Month: June 2023

At what point do we stop calling supposed medical journals, actual medical journals? A friend of mine recently cancelled his subscription to the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM). For those of you unawares, the NEJM had been the premiere medical journal in the U.S. for at least fifty years, and my friend had been reading the NEJM regularly for many, many years. When I asked him, Why? … he responded, “too woke!” He further explained that wasn’t the medical studies, per se, but rather the editorials and the letters to the editor that the NEJM chose to publish, which he politely termed, “rubbish!”

I know three others who are retired from medical practice, but continue to work part time teaching at the local medical school. One of them summed it up succinctly when he said, “if you’re under forty, in ten years do not get sick! “Why?” I asked. … Because you will end up with this new breed of physician taking care of you, and unless something dramatically changes, they do not know much!”

Luckily, I am no longer under forty!

Finally the topper from Townhall:

“The Lancet was once a leading British medical journal. It was sober and medically exacting. It was so respected that it was often cited to settle controversial issues in the field of medicine.

Today, it is a shell of its former self, shot through with leftist political ideology. A recent editorial called out the UK Home Secretary for her “appalling and shocking“ comments.

Was it about a drop in research funding or disputed medical opinions or something else of direct relevance to medicine? No, the Secretary opined that new migrants to the UK possessed “values which are at odds with our country“ and brought “heightened levels of criminality“.

Until I read this, I did not realize that the Lancet, a once renowned British medical journal, had  gone the way of the once renowned NEJM. Of course, in ten years it might not matter much as medicine, as we know it, is dying a slow death. In fact, in ten years, the present medical students, soon to be doctors, will probably not be able to understand any actual medical articles anyway.

6/30/23

The other morning I read an interesting story on Coffee & Covid concerning something that is happening in the Canadian military.

“Over 300 [Canadian Armed Forces] Members Launch $500 Million Lawsuit Against Military for COVID Vaccine Mandates.”

More signs of life in Canada! On June 21st, 330 active or former members of the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) who allege they were harmed by jab mandates have filed a class-action lawsuit against high-ranking members of the Canadian military, seeking $500 million in damages.

Alberta-based lawyer Catherine Christensen of Valour Law, which specializes in military law, filed the class-action lawsuit on behalf of the CAF members. She said the lawsuit amounts to approximately $1,000,000 for each of the plaintiffs, plus “extensive other damages; Essentially, a lawsuit for about $500,000,000.”

FYI:

To add fuel to these simmering embers, a Canadian independent military tribunal found that the military mandate violated the charter rights of service members who refused the jabs.

The tribunal’s findings are advisory in nature and non-binding, but are considered persuasive.

Although, I cannot fathom a $500,000,000 judgement going against the CAF, and its high ranking members, this will be interesting to watch

6/29/23

californiacontrarian

On 6 23/23 I watched Sen. John Kennedy (R,La) speaking on the floor of the Senate about pistol braces. The issue was concerning whether Joe Biden’s ATF had the authority to turn pistols using pistol braces into short barreled rifles. 

Now let’s be clear. I do not own a gun … yet! Prior to listening to Senator Kennedy’s speech, I did not know what a pistol brace was or what it looked like. I watched this Kennedy speech because I love to watch Sen. John Kennedy speak, and believe me, I was not disappointed as his speech was not only very informative, but also quite humorous in parts.

As background, historically pistol braces were invented to assist individuals who only have the use of one arm (handicapped individuals) to be able to use a pistol. So instead of saying that “one-armed” individuals could not own guns as that would be unconstitutional, Biden’s ATF instead banned pistol braces. As Sen Kennedy emphasized banning pistol braces is just a devious way of banning the possession of guns by certain individuals.

Basically Biden’s ATF said that pistol braces turn pistols into short barreled rifles, and Sen Kennedy was speaking in the Senate because there was going to be a vote to overturn Biden’s ATF’s ban on pistol braces.

The reason that this ATF change in vernacular is important was that short barreled rifles are outlawed, and so bingo-bango-bongo now pistol braces are illegal because magically they turn a pistol into a short barreled rifle.

Some further background:

In 2012, the Obama-Biden administration’s ATF determined that pistol-brace attachments do not change the classification of a pistol to that of a rifle. Despite this, the Biden administration in 2021 directed the Department of Justice (DOJ) to propose a rule that clarifies when a pistol with a brace attachment should be designated as a rifle. 

If you want to be informed on pistol braces while enjoying yourself, I would strongly suggest watching this YouTube video.

(One classic Kennedy line from this speech … “Under President Biden Americans are a lot poorer, but not necessarily a lot stupider!”)

BTW: The Senate subsequently did take a vote as to whether or not to overturn the ATF’s ban on pistol braces. The overturning of this ban was defeated 50-49 with all of the Democratic Senators voting basically to prevent one armed veterans from owning and using a pistol!

