Secrets of Hillsong, pt. 2

Last night I finished watching the FX Vanity Fair four part documentary on Hulu, The Secrets of Hillsong, a Christian (Pentecostal) megachurch in Australia, which spread to the United States. Much of this story was revealed in 2022 on the Discovery Channel. I was unaware of any of this, mainly because Hillsong first became famous through its music, which so many churches were already using. I don’t attend a service that uses that so there were probably discussions I ignored.

The first episode is primarily about Pastor Carl Lentz, the rock star pastor of the New York City Hillsong church who was so charismatic and charming (think Bill Clinton charisma but younger and better looking) that he became an entertainer-preacher who had celebrity guests like Justin Bieber, Kevin Durant and Vanessa Hudgens at the worship services. Lentz even appeared on the View. The footage shown of the services looked like rock concerts, but with more arm waving and jumping up and down. Even OSU Buckeye football fans don’t get that worked up!

Pastor Lentz falls from grace due to marital infidelity in the first episode after the audience has been introduced to his incredible ability to spin the Gospel and sway with the culture, but if that were the point of this documentary, there would be no story. The underlying theme and purpose in my opinion is to tell the audience that Christianity and Christians are a bunch of fakes and charlatans out of step with LGBTQ, BLM and Feminism, plus they are stealing money from their congregants and molesting children as sidelines.

In episode one we are introduced to the journalists and writers who put this story together (obviously with Pastor Lentz’s input). They dead pan pithy explanations yet do not condemn. That is left to the other on camera speakers, mostly from the NYC church who at one time were “volunteers” in responsible positions. (By the end of the 4th episode, they’ve all left the church, and some have left the faith, but you don’t know that in episode one). In the first episode, these are all women, several black, one possibly Hispanic, and one gay man who had been on a reality show with his boyfriend. In the 3rd or 4th (don’t remember) episodes we meet some men who worked with the Australian church, and like Lentz, were dismissed or “cancelled” by Brian Houston, the Australian founder of Hillsong (originally that was the name of the music arm, and the church took the name).

The final episode focuses on the sins of Brian Houston and his father Frank (d. 2004), who had been charged with child sexual abuse, but the church and particularly son Brian took no action even after a lengthy investigation by secular authorities. The trial is coming up in June, so that is yet to be revealed. Maybe there will be a fifth episode.

As I watched the very moving stories about the child abuse, I couldn’t help but think that this looks like nothing compared to what our current “leaders” from entertainment to school boards to medical clinics to churches are accepting-- the mutilation and sterilization of children who cannot give consent, either to attend drag shows, read assigned books or to have their bodies destroyed. Will they ever come to trial?

https://youtu.be/5_aIauL2xKA Shout to the Lord (Hillsong) The composer is at piano, and the lead singer might be Darlene Zschech.

https://news.yahoo.com/where-brian-houston-now-hillsong-203049379.html?guccounter=1

Keep in mind if you watch this, that from start to finish, the whole point appears to be to condemn all Christians, not a particular church or group of sinners. Why would Vanity Fair care? There are other sources for this story which may not have that slant.

Memorial Day, 2023

Today is Memorial Day, the last Monday of May, originally observed on May 30. It began in the South in 1866 to recognize their war dead, and became a national holiday in 1868. We now memorialize all those who died in service to our country, and it has become customary to honor also our friends and family who are deceased. To my knowledge, my family on my mother's side has only one Civil War dead to honor, Jacob J. George, my great grandfather's youngest brother. In a cruel irony, his parents who lived in Adams County, Pennsylvania (Gettysburg is in that county) sent their youngest boy to live in the relatively safe area of Lee County Illinois with his adult brother, a farmer.

Although we can find Jacob's name in the History of Lee County Illinois with the other volunteers from Company G, he and the others (almost 2,500 just from that county) had no idea they'd signed on for bad food, injuries, disease and prison. Lee County was paying $100 bounty, and it probably seemed like a great adventure to him (obviously lied about his age). He enlisted on January 4, 1864 when he was 15 years and one month old.

