In The Mailbox: 07.29.21

Posted on | July 29, 2021 | Comments Off on In The Mailbox: 07.29.21

Silicon Valley delenda est.

Operator-chan’s French cousin (h/t Jed Babbin)

OVER THE TRANSOM
357 Magnum: Chicago Mayor’s Failed Anti-Violence Campaign
Red Pilled Jew: The Elois’ Smile
EBL: Scarlett Johansson Sues Disney Over Black Widow
Twitchy: “Who The Hell Is She?” also, Horrifying Display Of Decadent Apathy – Democrat Staffer Snaps Pics Of Maskless Republican Staffers Playing Beer Pong
Louder With Crowder: Crowder’s Getting Heart Surgery
Vox Popoli: Christianity Is Not “The Tradition Of The Elders”, also, Red China Rubs Afghan Failure In America’s Face

RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
American Conservative: A Year & A Half Of Magical Thinking
American Greatness: GOP Lawmakers Blocked From Visiting 1/6 Political Prisoners
American Power: So, Electric Cars Are Destroying The Planet?
American Thinker: Questions The 1/6 Commission Won’t Ask
Animal Magnetism: Animal’s Daily Gun Control Stupidity News
Babalu Blog: Sixth High-Ranking Cuban Military Officer In Ten Days Mysteriously Dies, also, The Brutality Of The Cuban Regime Is So Bad Not Even The NYT Can Ignore It
Baldilocks: Lifecycle
BattleSwarm: Austin Pays $10,000 To Indoctrinate APD In Critical Race Theory, But It Gets Worse
Behind The Black: Today’s Blacklisted American, also, Nauka Finally Docks With ISS
Cafe Hayek: COVID Did NOT Reduce Life Expectancy By 1.5 Years – And The FDA Is No Friend In The Fight against COVID
CDR Salamander: Diversity Thursday
Da Tech Guy: The Democrats’ Delta Variant, also, The John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act Is Another Democrat Attempt To Steal Future Elections
Don Surber: Ohio RINOs Let Killers Go Free, also, The Olympics Through Woke Eyes
First Street Journal: Street Justice, also, More Discrimination Against Asians By The Left
The Geller Report: Lying Biden Mocked For Claiming He Used To Drive An 18-Wheeler, also, Swastika In The State Department
Hogewash: Team Kimberlin Post of The Day, also, Don’t Know Much About History
Hollywood In Toto: The Other Reason For Weak Box Office Numbers That Noone Will Admit, also, Geena Davis Skewers Woke Hollywood For Snubbing Older Actresses
The Lid: Democrat Dark Money – Big Labor Loophole Hid $1.8 Billion In 2020 Support
Legal Insurrection: New Prof At Arizona State Applies CRT To Study Of Music, also, Fauxcahontas Trying To Save Gavin Newsom From Recall
Nebraska Energy Observer: Ageist
Outkick: Scherzer To The Padres? also, American Sunisa Lee Takes The Gold As Simone Biles Watches
Power Line: Biden The Truck Driver? C’mon, Man, also, Delta Hysteria
Shark Tank: Charlie Crist Flip-Flops On Abortion – Again
Shot In The Dark: On The Line, also, Life Is Full of Ironies, If You’re Stupid
The Political Hat: Woke Learning – Indigenous Creationism, Critical Race Collective’s Five Tenets, & Not Really Math, also, California Bans High-End Personal Computers
This Ain’t Hell: Administration Orders Everyone At Pentagon To Mask Up, Even If They Got The Jab, also, Thursday FGS
Victory Girls: Roundup Time – A Curve The Ruling Class Won’t Flatten
Volokh Conspiracy: $250/Day Fine For Displaying “F**k Biden” Sign At Home Dropped Thanks To NJ ACLU
Weasel Zippers: Merrick Garland Threatens TX Gov Abbott Over Immigration Enforcement, also, Project Veritas Leaks Unreleased Documentary Wherein Occasional Cortex Compares 1/6 To Being Raped
The Federalist: House Freedom Caucus Calls For Kicking Cheney & Kinzinger Out Of GOP Conference, also, Postal Union That Endorsed Biden Rejects Federal Vaccine Mandate
Mark Steyn: Live Around The Planet…With A Few Extras

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Category: Linkagery

In The Mailbox: 07.28.21

Posted on | July 28, 2021 | Comments Off on In The Mailbox: 07.28.21

— compiled by Wombat-socho

Silicon Valley delenda est.

