Dr. Fauci’s Interventions By Michael Brendan Dougherty

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/dr-faucis-interventions/?utm_source=recirc-desktop&utm_medium=homepage&utm_campaign=river&utm_content=featured-content-trending&utm_term=second

Dr. Anthony Fauci’s interventions continue to lose coherence and connection from reality.

We are now at the point where Fauci seems to be implying that normality will never come back, and where reasonable people may draw the inference that getting vaccinated is vaguely socially irresponsible.

Take his comments this week, from a report at Business Insider:

“There are things, even if you’re vaccinated, that you’re not going to be able to do in society,” Fauci said on Monday during a White House COVID-19 press briefing. “For example, indoor dining, theaters, places where people congregate. That’s because of the safety of society.”

“We hope that when the data comes in, it’s going to show that the virus level is quite low and you’re not transmitting it,” Fauci said, cautioning: “We don’t know that now. And for that reason, we want to make sure that people continue to wear masks despite the fact that they’re vaccinated.”

The first thing to ask is: What planet are you living on? People are dining indoors and going to movie theaters right now. Many schools are open and are managing to keep transmission very low.

Now, the background to Fauci’s comments is that, with some diseases, vaccination may reduce the incidence of serious disease and death, but may not stop people from contracting and transmitting the virus.

Tanden votes scrapped in latest sign of trouble for budget nominee Another bad sign for White House budget director nominee’s chances By Jennifer Shutt

https://rollcall.com/2021/02/24/tanden-votes-scrapped-in-latest-sign-of-trouble-for-budget-nominee/

The two Senate committees tasked with approving Neera Tanden’s nomination to be White House budget chief postponed their Wednesday votes, hours before senators were expected to vote on the nominee.

An aide to Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Democrats said the panel postponed the meeting because “members need more time to consider the nominee.”

“The president deserves to have a team in place that he wants, and we’re going to work with our members to figure out the best path forward,” said the aide, who was not authorized to speak publicly about internal deliberations.

The Senate Budget Committee, which shares jurisdiction, never officially set a time for its expected business meeting on Wednesday. A Senate aide who spoke on condition of anonymity said Wednesday morning the vote had been postponed.

Several high-profile defections in recent days have put Tanden’s confirmation in jeopardy, starting with Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin III of West Virginia, who said Friday he couldn’t support her based on her past attacks on other lawmakers.

Later on Wednesday morning, the Budget committee scheduled a confirmation hearing for Shalanda Young, whom Biden has nominated for deputy director at the Office of Management and Budget, on March 2. Young, a popular former top aide to House Appropriations Democrats, has been on the short list of potential candidates to replace Tanden if her nomination continues to falter.

Confirming Young as deputy, which under Senate rules could occur after just two hours of debate versus up to 30 hours for the No. 1 position at OMB, would position her to at minimum take the role of acting OMB director while the Biden administration decides its next move.

Who is really pushing misinformation? Two House Representatives want channels they don’t like taken off air

https://spectator.us/topic/really-pushing-misinformation-eshoo-mcnerney-cnn/

There’s a new administration in town. On Monday, House Democrats Anna Eshoo and Jerry McNerney, both members of the House Energy and Commerce committee, sent letters to 12 grand poobahs of television to make sure they were properly updating their ideological software.

‘Some purported news outlets have long been misinformation rumor mills and conspiracy theory hotbeds that produce content that leads to real harm,’ the letter says. ‘Are you planning to continue carrying Fox News, Newsmax, and OANN… now and beyond any contract renewal date? If so, why?’

Sadly, America’s government grows less transparent by the day, so the letter conceals half its content beneath a layer of subtext. That’s a nice TV company you have there, it says. Would be a real shame if something happened to it. TV companies that want to avoid a regulatory stink-eye are encouraged to make the bad voices disappear from the television.

Tragically, like Funes from the Borges story, Cockburn is cursed with the ability to remember things. So he remembers the four years of shrieking that every Twitter tantrum by President Trump was the worst attack on Liberty since the Israelis accidentally strafed it in the Six-Day War. In 2018, Trump was sued by CNN because he wouldn’t allow CNN’s Jim Acosta to keep Acostabating in the White House. PEN America sued the Trump White House in part because he was supposedly targeting the Washington Post by wanting Amazon to pay higher Postal Service delivery fees. The ACLU kept a running list of offenses which they claimed represented ‘an assault on the cornerstone of American democracy.’

Biden’s twisted immigration policy Who built the cages, Joe?

https://spectator.us/topic/biden-immigration-policy-migrant-protection-protocols/

Immigration, a top issue before and during the Trump presidency, has become much less of a concern for Americans over the past year due to the primacy of the pandemic and the ensuing economic shutdown. That, combined with the press’s lackadaisical approach to covering the Biden administration, means there hasn’t been enough media scrutiny of Biden’s incoherent border policy.