He's buried in The National Cemetery in Nashville, TN with over 16,000 soldiers, both Union and Confederate, whose names are known, and another 3,500+ unknown. He died in the hospital of acute diarrhea on May 10, 1865, having entered the hospital on April 12. General amnesty was proclaimed by the President on May 29, 1865, and the war ended. Many in this cemetery were transferred from hospital burial grounds. His Discharge papers (death certificate) showed his age as 18. He was 16.

It was about 120 years later that my mother and her sister learned about Jacob through the genealogical research of their cousin, and a few letters were found that he had sent his sister in Iowa describing his ordeal and homesickness. This is my own speculation, but I'm guessing his brother in Illinois, my great-grandfather, never mentioned him to his family. His birth and death dates are not in the family Bible. It's possible that when Mom was a little girl waving her flag at the parade on May 30 when the old Civil War veterans marched by, some may have been from Jacob's regiment.

Death and the Civil War: Extended Trailer | American Experience | Official Site | PBS

More evidence about the virus source

"Chinese scientists affiliated with the People's Liberation Army filed a patent for a Covid-19 vaccine in February 2020, with their research indicating they began working on a vaccine at least by November 2019, nearly two months before Beijing disclosed the Covid outbreak, according to a report on the virus compiled by Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and his staff.

Additionally, Wuhan researchers filed for a patent in December 2019 for an "integrated system for use in biological protection" that would detect air pressure changes to maintain negative airflow and ensure that the lab operates safely.

The patent application also included data from between September and December 2019 indicating that the WIV was experiencing serious issues with its ventilation systems.

”The outbreak of an airborne viral pneumonia is one way that such problems could have become evident to the WIV leadership," the Rubio report states."

https://sharylattkisson.com/2023/05/report-early-chinese-vaccine-patents-adds-to-evidence-of-covid-lab-leak/?

A return to the worship of Caesar

Calling out every organization and person that doesn't bow and worship the policies and confusions of the Biden administration as "white supremacists" is indeed ugly and false. It's also leftist dog whistle for "Christian." But Rome did that too in the first and second centuries. Christians were expected to worship Caesar and were considered immoral pagans because they didn't revere the Roman gods. They were "cancelled" too--thrown to the lions for entertainment. We've been through this before. But Garland/Biden Satan's tricks don't change much. Be brave and smart. Don't let Garland Goons go after Christians with his names and slurs. Speak up.

https://dailycaller.com/2023/05/26/gama-sosa-merrick-garland-new-criminal-class-youll-be-part-of-it/

"Soviet dissident Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn wrote in Gulag Archipelago (pg. 505 if you’re interested) that in the early days of the USSR, thieves and murderers were often treated with kid gloves. They could be rehabilitated, the party line went, and they were often allowed to commit crime if they targeted the right people.

Not so for anyone considered a “political criminal,” either directly or by association. Those people eventually ended up in the GULAG. Now this might seem unsurprising, until you realize that the crime of opposing the state could be something as simple as having more money than your neighbor, belonging to the wrong ethnic group, being Christian or simply existing."

Secrets of Hillsong

 I'm not sure I'll ever watch the documentary, "Secrets of Hillsong" (on HULU).  It sounds disgusting, but wonder if you have. 

"A non-denominational Christian church that began in Australia in 1983, Hillsong quickly expanded to a global audience, including the U.S. and nearly 30 other countries–launching its first U.S. location in New York City in 2010. The church’s rapid growth can be credited to its casual, almost secular style–pastors wear shredded jeans and leather jackets while preaching instead of more traditional wear; music for the congregants at a Kings of Leon concert; and church services are regularly held in venues like nightclubs." (Time description) 

Sex, child abuse, spousal abuse, money laundering, celebrity Christians--not a word about Jesus in all the articles I looked at. 

