We Are Soooooo Screwed

Whole lotta nothing much

Posted on September 9, 2020September 9, 2020 by Mike

I’m thinking very seriously about making this my final COVIDIOT shamdemic post.

A recent study claimed that the annual motorcycle rally held last month in Sturgis, South Dakota was a “superspreader event” infecting more than half of the 460,000 attendees at a cost of $12 billion to our public health institutions.

In a report titled “IZA DP No. 13670: The Contagion Externality of a Superspreading Event: The Sturgis Motorcycle Rally and COVID-19,” claimed that “large crowds, coupled with minimal mask-wearing and social distancing by attendees” turned the rally into a “superspreader” infecting 260,000 people.

Authors Dhaval M. Dave, Andrew I. Friedson, Drew McNichols, and Joseph J. Sabia concluded that “the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally generated public health costs of approximately $12.2 billion.”

The public health risks of Sturgis were so rigorously studied by the authors that “no medical journal would touch it,” as bestselling author and public health writer Alex Berenson noted on Tuesday. Instead, the report was posted on the website of the obscure Insitute of Labor Economics, a leftwing German thinktank.

Our infotainment industry — formerly known as “the mainstream media,” and prior to that as “the news business” — went bonkers over the claim.

The Hill — formerly a respectable Washington-based publication — breathlessly ran the study’s claims as though they were undisputed by anyone without a political agenda.

Here’s a partial list:

NBC News: Sturgis rally may have caused more than 250,000 new coronavirus cases, study finds

USA Today: Study says Sturgis bike rally was a ‘super-spreader’ event, led to 260,000 COVID-19 cases

IBT: Sturgis Rally May Have Led To 250,000 New US Coronavirus Cases, Study Estimates

Jalopnik: Results Are In: Sturgis Motorcycle Rally Was A COVID ‘Super Spreader’ Costing Billions

Forum News Service: Researchers: Sturgis rally a ‘superspreader event’ linked to 267K coronavirus cases

Kaiser Health News: Sturgis Biker Rally Linked To 260,000 COVID cases

PLEASE NOTE: I boldfaced all those mentions of new “cases” above for a reason, folks. To wit:

I am begging you not to use the enemy’s language. Stop saying “cases”. Correct people who do.

A positive test is not a case. A case is an active symptomatic illness in a person needing or seeking treatment. A case is not a person who just has the bug and has, say, only the sniffles. Most people who get this don’t develop anything like a serious illness. Many never even knew they had it!

Again, some positive tests are false. Most genuine positives tests not are not symptomatic. (Here is one example.)

Positive tests do not necessarily mean active infections. I told us months ago the test was likely picking up past infections. This has since been verified (and it was always likely). Also as we guessed a long time ago, using evidence from other similar infections, the best current guess of the infection fatality rate is about 0.3%. We used similar numbers to show pictures of the number of people likely already infected.

Propagandists and governments are using these false “cases” to cause unnecessary panic. When you hear somebody say “cases”, tell them, “You mean positive tests. How many of them required hospitalization? How many deaths were caused by the virus? How many died with it?”

Stop saying cases!

Also stop saying deaths. Say “attributed deaths”, or “deaths with but not necessarily by.” Poor use of language has exacerbated this crisis beyond all measure. Do not contribute to it.

From the very start of this fiasco, it’s been nothing but lies and deception, all the way down. Well, unless one would like to be generous about the thing and credit witless stupidity instead, which I admit is a possibility too. But either way, the scam served its purpose very well already; the soaring Trump economy has been thoroughly brought down, the Amerikan populace cowed and subjugated, the “new normal” established. The shamdemic horse has been well and truly flogged nearly unto death at this point, and I for one am sick and tired of hearing about the damned thing, much less talking about it here.

So unless it’s something other than yet another run-of-the-mill “whoopsie, got it wrong” admission from yet another gaggle of mutton-headed “experts,” I’m thinking of just packing it all in for good. Perhaps that will be harder to do than I think at the moment; could be my spluttering rage as TPTB smear yet another transparent lie into the faces of the gullible majority will force me to the keyboard for another rant on this tired topic. We’ll see.

Oh yeah, that Sturgis “superspreader” surge? Guess what.

According to South Dakota health officials, 124 new cases in the state—including one fatal case—were directly linked to the rally. Overall, COVID-19 cases linked to the Sturgis rally were reported in 11 states as of September 2, to a tune of at least 260 new cases, according to The Washington Post.

There very well may be more cases that have been linked to the early August event, but so far, that’s only 260 confirmed cases—about 0.1 percent of the number the IZA paper offers.

The results of the IZA paper “do not align with what we know,” South Dakota epidemiologist Joshua Clayton said at a Tuesday news briefing.

The IZA paper “isn’t science; it’s fiction,” Gov. Kristi Noem (R) said.

It’s also good election-time propaganda, apparently.

NOW you’re getting it.

The Forever Lockdown

Posted on September 7, 2020September 7, 2020 by Mike

Don’t look now, but our masters just moved the goalposts yet again.

The notion that we would lock down our society until a vaccine is introduced to counter a virus with a 0.3% infection fatality rate and near-zero risk for non-immunocompromised individuals was shockingly insane. Then we were told that even after a vaccine is in place, the social control will not end because the vaccine will not fully work against COVID-19 for all people. Now, we are beginning to see that because indeed COVID-19 is not that much different from a pandemic flu, the flu itself will now constitute the new threshold for social control and panic in perpetuity. In other words, the totalitarianism that we blissfully accepted in March is here to stay forever, unless we reclaim our sovereignty.

“[Arizona] State officials Monday laid out a plan for ‘aggressively’ combating the upcoming influenza season as the COVID-19 pandemic lingers, with the first step being to urge people to get a flu shot as soon as possible,” wrote the Copper Courier on Tuesday. “The state plans to increase funding for Medicaid recipients to get flu shots, combine flu-shot sites with coronavirus testing facilities, and more, while also advocating many of the same measures meant to head off the spread of COVID-19” (emphasis added).

