected with the coronavirus had actually increased six to eight months after infection. B Cells are a type of “memory cell” in the immune system that remembers a pathogen. If a person is reinfected with a pathogen, the B Cells will then produce antibodies to fight it.
The study examined 185 men and women ages 19 to 81. It tracked the production of B Cells, coronavirus antibodies, and two types of immune system cells called T Cells. The antibodies showed a modest decline after six to eight months, while the T Cells showed a much smaller decline.
Previous research had found that the number of people with detectable coronavirus antibodies had fallen 26% in three months, suggesting that immunity to the virus was short-lived. However, it is common for antibodies to decline, according to immunologists. Antibodies are just one part of the human body’s immune response.
Shane Crotty, a virologist at the La Jolla Institute of Immunology and one of the researchers on the study, suggested that the increase in B Cells was particularly good news.
“That amount of memory would likely prevent the vast majority of people from getting hospitalized disease, severe disease, for many years,” Crotty told the New York Times.
The results also suggest that a coronavirus vaccine may have long-lasting effects.
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Australian research: Kids’ saliva may be key to fighting COVID-19
It’s long baffled the experts: why don’t children appear to contract or spread coronavirus? New Aussie research may have the answer.
Children exposed to coronavirus from their infected parents have produced antibodies to the virus without testing positive, new research has revealed
A Murdoch Children’s Research Institute expert says an antibody in the children’s saliva could hold the key to explaining why the children were protected.
The case emerged early in the pandemic when the Victorian children had close contact with their symptomatic infected parents, including one child who shared the parents’ bed but never got coronavirus.
“The parents were positive but the children weren’t despite us doing lots of tests,” Associate Professor Nigel Crawford told 3AW on Wednesday.
“But we did find they had an immune response similar to their parents, suggesting they’re getting protection from the virus.”
Dr Crawford said testing showed that the children’s saliva started to produce some immune response.
“They started to show the children were producing antibodies in their saliva, which may have stopped the virus from invading their system and causing more severe disease,” he said.
“So there is evidence saliva is something we need to learn more about. This may even be a way to potentially test for the virus as well rather than the more invasive nasal swab.”
Dr Crawford, who is also a paediatrician at the Royal Children’s Hospital, said the finding could begin to shed light on why children were shielded from the virus.
“We haven’t seen very many children admitted to hospital, certainly not many becoming very unwell or sick, despite the increased numbers with that second wave,” he told the radio station.
“So we can start to unlock the mystery of why children are protected. We may then be able to understand how we can get protection broader in the community, including with vaccination programs.”
The institute is doing an in-depth investigation and monitoring more than 20 families, including some in which parents were COVID-19 infected but their children weren’t, to obtain more detailed findings on protective immunity in children.
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Shocked Americans and Europeans cooped up in lockdown marvel at the 52,000 screaming Australian football fans packed into a stadium with no masks or social distancing
Australia is the envy of the world after hosting the biggest crowd at a sporting event since the coronavirus pandemic began.
Thousands around the globe who tuned into the State of Origin decider were stunned to see over 52,000 eager fans packed in Brisbane's Suncorp Stadium with no social distancing and very few face masks.
International viewers watching in countries with hundreds of thousands of active infections marvelled at the spectacle as almost all major sports worldwide are now played behind closed doors or with very limited, spaced out crowds.
But Australia has fought the pandemic so successfully that it has relaxed restrictions so much that big sporting crowds are possible.
Many overseas onlookers praised Australia and the Sunshine State for the pandemic policies which made the event possible.
But some locals were furious and questioned why thousands were allowed to gather at the footy, but they were banned from attending funerals and weddings.
Queensland were too strong for New South Wales and went on to win the brutal match 20 to 14 after surviving a late fightback.
But for a large number of viewers, the contest was not as impressive as the event itself.
Queensland has not had a single community transmission of Covid-19 in months and there are now only 94 active cases in all of Australia - the vast majority oh which were acquired overseas.
'Look at the crowd for the state of origin in Australia. Are they on the same planet as us?' One Twitter user posted.
'Breaks me seeing that and thinking about the state that our sports are in.'
Another said: 'Around 50,000 fans inside Suncorp Stadium for State of Origin III decider this morning. Amazing to see. Makes me very, very jealous to see.'
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IN BRIEF
Black former NFLer Burgess Owens flips Utah-4, becomes 12th GOP House pickup (Examiner)
Reparations advocate tapped for Biden team (Disrn)
Biden transition official wrote op-ed advocating free speech restrictions (NY Post)
House leaders urge Democrats not to join the Biden administration to maintain majority (NY Post)
Georgia recount unearths more than 2,600 uncounted ballots in Floyd County (Fox News)
Professor shows students how easy it is to hack a Dominion voting machine in 2018 NY Times video (Bongino.com)
Ilhan Omar calls Trump events "Klan rallies" (Post Millennial)
The Washington Post tries to use data to prove that the Republican Party is authoritarian and it's the stupidest thing ever (Not the Bee)
Suspect filmed beating Trump supporters in DC is a journalism student (Post Millennial)
Portland anarchists attacked a Democrat Party HQ and suddenly vandalism isn't cool anymore (Hot Air)
Even though it kills more than 480,000 American annually, the pandemic has people smoking again (Vox)
Dow Jones sets new record after promising vaccine news (Time)
Thanks to Republican deregulation and corporate tax cut, household incomes increased more in 2018 than in the previous 20 years combined (FEE)
American Spirit: 38% of Americans still planning a big Thanksgiving despite COVID (NY Post)
Nearly 90,000 sex abuse claims filed against Boy Scouts of America (Axios)
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http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://john-ray.blogspot.com (FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://awesternheart.blogspot.com.au/ (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)
https://heofen.blogspot.com/ (MY OTHER BLOGS)
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Thursday, November 19, 2020
Mouthwash can kill coronavirus within 30 seconds, study finds
Mouthwash could become a vital part of people’s daily routine after laboratory tests found it can kill off coronavirus within 30 seconds.
The initial results of a non-peer-reviewed Cardiff University study showed “promising signs” of mouthwashes containing at least 0.07 per cent cetypyridinium chloride (CPC) being capable of combatting the virus.
Scientists carried out tests at the university's laboratory by mimicking the conditions of a person's naso/oropharynx passage and using mouthwash brands including Dentyl.
Their report - titled “The Virucidal Efficacy of Oral Rinse Components Against SARS-CoV-2 In Vitro” - is yet to be peer reviewed but supports another study published last week that found CPC-based mouthwashes are effective in reducing Covid's viral load.
A clinical trial will next examine how effective over-the-counter mouthwash is in reducing the levels of Covid-19 in the saliva of coronavirus patients at the University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff. The results are expected to be published in early 2021.
Dentyl is the only UK mouthwash brand to have taken part in the 12-week clinical trial, led by Professor David Thomas from Cardiff University.
Dr Thomas told the PA news agency: "Although this in-vitro study is very encouraging and is a positive step, more clinical research is now clearly needed.
"We need to understand if the effect of over-the-counter mouthwashes on the Covid-19 virus achieved in the laboratory can be reproduced in patients, and we look forward to completing our clinical trial in early 2021."
Dr Nick Claydon, a specialist periodontologist, said he believed the research was "very valuable".
