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Ruth King

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Who Eats the Cake in Tehran? by Amir Taheri

By on April 5th, 2020

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15841/who-eats-the-cake-in-tehran

The new message from Tehran is that Iran is in need of humanitarian aid to curb the coronavirus and prevent the death of large numbers of Iranians… The first sign that the message may be working came last Monday when Germany announced that it has arranged a $5 million cash line through the European Union for Iran to secure medical supplies needed to fight the pandemic. The German initiative, through a mechanism called Instex and designed to by-pass sanctions, is clearly meant to test the waters.

Nevertheless, the acceptance of the first Instex operation and the renewal of waivers might have two outcomes that may not please Washington…. The result could be a sham show of unity by the regime with a new message to Iranians, as German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas believes that change within the regime may be better than regime change.

The trouble with all this is that we have already been there, done that and bought the t-shirt. Europe and the United States have repeatedly tried to bring the Islamic Republic in from the cold by playing the accommodation, not to say appeasement, card, each time ending up as the cuckold in the story.

The tidbits offer an insight into the mindset of the weird clique dominating Iran since 1979 and why those who believe they are dealing with a normal government would need to have their heads examined. The Reagan administration, helped by Israel, smuggled over 1,000 anti-tanks missiles to Iran to help it stop the advance of the Iraqi invasion in the eight-year Iran-Iraq war. The mullahs paid half the cost of the missiles as down payment but refused to pay the second half after they had received all consignments. There was no need to pay “The Crusaders” the price.

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What a Year! The Coronavirus Crisis in Retrospect The crisis led to a new appreciation of contingency—an appreciation of the fact that our world is beset not only by the fragility of normality but also the normality of fragility. By Roger Kimball

By on April 5th, 2020

https://amgreatness.com/2020/04/04/what-a-year-the-coronavirus-crisis-in-retrospect/

December 31, 2020. What a roller-coaster of a year it has been.

In January, congressional Democrats were busy trying to impeach the president of the United States. That same month, news of a new, highly contagious virus leaked out of China and began to circulate in the West. The stock market stumbled, then recovered and went on to new heights, flirting with the magic number 30,000. Unemployment was at historic lows.

Then more worrying news about the virus emerged from China. It was difficult to wrest the facts from the secretive Communist Party. At the end of January, President Trump suspended all flights from China, a decision for which he was roundly condemned as “racist” and “xenophobic.”

It was not until March that the narrative shifted. In January, Trump had overreacted. By mid-March, he was accused of under-reacting. For weeks on end, there was only one subject: coronavirus, the “Wuhan virus,” the CCP flu.

It seems long ago now, but the dual onslaught of the new coronavirus and the resulting economic meltdown turned the world upside down.

For a brief period, hysteria reigned. The stock market plunged by thousands of points, erasing trillions of dollars of wealth. Whole states went into virtual lockdown. People started parading about—to the extent that they went out at all—in latex gloves and medical masks. All businesses deemed “non-essential” were shuttered for weeks. Many schools and colleges closed, first for weeks, then for the rest of the semester.

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COVID-19 has seen America develop a dangerous expertocracy By Andrea Widburg

By on April 5th, 2020

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/04/covid19_has_seen_america_develop_a_dangerous_expertocracy.html

People are beginning to realize that the experts have been wrong about a lot of things when it comes to COVID-19. This is due in part to the ever-changing knowledge we’re acquiring about the disease. It’s a good thing that the experts can adjust their ideas as they acquire new evidence. The problem, though, is that we are allowing medicine and science experts to make vast, unquestioned policy decisions, and that’s a perilous thing to do.

Ever since the early Progressives, back at the turn of the 20th century, Americans, especially Democrats, have had a reverence for expertise. Woodrow Wilson, who was the leader of American Progressivism, was already dreaming of rule by experts when he was still a Bryn Mawr College professor.

In 1887, Wilson wrote a far-reaching paper dismissing the Constitution as defective (too much power for the people) and, instead, called for a bureaucracy of experts to run the country. America’s rising middle-class fell in love with the idea and has been in love with it ever since. Nowadays, we look to experts in everything, including raising our own children — and we do this despite the conflicting information they give and the daily proof that, the more theoretical the subject, the more often they are wrong (and wrong in ways that run profoundly contrary to common sense).

