This time next year we'll be laughing; a memoir by Jacqueline Winspear

 Our book club met yesterday (via Zoom) to discuss Jacqueline Winspear's memoir.  She is the author of the Maisie Dobbs series, that my husband loves and has read every title on the list.  I've only read a few of them.  Because it was on our 2021-2022 list and he loves her, I bought the book for him as a Christmas gift so I could read it! https://jacquelinewinspear.com/books/this-time-next-year-well-be-laughing/

I didn't find the memoir all that compelling, but what I enjoyed were those memories with which I could identify although I am 15 years older and grew up "across the pond." She is British (now lives in California) and grew up with WWII stories told by her parents and I lived in northern Illinois hearing my parents' stories of the Great Depression.

Two chapters (the book is not linear and each seems to stand alone as if she had written them for a class, and maybe she did) resonated for me--horses and neighbors.  Young Jackie loved horses and wrote about her first encounter in her long relationship, even to this day, with horses.  Sort of like mine.  I remember the day (although not the date) I fell in love with horses.  I think it's memorable because when our family was living on highway 64 in little Mt. Morris I probably never saw a horse except in the movies or in a parade.  My grandparents lived on a farm between Franklin Grove and Ashton, but there were no horses.  When we moved to Forreston in 1946 to a small farm house on the west edge of town there was a fenced 10 acre field right at our back yard that had several horses. I was fascinated; I fell in love. From that day forward I wanted a horse, I dreamed about owning a horse, I drew pictures of horses, I began reading all the horse series like Black Stallion and Marguerite Henry. When I finally got a 2 wheeler bike, it became a horse, at recess during play time I WAS a horse, and when in 1947 we moved to a better home, I became acquainted with the Ranz men, Charlie and Raymond, father and son horse and cattle dealers who had a barn--with horses! When I was old enough to earn my own money, it was saved quarter by dime in my "Marathon" bank (my dad delivered fuel oil for Marathon). How much money can an 8 or 9 year old earn to save for a horse?  By delivering the Rockford Morning Star through the snow and rain, and by babysitting by age 10, apparently a lot. We moved back to Mt. Morris in March 1951, and that summer I babysat for $5/week (a magnificent sum for an 11 year old). Like Jackie's parents, mine had made a promise--I could have a horse if I had enough money. By the time I was in seventh grade I had saved $100.00--about $1,000 in today's value.  I counted several times a week. One day I came home from my babysitting job and there on the railing of our house on Hannah Avenue was a leather, western saddle (not sure about the bridle).  My dad got my old friend Raymond Ranz to look at a horse I wanted--a lovely roan mare my friend Mary Ann owned. He declared her "unsound"-- she had a hip problem which is probably why Mary Ann was selling her. Then dad found a chestnut and white pinto gelding owned by the Orr family who lived a few miles away on the road to Dixon.  I had never seen the horse, but he was bought sight unseen by me, and my dad rode him to our house on Hannah (how he went back for his car I don't know).  And my happy story ends there, because if you ever want to fall out of love with horses, just own one and try to support their upkeep on what a 12 year old can earn!

One of the other stories in her memoir was about her neighbors at the Terrace, one of the places the Winspears lived.  There were the Martins and Jenners who took her to Sunday School (may be the only mention of church in her memoir), Elsie who took care of her own mother, two nosy sisters, the interesting Polly who apparently was a prostitute, Auntie Marion and Uncle Bryn, and Pat and Ken, teachers who had no children of their own. So I immediately wandered back to my old neighborhood on Rt. 64, with the Aufderbecks on one side and the Crowells, Ruth and Earl, on the other. Further down the street were the Ballards, my great grandparents, and the Potters. Behind us were the Rittenhouses, the Zickhurs, the Balluffs, and the Leopolds, plus some others whose names I've forgotten. Mike and Tommy and I would ride our tricycles up and down Hitt St. and around the corner to Mike's house. But I seemed to wander in and out of the houses of the neighbors--don't remember anyone telling me I couldn't. 

 Ruth and Earl had a box of toys that were charming--much more desirable than those I had to share with my siblings.  Ruth made two cloth dolls for me, Blue Doll and White Doll, and I still have White Doll. Earl would actually play with us in the back yard--casting his fishing line for us to catch, although no one could. One of our neighbors was a chicken hatchery, and we were free to walk in and look at the baby peeps, who were just about eye level for a five year old. The Burkes lived across the street and also owned a filling station and auto repair shop.  So I knew women could have careers because Minnie ran the station and repaired cars. Although I didn't know this until she died and I read her obituary, Minnie's brother was married to my Great Aunt. So we were sort of shirt tail relatives.  When Tommy's dad (they lived next to my great grandparents) went hunting or trapping, I'd go down and inspect the skins nailed to boards in the garage.  Tommy's dad had been a famous baseball player, Nelson Potter, so everyone in town knew him. When we grew up Tom was the valedictorian of our class and I was the salutatorian, so we sort of remained friends until his death a few years ago.  He became a professor of philosophy at the University of Nebraska in Lincoln.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nelson_Thomas_Potter_Jr.  He may have been the smartest man to ever leave our little town.  Ruth died in 1950 when she was about 49 from heart problems--I was devastated, and remember to this day that phone call. Earl died in 1965 and I remember waving to him as I walked past the campus where he sat every day with the other old men when I was in high school.  In 1949, my great grandfather died, and we came from Forreston to attend the funeral.  I met people I'd never seen before--all members of my grandmother's family.

 

White Doll in center 

Putting this here

 Yesterday I had to return a scarf to Talbots before it was too late for a Christmas return.  My hair is white now, and although coral used to be my go-to color, it just doesn't work for me anymore.  So after doing business with the cashier, I decided to browse a bit.  There was a table with new arrivals so I decided to take a look.  One really cute springy T was in pink with darker roses.  Then I decided that after Valentine's Day it might be a bit seasonal.  So I picked up one that was royal blue with black and white narrow stripes. Hmm.  That might a nice 3 season style, I thought.  So I took it back to the cashier to check on the price.  With the amount I'd just put on my account, with the amount I still had from some other deep in the past exchange, the $65.50 T-shirt came down to $5.74.  Sold!  I wouldn't dream of paying $65 for a t-shirt (made in Vietnam), but this didn't seem like it, even though it was.  Royal blue is one of my favorites, and if it's not too hot, I think I can wear it late spring into summer. Also a new wrinkle.  The tag announcing that it is an "authentic Talbots" is sewn to the lower left front of the shirt.  What's up with that? 

 I'm still learning to use my new smart phone, and because of lack of strength I need both hands.  The mirror's beveled edge gives the table cloth and my shirt and extra ruffle, but this is the general idea.

  

A CNN vocabulary guide by Mike Huckabee

 If leftists burning down cities, assaulting police and looting businesses is “mostly peaceful protest,” then what is it called when working people stage a genuinely peaceful protest of a leftist government that’s destroying their businesses and violating their rights?

(A.) “Sedition”

(B.) “A threat to democracy.”

(C.) “Insurrection driven by madness”

(D.) All of the above.

Click here to see the answer (as if you don’t already know):

https://www.foxnews.com/media/cnn-freedom-convoy-protest-sedition-threat-democracy

Fentanyl poisoning

It's not an "overdose," or an "addiction," it is poisoning and some people should be held accountable.. Fentanyl, a synthetic opioid, is 50 to 100 times more potent than morphine, and up to 50 times more potent than heroin. Even tiny doses, as little as two milligrams, the size of two grains of salt, is a fatal dose for most people. Teen don't have a fully developed brain for the problems of risk taking, and are accidentally poisoned. And the origin is China, just like Covid. Why does the president not act?

https://www.rand.org/blog/2019/09/tackle-fentanyl-like-a-poisoning-outbreak-not-a-drug.html

https://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/teens-tragic-tales-meet-some-of-children-who-died-from-fentanyl-poisoning

https://www.foxnews.com/us/fentanyl-poisoning-deaths-double-30-states

Fentanyl, Covid-19 and Public Health   https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/wmh3.355

Putin and Biden and sanctions

Presidents Clinton and Obama set the stage to weaken Ukraine, so there's no reason for Putin to fear Biden who bugged out in shame from Afghanistan. Why is Biden waiting to shut down the Nord Stream pipeline (a system of offshore natural gas pipelines in Europe, running under the Baltic Sea from Russia to Germany)? Why did he shut down our Keystone pipeline making us dependent on others and unable to export energy to European countries at risk of Russian terrorism?

