Small tornadoes visited Mayfield when we lived there. They did some damage. The great ice storm of 2009 hit Mayfield hard; we lost power and several trees. But the photos and videos we are now seeing of Mayfield look like images from Berlin in 1945.
Evidently, the storm spared our old neighborhood in south Mayfield. But apparently, almost everything north of Broadway, the main street, is gone. So are other parts of the town.
In 2020, almost every rural county in the state voted for Trump. Many counties registered two Trump votes per Biden vote, similar to the sum total of the suburban Milwaukee WOW counties of Waukesha, Ozaukee and Washington.
That's a far cry from 1992, when most rural Wisconsin counties voted for then-Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton over Republican President George H.W. Bush.
Today, about 30% of Wisconsinites live in rural areas and rural millennials are fleeing to population hubs, according to Malia Jones, a social epidemiologist at UW-Madison's Applied Population Laboratory.
[Green Lake County's current population of 19,018 and is 91.7% white, compared to 81% in Wisconsin and 60% nationally. Percentage of residents 65 and older is 22.5% compared to 17.5% in Wisconsin and 16.5% nationally.]
Green Lake County vaccination rate is 9 percentage points lower than the statewide rate of 64%.
To recap, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said on Tuesday the RNC got it wrong. Trump responded by saying McConnell didn’t speak for the party. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), after first scurrying away from a reporter who asked about the resolution, later said he agreed with it. Cringeworthy Trump flunky Rep. Elise Stefanik (N.Y.), who got her spot in GOP House leadership after the party dumped Cheney, gave the censure the thumbs-up, too. [BANG! ZOOM! Emphasis added]
The “discourse” in question included threatening to hang those who were performing their constitutional duty to certify the electoral college count, trashing the building and smearing feces on the walls.
The Republican Party on Friday officially declared the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol and events that led to it “legitimate political discourse,” and rebuked two lawmakers in the party who have been most outspoken in condemning the deadly riot and the role of Donald J. Trump in spreading the election lies that fueled it.
The Republican National Committee’s voice vote to censure Representatives Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger of Illinois at its winter meeting in Salt Lake City culminated more than a year of vacillation, which started with party leaders condemning the Capitol attack and Mr. Trump’s conduct, then shifted to downplaying and denying it.
On Friday, the party went further in a resolution slamming Ms. Cheney and Mr. Kinzinger for taking part in the House investigation of the assault, saying they were participating in “persecution of ordinary citizens engaged in legitimate political discourse.”
In one of the Facebook posts, which were obtained and reported by The Washington Post, Ms. Miles said, “Patriots have stormed the Capitol.”
“No surprise,” she wrote on Jan. 6, 2021, while the Capitol was being attacked, according to The Post. “The deep state has awoken the sleeping giant. Patriots are not taking this lying down. We are awake, ready and will fight for our rights by any means necessary.”
The Facebook posts are not publicly visible, but Ms. Miles told The Post that she had not deleted them.
In another post, Ms. Miles said that “these left wing violent loonies better realize that DJT is getting a second term,” referring to Mr. Trump by his initials.
The tmove, which affects Entertainment Weekly, InStyle, EatingWell, Health, Parents and People en Español, will lead to 200 job cuts, according to a memo sent to employees on Wednesday. The cuts amount to less than 5 percent of the company’s total work force.
The magazines were acquired last year by Dotdash, a subsidiary of Mr. Diller’s InterActiveCorp, when it bought the publishing giant Meredith for roughly $2.7 billion.
"We have said from the beginning, buying Meredith was about buying brands, not magazines or websites,” Neil Vogel, the chief executive of Dotdash Meredith, wrote in the memo, which was obtained by The New York Times. “It is not news to anyone that there has been a pronounced shift in readership and advertising from print to digital, and as a result, for a few important brands, print is no longer serving the brand’s core purpose.”
Fellow Republican conservatives rallied Tuesday behind a Kansas physician-legislator who's under investigation by the state medical board, advancing his measures to protect doctors pursuing potentially dangerous treatments for COVID-19 and to weaken childhood vaccination requirements.
As a Senate health committee member, state Sen. Mark Steffen successfully pushed a proposal that would require pharmacists to fill prescriptions of the anti-worm medication ivermectin, the anti-malaria drug hydroxychloroquine and other drugs for off-label uses as COVID-19 treatments. Steffen is among the Republican-controlled Legislature's biggest vaccine skeptics and a critic of how the federal government and Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly have handled the coronavirus pandemic.
If Daniel sounds like a duck, that's because he's a quack.
Daniel Koster, a family medicine physician in Green Bay, said at a press conference in the Wisconsin State Capitol on Wednesday that the bill is needed because within the last year, a pharmacist refused to fill a prescription he wrote for ivermectin.
This includes the antiparasitic drug ivermectin, which has been promoted by conservative politicians — and podcast host Joe Rogan — as a treatment for COVID-19. Now, state Rep. Shae Sortwell, R-Gibson, is proposing legislation that would prevent employers and credentialing boards in Wisconsin from taking action against doctors who prescribe it.
"We don’t need group-think. We need doctors to be able to be doctors," Sortwell said at state Capitol press conference with Reps. Chuck Wichgers, R-Muskego; Clint Moses, R-Menomonie; and Dave Murphy, R-Greenville.
Yup, Shea, we really need to get rid of this kind of group think!