He added: "If these positive results are reflected in Cardiff University's clinical trial, CPC-based mouthwashes such as Dentyl used in the in-vitro study could become an important addition to people's routine, together with hand washing, physical distancing and wearing masks, both now and in the future."
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The Resistance Has Begun
I have to be careful in writing this column, not because I might say something I don’t mean, but because I might say exactly what I mean and the editors will cut it because it’s…well, let’s just say “not quite family friendly.” In “Groundhog Day,” Bill Murray tells Phil the groundhog “Don’t drive angry.” Writing angry is fine, but writing disgusted is something different. So, if you pick up on any subliminal messages in this piece, they are by accident (mostly).
Whatever ends up happening with the challenges in the election (the media called it for Biden and in between the time this is written and published a million accusations will have flown), I didn’t want to write an “I told you so” piece about the people pushing the “Trump in a landslide” lie (but I was right, they were selling themselves to move books, get subscribers and clicks and you should remember that). I was left wondering what do I write about as everyone absorbs the latest news.
Then I noticed that leftists, as they always do, showed the world who they really are, and it was disgusting. And it also made my choice of topic easy.
The “conservative blogger” at the Washington Post, a troll named Jennifer Rubin, tweeted yesterday, “Any R now promoting rejection of an election or calling to not to follow the will of voters or making baseless allegations of fraud should never serve in office, join a corporate board, find a faculty position or be accepted into "polite" society. We have a list.”
Leftists do love their lists, don’t they?
Never one to let something stupid pass her by, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez chimed in with, “Is anyone archiving these Trump sycophants for when they try to downplay or deny their complicity in the future? I foresee decent probability of many deleted Tweets, writings, photos in the future.”
To put it as someone might tweet it, Rubin and AOC: Can’t. Understand. Normal. Things.
Not to be outdone, a group of former Pete Buttigieg’s staffers decided they wanted to make their own list, because when a dumb idea occurs to one liberal is occurs to them all, and they started one – The Trump Accountability Project.
The idea behind it was as simple as the totalitarian philosophy that inspired it – an enemies list to hunt and hound anyone who’d supported President Donald Trump the way a celebrity stalker just can’t get over the fact that the object of their desire has no idea they exist.
According to the group’s website, “We must never forget those who furthered the Trump agenda.” Pretty sick use of Holocaust language there, but leftists always love to embrace, subtly, their history.
“We should welcome in our fellow Americans with whom we differ politically,” the statement on their website continues, magnanimously allowing some Americans to live, at least until the first round of purges are done.
“But,” the message continues, “those who took a paycheck from the Trump Administration should not profit from their efforts to tear our democracy apart. The world should never forget those who, when faced with a decision, chose to put their money, their time, and their reputations behind separating children from their families, encouraging racism and anti-Semitism, and negligently causing the unnecessary loss of life and economic devastation from our country's failed response to the COVID-19 pandemic.”
Think improperly and the left will come for you the second they get a whiff of power.
Their targets are “Individuals who worked for the Trump for President campaign, Republican National Committee, and affiliated PACs in 2016 or 2020,” and “Individuals who worked in any role as a political appointee in the Trump Administration. And finally, “Individuals who used their massive personal wealth and influence to bundle money for Trump.”
Thousands upon thousands of Americans targeted for destruction for working toward a goal Democrats deem unacceptable. Do you think they’ll stop there? Of course not.
What does it say about Joe Biden that former campaign staffers for someone under serious consideration for a Cabinet position in a potential administration would advocate and assemble a list of unacceptable people whose lives must be ruined for the sin of taking a job?
This is who liberals are – the ultimate in conformists, hell-bent on dominance and destruction of anyone they deem unacceptable. Whether it was in Moscow, Berlin, Beijing, or anywhere else “progressive” power has been flexed since it leaped from academia to the realm of politics, they’ve loved their lists. And you never want to be on one of them. It starts off with harassment, but it never ends there. Geography doesn’t matter, ideas do.
The left regularly shows the world who they really are, we’d better start believing them.
https://townhall.com/columnists/derekhunter/2020/11/08/liberals-show-us-who-they-really-are-n2579674
********************************The 2020 Election Results Look Like a Massive Rebuke of Socialism
Summarizing the key lessons that Democrats should take away from election results that were much less favorable than expected, Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D–Va.) reportedly told fellow members of her caucus during a conference call on Thursday that they shouldn't say the word socialism "ever again."
This would be good policy advice, whether or not it's good political advice. But as it turns out, socialism is looking like a major political loser this election cycle, with the specter of it likely costing former Vice President Joe Biden his chance at winning Florida. Indeed, this could be a rough couple of years for progressives: A Biden presidency coupled with a Republican-controlled Senate—an outcome that is far from certain, but gaining some degree of likelihood—would make it almost impossible for Democrats to push through the structural changes (such as D.C. statehood or an expansion of the Supreme Court) that could allow the left to take power.
This is something of a reversal of fortunes. For democratic socialists, the 2020 election cycle began with great promise; the hard left had not one but two ardently progressive primary candidates in Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D–Mass.) and Bernie Sanders (I–Vt.), the latter of whom had shown auspicious resilience against Hillary Clinton in 2016. There had also been small, encouraging signs in the years between then and now: the surprise election of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D–N.Y.) in 2018, the success of socialist magazines and podcasts, the increasing salience of issues like economic inequality and Medicare for All, the formation of "the Squad."
But neither Warren nor Sanders could overcome Biden, the candidate who had worked hardest to put serious distance between himself and the term socialist. If anything, Biden needed to work even harder at this, since President Donald Trump's reelection campaign was able to tie Democrats to Latin American socialism in the minds of some Florida voters, leading to a surprisingly good showing for Trump among Latino—and particularly Cuban—voters.
Progressives often operate under the assumption that their failure to win elections is a result of malfeasance: More democracy, more activism, and more turnout will produce the broad mandate they need to enact change. They also assume that an increasingly racially diverse electorate will override the white voters who don't support fundamental, revolutionary changes to the economy. But the 2020 results are casting doubt on both of these beliefs: Trump is on track to have the GOP's best showing among minorities in decades, and while he will indeed lose the popular vote to Biden, the unusually high turnout did not lend itself to any sort of blue wave.
Not all of the results are in yet, and it's possible that subsequent election-related developments could change the outlook for progressives. But a GOP-controlled Senate will kill any chances of big, lofty, leftist legislation. The Senate could vote down Biden's judicial picks, and they could thwart liberal Cabinet nominees. Warren's bid for Treasury Secretary will be dead in the water.
"The Biden presidency will be doomed to failure before it starts," writes New York magazine's Eric Levitz, who correctly notes that progressives are on the brink of catastrophe.
Democrats are clearly unhappy with this result, and many blame the excesses of the left for putting them in such a position.
"Democrats' messaging is terrible; it doesn't resonate," Rep. Kurt Schrader (D–Ore.), a moderate Blue Dog Democrat, told The Washington Post. "When [voters] see the far left that gets all the news media attention, they get scared. They're very afraid that this will become a supernanny state, and their ability to do things on their own is going to be taken away."
Former Missouri Democratic Senator Claire McCaskill, now a commentator for MSNBC, told viewers on Wednesday she was worried that far-left positions on issues were scaring potential voters away. Her remarks drew a rebuke from Ocasio-Cortez, who said McCaskill's loss in 2016 means she's no expert on winning elections. (McCaskill might have responded that AOC's own victory in an inner-city House district hardly confers a great deal of political expertise.)