The Story Behind 'The Secrets of Hillsong' | Time

'The Secrets of Hillsong' explores allegations behind the international megachurch : NPR

Four Big Takeaways From The Secrets of Hillsong’s Carl Lentz Interview | Vanity Fair

Fourth anniversary of our kitchen fire in Lakeside

What I wrote 4 years ago, May 25, 2019.

"If we're on your prayer list, thanks. It never hurts to be preemptive. We're OK. The fire has been put out, and we had some clean up. The cottage odor is a combination of Febreze, scented candles and burned butter. We had a wonderful meal at Sortino's (Sandusky, OH) on Thursday evening and came home with 5 carry out bags + bread. However, the 20" stove in our summer home wouldn't quite hold everything when we tried to warm up dinner the next evening and (we're blaming Bob) some fettuccini alfredo over flowed, dripping butter, which then caught on fire. The four of us in the tiny kitchen (think Keystone Cops) were a hoot, with Phoebe rescuing our dinner from the flames and Mark squelching the fire. It is cleaning week-end so we then had fine soot over our freshly washed cabinets, counters, and floors. BUT. No one was hurt and there's no permanent damage. Supper was delicious once we all settled down, and I think there's enough for tonight's dinner. I do plan to buy a new stove, though."

Disparate Impact and racism

 Black homicides: Remove all deaths caused by police (6 unarmed blacks in 2021) and all deaths of blacks caused by whites, and it would make almost no difference in the rate and percentage. Homicides of black women increased by 33% in 2020. Disparate impact is the odd law that is putting black criminals back out on the street to terrorize more black victims. It's considered structurally racist that crime rates are higher for blacks. That's disparate impact fall out.

Your mother's dementia diagnosis: The MCAT is now considered structurally racist because too many blacks can't pass and get into medical school. So, although it didn't begin in 2020, since the George Floyd riots and the rise in white guilt there's a push to eliminate the standards so more blacks enter medical school. Asian Americans have the highest MCAT scores and black Americans the lowest. The Asian American who didn't pursue a career in Alzheimer's research because the team needed to be racially balanced isn't available to find the cure for your mom because of disparate impact, i.e., all that matters is race.

What would Thomas Sowell say about disparate impact.
https://open.spotify.com/episode/5szK1RX0gevURrY2BHCmer

Medical School Acceptance Rates by Race (2023): Does Ethnicity Play a Role? — Shemmassian Academic Consulting (shemmassianconsulting.com)

What the Media Doesn’t Want You To Know About 2020’s Record Murder Spike | The Heritage Foundation

Finding fun together as a family

 Our niece Joan lives in Indianapolis.  I often see on Facebook places she's taken her class (she's a teacher) or her grandchildren, or her friends for a day of adventure, fun or crafts. Sometimes it's a farm, or a park with forest and a fishing hole, a historic site, or a craft assembly.  Here's a photo of Joan, her sister, her two daughters-in-law, and her son's girlfriend.  They all made items out of wood and painted them.  Bonding and fun! We probably have businesses like this in Columbus, but I don't know where they are.

The economy

All the numbers look good according to the pro-Biden reports. Except when corrected for inflation they are all underwater, from retail to manufacturing to investment capital to jobs. They still can't get the workers to return--it was too easy working in pajamas, or less. As the election cometh, so come the lies.

I haven't shopped Target for years. It went all out trans during the Obama administration around 2012 where all this started, beginning with making the Target restrooms unsafe for girls and women. Then Target began devoting a whole month to the rainbow, for 2% of the population, hacking a rainbow sent by God after the flood which they stole from Christians and Jews. Now they've got swimsuits in the women's department with a "tuck" feature for men, so men can frolic in the women's locker rooms and real women will be at risk of assault. What ever happened to all those brave ladies of "Me Too?" Never believe a man who says he's a woman. And if the woman has just discovered she was raped 20 years ago, don't believe her either. Especially if the perp is a politician or movie star or rock celebrity.

