NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Feinstein’s Real Insider Trading Scandal Is Selling America Out To China Ben Weingarten

Posted By on March 23rd, 2020

https://thefederalist.com/2020/03/23/feinsteins-real-insider-trading-scandal-is-selling

The far more consequential story is Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s participation in richly profiting from the U.S.-China policy for which she has lobbied for 40 years.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) rightly faces a potential scandal for dumping several million dollars’ worth of stock while privy to sensitive information as a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee before a major drop in financial markets due to coronavirus. But the far more consequential story is Feinstein’s participation in the biggest insider trade of all in her family richly profiting from the U.S.-China policy for which she has lobbied for 40 years.

This policy of dramatically expanded economic and political ties between America and China while turning a blind eye to the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) tyranny—enabling China to become a world power heavily integrated into global supply chains and international institutions—has contributed to this China-driven pandemic.

A Long History of Friendship with Communists

As detailed in an earlier Federalist exposéspurred by revelations that Feinstein had employed a staffer for nearly two decades who was spying for the Chinese government, arguably no politician in American history has maintained a deeper, more longstanding, and friendlier relationship at the highest levels of the CCP than Feinstein. This dates back to at least the normalization of U.S.-China relations in 1979, when shortly thereafter, as mayor of San Francisco, Feinstein established a “sister city” relationship with Shanghai and Mayor Jiang Zemin.

CHARLOTTE'S NEWS WEB, NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Biden slow to explain why he’d be quicker than Trump in tackling coronavirus Byron York

Posted By on March 23rd, 2020

www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/biden-slow-to-explain-why-hed-be-quicker-than-trump-in-tackling-virus

Give Joe Biden some credit. On Jan. 27, he published an op-ed in USA Today recognizing that the coronavirus outbreak could become a big problem. But he devoted nearly the entire piece to bashing President Trump, then fighting off impeachment from Biden’s old Democratic colleagues on Capitol Hill, and nearly none of it to explaining what he, Joe Biden, would do to fight the pandemic.

Since then, where has Biden been? It’s been eight weeks since the Iowa caucuses, when Biden began a terrible stretch at the polls that threatened his presidential candidacy. It’s been three weeks since South Carolina and Super Tuesday, when he roared back and took a big lead over rival Bernie Sanders. Two weeks since primaries in Michigan and other states, when Biden took a prohibitive lead in the delegate race. And it’s been one week since primaries in Florida and elsewhere, when Biden essentially became the presumptive nominee.

During that time, the coronavirus outbreak has turned into a historic national crisis.

So, what has the man who wants to be the next president, now confident of his path to his party’s nomination, done? Not a lot. Biden is “largely out of sight hunkered down in Delaware,” the New York Times reported Sunday.

MEDIA Comments turned off

Nolte: Increasingly Unstable Media Demand Blackout of Trump’s Coronavirus Briefings John Nolte

Posted By on March 23rd, 2020

https://www.breitbart.com/the-media/2020/03/22/nolte-increasingly-unstable-media-demand-blackout-of-trumps-coronavirus-briefings/

America’s increasingly unstable and dangerous establishment media are calling for a full blackout of President Trump’s daily coronavirus press conferences.

Think about that for a moment…

For the first time since World War II, for the first time in nearly 80 years, Americans have no idea what their country will look like a year from now, and the corporate media want to impose a full blackout on the daily briefings the American president is making to the American people.

There’s a lot of jokes out there about the hypocrisy of how this demand is coming from the same media that had a tantrum over the White House canceling the daily press briefings. But this time we’re talking about something so much more than hypocrisy.

We are currently in the middle of global pandemic, a state of siege that, in just two weeks, has shut down our economy and locked many of us up in our homes, either by government decree of just plain old fear, and…

In a time of national crisis, the left-wing fascists in the media want to use their corporate monopoly to put a stop to the president of the United States communicating directly with the American people who elected him.

CHARLOTTE'S NEWS WEB, NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

The Economic Disaster Media And Washington Haven’t Begun To Notice Christopher Bedford

Posted By on March 23rd, 2020

https://thefederalist.com/2020/03/23/the-economic-disaster-media-and-washington-havent-begun-to-notice/

The U.S. economy is in trouble, and if you can believe it, that trouble isn’t simply the closure of Main Street, the massive number of nationwide layoffs, and the danger of financial crisis we’ve all heard about. As companies run out of cash, pushing them toward insolvency, our country’s business-to-business trust is at risk of coming apart — tearing and ultimately collapsing the delicate system that keeps industries as diverse as farming, chemicals, and aluminum profitable and solvent.