“The stated goal is to depopulate the planet and the ones that are left, either make them chronically sick or turn them into transhumanist cyborgs that can be manipulated externally by 5G, by magnets, by all sorts of things,” Tenpenny said during an appearance on “The Stew Peters Show” Thursday night. “I got dragged through the mud by the mainstream media when I said that in May of last year in front of the House committee in Columbus, [Ohio]. Well, guess what? It’s all true.”
Mask mandates were the topic of the evening at the Page County Public Schools board meeting in Luray, Va., on Thursday night when Amelia Ruffner King stepped to the podium to speak during time allotted for public comment
“My children will not come to school on Monday with a mask on, all right?” Ms. King, 42, said. “That’s not happening. And I will bring every single gun loaded and ready to, I will call every …”
It is not clear what attracted Mr Trump to Ms Michael's posts, but she appears among a circle of conservative pro-Trump Twitter users who regularly retweet one another. It is also not clear whether the name of her Twitter account had any bearing on Mr Trump's decision to retweet her.
t a rally against vaccine mandates in Washington, DC, on Sunday, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. likened vaccine policies in the US to the actions of a totalitarian state, even suggesting Anne Frank was in a better situation when she was hiding from the Nazis.
"Even in Hitler Germany (sic), you could, you could cross the Alps into Switzerland. You could hide in an attic, like Anne Frank did," said Kennedy, a prominent anti-vaccine advocate, in a speech at the Lincoln Memorial. "I visited, in 1962, East Germany with my father and met people who had climbed the wall and escaped, so it was possible. Many died, true, but it was possible."
Kennedy's historically inaccurate anti-Semitic remark ignores the fact that Frank and some 6 million other Jews were murdered by Nazis
Adams first tested positive for COVID-19 after feeling symptoms late Wednesday night. He tested positive Thursday. His spokeswoman, Aundrea Peterson, said he was “following the CDC recommended five-day quarantine period, which will conclude on Monday,” the day before the first day of the session.
So Adams came to work on Tuesday. He didn’t wear a mask while he gave his opening remarks in the Senate chamber, saying he had “just recovered from COVID.”
During his speech, Adams initially said he “tested positive, once yesterday once today,” before minutes later saying he “tested negative twice,” joking that he was making sure people were listening.
Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor has diabetes, which puts her at higher risk for a serious bout with COVID-19. In the fall, the Obama appointee was the only one of the nine justices to wear a mask in the courtroom where attendance is limited because of the coronavirus to the court, the attorneys and the Supreme Court press corps. As cases began to rise during the holiday season, Sotomayor said she did not feel safe near people who were unmasked.
Chief Justice John Roberts then asked everyone to wear masks in the courtroom, NPR reported. Everyone complied — except for Associate Justice Neil Gorsuch.
Dick move!
1/12/2022 update starts here
Meet Covidiot and WI State Senator Mary Felzkowski
State Sen. Mary Felzkowski, R-Irma, speaking on Assembly Bill 299, which prohibits vaccination proof requirements, defended the bill as protecting people's personal freedoms while calling the various vaccines available an "experimental drug." That bill passed out of the Assembly in June of last year
Freedoms to spread the virus, fill hospitals with Covid patients, and make working in hospitals and care facilities an absolute hell.
“This bill seeks to give another tool in the toolbox not only for employees who are potentially looking at a significant loss of employment but also employers who are looking to just do the right thing and maintain their workforce,” bill co-author Rep. Cody Horlacher, R-Mukwonago, said at the Senate Labor and Regulatory Reform Committee hearing Tuesday.
“The vaccines kill, don’t get it!” she yelled in the video. “This is how gullible these idiots are. They’re all getting vaccine!”
Ms Weldon began showing symptoms that she had been infected by Covid-19 in late December. Her final video shows her coughing and struggling to get through a rant about patriots overthrowing the US government. During the video she complained that she was exhausted.
Navarro went on to say that there is “literally no upside to children with healthy immune systems to get jabs,” adding, “the risk is so far bigger than any kind of reward, that again I get back to the child abuse issue.”
Despite links to myocarditis, vaccinating children does have serious health benefits, and plays a huge factor in halting the spread of Covid-19.
“The known risks of COVID-19 illness and its related, possibly severe complications, such as long-term health problems, hospitalization, and even death, far outweigh the potential risks of having a rare adverse reaction to vaccination, including the possible risk of myocarditis or pericarditis,” the CDC noted in their statement.
Reps. Jon Jacobsen, R-Council Bluffs, and Mark Cisneros, R-Muscatine, have led work on the proposal, which would override the COVID-19 vaccination requirements that some businesses have put in place to fight the virus. The bill would apply widely to employers — including health care providers — and governmental entities but would not affect childhood immunization requirements for schools, Jacobsen said. [emphasis added]
During the pandemic, Ernby remained an ardent and vocal opponent of COVID-19 vaccine mandates.
As recently as Dec. 4, she spoke against them during a rally held outside Irvine City Hall. Organized by the UC Irvine and Cal State Fullerton chapters of Turning Point USA, the rally drew dozens in attendance, according to the Daily Titan, a CSUF student newspaper.
“There’s nothing that matters more than our freedoms right now,” Ernby said. [emphasis added]
As COVID-19’s Omicron variant spreads rapidly in the United States, Indiana — like many other states — is seeing its hospitals being inundated with COVID-19 patients. Indiana, according to the Indianapolis Star, reported that almost 3,000 patients were hospitalized with COVID-19 in the state on Tuesday. But the following day, Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita tweeted a December 17 interview in which he said he doesn’t believe the coronavirus statistics coming from the state’s health department.