Biden has a REAL Russia, Russia, Russia scandal on his hands, and not a phony baloney good times fake story passed along to the Clinton campaign in 2016. Will the legacy media remain true blue?

https://www.brookings.edu/blog/order-from-chaos/2020/03/17/crimea-six-years-after-illegal-annexation/

https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1994-01-11-mn-10675-story.html

Biden ended 3 Trump measures that protected Europe from Russia and which allowed U.S. energy superiority and independence. "MedEast is the second major pipeline that the Biden administration has put a damper on: the first being the Keystone XL pipeline that would bring oil from Canada and North Dakota to the Gulf States. Canadian oil is heavy oil needed for U.S. refineries that retooled decades ago when U.S. light oil production was declining. Keystone XL would also provide more oil to the United States from an ally rather than being dependent on OPEC and Russia for oil. For several months since the pandemic began, Russia was the number 2 supplier of oil to the United States, competing with Mexico for that distinction. When Biden blocked the Keystone XL pipeline by canceling its Presidential permit, he blocked a project that went over and above existing standards to address issues such as carbon emissions, safety standards, and cooperation with indigenous people impacted by the pipeline.

Biden’s Keystone XL and MedEast pronouncements both overturn decisions made by President Trump. When Joe Biden agreed to set aside U.S. objections to the controversial Russian undersea Nord Stream 2 pipeline, he reversed former President Trump’s policy of opposing the project due to security concerns. The 760-mile Baltic Sea pipeline allows direct Russian natural gas supply to Germany and other western European countries and allows Russia to dominate the European energy market, making Putin a power player in continental Europe, where Russia already supplies over 40 percent of its natural gas." https://www.instituteforenergyresearch.org/international-issues/biden-anti-energy-onslaught-continues/

The Joe Rogan hypocrisy and double standard "scandal"

I'm waiting for all the bleeding heart blue media to count the number of times rappers have insulted and demeaned women, particularly black women, for money and then try to remove them from their platforms. Crickets. And how about a senator and former vice president and now president using the N-word in public speeches and putting down the race of candidate Obama and trying to smear Justice Thomas? Crickets x2. Why is that acceptable but a talk show comedian with a potty mouth isn't? Crickets x3. And oh, the black face on Democrat governors and comedians, just for fun, and an outspoken, nasty, mean View host? Crickets x4.

 
It's an old truism--if it weren't for double standards Democrats would have no standards at all.

Trafficking in Persons Report, 20th

As this 20th anniversary report is released, we and our allies and partners find ourselves confronting a crisis that has reached previously unimagined proportions. While urgency has always marked the fight against human trafficking, the implications of the COVID-19 pandemic have magnified the need for all stakeholders to work together in the fight more than ever. We know that human traffickers prey upon the most vulnerable and look for opportunities to exploit them. Instability and lack of access to critical services caused by the pandemic mean that the number of people vulnerable to exploitation by traffickers is rapidly growing. (2020)

https://bd.usembassy.gov/release-of-the-20th-annual-trafficking-in-persons-report/

https://sharedhope.org/2020/07/13/20th-anniversary-of-trafficking-in-persons-report/

https://www.insidernj.com/press-release/rep-smith-20th-annual-trafficking-persons-tip-report-released/

The link to the report was down and archived.

Change in focus under Biden--climate change, various "vulnerabilities" and discrimination.

This year’s Trafficking in Persons Report sends a strong message to the world that global crises, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, and enduring discriminatory policies and practices, have a disproportionate effect on individuals already oppressed by other injustices. These challenges further compound existing vulnerabilities to exploitation, including human trafficking. We must break this inhumane cycle of discrimination and injustices if we hope to one day eliminate human trafficking. (2021)

Natural immunity superior to vaccinated immunity

This is clear indisputable evidence that natural immunity is far more durable than vaccinated immunity: The Covid protection lasted for 650 days with no noticeable decline.

"Prevalence and Durability of SARS-CoV-2 Antibodies Among Unvaccinated US Adults by History of COVID-19" Jennifer L. Alejo, MD1; Jonathan Mitchell, MBBS1; Amy Chang, MD1; et al JAMA Network
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2788894

In this cross-sectional study of unvaccinated US adults, antibodies were detected in 99% of individuals who reported a positive COVID-19 test result, in 55% who believed they had COVID-19 but were never tested, and in 11% who believed they had never had COVID-19 infection. Anti-RBD levels were observed after a positive COVID-19 test result up to 20 months, extending previous 6-month durability data.5

Study limitations include lack of direct neutralization assays, the fact that antibody levels alone do not directly equate to immunity,4,6 the cross-sectional study design, a convenience sample with an unknown degree of selection bias due to public recruitment, self-reported COVID-19 test results, the study population being largely White and healthy, and lack of information on breakthrough infections. Participants were given only 1 month to complete antibody testing, which may have contributed to the 52% rate among those invited to test.

Although evidence of natural immunity in unvaccinated healthy US adults up to 20 months after confirmed COVID-19 infection is encouraging, it is unclear how these antibody levels correlate with protection against future SARS-CoV-2 infections, particularly with emerging variants. The public health implications and long-term understanding of these findings merit further consideration.

Scott Atlas of media bias

  

Trump on Truckers

"Facebook and Big Tech are seeking to destroy the Freedom Convoy of Truckers. The Freedom Convoy is peacefully protesting the harsh policies of far left lunatic Justin Trudeau who has destroyed Canada with insane Covid mandates. Now, thankfully, the Freedom Convoy could be coming to DC with American Truckers who want to protest Biden’s ridiculous Covid policies. Facebook is canceling the accounts of Freedom Convoy USA, and GoFundMe is denying access to funds that belong to the Freedom Convoy. This is unacceptable and extremely dangerous in any country that values free expression. TruthSocial is announcing today that we are welcoming the Freedom Convoy with open arms to communicate freely on TruthSocial when we launch – coming very soon! TruthSocial will fight back against Big Tech so we can protect our rights to free expression. Also, on top of everything, it is big news that Facebook daily users went down for the first time ever, people are tired of biased social media like Twitter and Facebook, and it’s showing in their numbers!" Donald Trump

Do as I say, not as I do--how progressive are Democrats

https://youtu.be/hNDgcjVGHIw

When Democrats have the power, just how progressive are they?

Start with housing.  The vote down low income housing--but they say they want it.

Then tax codes.  The wealthiest pay the lowest tax rate--but they are Democrats.  Texas is more liberal than Washington state on taxes.

What about education?  World class in every zip code? 140 districts in one county--Cook in Illinois. So there is great inequity in funding schools.  Same in wealthy Connecticut.  Liberals don't want to share. Than blame Republicans for the crises in blue states.

This video had about 6 million view when I watched it.

Pamphlet from 1916

A squirrley tail--noticed on Facebook

The Presbyterian church called a meeting to decide what to do about their squirrel infestation. After much prayer and consideration, they concluded that the squirrels were predestined to be there, and they should not interfere with God’s divine will.

At the Baptist church, the squirrels had taken an interest in the baptistry. The deacons met and decided to put a water-slide on the baptistry and let the squirrels drown themselves. The squirrels liked the slide and, unfortunately, knew instinctively how to swim, so twice as many squirrels showed up the following week.

The Lutheran church decided that they were not in a position to harm any of God’s creatures. So, they humanely trapped their squirrels and set them free near the Baptist church. Two weeks later, the squirrels were back when the Baptists took down the water-slide.