“Aggressively” combating freedom, more like. But note well the next part, which I’ll boldface for ya.

The Arizona paper was reporting on a press conference held by liberal Republican Governor Doug Ducey and Arizona health department director Dr. Cara Christ, when they warned about “a perfect storm” of lingering COVID-19 mixing with the flu season in the coming months. They warned about mask-wearing and shutting down businesses that don’t participate in their unproven social control rituals. They also revealed that indeed hospitals get overwhelmed to a degree during the flu season and now that fact, which we always lived with every year, will be used to control our lives.

Lest anybody think that the scourges of liberty and proper Constitutional governance exclusively inhabit the Demonrat Party. Hate to tell ya, but the infestation of Statist tyranny is far more extensive than that, I’m afraid.

Folks, we have come full-circle. When this all began in early March, we were warned by the World Health Organization that COVID-19 was the worst epidemic in generations, with an infection fatality rate of 3.4% and a hospitalization rate exponentially higher that was going to swamp all of our big-city hospitals. As such, there was no way to compare it to the flu. Anyone who did was treated almost like a Holocaust denier.

Now, those same control freaks are comparing COVID to the flu! See, if they were right about the threat level of this virus, the contrast between it and the flu would be black and white. Talking about the perfect storm between COVID-19 and the flu would be tantamount to tethering the health care concerns of cancer to those of a cold. But now the truth comes out that this virus really is not that much different from a pandemic flu and that hospitals are always crowded at the peak of even a seasonal flu, much less a pandemic flu.

In July, Justin Hart, founder of RationalGround.com, which promotes a rational approach to the virus, posted on Twitter a series of articles describing emergency measures in various ERs throughout the nation during the 2018 pandemic flu. Yet the media coverage at the time wasn’t incessant, it never became political, and the politicians never gave any thought to shutting down our lives. We lived with it, and few people ever heard of the 2018 pandemic flu.

That is all about to change. Now the flu is the new threshold for perpetual mask-wearing, draconian regulations on businesses and houses of worship, and government mandates of every facet of our lives.

And after that, it will be…something else. Whatever comes to hand for them, so as to keep the Sheeple fearful and compliant, and the slaugherhouse train rolling happily along.

Hence, the politicians have gone from “Don’t you dare compare this to the flu” to “We should be doing this for the flu as well.” In other words, there’s a reason why politicians and the media warn about a “new normal.” It’s not because COVID-19 will necessarily be with us forever; it’s because the tyranny of the government response had nothing to do with COVID-19. That was simply the perfect pretext because so much was unknown about it earlier this year. Now that everyone is conditioned to go along with the suspension of democracy for “public health,” it’s not even a political leap to use the flu as the next excuse.

My boldface above is exactly what I’ve said from the very start of this shamdemic fiasco. Believe me when I tell you that I take no pleasure whatsoever in having been right all along.

At present, we are at the point in this COVID “epidemic” where the flu season, which is driven more by symptoms and not testing, more definitely disrupts people’s daily schedules with illness. As Lamb notes, “By this logic, the virus would never go away and emergency powers will be indefinite.”

And indeed, that is exactly the point. That is their plan … if we let them get away with it.

Unfortunately and to our undying shame, that’s EXACTLY what we’ve done.

Holding back the Dismal Tide

Posted on September 3, 2020September 3, 2020 by Mike

Q: What happens if Trump loses? A: More, and worse.

In modern America, hypocrisy and double standards aren’t merely part of the business climate; they’re endemic to the whole society. Former Heritage Foundation scholar and Washington Times writer Sam Francis dubbed this system “anarcho-tyranny”: complete freedom—even exemption from the gravest laws—for the favored, maximum vindictive enforcement against the pettiest infractions by the disfavored.

Rarely has an analysis been so vindicated by events. Even before the 1619 Riots began in May, anarcho-tyranny was already the de facto law of the land. Can you remember the last time anyone in Antifa was punished for anything? I can’t. But I do remember community college adjunct philosophy professor and Antifa thug Eric Clanton walloping three people on the head with a five-pound iron bike lock—and the Alameda County, California district attorney letting him go with probation.

I also remember, in pre-apocalypse New York City, Antifa goons getting into a fight—it’s hard to say who started it—with a group of men calling themselves the Proud Boys. Although no one was seriously injured, the NYPD expended significant time and resources tracking down the Proud Boys, but none whatsoever looking for any Antifa figures involved. Two Proud Boys were sentenced to four years in prison. No Antifa members were ever identified, much less charged with any crime, still much less tried or convicted. At most, the incident was a mutually idiotic brawl for which only one side was punished. The real distinction here is that the Proud Boys are regime dissidents while Antifa thugs are ruling-class shock troops.

All that, though, was child’s play compared to the nightly horrors Antifa—and their BLM allies—have wreaked on America’s streets for three straight months with close to zero official attempt to rein them in, and often with officials cheering them on. Examples—from Joe Biden and Kamala Harris to Governors Gavin Newsom, Andrew Cuomo, and Tim Walz, to Mayors Bill de Blasio, Eric Garcetti, Lori Lightfoot, Jenny Durkan, Ted Wheeler, and Jacob Frey—are too numerous to catalog fully. The latest atrocity came from Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers, who, the instant a career criminal wanted on an active warrant was shot while resisting arrest and, it appears, reaching into his car for a knife, took to Twitter to fire up the mob. His state’s fourth-largest city has burned every night since. It took him days to make even a token appeal for calm.

Then consider the fates of those not destroying America in the name of “social justice.” This story is still “developing” as they say, but as of Friday, August 28, a young man who appears to have had a Molotov cocktail thrown at him, a loaded pistol pointed at his face, and his head bashed with a skateboard after being chased by three Antifa thugs is currently in jail on a charge of first-degree murder.

The fundamental right of self-defense—the bedrock foundation of all our other rights—increasingly is not honored if you’re a member of a disfavored group and your attacker is not.