My heart breaks for my country

 We’ve recently seen but few have read the Durham Report which is 380 pages of crimes at the highest level of government, especially of an agency that will call parents at school board meetings “domestic terrorists” but won’t police its own criminal bureaucracy. No one will be charged for these crimes even though some ineffective, powerless protesters from two years ago are still without trial. The very criminals listed in this report are still seeking more citizens to charge for January 6 for even being near the Capitol. Other rioters and looters from the summer of 2020 have never been charged or have received light sentences.

Also this week we heard testimony of three whistleblowers from the FBI.  The agency which is supposed to protect their rights, and our rights to disagree with the government—the FBI--refuses to recognize they are whistleblowers!  Their damning testimony seriously calls into question the events of January 6, 2021. And therefore, some members of the Congressional committee sneered and ridiculed their stories of abuse, loss of jobs and income.

We are embroiled in a horribly expensive (in both blood and treasure) proxy war in Europe between two Christian nations, while at the same time ignoring the debt ceiling reality. More billions approved today.  No one in our government is even suggesting brokering a peace.  Thousands of people are dying and we stand at the brink of nuclear war—no one in the world will survive that.  Not even the people who are making billions from such a war. Meanwhile, we ignore two other major wars among Christians because they are in Africa.  Black lives do not matter.

We no longer have borders.  And without borders there is no country.  6.5 million people—including Venezuelans, Cubans, Haitians, Africans, Chinese, Afghanis--have entered our country illegally in the last two years under the present administration.  They join all those who came before them and are now protected by a patchwork  of Executive Orders.  These are not legal immigrants, and few are refugees.   The years of promising “The American dream” in story, poetry and song to our own citizens is a joke. Much of the mischief is caused by NGOs, paid for by our donations to our churches and grants from our government with our taxes.

Coming across the border financed by the drug cartels and NGOs is a huge drug enterprise. The sex trafficking of women and children is also very lucrative. This is killing our own children and the children of other nations.

Special interest money is choking off the spirit and promise of the United States.  No one can or even wants to stop George Soros who has put 70 prosecutors in powerful big city offices  which have politicized the criminal justice system.  The criminals they put back on the streets are allowed to terrorize minority communities.  

Our U.S. oligarchs like Bezos, Gates and Zuckerberg are steam rollers at election time allowing our Bill of Rights to be mangled and rendering our own votes useless. Twitter was allowed via the mob violence of its “members” (and bots)  to destroy all manner of civil rights and protections.  No one stops them; they are the worst crony capitalists in our history and make the Ukrainian, Russian and Chinese oligarchs look like beginners.

Children are being maimed by “top and bottom surgery” and made infertile with cross sex hormones and genital surgery in tax supported “gender affirming” medical clinics all over the country—one at Ohio State just a few miles from my home.  Transgenderism has become the new civil rights movement of the current party in power as mentally confused children are told from an early age from their libraries to their school classrooms to the locker rooms of the sports teams that biological sex is not real. We have Supreme Court Justices who cannot define a woman because sex has become a political tool instead of God’s way of procreation.

The pandemic lockdown threat is not over.  All the societal protections bowed to a powerful bureaucracy which gave authority over our lives to local and state public health agencies with unelected, barely educated staffers. That power can be reinstated at any threat because we gave up freedom for safety.  All lessons from the past about health, quarantines, masks, mental and physical health were tossed overboard.  It was lust for power, not concerns for safety or life. Our church boards, pastors, priests, synods and fellowships just closed down and accepted money they didn’t need to use as they wished—but it was all “legal” when I questioned my church.  Legal but not moral. Some churches which did stand up to this injustice are still having battles in court.

Our independent media are a joke. The misinformation and disinformation are coming from the very agencies that warn us about the problem. In foreign countries journalists can be jailed; at home they are fired, cancelled or reassigned.

Churches and pregnancy clinics are terrorized and vandalized and the FBI looks away or arrests people praying at clinics. We are expected to follow some unstated law about pronouns.

