Posts Tagged ‘lockdowns’

CDC now stands for Corrupt Democrat Cesspool

Posted: May 6, 2021 by Jon Fournier in Uncategorized
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Since its founding the Centers for Disease Control was something extremely rare.  It was a government agency that actually functioned reasonably well.  Sadly that is no longer the case.  It is now a corrupt agency that cares more for being politically correct and spouting progressive ideology than science and medicine.  I am not exactly sure when the CDC began its decent but it most likely took place during the Obama Administration.  During that dark period the CIA, FBI, and NASA all became mobs of liberal political hacks.

It quickly became evident as the Coronavirus pandemic unfolded just how little the CDC now cares about medicine and science. The CDC has gone out of its way to embarrass itself with statements that contradict basic tenants of science and medicine.  I know I’m not the only one who noticed.  Check out this statement by Senator Tom Cotton:

The CDC is a thoroughly politicized agency. Most Americans disregard their advice on things like steaks and hamburgers and beers. Increasingly, they should disregard their advice when it comes to school reopenings. Schools need to be open. Schools have been open in Arkansas five days a week, in-person since last August, and it’s been largely fine. That’s been the case all across the country as well. We shouldn’t have a politicized public health bureaucracy like the CDC answering at the beck and call of the teachers’ unions. We need kids back in school, and back in real school, not sitting in a classroom doing a Zoom session with teachers who are not in the classroom. We need kids in schools with their teachers now

This New York Post article highlights one specific issue where the CDC really demonstrated how political it has become.

The American Federation of Teachers lobbied the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on, and even suggested language for, the federal agency’s school-reopening guidance released in February.

The powerful teachers union’s full-court press preceded the federal agency putting the brakes on a full re-opening of in-person classrooms, emails between top CDC, AFT and White House officials show.

The emails were obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request by the conservative watchdog group Americans for Public Trust and provided to The Post.

The documents show a flurry of activity between CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky, her top advisors and union officials — with Biden brass being looped in at the White House — in the days before the highly-anticipated Feb. 12 announcement on school-reopening guidelines.

Mask mandates are another issue that has demonstrated just how much the CDC has abandoned science in favor of the panic pushed by progressives.  Check out the National Review article CDC’s New Outdoor Mask Guidance Is a Joke

To be clear, the science was overwhelming last year that the risk of outdoor transmission of COVID-19 was low to non-existent. Anybody following the science should have never felt compelled to wear a mask outdoors during the pandemic.

Furthermore, somebody who is fully vaccinated is at minimal risk of catching COVID-19 indoors or outdoors. Earlier this month, the CDC itself reported that out of a universe of 66 million individuals who were vaccinated at the time, just 5,800 got the virus. That’s less than 1-in-10,000.

The idea that the CDC, even in loosening outdoor mask guidance, is still insisting that vaccinated people wear masks in crowded outdoor settings is completely unmoored from science or reason. This is a bungling agency that has made one mistake after another throughout the pandemic.

This Statement by Director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota is almost the sort of statement the CDC should have issued if it still believed in science.

On Monday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “11th Hour,” Director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota and former adviser to President Biden’s transition team Dr. Michael Osterholm stated that if you’re fully vaccinated, “you can basically protect yourself and have all the kind of socialization that you want to do.”

[I]f you’re among vaccinated people, party hard, party hard. Invite people over to your house, do family-related things. But get vaccinated. If there was ever a time to want to incentivize people to get vaccinated, it’s now. Because if you do, you can basically protect yourself and have all the kind of socialization that you want to do.

We should be very afraid of the panic porn being pushed by the CDC.  It sets a dangerous precedence.  This article is a stark warning: Totalitarian Elites Want To Extend COVID-19 Lockdowns Forever For ‘Climate Change’

It’s financially unsustainable and morally untenable to involuntarily confine anybody — let alone healthy people — to their homes, and deprive them of opportunities to interact or earn a living. However, when halting what Greta Thunberg called “the fairy-tale of eternal economic growth” is the goal, lockdowns become an enticing tool for ending both capitalism and climate emissions

Texas and Florida are proof that Coronavirus lockdowns and mask mandates are all about forced obedience rather than public health

Posted: April 29, 2021 by Jon Fournier in Uncategorized
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I so long for a time when I no longer see everyone’s faces shrouded by a hideous mask.  It is so dehumanizing to me.  We were told that mask mandates were absolutely necessary for the safety of everyone.  There are a great many articles published that demonstrate that the science behind masking is nonexistence yet we are forced to wear a face diaper or be slapped with a fine.  Here in Massachusetts we have been forced to wear masks outdoors, at all times if we leave our homes, or face a $300 fine.  Thankfully that silliness ends on April 29th.  We will still be forced to wear masks if we want to enter any public establishment such as a store or restaurant. 

For the second year in a row the Boston Marathon was canceled along with so many other fun events.  Tomorrow restaurants and most other business will be allowed to open at 25 percent capacity instead of just the current 12 percent.  The few that remain will be happy for those few extra crumbs from Governor Charlie Baker.  On August 1st we may finally get our lives back to normal, if Emperor Baker thinks we have behaved ourselves enough.