6\28\23

Finally a chink in the armor of the “green energy or nothing” enthusiasts. This latest bit of sanity comes out of Sweden. Those of us with a little knowledge of world geography know that Sweden lies pretty far north. In general, the further north one goes the colder it gets, and the less the sun shines. Therefore,  it stands to reason that it is less likely that solar power will suffice as a source of energy, as one goes further north. In addition wind power is unreliable, unless the wind turbines are placed in certain spots where the wind is known to blow either steadily or at least quite often. In addition, the further north one goes, the colder it gets in the winter, and the longer the winter lasts, and thus more energy is needed to heat homes and businesses.

This rational kind of thinking is what caused Sweden to change its stance on nuclear power.

From Red State, 6/25/23:

“Sweden Shocks Europe: Abandons ‘Unstable’ Green Energy Agenda, Returns to Nuclear Power”

Sweden just dealt a severe blow to the globalist climate agenda by scraping its green energy targets. In a statement announcing the new policy in the Swedish Parliament, Finance Minister Elisabeth Svantesson warned that the Scandinavian nation needs “a stable energy system.”

Svantesson said wind and solar power are too “unstable” to meet the nation’s energy requirements. Instead, she said, the Swedish government is shifting back to nuclear power and has scrapped its goal of a “100 percent renewable energy” supply to meet the nation’s energy requirement,

Finally, a chink in the armor of the Green Energy Agenda. How long before Sweden’s neighboring countries come to their senses, and realize the wisdom of what Sweden is doing? And then how long before the Northern European countries admit that going totally green is a fool’s errand.

Similarly, at some point those that live in the northern part of the U.S.A will be forced to admit that going green will just not work for them, especially during their long cold winters. If one lives south of the Mason-Dixon Line, then perhaps the story will be somewhat different, but we’ll see.

Sweden showed wisdom and foresight with its approach to Covid, and I predict that its rational approach and its foresight when it comes to energy will be the standard of the future.

6/27/23

In the history of the U.S there has been only one president who served two non-consecutive terms, and that was in the late 1800s. Who was that?

As part of the educational aspect of my blog that was Grover Cleveland. From Wikipedia:

Stephen Grover Cleveland (March 18, 1837 – June 24, 1908) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 22nd and 24th president of the United States from 1885 to 1889 and from 1893 to 1897. In the years before his presidency, he served as a mayor and governor in New York state, winning fame as an anti-corruption crusader. Cleveland is the only president in U.S. history to serve non-consecutive presidential terms. He won the popular vote in three presidential elections—1884, 1888, and 1892. Benjamin Harrison won the electoral college vote, and thus the presidency, in 1888.

Could Donald Trump be only the second President to serve two non- consecutive terms? If there have been other U.S. presidents who ran a third time after losing in their quest for a second consecutive term, I confess … I just don’t know. When you think about it, there are really only a few reasons why someone would run a third time after losing the second time around.

Back in 1888, Grover Cleveland won the popular vote, and so he possibly felt that he had a reasonable shot at being elected in 1892.

He was right, as he did get elected in 1892.

To me there are two other possible reasons why someone would run for President after losing in the interim.

First: the interim election was fraudulent! To me the 2020 Presidential election was indeed fraudulent. The recent uncovering of the fraudulent nursing home votes in Wisconsin and the info showing that the so-called “impenetrable” voting machines are actually susceptible to potential hacking, are only the first two chinks in that armor.

Second: The President who was “elected” in the interim election has been terrible, and we’ve got that in spades!

Therefore, because of past election fraud and present Presidential incompetence, I am predicting that DJT will be a second Grover Cleveland.

6/26/23

On Sundays I write about someone who has demonstrated fortitude, and is worthy of our admiration. Paul Sykes is such an individual.

Last week, you may have read about a civil lawsuit that was won by the white plaintiff, Shannon Phillips, who claimed that her firing was racially motivated. She was awarded $25 million in punitive damages as well as $600,000 in compensatory damages. The loser in this case was Starbucks. The jury basically agreed that Starbucks fired Ms. Phillips because she was white. (To get further details of this case read my prior blog of 6/16/23.)

From “Coffee and Covid:”

For its part, Starbucks denied the firing was racially motivated, adding insult to the injury by telling the jury Ms. Phillips was just a terrible manager all around, just awful, nobody would want her, and her termination’s timing was pure coincidence.

One of the main witnesses during this trial was Paul Sykes. He was the assistant manager in that Philadelphia Starbucks, and it was an un-named employee under his supervision who called 911 concerning the two suspicious black men who appeared to just be loitering in the store.

At the trial, the courageous Assistant Manager Sykes testified on Ms. Phillips’ behalf, telling the jury her firing had been racially motivated. He testified that, even though he supervised the employee who called 911, and even though Ms. Phillips never even knew about it, Mr. Sykes himself wasn’t disciplined at all.