Operator-chan saves the day.

OVER THE TRANSOM
Ninety Miles From Tyranny: The 90 Miles Mystery Box, Episode #1427
EBL: Separated At Birth Or Transitioning Liars?
Twitchy: Army General Protects Twitter Account After Getting Pwned By Hillsdale Student, also, Locals Pour Cold Water On Yoga Mom’s “Off-Grid Thing” Travel Plans Through Central America With Ten Year Old Daughter
Louder With Crowder: Genius Video Shows Joe Biden Demanding Tougher Penalties For Crack While Hunter Smokes Along
Vox Popoli: The “Courage” Of The Quitter, also, Google & Facebook Mandate Vaccinations

RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
Adam Piggott: Never Start A Land War In Australia
American Greatness: COVID-Positive Illegals In Texas Staying In Charity-Funded Hotel, Infecting People In Restaurants, also, Democrat Megadonor Ed Buck Found Guilty Of Two Drug-Related Deaths In His Home
American Thinker: Why Democrats Don’t Care About Crime
Animal Magnetism: Animal’s Hump Day News
Babalu Blog: A Black Uprising Is Shaking Cuba’s Communist Regime, also, Cuba, The Truncheon Utopia
BattleSwarm: Democrat Megadonor Ed Buck Convicted On All Charges
Behind The Black: Today’s Blacklisted Americans, also, Blue Origin Working To Make Second Stage Of New Glenn Reusable
Cafe Hayek: The Invisible Hand Relies On Visible Prices
CDR Salamander: Get The Damn JAG In Here
Da Tech Guy: Post-Christian/Marxist Sore Thumbs In Science, Law, Tribalism, & The Fruits Of It All, also, Report From Louisiana – Turmoil In The Church
Don Surber: Cleveland Indians’ New Name Already Taken, also, Calling Someone Jussie Smollett Is RAAAAACIST!
First Street Journal: Why Don’t Neoconservatives Support Liberty At Home? also, It’s Getting Closer & Closer!
The Geller Report: Officer Who Claimed 1/6 Rioters Were Chanting The N-Word Is Huge #BLM Supporter, also, Iranian Defector Mollaei Dedicates Olympic Judo Silver To Israel
Hogewash: A Supply Chain War Story
Hollywood In Toto: The Defund The Police Crowd Would Hate Michael Mann’s Miami Vice, also, NAACP Won’t Accept Morgan Wallen’s Repeated Apologies
The Lid: New Problems for Biden’s ATF Nominee David Chipman
Legal Insurrection: Poll Says Vote To Recall Gavin Newsom A Statistical Dead Heat, also, Seventeen Senate Republicans Vote To Move Infrastructure Bill Forward
Nebraska Energy Observer: The Fight Against CRT, And WuFlu Testing
Outkick: Novak Djokovic Drops Truth Bombs – Players Need To Deal With Pressure, also, Big 12 Accuses ESPN Of Encouraging Destabilization Of Conference, Issues Cease & Desist
Power Line: The “Follow ‘The Science'” Clown Show, also, Masks Again?
Shark Tank: Sabatini Blasts “Shameless” Murphy And 1/6 Committee
Shot In The Dark: Just So We’re Clear On This, also, Lining Up For Final Approach On That Windmill
STUMP: Mortality Basics With Meep
The Political Hat: It’s Not The Funding, It’s The Pedagogy
This Ain’t Hell: DOD “All In” On Fighting “Food Insecurity” In The Ranks, also, Red China Stirs Another Pot
Victory Girls: The Far Left Is Everyone’s Enemy, Not Just Eric Adams’
Volokh Conspiracy: How I Approach Unconventional & Unpopular Legal Views
Weasel Zippers: ACLU Says Second Amendment Is Racist, also, Joe Biden Claims He Used To Drive An 18-Wheeler
The Federalist: Shocker! Nearly 90% Of Illegals Let In By Biden Have Failed To Report As Required, also, The Left Essentially Exists To Make Your Entire Life Worse
Mark Steyn: Restaurants Redux, also, El Covid Pasa

