Category: Uncategorized

The Pacific island nation of Kiribati, which had almost entirely kept the coronavirus out, went into lockdown on 1/22/22 for the first time in the pandemic. The government imposed a 24-hour curfew after passengers on the first international flight in months tested positive for the virus.

Before this month, the island, one of the world’s most remote, had recorded just two infections – in two people returning on a ship in May last year, who quarantined on the vessel.

So you might be asking, “Where is Kiribati?” and “Who cares!”

First … “Where is Kiribati?”

Kiribati, officially the Republic of Kiribati, is an independent island nation in the central Pacific Ocean. The permanent population is over 119,000, more than half of whom live on Tarawa atoll. The state comprises 32 atolls and one raised coral island, Banaba. Kiribati sits in the middle of the South Pacific between Hawaii and New Zealand.

Thirty-six people on a flight from Fiji tested positive on landing about a week ago on the first plane to arrive since the nation reopened its borders this month. All 54 passengers were quarantined at a facility, but at least four cases were since reported in the community, including a security guard at the quarantine center.

Second … “Who cares?”

I find the Kiribati situation interesting because it points out that isolation where possible, as on an isolated island nation, only works for so long.

A similar situation is occurring in American Samoa, which detected its first infection only in September, also announced a full lockdown for 48 hours starting Saturday after an uptick of 15 coronavirus cases that arrived on a flight from Australia.

And speaking of Australia which was in an over the top “lockdown-a-go-go” is now being overwhelmed by Omicron.

What Kiribati, American Samoa, and Australia have in common other than being island nations, is that they all have high vaccination rates, and so one would expect mild although prolific disease with Omicron.

Irrespective of how long and how stringent one’s lockdown policies are, it’s only a matter of time before Covid breaks through.

1/25/22

My dad was a “Ford guy,” meaning that he would only buy Fords. Granted he never bought a new car, so perhaps you could say that he was a “used Ford guy.” Because we had only one car, when I was growing up, I drove only Fords … Fords with the gearshift right there by the steering wheel. The car that I remember the most was “the Blue Flash,” which was probably a 1956 Ford sedan.

Although I cannot recall ever having a bad Ford experience, for the last thirty years, I have been a Toyota guy. However, based upon what Ford’s CEO recently did, I may be a Ford guy from here on out.

As many of you might recall last spring after the Georgia legislature voted on and passed new voting laws, some companies just could not resist, and caved to “the woke.” Major League Baseball caved. Delta Airlines caved. Coca-Cola caved. My response to these “woke” cavers was not to subsidize their products. 

According to auto news site, Jalopnik, a contingent of black and white employees at Ford Motor Company recently penned a letter airing their grievances over the company’s relationship with numerous police departments in America — about two-thirds of police vehicles in the country are Fords.

In the letter, the employees argued that Ford, by building vehicles used by police, is actively sustaining racism and oppression in America. As a way to address this, they urged executives to discontinue all production of police vehicles.

In my mind if the CEOs of Delta, Coke, or MLB had been in charge at Ford, we would soon be seeing police driving around in Priuses or Chevy Volts. Fortunately, the CEO of Ford, Jim Hackett had the perfect response the group of virtue-signaling employees after he  caught wind of the letter, or at least its sentiment, and he subsequently addressed the issue in an office memo.

In the memo, he kindly but forcefully clapped back at the demands with logic and common sense. Here’s an example: “The issues plaguing police credibility have nothing to do with the vehicles they’re driving.” One would think such a notion would be obvious, but evidently it needed to be explained.”

PJMedia provided a shortened translation of the memo: “No. We’re not going to stop making police cars. Now get back to work.”

It’s refreshing to see common business sense prevail over “wokeness,” and hopefully we will see more CEOs standing up instead of fizzling like the CEOs of Delta, Coke, and MLB did.

1/24/22

As has been my pattern on Sunday, today’s piece is about someone who should deserve our respect and praise. This week it is Mary Onuoha, who was born and raised in Nigeria now lives in South London.

From the Daily Mail:

The Christian faith was at the heart of the Nigerian village where Mary was raised, the eldest of ten siblings in a loving family. And it was there that a family tragedy set her on the path to becoming a nurse.

