Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[WingsFan]

Biden eating ice cream until I can think of something better

BmaKFZO.jpg

[Dr. Strangelove]

Here's a sleazy pardon story that's been flying under the radar (but not for much longer, probably)

Trump pardoned one of the USC bribery parents. A real estate developer from Miami named Robert Zangrillo. This dude paid others to take highschool classes for his daughter and then paid $250,000 to get her into USC. They were faking her being a recruit for the crew team.

The White House release said this pardon was recommended to them by Tom Barrack, Trump's longtime friend who ran his Inauguration. Barrack is also on USC's board of Trustees. Barrack is denying that he had anything to do with it. The WH also claimed that this Zangrillo guy's daughter was earning a 3.9 GPA at USC ( a good student in other words). USC says she's not even enrolled there any more.

This Zangrillo guy's attorneys have also been unusually aggressive and have been fighting to get their hands on USC's donor lists and who fights for certain applicants. Probably an effort to embarrass the school and show that the entire process is corrupted by bribes. Now that he's pardoned, that information is no longer needed.

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-01-21/fingerpointing-outrage-after-trump-pardons-usc-father-in-college-admission-scandal

[Hannibal]

A Pepe The Frog was painted over a Bernie Sanders Mural.

It is being investigated as a Hate Crime.

https://wtop.com/dc/2021/01/bernie-s...as-hate-crime/

Green Frogs will not be tolerated by The Party in NewAmerica.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Thanks Jon, Liney, Tom and DSL for addressing the surveillance question I posed. It certainly comes down to assessing the benefits of property security using private surveillance devices installed there versus the risk of having that surveillance exploited by good or bad guys. Tom's point is well taken ..... we are all probably heavily surveilled by lots of government agencies already. Like Tom is thinking, I don't have anything to hide, I don't commit crimes and I try not to piss other people off, except when I'm driving and that activity has been curtailed with the foreknowledge that a large number of stupid drivers are armed.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Yesterday afternoon, I asked my wife why I needed to be told by the array of non-stop political commentary what Joe Biden said and did yesterday and what it means. I saw some of it. Some of it I liked, some I didn't. Yes, I know, Hanni, the party needs to tell me how I should be thinking.

You'll recall, I supported the president but not the man for a while during Trump's time in office. It was the Charlottsville events - The Unite the Right Rally - and PDJT's response to it that was the straw that broke the camel's back for me. That was just one event out of probably hundreds where Trump could have driven home appropriate populist views but failed because his messaging was, during his entire tenure, terrible. That the MSM accentuated every possible negative or racist take on everything PDJT said and ignored justifiable populist concerns fueled his demise and the rise of Joe Biden.

So, I'm not going to go down the road of not supporting this newly elected president. The man is humble, he understands conciliation and compromise, and much like his predecessor, I can support a good deal of his legislative agenda. The most important thing I'm watching right now is how he carries out his promise to get vaccines delivered to Americans. Until I see the catastrophes that his political opponents are saying will occur as a result of his leftist and green policies actually happen, I'm supporting him.

[lineygoblue]

I know its not important to Joe what I believe or think, but I'll express a thought anyway.

Jeff touched on this a moment ago. I think Joe could make a very good gesture toward "trump people" if he would tell Nancy Pelosi and the "house leaders" to stick the impeachment article where the sun don't shine, and get on with running the real business of the country. Vaccine manufacturing and distribution should be #1 or #1a on his list right now. The history books will show that PDJT was impeached twice. Good for the Dems. They did it. They are now the official party of impeachment. Move on already. That's what the Dems said after Clinton's impeachment. Move on. That's where that organization got their name from.

If he wants to make another magnanimous move toward "trump people" that would not cost him a lot politically, he could state unequivocally that he is a capitalist, and not in favor of socialism. Yes, AOC, Bernie and Rasheedah would scream like the little girls that they are, but at least 74 million voters out there don't want a socialist society. I'd daresay there are a few million on the other side as well. So, dispose of that piece of business. Confirm that America's economy will remain democratic and capitalist.

Its not like the House will impeach him for that ....