Our officials—at least in all the Democratic Party-controlled state and local governments—operate in the precise opposite way that they are supposed to. Instead of enforcing the law and maintaining order, they encourage riots, refuse to enforce the law, and then leap into action only when a victim defends himself. This is not incompetence or misguided idealism; it is evil. Should it continue, it will lead either to the collapse of the country or to revolution.

To return to more prosaic matters, should Trump lose, the repowered thought police will greatly expand its “enemies list.” Those deemed “dangerous” by the wokerati will be dogged by authorities. Any suspected dissident not as scrupulous as Caesar’s wife in his every interaction with the state will get the book thrown at him for minor, technical infractions of some law, executive order, or administrative rule. As the poor sucker is hauled away in cuffs by a heavily armed team of feds in windbreakers, CNN and MSNBC reporters—tipped off in advance to get it all on camera—will intone that this “dangerous white supremacist” with “ties to neo-Nazi groups” was “planning attacks.” Months or years later, after being held without bail, the unfortunate target will be convicted of something like mail fraud and given the maximum sentence.

All of this is easy enough to predict because it is either what the Left is already doing where it has the power, or what it says it wants to do.

The lessons of California and New York show that when leftists no longer face opposition, they do whatever they want—or try to. The problem (for them, for now) is that they still face opposition from the red elements still extant in the federal government, from red states, and from red communities in their own states. Once the whole country has gone blue, though, things will be…different.

Don’t kid yourself for one moment that things couldn’t possibly get worse. The above is excerpted from the great Michael Anton’s latest book—at 14.99 for the Kindle version, not exactly cheap, but I’m gonna have to somehow scrounge up the wherewithal to get it nonetheless—and, sobering though it most definitely is, you very much need to read it all. There’s also a fine review of the book by no less a light than Angelo Codevilla which is well worth looking in on, too.

Is it insurrection yet?

Posted on August 30, 2020August 30, 2020 by Mike

I’d say so, yeah.

Sen. Rand Paul: My wife and I were attacked by a mob — Dems would worsen problem by bowing to rioters

Don’t look now, Senator, but they aren’t just “bowing” to them. They’re encouraging them, covering for them, lying about who they are and what they’re doing to help maintain the facade of legitimate protest, and ensuring that they’re exempt from the law by ordering cops to stand down and refusing to prosecute the handful who do get arrested.

The Dems aren’t “worsening” the problem; they ARE the problem. They need to be made to pay for that, and dearly.

My wife Kelley and I were attempting to leave the White House event. We were staying at a hotel directly across the street, maybe 50 yards from the gates of the White House. But as we went to leave, it became apparent there was no safe exit out the gates and through the unruly mob that had gathered there.

Why? Because another Democratic-run city had decided it would bow to lawless rioters instead of protecting its citizens. Mayor Muriel Bowser was asked by the Secret Service to allow wider and better protection for those leaving the White House Thursday night, but she refused.

Mayor Bowser and many others are responsible for what happened. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., called my Senate colleagues and me “enemies of the state.” Democratic vice-presidential nominee Sen. Kamala Harris has advocated paying bail to get violent rioters out of jail.

Three Democratic House members who are part of the socialist “Squad” have called for people to “take to the streets.”

Well, national Democrats, your people are listening to you. How does it feel to watch it happen? Are you comfortable watching the mob go after my wife and me?

Of course they are. To them, you ARE the enemy. If you learn nothing else from your ordeal, Sen Paul, please learn that these filthy snakes in the grass are neither your colleagues nor your countrymen. They are well and truly enemies, and dangerous ones at that—enemies not just of you and your wife personally, but of every decent American, of the Constitution, of the country entire. And they aren’t just playing around here; the insurrection is for real, they’re all in and playing for keeps, and they firmly intend to win.

My question is: Who are these people? Who paid for their hotel rooms? Who flew them in? Law enforcement needs to look at the funding of violent criminal activity like this.

And national Democrats need to confront it. It’s organized. It’s paid for. It’s violent. It’s not about Black lives or any lives; it’s about anarchy and destruction. The American people are starting to catch on and grow tired of it.

So I ask Democratic presidential nominee former Vice President Joe Biden and his running mate Kamala Harris this:

Will you stand up finally and denounce this violence and destruction? Will you quit inciting it and urge other leaders to do the same?

My wife and I await your answers.

I hope you aren’t holding your breath.

Answers itself

Posted on August 26, 2020August 26, 2020 by Mike

Ask a silly question.

COVID-19: The epidemic is ending, why do government restrictions remain?

Easy-peasy: because governments like them. To ask the question, truly, is to answer it. Robert knows this quite well already, of course.

This essay is going to include a number of graphs [data source], showing the daily numbers related to the Wuhan virus since the beginning of the epidemic. All show that the epidemic is truly tapering off or ending, regardless of where you live. All also strongly suggest that the lock downs, restrictions, mask mandates, and the many other odious rules that were imposed initially for just a few weeks to prevent our healthcare system from being overwhelmed but have remained in force now for many months should immediately be cancelled or removed.

And yet, these restrictions remain, in one form or another, with some rules (such as the mandate to wear masks) being expanded, sometimes to the point of idiocy. That they remain proves again that those lock downs, restrictions, mask mandates and other rules had little to do with the disease. Instead their goal was to impose new authoritarian rules on the citizenry, meant to establish new precedents of power and control for the petty dictators who wish to rule us like servants.

DINGDINGDINGDINGDING! Ladies and gennlemens, we have ourselves a winner!

Zimmerman has put together a nice collection of facts and figures—ie, actual science—that solidly confirms what I said from the very beginning about all this: the phony Covid Clampdown was never really about any stupid virus in the first place. Read it all.

The plot thickens

Posted on August 23, 2020August 23, 2020 by Mike

Don’t call it paranoia, they really ARE out to get you.

“Traitors everywhere. [D] leadership in joint ops w/China [CCP] in effort to regain power? It was never about the virus,” wrote Q on July 31st.

Q then proceeded to explain the many advantages the virus brought the Democrats: It decimated the booming economy and laid off millions of workers, wrecking Trump’s great economic achievements. It stopped Trump’s huge campaign rallies, which showcased his popularity, and sheltered Biden from public appearances, limiting public exposure of his mental condition.