Data from the few states that have fully relaxed all lockdown and mask restrictions poved that none of these restrictions were helpful in the slightest and should have been done away with a long time ago.  Governor Baker should read this Breitbart article.  If he did he we would see that there is no harm in lifting restrictions immediately.  The people would benefit so greatly economically and mentally because their full freedom would be restored.

According to the CDC’s April 23 data, Michigan reported 449.2 cases of the virus per 100,000, or 44,862 total, in the last seven days. Gov. Tom Wolf’s (D) Pennsylvania has reported 239.6 cases per 100,000 in the last seven days, or 30,678 total.

CDC data separates New York City from the rest of the state in its reporting of new virus case data. Even so, New York City alone has reported 208.1 new cases per 100,000 in the last seven days, or 17,475 cases total. The remainder of the state has reported 191.9 cases per 100,000, or 21,213 cases in the last seven days. Together, the state has reported 38,688 new cases in the last seven days.

All three blue states, which have mask mandates in place, are reporting a higher number of new cases per capita than both Texas and Florida, which remain open and have no mask mandates in place.

Texas reported 70.3 cases per 100,000 in the last seven days, or 20,374 total, while Florida has reported 195.5 cases per 100,000, or 41,993 total, in the same time frame.

This Mises Institute article contains very similar data.

Early last month, Texas governor Greg Abbott announced he would end the state’s mask mandate and allow most businesses to function at 100 percent capacity. The response from the corporate media and the Left was predictable. California governor Gavin Newsom declared the move “absolutely reckless.” Beto O’Rourke called the GOP a “cult of death.” Joe Biden called the move “Neanderthal thinking.”

Yet in recent weeks, these predictions about Texas’s fate have proven to be spectacularly wrong. Moreover, many of the states with the worst growth in covid cases—and the worst track records in overall death counts—have been states that have had some of the harshest lockdowns. 

In New Jersey, for example, where lockdowns have been long and harsh, case growth is nearly four times what it is in Texas. And then there are Pennsylvania, Minnesota, Rhode Island, Maine, and New York, all of which have new case growth rates of more than double what’s going on Texas.

Moreover, Florida’s covid-19 overall outbreak has been far less deadly than those in the states that embraced lockdowns long and hard. New Jersey, for example, has the worst covid death rate in the nation at 2,838 per million as of April 20. Right behind are New York and Massachusetts with total deaths per million at 2,672 and 2,537, respectively.

Florida, on the other hand, is twenty-eighth in the nation in terms of covid deaths, at 1,608. Texas has total deaths per million at 1,721.

This Federalist Article contains a wealth of information about just how unnecessary all of the lockdowns and mask mandates were because the panic over the Coronavirus was so overblown.

These irrational fears are manufactured. They’re instilled by folks like Anthony Fauci, who said just last week that “No, it’s still not OK,” when asked whether vaccinated or unvaccinated Americans should be eating and drinking inside at restaurants and bars. Infection counts are still “disturbingly high,” he said, again fueling the fire of illogical  COVID terror.

“Even after you’re vaccinated, social distancing, wearing masks are going to be essential,” White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki warned in February. Meanwhile, corporations and the federal government are teaming up to make you prove you’re not unclean with a “vaccine passport” so you don’t pose an existential threat to your fellow citizens, blue-state leaders and bureaucrats are double-masking even after they’re vaccinated and saying “it is possible” we’ll still be wearing face masks in 2022, and Biden’s COVID adviser is saying the pandemic in the United States is still a “Category 5 hurricane” even after millions of Americans have been inoculated

School lockdowns lead to urban carjacking spike

Posted: April 11, 2021 by John Ruberry in crime, culture, News/opinion
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By John Ruberry

The COVID-19 school lockdown continues in America’s biggest cities, despite clear evidence that children are unlikely to become seriously ill from that virus.

One unintended consquence of the closing of public schools to all but remote learning is more crime–and especially more carjackings. 

It is no longer just conservative media calling attention to the link to the school lockdowns and carjackings in big cities. Although CBS was artful in its report in a story last week. “Investigators say the trend is driven by 12 to 15 year olds with time on their hands during the pandemic,” CBS News said. These kids have more time on their hands because their schooling consists of Zoom instruction something CBS omitted in its story.

Last month a 66-year-old UberEats driver, Mohammad Anwar, a Pakistani immigrant, died while clinging to his vehicle in Washington DC after being tased in a carjacking by two girls, a 13-year-old and a 15-year-old. A bystander took video of the crime–which has gone viral. 

“You know, idle minds are the devil’s playground. And a lot of these kids, they’ve been idle for a year and a half now without going to school. And that’s been a big problem,” Miami Police Chief Art Acevedo told Fox News last week.

In that CBS story referenced earlier it was also reported, “The number of carjackings has exploded during the pandemic. Carjackings have increased by more than 100% in Chicago, New York, Philadelphia and Minneapolis. They are up more than 343% in Washington, D.C.”