Frequently the Biden administration’s words do not match its actions, primarily because it does not seem to understand that policies have real-world consequences. For example, after Biden campaigned on loosening Trump’s stricter enforcement of immigration law, thousands of Honduran migrants formed a caravan to come to the US in hopes of gaining entry. The Biden team tried to put the genie back in the bottle. An unnamed transition team official told NBC News that migrants ‘need to understand they’re not going to be able to come into the United States immediately’.

Such messages are meaningless of course, unless they are accompanied by an actual policy change to eliminate the pull factors that incentivize migrants to attempt to cross the border. Instead, after taking office, Biden proposed legislation that would grant amnesty to 11 million illegal immigrants already in the country, signed a memo upholding DACA and is phasing out the Migrant Protection Protocols program.

NOT MENTALLY FIT: 36 Democrats Demand Biden Give Up Nuclear Codes

https://populist.press/dems-taking-full-control-of-nuclear-weapons-away-from-biden/

Hot Air reports:

Say, Why Are House Dems Calling On Biden To Give Up Full Control Of Nuclear Weapons?

Which answer do you want first — the fun answer, or the better answer? Let’s start off with the fun answer, but first, let’s specify precisely what House Democrats want from Joe Biden. A letter signed by three dozen of his party’s caucus urges the new president to relinquish full control over the country’s nuclear weapons in favor of a committee approach…

From Politico:

Nearly three dozen House Democrats on Monday called on Biden to relinquish his sole authority to launch nuclear weapons, in the latest appeal to reform the command-and-control structure so that no single person can initiate a nuclear war.

“…Vesting one person with this authority entails real risks,” states the letter spearheaded by Rep. Jimmy Panetta of California. “Past presidents have threatened to attack other countries with nuclear weapons or exhibited behavior that caused other officials to express concern about the president’s judgment.“

Why a Durham Report Is Becoming Highly Unlikely Lee Smith

lhttp://www.theepochtimes.com/why-a-durham-report-is-becoming-highly-unlikely_3708000.html

Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee say they want to know if President Joe Biden’s nominee for Attorney General Merrick Garland will allow Special Counsel John Durham’s investigation into the origins of the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Crossfire Hurricane probe to continue. “I have no reason to think he should not remain in place,” Garland told Sen. Chuck Grassley Monday.

In reality, if confirmed Garland will not allow Durham to stay in place, never mind issue a report. The prospect that Biden’s attorney general might allow Durham to indict former Barack Obama administration officials is ludicrous. Remember that documents released over the last year gave evidence that as vice-president Biden was not only aware of the spying operation against Trump officials but participated in it. Biden not only knew that the FBI was framing incoming National Security Advisor Michael Flynn but suggested that the Department of Justice might charge Flynn for violating the Logan Act.

In other words, the FBI officials that Durham is reportedly investigating are Biden’s co-conspirators. To allow them to be indicted would not only point to Biden’s guilt but also show that the most powerful man in the world is unable or unwilling to protect allies who have helped advance the cause of the party he now leads. That would show Biden to be weak. Garland understands that his primary duty as Biden’s chief law enforcement officer is not to oversee the fair and equal treatment of all Americans under the law, but to protect the president and the party he serves.

The Biden administration has already shown it is a very different animal than Trump’s. During his four years in office, Trump’s allies complained that his biggest problem was staffing. It’s true that key spots in his administration were filled with officials who opposed his America First agenda. There were problems with the personnel office, insiders explain. Further, sometimes Trump family members pressed for friends without the experience or commitment to implement Trump’s vision. But even those least experienced or most opposed to Trump’s vision would’ve fallen in line, if he’d given them cause to fear him.

Germany: Covid-19 Triggers New Wave of Anti-Semitism by Soeren Kern

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17095/germany-covid-antisemitism

German police reported a total of 2,275 anti-Semitic hate crimes — an average of six per day — in 2020, according to preliminary data provided by the federal government. The tally represents a more than 10% increase over the number of anti-Semitic crimes reported in 2019… Police were able to identify 1,367 suspects — but only five individuals were ultimately arrested.

It remains unclear why so few perpetrators have faced legal consequences for their crimes, especially when government officials repeatedly claim that fighting anti-Semitism is a top priority. A reason may be that it is politically incorrect to identify the true suspects.

German police, possibly under orders from political authorities, systematically assign unsolved anti-Semitic hate crimes to the far right.

“Why are the majority of anti-Semitic acts attributed to ‘right-wing’ German perpetrators? One can see a political motive behind this — growing anti-Semitism can be used politically as a weapon ‘against the right.'” — Tichys Einblick.

“There has been criticism from experts for a long time that the allocation of the vast majority of anti-Semitism cases to right-wing extremist perpetrators is incorrect and that other groups of perpetrators, for example from Islamist and other Muslim circles, are given too little attention.” — Die Welt.

“Even today, anti-Semitism is not just a phenomenon of the right-wing extremist fringes. It reaches into the middle of our society.” — German Foreign Minister Heiko Mass.

The number of anti-Semitic hate crimes in Germany surged to a two-decade high in 2020, according to new statistics released by the German government. Anti-Semitism in Germany has been steadily growing in recent years, fueled in part by far-left anti-Israel activists and by mass migration from the Muslim world. The problem is now being exacerbated by the Coronavirus pandemic, which far-right conspiracy theorists are blaming on both Jews and Israel.

