The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

What Trump Did and Didn’t Do

Posted on | March 17, 2020 | Comments Off on What Trump Did and Didn’t Do

 

At a press conference Monday, President Trump issued “guidelines” to slow the spread of the coronavirus. What should be noted, however, is what Trump didn’t do — he did not announce a nationwide quarantine order. You see, the consensus opinion inside the CDC was that such a nationwide action was advisable, but as Trump noted at the press conference, the threat of the disease is not evenly distributed nationwide. So what he did was to defer to state and local governments to take whatever actions they deemed necessary, based on local circumstances. In the San Francisco area, for example, six counties just got a “shelter in place” order prohibiting any non-essential activity. In Maryland, the governor ordered the closing of all bars, restaurants and gyms. The governors of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut also imposed shutdowns Monday. Restaurant chains also responded: McDonald’s closed its dining areas, offering takeout and drive-through orders only.

For the next couple of weeks, then, much of the country will be in emergency shutdown mode, but not on federal orders. These are state and local decisions, and also decisions by private businesses, so that constitutional federalism is preserved. We are now in a wait-and-see posture: If these measures succeed in slowing the spread of the virus, no further action will be necessary. On the other hand . . .

Well, I don’t want to indulge any worst-case-scenario speculation.

As of 10 p.m. ET Monday night, there had been 4,459 coronavirus cases reported, with 86 deaths. More than half of that death toll (48 people) was in Washington State, where one nursing-home patient who had traveled to China was the source of a disastrous outbreak. Five states — New York (950 cases), Washington (909), California (448), Massachusetts (197) and New Jersey (178) — account for 60% of U.S. coronavirus cases. Given how disproportionately the disease has been confined to a handful of states on the two coasts, it seems absurd to take drastic action affecting rural states in the Midwest. However, until the outbreaks in the coastal urban centers are brought under control, the rest of the country will be forced to go along with the crisis mentality.

We must err on the side of caution. So I’ve got 28 rolls of toilet paper, and the means to defend my family against any marauding bandits. That’s all I can do, except perhaps to urge readers to remember that the Five Most Important Words in the English Language are:

HIT THE FREAKING TIP JAR!

Thanks in advance for your contributions. I’ll be here in the bunker, hunkered down to protect our toilet paper stockpile.



 

Category: Health Care

Democrat ‘Rising Star’ Update

Posted on | March 16, 2020 | 1 Comment

Instant Classic AOSHQ Headline:

Former Democrat Gubernatorial Candidate
Andrew Gillum: After Careful Reflection, I Have
Decided to Withdraw From Public Life and
Spend More Time With My Male Escorts

This guy, who had been mayor of Tallahassee, was hailed as an Obama-caliber future superstar because he came within 35,000 votes of Ron DeSantis in the 2018 election for governor of Florida. But a married father of three caught in a hotel room with meth and a naked gay escort?

Former Florida candidate for governor Andrew Gillum disclosed Sunday that he is entering a rehabilitation facility, saying he had fallen into a depression and alcohol abuse after losing his bid for the state’s highest post.
The Democrat’s statement came days after Gillum was named in a South Florida police report Friday that said he was “inebriated” and initially unresponsive in a hotel room along with a male companion where authorities found baggies of suspected crystal methamphetamine.
Gillum . . . was not charged with any crime. The Miami Beach police report said Gillum was allowed to leave the hotel for home after he was checked out medically.
Gillum said in his statement Sunday night that he resolved to seek help after conversations with his family and deep reflection, calling the decision “a wake-up call for me.”
“Since my race for governor ended, I fell into a depression that has led to alcohol abuse,” he said, pledging to work to “heal fully and show up in the world as a more complete person.”

He’s a victim of a mental health condition, you see, and hooking up with muscular male escorts was . . . well, therapeutic. It’s wrong to stigmatize those who seek meth-and-gay-hookers therapy. By the way, isn’t it nice that the Associated Press doesn’t mention the gay-escort angle at all?

Can you imagine any such media consideration for a Republican under similar circumstances? Of course not. If a Republican were caught with a male escort, the words “gay sex” would be in the headline.