The Episcopalians tried a much more unique path by setting out pans of whiskey around their church in an effort to kill the squirrels with alcohol poisoning. They sadly learned how much damage a band of drunk squirrels can do.

But the Catholic church came up with a more creative strategy! They baptized all the squirrels and made them members of the church. Now they only see them at Christmas and Easter.

Not much was heard from the Jewish synagogue. They took the first squirrel and circumcised him. They haven’t seen a squirrel since.

Year of the Tiger

I saw this painting by Narasimma Balaji, Artist, at Watercolour Sketchers on Facebook. Since this is the year of the Tiger, I asked him if I could post it here on my blog. The Lunar New Year is rung in Tuesday, Feb. 1, 2022, with festivities celebrated by nearly 2 billion people worldwide that can go on for more than two weeks.

  

My college roommate at the University of Illinois is Chinese--her family moved to Brazil to escape the Communists, then she came to the United States as did most of her siblings (I think there were 12).  We still write at Christmas and she and her husband (also an architect and watercolorist like my husband) just recently moved to a retirement apartment after more than 40 years in a beautiful old house.

  

Mask mandates and research

Anyone can make mistakes, but when I think of the people who had their lives and careers upended it really makes me angry. I mean, how many people would have been saved (or made worse) if those in power hadn't been so greedy and denied them therapeutics like Ivermectin and HCQ.

Read about the ten myths and misinformation that turned out to be false. 10 COVID-19 'Truths' That Weren't True (dailysignal.com)

Even today, even against their governor's orders, there are schools preventing children from attending if they don't wear masks in classroom, on the bus, on the playground. They want to punish the parents--but are hurting the kids. There's not a shred of peer reviewed research that shows masks work, and particularly not the flimsy flopsy ones made in China from fossil fuel (polypropylene) that are littering our streets, malls and yards. God only knows what's going into their lungs. Now Biden says he'll roll out 400 million N95's (because those being worn for 2 years did nothing to protect us except start fights by Karens and snowflakes). More damage to children.

Is Biden playing with a full deck?

Lots of you think Biden is demented. I don't. I suspect he's a Chinese mole or maybe a tool of Soros. Think about it. He's scaring away President Zalensky's investors in Ukraine's economy--and Zalensky has asked him to just shut up! (That transcript won't be released to NYT and CNN.) He won't shut down the oil pipeline to Russia, but will shut down ours making us dependent again on the middle east. He's talking about an invasion of Ukraine (scaring the world) and ignores the invasion of millions more people unvaxxed and unvetted across our border! Even Russians and Ukrainians are coming through our southern border.  Apparently, they don't want to be in the fight. Does that sound demented or just demonic?

Down the rabbit hole with grandma's Bible

I wanted to check a different translation today for the sermon, so I tried to find my old KJV from 1946, which I received for Christmas that year as a first grader in Forreston, IL. Instead, I pulled out my grandmother's Bible, dated 1901, which was the year of her marriage. Big mistake to read the preface on how this Bible came to be (too long to explain but there was definitely a big battle between the British committee and the American committee in 1885). Then I opened it to the passage I was looking for in John and found a 4-leaf clover pressed at the beginning of the New Testament (another preface with additional information I stopped to read), a purple ribbon to mark the place (which practically crumbled when I tried to straighten it. Then I found an old newspaper clipping from 1934, probably the Gospel Messenger of the Church of the Brethren (I only know this because one of my articles published when I was working was about my grandparents' library and all the journals/magazines they had, and I learned how to read the clues.)

The clipping was a poem "Teach me to live" which begins "Teach me to live! 'tis easier far to die--/Gently and silently to pass away--" and ends with "Teach me to live, and find my life in Thee/ Looking from earth and earthly things away:" On the verso in perfect alignment was the death notices from November 1932 to January 1934 of Brethren probably sent by their home church, and a list of offerings from North Dakota (there may have been all states, but that's what fit on the clipping).

There was no author for the poem, so I went to the internet, and found it, in several versions, often used with funeral notices. I found one reference from 1865, but it still didn't give the author, although I stopped to read the article (a Bible study). Then I found a sad story about a young Jamaican man who died in 1916, with separate notices by both his wife and his parents. The wife continued to post this memorial poem for another 10 years after his death. The editor, who was apparently researching the archives, speculated that the wife and the parents didn't get along and so published separate notices and thank yous to friends of the family and deceased.

I checked "Find a Grave" for a few of the names on the list, but even those names I found which matched the state, didn't have the right year. Oh, and the Jamaican newspaper had a Facebook page, and I noticed FB reminded me it is my niece Jenny's birthday, so I had to look through her page.

This is why it takes so long to do a short Bible study about Nicodemus.

Second best seller of all times--Imitation of Christ

"Be not angry that you cannot make others as you wish them to be, since you cannot make yourself as you wish to be." ~ Thomas a Kempis (Born: 1380, died: July 25, 1471) "The Imitation of Christ. Book I, ch. 16". 1418.

Advice that's still good today. His book "The Imitation of Christ" is the 2nd best-seller and 2nd most translated and most influential book of all times. The Bible is number one.

What's going on in Kazakhstan?

I was watching Israeli TV this morning while cycling in place (my office). They are loving the snow in Jerusalem--a new event for many. Wait until it's dirty and slushy--they won't be so thrilled--all the drivers looked like they learned how to drive in snow in Columbus, Ohio.

Also, I watched the Arabic French special feature discussing the latest threat to world peace in Kazakhstan. Thirty years of the USSR boot off their necks and they are unhappy with the free market. Seems there are too many rich people. We don't see a lot about Kazakhstan on our TV channels. Their elderly (my generation born and raised in the 1940s and 50s) are as mind-warped as our college students. They want the old USSR style communism back so they can have their pensions. Nostalgia instead of fantasies about socialist equity.

 
One thing doesn't change from nation to nation, from riot to lockdowns. The academics and the journalists are there to stir things up and go on TV to talk about "our values" and "risks." A brand-new capital without charm or history is being built outside the old one. But the man they named it for has already fallen from grace, so there will be a name change (it's the socialist way). They seem to be leaning toward an OK for Putin to interfere. One thing missing is all the woke nonsense we have on every channel and every ad--they are all white, educated, well-off and Muslim. Still, there are lots of men running around in the streets throwing things. Could pass for Portland.

Google owns us

Thirty-five years ago, I was librarian of the Veterinary Medicine Library at Ohio State. A great job. By 1991-92 we were just learning about a strange thing called the WWW. Went to workshops where it was demonstrated, learned to write html and I began showing my students. I still remember the day in the late 90s another veterinary medicine librarian, I think she was at the University of Tennessee, said she'd found something new she liked better than Yahoo and I should try it. Google. Today Google owns us. Master of surveillance and manipulation. Now there are about 2 billion websites. Big Tech is more powerful than the President of the United States, the Congress, and the Supreme Court. What looked like freedom is now a prison and even if they opened the doors, no one would leave.

• Chart: How Many Websites Are There? | Statista

A second opinion: video of Senator Ron Johnson's invited panel

On January 24, 2022, Senator Ron Johnson (Wisconsin) invited a group of world-renowned doctors and medical experts to the U.S. Senate to provide a different perspective on the global pandemic response, the current state of knowledge of early and hospital treatment, vaccine efficacy and safety, what went right, what went wrong, what should be done now, and what needs to be addressed long term. This 38 minute video highlights the 5-hour discussion. https://rumble.com/vt62y6-covid-19-a-...

(My paraphrase) https://youtu.be/9jMONZMuS2U

Foundational principles have been ignored, and possibly 500,000 needlessly died. Public health has been politicized. Dr. Aaron Kheriaty said he formerly supported both Obama and Biden, but the current events have changed that. We have strategies to treat this but have created enormous damage by our current treatment and the government has tried to destroy reputations and careers. 2 years in and we still don't know how many Americans have had it and recovered, which is a crime in itself. People with natural immunity are the safest people to be around--not one case reported where they have transmitted the virus. 