On December 17, Rokita — a Republican who opposes mask and vaccine mandates — was interviewed by Todd Connor, a reporter for WSBT-TV Channel 22 in South Bend.
During the interview, Connor asked Rokita, “We’re hearing numbers: 80% of those in the hospital receiving treatment right now are unvaccinated. How do you rationalize trying to stop people from having to get the vaccines, but yet, so many in the hospital are the unvaccinated?” — to which Rokita replied, “Well, you know, first of all, I don't believe any numbers anymore. And I'm sorry about that, but this has been politicized.”
Connor asked, “From your state health people?” And Rokita responded, “This has been politicized since Day One.”
In reference to Rokita's ongoing lawsuits against the federal vaccine mandates, WSBT's Todd Connor asked, "How do you rationalize trying to stop people from having to get the vaccines, but yet so many in the hospital are the unvaccinated?"
"Well, you know, first of all, I don't believe any numbers anymore," Rokita said. "And I'm sorry about that, but this has been politicized."
"From your state health people, huh?" Connor asks.
"This has been politicized since day one," Rokita continues.
12/19/2021 update starts here
Meet WI Assembly Speaker Robin Vos
who seems to be on a continuous bad acid trip of late
The kind of drivel you'd expect from this preening moron.
"A sizable amount of the problems that are being brought on are being prodded by decisions that people are making," the Rochester Republican said. "Vaccine mandate means you have less staff, right? That might be a bad decision that hospitals are making. Again, it's their choice. I don't agree with it. I don't think they should have a vaccine mandate, but as of right now, they can."
A state lawmaker is offering “vaccination exemption assistance,” while local health officials plead with residents to mask up and get vaccinated and Excela Health struggles to deal with covid-19 infections that have pushed its three Westmoreland County hospitals beyond capacity.
State Rep. Leslie Rossi, R-Unity, said she offered help to those seeking vaccination exemptions in response to growing inquiries from fearful constituents in her district, which includes portions of eastern Westmoreland and western Somerset counties.
Her newsletter landed in local mailboxes as Westmoreland County emergency management officials warned of a “desperate” situation in local hospitals, where covid-19 infections have surged among unvaccinated residents, sparking overcrowding in emergency rooms and a scarcity of beds in inpatient and intensive care units. [emphasis added]
As many Kansas City area districts report record numbers of new COVID-19 cases, more than two dozen elected officials are urging Johnson County to drop its school mask mandate.
Twenty-six Kansas state legislators, local elected officials and newly elected school board members sent a letter to the Johnson County Board of Commissioners last week, pleading for the board to rescind its mandate by January. Since August, Johnson County has maintained a health order requiring all schools that serve students as old as sixth grade to require masks to help prevent the spread of COVID-19 while vaccination rates among children remain low.
Maybe some of those kids are suffering because their parents are among the 6,902 Kansans who have died from the virus.
The 7-day average of new cases has doubled during the past 2 months.
Senate President Pro Tempore Jake Corman (R., Centre), who as a parent joined the case as a plaintiff, said the decision meant “the power for parents and local leaders to make health and safety decisions in our schools is restored.”
A spokesperson for Wolf called the outcome “extremely disappointing.”
Pennsylvania's 7-day average of new Covid cases is up 1760% since July 1, 2021. Clearly, the PA GOP has a death wish for its members.
About two weeks before his death, which was confirmed by the Michigan Republican Party, his sister, Elizabeth Hartmann, wrote on Facebook that Mr. Hartmann was “in ICU with Covid pneumonia and currently on a ventilator.” He had been outspoken in his opposition to Covid vaccines. [emphasis added]
In August, some health workers protested across Wisconsin over hospital systems’ vaccine requirements. They were met with support from Senate Majority LeaderPresident Chris Kapenga, R-Delafield, who wrote in a statement that he encouraged the protests and that "it will be impossible for the hospital system to function" without the workers involved in the protests. But the protests died down quickly, and there haven’t been any instances of Wisconsin hospital systems shutting down or reversing their policies.\
There have been calls for local COVID-19 vaccine advocacy ever since the Warren County Commissioners rejected an idea to fund a promotional campaign via American Rescue Plan funds.
Such a campaign is now underway.
A group of local government, hospital and community officials have launched the COVID-19 Vaccine Awareness Campaign which “aims at increasing vaccine awareness, combatting misinformation, and expanding utilization of COVID-19 vaccines,” according to a statement.
44% of all Warren County residents are fully vaccinated compared to 60 % statewide in Pennsylvania.
On Wednesday he took it a step further, releasing a statement encouraging parents to report to his office any districts that continue to enforce COVID-19 rules, setting up potentially more lawsuits by the state seeking to overturn locally enacted mitigation measures.
"Mayor de Blasio will impose a first-in-the-nation vaccine mandate for all PRIVATE sector workers in NYC," Arizona Rep. Andy Biggs tweeted on Monday. "Bill de Blasio isn't a mayor, he is a tyrant."
"I never intended to go further than that one meeting," Nedweski said. "You know, I just wanted to say something on behalf of children who I knew may not have someone there to speak for them.”
By August of this year, Nedweski was taking control of a school board meeting room, revving up parents who'd refused to socially distance in overflow rooms and prompted school board members to retreat, according to the Kenosha News. She was wearing a T-shirt from Moms for Liberty, an organization that had recruited her earlier that month. She and other parents had shown up to call for no mask requirements.
