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April 2020

Kim Jong Un in ‘vegetative state’, Japanese media claims; China medical experts dispatched to North Korea

https://www.foxnews.com/world/kim-jong-un-vegetative-state-china-experts-north-korea

Kim Jong Un’s health appears could be more serious than initially believed, according to reports.

Reports emerged earlier this week that Kim was gravely ill following heart surgery, although that has since been disputed. However, Japanese media now claims that Kim is in a vegetative state following a stent procedure.

Japanese magazine Shukan Gendai reported that Kim collapsed during a visit to a rural area in April. Kim reportedly required a stent procedure following the incident.

Shukan Gendai subsequently detailed how the surgeon in charge of Kim’s operation was not used to dealing with obese patients and was too nervous during the operation, leading to delays that left Kim in a “vegetative state.”

The magazine cited an unnamed member of Kim’s medical team.

Government Bears the Burden of Proof on Coronavirus Restrictions By Andrew C. McCarthy

https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/04/coronavirus-restrictions-government-bears-burden-of-proof-before-denying-freedoms/#slide-1

Expert opinion is helpful, sometimes invaluable, but it’s no substitute for truth

There is never a good time for a pandemic, but an election year in a deeply divided country is an especially bad time. Everything is politicized. I would add that even science is politicized, but that would suggest that this was something new. Sadly, we’re inured to the politicization of science, thanks to climate change and to the centrality of government funding to academic endeavors. Research resources are diverted toward our political conflicts, rather than being freely allocated where they could better advance the search for truth.

The politicization of science has ingrained in our political life something about which we ought to be highly skeptical: The argument from authority. It is doing extraordinary damage to the republic, through governmental responses — federal, state and municipal — to the coronavirus.

And it will keep doing damage unless and until we restore the burden of proof.

There is no doubt that governments have a compelling interest in public safety, which includes preventing the spread of a potentially deadly infectious disease. It is nevertheless the foundational conceit of the American republic that governments are created to secure the fundamental rights of a nation’s citizens — our rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Moreover, the legitimacy of government is dependent on the consent of the governed.

Leak of sealed evidence in the Michael Flynn case points to a high-ranking deep state operative as a key to the Russia hoax conspiracy at DOJ and FBI Thomas Lifson,

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/04/leak_of_sealed_evidence_in_the_michael_flynn_case_points_to_a_highranking_deep_state_operative_a

General Michael Flynn was the first victim of the conspiracy of senior officials at the CIA, DOJ and FBI to unseat President Trump, and a leak about court-sealed new evidence in the legal case against him, under review by a US Attorney, upon close analysis points to a new key member, a point man of the conspiracy, a name until now only familiar to students of the Russia Hoax.  A new visage is going to join Comey, Brennan, McCabe, Strzok, Page, and Rosenstein on the front page of the cabal’s rogues’ gallery: Dana Boente.

On April 24, The US Attorney reviewing the case against Flynn released new evidence to Flynn’s lawyers, putting it under seal. His lawyer Sidney Powell gleefully tweeted:

#BREAKING The government just provided the #Flynn defense with remarkable new & long withheld BRADY evidence. Letter below just filed. Stay tuned.@realDonaldTrump @Techno_Fog @seanmdav @seanhannity @ProfMJCleveland @BarbaraRedgate @JosephJFlynn1 @lofly727 @GoJackFlynn

America: Responses to Tyranny by Lawrence Kadish

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15932/america-responses-to-tyranny

America has handed China hundreds of billions of dollars every year to buy cheap goods, watched American firms ship their jobs and factories to China, and provided the Chinese with the means to create technology that threatens to eclipse our future. In the meantime, the money we sent there is allowing the Chinese to grow their nuclear arsenal and strengthen their military. In return, China has shipped us Covid-19.

But the people of the United States are beginning to catch on to the Chinese ploy of using our money to buy their global dominance.

We need to suspend imports from Civilization Abusers and all enemies of democracy. We need to become and remain self- sufficient – from technology to medical supplies — so that we are never again dependent on nations that would seek to destroy us.

The United States needs to stop playing the chump.

For generations America has fattened up the very nations that would seek to destroy us.

Lawrence Haas: Israel Has Lots at Stake with Annexation

https://thehill.com/opinion/international/494633-israel-has-lots-at-stake-with-annexation

With Israel’s new “unity” government now set, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu faces a decision in the coming weeks with huge consequences for Israel’s relations with America and the wider world: whether to begin the process of annexing major parts of the West Bank.