Whether you call it gaslighting, dystopian, or just crazy, we Americans are in a very bad, bad place. We are not just denying God, we’re denying biological evolution, all the achievements of Western civilization, the beauty of nature, and ordinary common sense.

Gorsuch speaks out on lockdown, fear, declared emergencies, civil liberties

Statement of GORSUCH, J.

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES ARIZONA, ET AL. v. ALEJANDRO MAYORKAS, SECRETARY OF HOMELAND SECURITY, ET AL.

ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

No. 22–592.

Decided May 18, 2023

https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/22-592_5hd5.pdf

. . . Since March 2020, we may have experienced the greatest intrusions on civil liberties in the peacetime history of this country. Executive officials across the country issued emergency decrees on a breathtaking scale. Governors and local leaders imposed lockdown orders forcing people to remain in their homes.13 They shuttered businesses and schools, public and private.14 They closed churches even as they allowed casinos and other favored businesses to carry on.15 They threatened violators not just with civil penalties but with criminal sanctions too.16 They surveilled church parking lots, recorded license plates, and issued notices warning that attendance at even outdoor services satisfying all state social-distancing and hygiene requirements could amount to criminal conduct.17 They divided cities and neighborhoods into color-coded zones, forced individuals to fight for their freedoms in court on emergency timetables, and then changed their color-coded schemes when defeat in court seemed imminent.18 Federal executive officials entered the act too. Not just with emergency immigration decrees. They deployed a public-health agency to regulate landlord-tenant relations nationwide.19 They used a workplace-safety agency to issue a vaccination mandate for most working Americans.20 They threatened to fire noncompliant employees,21 and warned that service members who refused to vaccinate might face dishonorable discharge and confinement.22 Along the way, it seems federal officials may have pressured social-media companies to suppress information about pandemic policies with which they disagreed.23 While executive officials issued new emergency decrees at a furious pace, state legislatures and Congress—the bodies normally responsible for adopting our laws—too often fell silent. Courts bound to protect our liberties addressed a few—but hardly all—of the intrusions upon them. In some cases, like this one, courts even allowed themselves to be used to perpetuate emergency public-health decrees for collateral purposes, itself a form of emergency-lawmakingby-litigation. Doubtless, many lessons can be learned from this chapter in our history, and hopefully serious efforts will be made to study it. One lesson might be this: Fear and the desire for safety are powerful forces. They can lead to a clamor for action—almost any action—as long as someone does something to address a perceived threat. A leader or an expert who claims he can fix everything, if only we do exactly as he says, can prove an irresistible force. We do not need to confront a bayonet, we need only a nudge, before we willingly abandon the nicety of requiring laws to be adopted by our legislative representatives and accept rule by decree. Along the way, we will accede to the loss of many cherished civil liberties—the right to worship freely, to debate public policy without censorship, to gather with friends and family, or simply to leave our homes. We may even cheer on those who ask us to disregard our normal lawmaking processes and forfeit our personal freedoms. Of course, this is no new story. Even the ancients warned that democracies can degenerate toward autocracy in the face of fear.24 But maybe we have learned another lesson too. The concentration of power in the hands of so few may be efficient and sometimes popular. But it does not tend toward sound government. However wise one person or his advisors may be, that is no substitute for the wisdom of the whole of the American people that can be tapped in the legislative process.25 Decisions produced by those who indulge no criticism are rarely as good as those produced after robust and uncensored debate.26 Decisions announced on the fly are rarely as wise as those that come after careful deliberation. Decisions made by a few often yield unintended consequences that may be avoided when more are consulted. Autocracies have always suffered these defects. Maybe, hopefully, we have relearned these lessons too. In the 1970s, Congress studied the use of emergency decrees.27 It observed that they can allow executive authorities to tap into extraordinary powers.28 Congress also observed that emergency decrees have a habit of long outliving the crises that generate them; some federal emergency proclamations, Congress noted, had remained in effect for years or decades after the emergency in question had passed.29 At the same time, Congress recognized that quick unilateral executive action is sometimes necessary and permitted in our constitutional order.30 In an effort to balance these considerations and ensure a more normal operation of our laws and a firmer protection of our liberties, Congress adopted a number of new guardrails in the National Emergencies Act.31 Despite that law, the number of declared emergencies has only grown in the ensuing years.32 And it is hard not to wonder whether, after nearly a half century and in light of our Nation’s recent experience, another look is warranted. It is hard not to wonder, too, whether state legislatures might profitably reexamine the proper scope of emergency executive powers at the state level. At the very least, one can hope that the Judiciary will not soon again allow itself to be part of the problem by permitting litigants to manipulate our docket to perpetuate a decree designed for one emergency to address another. Make no mistake—decisive executive action is sometimes necessary and appropriate. But if emergency decrees promise to solve some problems, they threaten to generate others. And rule by indefinite emergency edict risks leaving all of us with a shell of a democracy and civil liberties just as hollow.