The lockdown also shifted focus from Biden’s burgeoning Ukraine scandal and offered him an excuse to refuse to debate. It encouraged state bailouts for New York and California, and increased the national debt, placing China in a controlling debt position in which it could regain leverage.

And, of course, the lockdown allowed the Democrats to relentlessly insist on mail-in ballots as the only safe voting option, thereby setting the stage for record-breaking fraud.

Q focuses on the significant date of January 15, 2020 on which three linked events happened: 1) After long delays, the House finally delivered impeachment articles to the Senate. 2) Trump and China signed a trade deal, which disadvantaged China. 3) The first COVID patient in America arrived from China at Seattle-Tacoma Airport.

The net effect of these developments was that the Democrats put on a big impeachment show, which drew attention away from the silent spread of COVID in America. And the Chinese, who had lost face and money, were reassured that they would soon prevail again.

Helping COVID to spread across America, Democratic politicians in New York and California, such as Nancy Pelosi and Mayor DiBlasio, urged crowds to come out and celebrate the Chinese New Year. Democratic governors like Andrew Cuomo and Phil Murphy forced COVID patients into nursing homes, quickly killing thousands of seniors, thereby driving up the death count that justified the lockdown. And, of crucial importance, Democratic politicians and their allies in the media and medical establishment demonized hydroxychloroquine and denied its use, cutting off access to life-saving treatment.

One of Q’s big themes is “Infiltration not invasion,” the notion that America has been sold to its enemies by powerful politicians and their donors, who gave China access without alarming the American people.

Preposterous; I’m SURE it’s all coincidence, every bit of it. Hey, who you gonna believe: the people who told you the Deep State didn’t exist? Or your own lyin’ eyes?

Add Q to the list of folks who need to be constantly checking their six.

Inexpertise

Posted on August 23, 2020August 23, 2020 by Mike

Expert me no more experts.

Joe Biden climbed out of his basement last week. Twice! Once to deliver a brief but well-received address at the Democratic National Convention, and once to give a socially distanced interview to ABC News with his wing-woman Kamala Harris. The big news out of the interview is that Biden said he would shut America down again if scientists told him to.

If this is true, then I have a question. Why are we even bothering to consider Biden? Why not just elect Dr. Anthony Fauci, or Dr. Deborah Birx if we want to smash glass ceilings in the process?

Very early on we all made a decision as a society to hand our freedom to a small group of people because they have lab coats with fancy logos. It’s shocking. It is something that America needs to come to terms with because what we did can never happen again.

The misery, joblessness, loss of life, addiction, destruction of businesses, suicides — they all happened. It wasn’t people wanting manicures and brunch, it was peoples’ lives being destroyed. Did we have to do it? Maybe. Maybe we did have to do it, maybe that heavy human toll had to be accepted to stop the spread.

But we didn’t even have a conversation about it. We just pretended the downsides didn’t exist. When President Trump or anyone else said, “Wait, this is gonna hurt people too,” they were called grandma killers.

Biden just told us that as president of the United States he will do whatever the science bureaucracy tells him to do. Then why have a president? What good is he? Literally anyone could do that. If the new rule is that nobody gets to go outside or go to church unless Dr. Fauci says so, then why have a president? Why have a Constitution? Let’s just have a medical board that sends out decrees. Also one for the environment and racism. It’ll be easy, we just do whatever they say while we watch Netflix and order stuff from Amazon while having Zoom drinks.

Sadly, Amerikans have now proved that they much prefer freedom FROM choice over freedom OF choice.

The Watchers

Posted on August 23, 2020August 23, 2020 by Mike

You’ll shoot your eye out, kid.

A Baltimore County, Md., fifth-grader got a visit from the police after his teacher called to report that she had seen a BB gun on the wall behind the student during a class video call.

The boy’s mother, Courtney Lancaster Sperry, a Navy veteran, is warning other parents about a lack of privacy during virtual classes after her son was targeted by a teacher who saw what she thought was a scary-looking gun hanging on the wall of the boy’s bedroom.

“While my son was on a Zoom call, a ‘concerned parent’ and subsequently two teachers saw his properly stowed and mounted Red Ryder BB gun and one other BB gun in the background,” Sperry wrote on Facebook. “He was not holding them and never intentionally showed them on video. In fact, he was oblivious that they could even be seen in the background.”

After the teacher reported the gun, the principal, Jason Feiler, decided to call the police to report the guns and ask that the home be searched.

The principal and the teacher cited a rule stating that students may not bring guns to school and claimed it extended to virtual classes as well, Sperry said, adding that the school handbook does not address rules for virtual learning at all. Besides, “he did not BRING anything to this meeting and he is in his own home,” she said. “They were simply in the background in our home, safely stowed in a room behind a closed door, with no ammunition (if you can even call it that).”

The 11-year-old in question is a Boy Scout, pursuing the rank of Eagle Scout, and is an “outdoors / all-boy kind of kid,” his mom said. “And as his parents and by way of legal rights, he is allowed to own said guns.” In addition to the BB gun, she said her son is training in archery and enjoys shooting his Airsoft gun.

Sperry was, understandably, shocked when police pulled up in front of the family’s home.

“I had no idea what to think. I’ve never been in any legal trouble whatsoever. I’ve never had any negative encounter with law enforcement,” said Sperry. “I had no idea. I really didn’t know what to think.”

“So, I answered the door. The police officer was…very nice. He explained to me that he was coming to address an issue with my son’s school,” the mother told Fox Baltimore. “And then explained to me that he was here to search for weapons, in my home. And I consented to let him in. And then I, unfortunately, stood there and watched police officers enter my 11-year-old son’s bedroom.”

Oh, there’s an issue with your son’s school, all right.

“The officers that responded were appalled at the call and even commended the set-up that my son has for his toys and commended him also on his respect and understanding of the BB guns,” Sperry wrote on Facebook.

They were “appalled,” you betcha. Which did NOT stop them from barging on in anyway and tossing your home for an item that is in no way, shape, or form illegal, please do note.