That’s because an Israeli decision to pursue annexation would strike at the heart of a longstanding belief in major world capitals that an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement establishing permanent borders between the two sides will result from direct negotiations, not unilateral action.

The decision will prove controversial enough in Jerusalem, much less overseas, because the two men who are to share power for the next three years – the Likud bloc’s Netanyahu and the Blue and White bloc’s Benny Gantz – don’t agree on the issue.

Netanyahu has long promised to annex West Bank settlements and the Jordan Valley, while Gantz has been inconsistent on the matter. He has long opposed unilateral action to solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but he expressed support this year for the Jordan Valley’s annexation while conditioning it on international coordination – even though the international community largely opposes annexation of any kind.

The Untold Story of the Bay of Pigs Freedom Fight—59 Years Ago This Week Humberto Fontova

https://townhall.com/columnists/humbertofontova/2020/04/25/the-untold-story-of-the-bay-of-pigs-freedomfight59-years-ago-this-week-n2567572

“It’s a great honor and I’m humbled for this endorsement from these freedom fighters (Bay of Pigs Veterans Association)…You were fighting for the values of freedom and liberty that unite us all. (Candidate Donald Trump, receiving endorsement of Bay of Pigs veterans at the Bay of Pigs Museum in Miami, Florida, Oct. 25, 2016.) 

‘Shameless ELECTION YEAR PANDERING!’ snort liberals. Well:

“I really admire toughness and courage, and I will tell you that the people of this brigade [Brigada 2506] really have that…you were let down by our country.” (Donald Trump, addressing Bay of Pigs Veterans at the Bay of Pigs Museum in Miami, Florida, November 1999.

Since liberals (and their libertarian kissing-cousins) mostly parrot versions of the Castro/KGB-concocted script on the Bay of Pigs, let’s clarify a few items:

First off—No, it wasn’t a matter of “Big Bad Bully” Uncle Sam waking up on the wrong side of the bed and deciding to punish an innocuous free-healthcare provider and “nationalist” who booted “The Mob” from Cuba.

In fact: The U.S. gave Castro’s regime its official benediction (diplomatic recognition) more rapidly than it had recognized Batista’s in 1952, and quickly lavished it with $200 million in subsidies.

The Economy Will Reopen Sooner Than You Think Edward Ziegler

https://spectator.org/the-economy-will-reopen-sooner-than-you-think/

There will likely be a reopening of our economy on the very near horizon. And this reopening will be much sooner rather than later, with full acceleration within just a few months, perhaps even weeks. Here’s why. Problematic coronavirus testing issues may fast disappear as critical preconditions to reopening the economy. Testing issues won’t go away; they are simply likely to be left largely unresolved. In addition, new reports suggest that infections may be much, much more widespread than most had thought, which, in turn, means that there is a strong likelihood that we have much, much lower death rates from the coronavirus in all age groups. While most working people (not sheltered in place) may get the virus, the death rates for the entire population may turn out to be not much higher than the seasonal flu. For younger workers under the age of 60, mortality rates, which are already very low, will drop even lower.

Here’s the analysis supporting this reopening. According to a number of recent reports, the true infection fatality rate from the coronavirus for the entire population may well be much, much lower than had been previously thought, perhaps in the range of about 0.12 percent to 0.2 percent. At the high end in that range, if there’s an eventual infection rate of, say, 50 percent for the entire U.S. population, that’s a death toll of about 330,000 people. Most of these deaths, though, will likely to be of older Americans above 60 years in age. Older folks have much higher coronavirus mortality rates, perhaps 10 to 20 times higher than younger age groups. Actually, data now show that Americans over 55 may account for well more than 90 percent of all deaths from the virus. Looking at comparative data on death rates by age, we are not actually “all in this together,” though that’s a nice sentiment. Of course, this isn’t a big secret, and awareness of this reality grows as each day passes. It’s evident every day on our streets, in our parks, and at the widespread protests across the country for reopening the economy.