Highest rate of gun violence was in the 1970s

 

  

What the data says about gun deaths in the U.S. | Pew Research Center  

While 2021 saw the highest total number of gun deaths in the U.S., this statistic does not take into account the nation’s growing population. On a per capita basis, there were 14.6 gun deaths per 100,000 people in 2021 – the highest rate since the early 1990s, but still well below the peak of 16.3 gun deaths per 100,000 people in 1974.

Also notice it was during the Obama years the gun deaths crept up after dramatic decline following the Omnibus Crime bill in 94--before George Floyd, before Covid. I'd start looking at who George Soros funded in high crime rate cities. I don't have dates, but right now he has funded 70 prosecutors still in office. Another 12 have been removed.

"From 2014 to 2021, Soros’ $40 million in campaign spending helped elect so-called social justice prosecutors across the country while dozens more benefited from the billionaire’s largesse while in office." New York Post June 8, 2022.

Map of Soros backed prosecutors https://twitter.com/LELDF/status/1641212886663020546

What we learned from the FBI Whistleblowers

"A former FBI agent testified before Congress Thursday saying that the FBI manipulated data to make domestic terrorism linked to Jan. 6 seem like a nationwide phenomenon instead of an isolated incident. . .

Steven Friend: “Typically you would investigate Jan. 6 as one case with lots of subjects, but instead the decision was made to open up a separate case for every single individual there,” he said during the hearing. “And instead of, on paper, investigating them from the Washington field office, spreading and disseminating those to the field offices around the country, and if the individual lived in that area.”

“In effect,” he added, “it made it look like there was domestic terrorism cases and activities that were going on around the 56 field offices when in fact the cases were really all from Washington, D.C., and Washington had a task force that was responsible for calling the shots in all those cases.” Whistleblower: FBI manipulated J6 cases to make domestic terrorism appear widespread - Alpha News

Losing my pie touch

"After all these years of declaring myself the second best pie baker east of the Mississippi (my mother was #1), I've learned an extremely painful lesson today. I've lost my touch. I may never bake again. . . " September 10, 2006.  

 This probably wasn't my last pie, but I knew I'd lost my touch and today came across the date I realized it was never going to be the same. Collecting My Thoughts  Almost 17 years ago. Based on the date, I may have been baking it for our anniversary.

Chicago Tribune calls out the city's latest leftist Mayor

Opinion by Aaron Kliegman (Fox News)

Chicago's most prominent newspaper called out the Windy City's newly sworn-in left-wing mayor for doing the bidding of unions and signing "radical" executive orders just hours into the job, calling one in particular a "disaster" for the fiscal stability of Chicago.

"As Mayor Brandon Johnson was celebrating 'the soul of Chicago' in his inaugural speech, his office was churning out a batch of deeply radical executive orders that signal trouble ahead for anyone worried about tax increases or concerned with the fiscal stability of America's third largest city," the Chicago Tribune's editorial board wrote Wednesday, two days after Johnson was inaugurated. "The one that most immediately caught our attention was Johnson's executive order creating a new deputy mayor for labor relations."