‘When I was 15 my beloved two-year-old brother died of measles,’ she recalls. ‘I was so sad that there wasn’t the medical care available for him that could have saved him at that time in the area where I lived. This made me passionate about caring for people and about medicine.

‘I was determined to help my mother and make sure it did not happen again.’

Mary moved to the UK with her husband Charles, settling in South London, where the couple have lived ever since with their family and where Mary qualified as a nurse.

In November 2001, she started to work at Croydon University Hospital, employed latterly as a theatre practitioner, a nursing role performed primarily in the operating theatre and providing pre- and post-operative care. Her cross was sometimes concealed by her scrubs, but was visible on other occasions.

However, it never attracted comment until 2014, when the theatre manager at the time asked her to remove it on health-and-safety grounds. ‘I refused and said words to the effect of ‘What about hijabs, turbans and kalava bracelets?’,’ Mary recalls. ‘She said she would get back to me but did not do so.

It was the first of many similar incidents, with a succession of managers asking her to conceal or remove her cross, deeming it a health-and-safety risk. If not, Mary was told, the matter would face ‘escalation’.

It was the start of what Mary says she can only describe as an ongoing campaign of intimidation by senior hospital managers, during which she was subjected to an investigation into her conduct.

By November 2018, she was suspended from clinical duties and instead assigned clerical work and told that security would be called if she attempted to enter a theatre area while still wearing her cross.

Nonetheless, by June 2020 the stress had become too much and Mary was signed off work by her doctor. Two months later she resigned, effectively forced out of a job she loved. For months afterwards she was unable to work, though she has now found a new job. ‘I never thought I would ever be in a situation like this, but I was determined to get through it,’ she says

She was equally determined to hold her employers to account – and last week her courage was vindicated by Judge Dyal who, in a damning ruling, said that the dress-code policy was applied ‘in an arbitrary way’ and with ‘no cogent explanation’ why plain rings, neckties, hijabs and turbans were permitted, but a cross necklace was not.

Kudos to Mary Onuoha.

1/23/22

Let’s be very clear from the beginning. I think the NBA is a woke organization that’s doesn’t really try to hide its sole intent, which is making money. Making money, irrespective of whom it has to step on, is at the top of its list, and of course, inherent in that philosophy is  … “do not piss-off China.”

Top players and league officials view China as a key market for the game’s future. The NBA’s relationship with China became an intense focus in 2019 after Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey tweeted support for protesters in Hong Kong. What was the response of the NBA? … “no, no, no, must not say anything against the CCP!” (Chinese Communist Party)

During his All-In podcast interview, Clamato Palihapitiya, part owner of the Golden State Warriors of the NBA, waved off concerns about China’s ongoing genocide against the Uyghurs, saying, “Nobody cares about what’s happening to the Uyghurs.”

Surprised? … Not me.

Palihapitiya, the CEO of Societal Capital which boasts that its call is “solving the world’s hardest problems,” shocked podcast host David Sacks when he dismissed concerns about the enslavement of millions of Chinese Uyghurs because he feels no one cares about them. Palihapitiya went on to add that he has other priorities to worry about.

Surprised? … Not me.

In addition to being a part-owner of the Warriors and a venture capitalist, Palihapitiya is also a major donor to the Democrat Party. He donated over $1 million to Democrats in the previous election cycle, including a $250,000 check to the Biden Victory Fund.

Hmmm!

Surprised? … Not me.

1/22/22

The following is a study out of Israel from last summer titled:

Comparing SARS-CoV-2 natural immunity to vaccine-induced immunity: reinfections versus breakthrough infections

The Conclusions: This study demonstrated that natural immunity confers longer lasting and stronger protection against infection, symptomatic disease and hospitalization caused by the Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2, compared to the BNT162b2 two-dose vaccine-induced immunity. Individuals who were both previously infected with SARS-CoV-2 and given a single dose of the vaccine gained additional protection against the Delta variant.

This study showed that natural immunity is 13 times more effective than vaccines in protecting individuals. “SARS-CoV-2-naïve vaccines had a 13-fold increased risk for breakthrough infection with the Delta variant compared to those previously infected.”

A smaller CDC study offers a different conclusion, namely that the vaccines offer better protection. According to the study authors, “These findings suggest that among hospitalized adults with COVID-19-like illness whose previous infection or vaccination occurred 90–179 days earlier, vaccine-induced immunity was more protective than infection-induced immunity against laboratory-confirmed COVID-19.”

