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A Tiny Virus Further Sickens the Fevered Media Mob . By Frank Miele

Posted By on April 20th, 2020

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2020/04/20/a_tiny_virus_further_sickens_the_fevered_media_mob_142976.html

In his 1898 novel, “The War of the Worlds,” H.G. Wells imagined a world changed forever by something like our dread coronavirus. In that familiar story, Martian invaders were close to total domination of the Earth when they were unexpectedly vanquished by the “germs of disease,” famously called by Wells “the humblest things that God, in his wisdom, had put upon this earth.”

In the novel, mankind is saved by germs, but in modern Hollywood science fiction viruses are usually employed to devastate human society, or change it forever. The extent to which COVID-19 will leave a permanent mark on us is yet unknown, but it is safe to declare that generations of future doctoral students will study its impact on everything from handshakes to food supply chains.

Within the sphere of politics, we have already seen short-term impacts to elections and how legislative bodies do their work, but the question of how the psychology of crisis will translate into permanent changes in the relationship between the governed and the government can only be answered with informed guesses. Is the rebellion in Michigan against Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s stringent stay-at-home orders the first shot in a war against the nanny state or the last gasp of “consent of the governed”? Will the electorate become enamored of receiving “paychecks” from the government for not working, or will it chafe at adding untold trillions to the national debt and demand new austerity measures? Can the political media continue to play the role of a Greek chorus, pretending to speak for the general population and assuming a posture of omniscience despite being mainly aligned with one political party – and being so wrong so often?

It is that last question that consumes me today as I watch yet again the White House press corps savage President Trump. It’s become a daily ritual, and one that I enjoy not because the president is being attacked, but because he so deftly fends off the swarming journalistic pests like Gulliver shaking loose from a dozen Lilliputians who mistakenly thought they had the giant pinned.

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It’s Time to Build We were unprepared for the coronavirus pandemic. Here’s what we need to do about it. Marc Andreessen

Posted By on April 20th, 2020

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2020/04/its-time-build-frontpagemagcom/

Editors’ note: We are proud to publish the following article by Marc Andreessen  on the long-term crisis facing our nation, and what can be done to create a better future. Marc is co-author of Mosaic, the first widely used web browser, co-founder of Netscape, co-founder of the Silicon Valley venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, and a member of Facebook’s board of directors. In 1994, he was one of six inductees to the World Wide Web Hall of Fame.

Every Western institution was unprepared for the coronavirus pandemic, despite many prior warnings. This monumental failure of institutional effectiveness will reverberate for the rest of the decade, but it’s not too early to ask why, and what we need to do about it.

Many of us would like to pin the cause on one political party or another, on one government or another. But the harsh reality is that it all failed — no Western country, or state, or city was prepared — and despite hard work and often extraordinary sacrifice by many people within these institutions. So the problem runs deeper than your favorite political opponent or your home nation. Part of the problem is clearly foresight, a failure of imagination. But the other part of the problem is what we didn’t *do* in advance, and what we’re failing to do now. And that is a failure of action, and specifically our widespread inability to *build*.

We see this today with the things we urgently need but don’t have. We don’t have enough coronavirus tests, or test materials — including, amazingly, cotton swabs and common reagents. We don’t have enough ventilators, negative pressure rooms, and ICU beds. And we don’t have enough surgical masks, eye shields, and medical gowns — as I write this, New York City has put out a desperate call for rain ponchos to be used as medical gowns. Rain ponchos! In 2020! In America!

We also don’t have therapies or a vaccine — despite, again, years of advance warning about bat-borne coronaviruses. Our scientists will hopefully invent therapies and a vaccine, but then we may not have the manufacturing factories required to scale their production. And even then, we’ll see if we can deploy therapies or a vaccine fast enough to matter — it took scientists 5 years to get regulatory testing approval for the new Ebola vaccine after that scourge’s 2014 outbreak, at the cost of many lives. In the U.S., we don’t even have the ability to get federal bailout money to the people and businesses that need it. Tens of millions of laid off workers and their families, and many millions of small businesses, are in serious trouble *right now*, and we have no direct method to transfer them money without potentially disastrous delays. A government that collects money from all its citizens and businesses each year has never built a system to distribute money to us when it’s needed most.

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Suppression of Expression Obscures the Truth About the Virus Victor David Hanson

Posted By on April 20th, 2020

https://amgreatness.com/2020/04/19/suppression-of-expression-obscures-the-truth-about-the-virus/

What explained the paradox of near paranoia to some inquiries but magnanimous tolerance of other absurdities? Usually, one of three explanations suffice—and often all three together.

Americans are acquainted with predictable but ultimately failed progressive efforts to suppress free expression by preemptive invective and politically correct finger-pointing.

To believe that U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s accusers revealed too many contradictions, too many lacunae, too many episodes of timely amnesia, and too many unsubstantiated accusations in their testimonies was chauvinistically to attack/smear/silence all women’s voices—at least until the same sort of memory-repressed accusations focused on handsy Joe Biden.