Marcus Lamb, a founder of the Texas-based Christian television network Daystar, who had been dismissive of Covid-19 vaccinations, died on Tuesday after contracting the coronavirus. He was 64.
[snip]
After contracting the virus, Mr. Lamb, who frequently suggested on the air that people pray instead of getting inoculated, was taken to a hospital when his oxygen levels dropped “all of a sudden,” his wife said in a broadcast on Nov. 18. It was not immediately clear when he had tested positive for the virus. [emphasis added]
Foucault, a parent of three who has lived in Somerset for about 15 years, said he started paying attention to his local school board last winter when he felt it was time to reconsider the district's mask requirement. He spoke during public comment periods but didn't get the results he hoped for.
A few days ago, Kenosha County's 7-day average of new Covid cases was as high as it's been since January 17, 2021.
In his letter to House Speaker Fecteau, Johansen said his wife's dedication to the family farm allowed him to serve in the Legislature and that he no longer has the time to manage both duties.
He said the decision was difficult because of the ongoing fight against what he described as the expansion of state power during the pandemic. [emphasis added]
Clearly, Chris has carelessly consumed a considerable amount of Covid Koolaid.
"To me, that's more dangerous than the slings and the arrows that get thrown at me. I'm not going to be around here forever, but science is going to be here forever. And if you damage science, you are doing something very detrimental to society long after I leave. And that's what I worry about," he said.
But in a 32-page ruling issued on Monday in St. Louis, the judge, Trump appointee District Judge Matthew T. Schelp, said that a preliminary injunction to halt the rule was warranted because he believed the arguments made by the plaintiffs — 10 mostly Republican-dominated states — that the CMS lacked authority to implement the requirement, probably had merit.
Prager then went even further and said, “I would argue that the unvaccinated are bigger pariahs. Were gays or people with AIDS banned from travel? Were they banned form restaurants? Were they fired from their jobs? Were they deprived of a way of feeding their family?”
“The unvaccinated are the most hated group since — I would say, since slavery,” Prager actually added.
Last month Prager told his audience he deliberately got infected covid-19 to get natural immunity. Recent CDC data concluded that the vaccines provide much stronger protection.
The jarring scene gave vaccine skeptics in Florida a big win and moved the state further away from the guidance of federal public health officials, reflecting how a highly politicized pandemic has only become more so as Republican-controlled states confront the Biden administration’s wide-ranging attempts to ease it.
Perhaps no state has been more aggressive than Florida, where Mr. DeSantis and his allies are betting that the anger over public health restrictions that drove Republicans to the polls this month in Virginia, New Jersey and other states will grow their political base and keep voters fervently engaged going into the 2022 midterms. Mr. DeSantis, who faces re-election next year, is also considered a leading 2024 Republican presidential contender. [emphasis added]
Anointed months ago by a febrile chattering class of DC 'insiders', self-appointed arbiters of poliical cool.
Brandtjen fears that if Madison can limit poll workers based on their vaccine status, that voters may be next.
“If the municipalities, if they are going to start creating these obstacles for voting or for poll workers, the next thing you’re going to hear is ‘We’re going to have to close facilities,’” Brandtjen said. “They’re going to move to an all mail-in ballot system.” [emphasis added]
Oregon voters have long cast their ballots by mail in many types of elections, including for local, state and federal offices. They started doing so in 1987 – and have voted exclusively by mail in all elections since 1998. [emphasis added]
Full disclosure: Janel is in the voter suppression camp, so this hysterial outburst comes as no surprise.
“Oklahoma may be able to take this step as a legal matter, but there are definitely things the federal government can do in response that might make it a painful Pyrrhic victory,” said Eugene R. Fidell, an adjunct professor at the New York University School of Law. “The governor and state adjutant general thus might find themselves commanding some very unhappy personnel.”
The doctor involved in a lawsuit over ivermectin treatments for a Fort Worth coronavirus patient has resigned from a Houston hospital after the hospital suspended her last week.
Dr. Mary Talley Bowden, a private-practice ear, nose and throat doctor who had provisional privileges to practice at Houston Methodist Hospital, was suspended Friday after spreading COVID-19 misinformation, the hospital said.
"I am a flea on the elephant of Methodist," Bowden said in an interview Tuesday on KTRH-AM, a Houston talk radio station.
"There is no reason for them to go after me like this. … They are using me to show what’s going to happen to doctors who speak out."
Buck Sexton, the host of a program syndicated by Premiere Networks, an iHeart subsidiary, recently floated the theory that mass Covid-19 vaccinations could speed the virus’s mutation into more dangerous strains. He made this suggestion while appearing on another Premiere Networks program, “The Jesse Kelly Show.”
The theory appears to have its roots in a 2015 paper about vaccines for a chicken ailment called Marek’s disease. Its author, Andrew Read, a professor of biology and entomology at Penn State University, has said his research has been “misinterpreted” by anti-vaccine activists. He added that Covid-19 vaccines have been found to reduce transmissions substantially, whereas chickens inoculated with the Marek’s disease vaccine were still able to transmit the disease. Mr. Sexton did not reply to a request for comment.