The Tribune outlined what "any reasonable adult, be they Democrat or Republican," would expect a deputy mayor for labor relations to do in a big city: balance the demands and expectations of a unionized workforce with the "need to hold the line on costs."

In the public sector, however, there's less incentive to hold the line on costs because spending money to gain popularity is more of an appeal than within private companies.

“In the case of the city's new mayor, this danger is compounded because everyone knows that Johnson was hand-picked by the Chicago Teachers Union, with the help of other public sector unions, and their superb ground game got out the Johnson vote and put their man in City Hall," according to the Tribune. "Even Johnson's most fervent supporters should hope that the new mayor will make some effort to stress his independence from his union paymasters … His first responsibility is to Chicagoans who are trusting him to be a steward of the hard-earned money they pay in taxes and deliver them functional services."

Johnson, a longtime union organizer and activist, was supported by a progressive coalition, including the Chicago Teachers Union. During his campaign, he acknowledged that his ambitious proposals for investments in Chicago's social programs would require tax increases. Among Johnson's most controversial tax proposals is head tax on large companies of $1 to $4 per employee and a jet fuel tax.
As part of his agenda, Johnson, a Democrat, seems to be adopting a clear pro-labor position through some of the new positions he's creating.

The job description for the deputy mayor for labor relations, as released Monday, is being "responsible for working with all city agencies and departments to foster, promote and develop the welfare of the wage earners, job seekers and retirees of Chicago; improve working conditions; advance opportunities for profitable employment; and assure work-related benefits and rights, including working with relevant authorities to help enforce workers' statutory rights."

According to the Tribune, such a job is a "gift-wrapped present" for the Chicago Teachers Union, "which probably had a big hand in its composition." The editorial board added that the executive order says nothing about an obligation to protect taxpayers, homeowners or businesses.

"It basically says: Do what unionized workers want, find more ways to give them more of what they want, and your annual review will be just dandy," the Tribune argued. "In fact, if you take that job description at face value, any deputy mayor pushing back on any union demand whatsoever would, in fact, be contravening what their boss says is the requirement of the job."

In other words, the city's biggest paper wrote, Johnson's job description for his new deputy is a "disaster and it needs to be immediately rewritten so as to reflect the dual responsibilities of the job, which is to navigate and mediate between legitimate union demands and the ability of the city to meet them without casting citizens from their homes or sending off Chicago businesses to Florida."

The Tribune then called on Johnson to recognize that unions can ask for "unreasonable things" of their employers and be willing to respond, "No, Chicago cannot afford that much."

Johnson has said as mayor he will fund more social workers instead of police officers, let illegal immigrants vote in school board elections, make Chicago a sanctuary for transgender people and ensure women can have easy access to abortions in the city.

On his first day of office, beyond the new deputy mayor for labor relations, Johnson also created new deputy mayor positions for community safety and for immigrant, migrant and refugee rights. During his inaugural address, Johnson said Chicago has "enough room" for migrants who are surging across the country's southern border "whether you are seeking asylum or you are looking for a fully funded neighborhood."

New World Bank reports life time earnings loss from effects of Covid

 I find it ironic (or not) that the very world organizations that our own CDC slavishly followed are now concerned about the fall into poverty and loss of lifetime earnings in the middle class due to Covid regulations that destroyed years of critical schooling.

Although this publication is dated 2023, there were earlier reports from 2021 that raised concern. Did that stop Fauci or Biden? Heck No. https://www.worldbank.org/en/publication/human-capital/publication/collapse-recovery-how-covid-19-eroded-human-capital-and-what-to-do-about-it I know exactly what they'll do about it, and I'm not even a clever bureaucrat (although I was a librarian). Taxes will be raised, but only companies with high ESG scores will be able to exist. Everyone and every agency will have to be woke so that the effects of the pandemic can be overcome. We'll get hammered with more climate lies, more CRT and more blame if we don't buy the left's current hysteria.