To express skepticism that current global temperatures are uniformly rising almost entirely due to human carbon emissions, that this state of affairs poses catastrophic dangers that may end civilization as we know it, and that this emergency can only be addressed by the radical restructuring of global economies is to be rendered a denialist, a crank, a fool.

But these parameters of censorship have a logic and predictability, given their race/class/gender/environmental orthodoxy.

Shifting Pandemic Orthodoxy

What explains the current taboo on topics regarding the coronavirus?

It is now a truism that almost every influential model that has been advanced about the spread of the coronavirus was flawed. They almost all erred on the side of exaggerated morbidity. But to suggest that in public is deemed heresy.

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‘Let us work’ protests spread all across the US this weekend; demonstrators labeled as ‘far-right’ | Vivek Saxena

Posted By on April 20th, 2020

https://www.bizpacreview.com/2020/04/19/let-us-work-protests-spread-all-across-the-us-this-weekend-demonstrators-labeled-as-far-right-910354

As protests against coronavirus-based lockdowns continue spreading across the country (and globe), authorities are growing increasingly despotic and arguably fascist in their enforcement of “stay-at-home” orders, with police in one community arresting a woman for simply planning a protest.

That woman, Kim Pagan of New Jersey, reportedly faces charges for “organizing a prohibited event” that involved protesters gathering in order “to demonstrate against” Gov. Phil Murphy‘s potentially unconstitutional coronavirus restrictions.

“Pagan has to answer to the charge in Muncipal Court. Violations of emergency orders constitute a disorderly persons offense carrying a potential sentence of up to six months in jail and a $1,000 fine,” Fox News reported.

On Friday, New Jersey Attorney General Gurbir Grewal posted a tweet in which he seemed to mock Pagan and other locals who’ve been charged for violating the governor’s authoritarian decrees:

But try as he and other officials might to infringe on the American people’s constitutionally guaranteed right “peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances,” protests continue to blossom throughout the country, from Nevada to Idaho, Texas and even California.

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WaPo comes to the defense of WHO By Allan J. Favish

Posted By on April 20th, 2020

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

The Washington Post’s so-called “Fact-Checker” omitted critical facts from his article criticizing President Donald Trump’s condemnation of the World Health Organization. On April 17, 2020, Glenn Kessler’s “Analysis Trump’s false claim that the WHO said the coronavirus was ‘not communicable’” gave President Trump three out of four “Pinocchios” for the allegedly deceptive statement that the WHO “publicly endorsed the idea that there was not human-to-human transmission happening” and that the WHO said it was “not communicable.”       

Kessler quotes a January 13, 2020 WHO news release which states: “To date, there has been no suggestion of human to human transmission of this new coronavirus.”  Kessler does not make any comment specifically about this sentence. Moreover, Kessler cites a document that proves that there was such a “suggestion” before January 13, 2020 but does not quote from that part of the document.  Kessler states:

Dec. 31, 2019:  The WHO was alerted to a potentially new virus in China.

That same day, the Taiwan Centers for Disease Control said it sent an email to the WHO regarding rumors of at least “seven cases of atypical pneumonia,” which it said is code in China for “a disease transmitted between humans caused by coronavirus.”

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How the Media Completely Blew the Trump Ventilator Story By Rich Lowry

Posted By on April 20th, 2020

https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/04/coronavirus-response-ventilators-trump-administration-handled-potential-shortage-deftly/

The administration handled the potential shortage deftly. 

At a coronavirus-task-force briefing at the beginning of April, White House adviser Jared Kushner explained the approach that would — as events proved — get the country through its ventilator crisis.

He was relentlessly pilloried, mocked, and distorted in the press for it.

After nearly four years of unrelieved Trump hysteria in the media, it’s hard to rank the worst journalistic outrages, but how Kushner’s remarks were misreported and misinterpreted belongs high on the list.

Much of the press coverage and subsequent commentary focused on one sentence at that April 2 briefing: “The notion of the federal stockpile was it’s supposed to be our stockpile. It’s not supposed to states’ stockpiles that they then use.”

Cue the outrage. As CNBC put it, correctly, in a headline, “Jared Kushner slammed for saying the federal medical supply stockpile isn’t meant for states.”

The blue-checkmarks on Twitter descended in force. Representative Ted Lieu tweeted, “Dear Jared Kushner of the @realDonaldTrump: We are the UNITED STATES of America. The federal stockpile is reserved for all Americans living in our states not just federal employees. Get it?”

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Propaganda masquerading as fact checking By Eugene Veklerov

Posted By on April 20th, 2020

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

Fact checking was devised to be a trusted way to separate fact from fiction. In reality, many journalists use the label “fact checking” as a cover for promoting their own biases. A case in point is an Associated Press (AP) piece headlined AP FACT CHECK: Trump’s inaccurate boasts on China travel ban, which was published on March 26, 2020, and carried by many news outlets.