While the Israeli study had 10 times more people, they primarily used the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. In the U.S., three are approved, including the Pfizer, the Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson vaccines.

Dr. Marty Makary, a professor at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and editor in chief of MedPage Today, argues that mandating vaccines for “every living, walking American” is, as of now, not well-supported by science.

In September, Makary shared that there are more than 15 studies that have demonstrated the power of immunity acquired by previously having the virus. This affirmed a June Cleveland Clinic study of health-care workers (who are often exposed to the virus), in which none who had previously tested positive for the coronavirus got reinfected. The study authors concluded that “individuals who have had SARS-CoV-2 infection are unlikely to benefit from covid-19 vaccination.” In May, a Washington University study found that even a mild COVID infection resulted in long-lasting immunity.

So it seems to me at this point that the preponderance of evidence suggests that natural immunity is better than vaccine induced immunity … the one CDC study notwithstanding. 

What I do not understand is why the CDC doesn’t collect data that either confirms or denies that natural immunity is protective. In a recent bizarre twist of logic, two Supreme Court Justices felt one way about Biden’s generalized vaccine mandates (6-3 against), but yet felt the opposite (5-4 for) when confronted with a similar question concerning health care workers. 

What makes this so befuddling to me is that healthcare workers undoubtedly have had a much higher exposure to Covid and logically thus a much higher incidence of prior Covid infections. If prior infection does indeed confer natural immunity, then it would stand to reason that this group would actually be the group that could logically argue against mandated vaccination!

At this point, my recommendation to anyone who has had  a positive Covid test …”keep a hard copy of this positive test result,” as in the near future this test result could be your escape clause for vaccination and for further boosters.

1/21/22

A while back I learned a few things that I found interesting and had not known before. What initially spurred me on was an article from the Epoch Times that was sent to me. I had never heard of, much less ever read the Epoch Times. The article was “State Department Rebukes China’s ‘Decadeslong War on Faith.’” While I was aware that the mass detentions of Uyghurs, a Moslem ethnic minority in the Xinjiang province of northwest China, is an ongoing issue, I was not aware of the repression of Tibetans and Buddhists and Falun Gong as well as Christians in China. 

I then decided to google “Falun Gong,” because I knew nothing about them, and that’s where it got interesting. Falun Gong was founded in 1992. It is an ancient Chinese spiritual discipline in the Buddhist tradition. At the core of Falun Gong are the values of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Tolerance. This all sounds good, but apparently not in China.

By 1999, Falun Gong had grown to become the largest and fastest growing practice of the sort in Chinese if not world history. In just seven years since its 1992 introduction to the public, an estimated 100 million people were practicing Falun Gong. The Communist China Party did not like the fact that there were so many Chinese practicing Falun Gong, and hence, their repression.

Millions of innocent people in China have been fired from their jobs, expelled from school, jailed, tortured, or killed simply for practicing Falun Gong. 

For the tens of millions of people who practice Falun Gong today in China, each day they live at risk of being taken away by Chinese authorities to be jailed, tortured—or worse. ‘Worse’ meaning that the organs of those who practice Falun Gong are being used in China for transplants . . . against their wishes!

Okay, so what is the segue to us in the U.S.? (Keep in mind that not surprisingly, I did not read about the following in my local newspaper.) 

On June 2,2020 President Trump signed an executive order that declared support for religious freedom a foreign policy priority. It mandated that “the United States will respect and vigorously promote this freedom abroad.” Is this not a good thing? Why did I not read about this in my local liberal newspaper?

The Religious persecution in China has intensified over the past year as the regime continues with its “decadeslong war on faith,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had said while presenting his department’s annual assessment on the religious freedom record around the world.

I must have again missed this in my local liberal anti-Trump newspaper. Why ?

What is our present administration’s and our State Department’s stance on the persecution of Falun Gong and the Uyghurs? Hmmm!

Here’s a hint:

On 6/16/21, House Democrats voted against an amendment that would have required companies to inform their shareholders if they engaged in activities with a Chinese official or company using forced labor.

The amendment, introduced by Kentucky Republican Rep. Andy Barr, would require companies to disclose to shareholders annually their activities with any “foreign entity” that “engages in, is responsible for, or facilitates the forced labor of Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, and members of other Muslim minority groups in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China.”