Just beyond — and in the midst of — the public health and financial liquidity crises is the expansive and potentially devastating solvency crisis. It won’t be solved by the Federal Reserve or Washington stimulus, although there is a way to draw from an important Depression-era lesson and hold it at bay.

 

While government and scientists across the planet rush to find a vaccine or treatment, the harsh medicine we’ve prescribed is turning off much day-to-day economic activity. Normal things like work or family trips, eating out, going to a bar, or even regularly driving our cars have all ground to a crawl and, in many instances, a complete halt.

ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

Why Your Parents Aren’t Idiots For Not Freaking Out About Coronavirus Like You Are by Helen Raleigh

Posted By on March 23rd, 2020

https://thefederalist.com/2020/03/23/why-your-parents-arent-idiots-for-not-freaking-out-about-coronavirus-like-you-are/

I asked my parents if they are worried about the coronavirus, and they told me they had been through much worse in their lives. They aren’t freaking out like we are because they have seen it all.

My cousin called the other day and sounded very stressed. Come to think of it, who doesn’t feel a bit stressed these days? Her source of stress was her parents, who are in their 70s. She complained they would not take this Wuhan coronavirus outbreak seriously.

What she really meant was that they are not making the same choices about it that she is. Neither of her parents wear the masks she sent them when they are out and about, they didn’t stock up on hand sanitizer or toilet paper, her dad still planned to attend his weekly Toastmasters meeting, and her mom was getting ready to see her friends from the wine club this week. They were both bummed when their gatherings got canceled.

My cousin was beside herself. She couldn’t understand why in the world her parents wouldn’t take the coronavirus threat seriously, or why they still planned to carry out their normal routines, even given the abundance of medical data demonstrating that the elderly are the most vulnerable group in this pandemic.

WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Chinese Authorities Underreporting New Infections in Epicenter of Wuhan: Leaked Documents BY Nicole Hao

Posted By on March 23rd, 2020

The Chinese regime has maintained that there have been no new domestic infections of the CCP virus in the entire country since March 18.

Local authorities say that the epidemic has leveled off, as they ease travel restrictions and tell people to return to work.

But the situation in the ground zero of China’s epidemic, the city of Wuhan, is much worse than what has been officially reported, according to a series of internal government documents obtained by The Epoch Times.

The Epoch Times refers to the novel coronavirus, which causes the disease COVID-19, as the CCP virus because the Chinese Communist Party’s coverup and mismanagement allowed the virus to spread throughout China and create a global pandemic.

The documents include four reports from the Wuhan Municipal Health Commission, which were statistical data sheets about diagnostic test results in the city on March 14.

The data showed that there were 91 newly diagnosed patients in Wuhan on March 14. China’s National Health Commission only reported four cases for that date.

Meanwhile, two residential compounds in Wuhan posted notices to alert their residents that there were people living there who were diagnosed with the CCP virus on March 19—another indication that the Chinese regime is concealing the epidemic’s true scale.

ISRAEL Comments turned off

Palestinians: Fighting against Coronavirus, for Freedom of Speech by Khaled Abu Toameh

Posted By on March 23rd, 2020

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15785/palestinians-coronavirus-free-speech

Hamas is claiming that it is worried about the safety of the Palestinians held in Israeli prisons, often for multiple murders, while its own prisons in the Gaza Strip are full of Palestinians whose only crime is that they dared to criticize the Hamas leadership or its policies.

Did Hamas forget that just last month another Palestinian, Ahmed al-Sa’afeen, 39, died shortly after he was detained for his alleged affiliation with Fatah?

Instead of directing millions of dollars to building hospitals or improving healthcare, Hamas has for the past few years invested approximately $150 million in rebuilding its tunnel infrastructure, and has diverted dual-use construction materials such as concrete, steel, and wood, which could have gone to rebuilding Gaza’s civilian infrastructure.

According to Palestinian sources, 50 Palestinians are being held in Palestinian Authority prisons in the West Bank because of their affiliation with Hamas and other opposition groups.