Jimmy DeYoung Sr., whose program was available on iHeart, Apple and Spotify, died of Covid-19 complications after making his show a venue for false or misleading statements about vaccines. One of his frequent guests was Sam Rohrer, a former Pennsylvania state representative who likened the promotion of Covid-19 vaccines to Nazi tactics and made a sweeping false statement. “This is not a vaccine, by definition,” Mr. Rohrer said on an April episode. “It is a permanent altering of my immune system, which God created to handle the kinds of things that are coming that way.” Mr. DeYoung thanked his guest for his “insight.” Mr. DeYoung died four months later.
On a recent episode of his podcast, Rick Wiles, a pastor and self-described “citizen reporter,” endorsed a conspiracy theory: that Covid-19 vaccines were the product of a “global coup d’état by the most evil cabal of people in the history of mankind.”
“It’s an egg that hatches into a synthetic parasite and grows inside your body,” Mr. Wiles said on his Oct. 13 episode. “This is like a sci-fi nightmare, and it’s happening in front of us.”
Marc Bernier, a talk radio host in Daytona Beach, Fla., whose show is available for download or streaming on iHeart’s and Apple’s digital platforms, was among the talk radio hosts who died of Covid-19 complications after expressing anti-vaccination views on their programs. The deaths made national news and set off a cascade of commentary on social media. What drew less attention was the industry that helped give them an audience.
On a June episode, Mr. Bernier said, after referring to unvaccinated people: “I’m one of them. Judge me if you want.” The next month, he cited an unfounded claim that “45,000 people have died from taking the vaccine.” In his final Twitter post, on July 30, Mr. Bernier accused the government of “acting like Nazis” for encouraging Covid-19 vaccines. [emphasis added]
Jacque, who has been a top proponent in the Legislature for bills banning vaccine mandates, has not said whether he was vaccinated when he became seriously ill with COVID-19 and did not encourage vaccinations during his floor speech. While Jacque was in the hospital, his wife released a statement urging people to consider talking to their doctors about getting vaccinated. [emphasis added]
Wonder what the medical bill is for his obstinate Covidiocy.
Dr. Tenpenny drew national attention this summer when she spoke to the Ohio House Health Committee, claiming COVID-19 vaccines magnetize recipients and "interface" with 5G cellphone towers. The physician was deemed a nonexpert by a federal judge in a vaccine injury lawsuit.
Previously, Dr. Tenpenny has called vaccines a "method of mass destruction"; charged for her "boot camp" training people how to convince others to refuse vaccination; and is the author of Saying No to Vaccines: A Resource Guide for All Ages, sold on Amazon for $526.
COVID-19 rates among unvaccinated
Rodgers' claim: "This idea that it's a pandemic of the unvaccinated, it's a just a total lie.
"Fact check: Unvaccinated individuals are, in fact, bearing the brunt of the pandemic's impact.
Perhaps the most notable evidence of this came from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention earlier this fall. The CDC studied more than 600,000 cases of COVID-19 from 13 states and found that unvaccinated people were 4.5 times more likely to get infected, 10 times more likely to be hospitalized and 11 times more likely to die than their vaccinated counterparts
Actually, Aaron, unvaccinated individuals are 6 times as likely to be infected with the virus and 12 times as likely to die from it.
"The order is unconscionable. OSHA does not know how to run our companies. We do," said Steve Fettig, Secretary and Treasurer of Tankcraft and Plasticraft. "OSHA does not know how to keep our employees safe. We do. And we have done so successfully since the start of the pandemic without the interference of a federal bureaucracy. We respect our employees’ fundamental right to make their own private, difficult medical choices."
Get over it, Steve. Corporations have a long history of federal reporting requirements.
Florida is doing better in per-capita cases and deaths from COVID than states that put in universal mask mandates and lockdowns. But you won’t hear that from the media. Now that DeSantis’ strategy has worked, they have quietly moved on without acknowledging their predictions of doom were wrong.
“We’re basically saying you’re the modern-day Jew,” Beard told the committee in person. “You’re gonna wear that star … and we don’t give a damn if you complain about it or not.”
Beard, who said he's vaccinated, referred to the yellow star that the Nazi government in Germany forced Jews to wear before and during World War II. Landwehr thanked him for his comments then later said the remarks made during the committee hearing reminded her of comments in a Holocaust documentary suggesting that the Nazis told Germans, “We’ll take you all down a path.”
“Now do I believe that that’s what we’re trying to do? I hope not. Because this is America and I don’t want to lose hope in it,” she said.
No one on the committee objected to the analogy during the committee's meeting.
Democratic Rep. Vic Miller, of Topeka, said afterward that he didn't “get the reference.”
Rabbi Moti Rieber, executive director of Kansas Interfaith Action, called the comparison between the Holocaust and vaccine mandates "odious and historically ignorant and offensive.”
Ladapo also has an advanced degree in Dick Behavior.
Polsky said there was a brief back-and-forth, and then she finally asked whether there was a reason he couldn’t wear a mask.
“He just smiles and doesn’t answer. He’s very smug,” Polsky recalled. “And I told him several times, `I have this very serious medical condition.’ And he said, ‘That’s OK,’ like it basically has nothing to do with what we are talking about.”
Eventually, Polsky said she asked Ladapo to leave her office, which he agreed to do, she said. But the Senator said before going, Ladapo remarked, “Sometimes I try to reason with unreasonable people for fun.”
"Our police do the hardest job in the world, and they deserve respect — not losing their pay or being fired for refusing to comply with a ridiculous vaccine mandate," Braun said in a statement to Fox News.