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1,000-Bed New York Hospital Ship Has Only 20 Patients By Rick Moran

By on April 5th, 2020

https://pjmedia.com/trending/1000-bed-new-york-hospital-ship-has-only-20-patients/

The hospital ship USNS Comfort that’s been docked in New York since last Monday, has only 20 patients, according to the New York Times. The USNS Mercy docked in Los Angeles has only 15 patients.

The ships were never meant to treat coronavirus patients and were admitting only those who tested negative. But bizarre rules and bureaucratic bungling have made the task of filling those ships with patients a lot harder than it should be.

Washington Examiner:

The Navy is refusing to treat nearly 50 conditions, and ambulances are unable to take patients directly to the vessel. Ambulances must first bring patients to a hospital for an evaluation, including a test for COVID-19, and then deliver them to the ship.

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Rep. Ocasio-Cortez Wants ‘Reparations’ for Minority Coronavirus Victims By Rick Moran

By on April 5th, 2020

https://pjmedia.com/trending/rep-ocasio-cortez-wants-reparations-for-minority-coronavirus-victims/

True to form, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is playing the “a crisis is a terrible thing to waste” game and is calling for reparations because minorities are getting the coronavirus at a faster rate than white people.

Reparations for being sick, reparations for being a distant ancestor of a former slave, reparations for being a victim of “redlining,” reparations for business inequalities — eventually she’s going to run out of white people’s money to take.

But that won’t deter our fearless warrior queen.

New York Post:

“COVID deaths are disproportionately spiking in Black + Brown communities,” Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) tweeted to her 6 million followers  on Friday morning.

“Why? Because the chronic toll of redlining, environmental racism, wealth gap, etc. ARE underlying health conditions,” the Bronx-born lawmaker added.

“Inequality is a comorbidity. COVID relief should be drafted with a lens of reparations,” she wrote.

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Venezuelan Warship Shoots at German Cruise Ship, Rams It and Sinks Itself By Rick Moran

By on April 5th, 2020

https://pjmedia.com/trending/venezuelan-warship-shoots-at-german-cruise-ship-rams-it-and-sinks-itself/

Reports out of Berlin tell of a German Arctic cruise ship being fired on by a Venezuelan naval vessel, which then rammed the passenger liner, sinking itself in the process.

No, this is not a story that appeared in The Onion.

The Jerusalem Post says that the incident occurred on March 30 and took place in international waters.

The Iranian regime-allied Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro accused the captain of the RCGS  RESOLUTE cruise ship of “terrorism and piracy” and sought to force the ship into a new direction on the high seas. The cruise ship, which had no passengers on board and was sailing under a Portuguese flag, has a reinforced hull that enables it to sail through ice water.

An unarmed passenger ship accused of “terrorism and piracy”? Well, it is the Venezuelan navy.

Columbia Cruise Services continued, stating that “Shortly after mid-night, the cruise vessel was approached by an armed Venezuelan navy vessel, which via radio questioning the intentions of the RCGS  RESOLUTE’s presence and gave the order to follow to Puerto Moreno on Isla De Margarita. As the RCGS  RESOLUTE was sailing in international waters at that time, the Master wanted to reconfirm this particular request resulting into a serious deviation from the scheduled vessel’s route with the company DPA.”

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John Durham investigation intensifies focus on John Brennan by Jerry Dunleavy

By on April 5th, 2020

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/john-durham-investigation-intensifies-focus-on-john-brennan

U.S. Attorney John Durham’s review of the Russia investigation is putting increased scrutiny on former CIA Director John Brennan, searching for any undue influence he may have had during 2017’s intelligence community assessment of Russian interference.

Durham, selected by Attorney General William Barr last year to lead this inquiry, drove to Washington, D.C., in March to ensure the investigation stayed on track during the coronavirus outbreak. The top Connecticut federal prosecutor is looking into highly sensitive issues, including whether Brennan took politicized actions to pressure the rest of the intelligence community to match his conclusions about Russian President Vladimir Putin’s motivations, according to sources cited by the Wall Street Journal.

