Author: Californiacontrarian

One of the questionable strategies in football is to basically ignore defense and to put your entire emphasis on offense. The logic goes something like this … “would you rather win 10-3 or 45-42?” While this strategy of “the best defense is a good offense” works sometimes, I hope it is not the guaranteed winning gambit that the Democrats believe it to be.

The following fliers were handed out while Trump was in court facing the latest “trumped-up” charge.

To me the pattern is obvious, and the liberal press finds it convenient to ignore what is going on with the Bidens while headlining what JB and the Dems are trying to do to Trump.

My local “newspaper” headlines that Trump is being charged, while nothing, and I mean nary a whisper, of anything about the Biden fiasco.

If there is anyone who believes that all of this is merely a coincidence … I have a bridge that I would like to sell them!

8/4/23

The headline in our local “newspaper” in exaggerated dark print read 

“Trump Charged in Bid to Overturn Election.”

No surprise, the front page article was from the Washington Post. Also not surprising was that there was no mention in the entire “newspaper” of Devon Archer’s closed testimony to a House committee. Probably just a coincidence that these two things occurred on the same day! Hmmm!

What should be obvious to anybody who has a thinking brain is that all of these anti-Trump lawsuits are being coordinated to interfere with him running for President. 

On that same day I read a very interesting take on how this federal lawsuit might just bite the anti-Trump leftists in the butt. 

From Jeff Childers  C&C:

This newest indictment includes four counts, for mainly two reasons: that President Trump “conspired to defraud the United States,” and that he “conspired to interfere with the certification of the election.” 

First, nearly all the conduct described in the four counts is speech, and not just speech, but political speech. Political speech is the most protected kind of speech under the Constitution’s First Amendment. That probably won’t stop the Obama-appointed judge from letting the case survive an inevitable motion to dismiss, but my initial take is the counts can’t survive without rewriting the Constitution.

The situation is slightly more complicated because the DOJ framed the counts as “fraud,” which is a type of speech that isn’t protectable, but that raises its own problems. Even if Trump did lie, which is debatable, lying isn’t illegal, not without something more, like being under oath, or harming someone who relied on the lie.

So the DOJ must first prove Trump lied, and then it must marry the lies to something else that can except them from First Amendment protection.

Which brings us to the DOJ’s next big problem, which is an interesting twist. A central material issue in this shiny new indictment is the truth or falsity of whether significant 2020 election fraud occurred or not. After all, the DOJ is claiming that Trump “lied” about election fraud, thereby — ironically — committing a fraud of his own.

In other words, they’re saying Trump committed fraud by alleging fraud. You can’t make this stuff up.”

Childers, who is a practicing attorney, then continues that the DOJ’s major problem will be “discovery,” as in order to prove that Trump lied when he said there was fraud, the court will have to allow discovery into those instances where Trump is claiming there was fraud. Consequently in these instances the DOJ will be forced to prove that fraud did not occur, and that, sport’s fans, will be impossible as there was obvious election fraud in multiple states.

I am going to look forward to the DOJ trying to prove a negative because as we all know proving a negative is extremely difficult, if not impossible.

Let the fun begin!

8/3/23

Today I read news of something I thought was truly amazing.

From Twitchy:

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is challenging President Biden for the Democrat nomination, and according to Real Clear Politics RFK Jr. has about 14 percent support.

According to Kennedy, he requested Secret Service protection during his run for the nomination but says the Biden administration denied that request: 

RFK Jr.commented , “Since the assassination of my father in 1968, candidates for president are provided Secret Service protection. But not me. 

“Typical turnaround time for pro forma protection requests from presidential candidates is 14-days. After 88-days of no response and after several follow-ups by our campaign, the Biden Administration just denied our request. Secretary Mayorkas: ‘I have determined that Secret Service protection for Robert F Kennedy Jr is not warranted at this time.’ Our campaign’s request included a 67-page report from the world’s leading protection firm, detailing unique and well established security and safety risks aside from commonplace death threats.”