Zero evidence that masks stop it. It's peeing in a swimming pool. Early treatment WORKS, but you have to find a doctor. Pharmacists refuse to fill some of the safest medicines known because they have been brainwashed by the drug companies. The "adverse results" these doctors have experienced is not dying patients, but careers "cancelled" and being attacked for being a good doctor. First 72 hours are critical, and it is late start that causes failures. FDA and CDC should have never been the sponsor of the vaccine--it's been a terrible mistake.

One doctor, Paul Marik, started to cry when telling about his dying patients because he wasn't allowed to use the drugs he knew would work. He's had 35 years experience.  When he sued, the hospital ended his career by using a sham peer review. One nurse who was fired said her unit had been using HCQ for 2 months with success early in the pandemic until the hospital disallowed it. Another nurse testified that doctors refused to even see vaccine injured patients.

Why are drug companies and government bureaucrats doing this? Dr. Pierre Kory says profits. 

In my opinion that's a good answer for Big Pharma, but for government it's power.

FLCCC Alliance member CV - Dr. Pierre Kory (covid19criticalcare.com)

Bio | Aaron Kheriaty, MD

Dr. Marik resigns from position at EVMS in midst of legal battle with Sentara over use of ivermectin (wtkr.com)

Full Hearing: COVID-19: A Second Opinion Hosted By Sen. Ron Johnson | Video | RealClearPolitics

Persistence of neutralizing antibodies a year after SARS‐CoV‐2 infection in humans (secureservercdn.net)

Biden’s Bounty on Your Life: Hospitals’ Incentive Payments for COVID-19 - AAPS | Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (aapsonline.org)

AAPS Sues the FDA to End Its Arbitrary Restrictions on Hydroxychloroquine - AAPS | Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (aapsonline.org)

Democrats have their wish

Democrats wanted an alternative to mean tweets and the art of making deals. And they got their desire. They hated Trump's style and could never give a reason why strong border security and energy freedom were bad for Democracy. So, they elected an elderly "moderate" with Big Tech manipulation of the vote, mainstream media lies and a worldwide pandemic stoking fear.

So now we have ISIS resurgence in Syria after Trump practically wiped them out and new ground troops from U.S. stepping up to "advise." How'd that work out the last 3 decades? Then there's the pesky border civil war between Ukraine and Russia and 8500 U.S. troops on alert. Our friends and enemies around the world know how weakened by his advisors Biden is--they saw it in the Afghanistan withdrawal disaster. They see his inability to negotiate with Mexico or follow Trump's plan to stop the millions pouring over our own border. They know he's Obama 2.0 and they remember the red lines and lines in the shifting sand for 8 years. Add to this miserable record, the military leaders Biden has chosen for guidance are more concerned about woke soldiers than skilled and trained troops. How helpful is a Marxist social theory when the Russians and Ukrainians, two former Communist states, are the same race, culture and religion, and the Syrian fighters are all some version of Islam?

The attack on al-Sina Prison points to a broader ISIS resurgence | Middle East Institute (mei.edu)

US orders 8,500 troops on heightened alert amid Russia worry (msn.com)

Robert Epstein talks with Joe Rogan about Big Tech

I'm listening to Dr. Robert Epstein on Joe Rogan's podcast. Remember, Rogan is the latest the Left is telling you to hate. He had the audacity to tell his audience (much bigger than CNN's) to use inexpensive therapeutics for the virus. Epstein is very outspoken on surveillance and manipulation--S and M in Geek talk. He says Google is the worst, and never use Android. Dump those listening devices like Alexa. Google’s search engine he says on another site is the most aggressive spying tool ever invented — funded from the outset by the NSA and the CIA to identify people who are a threat to national security. Google records every search you conduct, and your Google profile contains a complete history of every search you ever conducted — even those sketchy ones! Worse still, he says, Google’s search engine is also the most powerful mind control device ever devised; it shifts the opinions of millions of people around the world every day without them knowing it."

Anyway, on January 21 he was interviewed by Joe Rogan (he seemed to be everywhere in 2019 and 2020). https://jrelibrary.com/1768-dr-robert-epstein/ He's a Democrat, never voted for Trump, but knows the elections are manipulated. Interesting listening about who/what is controlling us. He recommends Brave.com as your browser to not leave a trace. Another article I read said he recommended Startpage.com (no tracking). I use Duck Duck Go, which Rogan prefers to Google because it doesn't push sites to the top so you don't look further.

However, Epstein says Duck Duck Go really doesn't crawl the internet, but looks at data bases. He prefers Brave. There are no laws or courts that can control Google according to Epstein. Google blocks access to millions of sites every day, and there are no laws or regulations to stop it. Few congress people understand--but Cruz totally understands. How do you fight something that has $150 Billion in cash, makes political contributions, and can manipulate elections?

Epstein says Windows 10 is a tracking tool; it's very hard to get around it. Surveillance is just soooo easy and so profitable. He brings up the last speech of President Eisenhower--the military industrial complex reference most remember. But what many have forgotten, he also warned of the rise of a technological elite that could control public policy without anyone knowing. And that was 1961! Those people are now in control, and Google is the most aggressive and dangerous. The Facebook model is to create dissension and chaos because it makes more money. YouTube research by his team finds 70% of the videos are suggested by their "up next" algorithm.

What does Warren Buffett have against black babies?

Even if you are pro-choice, you should be asking this question. Since 2000 he has funneled an incredible $4.7 billion to abortion providers as well as the vast array of activist, lobbying, and research groups insulating them in Washington. He uses a "philanthropic" foundation named for his deceased wife, but supports many such "do-gooders." We don't know the exact count but legal abortions he funded number around 4 million, but even before 1973, he was "helping" women get abortions. Almost 40% of abortions in the U.S. are for blacks--so he can put himself right up there with those 18th c. Arab slavers and Europeans who devastated Africa in the Atlantic slave trade. He also funds training of abortionists and abortions for black and brown babies in Latin America, Africa and Asia. The article is just gruesome in its thoroughness and complexity. https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/296529/

Why are effective therapeutics denied in the USA?

The charts below are the COVID case and death count as reported by the World Health Organization for India and the United States. The WHO is certainly not an Alt Right, anti-VAX, conspiracy theory organization. The first graph shows reporting for India, the second is the good old USA. You may need to click on the image and expand it to see the full graph for the United States.

India was in the news daily in April of 2021 because of a sharp spike in cases and deaths. You can see the spike clearly on the India graph. Then in early May 2021 you can see a sharp reversal of trend followed by a steady decline to nearly no new cases in December for India. On the USA graph you can see a less radical ebb and flow of cases and deaths but since the Summer of 2021 you will notice a steady increase in both cases and deaths culminating in a sharp increase in cases and somewhat less sharp increase in deaths from late 2021 to present. In contrast India had nearly no new cases or deaths in the summer and fall of 2021 and only recently has had a spike in cases but the death count is remaining flat for India.

So, you may be wondering what happened in India in late April and early May of 2021. Well, India decided to ignore WHO guidance and began a massive program to treat COVID with a cocktail of drugs which included Hydroxychloroquine and Ivermectin. They have also been using these drugs as a preventative for COVID. The results cannot be denied. The numbers tell the truth. You may argue that these results do not prove causation but hopefully you will agree they justify giving these drugs a chance here in our land.

In the USA and around the world there has been a concerted effort to deny the usefulness of Hydroxychloroquine and Ivermectin for` treatment of COVID. Doctors in the USA are being threatened with loss of license to practice medicine if they prescribe these drugs for COVID. Social media and legacy media are censoring affirming information for these drugs. If you Google Hydroxychloroquine or Ivermectin the first page of results will all be articles in opposition to these drugs, containing many lies I will add. They are saying that use of these drugs is unsafe but both drugs are on the WHO Model List of Essential Medicines for Children – 8th List (2021). Both are approved for off label use a further indication that they are safe. If you post articles affirming the effectiveness of these drugs on Facebook, YouTube or Twitter you will be censored, and your posting will be pulled down. You have to search for it to find it as I have done with these WHO graphs.