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Category: Linkagery

Georgia Democrats Admit They’re ‘F**ked’

Posted on | July 28, 2021 | Comments Off on Georgia Democrats Admit They’re ‘F**ked’

A couple of months ago, I had a long phone conversation with an old friend from Douglas County, Georgia. Among other things, we talked about the election there and, when I mentioned suspicions of fraud, my friend said he didn’t believe Democrats had fabricated votes in Fulton County. Instead, he said, they had exploited the Secretary of State’s decision (contradicting state law) to permit widespread mail-in voting with drop boxes. What Democrats did with that loophole, my friend explained, was to deploy an army of ballot harvesters who were soliciting votes in grocery store parking lots and they knew whose votes they were looking for, IYKWIMAITYD. So, according to my friend, the election wasn’t exactly stolen, but it was not exactly legitimate, either.

That experiment in mass mail-in voting was made necessary, according to its defenders, because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Be that as it may, the Georgia legislature was determined to prevent any future such improvisations, and passed a new election law which, as Gov. Brian Kemp has said, makes it “easier to vote, but harder to cheat.”

Without cheating, can Georgia Democrats win? They don’t think so:

On Monday, Politico channeled the freakout from Georgia liberals. The eye-grabbing headline:

‘We’re f—ed’: Dems fear turnout catastrophe from GOP voting laws
There’s growing concern — bordering on alarm — about the potential impact in 2022 of the raft of new voting restrictions.

Reporters Maya King, David Siders and Daniel Lippman began:

After Georgia Republicans passed a restrictive voting law in March, Democrats here began doing the math.
The state’s new voter I.D. requirement for mail-in ballots could affect the more than 270,000 Georgians lacking identification. The provision cutting the number of ballot drop boxes could affect hundreds of thousands of voters who cast absentee ballots that way in 2020 — and that’s just in the populous Atlanta suburbs alone.
…“If there isn’t a way for us to repeat what happened in November 2020, we’re f—ed,” said Nsé Ufot, CEO of the Stacey Abrams-founded New Georgia Project. “We are doing what we do to make sure that not only our constituents, our base, the people, the communities that we organize with, get it. We’re trying to make sure that our elected officials get it as well.”

Sometimes mainstream media outlets toss out numbers to make political points without citing the sources. . So where did Politico come up with that 270,000 number? They don’t say. They also don’t say if that number includes those who are not legally residing in Georgia or even if they’re U.S. citizens.
In any case, that number seems rather high since without ID you can’t do banking, driving, or just purchasing a beer among many other things. . . .
The most likely source for that 270,000 number is . . . an Atlanta Journal Constitution article published on June 1. Ironically, that same article makes clear that requiring identification is not really a barrier to voting.

What is incomprehensible to me is how these 270,000 people somehow got registered to vote without being able to prove who they are.

Let’s think about this: You could fill out a voter registration form just using any name — write in “Max Dorian Fried,” for example — and any address (e.g., 755 Battery Ave SE) and you’re a registered voter. And so far as we know, there are 270,000 such phantom registrations in Georgia, of “voters” who have no way of proving they actually exist, much less that they meet the legal eligibility requirements for voting.

This was how Stacey Abrams and her crew were able to work their electoral voodoo in 2020, a species of swindling they call “democracy.”