[Jeff Buchanan]

COVID news is not particularly encouraging today although it was certainly muted by news of Joe Biden's inauguration. There are several concerns. I was not aware of the necessity for this until I read an article about it but, genetic sequencing of SARS-2 variants is absolutely essential if the pandemic is to be brought under control. Identifying people with a particular variant, in this case there are two, only one of them in the US right now, that have proven to be much more easily transmitted, allows PH officials to track and isolate them. Isolating these potentially super spreaders has the potential of significantly blunting viral spread. This kind of action coupled with wide spread inoculations has tremendous potential ...... to allow an unrestricted CFB season.

Well, the US lacks the resources and infrastructure to do it and sucks at it. It would be the roll of the CDC to manage data collection and dissemination that would allow identifying infected persons carrying these variants and isolating them. We know the problems there. I posted about them a week ago. The CDC should be the global leader in pandemic responses that involve viral containment strategies and what genomic sequencing can do in that endeavor is significant. The US CDC isn't even close. Good news is that there is evidence that the Biden administration is listening to the experts here and are taking steps to fix the CDC giving them the capability to ramp up genetic sequencing as priority. It's not going to happen overnight although it should. It's possible this may be one of Biden's "war time" actions. Experts are calling for more reagents to do the sequencing, more labs to do it, upgraded data management and hiring more people trained in the PH fields. We'll see.

I think, although I may be allowing myself to be unduly influenced by the dire consequences meme, that vaccine distribution is not all unicorns and happiness. I simply can't just say that it is a supply and demand problem. It goes beyond that and I'm reading pharma supplying the G5 isn't doing a great job with production, falling behind doses contractually agreed upon with nations globally. Italy is considering legal action v. BioTech.

At the boots on the ground level, state governments are complaining that it is hard to plan the opening and staffing of new vaccination sites when information regarding the numbers of doses the state will get isn't accurate. I think states probably need to message better. You can't announce 70 new vaccination sites at Publix are now available in FL like Desantis did, and then have many of them not be able to offer more than a few dozen vaccine appointment because some Publix pharmacies only received a 10th of what they were told they were going to get. Similar stories are coming from NY for different reasons, in this case allegedly spoiled vaccines having to be thrown out because they couldn't be administered in nursing homes that received them. This due to staff shortages. 23K appointments were reportedly cancelled.

We're a month in. I get bumps in the road. The MSM isn't helping by reporting all the negatives and few, if any, of the positive stories. But this is where state government need to step up and let people know what the problems are, what the impacts of them are and not cover stuff up. The folks see right through that then start questioning everything. The president could help out here. If the pandemic and getting vaccines to Americans, as he claims, is his #1 priority, then get on prime time from the oval office and start talking about this.

[iam416]

Our rolling 7-day average for shots is over 900K for the 7 days preceding today. 900K. And Biden's big ambitious goal is 100M shots in 100 days.

[Jeff Buchanan]

I blame the MSM.......

[Jeff Buchanan]

Innauguration .png

[Da Geezer]

And finally, again, remember -- Chairman Biden choose 1619 over 1776. And environmental virtue signaling over 1000s of union jobs. In his first 6 hours.

I hope this link works. The 1776 report. Good stuff in the appendix too.

http://thf_media.s3.amazonaws.com/20...Commission.pdf

[Ghengis Jon]

Liney - The fastest and most effective way to begin the healing process would be for Trump to publicly apologize for months of MASSIVE FRAUD!!! lies that culminated in the Capitol riot by delusional followers incapable of separating reality from fantasy. Simply telling the people who believe him above all else the truth would go the farthest. It's an opportunity to salvage one small shred of his legacy and help heal this nation. (However, a delusional person suffering from Narcissistic Personality Disorder is not really likely to do so.)

Such an admission might even head off a Senate trial. The Senate could invoke the 14th Amendment ban on running for office by a simple majority vote. It would provide some small measure of accountability for Trump's rampant disregard of the Constitution throughout his tenure. It would provide cover not to have a trial. It would give an avenue to say "we're closing the book" on this sordid affair.

Point of law: Since the House voted to impeach, is the House REQUIRED to submit the Articles to the Senate? An expiration date?

[Da Geezer]

America was not exceptional in that it conquered weaker peoples, had slaves, had various other injustices, had a military, had some form of government, had lots of other things.