The question we need to be asking is, why is there such organized opposition to safe drugs which may be effective in treating COVID? Ask your doctor now if he/she will prescribe Hydroxychloroquine or Ivermectin for treatment of COVID if you should come down with the disease. If their answer is no find a different doctor with the courage to do the right thing regardless of the threats. If we follow India's lead, we can beat this disease.

If you have Spotify please listen/watch the Joe Rogen podcast interviews with Dr. Peter A. McCullough and Dr. Robert Malone.  From FB post by Marty Evans (1) Fans of Best of the Web Today | The charts below are the COVID case and death count as reported by the World Health Organization for India and the United States | Facebook

Compassion fatigue by a health care worker

I'm not sure who wrote this; I saw it on my niece's Facebook page.  She works in a nursing home with direct patient care.

You are not alone...

When are we going to wake up from this nightmare? New rules every day, extra work loads, short staffed, long hours, co-workers turning against each other and having to hear the frustrations of those who just want their lives back to normal. Humanity has fallen into a dark place in our existence. Compassion is lost in the deep abyss we cannot retrieve it back from. A while ago they said we were "heroes", now we are crying for help and waiting for our Superman to save us.

 
Today was the day I felt all the care and compassion leave my body. Not sure if others feel the way I do, but this is how far burn out has gone. I have a feeling there will be no end in sight if humanity keeps going in this direction. We are dropping like flies. Every day I keep hearing those advertisements saying, "Mental health is important". Yeah? Well, HELP US! We are tired when we come home, lost interest in taking care of our own selves. If you think that we are just being "overdramatic" or "you need to get over it", then I am truly sorry you are not walking in our shoes.

Here is the definition of compassion fatigue:

Compassion fatigue is a condition characterized by emotional and physical exhaustion leading to a diminished ability to empathize or feel compassion for others, often described as the negative cost of caring. It is sometimes referred to as secondary traumatic stress.

 
You read that right? Traumatic stress? This is why people are leaving nursing. It has taken a toll of us all once and for all.

"The expectation that we can be immersed in suffering and loss daily and not be touched by it is as unrealistic as expecting to be able to walk through water without getting wet." - Naomi Rachel Remen

Bountiful Goodness

I've requested through my public library, "Bountiful goodness" by Thomas a Kempis, a German priest and monk who died in 1471. Under copyright, so I'll just quote a few lines. It's a devotional, intended for meditation. Has a Matthew 25 feel--how to meet Jesus.

He who assists a brother in need holds Jesus by the hand.
He who patiently bears the burdens placed upon him carries Jesus crucified on his shoulders.
He who speaks consoling words to a saddened brother gives Jesus a tender kiss.
He who regrets another's fault and prays for his pardon washes and wipes Jesus' feet.
He who remakes an angry person into one of peace prepares a bed of flowers for Jesus in his soul.
He who at table places the best portion before his brother rather than himself places before Jesus a feast and a honeycomb of charity.

The One percenters--an internet meme sent by a friend

Some of you are younger and not in the 1% age group. I decided to send it as a history lesson of what life was like then.

Yes, I am one of the One Percenters and thank God every day that I do remember all of this - the Good and Not So Good. Let us continue to Stay Safe-Healthy-Strong to enjoy each day.

One percenters . . .The 1% Age Group.

This special group was born between 1930 and 1946 = 16 years. In 2021, the age range is between 75 and 91.

Are you, or do you know, someone "still around?"

Interesting Facts For You . . .

You are the smallest group of children born since the early 1900’s.

You are the last generation, climbing out of the depression, who can remember the winds of war and the impact of a world at war which rattled the structure of our daily lives for years.

You are the last to remember ration books for everything from gas to sugar to shoes to stoves.

You saved tin foil and poured fried meat fat into tin cans.

You saw cars up on blocks because tires weren't available.

You can remember milk being delivered to your house early in the morning and placed in the "milk box" on the porch.

You are the last to see the gold stars in the front windows of grieving neighbors whose sons died in the War.

You saw the 'boys' home from the war, build their little houses.

You are the last generation who spent childhood without television; instead, you “imagined” what you heard on the radio.

With no TV until the 1950's, you spent your childhood "playing outside." There was no Little League.

There was no city playground for kids.

The lack of television in your early years meant that you had little real understanding of what the world was like.

On Saturday mornings and afternoons, the movies gave you newsreels sandwiched in between westerns and cartoons.

Telephones were one to a house, often shared (party lines), and hung on the wall in the kitchen (no cares about privacy).

Computers were called calculators; they were hand cranked.

Typewriters were driven by pounding fingers, throwing the carriage and changing the ribbon.

'INTERNET' and 'GOOGLE' were words which did not exist.

Newspapers and magazines were written for adults and the news was broadcast on your radio in the evening.

The Government gave returning Veterans the means to get an education and spurred colleges to grow.

Loans fanned a housing boom.

Pent up demand, coupled with new installment payment plans opened many factories for work.

New highways would bring jobs and mobility.

The Veterans joined civic clubs and became active in politics.

The radio network expanded from 3 stations to thousands.

Your parents were suddenly free from the confines of the depression and the war, and they threw themselves into exploring opportunities they had never imagined.

You weren't neglected, but you weren't today's all-consuming family focus.

They were glad you played by yourselves until the streetlights came on.

They were busy discovering the postwar world.

You entered a world of overflowing plenty and opportunity; a world where you were welcomed, enjoyed yourselves and felt secure in your future although the depression poverty was deeply remembered.

Polio was still a crippler.

You came of age in the 50's and 60's.

You are the last generation to experience an interlude when there were no threats to our homeland.

The second world war was over, and the cold war, terrorism, global warming, and perpetual economic insecurity had yet to haunt life with unease.

Only our generation can remember both a time of great war, and a time when our world was secure and full of bright promise and plenty.

You grew up at the best possible time, a time when the world was getting better.

You are "The Last Ones."

More than 99 % of you are either retired or deceased, and you feel privileged to have "lived in the best of times!"

Amen! It’s great being part of the 1% Special Group! And I'll drink to that . . . yes it was good times . . .

HT to Jan Fritz, member of my church

Ashli Babbitt by Mike Huckabee (from his newsletter)

 If you’ve watched the documentary CAPITOL PUNISHMENT, about the Capitol Hill rally and riot of January 6, 2021, you’ve seen the video of Ashli Babbitt smiling and happy, enjoying herself immensely as she participates in a march to the Capitol building. She is effervescent. Even on that cold, gray day, she exudes positive energy.

But you’ve also seen the video of her just a little while later, inside the building, caught in a crush of people on a stair landing and trying to crawl through a broken-out window to the other side of a closed door when she is shot to death.

How to reconcile these two visions? Could this smiling young (unarmed) woman suddenly morph into an angry rioter, a vandal, an insurrectionist, trying to breach the Speaker’s Lobby and prevent Congress from doing its job? Her husband, Aaron Babbitt, looking at a frame-by-frame analysis conducted by The Epoch Times, says no.

That is not what happened.

“After repeatedly forcing myself to watch the murder of my wife,” he told The Epoch Times, “I have come to my own conclusion that Ashli came to a point of realization that she was in a very bad situation and the police weren’t acting appropriately to what she was witnessing.”

He said, “I know my wife very well. She is not destructive. She was not there to hurt anybody.”

“It all comes down to which mental angle a person views it from,” he said. “If they hate Ashli because they believe the lies, that’s all they see: her being part of a mob. Us who love her, know her, know every action and emotion she was displaying --- she realized a minute before her death she was not in a friendly situation and something very wrong was occurring.”