(Hat-tip: Ed Driscoll at Instapundit.)

Category: Democrats, Georgia

Wisdom From a Whore

Posted on | July 28, 2021 | Comments Off on Wisdom From a Whore

“Aella,” from her Twitter account.

Excuse the plain English in the headline, but we live in an age in which politically correct euphemisms are employed to conceal the ugly truth, and the truth about prostitution is about as ugly as it gets. You can call them “sex workers” if you wish, but they’re still whores, and no amount of fancy pseudo-academic jargon will change that fact.

The pervasiveness of pornography on the Internet, and the prevalent use of social media as a sort of personal advertisement (“HMU in the DMs”) for college girls to find “sugar daddies,” has somewhat blurred the distinction between dating and whoring, at least in the minds of many young participants in these endeavors. Recall when Utah sorority girl Mackenzie Lueck went missing, and members of her sorority complained about “slut shaming” when it was reported that Lueck had been meeting men through “sugar baby” sites. As I wrote at the time:

We should not pretend that “seeking arrangements” as a “sugar baby” is anything other than prostitution, and if participants in such “arrangements” don’t enjoy being told the truth, that’s not my fault. . . .
My suggestion (and I think most parents would agree) is that a woman who doesn’t want to be treated like a whore should scrupulously avoid any situation that might put her in such a light.

All of this is intended as preamble to quoting from Bari Weiss’s recent interview with a “sex worker” who calls herself Aella.

“Aella” grew up in a strict Mormon household, left home at 17 and — judging from her own published self-history — went wild at age 20, when she had eight different sexual partners in a year. That was about the time she started her “sex worker” career as a camgirl, and now her number of lifetime sexual partners is 38, including 11 women. “Aella” is currently 29 and peddling herself via OnlyFans, and I’m sure her family must be mortified by her career choice. It’s impossible for me to view such matters except from the parental perspective. Whenever you see this kind of behavior, you must think, “What went wrong? How did she get so messed up? What could lead her to disgrace her family this way?”

When I was a young bachelor, of course, my attitude might have been different, but as a father (and now a grandfather) I find myself appalled by the normalization of such shameful behavior. And all of this preamble, as I say, is intended as a disclaimer, to signify that I do not endorse this behavior, while wishing to quote some of what “Aella” told Bari Weiss, regarding certain of her male clients:

A lot of guys expressed finding me because they wanted sex before they died. . . . Some felt inadequate. Some were virgins and were really terrified that women wouldn’t like them and they had no idea what to do. They figured, ‘OK, if I get an escort, I can learn how to please a woman.’ These men desperately want to be valued by women. I had one guy who had the most profound impact on me. I met up with him in a hotel and we were talking and he said something and looked sad about it. He was talking about his life. That made me feel sad so I started crying and then he started crying. And then we just held each other and sobbed for a while.

Keep in mind her phrase about men who “desperately want to be valued by women,” and ask yourself, why do they feel so lacking in value? “Aella” gets very close to an answer when, arguing against banning OnlyFans, she discusses the motives that lead men to seek this online outlet:

The underlying thing is that men don’t have a clear path in their personal lives to find sexual acceptance from women. . . . I think men don’t have a role. The role for men has been becoming increasingly unclear. Men are now earning fewer college degrees than women and yet are still expected to be the strong provider in some ways. When it comes to gender roles, the thing that men provide is typically protection, and the thing that women provide is typically reproduction. We no longer need protection, but we still need reproduction, so it’s like, ‘What do men do? Why are they valuable? Why are they even here?’ It’s kind of the ambient question in the background. Women still have to do all this stuff, but what the f**k are men good for? Impregnating and running? I’m not saying there’s an answer. I’m not giving a simple quick fix. I feel like this is the thing that we’re going to have to figure out how to grapple with as a culture, because with any sort of advancement in a culture, we’re going to run into this problem where the role of one gender becomes unnecessary faster than the role of the other. This creates an imbalance in value. I think the imbalance in value ultimately is the thing that’s contributing to this sort of thing where women are able to rake in huge amounts of cash online while men are like sitting alone in their basements watching.