This outright refusal is doubly perplexing in view of the recent personal ad hominem attacks that multiple Democrats leveled against RFK Jr. during a committee meeting on social media and alleged censorship. These Democrats were very nasty and more than rude. ‘Hateful’ would be the most descriptive word to describe the Democrats’ behavior, and now this refusal to provide secret service protection for RFK Jr.! Do the Democrats in power want an attempt on the life of RFK Jr.? … or worse? Think about the response of RFK Jr. supporters to this latest insult by JB and Mayorkas. At this point are any of these RFK backers going to support and vote for Biden? 

Could this sort of double whammy cause RFK Jr. to run as a third party candidate? Personally, I would not blame him!

8/2/23

The following is not meant to be judgmental … as Jack Webb (AKA Sgt. Friday) used to say, “just the facts, please.”

Before the other day I had never heard of Hunga Tonga and Hunga Ha’apai, and had certainly not heard of the recent undersea volcanic eruption.

From Wikipedia:

Hunga Tonga and Hunga Haʻapai are the only subaerial parts of the volcano. Hunga Tonga is the eastern island, while Hunga Haʻapai is the western one. They are part of Tonga’s Haʻapai group of islands, an island arc formed at the convergent boundary where the Pacific Plate subducts under the Indo-Australian Plate.

Its most recent eruption in January 2022 generated a tsunami that reached as far as the coasts of Japan and off the Americas and a volcanic plume that reached 58 km (36 mi) into the mesosphere. As of May 2022 the eruption is the largest volcanic eruption in the 21st century.

Ash from the eruption blanketed nearby islands, forcing many people to evacuate to the main island. Around 84% of Tonga’s population were impacted by ash and tsunami waves in the immediate aftermath of the eruption, and two Tongan nationals were killed.

From NASA:

When the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai volcano erupted on Jan. 15,  it sent a tsunami racing around the world and set off a sonic boom that circled the globe twice. The underwater eruption in the South Pacific Ocean also blasted an enormous plume of water vapor into Earth’s stratosphere – enough to fill more than 58,000 Olympic-size swimming pools. The sheer amount of water vapor could be enough to temporarily affect Earth’s global average temperature.The  volcano not only injected ash into the stratosphere but also large amounts of water vapor, breaking all records for direct injection of water vapor, by a volcano or otherwise, in the satellite era. …The excess water vapor injected by the Tonga volcano … could remain in the stratosphere for several years. This extra water vapor could influence atmospheric chemistry, boosting certain chemical reactions that could temporarily worsen depletion of the ozone layer. It could also influence surface temperatures … since water vapor traps heat.

“We’ve never seen anything like it,” said Luis Millán, an atmospheric scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California.

From C&C:

Over the next year it would turn out that NASA badly underestimated the amount of water Hunga Tonga vaporized into the atmosphere. Current estimates are three times higher than the original: scientists now think it was closer to 150,000 metric tons, or 40 trillion gallons, of super-heated water instantly injected into the atmosphere.

[D]ue to extreme altitude reach of the eruption,  volcanic plume circumnavigated the Earth in only one week and dispersed nearly pole-to-pole in three months. 

The observations provide evidence for an unprecedented increase in the global stratospheric water mass by 13% as compared to climatological levels. As there are no efficient sinks of water vapour in the stratosphere, this perturbation is expected to persist several years.

Here a few headlines from recent articles:

Cold the after effects of the Tonga eruption and the resultant increase in atmospheric water vapor have anything to do with this summer’s heat wave?

Likewise a headline from a recent scientific article:

Again another:

Again from C&C:

What causes boiling-hot, deep-ocean vents? Volcanic activity. Magma from the Earth’s core is heating up the water, which is venting out, raising ocean temperatures and putting even more water vapor into the atmosphere, which heats the air through greenhouse effects.

Is the combination of the relatively recent massive Tonga undersea volcanic eruption and the deep ocean vents spewing boiling hot ocean water have anything to do with warmer temperatures and warmer ocean water temperature?

Here I am trying not to be judgmental, but I just want the facts.

8/1/23

Finally someone is calling a spade, a spade. Here I am referring to Fentanyl, a synthetic opioid, and more precisely to illicit fentanyl,

which Dr. Donna Nelson (an organic chemist and professor at the University of Oklahoma) says should be declared a weapon of mass destruction.

As background, Ms. Nelson was the science adviser for the show, “Breaking Bad,” and the 2016 president of the American Chemical Society. 