In fact, the video strongly suggests that she was trying to stop the violence, not join in. She had gone up some stairs and, only about five minutes before she was killed, was casually talking and laughing with three U.S. Capitol Police officers. (She had served in the Air Force as a military police officer herself.) But then more people started coming up behind her. Members of a U.S. Capitol Police Containment Emergency Response Team rushed up the stairs as well, in response to a false alarm –- repeat, false –- of shots fired. (No shots were ever fired except by Ashli’s killer.) She was trapped in that mass of people outside the door.

It’s evident in the video that she was horrified by what was suddenly happening. She confronted a rioter identified as Zachary Alam, getting between him and one of the officers guarding the doors to the Speaker’s Lobby. He turned away from her and punched a window in one of the doors with his hand, then punched it again with a helmet to smash it. Her face registered alarm.

According to husband Aaron, an audio analysis of the video shows that she was shouting, “Stop! No! Don’t! Wait!”

Aaron says she was trying to climb through the broken glass because she was in fear for her life. She was trying to escape. U.S. Capitol Hill Police Lt. Michael Byrd shot her as she was partway through the window frame, and she fell backwards onto the landing.

The officers who were supposed to be guarding that door were not there. “The only way we’d ever know why Ashli felt the window was the only way out is if she had been detained by one of the countless police officers that abandoned their post in front of those doors, Aaron said. “That did not happen. She was murdered and robbed of the chance to tell her side of the story.”

There are conflicting reports as to whether Byrd shouted warnings before he shot her. It was so noisy in the stairwell, it’s likely no one could hear anyone else, so we might never know. And Byrd refused to be interviewed or even give a statement for the Internal Affairs “investigation,” which apparently was fine with the investigators ("investigators"?) because they no-billed him, anyway. “We have declined criminal prosecution of the above officer as a result of this incident,” wrote Acting U.S. Attorney Channing Phillips as part of a three-sentence dismissal.

But Ashli’s family is suing. Their lawyer, DC attorney Terry Roberts, said, “If you’re acting in self-defense, you have to tell somebody you’re acting in self-defense, or it should be quite plain from the circumstances. It clearly was not plain in these circumstances. I don’t believe the officer acted in self-defense at all.”

Another witness, Tayler Hansen, told The Epoch Times that Alam broke out that window because HE wanted to get to the Speaker’s Lobby. He said the only reason Alam didn’t climb through the window before Babbitt is that his glasses got knocked down his face in the scuffle and he had had to stop to reposition them. “He was about to go through that window,” Hansen said. “It was his idea. He was the one shattering it.”

Here’s more about Alam and how the FBI tracked him down. They say if you can’t say something good about someone, don’t say anything at all, so we won’t say anything at all.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9225389/Man-filmed-smashing-windows-Capitol-rioter-Ashli-Babbitt-arrested.html

In contrast, there’s a lot of good to say about Ashli. Hansen, an independent journalist who knew her and was walking close behind her inside the Capitol, echoed her husband in describing her. “The reality of it is, Ashli wasn’t a violent person. She was a good person, but they’ve demonized her to become this domestic terrorist that she has never been,” he said. “She served her country for 14 years. That’s just insane to me that they can get away with pushing this narrative. They’ve done that by suppressing first-hand witnesses like me.”

So, why had the Capitol Police left their posts at the door to the Speaker’s Lobby? One of them told Internal Affairs investigators that he left because he feared for his life and hadn’t wanted to have to use deadly force. If this was a situation in which officers were afraid for their own lives, it’s easy to imagine Ashli feeling the need to escape it as well.

According to a U.S. Capitol Police sergeant, Byrd and one other officer had taken positions on the other side of the door and had their guns out. This can be seen in the video, but it doesn’t appear that it was visible to Ashli. For her, the shot would have come out of nowhere.

Incidentally, the video that is providing so much detail was shot by the mysterious John Sullivan, also known as Jayden X, who has said he was there to “document” the event. Who he’s associated with and why he was there are questions for another time, but it’s fortuitous that we have his record of what happened. Otherwise, all we'd have to go by was what the feds and their media minions told us.

The Epoch Times story is a premium report, but ZeroHedge has a detailed account.

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/stop-no-dont-babbitt-tried-stop-attack-capitol-speakers-lobby-video-analysis-suggests

Why Big Tech controls us: It controls the internet.

Wall St. Journal, Jan. 15:

. . . "Fiber-optic cable, which carries 95% of the world’s international internet traffic, links up pretty much all of the world’s data centers, those vast server warehouses where the computing happens that transforms all those 1s and 0s into our experience of the internet. Where those fiber-optic connections link up countries across the oceans, they consist almost entirely of cables running underwater—some 1.3 million kilometers (or more than 800,000 miles) of bundled glass threads that make up the actual, physical international internet. And until recently, the overwhelming majority of the undersea fiber-optic cable being installed was controlled and used by telecommunications companies and governments.
Today, that’s no longer the case. In less than a decade, four tech giants—Microsoft, Google parent Alphabet, Meta (formerly Facebook) and Amazon—have become by far the dominant users of undersea-cable capacity. Before 2012, the share of the world’s undersea fiber-optic capacity being used by those companies was less than 10%. Today, that figure is about 66%…”

Pay wall: Google, Amazon, Meta and Microsoft Weave a Fiber-Optic Web of Power - WSJ

The July 2021 outbreak among the vaccinated

Although the breakthrough infections among the vaccinated were reported, the Provincetown, Massachusetts, mini epidemic in July 2021 was the first big one I heard about. (And haven't heard of another one.) Over a thousand people developed Covid, and over 900 of them were vaccinated. This article in CDC's January 2022, Emerging Infectious Diseases, "Multistate Outbreak of SARS-CoV-2 Infections, Including Vaccine Breakthrough Infections, Associated with Large Public Gatherings, United States" https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/28/1/21-2220_article? is an interesting description of the investigation which was a major warning that vaccines might protect from death or serious illness, but not from getting or transmitting the disease. There is no comment in this article that P-Town is mecca for the LGBTQ community. Special guides are printed to promote this. I can't even link to some of the articles about the activities. Even the titles were pornographic.  We visited there in the late 1970s and it was true then. In this discussion there's no mention of the immune compromised state of untreated or controlled HIV or whether the drugs given to gay men for long term treatment of AIDS might affect the efficacy of the vaccines. I know there is research on this--I saw it in Lancet. Also, perhaps it was the serial intimacy and not the "large gathering" that was the problem? Masks, which are recommended for vaccinated people in this discussion, won't help with that. 

The main author, Radhika Gharpure, concludes that with all this data, "major epidemiologic QUESTIONS about BREAKTHROUGH INFECTIONS, such as the comparative infectiousness of fully vaccinated and non–fully vaccinated persons, duration of viral shedding, and duration of vaccine-derived immunity, REMAIN." The obvious question probably couldn't be pointed out without damaging her career.

Rolling Stone did an anecdotal account of those who were in P-Town and how the gay community stepped up to alert others, but it too seemed to suggest more masking as the solution to a terrible infection rate.

https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/covid-delta-variant-provincetowns-gay-community-1214665/?

Letter to a promoter for an interview

As my friends and family know, I've been writing this blog for almost 20 years (began October 2003). That's how I met some nice people whom I now follow on Facebook. So, I get offers to review books and do interviews. I did review some books, but I don't anymore, and have republished some canned interviews. Sometimes I get snarky and write back my opinions. I have no idea if anyone reads them. The one I received on Monday, January 17, Martin Luther King, Jr. Day wanted to let me know that young people aren't educated about MLK Jr. because "only 81%" knew about his "I've got a dream speech," and "only 82%" knew about the March on Washington. I think that's fantastic--they probably don't know the year their parents were born, or what happened on July 4. So, here's my response.