She speaks in general terms, about a definite social trend, which would be interesting enough to discuss, but I’m reminded of something Margaret Thatcher said about her opponents in a 1987 interview:

“They are casting their problems at society. And, you know, there’s no such thing as society. There are individual men and women and there are families. And no government can do anything except through people, and people must look after themselves first. It is our duty to look after ourselves and then, also, to look after our neighbours.”

The statement that there is “no such thing as society” was cited by her opponents as evidence of Thatcher’s heartless individualism, but she was correct in criticizing the way in which some people seem to think we are all helpless victims of social forces beyond our control.

My point is that, however much we may sympathize with young men struggling in an age where “equality” (as the feminists would call it) has put them at a remarkable disadvantage, our admiration should be for those who find a way to surmount the challenge of this situation. No matter how many problems “society” may inflict on them, still most men as individuals are able to cope with and overcome their problems.

If there is no “clear path” for men “to find sexual acceptance from women,” how much greater the praise deserved by those men who somehow manage to hack their own “path” through the dangerous jungle. Because however great “the imbalance in value” between men and women, surely not every young man is a doomed loser forced to pay a whore for the opportunity to cry in her arms.

What is the difference between the winners and the losers in this game? Is it all just a matter of luck? Or is it the case, as Thatcher’s quote implies, that the individual always bears some responsibility for his own fate, no matter how unfortunate his circumstances may be?

Well, I’ve reached the 1,200-word mark without resolving anything, but I must thank the whore “Aella” for her perceptive analysis of the problems facing men in the 21st century, and I must thank Ed Driscoll for linking a column by Kyle Smith about Substack that led me to Bari Weiss’s interview with “Aella.” Y’all hash it out in the comments.

Category: Sex

Bang Bang Fang Fang: Eric Swalwell’s China Spy Secrets Inspire Painful Puns

Posted on | July 28, 2021 | Comments Off on Bang Bang Fang Fang: Eric Swalwell’s China Spy Secrets Inspire Painful Puns

Monday, Matthew Boyle at Breitbart published this:

The U.S. Intelligence Community currently has in its possession a classified report that includes intricate and intimate details of the nature of the relationship between Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) and a Chinese spy known as “Fang Fang,” Breitbart News has confirmed.
The report, which intelligence and national security sources familiar with its contents who spoke on condition of anonymity told Breitbart News, contains details of the nature of Swalwell’s relationship with Fang Fang including certain sexual acts they allegedly engaged in together. Sources familiar with it, however, would not provide any more detail on the nature of those acts or other details in the report—which is currently classified.

While this classified report has not yet been leaked, and Boyle claims his sources “would not provide any more detail” about exactly what transpired between Swalwell and Fang, the clues are beginning to accumulate, in the form of suggestive phrasing:

“Regardless of whether you would have pegged Eric Swalwell as someone dumb enough to sleep with a CCP spy, the evidence is damning,” a second source familiar with the report’s details, a former external senior adviser to Intelligence Community (IC) leadership, told Breitbart News. “That report should be declassified. There are no concerns about sources or methods. The only purpose served by keeping that report classified is saving Swalwell from embarrassment. That’s not a good enough reason.”

I see what you did there.

Boyle’s editor got in on the hint-hint game Tuesday night:

On Tuesday’s edition of the Fox News Channel’s “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” Breitbart News editor-in-chief Alex Marlow, author of Breaking the News: Exposing the Establishment Media’s Hidden Deals and Secret Corruption, stated that a Breitbart News report points to “deep penetration inside” the operation of Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) “by the Chinese government.”
Marlow said, “Now, we knew Fang Fang was infiltrating operations within the United States, various offices and having relationships with up-and-coming politicians before she abruptly left the country a few years ago, and we knew she had an intimate relationship with Swalwell. We just didn’t know the extent to which it was intimate.”
“Well, now, apparently, we do, according to this report, which, as of now, Swalwell hasn’t denied,” he continued. “Tucker, this is deep penetration inside the Swalwell operation by the Chinese government.”

