Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[Jeff Buchanan]

Like you, I just can't believe we are where we are with this.

[iam416]

I don’t see how brinkmanship possibly works without at least some modest political majority. Half the damn country thought it was a nut job conspiracy. I don’t think you can enter a game chicken with Xi without the political will. This is where we really part ways. And that’s fine. You’ve thought about it and gave a detailed response. I disagree.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Fair enough ....... it takes ballsy leadership to say fuck the politicians and the media, I'm the CINC, this is a national security issue. I'm going to do what protects American interests and security. That's my job as president. Therefore, I'm going to pull out all the stops to hold the Chinese government accountable.

I think the political will could have been rallied behind Trump. It was a little late in the game for Chairman Joe but still ....... The public would have followed with the right messaging (see FDR) but that's a shaky assumption and I'll grant you it may not play. This is a different time from the Japs attacking Pearl Harbor and Hitler's Blitzkrieg of Poland. The challenges though are similar, IMO. YMMV.

[Tom W]

Fair enough ....... it takes ballsy leadership to say fuck the politicians and the media, I'm the CINC, this is a national security issue. I'm going to do what protects American interests and security. That's my job as president. Therefore, I'm going to pull out all the stops to hold the Chinese government accountable.

I think the political will could have been rallied behind Trump. It was a little late in the game for Chairman Joe but still ....... The public would have followed with the right messaging (see FDR) but that's a shaky assumption and I'll grant you it may not play. This is a different time from the Japs attacking Pearl Harbor and Hitler's Blitzkrieg of Poland. The challenges though are similar, IMO. YMMV.

I'll have to respectfully disagree with that assumption. There were four years of full press efforts, from every corner of the left, to make sure that none of that was going to happen. Yeah, Trump acted like a buffoon WAAAY too often, and wasn't particularly savvy in the ways of politics. But, seriously, WTF are the expectations now that he's gone?

[Hannibal]

Some of Tucker's monologues channel the wisdom of God.

[Hannibal]

Like you, I just can't believe we are where we are with this.

I can believe it. What I can't believe is that people chose it over Bad Orange Man's Tweets. But here we are.

[lineygoblue]

With Biden and the Dems in charge, we'll never find out if China was trying to find ways to use viruses as weapons. If its true, it will never see the light of day here in the US.

Is anyone willing to state that there is no way that China was researching possible viral weaponry?

I think the average Chinese citizen doesn't give a crap about what we do in the US. But the Chinese Communist Party thinks they can, and should, rule the world.

I know... time to get my tinfoil hat out again ... pfft.

[Jeff Buchanan]

With Biden and the Dems in charge, we'll never find out if China was trying to find ways to use viruses as weapons.

My guess is that western intelligence agencies know with some degree of precision what actually happened in China. There is no question the Chinese do bio-weapon research. It's less certain, IMO, that SARS2 was worked on for that purpose.

The evidence is pretty strong that the Wuhan lab was doing gain of function experiments on SARS in a supposed Level 4 facility that wasn't actually up to those standards. One can build a convincing case that SARS2 originated in the Wuhan lab, infected workers there and those workers spread the virus to initiate the global pandemic. IMO, the theory of animal to human transfer is less convincing.

Regarding the general sentiment here that the MSM has evolved to become organizations with agendas inconsistent with their roll as guardians of truth, this appeared in my evening edition of my NYT's. I'll get to my point after you read it:

In the still-early process of investigating the origins of the novel coronavirus, the two most vocal poles of the argument are natural spillover vs. laboratory leak. Virologists still largely lean toward spillover, but the “lab leak” theory is now getting a lot of attention.

The natural spillover theory hypothesizes that an infected animal, like a bat, spread the virus to humans outside of a lab. Viruses, including coronaviruses, follow this path on a regular basis.

The lab leak theory speculates that Chinese researchers working at a laboratory in Wuhan isolated the virus, which then infected a worker. Such accidents have happened. The theory has been in the news recently because scientists who were once skeptical of the idea have expressed more openness to it.

While the debate over the lab leak theory is shifting, my colleague Carl Zimmer told me that the scientific evidence hasn’t changed.

“There’s been no clear evidence that’s emerged that has given any strength to the lab leak theory,” Carl said.

Some scientists are speaking more openly about the theory, partly because of China’s behavior. These scientists had hoped that a joint inquiry last year by the World Health Organization and China into the origins of the virus would yield some answers, but the Chinese government repeatedly interfered with the investigation.

Note how the article neatly leads up to the two boldened statements. They are factually inaccurate.

(1) There is substantial genomic evidence that SARS2 was engineered in a lab doing gain of function experiments. Talent linked to the detailed article that if one choose to read through the whole thing, it is pretty convincing. The author is well known in academic circles. He's not a crank. As well the author lays out a good case that given how animal to human transmission works and the actual time frames provided by the Chinese, the evolution of SARS2 to that stage was way too rapid. Truth be known, the Chinese are easily caught in a lie.

(2) Scientists aren't speaking out because of "Chinese behavior." For the most part people involved in scientific research are fact based. The facts support that SARS2 was engineered and came from the Wuhan lab. The NYT's watering down the facts and presenting a set of nebulous reasons why the lab theory of origin is pretty solid is a misrepresentation of the available information.