So let us check this fact-checker.

The lead of the AP article reads as follows:

Defending early missteps in the U.S. response to the coronavirus, President Donald Trump has repeatedly boasted of travel restrictions on China that he suggests he decided on his own over the objections of health experts and saved “thousands” of lives.

The verdict of the AP piece:

His claims aren’t substantiated.

To support its verdict, the AP piece presents several arguments, all of which begin with the words “THE FACTS” (in all caps). Let us address these arguments. For the sake of clarity, THE FACTS presented by the AP piece are italicized. My responses begin with the words “THE REBUTTAL.”

THE FACTS: His [President Trump’s] decision was far from solo nor was it made over opposition from health experts, as the White House coronavirus task force makes clear. His decision followed a consensus by his public health advisers that the restrictions should take place.

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Adam Schiff’s Dirty Impeachment Tactics Coming to Light By Robyn Dolgin

Posted By on April 20th, 2020

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2020/04/adam_schiffs_dirty_impeachment_tactics_coming_to_light.html

Rep. Adam Schiff spent months launching secret impeachment hearings, never thinking his conduct would be called into question.

He is now caught in the crosshairs of a formidable government agent, Mr. Brendan Carr, Federal Communication Commissioner. The impeachment may be over, but Mr. Carr is formally investigating Rep. Schiff for violating privacy laws — more like obliterating ethical boundaries — by setting up his own surveillance state to target the president’s allies.

Carr is currently uncovering the diabolical nature of the congressman’s “surveillance state.” At the time, Schiff resorted to such desperate measures because he didn’t have much of an impeachment case: Therefore, he issued secret subpoenas to phone carriers hoping to mine the private data of his political opponents, or in effect ransacking their private lives.

The objective was to obtain and publish the calls of Trump’s allies.

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Gunman Kills 16 in Rampage, Deadliest in Canadian History

Posted By on April 20th, 2020

https://www.theepochtimes.com/gunman-in-canadas-deadliest-mass-shooting-identified-16-dead_3318461.html

TORONTO—A man disguised as a police officer went on a shooting rampage in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia, killing 16 people Sunday, in the deadliest such attack in the country’s history. Officials said the suspected shooter was also dead.

A police officer was among those killed. Several bodies were found inside and outside one home in the small, rural town of Portapique, about 60 miles (100 kilometers) north of Halifax—what police called the first scene. Bodies were also found at other locations.

Overnight, police began advising residents of the town—already on lockdown because of the coronavirus pandemic—to lock their doors and stay in their basements. Several homes in the area were set on fire as well.

Police identified the man believed to be the shooter as Gabriel Wortman, 51, who was thought to live part-time in Portapique. Authorities said he wore a police uniform at one point and made his car look like a Royal Canadian Mounted Police cruiser. Authorities believe he may have targeted his first victims but then began attacking randomly.

Police first announced that they had arrested Wortman at a gas station in Enfield, outside Halifax, but later said he had died. It was not clear how, and they did not explain further.

“This is one of the most senseless acts of violence in our province’s history,” said Nova Scotia Premier Stephen McNeil.

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A Visit to Europe’s Front With Russia Ukraine has held the line with separatists for six years. By Bernard-Henri Lévy

Posted By on April 20th, 2020

https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-visit-to-europes-front-with-russia-11587166080?mod=opinion_major_pos4

Mariupol, Ukraine

The huge troop-transport helicopter dates from the Soviet era. It flies just above the tree line, nose down, to avoid Russian radar. After two hours of flying over smooth ground, frozen lakes and ruined villages in the dark winter night, we arrive here at the headquarters of the Navy Guard, where we meet the officers who for six years have led the fight against pro-Russian separatists in the Donbass region.

I didn’t wait for the briefing. The nearly deserted fish market in the center of town told the story. So did the empty shops on Lenin Avenue and the enormous blast furnaces of the Azovstal factory, running at half power and emitting thin clouds of dirty black smoke. This shutdown of a key industrial city wasn’t caused by a pandemic. The separatists, unable to take control of the city, imposed a blockade.

In Shyrokyne, a seaside resort half an hour’s drive east, all that remains of its 2,000 residents are a couple, Maxime and Tatiana, former innkeepers who’ve come in under the protection of a national guard unit to lay flowers at his father’s grave. The elegant houses that lined Shapotika and Pushkin streets are reduced to piles of rubble. Lt. Martha Shturma, our interpreter, says this was an ordinary resort with no strategic importance. Its remains to tell a story of gratuitous destruction: the church with the collapsed roof; the clinic reduced to concrete pillars and mined; the school pulverized by heavy artillery, where we find a section of blackboard, half-burned notebooks and a backpack, miraculously spared.