“The officers were more than nice,” she wrote, “and though they did not have a warrant, I have always been taught to not only comply, but had nothing to hide and allowed them to look wherever they wanted to.”

And comply you did, which was the exact moment you freely gave up your liberty and your rights forever.

But hey, we’re Amerikans, right? It’s in our nature to comply, to obey, to bend the knee and submit to authority. In the land of the “free” and the home of the “brave,” we believe everything they say and do as we’re told. Right?

This story is appalling at every level, with every participant thoroughly disgracing themselves.

Update! What he said.

There is a litany of excuses, to the effect that these were “only BB guns,” and were “properly stored,” and so on.

The fact is that if they had been fully operational AR-15s dangling from the walls with loaded magazines, this illegal intrusion would have been no more justified, either by the insane educrats, or the complisiant coppers.

First off, what, precisely, was the law that was broken? What was the crime that these garbage teachers observed?

And what, had the naïve parent not consented to the police entry without a warrant, would the cops have had to present to a judge in order to get a warrant?

Everybody involved here is an idiot. The teachers are malignant idiots for presuming that their writ extends into private homes simply because they are connected to a computer housed in such homes.

The cops are idiots for not telling the teachers to FOAD.

And mom was an idiot for allowing the coppers entry in the first place.

Nobody involved could be said to have covered themselves in glory here, and that’s putting it mildly indeed. Bill links to another all too similar, and perhaps even worse, story—a one-two punch that pretty much serves to confirm just how thoroughly broken this once-great nation really is.

Open the schools? Hell no. Shut ’em down, burn the buildings, plow the grounds, salt the earth, start over fresh. This is way too big a mess to straighten out any other way.

Spicy time countdown

Posted on August 20, 2020August 23, 2020 by Mike

This has been my own thought for a fair bit now.

Regardless of who is elected, it’ll be civil war
I’m not going to say that what we’ve been experiencing over the last three months have been the first salvos of a civil war, but it sure looks like it. While hard-line socialists in the Democratic Party are working within the political infrastructure and behaving as though they are conducting the business of governance according to the rule of law and constitutionally established procedures, they are in fact in the process of fomenting civil war – or at least, they have made it apparent that they are willing to go that far if they are not able to gain ascendency via political means.

One of their prerequisites for standing down appears to be the removal of President Donald Trump, whether this is achieved via the general election in November or by some other means. It is clear – and should be clear to historians in the future – that the impeachment proceedings that took place in 2019 and early 2020 were nothing more than an attempted coup against our president.

Failing that, elected officials in Washington (both Republican and Democrat), their supporters, powerful Democrat donors and far left activists in the streets and corridors of power orchestrated violent demonstrations on the pretext of widespread racism on the part of police agencies across the country. Elected officials in Democrat-controlled enclaves have allowed these to persist in order to serve their greater agenda.

And make no mistake: The two-party system in America has been an illusion and a deception for quite some time. Most Republican elected officials who support the president are only supporting him because of his popularity amongst Republicans and swing voters. Nearly all of them hold allegiance to the Washington establishment and have been vehemently opposed to Trump’s housekeeping efforts from the start.

And although we know that political rhetoric has had a tendency to get nasty and hyperbolic during election cycles since our nation’s earliest days, the magnitude of the lies and the level of projection being proffered by everyone from Black Lives Matter and Antifa thugs to Kamala Harris and Joe Biden have truly pushed the boundaries of the surreal. I mean, when Bill Clinton has the nerve to criticize President Trump’s behavior in the Oval Office as he did this week at the Democratic National Convention, it becomes clear that these people have no sense of shame, and have cast both decency and reality to the wind.

It is entirely possible that if President Trump secures reelection, the left will escalate and extend the scope of the violence, touching off a full-blown, costly civil war. I believe it is equally possible that if Joe Biden wins the election, heretofore law-abiding Americans will determine that enough is enough, rise up and take decisive action against leftist dissidents, with the same unfortunate result.

Should this occur, it will be a civil war such as we’ve seen in many other nations over the years, rather than what transpired during the Civil War: Potential enemies will be present in our cities and towns, in our neighborhoods and occasionally in our own homes. Lines between enemy combatants will be blurred, as will those between police, the military and the militias that will inevitably rise up. BLM and Antifa thugs will continue to ply their trade until they are beaten back, or they prevail.

It should be clear by now to all but the intellectually indolent or deficient that those on the left thrive on the suffering of the citizenry at large. In fact, it was the deep suffering generated by the Obama administration that led to the election of Donald Trump in 2016. Now, like spoiled but very dangerous children, the left intends to prolong the pain of civil unrest until we get rid of him.

I shouldn’t have to point this out, but people who thrive on the suffering of others are inherently evil. Prudent individuals do not concern themselves with decorum or even fairness when dealing with evil people.

Nope, nor should they. Instead, they fix the evil people’s breathing problem—the problem being, they still ARE breathing.

In fairness, though, we should probably grant that not all of them are in fact evil; some of them are just stupid. Either way, we’ve conceded the Left’s presumed “right” to rule over and control us for much too long now. It’s long past time we rescinded that misguided concession, by whatever means we must.

War to the knife, knife to the hilt: I don’t see any way it can possibly be averted now, and that’s a terrible, terrible tragedy. But our differences are irreconcilable; we have here a chasm that cannot be bridged in any honorable fashion. There is no resolution in which any semblance of liberty can be preserved. The Left has made it clear that they will not relent until every last Real American submits and is brought fully and firmly to heel. That is, quite simply, unacceptable. So if war it must be, then let’s win the thing, by God.

(Via WRSA)

Hope the overblown hysteria was worth it

Posted on August 14, 2020August 14, 2020 by Mike

Toldya.

The entire restaurant industry is “on the brink” of economic collapse as COVID-19 shutdowns and restrictions have cut sales nearly in half in some cities, according new figures released by the Independent Restaurant Coalition.

The group estimates that five out of six restaurants face permanent closure, and up to 16 million jobs could be lost.