But why “ a weapon of mass destruction?”

In June, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) seized approximately 2,100 pounds of illicit fentanyl at the U.S. southern border, according to the agency’s latest report. The amount is enough to kill every American and then some. [One kilogram (2.2 pounds) of fentanyl can potentially kill 500,000 people, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).]

In fiscal year 2020, CBP seized an average of 445 pounds of fentanyl per month at the southern border. In fiscal 2021, that amount increased to approximately 882 pounds per month. In fiscal 2022, the average amount of fentanyl seized per month was 1,175 pounds. The total amount for fiscal year 2023 won’t be available until October, but CBP has already seized more fentanyl in the first nine months than it did for all of 2022, for an average of 2,427 pounds per month. In less than three years, the amount of fentanyl seized at the southern border per month has increased more than fivefold. 

“Every month, that’s enough to kill every person in the United States,” Ms. Nelson said.. “You have to assume that the border agents are not catching everything that’s coming into our country,” she added.

Rep. Neal Dunn (R-Fla.) introduced a resolution to the U.S. House in January, which would classify illicit fentanyl-related substances as a weapon of mass destruction. He said the classification will make it easier to curb drug trafficking and free up resources for U.S. law enforcement.

“The House must recognize this dangerous drug for what it really is—a weapon of mass destruction,” Mr. Dunn said. “Fentanyl-related substances are tearing families and communities apart, and we must do whatever we can to help law enforcement get them off the streets.”

Those of you who are familiar with my past opinions will recognize that I have called for dramatic consequences for those drug cartels that are responsible for the Fentanyl that is coming across our southern border.By dramatic consequences I mean drones with bombs.

As a warning … those who have not yet known of someone who has been killed by illicit Fentanyl … just wait, as it is only a matter of time!

7/31/23

How is it that some individuals seem to have an innate and overwhelming sense of doing good for others? Obviously I do not know the answer to that question, but whatever it is, Troy and Shannon Pinkerton have it.

As is my usual modus operandi on Sunday I write about someone who deserves our respect, praise, and admiration for what they do or have accomplished. If there was a grading scale for these Sunday individuals, on a 1-10 scale, where do you think Troy and Shannon Pinkerton might grade out? Read the following and then decide.

From Epoch Bright:

Originally from San Diego both she and her husband now call their 40-acre (16-hectare) ranch in Wyoming home, where together they have fostered 30 kids, before finally adopting Joey in 2000.

Presently their sizable brood consists of four biological kids, plus six that were adopted—all of the latter being special-needs children, five of whom have Down syndrome.

Ms. Pinkerton said she was raised by parents who ran a group home and was always surrounded by special needs individuals. Chaos, turmoil, and noise don’t get to her at all; that’s all she’s ever known.

Caring for kids, ages ranging from 18 to 27, one could say the parents, Troy and Shannon Pinkerton, have their hands full.

“During school time, it kind of gets rowdy because the boys wrestle and they wrestle in the house,” Ms. Pinkerton, 51, told The Epoch Times.

Or else Cameron, 23, who is clinically blind, might “get ticked off because he thinks he owns the TV.”

Kids with disabilities, like Devlin, 18, who have been through staff-run facilities, received little in the way of consistency. With often contradictory rules, depending who was on shift, there was bound to be rebellion.

“So when I first get my kids, they are naughty,” Ms. Pinkerton said. “A few of them came from great homes, but a couple of them, they come from a facility.”

Many kids with Down syndrome in the foster system get bounced around, she adds. Often, the foster parents have never dealt with a child with special needs—as was the case with Cameron.

Cameron had behavioral issues when he first arrived at the Pinkertons’ home. Repeated outbursts led to several hundred dollars in household damages, and at one point he yelled, “You’re gonna make me leave, aren’t you?”

To which Ms. Pinkerton replied, “Oh, no, buddy, you’re grounded. You’re gonna finish out your grounding, and then you can let me know what you want to do when you’re ready.”

But Cameron doesn’t do that anymore, she told us. He has since “mellowed out.”

So what grade do you think? … 10/10 for me!

7/30/23

I think that I am at least fairly up to date on the ever changing Hunter Biden situation. To me, there is only one outcome of this political mish-mosh, and it will occur sequentially.