Even some progressives think it's in the party's best interest to at the very least stop using the word socialism.
"I think Republicans did get some traction trying to scare people on this 'socialist narrative,'" Rep. Jared Huffman (D–Calif.), a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, told The Washington Post. "What's the point of embracing a phrase like that?"
If a large number of Democrats actually absorbed this message, it would be icing on the cake. Right now, it appears that some of the worst impulses of both parties have been checked, and the next administration will take office with neither a mandate nor an ability to enact transformational economic policy changes.
https://reason.com/2020/11/06/socialism-2020-trump-biden-rebuke-left/
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Wednesday, November 18, 2020
Democrats may feel smug, but there’s plenty to be worried about with Biden in charge
As has been looking increasingly clear since the morning after election night a narrow win in key states will deliver Joe Biden a comfortable election win in the electoral college. This is much as it was four years ago when Trump won, and much as it looked like it might be for him again when voting first halted on election night, before the late rush of mail-in ballots proved to be even stronger for the Democrats than expected.
The first point to make is that — legal challenges withstanding — this makes it a clear and orthodox presidential victory. Much like our own system often turns on narrow margins in key seats, it is entirely normal for a US presidential result to hinge on relatively few votes in swing states.
Especially given the temporary electoral changes for this election — widely relaxed rules around mail-in ballots that boosted “turnout” and helped deliver victory to the Democrats — Republicans will need uncommon grace to acknowledge and accept the result. That is because the Democrats and large swathes of media commentary have spent the past four years undermining the legitimacy of the Trump presidency, pointing to the nationwide popular vote and the narrow margins in crucial states.
This was nonsense then and is nonsense now — the nationwide popular vote does not matter, it never does, because neither the campaigns nor the voters have an interest in winning it. The bulk of the difference, for instance, is contained in one state, California, and if the national vote mattered it would lead to a very different campaign in that state and give Californian Republicans a much greater incentive to turn out.
Republican supporters must, and most likely will, hold themselves to a higher standard than Democrat supporters who first started smashing widows and burning cars on election night 2016 and did not stop until they won the White House back. Lord knows what will happen when Biden disappoints them.
The Biden win will be attributable to a focused and successful campaign in the states that matter, the states Hillary Clinton ignored and, it must be said, the states Trump did a solid job trying to hold. Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania are key, Georgia was a bonus, and Arizona may well have been gifted to the Democrats thanks partly to Trump’s unforgivable disrespect towards the late senator John McCain — the ghost of McCain had the last laugh.
So, just as it was for Trump, Biden must be chastened and urged on by the realisation that his tenure in the White House hinges on less than 100,000 votes across about five crucial states. This is a political reality that Trump at least understood — it means that to win a second term you must entrench that support and broaden it, something the property billionaire had achieved before this year of the pandemic.
The legal challenges will play out through the tried and tested checks and balances of the US system; that is as it should be. But the role of the mail-in ballots will warrant serious examination by both parties and political analysts.
On first blush it seems to have delivered the highest “turnout” because it removed the burden of having to turn out. On one level this should be welcomed for encouraging more Americans to be involved in their democracy.
But there are questions. There is no doubt it increases the opportunity for rorting. It will also reward greater organisation in encouraging and arranging delivery of votes — did the Democrats and their union and party organisations do this better, and do the Republicans need to improve this element of the ground game?
Some of the changes — allowing any voter to ask for a mail-in ballot for any reason, mailing out mail-in applications to all voters, or extending the time period for such voting — are temporary in most states. Will there be a case and a push to make them permanent?
This could change electoral dynamics forever. Much might rely on what transpires in the investigations and court cases prompted by a president who shows no sign of budging at the moment.
Calm and the rule of law must prevail. January 20 seems a long way away.
Still, if Trump moves on what will we miss? What will we lose?
First, the incessant drama and permanent combativeness around the White House will not be missed. There will be a return to something approaching normality; less fun, fewer stories, less belligerence, more order.
What Trump’s always emotional and often dishonest media critics never acknowledge — fixed as they are on “character” above effectiveness — is how his unpredictability delivered some historic developments in global affairs. Only the volatile and unorthodox approach of Trump could have delivered the breakthrough in the Middle East peace process, the concessions from China on trade and, indeed, the unfinished rapprochement with North Korea.
At home Trump delivered lower taxes and high jobs growth before he was sideswiped by the coronavirus. He also focused on cheap and reliable energy, relieving the US of the multilateral constraints of the Paris agreement.
The US will suffer a tough winter at the hands of the coronavirus; Biden will not be able to change much. Health management rests mainly with the states, just as it does here, and the US social and political dynamic means brutal lockdowns will not be tolerated or respected.
Biden will be less active, less confrontational, and less dynamic. He will be more of a puppet of his party; by contrast Trump used the Republican party like a parasite uses a host.
There is a grave risk that he will be pushed by Bernie Sanders and The Squad of Far Left Democrats. They have publicly proclaimed their intent to make him the most progressive president since FDR.
But the strong Republican showing under Trump will provide some protection. The Democrats should be denied the Senate and their majority in the House has been cut. The Senate should block fundamental changes to the Supreme Court and the political reality of these narrow margins should curb Biden’s activism.
Still, Biden will rejoin the Paris deal and launch an assault on the oil and gas industries the likes of which the US has never seen before. This will attack the very building block of the largest and most innovative economy the world has ever seen.
Biden has also been a captive of identity politics, in all its destructive guises. There is a contest between the police in major cities, against activists, anarchists and protesters, and we should worry that Biden will continue show ambivalence about where he stands. So, there is plenty to be worried about.
It is laughably hypocritical for Biden and his media barrackers to start taking the high moral ground now, calling for unity and respect, when they have spent every day of the past four years questioning the legitimacy of President Trump and calling him everything from a white supremacist to a Russian collaborator. Healing will not be easy — almost half the country’s voters will be aggrieved.
Some Democrats have already been wise enough to recognise the limitations of their victory, the fact that it does not represent a widespread repudiation of Trump’s agenda or an overwhelming endorsement of the Democrat alternative. Much will depend on how Biden handles this period before the inauguration when an outgoing president is usually a lame duck but this time will be more like a wounded bull.
Apart from the dynamic in the Middle East and the strength on China there is one thing about Trump that I will miss most. Like no president before him, even a host of other Republicans who are so reviled by the White House press corps, Trump has taken the vitriol from the media and turned it straight back at them. No president has exposed the jaundice and hypocrisy of journalists so courageously.
He was enabled in this by the tool of social media. Usually a platform for the juvenile Left, Trump used it to reach voters directly and expose the games and dishonesty of the media. Many of us will miss that, especially when we can already see the cosy cabal around a Democrat president-elect and a mainstream media smug about getting the president it wants.
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If there's fraud in the 2020 election, then we must find it
There’s more evidence of voter fraud in the 2020 election than there ever was of Russia collusion, so America is owed a legal examination of the election irregularities alleged by the Trump campaign.
It’s not crazy to say this, despite the gaslighting from much of the media. Basically, the election is down to roughly 120,000 votes of almost 150 million votes cast. That’s 0.08 percent, a tiny margin by anyone’s reckoning.