Both the PA and Hamas, even during the difficult time of a pandemic, as they have made abundantly clear, do not hesitate to pursue their repressive measures against anyone who dares to speak out against financial and administrative corruption, or express views that annoy anyone leading the Palestinians.

Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist movement that has controlled the Gaza Strip since 2007, says it has taken drastic steps to prevent the spread of the coronavirus among the two million Palestinians living under its rule.

On March 22, the Hamas-controlled Ministry of Health announced the first confirmed cases of coronavirus in the Gaza Strip: two Palestinians who returned from a visit to Pakistan. The ministry said the two patients were placed in quarantine in a field hospital near Gaza’s border with Egypt.

FOREIGN POLICY, HISTORY Comments turned off

Lessons from History: The Reagan Legacy by Peter Huessy

Posted By on March 23rd, 2020

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15746/reagan-nuclear-legacy

Even if Reagan believed the Soviets would never fire a long-range missile at the US — which he certainly did not believe — what about the long-range missile threats against the United States from China? Certainly, given such threats, the United States had the right to build strategic missile defenses, making any deal to forgo missile defenses with the Soviets an absurd proposition.

Even worse, what was described as “arms control” in the SALT 1 and 2 treaties was just an agreement between the Soviets and the United States largely to build-up US nuclear arsenals as it was already planning to do even without the arms treaties.

Reagan left an open window of consensus to 1) modernize the US nuclear deterrent, 2) seek future arms control that includes limiting all nuclear weapons, including China’s, and 3) deploy more robust missile defenses especially in the near term and refuse to negotiate away America’s current and future missile defense capability.

If these three “Reagan” factors can be preserved, the US may indeed remain safe from nuclear conflict. As these policies keep the US safe, hopefully its leaders will realize how well Reagan’s policy of “peace through strength” worked.

President Ronald Reagan envisioned a future with a highly survivable and modernized nuclear arsenal, markedly lower warhead numbers reduced through verifiable arms control, and the eventual deployment of robust missile defenses. The goal? To vitiate a nuclear-armed adversary’s ability to disarm the USA through a massive nuclear strike and to defeat any small or limited attacks from rogue states or terror groups.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

A Washington Liquidity Infusion The Senate virus bill may help the economy stave off a depression.

Posted By on March 23rd, 2020

https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-washington-liquidity-infusion-11584919023?mod=opinion_lead_pos1

Federal and state governments have shut down much of the American economy, and now Washington is moving to lend its balance sheet to compensate for some of the losses it is causing. The foremost goal should be to provide liquidity to prevent defaults and business failures that will cascade into mass layoffs and another depression.

By our deadline, the Senate had not reached a final deal. But the bipartisan draft bill and summaries we’d seen on Sunday afternoon were a major improvement on the state of play on Friday. The overall cost is murky, though it will be in the multi-trillions of dollars, and that includes hundreds of billions in subsidy payments to individuals to buy broad political support.

The version we examined is nonetheless worthy of Senate passage—not least to avoid House Speaker Nancy Pelosi making it worse. She and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer were blocking a deal late Sunday with more demands from their non-virus-related policy wish list.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

These Drugs Are Helping Our Coronavirus Patients The evidence is preliminary on repurposing two treatments. But we don’t have the luxury of time. By Jeff Colyer and Daniel Hinthorn

Posted By on March 23rd, 2020

https://www.wsj.com/articles/these-drugs-are-helping-our-coronavirus-patients-11584899438?mod=trending_now_4

A flash of potential good news from the front lines of the coronavirus pandemic: A treatment is showing promise. Doctors in France, South Korea and the U.S. are using an antimalarial drug known as hydroxychloroquine with success. We are physicians treating patients with Covid-19, and the therapy appears to be making a difference. It isn’t a silver bullet, but if deployed quickly and strategically the drug could potentially help bend the pandemic’s “hockey stick” curve.

Hydroxychloroquine is a common generic drug used to treat lupus, arthritis and malaria. The medication, whose brand name is Plaquenil, is relatively safe, with the main side effect being stomach irritation, though it can cause echocardiogram and vision changes. In 2005, a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study showed that chloroquine, an analogue, could block a virus from penetrating a cell if administered before exposure. If tissue had already been infected, the drug inhibited the virus.