If you read this carefully, you won't be able to tell if this was caused by the virus, the vaccines, or the lockdowns. But because very few children became ill or died, we all know the #1 problem was the lockdown which governments all over the world used to assume more power. 

6.5 million invasion led by Joe Biden

That's the number just since he took office. There's another 6.5 million already here waiting for amnesty. It's not kindness or protection for the refugee, it's about more numbers for the Democrat party. Their ideas are bankrupt and corrupt, so they can only increase through duplicity. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/biden-bill-would-give-amnesty-to-6-5-million-illegal-immigrants-cbo-says

[Two years ago, May 18, 2021] "The governors of 20 states sent a letter to President Joseph Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris in which they ask them to take action immediately on the crisis at the southern border. According to the governors, contrary to what the administration has been saying, the border is not closed or secure.

In fact, Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) has reported a staggering surge in illegal border crossings: 172,000 in March, the highest number in nearly 20 years; as well as 18,890 unaccompanied children, which — the governors note — is the largest monthly number in history." Border surge includes people from countries other than Central America, highlighting terror threat | The Hill

They laughed at that letter or tore it up. Biden and Mayorkas are still lying about it and Harris is MIA. 6.5 million have now illegally jumped the border since January 21, 2023, been given "parole", an app for their phone, or a court date and are being spread all over the country. We are all border states now and Sanctuary cities are crying in their beer. (Probably Bud-light). They take jobs from Americans, primarily the poor, because the big tech guys can ship in green card workers and legally steal American jobs. Women and children are being sex trafficked, many have died in their effort to make difficult journeys, fentanyl is killing more Americans, and those white guys in DC, the spiritual grandsons of the KKK , are pointing a finger at the weak, spineless Republicans. Biden could have stopped it the first day of his administration by retaining Trump's policies, but instead in his lust for more Democrat voters, he is destroying our country.

FBI, Russian collusion hoax and the Biden crime family

 

CVS largest share of Rx drug market in U.S.

 I've been going around and around with my CVS about a prescription.  The press this, press that, message system is about to send me around the bend.  The latest message via my doctor's tech is that the prescription is still showing at Walmart in Port Clinton where I had it transferred this past summer when I didn't want to drive 120 miles to get a refill.  Of course, I picked one up in February at CVS, and no one said, Oh my this is at Walmart, nor did anyone say I couldn't get it refilled after April.  So I called Walmart.  Easy peasy.  Talked to a real person.  He looked up my name, told me they had transferred it back, and did I want them to fill it.  Imagine. Good service is alive and well at Walmart.  At the 5th largest prescription market I can talk to a person, but at the largest, I could still be talking to a machine and going back to press one. Thank you, Walmart, for having humans available, at least in the pharmacy.  "Talk to a live person" should be #1 on all medical/health answering machines.

Largest pharmacies by Rx drugs market share 2022 | Statista

Democrats and the FBI--outrageous, heartless, scoundrels and evil

 The three FBI whistleblowers are FBI Special Agent Garret O’Boyle, former FBI Special Agent Steve Friend, and FBI Staff Operations Specialist Marcus Allen. I watched this hearing today in horror when I saw what the FBI did to try to ruin men with an impeccable record plus a wonderful record of protecting us when they were in the military. FBI tried to bankrupt and demoralize them, and doesn't allow them to work elsewhere, but won't let them work for the FBI. And the Democrats on the committee were outrageous, heartless, scoundrels and evil. It may take me days to get over this following so close to the Durham Report which shows how corrupt the FBI is.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/house/watch-live-house-weaponization-committee-holds-hearing-with-three-fbi-whistleblowers?

Watch live: FBI whistleblowers testify before House ‘weaponization’ committee | The Hill

Dem Rep. Wasserman Schultz vs. Jim Jordan: FBI Has Determined That These Are Not Whistleblowers | Video | RealClearPolitics