Recounts have been ordered. President Trump’s campaign is challenging hundreds of thousands of votes in the courts.
Five swing states are within 1 percent, all with Joe Biden in the lead.
In Georgia, Biden was ahead on Sunday night by just 10,352 votes.
In Arizona, he was ahead by 19,438 votes.
In Wisconsin, he was ahead by 20,540.
In Pennsylvania, he was ahead by 43,251.
In Nevada, he was ahead by 31,464.
It is not outlandish or unprecedented to accept the possibility that at least some of those margins may be erroneous, whether through human error or, indeed, fraud.
Electoral fraud is not unknown in America. Probably the most famous example was in 1960, when Chicago Mayor Richard Daley allegedly rigged the ballot for John F. Kennedy, dead people were found to have “voted” and 677 election officials were indicted.
Due to the pandemic, around 40 percent of votes in Tuesday’s election were cast by mail, double the percentage in 2016.
Even the New York Times once reported the truth that mail-in voting is the most vulnerable to fraud. This is why most developed countries ban the practice.
So, as you can see, it is perfectly reasonable in such a close election to take seriously allegations of irregularities and suspicious activity.
An honest media would investigate rather than dismissing the allegations out of hand as “baseless,” “false” and “conspiracy theories.”
The Trump campaign’s legal team, led by former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, claims that, in Pennsylvania alone, 600,000 ballots are in question because they were counted without any poll-watchers observing to ensure they were legitimate, as state law requires.
In Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, Giuliani says that “50 to 60 poll-watchers … will all testify that they were uniformly deprived of their right to inspect any single part of the mail-in ballots … Not a single one was inspected as the law required. Even when a court order was obtained to allow the Republican inspectors to get six feet closer, they moved the people counting the ballots six further feet away.
“It’s really simple. If you have nothing to hide with these mail-in ballots, you allow inspection.”
Giuliani has promised one lawsuit will be filed today and four more by the end of this week.
Another Trump team lawyer, Sidney Powell, claimed yesterday that 450,000 ballots had been found with only votes for Biden and no down-ballot selections, which she regarded as suspicious.
She also claimed in an interview on Fox News that two pieces of software called Hammer and Scorecard were used to flip votes from Trump to Biden in some pre-election voting ballots.
As well, Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger announced Saturday an “issue involving reporting” of votes in Fulton County on Friday, and said he had sent “investigators onsite.”
Sen. Lindsey Graham, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said in a statement that he will be investigating “all credible allegations of voting irregularities and misconduct” after receiving a sworn affidavit from Pennsylvania postal worker Richard Hopkins alleging that Erie Postmaster Robert Weisenbach had told workers he was “back-dating the postmarks on the ballots to make it appear as though the ballots had been collected on November 3, 2020 despite them in fact being collected on November 4 and possibly later.”
Graham, R-S.C., also yesterday claimed that in Pennsylvania, the Trump team has found “over 100 people they think were dead but 15 people that we verified that have been dead who voted … Six people registered after they died and voted.”
All of this may not amount to a hill of beans. But it deserves to be examined, or otherwise 71 million people who voted for Trump may end up believing the election was stolen.
Whatever comes of the allegations, in reality, nothing is more important than two Georgia US Senate runoffs, on which control of the Senate may depend.
Since neither of the Republicans, David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler, has reached the 50 percent threshold in votes required under Georgia law to win outright, there has to be a redo on Jan. 5.
If they both were to lose, the US Senate would be deadlocked 50-50, with the vice president, Kamala Harris, having the deciding vote. In other words, the Democrats would be in control and nothing would impede their radical agenda, including the Green New Deal, packing the Supreme Court and adding two new states.
In the end, it’s worth remembering that the situation we are in today is not unprecedented.
It took 37 days for the legal battles to be sorted out after the very close 2000 election, and George W. Bush to be declared the winner.
https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/fraud-2020-election-miranda-devine
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Tuesday, November 17, 2020
A second lockdown would smother our economic recovery and only delay the inevitable spread of COVID-19.
European countries are imposing harsh lockdowns again as a second wave of COVID-19 spreads throughout Europe. It was a mistake last spring, when most U.S. states followed Europe’s lead in imposing lockdowns during the first wave, and it would be an even bigger mistake to copy the failed lockdowns again today.
I was stunned when Italy imposed regional lockdowns in late February and a national lockdown on March 9. In short order, most other European countries did the same. Then, influenced by the sensational predictions from Neil Ferguson’s team at Imperial College London that more than 500,000 Britons and 2.2 million Americans might die from the virus, the United Kingdom and most of the United States followed suit.
Panic and herd mentality drove policy making in March, and frightened populations ceded their personal, economic, and religious liberties on a scale unprecedented even during wartimes. With eight months of hindsight, it seems obvious that the lockdowns did more harm than good on a number of accounts. Not only did they throw tens of millions worldwide out of work, decimating entire industries (think restaurants and bars, travel, tourism, airlines and aerospace), but they also triggered waves of secondary medical problems, including anxiety and depression, increased substance abuse and domestic violence, and other adverse health outcomes as many surgeries and screenings were delayed or missed.
Some economic damage was inevitable because of COVID-19, but long, indiscriminate lockdowns made the contractions much worse. The simultaneous timing of increased COVID cases and lockdowns in March and April made it difficult to determine which was, in fact, causing more economic harm. But as Southern states began to reopen over the summer, both their COVID cases and economic activity surged. The region had the highest number of daily new COVID cases and the lowest unemployment rate (6.9 percent) in the country.
The lockdowns probably did save hospitals from being overwhelmed in New York City, New Orleans, and elsewhere, but hospitals were nowhere near capacity in most of the United States. In fact, because of the widespread cancellation of non-emergency surgeries, many hospitals were overstaffed and laid off workers.
Europe and the United States are now facing a second wave of COVID-19 infections. Over the last month daily cases tripled in France and increased by a factor of four in England, six in Germany, and ten in Italy, according to the New York Times Covid Case Counter. As a result, the countries are locking down again.
France has closed bars and restaurants and is requiring people across the entire country to stay home. Factories can continue to operate but “non-essential” stores must close. The United Kingdom just announced what amounts to a new national lockdown. Germany has shut down its restaurants, bars, gyms, theaters and hotels, and is now prohibiting gatherings of more than ten people. Protests and riots have erupted in Italy over its reimposed restrictions.
Here in the United States, meanwhile, cases have nearly doubled over the past month. California, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, and some other Northern and Western states, have kept many of their restrictions in place and are requiring travelers from other states to quarantine. Florida, Texas, Georgia, Tennessee and most Southern and Midwestern states have mostly reopened — and some, such as South Dakota, never locked down.
Even with California, New York, and Massachusetts maintaining tight restrictions on personal and commercial activities, the economic recovery — driven in large part by the open states — has exceeded expectations. The United States recorded its most rapid economic expansion in history during the third quarter (July-September) of 2020 — bouncing back at an annualized rate of 33.1 percent. Unemployment, which hit 15 percent last Spring is now under 8 percent nationally, according to a recent report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. A second lockdown would smother the recovery while only delaying the inevitable spread of COVID-19.
Instead of following Europe into a second round of lockdowns, the United States should follow the advice of the top scientists and medical experts who have signed the Great Barrington Declaration. They advise avoiding lockdowns and focusing instead on protecting the most vulnerable, letting the disease spread among the young and healthy to build population immunity.