Dear XXXX

You’re not making a good case. Considering how LITTLE anyone, let alone youth, know about our history, if 81% know about the “I have a dream speech,” that’s fantastic! I know some who graduated from high school in 1986. One day I asked them a fairly simple question, "Which came first WWII or Vietnam War?" and they didn’t know! That’s the level of history education in our country, and we live in a great school district with high scores. What makes you think this is a lack of resources? I’ve seen Martin Luther’s statue on the internet identified as Martin Luther King! Our young people may know who King is but have never heard of Martin Luther. How many know Martin Luther King, Jr. was a Republican? Or that there were over 200 bills in Congress to fight lynching, and Democrats voted against all of them? You’ve got some buzz words in this message that tell your mission. . . “democratizing education,” “equal access,” “cause for equality,” “diverse backgrounds.” If you need to know how ignorant U.S. youth are, watch some of the Prager U videos or the Will Witt interviews on college campuses, “What is a conservative?” https://youtu.be/jVJO1IETjC8 Also notice how inarticulate the students are—except for the one or two who can define conservatism.

Also, MLK Day was the day I got your message—how would I do an interview BEFORE today?

Looking for a king?

The elders of Israel came to Samuel and asked for a king, which didn't make him too happy, but he prayed about it and the Lord said, "Grant them their request." So here's was Samuel told them they would get:

He will take your sons and assign them to his chariots and horses, and they will run before his chariot.

He will also appoint from among them his commanders of groups of a thousand and of a hundred soldiers.

He will set them to do his plowing and his harvesting, and to make his implements of war and the equipment of his chariots.

He will use your daughters as ointment makers, as cooks, and as bakers.

He will take the best of your fields, vineyards, and olive groves, and give them to his officials.

He will tithe your crops and your vineyards and give the revenue to his eunuchs and his slaves.

He will take your male and female servants, as well as your best oxen and your asses, and use them to do his work.

He will tithe your flocks and you yourselves will become his slaves.  When this takes place, you will complain against the king whom you have CHOSEN, but on that day the Lord will not answer you.

The people, however, refused to listen to Samuel's warning. . . 

Sounds like the Democrats doesn't it?

I Samuel 8:4-7, 10-22

Two speeches, a defining moment in history

Peggy Noonan, whom I gave up on when she went all soft and gooey and swooned over Obama in 2008: 

"It is startling when two speeches within 24 hours, neither much heralded in advance—the second wouldn’t even have been given without the first—leave you knowing you have witnessed a seminal moment in the history of an administration, but it happened this week. The president’s Tuesday speech in Atlanta, on voting rights, was a disaster for him. By the end of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s answering speech on Wednesday you knew some new break point had occurred, that President Biden might have thought he was just crooning to part of his base but the repercussions were greater than that; he was breaking in some new way with others—and didn’t know it. It is poor political practice when you fail to guess the effects of your actions. He meant to mollify an important constituency but instead he filled his opponents with honest indignation and, I suspect, encouraged in that fractured group some new unity.

The speech itself was AGGRESSIVE, INTEMPERATE, not only OFFENSIVE but meant to OFFEND. It seemed prepared by people who think there is only the Democratic Party in America, that’s it, everyone else is an outsider who can be disparaged. It was a mistake on so many levels. Presidents more than others in politics have to maintain an even strain, as astronauts used to say. If a president is rhetorically manipulative and divisive on a voting-rights bill it undercuts what he’s trying to establish the next day on Covid and the economy. The over-the-top language of the speech made him seem more emotional, less competent. The portentousness—“In our lives and . . . the life of our nation, there are moments so stark that they divide all that came before them from everything that followed. They stop time”—made him appear incapable of understanding how the majority of Americans understand our own nation’s history and the vast array of its challenges. (Wall Street Journal pay wall, but you get the idea Biden’s Georgia Speech Is a Break Point - WSJ )

In my opinion, I don't think Biden is able to think or comment like this.  His speech writers are all steeped and stewed in Critical Race Theory, which means they know nothing about American history.

The Wedding at Cana, John 2:1-11

 

A happy accident. Sometimes that's an unplanned baby who becomes mom's caregiver in her old age; sometimes it's a splash of color on an almost finished painting that becomes an award winner; and sometimes it's something you read right after you read or saw something related that brings it all together.

Our lesson for Sunday is John 2:1-11, Jesus' first miracle at the wedding at Cana. It can be read literally or as theology or as an allegory or a prophecy, but John says Jesus revealed his glory (see Exodus 19:11). Why Cana? Why is Mary in charge of a wedding? Why 6 jars? What is the significance of the first of seven signs. On and on. There are entire sermons and articles on the details. But here's what happened to me.

I use a little journal (5 x 7) "Magnificat" in my morning devotions, and besides several hymns and Bible selections for morning and evening, and the story of a saint, each issue has two articles on Christian art, the cover art and another one which may be connected to other content. It's like taking an art appreciation class. I wait a bit and savor it after a week or two, so I didn't read the essays for January until today. In all the years I've been using this journal, I may have only recognized a few, probably if they were on the little Sunday School bulletins children in the 40s and 50s received. The cover art for January was a small (about 8 x 6) altar piece painted by Juan de Flandes, the official painter of Queen Isabella who with her husband Ferdinand unified Spain and financed Columbus' voyages to the New World. She had commissioned 47 of these paintings illustrating the life of Christ, but only 25 of them are still extant.

 
So, what is the cover story art? The wedding at Cana, and we see Jesus and Mary and the wedding couple (whose names John didn't include, nor do we know what their relationship was to Jesus). Their image in the painting is the likeness of Ferdinand and Isabella's son Prince John of Aragon and his bride Margaret of Austria, who married in 1497. They were 19 and 17 when they married and deeply in love, but sadly John died only 6 months after the wedding. So, he is also memorialized in a painting that lauds the sacredness of marriage.

"The moral of this small, private devotional painting is clear: at the intercession of the Virgin Mary, Christian spouses are invited by Jesus to fill-to the brim--their life of human love that, through the sacrament of Marriage, the love that unites them may be raised to the level of divine love." (Pierre-Marie Dumont on the cover art)

Hollywood's New Rules, they are so woke

https://bariweiss.substack.com/p/hollywoods-new-rules?

"Hollywood had always pushed boundaries—from the 1947 “Gentleman’s Agreement,” which confronted antisemitism, to “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner” (1967), which tackled interracial marriage, to “All in the Family” (1971-1979), which grappled with race and women’s liberation. The original run of “Will and Grace” (1998-2006), did more to advance the cause of gay marriage than anything else pre-Obergefell.

And then there were the villains: The vast majority—from the Terminator to Hannibal Lecter to Gordon Gekko—were uber-white: an Austrian (robot), a Lithuanian, a WASPy, pinstriped capitalist. (For the insider’s list, see this from The Hollywood Reporter.) . . .

Then came George Floyd, and, in the summer of 2020, everything that had been happening in slow motion started to happen much faster."

The new rules (no white men allowed as actors, directors, screen writers--their agents are dropping them) definitely are being applied to TV advertising.

James Comey and media scandal

 

James Comey and Our Poisoned Politics

Five years ago, the FBI boss was busy selling the bogus Steele dossier.