First, there will a Hunter Biden trial, and despite the best efforts of the DOJ, he will be found guilty of something that will warrant jail time. Of course, his conviction will be appealed etc. almost ad infinitum or until the following happens.

Joe Biden numbers will continue to tank, and at some point, his fellow Democrats will persuade him not to seek re-election. He will graciously bow out early in the primaries, saying that he is doing it for the good of all Americans. In essence, everyone is aware that he has been forced to pull out not only because he is so unpopular, but also because the ongoing Hunter Biden saga.

Finally, somewhere between the November 2024 election, and mid January 2025 end of his term, he will pardon his son, Hunter Biden. 

The only wildcard in the above scenario is whether or not President Biden will be impeached. If this happens, it will be “a damned if you do, damned,  if you don’t” scenario for Joe Biden. If his impeachment were to be upheld  he would consequently be out of office, and thus, he would no longer be able to pardon Hunter Biden. However, if he pardons his son before the end of his impeachment trial, then his guilt will be a forgone conclusion.

Whichever way this ultimately comes down, history will confirm that Joe Biden was the most disgraceful President ever!

7/29/23

First a headline from HealthDay News:

“Overall, 16.2% of the pediatric population experience one or more persistent symptoms at least three months after COVID-19.”

Initially when I read that headline I thought “wow!”

But … was this just a pro-vax position camouflaged with a somewhat sensational headline?

After the headline the summary continues:

Li Jiang, M.D., M.P.H., from the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, and colleagues conducted a systematic review to examine the prevalence and characteristics of the long-term clinical features of COVID-19 (long COVID) in the global pediatric population (aged 0 to 19 years). Published articles and preprints from December 2019 to December 2022 were included; 27 cohorts and four cross-sectional studies involving more than 15,000 pediatric participants met the inclusion criteria.

The researchers found reports of more than 20 persistent symptoms and clinical features among children and adolescents. Overall, 16.2 percent of the pediatric participants experienced one or more persistent symptoms at least three months after COVID-19. Developing certain long COVID symptoms was possibly associated with female gender.

“Long COVID in children and adolescents has been reported with a very wide symptom spectrum and with great heterogeneity among studies included in this review,” the authors write. “The presentation of long COVID may change with time. There is the need for high quality, prospective, and well controlled studies to address these issues. In the interim, preventing COVID-19 infection and vaccinations for children and adolescents must remain a priority.”

Hmmm! Does that last line expose what this article is really about?

Obviously, there is no mention of the possible both long term and short term side effects from the Covid vaccine. 

From the Epoch Times:

“Damage to the heart is more common than thought after receipt of Moderna’s COVID-19 booster, a new study in the European Journal of Heart Failure..

One in 35 health care workers at a Swiss hospital had signs of heart injury associated with the vaccine, mRNA-1273, researchers found.

The group experiencing the adverse effects was followed for only 30 days, and half still had unusually high levels of high-sensitivity cardiac troponin T, an indicator of subclinical heart damage, at follow-up.

The long-term implications of the study remain unclear as little research has tracked people over time with heart injury after messenger RNA vaccination, which is known to cause myocarditis and other forms of heart damage.”

Would Bronny James and Damar Hamlin still be alive if they were not defibrillated quickly? If either of them had their cardiac arrest in a location where a defibrillator was not immediately available, would both of these stellar young athletes now be dead ? Kids play sandlot football and full-court basketball outside all the time. In these situations there are no defibrillators immediately available to stop one of them from dying if their heart stops beating. How often does this occur? No one knows, and no one appears interested in finding out.

If you are a parent with an athletic teenage boy do you get the Covid shot or the booster, and potentially risk the known side effect of myocarditis, or do you roll the dice and take the chance of long-Covid if he gets Covid?

Parents, you decide.

7/28/23

Last month I wrote about Damon Atkins and the Scranton Police. To refresh everyone’s memory … from the Epoch Times:

On 6/3/23 a street preacher was arrested by police shortly after arriving at a June 3 LGBT pride event sponsored by the city of Reading, Pennsylvania.

The group Reading Pride Celebration partnered with the city for a ceremonial raising of the rainbow flag at Reading City Hall for the start of LGBT pride month, followed by a short parade to a park where there was a rainbow pride celebration with speakers and free food.