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy tweeted on 6/16/21 in response,

“The ‘Woke’ party’ would rather keep turning a blind eye than stand against human rights’ abuses.”

Who do you think the ‘Woke party’ is?

I resurrected this piece about the Falun Gong because of a recent statement by the co-owner of the NBA’s Golden State Warriors.

Golden State Warriors owner Chamath Palihapitiya said “nobody cares” about China’s brutal mistreatment of Uyghurs. “Nobody cares about what’s happening to the Uyghurs, okay?” said Palihapitiya to his interviewers in a recent podcast. “You bring it up because you care and I think it’s nice that you care. The rest of us don’t care. I’m just telling you a very hard, ugly truth. Of all the things that I care about, yes, it is below my line.” The U.S. has officially designated the Chinese Communist Party’s actions against Uyghurs a “genocide.”

Wow! … Why would this bozo say something like that?

A sign of the times ?

1/20/22

Throughout this entire Covid ordeal, many groups have been unnecessarily stepped on and crushed. The first group that comes to mind is El-Hi students, many of whom have not, at this point, and perhaps will not ever recover from what has been done to them. Here I am referring not only to the lost years of schooling, but also to the widespread psychological damage that has been inflicted upon them.

The second group that has suffered significant damage is college students. Like the El-Hi students, the college-aged students have been quarantined, forced to take their classes online, been robbed of any meaningful college experience, and been forced to pay for an obvious suboptimal college education. The biggest difference between these El-Hi students and the college students is that for the most part college students can be considered as adults, and yet the difference between college students and flocks of sheep has been undetectable. The college students have merely followed meekly along, and continue to get dumped 

on even though the mortality in their age group is minuscule.

The local universities in San Diego have kowtowed willy-nilly to whatever outrageous demands are thrust upon them  … sheep! In fact California university students are like lovable dogs who just want their belly scratched, as they just automatically lie down and roll over. Are there any students anywhere in the U.S. who have any cajones?

Finally, much to the surprise of just about everyone, courage has finally arisen in an unlikely place … at the University of Chicago!

The editorial board of Chicago Thinker student newspaper at the University of Chicago has thrown down the gauntlet with a lengthy, well argued attack on the school’s booster mandate.

The University of Chicago!! … OMG!!

The editorial is very well written and much too long to copy and paste here. However I would encourage everyone to read it. It was written on 1/16/22, and is titled:

Editorial: UChicago Must End Its Booster Mandate—We Are Not Lab Rats.

Even though I am originally from Chicago and lived there for twenty-nine years, I never visited UChicago as it was way at the other end of the city. However after reading this Chicago Thinker editorial, I may have to finally expand my horizons, the next time I visit the Windy City.

1/19/22

I just read an article in Lifesite about the Covid vaccinated/unvaccinated situation in hospitals in Canada. Note that I did specify that the following data was concerning hospitalizations, not cases, in Canada. Remember, that one of the biggest reasons for encouraging the Covid vaccine was that it would make one less sick with Covid and thus less likely to end up in the hospital. 

Now perhaps the reason for the following data and it’s apparent upside down-ness quandary is “the denominator factor,” but I will get to this later.

To cut to the chase, in Canadian ICUs there is approximately an equal number of vaccinated and unvaccinated Covid patients.

According to the data in Ontario, as of January 7,  there are 1,327 “Fully vaccinated cases” in hospitals, compared with just 441 “Unvaccinated cases.” For “Partially vaccinated cases,” there are 100 people in the hospital. Of those in ICU in Ontario, there are 119 “Unvaccinated cases,” 17 “Partially vaccinated cases” and 106 “Fully vaccinated cases.”

When it comes to those who test positive for COVID, Ontario’s data shows that the vast majority come from “fully vaccinated” people.

On January 7, the province reported 9,515 cases in “fully vaccinated” people, compared to 1,543 cases in the vaccine-free. There were 375 cases in those who were “partially vaccinated.”

Well, maybe Ontario is just weird!!

However, data from Alberta and Quebec also shows that the majority of  people in hospitals due to COVID are “fully vaccinated” as well.

In fact in all provinces in Canada, the majority of new COVID “cases” are in those who are fully jabbed.