Heeding their guidance would better preserve the economic recovery and more quickly end the pandemic than another round of lockdowns.
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Eli Lilly Covid Antibody Drug Gets FDA Emergency Clearence
Eli Lilly & Co.’s antibody therapy was granted an emergency-use authorization by U.S. drug regulators for treating Covid-19, widening access to a treatment that early data suggest is effective in keeping people infected with the coronavirus out of the hospital.
The Food and Drug Administration authorized the experimental treatment, called bamlanivimab, for use against mild-to-moderate Covid-19 in adults, including those who are 65 and older, and pediatric patients, the agency said in a statement.
Shares of Indianapolis-based Lilly gained as much as 5.2% in late trading on Monday. Through the close, the stock had advanced 8.3% so far this year.
The clearance gives doctors an option for tackling the virus in high-risk patients before they’re sick enough to require hospitalization. Other treatments that received the regulatory go-ahead, such as convalescent plasma, a component collected from the blood of recovered Covid patients containing immune factors, and Gilead Sciences Inc.’s antiviral remdesivir, are intended for use in severely ill Covid-19 patients.
The U.S. government will pay Lilly $375 million for 300,000 vials of the antibody treatment. The initial agreement is for delivery over the first two months following a regulatory green light. The U.S. also has the option to purchase an additional 650,000 vials through next June for as much as $812.5 million.
Now begins an even greater challenge: Keeping pace with demand.
“We’re in the middle of this surge in cases, so we have to continue to try to squeeze out as much supply as we can,” Chief Executive Officer David Ricks said in an interview. “We’re loading the trucks right now, so that they can move as fast as they can. We’ve made 88,000 doses that are being loaded tonight, and we about that much inside of a week shipping out to centers across the country.”
The drugmaker has a manufacturing partnership with Amgen Inc., among others, and plans to pursue more collaboration pacts in order to increase supply, Ricks said. “It still might not be enough,” he said.
Experimental antibody treatments could become a powerful component of the arsenal that doctors use to treat the coronavirus. Anthony Fauci, the top U.S. infectious-disease official, has referred to antibody-based medicines as a bridge to a vaccine. The class of treatments was thrust into the spotlight when President Donald Trump received an antibody cocktail made by Regeneron Pharmaceuticals Inc. after becoming infected with Covid-19.
The therapies, which rely on lab-made proteins that mimic the immune system’s ability to fight off the virus, also are being studied as short-term treatments that could be given to people such as nursing-home residents or staff who may have been exposed during a local outbreak to prevent them from getting sick.
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Flooding our nation with electoral ballots was a catastrophic mistake
If the current vote totals hold up, Joe Biden will win the presidency. But if there’s any truth to the widespread stories we’re now seeing about voting irregularities and even outright fraud, he’ll take office on January 20 not only as one of our most deeply flawed presidents but also as our least legitimate one.
No one — Democrat or Republican — should feel good about such a prospect, but it boggles the mind that such an inept and uninspiring old candidate could amass three million more votes than a youthful and charismatic Barack Obama posted during his remarkable 2008 campaign — a campaign that was unprecedented in terms of its energy, its mass-movement appeal, and its voter-turnout efforts.
It boggles the mind, that is, if we categorically dismiss the possibility of voter fraud.
We’ve already heard about the Sharpiegate lawsuit in Arizona (disputed though it is) and the hundreds of complaints received by the state’s attorney general’s office. And the ridiculous-on-its-face 88% voter turnout in Wisconsin, which was a whopping 21% higher than its higher-than-average turnout four years earlier. And the goings-on in Georgia’s Democrat-rich Fulton County, where Republican ballot-counting officials were told to go home only to have county officials continue to count votes in their absence. And the efforts of Philadelphia’s vote counters to keep Republican observers from getting close enough to see what’s actually happening with the votes being counted.
Again, if there’s any truth to these allegations, none of them instills confidence in our electoral system. None of them sets the stage for a peaceful transfer of presidential power. And that’s because no one knows where Biden’s record-shattering 72 million (and counting) votes have come from.
Normally in matters of politics, there’s plenty of blame to go around. But the Democrats own this problem entirely. After all, they’re the ones who unilaterally rigged the game and flooded the country with mail-in ballots.
What did they think was going to happen? Exactly what is happening. As National Review’s Andrew McCarthy has noted, this deluge of ballots is part of “a two-step scheme to enable post-election cheating: First, infiltrate as many illegal ballots as possible into the state systems; second, keep chanting that ‘every vote counts’ and demagogue anyone who says otherwise.”
Indeed, charges of voter suppression and election stealing are powerful deterrents.
The Daily Wire’s Matt Walsh comes out and says what a whole lot of us are already thinking: “Mail-in voting and early voting create more opportunities for things to go wrong, either through intentional subterfuge, human error, or other circumstances. This is largely why I hold the scandalous view that all voting should take place in person, on election day. Voting should end when that day ends, and begin when it begins. Exceptions could be made for active duty military and perhaps a few other very limited and carefully selected groups. But the vast majority of people should be expected to show up, in person, on the day of voting to vote.”
All voting should take place in person on Election Day.
No one knows where Election 2020 will take us, but the coming weeks promise to be some of the most bitter we’ve ever experienced as Americans. When we lose faith in our most sacred institutions, we lose faith in the things that sustain us. And we end up in a very bad place.
We’re in a heck of a mess. And we have the Democrats to thank for it.
https://patriotpost.us/articles/74697-our-fatally-flawed-voting-system-2020-11-05
***********************************IN BRIEF
Trump campaign releases initial list of dead Georgia residents that "voted" in 2020 election (Just the News)
Texas social worker charged with 134 counts involving election fraud (CBS DFW)
Belly laugh of the week: Top officials claim 2020 Election most secure in U.S. history (AP)
Biden under pressure from the Left to erase student debt (Washington Examiner)
Biden likely to scrap parts of Trump decision to pull troops from Germany (Washington Examiner)
Seven deleterious things Biden could do with a Democrat-controlled Senate (Daily Wire)
2020 election results set Republicans up for success in 2022 and beyond (Washington Examiner)
"The message wasn't right": Election losses leave stunned Democrats rethinking path forward (Washington Examiner)
Spendthrifts Pelosi and Schumer see $3.4 trillion as "starting point" for next COVID stimulus (Disrn)
Justice Samuel Alito rips Supreme Court for not considering church coronavirus lawsuits (Washington Examiner) | Alito warns of dangers to free speech and religious liberty (Fox News)
Trump eyes digital media empire to take on Fox News (Axios)
Parler adds five million users as conservatives grow tired of censorship (LifeNews.com)
Feds strike deal to make vaccine free at major pharmacies (NY Post)
"Cancel traditional Thanksgiving": Chicago issues stay-at-home advisory (Washington Examiner)
Sweden imposes partial lockdown for first time (Daily Caller)
Great timing: Georgia secretary of state to quarantine, wife tests positive for coronavirus (Fox 5)
Massachusetts prepared to legalize abortion up to moment of birth (Disrn)
California set to reopen strip clubs before churches (Free Beacon)
Appeals court rules Harvard doesn't discriminate against Asian American applicants (NPR)
Excerpt: "Proponents of ending race-based considerations at U.S. universities were unfazed by Thursday's decision and plan to bring the case to the Supreme Court."