Across the street, a handful of people gathered to protest the event, none with loudspeakers. Police stood in the street between the groups.

Damon Atkins 41, arrived at the event carrying a sign with a slogan that showed his opposition to the event, police said in the criminal complaint describing the arrest.

The offending two-sided sign had Bible verses. On one side it said, “Jesus said go and sin no more,” and the other side said, “Jesus said I am the way, the truth and the life.”

The officer approached Mr. Atkins and told him to be respectful and to “let them have their day,” referring to the LGBT pride gathering.

“Oh, I’m respecting,” Mr. Atkins said in the video. “You know who is cheering for us? The people that are in hell. So, you do you, and I’ll do me. This is public property.”

The officer turned his back and walked a few steps into the street. Mr. Atkins raised his voice and got out part of a sentence.

“Yo. God is not—,” Mr. Atkins began saying, but the officer turned back to Mr. Atkins, put him in handcuffs, and had him transported to a police processing center where he spent a few hours in police custody.

The Berks County District Attorney’s office withdrew the charges four days after the arrest citing insufficient evidence and prosecutorial discretion.

Well, to no intelligent person’s surprise, Damon Atkins is suing the police, the city, and Reading Mayor Eddie Moran, whose comment was some namby-pamby comment basically saying that Damon Atkins does not have any First Amendment rights as he was trying to disrupt an organized event.

Joel Ready, Damon Atkins attorney said the following,

“That should disturb any American, that the police can come and say, because your message is unpopular, we’re going to—in front of a crowd—declare on behalf of the government of the city in which you live, that your words are not welcome here, that your particular viewpoint is wrong. And that is what I think is particularly chilling.”

Was Damon Atkins being courteous? … No.

Was Damon Atkins within his First Amendment Constitutional right to free speech? … In my mind, yes.

My prediction here … Scranton, etc. will settle, as this is the only way for them to get away relatively cheap.

I hope to follow-up on this as it moves forward.

7/27/23

californiacontrarian

The sports world was shocked on 7/25/23 when Bronny James, son of LeBron James, apparently suffered a cardiac arrest during a USC basketball practice. He was resuscitated on site, and then hospitalized.

Initially, to me, this was somewhat reminiscent of what happened to Hank Gathers back in 1990. He was 23 when he collapsed during an LMU college basketball game, and died before reaching the hospital. Hank Gathers had hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (IHSS), and had stopped taking his medication because it made him feel sluggish. Back there was no paucity of information as to what had exactly happened to Hank Gathers.

Compare that to Damar Hamlin who suffered a cardiac arrest during a Monday Night Football game. This episode was witnessed by millions of viewers across the nation. There are major differences between the Hank Gathers situation and the Damar Hamlin situation.

-Hank Gathers died, while Damar Hamlin is still alive. 

-Whereas we knew basically everything about Hank Gathers cardiac condition, we know basically nothing about the heart structure or function of Damar Hamlin.

-Hank Gathers’ cardiac arrest was due to his IHSS. At present the party line is that Damar Hamlin’s cardiac arrest was due to commotio cordis.(From Science Direct: Commotio cordis, a rare syndrome in which young healthy individuals suddenly suffer cardiac arrest after blunt chest trauma traditionally related to a sports activity such as baseball, hockey, or lacrosse, is characterized by a sudden disruption of cardiac rhythm in the absence of demonstrable signs of significant heart injury that is induced by a direct blow to the chest.)

Let’s be clear … is it possible that Damar Hamlin’s cardiac arrest was due to commotio cordis? Yes, it is possible. However, is it likely? No … unless there is an increased susceptibility to commotio cordis in those athletes who have received Covid vaccinations. 

-Hank Gathers obviously did not receive a Covid vaccine, while the vaccine status of Damar Hamlin is kinda hush-hush and is not commented on.

To me, it is interesting that what happened to Bronny James was not in our local “newspaper” the following day. Certainly it can be categorized as news, but nothing, zero, zip, nada. 

I wish Bronny James a full recovery, and I hope that the cause of his cardiac arrest is treated openly, more like that of Hank Gathers, and not secretively like that of Damar Hamlin.

7/26/23

californiacontrarian