Let’s look at Chicago. The pusillanimous nature of the local media creates an opening for straightforward sources. One of those news sites is Hey Jackass! and it reports the raw numbers of carjackings. Well sort of. Stick with me on this one. In 2019 there were 603 reported carjackings and 1,396 last year. So far in 2021 there have been 404. But here’s the kicker. “Carjacking data comes directly from the CPD’s own data set,” Hey Jackass! warns, “so add 20% to obtain the true number.” 

There’s a lot of speculation about why carjackers commit their crimes. Thrill is probably one of them, but also often vehicles are carjacked to aid other crimes. Perhaps it’s a mix of the two. Just last night, another great local crime site, CWB Chicago, told us of a 55-year-old woman who was pushed to the ground inside a Target parking lot as her Audi was carjacked. The criminals drove away with her car and the one they arrived in, a Kia, which was likely carjacked near the University of Chicago a couple of hours prior. Percentage-wise since 2017 the arrest rate for Chicago carjackings has been in the single digits, according to Hey Jackass!

On April 19 Chicago’s public high schools are scheduled to re-open, although how that occurs varies from school to school. Of course the recalcitrant Chicago Teachers Union, citing new COVID-19 numbers, is opposed.

Mental health among students has suffered during the lockdown. 

Once the school lockdowns end–and I believe they will one day–don’t expect the carjackers to give up their horrible hobby. 

Businesses in Chicago, already suffering from 13 months of lockdowns, rioting, and looting, are receiving another hit. Suburbanites, for good reason, are afraid to travel to the city. And the carjackings occur in all neighborhoods, rich, poor, and in between.

John Ruberry regularly blogs at Marathon Pundit.

Coronavirus lockdowns and mask mandates are another battle in the war collectivists are waging against individualism

Posted: April 8, 2021 by Jon Fournier in Uncategorized
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There is absolutely nothing more destructive to the individualism of a human being then forcing that person to cover their face with a mask.  Forcing the entire population of a society to cover their faces whenever they leave their homes strips away the individuality of every person.

There is nothing a committed leftist despises more than a nation full of individualists, especially if that nation is truly prosperous as well free.  They will strive tirelessly to destroy the individualism at the core of that great nation.  That is just what progressives have been doing to the United States since the beginning of the 20th century.

Progressives firmly believe in the philosophy of collectivism.  They believe no one has free will or any true value.  They believe that the highest duty of government is to force every individual in the society to be exactly equal.  They believe that the government has the power and authority to sacrifice the lives of all individuals living in the society.

There are no scientific or medical justifications for the mask mandates that have been imposed by the governors of so may states, and even less reasons to keep them in force for the past year.  If you believe that mask mandates are backed by science check out these quotes from the article Mask-Wearing Represents Fear and Blind Obedience, Not Science by Dennis Prager:

Dr. Anthony Fauci himself told the truth about the uselessness of mask-wearing on “60 Minutes” on March 8, 2020: “Right now, in the United States, people should not be walking around with masks. … There’s no reason to be walking around with a mask. When you’re in the middle of an outbreak, wearing a mask might make people feel a little bit better, and it might even block a droplet, but it’s not providing the perfect protection that people think that it is. And, often, there are unintended consequences: People keep fiddling with the mask, and they keep touching their face.”

Dr. Paul E. Alexander, a Canadian epidemiologist, wrote: “Surgical and cloth masks, used as they currently are, have absolutely no impact on controlling the transmission of Covid-19 virus, and current evidence implies that face masks can be actually harmful.” (American Institute for Economic Research, Feb. 11, 2021.)

Roger W. Koops, who has a doctorate in chemistry from the University of California, Riverside, wrote: “A ‘mask,’ and that term usually refers to either a SURGICAL mask or N95 mask, has no benefit in the general population and is only useful in controlled clinical settings. Further, it has been considered a greater transmission risk than a benefit in the general population. … In the open environment, no one should be wearing face coverings.” (American Institute for Economic Research, Oct. 16, 2020.)

Finally, a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine on May 21, 2020, concluded: “We know that wearing a mask outside health care facilities offers little, if any, protection from infection. Public health authorities define a significant exposure to Covid-19 as face-to-face contact within 6 feet with a patient with symptomatic Covid-19 that is sustained for at least a few minutes (and some say more than 10 minutes or even 30 minutes). The chance of catching Covid-19 from a passing interaction in a public space is therefore minimal. In many cases, the desire for widespread masking is a reflexive reaction to anxiety over the pandemic.”

Lockdowns prevent individuals from earning a living, making them dependent on government which is very destructive to ones ego and individualism.  Small businesses are harmed far more than large corporations by the lockdowns, most often this is a planned feature of the restrictions.  Collectivists do not want millions of successful businesses owned by individuals employing small numbers of individuals.  It is far easier to centrally plan the economy if it is made up of a small number of immensely large corporations.

Lockdowns also prevent individuals from traveling and interacting with others which is very harmful because humans are social animals.  The nonstop Coronavirus fear porn splashed across TV and computer screens is meant to keep us from speaking out against the evils we see being perpetrated by collectivists.

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