Look, I’m not stupid enough to miss those clues, but on the other hand, this is not a subject I want to think about, much less to have to write about, so let’s not . . . uh, probe this topic too much deeper. As far as I’m concerned, these secrets can remain classified forever.

Category: China, Democrats

In The Mailbox: 07.27.21

Posted on | July 28, 2021 | Comments Off on In The Mailbox: 07.27.21

— compiled by Wombat-socho

Silicon Valley delenda est.

Under The Same Sky – Mash Kyrielight

OVER THE TRANSOM
357 Magnum: How’s That Affordable Bail Working Out?
Red Pilled Jew: The 7.3 Million Dollar – Er, Person – Question
EBL: Yellowstone – Revenge Will Be Worth The Wait?
Twitchy: NYT Reporter Admits Deleting “Unclear Tweets” About 1/6 Committee (That Weren’t Unclear At All)
Louder With Crowder: CNN “Fact Checker” Saves The Day!
Vox Popoli: Personal Cleanliness Is Important, also, Why People Don’t Believe In “Science”

RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
American Conservative: Fulton Sheen, Cuba, & The New Latin Mass
American Greatness: Did The FBI Manipulate The MI Kidnapping Plot To Affect The Election? also, Left-Wing Agitators Try To Shut Down GOP Presser Demanding Transparency On 1/6 Detainees
American Power: Simone Biles’ Shocking Exit From Tokyo Olympics, also, Popular Revolt Against Critical Race Theory
American Thinker: Served Its Purpose? CDC, FDA Recall Faulty COVID Test
Animal Magnetism: Animal’s Daily Inflationary News
Babalu Blog: Another Cuban General Suddenly Dies – The Fourth In Little More Than A Week, also, Mexican President Praises Cuban Dictatorship, Calls For Dismantling Of OAS
BattleSwarm: Dallas Mayor Wants To Hire 275 More Police, also, Trump Endorses Paxton Over Bush
Behind The Black: Today’s Blacklisted American, also, An Astrophysicist Explains Cosmology’s Theoretical Failures
Cafe Hayek: Quotation Of The Day
CDR Salamander: We’re Designing Ourselves To Lose
Da Tech Guy: For The Love Of All That Is Good, Get Off The Cloud! also, Chicago Has Most Of The Tools To Fight Violent Crime Already, Without Federal Help
Don Surber: The Dehumanization Of Americans, also, 430 Died In A Mostly Peaceful Week
First Street Journal: The Philadelphia Inquirer Proves My Point, also, Fear Is The Mind Killer [Updated]
The Geller Report: Ashli Babbitt’s Mom – Nancy Pelosi Orchestrated The Killing Of My Daughter, also, A Seven-Day Journey Through The War Against The American People
Hogewash: Editing A Headline, also, Team Kimberlin Post Of The Day
Hollywood In Toto: Let These Baby Boomer Franchises Die Already, also, Jungle Cruise Sails Down Woke River
The Lid: Cuba’s Communist Regime Caught Shipping In Fake Pro-Government Protesters
Legal Insurrection: Bad Orange Woman Can’t Give Scientific Answer About Why Vaccinated People Need Masks, also, Democrats & Media Already Spinning 2022 Losses Over Voter ID
Nebraska Energy Observer: For What It’s Worth, also, The Sky Is Falling! The Sky Is Falling!
Outkick: ESPN Writer Disturbed By U.S. Flag At Olympics, also, Three-Time Olympian Lolo Jones Slams Protests, Says They Affected Olympic Games Ratings
Power Line: 1/6 Show Trial Gets Underway, also, The Vexing Vaccine
Shark Tank: Cammack Says Biden Lacks “Moral Compass” To Act On Cuba
Shot In The Dark: Ruparing, also, God, Guns, & Gold
The Political Hat: Witch-Verse Of The Federation, also, Anti-Racist Bioethics
This Ain’t Hell: U.S. Combat Mission In Iraq To Be Over By Year’s End, also, Major General Outflanked In Twitter War
Transterrestrial Musings: Another Blow To Mann’s Case
Victory Girls: Swalwell Tries To Work Up A Media Frenzy, But Nobody Falls For It
Volokh Conspiracy: Judge Strikes All Of Michael Mann’s Expert Witnesses From Libel Suit
Weasel Zippers: Woke Mob Declares Spray Tans Are Blackface, also, Squad Member Spent $70,000 On Security After Calling To Defund Police
The Federalist: Weeping Capitol Cop Who Testified About 1/6 Previously Defended Violent Riots In Kenosha, also, Robin DeAngelo Whines That Comedy Gives White People An Excuse To Be Racist
Mark Steyn: You’re Once, Twice, Three Times A Loser, also, When Virtue Signaling Will No Longer Suffice