Michael Cohen's bogus book about Trump is being made into Hollywood movie (Daily Mail)
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http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://awesternheart.blogspot.com.au/ (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)
https://heofen.blogspot.com/ (MY OTHER BLOGS)
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Monday, November 16, 2020
Arthritis drug 'cuts elderly Covid-19 deaths by two-thirds', say researchers - raising hopes that it will save the most vulnerable
An arthritis drug has been found to cut deaths in patients admitted to hospital with Covid-19 by a remarkable two-thirds – giving medics a powerful new weapon in their armoury against the disease.
The daily pill, first earmarked as a potential Covid game-changer by a British firm, reduces deaths by 71 per cent in those with moderate or severe illness, researchers say.
Importantly, it works in the elderly, raising hopes that it will save the most vulnerable.
Called baricitinib, and marketed under the brand name Olumiant, it is a relatively new drug for rheumatoid arthritis that has been available for only three years.
But in February it was identified as a strong candidate to help treat what was then the new threat of Covid-19.
The drug was picked out by London-based BenevolentAI, which examined thousands of existing medicines for signs they might combat Covid.
Its artificial intelligence program predicted baricitinib would ‘reduce the ability of the virus to infect lung cells’.
Now the idea has been validated with pan-European researchers, led by Sweden’s Karolinska Institute, reporting baricitinib slashes death rates in those admitted to hospital with the disease by two-thirds.
Last night NHS cancer specialist Professor Justin Stebbing, of Imperial College London, predicted that baricitinib would help save thousands of lives.
The results, in the journal Science Advances, come from patients hospitalised with Covid-19 pneumonia at two hospitals, in Italy and Spain.
Professor Volker Lauschke, of the Karolinska, who led the study, said: ‘These results are especially encouraging seeing as the study included a large cohort of elderly patients, a group often excluded.’
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Positive lessons conservatives can learn from Trump
Like Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher before him, Donald Trump has redefined conservative politics throughout the Western world. Every centre-right party in the West now has a Trumpist faction. Like Reagan and Thatcher, some of Trump’s policy achievements are unlikely to be reversed.
Of course, Trump is no Reagan or Thatcher. It’s easy to forget both Reagan and Thatcher were furiously vilified by the left when they were in office. Reagan was portrayed as a simpleton — “It’s what he knows for sure that just ain’t so,” Walter Mondale wisecracked. Thatcher was regarded as a warmonger, a heartless destroyer of communities and would-be authoritarian, and Thatcherism was an analogue for fascism.
Reagan and Thatcher each won multiple elections, cementing their revolutions. Each was succeeded by a paler, plainer associate.
Reagan and Thatcher behaved properly in public and private life. No one could say that of Trump. Reagan was widely loved.
Trump is still in office. His strange purge of the upper echelons of the Defence Department may be just spite. But they could indicate a big surprise, possibly a sudden withdrawal of all US troops from Afghanistan.
Overall, it’s not likely, but it is possible. Trump’s actions here, as elsewhere, are weird.
Ultimately, Trump will likely accept Joe Biden’s victory. But still we should marvel at the closeness of the result. Last time, Trump won Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan, which put him over the top in electoral college votes, by a cumulative sliver of 77,000 votes.
This time he’s behind in Pennsylvania by a bit under 60,000 votes, in Georgia by 15,000 and Arizona 11,000. Those three states would have given Trump victory. In an election of just under 160 million voters, Trump will lose office by a cumulative total of less than 90,000 votes; 90,000 out of 160 million. If it was a fluke for Trump to win in 2016, it’s a fluke that he lost this time.
And, as widely commented, the overall results were very shabby for the Democrats. The Senate now stands at 50 Republicans, 48 Democrats, with two Senate run-off elections in Georgia in January. The Democrats lost the governorship in Montana and did not win one from the Republicans. They did not capture a single state legislature from the Republicans, including critical states like Texas, Michigan and Pennsylvania. They lost eight or more seats in the House of Representatives and now have a narrow and vulnerable majority there.
Trump went backwards in his share of white male voters but went up with Hispanic voters, black men and most other demographic groups. Trump lost, Biden won. It was a narrow result. But beyond the presidency, the Democrats did very poorly.
Out of all this cross-grained complexity and electoral ambivalence, how is it that Trump has transformed conservative politics?
First, there are two lessons out of the Trump phenomenon that conservatives definitely should not learn.
One is that to be successful, a conservative leader or movement must be as aggressive, crude, dishonest and offensive as Trump. That would be a disastrous lesson, for conservatives and for democracy.
However, there is an opposite lesson that also should not be learnt, and that is that in order not to be like Trump, conservatives should not fight, should not be aggressive politically as opposed to personally, should not campaign for cultural values as well as economic or defence policy, that in order not to be Trump they need to become like Charles Dickens’ Uriah Heep, famous for his perennial ‘umbleness.
American conservatism has a huge effect on conservatism all over the Western world. It wasn’t always thus. Because it is so self-consciously a nation of the New World, the US was often thought not to be really conservative at all in the European sense. It lacked traditions of throne and altar, and of close ethnic association with nationality, as in German Germans, Italian Italians and so on.
Today conservatism right throughout the West is profoundly influenced by the US and very often defined in US terms. American conservatives have big think tanks, a continuing conservative rural base, private universities and liberal arts colleges, a thousand journals and a vast multiplicity of activist groups to draw on.
They also have a much higher degree of religious belief and practice than European nations, or Australia. And right throughout the West there is a close correlation between churchgoing and overall conservative attitudes.
I don’t want to be misunderstood. Christianity, in most policy areas, does not adjudicate definitively between centre-right and centre-left parties. But it is a simple sociological fact that one of the best predictors of conservative social and political attitudes in countries with predominantly Christian backgrounds is frequency of church attendance. And the US still has a much higher rate of church attendance than most Western nations, with a very few exceptions such as Poland. What should conservatives therefore make of the Trump period?
First, of course, Trump is not likely to leave the scene. He has just received more than 72 million votes for president. His overwhelming desire to be the centre of attention means that he will surely tease Americans, and torture the Republican Party, with the prospect of running again for the presidency in 2024, when he would only be Joe Biden’s age now. Indeed, if Biden survives four years in office and runs for a second term, Trump at 78 could still be the youth candidate.
Or if Kamala Harris succeeds Biden as the Democrats’ candidate, will she be able to win states like Pennsylvania and Michigan against Trump? This will be especially the case if Biden’s pro-regulation, pro-green policy bent has damaged US economic growth.
Trump’s likely presence on the national and international stage, perhaps at the head of a new right-wing cable news network or other media ventures, makes it all the more important that conservatives learn the real lessons of the Trump presidency.
Conservatives who dislike Trump must recognise the real achievements of his presidency: lower taxes; deregulation; high economic growth before COVID-19; better enforcement of American borders; conservative black letter law judges; three new Middle East peace deals; a positive revolution in Israel’s position in the Middle East; containing Iran; calling out China; trade deals that help American jobs; onshoring of more manufacturing production in the US; a higher defence budget; putting pressure on NATO countries to increase their defence expenditure; stronger support for pro-life measures and movements than any previous president. It would be a strange conservative who held that list of achievements as nothing. Equally, however, those conservatives who have fallen in love with Trump should acknowledge his substantial failures and disasters.