America was and is exceptional in its embrace of liberal democracy (constitional republic), the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and Bill of Rights (a lot of countries still don't protect freedom of speech), holding a fucking election during a CIVIL WAR, the Marshall Plan, rebuilding Japan and, in general, an overall commitment to freedom.

American exceptionalism isn't that America is entirely exceptional, but that, at its core, it certainly is. And that's entirely unacceptable to Chairman Joe which, sadly, is entirely unexceptional for the Left.

True. The 1776 project in Appendix III deals with that issue, and, in particular, critical theory which has dominated American universities for the last 30 years. The introduction to that appendix is as follows

Americans are deeply committed to the principle of equality enshrined in the Declaration of Independence, that all are created equal and equally endowed with natural rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. This creed, as Abraham Lincoln once noted, is “the electric cord” that “links the hearts of patriotic and liberty-loving” people everywhere, no matter their race or country of origin. The task of American civic education is to transmit this creed from one generation of Americans to the next.

In recent times, however, a new creed has arisen challenging the original one enshrined in the Declaration of Independence. This new creed, loosely defined as identity politics, has three key features. First, the creed of identity politics defines and divides Americans in terms of collective social identities. According to this new creed, our racial and sexual identities are more important than our common status as individuals equally endowed with fundamental rights. Second, the creed of identity politics ranks these different racial and social groups in terms of privilege and power, with disproportionate moral worth allotted to each. It divides Americans into two groups: oppressors and victims. The more a group is considered oppressed, the more its members have a moral claim upon the rest of society. As for their supposed oppressors, they must atone and even be punished in perpetuity for their sins and those of their ancestors. Third, the creed of identity politics teaches that America itself is to blame for oppression. America’s “electric cord” is not the creed of liberty and equality that connects citizens today to each other and to every generation of Americans past, present, and future. Rather, America’s “electric cord” is a heritage of oppression that the majority racial group inflicts upon minority groups, and identity politics is about assigning and absolving guilt for that oppression. According to this new creed, Americans are not a people defined by their dedication to human equality, but a people defined by their perpetuation of racial and sexual oppression.

If the government-run educational system is about teaching identity politics, then the American Exceptionalism that Talent talks about eventually dies. Why do these folks hate the US so much?

[THE_WIZARD_]

Liney - The fastest and most effective way to begin the healing process would be for Trump to publicly apologize for months of MASSIVE FRAUD!!! lies that culminated in the Capitol riot by delusional followers incapable of separating reality from fantasy. Simply telling the people who believe him above all else the truth would go the farthest. It's an opportunity to salvage one small shred of his legacy and help heal this nation. (However, a delusional person suffering from Narcissistic Personality Disorder is not really likely to do so.)

Such an admission might even head off a Senate trial. The Senate could invoke the 14th Amendment ban on running for office by a simple majority vote. It would provide some small measure of accountability for Trump's rampant disregard of the Constitution throughout his tenure. It would provide cover not to have a trial. It would give an avenue to say "we're closing the book" on this sordid affair.

Point of law: Since the House voted to impeach, is the House REQUIRED to submit the Articles to the Senate? An expiration date?

Fastest healing process would be for liberal imbeciles like yourself to STFU...

[Dr. Strangelove]

Liney - The fastest and most effective way to begin the healing process would be for Trump to publicly apologize for months of MASSIVE FRAUD!!! lies that culminated in the Capitol riot by delusional followers incapable of separating reality from fantasy. Simply telling the people who believe him above all else the truth would go the farthest. It's an opportunity to salvage one small shred of his legacy and help heal this nation. (However, a delusional person suffering from Narcissistic Personality Disorder is not really likely to do so.)

Such an admission might even head off a Senate trial. The Senate could invoke the 14th Amendment ban on running for office by a simple majority vote. It would provide some small measure of accountability for Trump's rampant disregard of the Constitution throughout his tenure. It would provide cover not to have a trial. It would give an avenue to say "we're closing the book" on this sordid affair.

Point of law: Since the House voted to impeach, is the House REQUIRED to submit the Articles to the Senate? An expiration date?

The House can hold onto the Articles indefinitely as far as I understand. But once they are officially sent, the Senate is required (by Senate rules) to take them up immediately. Pelosi has the power to stall it, in other words, but neither McConnell or Schumer can.