I think this sort of reporting absolutely supports the contention that the MSM isn't about raising questions on an administration's actions or policies but rather, in the case of Trump, hammering him at every opportunity presented, in the case of Biden giving him a soft landing.

[Ghengis Jon]

Liney, you don't think the US doesn't have / hasn't done bioweapons research? Really? Probably don't believe the CIA did hallucinagenic drug testing on both volunteers and unsuspecting soldiers. Or how about the US Army's venereal disease and transmitable virus research done specifically on unsuspecting black soldiers? That enough or need more verifiable examples?

Let's take Talent's ultimate boogieman, the media, at the risk of complementing the Trump administration. If (certainly is) the US intel community is watching the Wuhan lab (etal) through various means (humint, satint, commint), it is in our best interest to conceal our methodologies for a given target. If we are looking at a lab, have a souce(s) that can lead us to info we want, the intel community will use denial, misdirection and misinformation as cover. If the US has such an 'in', or can develop such an 'in', you don't think the US wouldn't use/encourage the media to cloak our interest in the lab or potential sources? Delusional fruitcakes who think "the media" blindly supports China are too intellectually shallow to even consider the US plays "the Great Game" much less uses whatever is available in its play.

Are you saying the Trump administration was far too stupid to even consider such a course of action? Or are you saying Trump so demoralized and emasculated our intelligence community that such a course of action was a non-starter? Or did Trump masterfully guided the media as a tool of intelligence gathering brilliance to cover the data collection in which the media should be commended for its cooperation?


"....the Chinese Communist Party thinks they can, and should, rule the world...." is an accurate statement. The rest is, well, tinfoil echo chamber stuff.

[iam416]

The evidence is pretty strong that the Wuhan lab was doing gain of function experiments on SARS in a supposed Level 4 facility that wasn't actually up to those standards. One can build a convincing case that SARS2 originated in the Wuhan lab, infected workers there and those workers spread the virus to initiate the global pandemic. IMO, the theory of animal to human transfer is less convincing.

The evidence re the Lab Leak is circumstantial and rational. We know where the lab was. We know what they were studying. We know where the first outbreak was. We know that employees their were "sick". Further, the circumstantial evidence we'd expect to see re human transfer isn't present. Are we really to believe that these bats traveled 1000 miles to Wuhan without infecting a single soul along the way? There should be a trail of some sort. There should also be some sort of evidence in live animals -- or maybe this was this silver bullet bat that managed to infect no one until Wuhan.

Personally, I'm at the point where I find the animal-to-human theory almost implausbile in view of current evidence (or lack thereof). And the only other viable theory is the Occam's Razor circumstantial one.

As for scientists not speaking up re Lab Leak -- it was deemed a wild, RACIST, conspiracy theory. They were terrified of the social media lynch mob -- if they were at all inclined to speak up.

[iam416]

The idea that The Media would be encouraged to do anything by DJT and then do his bidding is, I have to admit, the most laughably stupid thing I've seen in....I mean, years. It's so vapid it's evern worth commenting on a post I wouldn't ever waste my time on.

Nearly everyone here -- including the likes of Strangelove and the moron Alabam"Alum" -- along with folks all over the place acknowledge the gross failure of The Media re the Covid origins. But, man, this is the first time I've ever heard anyone say The Media's failures were done at DJT's bidding. LMMFAO. I mean....HFS, I couldn't make that shit up.

[iam416]

Some of Tucker's monologues channel the wisdom of God.

That was good, but I couldn't believe the San Francisco stuff...

But, shit, no less an authority than the hallowed NY Times even reported on it -- https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/21/u...-epidemic.html

That's where the Ds are taking us. It's not some sort of imaginary land of purple unicorns. It's happening. Already. On a small scale, sure...for now.

[iam416]

I think this is a really thoughtful, good essay on the "State of Race" in America. It is obiovusly more in line w/ my thoughts, but it isn't fire-breathing or rhetorically stupid. It makes the case in a clear, rational way. Whether you agree with the case -- up to you, but it's a good perspective.

https://quillette.com/2021/05/28/black-lives-matter-and-the-psychology-of-progressive-fatalism/

[Da Geezer]

"That is why Dems have cheated in elections all my lifetime."

Hey moron you lost. Get over it. Stick your head up your ass for the next four years!

Prunes, Stan,.....Prunes.

[Da Geezer]

That was good, but I couldn't believe the San Francisco stuff...

But, shit, no less an authority than the hallowed NY Times even reported on it -- https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/21/u...-epidemic.html

That's where the Ds are taking us. It's not some sort of imaginary land of purple unicorns. It's happening. Already. On a small scale, sure...for now.

The Dems have repeatedly tried to silence Tucker Carlson. IMO his monologues at the start of his show are a needed counter-weight to the overwhelming dominance the Dems have in the controlled media (a phrase I've been using since 2011). One of my favorite monologues is the following dealing with white police killing unarmed black suspects. Note that this was done on June 3, 2020, just a few days after the murder of George Floyd.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33vP7XP8qMs

I watch Madcow on CNN just to see what the Left is "thinking" about. The leftists on this forum might want to watch Carlson once and a while to see what the right is saying.