This week marks the fifth anniversary of perhaps the greatest media scandal of our age. Outlets like CNN and BuzzFeed flogged a bogus dossier of salacious claims funded by the Hillary Clinton campaign, even while admitting they didn’t know whether the dossier’s allegations against Donald Trump were true or false. It wasn’t necessarily that reporters had mistaken fake news for the real stuff—they simply didn’t care or acknowledge that they had an obligation to vet anti-Trump claims before disseminating them. The pathetic media excuse for running with the story was that important people in the government were talking about it. And no one wanted to talk about it more than the FBI’s then-director, James Comey. He kept talking about it even after his department had failed to corroborate it, and even though the CIA viewed it as mere “Internet rumor.” On this day five years ago, Mr. Comey emailed Director of National Intelligence James Clapper. As the dossier story was raging in the press, Mr. Comey mounted an unsuccessful effort to stop Mr. Clapper from publicly acknowledging that U.S. intelligence agencies had not deemed the dossier reliable and were not relying upon its claims, which had been compiled by former British spy Christopher Steele. According to the Obama-appointed Justice Department inspector general who reported on the government abuses in this case in 2019, Mr. Comey’s Jan. 11, 2017 email to Mr. Clapper included the following: I just had a chance to review the proposed talking points on this for today. Perhaps it is a nit, but I worry that it may not be best to say “The IC has not made any judgment that the information in the document is reliable.” I say that because we HAVE concluded that the source [Steele] is reliable and has a track record with us of reporting reliable information; we have some visibility into his source network, some of which we have determined to be sub-sources in a position to report on such things; and much of what he reports in the current document is consistent with and corroborative of other reporting... In the long history of Beltway bureaucratic maneuvering, has a government memo ever included so much inaccuracy in so few words? Mr. Steele had already been fired by the FBI as a confidential source, and his story was falling apart. The day after the Comey email, the FBI received a U.S. intelligence report warning of a particular inaccuracy in the dossier and assessing that the material was “part of a Russian disinformation campaign to denigrate U.S. foreign relations.” Read the article (paywall) https://www.wsj.com/articles/james-comey-and-our-poisoned-politics-11641944998?

Mike Gallagher's experience with tests for Covid

Mike Gallagher keeps the test kits on hand. Sends them to friends and family who can't get them. He and a friend from out of town had planned a night out--dinner in a restaurant and then the theater, and he asked the friend to first take a Covid test. Both he and the friend were vaxxed and boosted, and both had had Covid after their vaccinations. The friend agreed and the test came up positive. He couldn't believe it, so Mike gave him another one. Positive again. So, they cancelled their plans. 01-12-22 The Mike Gallagher Show Hour #1 | Salem Podcast Network Listen at minute 19.

Lockdown side effects

I wonder if anyone has investigated how the lockdowns have warped our perception of our own importance.

Yesterday I ironed queen size sheets and felt like I'd won the bull riding event in a rodeo.

Today I rearranged a closet to accommodate the Christmas decorations boxes and patted myself on the back for helping with the moon launch.

Comments on masks and Covid

 From an e-mail, name withheld.

"A little more on the masks. When you look at the size of the virus and the size of mask holes and what they filter, it behaves like mosquitos flying through a mesh wire fence at the baseball diamond (this analogy came from a friend that until recently was in charge of Covid at Walter Reed and assistant Medical Director). You might catch larger droplets. Only the medical grade masks like FPP2 and FPP2 and N95 mask offer some protection because the fibers are charged to attract the virus. I was riding the German bullet train last week and the public bus and they demand that you wear these medical grade masks because it does not seem to be a big secret anymore that all other masks are not very effective if effective at all. 

On my flight over to Germany, I sat next to an interesting Belgian logistics guy who heads up the now Belgian owned for eBay Logistics Unit.

He shared with me that he was the black sheep in the family because everyone else in the family were high powered doctors, like neurosurgeons etc.

So, I asked him about their take on the masks and the vaccines. His responses were rather interesting.

He asked me, if I ever heard of COVID spreading in an airplane and infecting the passengers. He said it is the perfect environment for tracking every person, where they sit, where they are from etc. And by the way, you constantly take your mask of for every drink, meal, cookie etc. I could not recall ever hearing about such a case and neither could he. The point here, which my German doctor friends also stated, is that only people with a large viral load infect other people through the air. And with all the testing and screening for the flights, it is not likely to happen, plus the high rate of air exchange on planes seems to prevent transmission. 

The second interesting comment was on the vaccine. None of his family members would voluntarily take any of the RNA messenger vaccines only the J+J vector vaccine or one of the traditional vaccines – I believe the so nick named ‘Texas’ vaccine is a traditional vaccine, but the US government rejected it because it was too cheap at $1.50 per dose and easy to transport – likely did not allow the bureaucrats to build empires. 

Peter

Memorializing January 6 is a big fail

As Democrats memorialize January 6 with false claims that Democracy was threatened, we remember

• An invasion at the southern border
• Inflation at a 40-year high and rising
• A COVID response that’s both ineffective and arguably unconstitutional
• An unparalleled supply-chain crisis
• A disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan that left hundreds of Americans behind, 13 U.S. service members dead,
• U.S. drone strike that killed 10 civilians, including seven children
• The loss of trust from our allies
• The loss of fear from our adversaries

(List by Dorstewitz at Newsmax but you can probably think of more)

The peculiar stupidity of modern progressives

"Trump had one of the most successful first terms of a president in the postwar period––a judgement the validity of which it took “Joe Biden,” the simulacrum of a president, less than a year of failures and disasters to confirm. Inflation, supply-chain bottle-necks, unfilled jobs, hysterical covid protocols, drunken-sailor spending, exploding violent crime, a dishonorable abandonment of Afghanistan, geopolitical adventurism by our rivals and enemies, loss of our energy independence, runaway gasoline prices, and schools blatantly indoctrinating students with transgender and literally racist propaganda––all are the wages of the Trumpophobia epidemic."

How progressives are ruining our country. Critical Race Theory. Climate Change.  Experts. The Year of Living Stupidly | Frontpagemag

No supply chain problems for fentanyl

 Biden has no problem with supply chain for fentanyl.  In fact, his open border policy encourages it.

"The emergence of fentanyl began nearly a decade ago. U.S. Customs and Border Protection , the federal agency responsible for safeguarding the country’s borders, initially reported seizing fentanyl in 2013, when just 2 pounds were found. In that time, suppliers have surged enormous amounts into the country. While federal agencies are making record-high seizures, exorbitant amounts are making it past them, as evidenced by the rise in fentanyl-caused overdose deaths.

The 11,200 pounds of fentanyl seized by CBP at international mail inspection facilities, sea, land, and air ports of entry, and by smugglers trying to sneak it across between the ports of entry was double last year's fentanyl seizures. That same year, 5,400 pounds of heroin were seized, according to CBP data for fiscal year 2021, which ran from Oct. 1, 2020, to Sept. 30."

From 2 pounds in 2013 to 11,200 in 2021.  Eight years. The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) says that 2 milligrams of fentanyl is a lethal dose in most people. That works out to 227,000 deaths per pound of fentanyl. Or over a billion people.

How Much Does Fentanyl Cost On The Street? - Addiction Resource

FACT CHECK: ‘Just 118 Pounds Of Fentanyl Could Kill More Than 26 Million People’ | Check Your Fact

Two interviews on therapeutics and the Omicron variant

Dr. Peter McCullough is an internist, cardiologist, epidemiologist, a full professor of medicine at Texas A&M College of Medicine in Dallas, USA. He also has a master's degree in public health and is known for being one of the top five most-published medical researchers in the United States and is the editor of two medical journals. Based on his credentials and published articles, I'd call him much better than Tony Fauci for advice.   He has been deplatformed and silenced on the internet by Big Tech for "misinformation."  Reuters Thompson, one of the fact checkers for Facebook, has financial ties with Pfizer, but I don't know about others. When one of my posts gets censored, I sometimes look at their alternate article and it's an opinion piece, just like mine, but I doubt the fact checker was a medical librarian.

PART 1: Dr. Peter McCullough—The Inexplicable Suppression of Hydroxychloroquine, Ivermectin, and Other COVID-19 Treatments (theepochtimes.com)

PART 2: Dr. Peter McCullough on Omicron Realities and VAERS Reports on Vaccine Injuries and Deaths (theepochtimes.com)

This all makes sense to me and I didn't find it difficult to understand, however, I didn't know that Operation Warp Speed was on three levels, but only the vaccine component got the "juice." The therapeutic trials seemed to wither on the vine due to lack of the right controls in the trials. That's disappointing because therapeutics could have saved thousands of lives and relieved the hospitals of all the overcrowding. He also mentions simple nose rinses like Povidone-Iodine that can stop the virus in the nose before it gets to the lungs.  This is used in Bangladesh, and they've had better outcomes than we have.