Okay, so Paul Sykes testified at a trial. That, in and of itself, doesn’t make Paul Sykes someone we should admire.

However, the rest of the story is … Paul Sykes is black!

6/25/23

californiacontrarian

 Election Irregularities . . . Hmmm! 

This was originally posted on 3/26/21, and it still holds true.

As many of you are aware, I am convinced that there was some chicanery in the 2020 presidential election. When I went to bed on 11/3/20 at 10pm, Pacific time, President Trump was way ahead. When I awoke at 7am the next morning, he was way behind – Hmmm! … what happened?

I have my opinion as to whether this chicanery involved cutting corners, walking on the tightrope of illegality on one extreme or outright fraud on the other extreme. At this point I am not 100% sure, although I suspect elements of both in varying degrees. 

With that as background, I just read and interesting article about the 2020 election that was not merely an opinion article, but rather involved numbers and probabilities.

What follows is from that article of 3/16/21 by Stu Cvrk, who was a Naval Academy graduate and has served 30 years in the U.S. Navy, both active duty and reserves.

Per Mr. Cvrk:

“Election irregularities in the 2020 presidential election continue to be uncovered through independent analysis. An expert team led by physicist and Mensa John Droz, Jr., has been relentlessly examining election-related data and lawsuits since November, uncovering significant anomalies that warrant further investigation. The team’s objective throughout has been to help ascertain that all legal votes – and only legal votes – were counted.

That team has just completed a “contrast analysis” of Biden versus Trump results in 2020 and Trump versus Clinton results in 2016 that exposes some irregularities that cannot be easily explained.

Note: as the team reports, “A statistical contrast is not proof of voting fraud, but a large contrast does point to situations that might merit closer examination.” And that is exactly the purpose of the team’s contrast analysis: to identify states in which vote tabulations could warrant further analysis, peeling the onion to the county and precinct levels as appropriate in order to forensically validate the results.

The team performed contrast analyses for 48 states (Alaska and Maine were not examined due to lack of data), with a “positive” contrast indicating that Biden scored more votes in 2020 than expected in that state, and with a “negative” contrast indicating that Trump did better in 2020 than expected in a state. The team also performed a contrast analysis for each county in each state in order to determine outliers that are good candidates for precinct-level analysis. Several outlier states were identified in which the positive contrasts for Biden could not be easily explained by population increases in those states. In addition, the ten states with the largest positive contrasts provided 3± million more votes for Biden than they did for Clinton, as shown in a table in Cvrk’s article. Is that really possible without fraud, given Biden’s unwillingness to campaign and inability to draw a crowd when he did?

Conclusion: This latest report from the Droz team adds more fuel to the fire regarding “election irregularities” in multiple states during the 2020 presidential election. It is a travesty that forensic audits are not being conducted in many states to validate the results.”

Hmmm!

There were many tables in this Cyrk article from Red State that you can peruse if you are interested. Also in that article there are many specific examples of “irregularities” in multiple states. Hmmm!

The following line from the last paragraph of this Cvrk article is the key take-away for me:

“That the Democrats have fought tooth-and-nail to prevent such audits explains much because if they were certain of Biden’s “overwhelming victory,” then the audits would prove that fact once and for all. “

Hmmm!

3/26/21

6/24/23

I would assume that pretty much everyone is familiar with the First Amendment and how it protects free speech. Are there exceptions to this First Amendment’s right to free speech? Although sometimes controversial, it appears to me that the prevailing legal opinion is “no.”

Even the often quoted example of not being able to yell “fire” in a crowded movie theater (when there is no fire), is not hard and fast law.

Lately, I am reading more and more about free speech disputes. For example just this last week, I read about two distinctly dissimilar situations that involved “free speech.” One dispute involved the wearing of a certain encrypted T-shirt in a Massachusetts school, and the other involved yelling while on a Reading, Pennsylvania public sidewalk.

Do I know the correct answer or have an opinion as to the limits of free speech? … As an infamous president once said, “that is above my pay grade!”

However, I do feel that elected officials should keep their mouths shut on these contentious free speech issues. Most of them are far from being Constitutional scholars, and sometimes I wonder if they are familiar at all with the First Amendment. 

For example, in Reading, Pa. where the mayor as well as members of the Reading, Pennsylvania city council are backing their police department despite the fact that the Berks County District Attorney’s Office dropped the disorderly conduct charges against Atkins, saying, “The charges were withdrawn after the District Attorney’s Office reviewed the videos of the incident along with applicable case law.”

Council President Donna Reed, “I believe in freedom of speech, but there are parameters of decency and civility.” With due respect to Ms. Reed, actually the First Amendment never mentions “decency and civility.” Perhaps, in this situation, it would be best to just keep your mouth shut.