Well-known TV chef Andrew Zimmern is behind a new TV ad detailing the restaurant industry’s politically-induced woes. The ad is narrated by Morgan Freeman who intones in that way of his that restaurants are “facing extinction.”

This comes as no surprise. The restaurant industry has high fixed costs and razor-thin profit margins typically not much better than 3%.

Already successful restauranteurs will take hits, sure, but it’s the mom & pop places — and all the people they employ — whose businesses, savings, and dreams will be crushed by this economic collapse.

“Two weeks to flatten the curve” has morphed into “however long it takes to crush the economy.”

That’s not COVID-19. That’s your city or state government at work.

The destruction so wantonly wrought on this country by an unholy combination of power-drunk demi-tyrants, opportunistic Democrat-Socialist politicians, a wholly-complicit media establishment, and a fearful, easily-stampeded populace is way beyond criminal.

They’re just rubbing our noses in it now

Posted on August 8, 2020August 8, 2020 by Mike

STILL think this is really about a virus, do ya?

Thou fool.

Physical distancing, mask-wearing could be in place for 2-3 years even with vaccine, Dr. Tam warns. COVID-19 vaccine won't be a 'silver bullet,' chief public health officer says. https://t.co/hJ4rqD5qGz

— CBC News Alerts (@CBCAlerts) August 4, 2020

Goalposts, on wheels, permanently. Via WRSA, Patriactionary says:

She really thinks Canadians will put up with that!

I pray she’s wrong, and that we don’t put up with it.

There’s never even ever been a vaccine for coronaviruses; who’s to say we’ll even get one, so, what, we’ll remain locked down indefinitely?

NOW you’re getting it, buddy. I repeat: goalposts. On wheels. Forever and ever, amen. As for “not putting up with it,” early indicators are extremely discouraging on that score, and by no means only in Canada, alas. Now for another one a bit closer to home, at least pour moi.

It’s truly incredible how we went from “we need a brief pause to build hospital capacity” in March to “we must indefinitely suspend any activities that could allow the virus to spread” in August. https://t.co/rFheB88iF0

— James Hasson (@JamesHasson20) August 6, 2020

Gee, imagine my surprise. What will the rationale for Comrade’s Cooper’s next “regrettable” Clampdown extension be in five weeks’ time, we wonders? Helpful Hint for the obtuse: this ain’t about “keeping people healthier,” either. And “boost our economy”? Seriously, motherfucker? SERIOUSLY, FOR FUCK’S FUCKING SAKE?!?!?

My God, the balls on that sleazy sonofabitch.

They’re not even bothering with PRETENDING to try to fool us anymore. They’re just waving the bloated, blubbery Phallus Of Contempt—grotesquely engorged, an obscenity—right in our very faces, shamelessly defying the hapless Sheeple to utter Peep One of protest over it.

But hey, never mind all that stuff. Y’all just be sure and always wear your little Mask Of Submission now, y’heah? It’s IMPORTANT.

The top immunologists and epidemiologists in the world can’t decide if masks are helpful in reducing the spread of COVID-19. Indeed, we’ve seen organizations like the World Health Organization and the CDC go back and forth in their recommendations.

The truth is masks have become the new wedge issue, the latest phase of the culture war. Mask opponents tend to see mask wearers as “fraidy cats” or virtue-signalling “sheeple” who willfully ignore basic science. Mask supporters, on the other hand, often see people who refuse to wear masks as selfish Trumpkins … who willfully ignore basic science.

Whether one is pro-mask or anti-mask, the fact of the matter is that face coverings have become politicized to an unhealthy degree, which stands to only further pollute the science.

Last month, for example, researchers at Minnesota’s Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy responded to demands they remove an article that found mask requirements were “not based on sound data.”

The school, to its credit, did not remove the article, but instead opted to address the objections critics of their research had raised.

The problem with mask mandates is that public health officials are not merely recommending a precaution that may or may not be effective.

They are using force to make people submit to a state order that could ultimately make individuals or entire populations sicker, according to world-leading public health officials.

That is not just a violation of the Effectiveness Principle. It’s a violation of a basic personal freedom.

NOW you’re REALLY getting it, buddy. That’s precisely what they’ve done, all right; horrifying, to be sure. But even more horrifying is how handily they’ve gotten away with it so far. I dunno, it begins to look as if we may have waited a bit too late to start in on thumping the living daylights out of Ken and Karen a la my earlier post. We should’ve been doing it from jump, just on general principle.

Just stay home!

Posted on August 5, 2020August 5, 2020 by Mike

Shhhhhh.

If you are, like me, stuck in a state where coronavirus restrictions have turned your life upside down, bankrupted your business, and traumatized your kids, and there’s no light at the end of the tunnel, you might be considering a big relocation. There are plenty of states that are retaining liberty in spite of the Chinese flu virus that has a 99% recovery rate. If you are considering fleeing your state for a new one, then look into the following five states that scored the highest in a data-collection study by the financial site WalletHub, showing which states have the fewest coronavirus restrictions. (Please note that coronavirus restrictions change daily. It is possible that by the time this is published one or more of these guidelines will have changed so verify before you pick up and move.)

After the list, she appends a “Whither Texas” update at the bottom that is, frankly, quite depressing.

Sadly, shockingly, Texas does not make the list of places I would move anymore. The left has taken over the major cities in Texas. Invaders from California, bringing their politics with them, have made Texas a place that needs major rehab. Coronavirus restrictions are also quite stringent and Texas ranked as the 46th-worst state for restrictions on freedom in the WalletHub study. That’s hard to believe, isn’t it? We should all consider that winning a presidency without Texas is going to be damn near impossible. So for that reason alone, it might be a place to move if your goal is moving to politically strategic places. But don’t expect an abundance of freedom in Texas. Those days are over.

It would seem so, alas. Progtard locusts have the most amazing ability to destroy our liberty, independence, and dignity no matter where the swarm ends up.

Unintended consequences

Posted on August 4, 2020August 4, 2020 by Mike

Thanks to the COVIDIOT scam, everything old is new again.