His response to COVID-19 was chaotic, ineffective, counter-productive on key measures like mask wearing and social distancing generally, and politically calamitous. It’s wrong to blame Trump personally for most US virus deaths, it’s right to say his response was ineffective and chaotic. As well, needlessly and constantly, Trump tells lies. He seems to lie as often as he tells the truth, and indeed seems indifferent as to the difference. He even boasted to Bob Woodward in the book, Rage, that he lied about the severity of COVID in order not to alarm the nation.
Trump often lies about international affairs, as in his ridiculous early boast that he had removed the North Korean nuclear threat by his love-ins with Kim Jong-un.
Trump’s administration was needlessly unstable, with a bewildering and dangerous turnover of key personnel in defence and national security areas in particular. He trashed the value of alliances.
There was also a consistent vindictive nastiness to Trump. It’s one thing to be nasty to The New York Times. It’s quite another to express contempt for the war service of Senator John McCain, who spent five years as a prisoner of war being brutally mistreated by North Vietnamese communists and refusing early release, insisting instead that, according to the rules of war, combat pilots should be released in the order in which they were captured.
And for all that some of Trump’s achievements need to be recognised, his ultimate political fate was that with positive economic reviews, and all the advantages of incumbency, he was still defeated by Biden, who took five states Trump had won in 2016 and won the popular vote by more than five million.
Nonetheless, there are important positive lessons for conservatives in Trump’s politics. One is that nationalism and patriotism are powerful forces that galvanise voters in a positive direction. This is a deep insight that conservatives should embrace more energetically. It is a cleavage between left and right in modern Western politics. Pope Francis, undoubtedly a good and holy man but a pontiff with a left-wing view of politics and economics, in his latest Encyclical, Fratelli tutti (All Brothers), argues for a kind of world government of technocrats to solve international problems.
At the kindest, you would have to say that this formulation is unrealistic, given how despotic and dysfunctional so many national governments are. But it’s also wrong in principle. Pope John Paul II, also a good and holy man but one with a conservative view of politics, argued in his Encyclicals that family and nation were natural states of humanity. They were mechanisms of human solidarity, not to be despised.
Similarly, however coarsely, Trump vigorously rejects the toxic notion that Western societies today are responsible for historic misdeeds of centuries ago, or that their national stories are inherently and intrinsically evil. Trump is not well equipped to make these arguments intellectually, but instinctively he wants to fight such culture wars. He’s right to do so.
Many conservative leaders are scared of these conflicts. But the more they give in to the cultural left, the more they are endlessly apologising, inviting defeat. Conservative politicians shouldn’t make these issues the centre of their politics, but they shouldn’t be scared of them. A bit of fight is no bad thing.
A lesson which it is astonishing that Trump should teach us is that conservative parties must seek out ethnic minority voters.
Trump went backwards with white men but came within an ace of winning a second term by increasing his vote with Hispanics and blacks. He won something like 40 per cent of Hispanics in Florida but also a large share in Texas.
Democrats have thought for decades that demography is their friend. They’re wrong. Conservatives should never accept a vote is lost to them on the basis of a citizen’s ethnicity. Hispanics are natural Republicans — they love the military and enlist in disproportionate numbers, they love religion, family is the centre of their life, they run many small businesses. They don’t necessarily favour illegal immigration. In opposing illegal immigration Republicans must support legal immigrants.
Republicans have been poor at seeking out Hispanic and black voters just as Liberals in Australia have been poor at seeking out ethnic Indian and Chinese voters. Boris Johnson’s government is good at this, as was Canada’s last Conservative PM, Stephen Harper. So long as conservatives are truly colour blind in civic matters, their values should resonate with ethnic minorities much more powerfully than woke, left-liberal, postmodern identity politics obsessions. Most minority voters like law and order.
For all that, economics is the key to everything. Trump had powerful appeal to minorities, and to mainstream voters, because prior to COVID he had provided jobs and wages were rising.
Conservatives must be pragmatic. They are patriotic and socially conservative but they should not be wedded to any government ideology, whether it’s libertarianism, free markets, social welfare cuts or anything else. Trump in 2016 appealed because he promised results rather than dogma.
Finally, conservatives need leaders who command the public square. If in our culture it is now impossible to have cut-through, like Reagan, unless you are nasty, like Trump, then we are in a mess.
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http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://awesternheart.blogspot.com.au/ (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)
https://heofen.blogspot.com/ (MY OTHER BLOGS)
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Sunday, November 15, 2020
National Election Fraud: Evidence of National Chicanery During America’s 2020 Presidential Election
Below is part of a large study of election fraud. See the original for links
Regardless of where one falls politically, the sanctity of the vote is a bedrock of a functioning representative democracy. Voters have to believe their vote matters. And that the vote is free, fair, and accurate.
The basic facts of the 2020 American Presidential election are concerning because mounting evidence indicates there’s been a concerted effort by state Democratic Parties to flip the election from President Donald Trump to former Vice President Joe Biden in a number of key swing states with the help of notoriously corrupt Democratic Party machines in at least five American cities — Detroit, Milwaukee, Philadelphia, Pittsburg, and Atlanta.
Here are the basic facts of the case: On Election Night when America went to bed, President Trump had a commanding lead in virtually every swing state, as well as Virginia, which no one expected him to win. However, when America woke up the next day, we found that he’d lost these leads, largely on the basis of mail-in ballots found in the middle of the night and out from under the watchful eye of legal election monitors.
What’s more, these massive caches of votes – almost all of which were for former Vice President Biden – came via large dumps primarily from the five aforementioned cities in states predominantly run by Democratic governors.
When one looks at the statistical likelihood of the reported turnout, the numbers are so improbable they’re more at home in a one-party state like Saddam Hussein’s Iraq or North Korea.
What’s more, Biden’s victory does not square with the results of the Republican Party nationally: Republicans won 28 of 29 competitive House seats and Democrats were unable to flip a single state legislature. Joe Biden secured a scant three of the so-called “Bellwether Districts” that almost always choose the winner, one of which was in Delaware. Judicial Watch found 353 counties in 29 different states who had higher than 100 percent turnout.
Anecdotally, swing states tend to follow Florida in terms of swinging left or right. This is particularly true in Michigan, which has voted in lockstep with Florida since 1968. Nearly three dozen states had counting machines connected to the Internet during the election, which is inherently insecure. Joe Biden’s lead among mail-in ballots was massive in two states — Michigan and Pennsylvania — while it was in the single digits in most states.
Evidence of chicanery, irregularities, and outright manipulation have poured in from a variety of states — Pennsylvania, Michigan, Georgia, Wisconsin, North Carolina, Texas, New Jersey, Nevada, and Arizona. This evidence could easily be dismissed as simply weird if one is being generous or naive.
While much of this took place at the state level, there are also irregularities that are occurring across state lines and these are worthy of consideration. It’s not evidence per se, but there was a massive spike in the number of Google searches for “election fraud punishment” in swing states in the 30 days leading up to the election.
Below we explore the details and the data of what happened across the nation on Election Day, with flagrant and often sloppy irregularities occurring from coast to coast. Elsewhere we explore similar efforts in the key swing states of Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Georgia.
All of the posts in this series will be updated as more credible information is uncovered.