Is there any reasonable explanation for this Canadian upside-down cake? Actually, to me, there are only two possible expiations.

First, Dr. Robert Malone, the inventor of the mRNA technology used by the vaccines, has said that it is the vaccinated, not the unvaccinated, who are the “super-spreaders” of the disease. This is what is perhaps suggested by the above noted hospitalization data.

The second explanation has to do with “the denominator factor.” (Note that this is a term I made up, but that probably describes reality.) In other words, in Ontario, for instance, for the sake of discussion, let’s assume that the vast majority of the populace is vaccinated … of each 100 residents 90 are vaccinated and 10 are not. If the ICU hospitalization stats are close to 50/50, that could mean that for every 5 ICU hospitalized vaccinated patients, there are 5 ICU hospitalized unvaccinated patients … but here is where “the denominator” comes in.

5 vaccinated patients in the ICU/90 vaccinated individuals in Ontario. This amounts to a 5.5% risk.

Whereas 5 unvaccinated patients in the ICU/10 unvaccinated individuals in Ontario. This amounts to a 50% risk!

So while the overall number of hospitalized patients in ICUs in Ontario may be close to 50-50 (vaccinated-unvaccinated), the risk of ICU hospitalization remains considerably higher for unvaccinated individuals.

Nonetheless, merely being vaccinated does not preclude one from being sick enough to require an ICU bed … at least north of the border.

1/18/22

Who doesn’t remember Ray Parker Jr.’s 1984 song, “Ghostbusters” from a movie by the same name? I do not recall ever seeing the movie although  I often find the song cascading through my brain. Even though the melody was catchy and you could dance to it, the lyrics of the song were somewhat nonsensical:

“If there’s something strange

In your neighborhood

Who you gonna call?

Ghostbusters!”

Or

“If you’re seeing things

Running through your head

Who can you call?

Ghostbusters!”

I queried as to why the refrain of this song (“Who you gonna call.”) came  into my mind today. Intuitively … it’s all about Covid these days. 

As there are multitudinous questions concerning Covid, “who are the American people gonna call” for Covid answers?

In essence a recent survey asked this same question.

“When it comes to information about COVID-19, which of the following sources would you say you trust?”

“Your doctor” was the clear winner, with more than 60 percent of people selecting it. That’s in line with a recent Gallup survey that found 64 percent of Americans trusted their doctor’s advice, which was a 6 percent dip from 2010. However, fewer than 20 percent selected President Joe Biden and the news media in the NewsNation survey.

Dr. Anthony Fauci received support from a little less than one-third of respondents in the NewsNation/Decision Desk HQ poll, which is far below a December 2021 Gallup poll that found 52 percent of people approved of the job he was doing.

So “who are you gonna call” to find info about Covid … not Fauci,  certainly not Joe Biden and the news media.

1/17/22

In accordance with my recent tradition, on Sunday, I devote the entire piece to an individual who is deserving of our praise. 

According to the Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Office on 1/9/22 in a suburb of Denver four juvenile relatives, ages 4 to 11, were playing on a frozen pond when three of them fell in.

A neighbor, 23-year-old Dusti Talavera, watched the horror unfold from her window.

“Before I even realized it, I was out there in the middle of the pond pulling two kids out,” she said during a press conference. “And that’s when I fell in.” 

Talavera managed to pull out a 4-year-old girl and an 11-year-old boy from the water but struggled to rescue the third child, a 6-year-old girl. The girl’s 16-year-old male cousin arrived and helped Talavera pull the girl out of the water. 

“I tried to hold her head up, I tried to hold my head up, the pond was really deep. A young man threw us a rope. He pulled us out,” Talavera said.  

Arapahoe County sheriff’s deputies and South Metro Fire Rescue (SMFR) officials were on the scene within minutes. The sheriff’s office said the 6-year-old girl was not breathing, not conscious, and had no pulse. They said she was “cold to the touch, and her clothes were soaked.” Sheriff’s deputies performed CPR on the girl until SMFR took over the situation. 

The girl was taken to a local children’s hospital. The girl has since been released from the hospital, reunited with her family, and is in good health. 

Talavera told deputies she “wasn’t concerned for her safety because they were babies and they needed help.” 

Spoken like a true hero … and Dusti Talavera is indeed a real hero.

1/16/22