Governments’ response to the coronavirus pandemic is driving a resurgence of diseases that may be deadlier than COVID-19, according to health experts.

Diagnosed cases of tuberculosis, HIV, and malaria have plummeted across dozens of countries. Clinics, equipment, and medicine used to diagnose and treat patients for these diseases have been converted en masse to fight the coronavirus pandemic, leaving health officials grappling with what they fear may be a massive resurgence in disease, according to The New York Times.

Government shutdowns have also disrupted supply lines, making it difficult, especially for impoverished countries, to get access to medicine to treat malaria and HIV. Consequently, patients are dangerously stretching the limited amount of medicine they have left, or have stopped taking medication altogether, leaving themselves and others at risk.

Dr. Giorgio Franyuti, who heads the advocacy group Medical Impact, has seen a similar trend in Mexico. Sick people with tuberculosis are coming into hospitals with flu-like symptoms, being diagnosed with COVID-19, and being sent home only to return months later with serious health problems related to their misdiagnosis.

“Nobody is testing for TB at any facility,” Franyuti said. “The mind of clinicians in Mexico, as well as decision makers, is stuck with Covid-19.”

“TB is the biggest monster of them all. If we’re talking about deaths and pandemics, 10 million cases a year,” Franyuti continued. The current global death toll from the coronavirus is nearing 700,000, though that number may vary widely do to misreporting in countries such as Iran and China, both of which the U.S. State Department has said inaccurately report their data.

The resurgence in deadly diseases follows reports that vaccinations for deadly diseases are plummeting in the United States and around the world as parents elect not to get their children vaccinated for diseases such as diphtheria, cholera, and measles. Parents are afraid that a trip to a hospital or clinic to get necessary vaccinations would leave them exposed to the coronavirus. Now, diseases long thought to be handled are reappearing at alarming rates.

Just great. Can a resurgence of smallpox, cholera, and polio be far behind?

Trust us!

Posted on August 2, 2020August 2, 2020 by Mike

Following the science. The ACTUAL science, that is, not the self-serving, overhyped malarkey fed to us by Feckless Fauci and his dimestore dictators.

Nothing like this has been tried in the whole history of humanity, certainly not on this scale. You might suppose, then, there was absolute certainty that there would be a causal relationship between lockdowns and the trajectory of the virus. Just as the FDA doesn’t approve a drug unless it is proven to be safe and effective, one might suppose the same would be true for a policy that shattered every routine and trampled human rights in the name of disease mitigation.

Surely! It turns out that this is not the case. It was pure speculation that lockdowns would suppress this virus, and that speculation was based on a hubristic presumption of the awesome power and intelligence of government managers.

For five months, governments all over the world have been freaking out, ordering people around to do this and that, passing mandate after mandate, and yet there is no evidence that any of it matters to the virus.

Already in mid-April questions arose. Prof Isaac Ben-Israel, head of the Security Studies program at Tel Aviv University and the chairman of the National Council for Research and Development, looked at the data around the world and concluded that the virus comes and goes after 70 days regardless of the policies deployed. He found no relationship at all between locking down and transmission and death.

Fast forward to mid-July. Data scientists investigated the experience from the spring. They too found no relationship between the virus and policy. Putting it very bluntly: “Rapid border closures, full lockdowns, and wide-spread testing were not associated with COVID-19 mortality per million people.”

That’s awesome to consider. Billions of lives fundamentally altered. Economies wrecked. Centuries-old traditions of liberty and law thrown out. Police states everywhere. And to what end? The data indicate it was all for naught. Apparently, you cannot control a virus with state policies. The virus just doesn’t seem to care.

Neither do our masters. They ginned up a panic amongst a cowardly, ignorant populace, then used it to ring the bell on pretty much every last item on their letters-to-Santa wish lists. “All for naught”? I think not, alas.

At some point, we are going to have to throw in the towel. Whether a country locks down or stays open has as much predictive power over deaths per million as whether it rains today is related to the color of my socks. Or whether hurricanes are controlled by literacy rates.

In other words, the claim that lockdowns control viruses is pseudoscience or magical thinking of a deeply dangerous sort; it wrecks economies and lives.

Why, it’s almost as if we’ve been sold a pig in a poke, by people harboring nefarious intentions or something. But no, that just CAN’T be right.

Can it?

So what’s next?

Posted on July 29, 2020July 29, 2020 by Mike

This.

Americans can’t seem to handle wearing masks to stop the coronavirus. Now, imagine if the CDC changed its guidelines to also call for “eye protection” like medical goggles to stop the spread of the virus (and protect your neighbor, as well as yourself).

Well, Dr. Fauci is apparently preparing to do just that.

During an interview with ABC News, Dr. Fauci said Wednesday that he may soon advise Americans to wear ‘eye protection’ to avoid being infected by COVID-19 as deaths along the Sun Belt climb to record highs.

“If you have goggles or an eye shield, you should use it,” the doctor said, before adding that it’s not universally recommended, “but if you really want to be complete, you should probably use it if you can,” he said.

Fine by me, just do it already. I won’t wear your silly-assed face diapers, and I won’t wear your fucking silly-assed goggles either, asshole. Another directive I won’t be complying with, from a piece I linked about a month ago:

A new pandemic is raging. Even before the Covid 19 pandemic has subsided, the WHO has now warned that a virulent form of Hoof and Mouth disease has “jumped” species in record time from horse to humans and is threatening to devastate the planet. It is even more deadly than the original. An appropriate name for the pathogen is being considered, as we speak.

Curiously enough, the pathogen has an affinity for the right foot of its human host. At this early stage of the pandemic, we can already state, with confidence, that the microbe can be detected by the application of a simple laboratory test to the right foot.

Now that we know what we are dealing with, what do we do to prevent the spread? We cannot simply wait for the vaccine. Patience is not an option. There is no time for that. We must act now!