Similarly, Reading Mayor Eddie Moran said in a statement days before the city council meeting that freedom of speech doesn’t apply in the case of Damon Atkins, the man who was arrested after beginning to quote the Bible at the June 3 pride rally.

Hmmm! “Freedom of speech doesn’t apply in the case of Damon Atkins.” With due respect, Mayor Moran, here is a situation where perhaps it would be best to keep your mouth shut.

6/24/23

californiacontrarian

This morning I read about two different news stories. Although on the surface these stories are seemingly unrelated, a columnist of the New YorkPost, Miranda Devine, is not so sure. …Hmmm!

First from Townhall:

“Just days after Hunter Biden reached a sweetheart plea deal with his father’s Justice Department to avoid jail time for tax and gun crimes, the House Ways and Means Committee unveiled new testimony from IRS whistleblowers alleging roadblocks were set before them to ensure preferential treatment to President Joe Biden’s son. What’s more, whistleblower testimony claims that the U.S. attorney overseeing the probe of Hunter’s alleged tax crimes had his attempts to charge hunter in 2022 denied.

“Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith (R-MO) confirmed on Thursday that his committee had ‘credible whistleblower testimony alleging misconduct and government abuse that is resulting in preferential treatment’ for the president’s son, Hunter Biden. 

“The multiple whistleblowers with whom transcribed interviews were conducted revealed three key “areas of focus,” according to Smith:

1. The federal government is not treating taxpayers equally when enforcing tax laws.
2. The Biden Department of Justice is intervening and overstepping when it comes to the investigation of the president’s son.
3. Whistleblowers report they have faced almost immediate retaliation.”

To me this seems like significant real news, and so I looked in my local “newspaper” on 6/23/23, and found the story buried on the bottom of page 4.

Second, from Townhall:

“The US Navy revealed that they knew the Titan submersible, which was diving to see the remains of the Titanic wreck, imploded on Sunday, 6/18/23. We have sonar detection and acoustic networks for our national defense, and this classified system picked up the moment when this craft and the five people inside it perished. So, why did we waste an inordinate amount of time rushing to rescue people some in the government knew to be dead?”

This from 6/22/23 Miranda Devine (NY Post) on Twitter:

The Biden administration knew the Titan submarine imploded Sunday, 6/18/23. But waited until today (6/22/23) to make it public. Convenient smokescreen for today’s House Ways & Means release of IRS whistleblower testimony of DOJ sabotage of the Hunter Biden investigation.”

Lo and behold on 6/23/23 in my local “newspaper”, the Titan submersible story was at the top of page 1. 

Typically, I am not a fan of conspiracy theories, but perhaps Miranda Devine is on to something. Hmmm!

6/23/23

californiacontrarian

The other day after I read some very interesting health related news, I decided that it’s my duty to pass it on to all my readers, both liberal and conservative.

First to be clear, I do not have a “fancy phone.” Yes, I still have a landline (another topic for another day!), but here specifically I am referring to my non-fancy cell phone, which is a flip-phone and I am not sure how much of the following is pertinent to flip-phone users.

What I read about was the health related consequences of cell phone usage.

First a little background. A study published in The Canadian Journal of Cardiology states that hypertension is one of the primary risk factors for heart attacks and strokes and a leading cause of premature death worldwide. According to the World Health Organization (WHO)’s estimation, around 1.28 billion adults aged 30 to 79 worldwide suffer from hypertension.

In other words hypertension (high blood pressure) is bad.

From Epoch Health:

According to a study published on May 4 on the European Society of Cardiology’s (ESC) website, compared with people who talk on their mobile phones for less than 30 minutes per week, those who talk for half an hour or longer have a 12 percent higher risk of developing hypertension. 

In this study, researchers followed 212,046 participants for up to 12 years (median time) and found that 13,984 participants (6.6 percent) were diagnosed with hypertension. Mobile phone users had a 7 percent higher risk of developing hypertension than nonusers.

( At this point, you might be saying, “7%! … not a big deal. Move on!)

Moreover, increasing weekly time spent on a cellphone was associated with increasing risk of developing hypertension … more than 6 hours per week was associated with a 25% risk.

(Now a 25% risk of developing something that may kill you is a big deal. Pay attention!)

Importantly, among mobile phone users, years of use and use of a hands-free device/speakerphone were not significantly associated with the development of hypertension.

 Now I suppose that one might say that this cellphone – hypertension risk is old news, as far back as 1998, an article published in The Lancet reported that exposure to mobile phone radiation increases the risk of cardiovascular hypertension.

However, to me, this recent study adds quantification to the risk associated with cellphone usage. In addition, it’s my duty to inform you of any data that may indicate that flip phones may make a comeback!!

6/22/23