The senator added that the officers "deserve respect" and encouraged the "3,000 Chicago cops defying this government overreach" to come to his state of Indiana.
At least Thomas Gallagher, whose presentencing report suggested he had been watching “too much Fox News” leading up to the insurrection, had the decency to apologize for being part of the mob of thousands who invaded the Capitol to try to stop Congress from formally recognizing the election of President Biden.
So what’s the excuse for the four Republicans who sit on the five-member Executive Council? They rewarded the outlandish and menacing behavior of anti-vaccine demonstrators by caving into their demands, refusing to accept $27 million in federal money that would help vaccinate the most vulnerable Granite Staters.
An Alaskan Republican lawmaker who was banned from an airline due to her refusal to wear a mask on the aircraft has contracted COVID-19.
In a Facebook post shared on Tuesday, October 12, Alaska state Sen. Lora Reinbold (R) revealed she'd tested positive for COVID-19. "It's my turn to battle Covid head-on... game on! Who do you think is going to win? When I defeat it, I will tell you my recipe," Reinbold wrote.
He suggested that the county use a portion of its American Rescue Plan funds — approximately $22,000 — to build a series of promotions that highlight “local voices” and the “recommendation of folks in the community” to boost vaccination efforts.
The commissioners in a 2-1 decision rejected the proposal during Wednesday’s meeting.
A second motion for the effort failed for lack of a second.
43% of all Warren County residents are vaccinated compared to 59% statewide.
"Today, as Acting Governor, I fixed Gov. Little's Executive Order on 'vaccine passports' to make sure that K-12 schools and universities cannot require vaccinations OR require mandatory testing. I will continue to fight for your individual Liberty!" tweeted McGeachin, who is elected separately from Little and is running to take her fellow Republican's job next year under the campaign slogan "Make Idaho free again."
October 6 update starts here
Meet New Hampshire state representative Key Weyler,
Sununu’s statement comes after Weyler, 79, emailed colleagues materials full of COVID conspiracy theories, including a discredited, false report that claims COVID deaths are driven by a plot orchestrated out of Vatican City, Washington D.C. and London.
“It’s all one huge puppet theatre, where the majority of the people
— even most of those who are complicit — haven’t got the slightest clue what is going on, and how everyone is being played,” the report states.
Among other false claims, the report says some COVID vaccines include “living organism(s) with tentacles.”
House Speaker Sherman Packard has remained silent on whether Weyler will be stripped of his post and downplayed Weyler’s decision to share such material.
In the Legislature’s Federalism Committee on Monday, lawmakers recommended draft legislation by Senate Assistant Majority Leader Steve Vick, R-Dalton Gardens. Vick’s bill would charge government officials with a misdemeanor if they violate a state law on immunization, which allows residents to decline to get immunized without “threat of penalty by the federal government.”
The bill would penalize individuals, not agencies, for the violations. Anyone with a misdemeanor can face up to six months in jail or a $5,000 fine, or both. [emphasis added]
A Jewish council member pushed back, arguing that the yellow Star of David symbol is antisemitic and offensive.
Then the mayor made a shocking defense: “I think us borrowing that from them is actually a credit to them,” Dave Bronson said, referring to Jewish people.
The national blowback and condemnation from local Jewish community leaders against the Republican mayor was swift. Bronson backtracked his words and apologized.
The fact that a supposedly educated person would make such an idiotic statement is indefensible.
Alaska set a record for highest 7-day average of new Covid cases son September 27, 2021. Four days ago.
Screenshot from Dallas Morning News Coronavirus Update email
Rowlett, Texas, straddles Dallas and Rockwell counties, both of wbich, like the majority of Texas's 254 counties, are at extremely high risk of Covid spread.
One of the last videos the married couple posted on their now deleted YouTube channel was about how they wouldn’t get the vaccine.
It was later reposted on Vaxx Mann’s channel, which is connected to a website titled SORRYANTIVAXXER.COM, dedicated to sharing stories of people who have gotten COVID and died, or came close to dying after sharing their anti-vax beliefs.
“I’ve got my own passport. It’s called the ‘Bill of Rights,’” Dusty said in the video around the 41:30 mark. “I think this will be all behind us in a couple of years.”
All but 1 of Alabama's 67 counties is at extremely high risk of Covid spread.
"That the leaders of the Horry County Republican Party believe it is appropriate to advocate for medical treatment for any illness is simply insane," Rice wrote. "Especially in the middle of a plague, and in opposition to the guidance of the Center for Disease Control, the National Institute of Health, and 95% of the physicians in the country. Folks, talk to your doctor if you want medical advice."
Much of the interview centered around COVID-19 and treatments Cole claims are effective against it. That includes ivermectin, an anti-parasitic drug that has soared in popularity to treat COVID-19. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, though, has not approved ivermectin for that use and said doing so could be dangerous.
Cole also expressed doubt about the efficacy of the COVID-19 vaccine, calling it “investigational” and unproven to work. He recently said he tested positive for COVID-19, the Idaho Capital Sun reported. Cole has said he’s not vaccinated against COVID-19. He’s publicly called the vaccine a “clot shot” and “needle rape.”
Elmore Commissioner Bud Corbus said he talked to 10 local doctors, all of whom disagreed with Cole’s viewpoints on the pandemic and its possible treatments. He read aloud emails from doctors describing the surge of COVID-19 patients in local hospitals, and how the number of sick and dying patients far exceeded earlier stages of the pandemic.