German police reported a total of 2,275 anti-Semitic hate crimes — an average of six per day — in 2020, according to preliminary data provided by the federal government. The tally represents a more than 10% increase over the number of anti-Semitic crimes reported in 2019, itself a record-breaking year for such offenses. The official numbers represent only the crimes reported to the police; the actual number of incidents is presumably much bigger.

MY SAY: JOHN STUART MILL (1806-1873)

I am always dazzled by the genius of John Stuart Mill-philosopher, political economist, parliamentarian, and civil servant.  In a few pithy words he lances the arguments defending the present curtailment of freedom of speech and opinion.

“If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind.”

― John Stuart Mill, On Liberty

Why Do the Election’s Defenders Require My Agreement?  The purpose of voting today is to give a democratic veneer to an undemocratic regime—not to give the people a say in the direction of their government.  By Michael Anton

https://amgreatness.com/2021/02/23/why-do-the-elections-defenders-require-my-agreement/

Recently, I appeared as a guest on Andrew Sullivan’s podcast. Sullivan is vociferously anti-Trump, so I expected us to disagree—which, naturally, we did. But I was surprised by the extent to which he insisted I assent to his assertion that the 2020 election was totally on the level. That is to say, I wasn’t surprised that Sullivan thinks it was; I was surprised by his evident yearning to hear me say so, too. 

Which I could not do. 

Sullivan badgered me on this at length before finally accusing me of being fixated on the topic, to which I responded, truthfully, that I was only talking about it because he asked. As far as I’m concerned, the 2020 election is well and truly over. I have, I said, “moved on.” 

So I thought. Then I received two emails from a friendly acquaintance who is a recognized Republican expert on elections that suggested he, too, is troubled by my lack of belief. Then came two other data points, which I noticed only after the first draft this essay had been completed. Ramesh Ponnuru snarked (snark seems to be the go-to, indeed the only, device his in literary quiver) that one of the anomalies I cited in my most recent article in the Claremont Review of Books had been “debunked” by the partisan left-wing FactCheck.org. While I appreciate the insight into the sources from which National Review editors get their “facts” these days, the quote provided admits that the statistic I cited is, well, accurate. Ponurru naturally ignores all of the other points raised in my earlier article.

Jonathan Chait wrote yet another (his 12th?) article denouncing me, for this same sin of disbelief. Why did he bother? Is there even a remote chance that a single one of his New York magazine readers either read my article or encountered its argument? Or is he worried that the “narrative” of the election is so fragile that it needs to be shored up?

I wanted to move on, I really did. But when Left (Chait), center (Sullivan), faux-right anti-conservative ankle-biter (Ponnuru), and genuine, if establishment, Right (my correspondent) all agree that my lack of belief is a problem, I wondered why this should be so, and the following observations came to mind. 

Let me begin by repeating something I said to Sullivan: I do not actively disbelieve in the outcome of the 2020 election. I do not assert that the election was stolen. I also do not believe the election was totally fair, “belief” being an affirmative mental state. I say only that I don’t know; I haven’t been convinced either way. One side tried to convince me and failed (at least so far). The other side has made no such attempt but instead mostly shouts in my face that I must believe. The latter effort, in addition to being aggravating and insulting, has been less effective. 

Philip Haney Not Resting in Peace One year after DHS whistleblower was gunned down, FBI still not releasing results of forensic investigation. Lloyd Billingsley

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/02/philip-haney-not-resting-peace-lloyd-billingsley/

Philip Haney is the author of author of  See Something Say Nothing: A Homeland Security Officer Exposes the Government’s Submission to Jihad. One year ago, on February 21, 2020, Philip Haney was “found deceased in our jurisdiction,” in Amador County, California. According to the county sheriff, “a forensic autopsy was scheduled and performed,” but the case was more complicated.

“At that time, we reached out to the Federal Bureau of Investigation to assist in analyzing documents, phone records, numerous thumb drives and a lap top that were recovered from the scene and Mr. Haney’s RV. Those items and numerous other pieces of evidence, were turned over to the FBI. The FBI has performed a forensic examination of these items. We expect to receive these reports within the next few weeks.”

That was the Amador County sheriff in a press release dated July 22, 2020, their most recent update on the case. Last week, the Amador sheriff’s office told Frontpage there was no new press release, and would say nothing else about the case. Last week, Amador undersheriff Gary Redman told Jack Mitchell of the local Ledger Dispatch, “We are waiting for a few remaining pieces to be analyzed out of Virginia,” but there was “no estimated time of arrival.”

Sources close to Haney told Mitchell the “documents,” found at the scene were from the manuscript of Haney’s new book, also on a thumb drive Haney carried at all times. Last September, the Department of Justice told journalist Rex Hastings these items were “exempt from disclosure” under the Freedom of Information Act. Even so, last week Frontpage asked the FBI about the documents, phone records, thumb drives and laptop. What did the forensic examination reveal?