It seems that pressure on the right foot creates a veritable explosion in the number of microbes. The tissue on the bottom of the right foot is suited to hold the weight of the entire body with every step. However, the act of stepping causes the microbe to multiply. Perhaps it is due to the pressure exerted on the big toe of the right foot. Perhaps the skin on the right foot is more attractive to the pathogen than the skin on the left foot which seems inhospitable to it. These are good questions to which the answers, at present, are unknown. Nevertheless, once the microbe is embedded in the right foot, it oozes out, microscopically, through the skin and into the shoe. But, as these are among the smallest of microbes, the story does not end there. The motion of the foot in the shoe, after the pathogen has been released from the skin, causes it to be dispersed upward and outward, diffusing into the atmosphere. Of course, the condition is far more lethal when one wears sandals as opposed to a closed shoe. Nevertheless, the pathogen cannot be contained even in a shoe that is closed. Therefore, we must avoid excreting the pathogen through the action of our right foot, and, more specifically, through our big right toe.

Anyway, along with our Covid 19 lifestyle, what are a few more mandates if the reward for our efforts is the conquest and elimination of yet another new disease? The following rules have been thoughtfully formulated and could easily be incorporated into what we are already doing to combat Covid 19.

First, let us talk about the mask. I recommend that we jettison the shoe or sandal that we wear on our right foot. With all due respect to the shoe industry, this is for everyone. Not only those with a positive or false positive diagnosis. Why? Because we can be a carrier whether we know it or not. Healthy people can make other healthy people sick! Got that? So that means we wear a mask adapted to our right foot—a mask that is impermeable to the pathogen. Even though such a mask does not yet exist, wearing a mask on your foot is a symbolic act that communicates your understanding that the situation is dire and that 50% of us will be goners if we refuse to comply.

Secondly, and this is the final guideline, and, perhaps, the most important one: we must stop proliferating the pathogen when stepping on our right foot. We must stop walking and start hopping!

Yes! I said hop! On our left foot. Now, you might object that hopping on one foot will not get us very far when we have someplace to go. You are right. Therefore, enough said about that! However, I do acknowledge that hopping is tiring, if not tiresome. Especially if you have no alternative, and surely there is none. That is why I recommend, in fact, mandate, that we always carry a cane or a stick in our right hand, or lodge a state-of-the art crutch under our right shoulder to keep us in balance and to prevent us from falling. An implement of this sort will also be of great value in maintaining our social distance and thus enable us to avoid close body-brawling when our fellow human violates our six-foot social space.

Please, let me be very clear as to dispel all misunderstanding: I do not advocate that you employ your hopping-aid as a weapon. However, the violation of one’s social distancing space is an act of wanton aggression that is a menace to the health and safety of society. Law enforcement cannot respond to each, and every infraction–as recent and current riots attest. Therefore, it is up to us to look after our neighbors and to gently remind them that the common good is their good. As we have all experienced under Covid 19, obedience is its own reward.

Seems pretty funny now, but it won’t for long. So where does this leave us? Where does it all end? Clue: it doesn’t—EVER.

Tucker Carlson calls the rioters “Biden voters”—an expression that seems to be catching on and may not bode well for the Left. As Thomas Lifson at American Thinker reports, “some Democrats are openly expressing their fear that the rioters are helping Trump,” concluding that the Democrats “are riding a tiger. If they attempt to dismount, they will be eaten by the tiger.” Perhaps the strategy of colluding with the violence-prone “protesters” may backfire; nonetheless, the majority of Democrat operatives seem to be in it for the long haul.

And why not? Democrat officials from local to state survey the national scene and see sports teams changing their names to appear inoffensive; people lobbying to replace the national anthem; Hollywood celebrating its anti-Americanism with slanted, godawful movies; wealthy corporations subsidizing domestic terrorists; outright traitors to the flag sitting in Congress; generals embarrassing their President; police chiefs kneeling before the mobs and religious leaders washing the feet of those who would depose them; public schools and universities churning out hordes of Leftist hoplites; and the mainstream media and big digital platforms practicing censorship, swaying elections and promoting insurrection.

In brief, what these so-called public representatives observe is a country submitting to the lure of Cultural Marxism, which views the world in terms of interest groups, power relationships, systemic oppression and endemic inequality, victim categories and identity politics, with socialists as the great healers and redeemers. From the perspective of the commissars, what’s not to like?

Add to this political scenario the Leftist COVID-mongers who, as Angelo Codevilla shows beyond the slightest doubt, are engaged in the usurpation of arbitrary political power by stoking public panic, prolonging the lockdowns, constantly “moving the goalposts” even when the famous “curve” has not only flattened but become catenary, and collapsing the nation’s economy in order to unseat President Trump. These blue state authorities and their comrades in a Democrat-controlled Congress are dedicated to establishing the new “new normal,” which is to become the default position of everyday life leading us, as Paul Gottfried writes, into the “new frontiers of madness.”

In a 1965 radio broadcast titled “If I Were The Devil,” Paul Harvey foresaw the socialist plan to take over America, which was as simple as it was methodical. The devil would begin by subverting the churches and proceed, among other steps, to educate authors to produce lurid literature, lard TV with dubious movies, peddle narcotics, tranquilize the public with pills, corrupt the schools, deify science, take from those who have and give to those who wanted in order to kill incentive, and caution against hard work, patriotism, moral conduct, and marriage. And presto! We find ourselves living in the hell that is socialism.

The devil’s program seems poised to bear fruit. Should this be the case, and I suspect it is, we have a plausible explanation for blue state public figures unafraid to violate their mandate, estrange a portion their voters, and act in full view of the nation like the petty tyrants they always essentially were. They are the purveyors of the new regime of American socialism of which, as Dinesh D’Souza baldly states in his recent The United States of Socialism: “In principle, no less than in practice, socialism is the ideology of thieves and tyrants. As for the people who fall for the temptation, they are connivers attracted by the rip-off scheme.”

These thieves, tyrants, and connivers have every confidence that they will shortly possess full control of their fiefdoms in the newly-formed Socialist States of America. After all, if the plot succeeds, it is soon to be their home.

From here, it looks more like the socialists won already, and America That Was is conquered at last. Now they’re just walking the battlefield to shoot the wounded.

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