One doctor said: “I have had more patients die from this in the last month than from a year ago.”
Elmore County set a new record for highest 7-day average of new Covid cases on September 15, 2021.
Meet Waukesha County Chief Judge Jennifer Dorow, ready for another day's work. (Scott Walker appointed her to the Waukesha County Circuit Court in 2011.)
As instructed, the retired Marquette University chemistry professor showed up on Aug. 23 at the Waukesha County Courthouse at 1 p.m.
But to his surprise, he said, he was only one of three people among about 40 in the Jury Assembly Room wearing a mask. He said also noticed a lack of social distancing and tried to pull his chair as far aside as he could to watch the introductory video.
When it was over and the administrator solicited questions, Wilkie said he asked, "Why are there no masks?"
He said the answer was basically that just were no rules requiring masks.
"I decided immediately if you're going to be this cavalier about my health, I'm not staying," he said. And he left the courthouse.
On Friday, Wilkie got a letter from Chief Judge Jennifer Dorow ordering him to appear in her courtroom Oct. 5 "to explain why you have deliberately disregarded an Order of the Court." It cites state law that allows her to impose a $500 sanction if she finds he was in contempt of court.
Waukesha County is currently at very high risk of Covid spread.
Landry blasted the proposal in a strongly worded social media statement.
"The decision of an individual to get a COVID shot is not the President's to make. If Biden attempts to mandate it upon Louisiana citizens, I will challenge his unconstitutional overreach in court," he said.
Landry has been an outspoken opponent of mandatory COVID-19 vaccinations, particularly as a condition of attending Louisiana colleges and universities. He maintains students and residents should have the right to choose.
Here's what this 'right to choose' leads to: 60 of Louisiana 64 parishes are at exnremely high risk of Covid spread.
Chris Wallace tore into Gov. Pete Ricketts (R-Neb.) on Sunday for coming out against mandatory COVID-19 vaccination, even though his state has mandates in place for several other vaccines.
“You say it’s a personal choice,” Wallace said on “Fox News Sunday.” “In fact, to attend school in your state of Nebraska, children must be vaccinated against a number of diseases. ... They must be vaccinated against diptheria, tetanus, pertussis, polio, measles, mumps and rubella, hepatitis B and chickenpox.”
“Why are those mandates that parents in your state must comply with — and do comply with routinely — why is it that they’re not so objectionable and such a violation of personal freedom, but [President Joe] Biden’s vaccine mandates are?” he asked.
The lawmaker, Lora Reinbold, a Republican state senator, was captured on video in April arguing with employees at Juneau International Airport about mask rules.
After the confrontation, Alaska Airlines said it had notified Ms. Reinbold that she was “not permitted to fly with us for her continued refusal to comply with employee instruction regarding the current mask policy.”
Ms. Reinbold had previously complained about Alaska Airlines on Facebook, saying it was “part of mask tyranny.”
September 11 update starts here
One year ago, Warren County's 7-day average of new cases was 1. This year it's 14 and rising fast.
COVID-19 vaccination is recommended for all people 12 years and older, including people who are pregnant, breastfeeding, trying to get pregnant now, or might become pregnant in the future.
Evidence about the safety and effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccination during pregnancy has been growing. These data suggest that the benefits of receiving a COVID-19 vaccine outweigh any known or potential risks of vaccination during pregnancy.
There is currently no evidence that any vaccines, including COVID-19 vaccines, cause fertility problems in women or men.
Pregnant and recently pregnant people are more likely to get severely ill with COVID-19 compared with non-pregnant people. [emphasis added]
Lowry, a 67-year-old registered Republican, is midway though his second four-year term on the Volusia County Council, representing Deltona, Enterprise and parts of DeBary and Osteen.
He was a Deltona City Commissioner from 2010 until his 2014 election to the county seat.
He attracted controversy this summer for promoting conspiracy theories, including some about the coronavirus pandemic, in a sermon at Deltona Lakes Baptist Church.
"We did not have a pandemic, folks. We were lied to," Lowry said in the May 30 sermon.
He referred to Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, as "Dr. Falsey" — "I did not mispronounce that. That’s the way I wanted to say it." — and labeled him a liar and pervert.
All 67 Florida counties are at extremely high risk for Covid spread.
Butler County Common Pleas Judge Gregory Howard ordered West Chester Hospital, part of the University of Cincinnati network, to treat Jeffrey Smith, 51, with Ivermectin. The order, filed Aug. 23, compels the hospital to provide Smith with 30mg of Ivermectin daily for three weeks.
The drug was originally developed to deworm livestock animals before doctors began using it against parasitic diseases among humans. Several researchers won a Nobel Prize in 2015 for establishing its efficacy in humans. It’s used to treat head lice, onchocerciasis (river blindness) and others.
Both the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have warned Americans against the use of Ivermectin to treat COVID-19, a viral disease.
Then an adult stepped in to clean up Howard's mess.
The doctor said many of his patients aren’t afraid of ivermectin. Many of them have used it on their livestock.
“Growing up in a small town, rural area, we’ve all accidentally been exposed to ivermectin at some time. So, it’s something people are familiar with. Because of those accidental sticks, when trying to inoculate cattle, they’re less afraid of it,” he said.
Now, the rural patients are going into their local agricultural or tractor supply store, ignoring the warning signs surrounding the products, and figuring out a dosage themselves.
“Some people taking inappropriate doses have actually put themselves in worse conditions than if they’d caught COVID,” said the doctor. [emphasis added]
Oklahoma's 7-day average of new Covid cases is as high as its been since January 28.