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Category: Linkagery

A ‘Surge’ of Media-Hyped Fear

Posted on | July 27, 2021 | Comments Off on A ‘Surge’ of Media-Hyped Fear

Two graphics, courtesy of the New York Times. The first shows U.S. COVID-19 deaths dating back to the beginning of the pandemic:

The second graph shows COVID-19 deaths during the past month:

Notice that I’m showing you COVID-19 deaths, not “cases.” Because officials treat a positive test as a “case,” regardless of whether the person has symptoms (let alone severe symptoms requiring hospitalization), the reported number of COVID-19 “cases” is an unreliable barometer of the actual prevalence of the disease. By contrast, dead is dead.

Furthermore, treatment protocols for COVID-19 have advanced considerably over the past 18 months, so that if someone does become infected, doctors are better able to prevent their case from reaching a serious and potentially deadly stage, especially when the patient seeks help early. And, it should be obvious, those most vulnerable to disease were killed in the first year of the pandemic. All of these factors go into explaining why, despite constant hype from the media, we actually are not experiencing a “surge” of COVID-19 deaths.

What the media are doing now is selectively focusing on reports of localized “surges” — Miami, for example — in an effort to convince Americans that (a) there is a “pandemic of the unvaccinated” and therefore (b) we need to return to lockdowns and mandatory masks.

Why? On the one hand, the virus is real and vaccination should be encouraged. But on the other hand, the media hype is unscientific. The current 7-day average of daily COVID-19 deaths (275) is 92% below what it was six months ago, at the peak of the pandemic. Even if there has been a rise in the number of “cases” (defined as positive test results) in the past six weeks, this has not translated to a spike in COVID-19 deaths.

Senior citizens are most at risk for serious complications or death from the coronavirus, but the vast majority of those 65 and older are vaccinated. Most of the COVID-19 “cases” being reported now are among younger patients, very few of whom are likely to die from the disease. You see anecdotal reports in the media about younger people dying of COVID-19, but such cases are not part of a statistically significant trend.

My hunch — and it is only a hunch — is that this “surge” hype is really being driven by the teachers unions, who want to keep schools closed, and are exerting pressure on the Democratic Party who, in turn, are pumping out “surge” propaganda via their media allies. Part of this message is about scapegoating Republicans as responsible for vaccine “resistance,” even though the lowest vaccination rates are among blacks and Hispanics, both of whom are key Democratic Party constituencies.

None of this, of course, is intended as an argument against vaccination. I’m not at high risk, and therefore haven’t gotten the shot yet, and actually suspect that I might have already had a mild case that would make me immune. Furthermore, some friends and family members who have gotten the vaccine tell me the side-effects can make you feel crappy for a day or two. So I’ve avoided getting vaccinated thus far, but I’ve gotten so tired of the incessant nagging from the media that I’m now thinking I should go get the shot because SHUT UP!

Category: Media Bias