Officials said Durham has been interviewing CIA officials this year, zeroing in on those at the National Intelligence Council, a center within the Office of the Director of National Intelligence which oversaw the collaboration between the CIA, FBI, and National Security Agency in putting together the 2017 assessment, and looking at how the work product was finalized.

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How deadly is the coronavirus? By Lisa Boothe

By on April 5th, 2020

https://thehill.com/opinion/healthcare/491021-how-deadly-is-the-coronavirus

“That is why random sampling is important. John Ioannidis, a Stanford epidemiologist who is famous for debunking bad research, has been pushing for it. He told me that random sampling is needed and could be done with a couple of thousand tests. When I told him that I previously worked in the polling industry, he put it in terms that resonated with me. He said, “Random representative testing is like polling. We run thousands of opinion polls in this country. We should similarly get a representative sample of the population and get them tested. It is just so easy.”

How deadly is the coronavirus? It is a simple but vital question that we don’t know the answer to right now. With American lives and livelihoods on the line, we need a science-based baseline from which to make public policy decisions. Hopefully those answers come sooner than later as the White House looks to do random sampling, something I recently reported. 

To be clear, every single life has value, and the overburdening of hospitals in places such as New York City is real and devastating. The toll on our doctors and nurses, many of whom have contracted the coronavirus by selflessly putting their own lives on the line to save others, is also real. We mourn the loss of each precious life and are in debt to the heroes on the front line.

The economic toll of shutting down nonessential businesses across the country is also real. A record-shattering 10 million Americans filing for unemployment in just two weeks and the largest bailout in United States history — $2.2 trillion — are sobering numbers that reflect the economic calamity we are facing. As government and public health officials make decisions of enormous magnitude, shouldn’t we know how infectious and lethal the coronavirus is?

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CDC begins testing blood for antibody coronavirus treatment By Marina Pitofsky

By on April 5th, 2020

https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/other/491200-cdc-begins-testing-blood-for-antibody-coronavirus-treatment

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control has started using antibody blood tests to confirm coronavirus infections, even among those who have not developed symptoms, Politico reported.

The test scans for antibodies in a blood sample to confirm whether a person has been exposed to the coronavirus, The New York reported. The tests, called serology tests, can help confirm whether there have been populations of U.S. residents carrying the virus across the country.

Determining how many people who come into contact with the coronavirus and do not get sick is key to understanding the spread of the pandemic, according to Politico.

The tests will focus on three groups. The first group tested will be those who were not diagnosed with the coronavirus in hot spots where the disease has multiplied across the country. This would include areas like New York City, now the epicenter of the virus in the United States. 

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ITALY’S RECIPE FOR DISASTER By Giacomino Nicolazzo

By on April 5th, 2020

NO URL HERE…..SENT TO STEVE S.-AN E-PAL- A MOST INSTRUCTIVE COLUMN

Giacomino Nicolazzo_ is one of Italy’s most beloved writers. Born and raised in Central Pennsylvania, he lives in a small village in Lombardy where he writes his books. _

Montecalvo, Lombardy, Italy_. As I sit here in my involuntary isolation, it was just reported that overnight 743 more people died and 5.249 new cases have been reported. This brings the total cases of infection to 69,176 and the body count to 6,820. We take relief in knowing that 8,326 people have recovered so far. (Numbers as of 3/24, 8:30pm in Italy 

Most towns here in Italy, from the upper reaches of the Alps to the ancient shores of Sicilia and Sardenia, while not deserted, are closer to being ghost towns than the bustling centers of tourism, business and daily life they were just a few weeks ago.

Stores and shops have been shuttered. Restaurants and coffee shops no longer serve customers. Schools, universities, sporting arenas…even our museums and theaters…all closed. Even the Vatican City has closed its gates and armed patrols monitor the 20 foot tall walls that protect it!

Streets and roads are now empty for as far as the eye can see. Normally, they would be filled with crazed Italian drivers in tiny cars and scooters (the ones that sound like demonic insects) darting here and
there, reaching the limits of centrifugal force on our roundabouts. In the piazze of our towns and cities, there are now officially more pigeons than people. Many of us know someone who has been infected and recovered. Some of us know someone who did not recover…now they are dead. But everyone knows someone who has been affected by this microscopic monster in one way or another.

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