And in South Dakota, Kristi Noem, who like Mr. DeSantis and Mr. Abbott is a potential 2024 candidate for president, has made her blanket opposition to lockdowns and mandates a key selling point. Arriving by horseback and carrying the American flag, she advertised the state’s recent Sturgis Motorcycle Rally, which drew half a million people, as a beacon of liberty.
Ms. Noem brushed aside criticism from Democrats and public health experts about the gathering, which was followed by a local Covid spike, saying on Fox News that the left was “accusing us of embracing death when we’re just allowing people to make personal choices.”
Anti-masker Marjain Breitenbach, who owns Doughboys Donuts KC in Raytown, made the news in August after customers complained about the sign in his store window that falsely blamed immigrants for spreading COVID-19: “Stop Importing COVID from Mexico Unmask Truth,” it said.
He and his wife Elisa Breitenbach, whose Facebook cover photo shows her with that sign, are not surprisingly maskless in photos of the Aug. 16 Independence City Council meeting at which a mask mandate was voted down. After the meeting, she posted, “We WON!”
While sometimes given to humans in small doses for head lice, scabies and other parasites, ivermectin is more commonly used in animals. Physicians are raising alarms about a growing number of people getting the drug from livestock supply centers, where it can come in highly concentrated paste or liquid forms.
Calls to poison control centers about ivermectin exposures have risen dramatically, jumping fivefold over their baseline in July, according to C.D.C. researchers, who cited data from the American Association of Poison Control Centers. Mississippi’s health department said earlier this month that 70 percent of recent calls to the state poison control center had come from people who ingested ivermectin from livestock supply stores. [emphasis added]
An unvaccinated and sometimes unmasked teacher at a Marin County private elementary school set off a COVID-19 outbreak in May that spread to more than two dozen students, siblings and parents, a new report from Marin Health and Human Services has found.
The report released Friday and published by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said the outbreak shows how easily the virus’ highly contagious delta variant can spread at school — including among elementary students too young for shots — and the importance of masks and other measures as kids return to the classroom.
WBAY-TV reported that the district implemented a mandatory mask policy on Monday. A group of 20 to 30 people showed up at the school board meeting Wednesday to protest the policy. The group refused a police officer’s order to don masks and an argument broke out with mask supporters in the audience.
The logical follow-up question for parader Scott Behrmann, who is interviewed in the video, is "Freedom of choice to do what?"
Kill people? Spread the virus? Keep our kids out of school buildings again?
Winnebago County's 7-day average of new Covid cases is as high as it's been since Janaury 28, 2021.
His appearance has since become one of the most-viewed videos of coronavirus misinformation. The videos — several versions are available online — have amassed nearly 100 million likes and shares on Facebook, 6.2 million views on Twitter, at least 2.8 million views on YouTube and over 940,000 video views on Instagram.
His talk’s popularity points to one of the more striking paradoxes of the pandemic. Even as many doctors fight to save the lives of people sick with Covid-19, a tiny number of their medical peers have had an outsize influence at propelling false and misleading information about the virus and vaccines.
Now there is a growing call among medical groups to discipline physicians spreading incorrect information.
Indiana's 7-day average of new Covid cases is as high as it's been since January 17, 2021.
It’s so bad that the Tennessee Medical Association had to issue a statement in support of the exhausted heroes who for the past 18 months have been risking their own lives to care for strangers. “The enemy is the virus, not health care workers,” the statement read.
This is what some of us have become here in the American South: people who need to be reminded that our doctors are not our enemies.
Things have gotten this terrible for one reason: Our elected leaders keep making an already bad situation much worse. Consider Tennessee’s governor, Bill Lee. When a handful of school districts here began to issue mask mandates to protect children too young to be vaccinated — as advised by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — he issued an executive order allowing disgruntled parents to opt out, effectively rendering all mask mandates unenforceable.
This is a new low even for Mr. Lee, whose failures during this pandemic are too manifold to be enumerated in this small space.
8/23/2021 update starts here
Greetings from the Trumpy borough of New York City, Staten Island (a.k.a. Richmond County)
But these were not just any vaccine resisters. They were nurses, medical technicians, infection control officers and other staff who work at a hospital in Staten Island, which has the highest rate of Covid-19 infection of any borough in New York City. [emphasis added]
[snip]
Scientists and medical professionals point out that those who refuse vaccines are potentially endangering the lives of patients. “Vaccinations are critical to protect our patients, our staff and protect the general community,” said Dr. Mark Jarrett, chief medical officer at Northwell Health, which is the state’s largest health care provider and runs Staten Island University Hospital. “It’s a tough issue, but it’s our professional obligation to always maintain that whatever we do, it’s for the safety of our patients.”
Cardinal Raymond Burke, a vaccine skeptic and a vocal critic of Pope Francis, announced his diagnosis Aug. 10. Four days later, his staff tweeted he was on a ventilator but more specific details about his condition remained unclear.[emphasis added]
He has built a reputation as an outspoken conservative, drawing attention in 2004 when he said he wouldn’t give Holy Communion to then-Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry because Kerry supports abortion rights. In 2009, he chastised the University of Notre Dame over plans to give then-President Barack Obama an honorary degree because Obama, too, supports abortion rights.
Note that the adjective 'good' does not appear before the noun 'reputation'.
Postcard from Retiring Guy's collection