The General Landscape of American Election Fraud
The media is trying to weave a narrative with ever-shifting goalposts. They began by saying that not only did voter fraud not happen, but that it’s impossible. Now, they have shifted their story to saying that there is always minor fraud, but that it never really matters much.
The Heritage Foundation has identified 1,200 elections where voter fraud made the difference in recent decades, long after the era of Jim Crow when election theft was de rigueur. Of these, fully 15 were thrown out specifically because of cheating by mail-in ballot.
Mail-in ballots are largely banned in Europe, where voter ID requirements are likewise the norm. Florida has been recognized specifically as an offender.
Another narrative in the controlled media is that illegal aliens and other non-citizens don’t vote. This is patently untrue. In fact, they vote at alarmingly high rates. A 2019 study found that approximately 2.2 percent of respondents admitted to voting illegally, which implies a little under a million ballots cast by non-citizens every year.
The counterargument is that respondents are either lying or misunderstood the question, but this is simply not true — those who conducted the study verified their votes.
So we can see that electoral fraud is not only impossible, it is common. It is not negligible, it has determined elections in living memory. With this as our backdrop, we will now investigate voter irregularities throughout the nation during the 2020 Presidential election.
What Constitutes Evidence of Electoral Fraud?
Before going further, it is worth discussing what constitutes evidence for electoral fraud. Well, the Carter Center has a set of standards that they use to determine whether or not there has been electoral fraud somewhere.
These are the standards used by globalists to determine whether or not elections they disapprove of have been conducted fraudulently. Several of them are present in the contested states:
* Counting procedures should be verifiable.
* Votes should be presented for independent review.
* Elections should be subject to recounts.
Additionally, the Carter Center states that it is the right of dissidents to challenge and question the results of an election that they believe to be fraudulent. Harassing dissidents is considered evidence of chicanery in and of itself.
“Effective redress” is the term they use and it is considered by the Carter Center to be vital for establishing an election as legitimate. The resistance of the Democratic Party to recounts and audits should be a red flag in and of itself.
There are also mathematical anomalies that are worth looking into because, regardless of turnout and outcome, elections will follow certain patterns. One of these is that, because of mail sorting, mail-in ballots will consistently show the same ratio of support for each candidate. We did not see that, however — there is a significant spike in support for Biden and fall off in support for President Trump as Election Night dragged on.
Indeed, in Wisconsin, this anomaly became massive around 4 a.m., the same time that the massive ballot drops without supervision began. The same phenomenon occurred in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Georgia, all four of these states with copious amounts of electoral chicanery and irregularity. Virginia was another state with similar mathematical irregularities.
Benford’s Law is another area where we see mathematical irregularities. Put simply: When we have large datasets of numbers, there is a pattern we can find with regard to the final and penultimate digit of each number in this data set.
Benford’s Law analysis is one of the first things run by forensic accountants looking for financial malfeasance or tax cheating.
Many of the electoral tallies in disputed states violate Benford’s Law — but only for Joe Biden, whose distribution more closely resembles the curve when people type “random” numbers in. President Trump, Jo Jorgensen, Howie Hawkins, and Kanye West’s numbers do not violate this law, but former Vice President Biden’s do in disputed areas.
The Wikipedia article about Benford’s Law was altered and locked after several enterprising Twitter users began investigating this strand of the 2020 election theft.
The Glitch From Coast to Coast
One recurring theme throughout the 2020 election is the glitch. There have been a number of glitches, many detailed in our series on irregularities in different states. This, in and of itself might not be cause for concern — however, in every case, these so-called “software glitches” favor former Vice President Biden at the expense of President Donald Trump.
Again, we have detailed these in our state series article, but we will mention some here just to give you a general idea of what has been going on with these “glitches.”
One in Michigan sent 6,000 votes to Biden that were meant for Donald Trump. Another in Wisconsin, robbed Donald Trump of 19,500 votes. Another similar glitch in Georgia saw an unspecified number of votes go to Biden that were, once again, meant for the President.
There appears to be a pattern here. Were these all bona fide mistakes, we would likely find votes that were meant to go for Joe Biden going to Donald Trump before the situation was corrected. But we are unaware of any such error in favor of the President.
The common denominator? The voting software used to calculate the vote made by a company with deep connections to the DNC.
The Turnout That Wasn’t
The DNC’s victory in the 2020 Presidential election relies heavily upon a massively increased turnout, again centered around a handful of large cities controlled by the Democratic Party. One example of this is 90 percent turnout in the entire State of Wisconsin, which would not only be the highest level of turnout in American history, but also comes close to the 92 percent average in Australia where voting is mandatory. In the city of Milwaukee alone, the turnout was 84 percent.
Compare this turnout to Cleveland, a culturally comparable city not in a swing state, which had a comparatively scant 51 percent turnout. This is an important city to draw a contrast with because, while it is a Democratic stronghold, as are most large cities, and it has a similar minority population, it was not in a state that was considered in play this election. Democrats attempted to steal the election by fabricating astronomical turnout in urban areas they control in swing states.
The turnout gambit becomes even more laughable when one considers that Biden is one of the least invigorating Democratic candidates since John Kerry or Mike Dukakis. Yet somehow this candidate was able to increase his vote above what Barack Obama enjoyed, with some districts in Milwaukee putting up more votes than there are registered voters in the area.
A broad study conducted by Judicial Watch found that 353 counties across 29 states had turnout exceeding 100 percent of registered voters. Eight of these had turnout exceeding 100 percent across the entire state: Alaska, Colorado, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, New Jersey, Rhode Island, and Vermont.
Perhaps more damning, the study was limited to 37 states publishing their voter registration data. This means that, of the 37 states that Judicial Watch had access to, 78 percent of them had turnout exceeding 100 percent.
Vetting of Mail-In Ballots
The American public was warned for months in advance that mail-in balloting, illegal throughout most of Europe, is inherently insecure and lends itself to the kind of mass voter fraud that we are seeing in action right now.
But the mail-in ballots that we are seeing in this election are not just nonspecifically “suspect.” They are rife with irregularities and a lack of accountability that should cause them to be closely investigated, audited and, where appropriate, thrown out entirely.
Mail-in ballots in Pennsylvania are particularly questionable. This is a state where Biden enjoyed a 60.5 percent lead in mail-in voting. More damning is the fact that many of these ballots seem to have arrived before they were even sent, arrived the same day or arrived within one day of being sent. This is an abnormal amount of processing time, especially when we consider the surge in mail due to the election.
James O’Keefe found two whistleblowers at USPS, one of whom was willing to come forward, who told of backdating ballots. This whistleblower was intimidated by the feds and it was falsely reported that he recanted his report.
Vetting of mail-in ballots is particularly important because they are widely open to electoral fraud, as we have discussed above. So it is troubling that we have multiple reports, including in the form of sworn affidavits presented before the court, of poll watchers being thrown out, mocked, intimidated and even physically assaulted during the course of counting mail-in ballots.
Of special note is the strong resistance to poll workers in swing states to allow anyone to watch them. In Pennsylvania, poll workers were caught on video expelling poll watchers despite knowledge of a court order preventing them from doing so. Reports of expelled poll watchers were part of the lawsuit filed in Michigan and there were similar reports out of Georgia. This raises the obvious question — why don’t they want anyone watching them?
More HERE
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http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://awesternheart.blogspot.com.au/ (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)
https://heofen.blogspot.com/ (MY OTHER BLOGS)
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