Ascent To The Summit: Two Men Meet In The Name Of Peace And Declare Themselves Capable To Determine What Is Right And Just For The World by Tabitha Korol

https://www.publishedreporter.com/2020/04/24/ascent-to-the-summit-two-men-meet-in-the-name-of-peace-declare-themselves-capable-what-is-right-and-just-for-the-entire-world/

Early February 2019 ushered in a momentous event, the joint signing of a covenant, “The Document on Human Fraternity for World Peace and Living Together,” by the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar Ahmed el-Tayeb, the head of Sunni Islam, and the Roman Pope Francis for a One World Religion. The historic ceremony was held in front of religious leaders of other faiths as a call for peace between nations, religions and races, although historically, Islamic peace is never achieved and it is they who continue to wage war. The declaration of peace, freedom, and women’s rights is indeed a beautiful document as described by Vatican News. Yet the imam is one man and the Islamic blood lust has maintained its presence in our world for 1400 years as a tribute to its founder, affecting even its own with intimidation and rules of torture, murder and suicide. Islam is the one religion that has been incompatible with the others and the Pope would do well to question whether Catholicism and the others would be willing to relinquish their own laws to accommodate the one that demands their elimination, in the quest for peace and a one-world religion.

Indonesian Muslim scholars also agreed to boost harmony and spirituality over the violence of the past by encouraging a school curriculum for “teaching Islamic history that contains the compassionate character of the prophet.” The suggestion is hardly comforting if it is the same prophet who beheaded the 600 to 800 Jewish men of Medina and enslaved the women and children, and whose descendants continue to engage in the same art of decapitation by the sword and bondage into the perpetual future.

Coronavirus: China Continues to Flood the World with Defective Medical Supplies by Soeren Kern

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15917/china-defective-medical-supplies

More than a dozen countries on four continents have recently disclosed problems with Chinese-made coronavirus tests and personal protective equipment. The problems range from face masks tainted with the coronavirus to medical garments contaminated with insects.

Chinese authorities have refused to take responsibility for the defective equipment and in many instances have cast blame on the countries that purchased the material. They have also called on nations of the world to stop “politicizing” the problem.

Slovakian Prime Minister Igor Matovič disclosed that more than a million coronavirus tests supplied by China for a cash payment of €15 million ($16 million) were inaccurate and unable to detect Covid-19. “We have a ton of tests and no use for them,” he said. “They should just be thrown straight into the Danube.”

U.S. Senator Kelly Loeffler from Georgia accused China of holding up shipments of test kits: “Testing is core to opening our country back up. I’m concerned that China’s holding up test kits. They’re playing games with trade policy to prevent us, the United States, from getting the testing that we need.”

“[W]e should not lose sight of the foundational strategic challenge confronting the West in the emerging post-globalization era: We are in a long twilight competition with the Chinese communist regime, a struggle we cannot escape, whether we like it or not.” — Andrew Michta, George C. Marshall European Center for Security Studies.

Gatestone Institute recently reported that millions of pieces of medical equipment purchased from China by European governments to combat the coronavirus pandemic are defective and unusable.

Since that report, more than a dozen countries on four continents have disclosed problems with Chinese-made coronavirus tests and personal protective equipment. The problems range from face masks tainted with the coronavirus to medical garments contaminated with insects.

AOC’s Baseless Accusation That the U.S. Is a ‘Brutal, Barbarian Society’ James D. Agresti

https://issuesinsights.com/2020/04/25/fact-check-aocs-baseless-accusation-that-the-u-s-is-a-brutal-barbarian-society/

According to democratic socialist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the COVID-19 pandemic is proving that the United States “is a brutal, barbarian society for the vast majority of working-class Americans.” As evidence of this, she claims that “40% of us couldn’t even afford a $400 emergency” before this crisis, and COVID-19 “is more than a $400 emergency.”

However, her “40%–$400” statistic is false, and the facts that broadly inform this issue reveal that:

government social programs, which AOC seeks to enlarge, depress workers’ savings, causing the very outcomes that she decries.
the people of the U.S. lead the world in charity.
middle- and low-income Americans are more financially capable of handling COVID-19 than the bulk of people in most developed countries, including those who live in more socialistic nations that AOC says the U.S. should emulate.
AOC’s Allegations

In a recent video, Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D–N.Y.) declared: “This is supposed to be the richest society in the world, and I think what this crisis is showing us is that this is only a rich society for a very small amount of people, and it is a brutal, barbarian society for the vast majority of working-class Americans because 40% of us couldn’t even afford a $400 emergency before this thing started. This is more than a $400 emergency, and we’re really going to have to step up and completely change our approach to our public systems.”