 

Category: Democrats, Florida, Gays

In The Mailbox: 03.16.20

Posted on | March 16, 2020 | 1 Comment

– compiled by Wombat-socho

OVER THE TRANSOM
357 Magnum: Your Tax Dollars At Work, Finnish Edition
EBL: Hand Washing Is Better Than Hand Sanitizer, also, Ides Of March – “Vehicle”
Twitchy: Conservative Woman Rips Left, Media In Thread About Trump’s Actual Coronavirus Response
Louder With Crowder: Joe Biden Wanders Off Camera In Bizarre Campaign Video

RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
Adam Piggott: Friday Hawt Chicks & Links – It’s The End Of The World Edition, also, Fashion, Style, & Automobiles
American Conservative: Did Maryland Police Shoot & Kill A Sleeping Man?
American Greatness: America In A New Upside-Down World, also, Biden Vows To Ban Fracking, Implement High-Speed Rail
American Thinker: The Wuhan Virus Escaped From A Chinese Lab, also, The Democrats’ Project Fear Will Fail
Animal Magnetism: Goodbye, Blue Monday
Babalu Blog: Cubans Being Fined For Standing In Food Ration Lines Too Often, also, Another Building Collapse In Havana Kills One
BattleSwarm: Norm MacDonald On The Coronavirus, also, Democratic Presidential Clown Car Update
Cafe Hayek: Two Takeaways From The COVID-19 Crisis
CDR Salamander: A Terrible Decision By The Marine Corps Commandant, also, Unmanned & Unafraid On Midrats
Da Tech Guy: The Story Of Brer Media, Brer Donkey, Brer Trump, & The Coronavirus Briar Patch, also, Report From Louisiana – COVOD-19 & Online Teaching
Don Surber: We Didn’t Need An Office Of Pandemics, also, Trump Doesn’t Need Rallies. Biden Does.
First Street Journal: The Left Love Them Some Authoritarianism!
Fred On Everything: Democracy Inaction
The Geller Report: Speak Out Against The Democrats’ Coronavirus Bill! also, Rashida Tlaib – “F*ck A National Day Of Prayer”
Hogewash: Team Kimberlin Post Of The Day, also, Math Is Hard
Hollywood In Toto: How Harriet Didn’t Follow Hollywood’s Faith-Averse Formula, also, 17 Must-Watch Hulu Movies For Your Coronavirus Binge
JustOneMinute: That Big Debate Last Night
Legal Insurrection: Cornell’s Coronavirus Plea To Students – Stop Partying! also, Trump Strongly Considering Full Pardon Of General Flynn
Megan McArdle: The Markets Are Just Trying To Manage The Present
The PanAm Post: In A Disease Panic, The Market Is Your Friend
Power Line: Will Springtime Stop COVID-19? also, “Their Islands Are Sinking”
Shark Tank: Gillum To Enter  Rehab After Drug Overdose Incident
Shot In The Dark: Downstream End Of The Supply Chain, also, 2020 Pledge Drive
STUMP: Coronavirus Activities – Museums, & Meep Explains Opera
The Political Hat: The Ides Of March
This Ain’t Hell: From The Other Side, also, VA Employee Convicted In $19 Million Home Health Fraud
Victory Girls: Pelosi Tried To Sneak Abortion Funding Into COVID Bill, also, Haters Gonna Hate – Trump Tests Negative For Coronavirus
Volokh Conspiracy: Can The Government Just Close My Favorite Bar?
Weasel Zippers: De Blasio Claims Wuhan Flu “A Case For Nationalization Of Crucial Factpories & Industries”, also, House Majority Whip Clyburn Comapres Trump & Republicans To Nazis
Mark Steyn: Anesthetized & Loving It, also, Peeping Tom

Amazon Warehouse Deals




Category: Linkagery

America Is Not Italy: Wuhan Coronavirus and the ‘Grisly Calculus’ of Pandemic Risk

Posted on | March 16, 2020 | Comments Off on America Is Not Italy: Wuhan Coronavirus and the ‘Grisly Calculus’ of Pandemic Risk

Let’s start with the good news: My American Spectator colleague Jeffrey Lord just ended two weeks of self-quarantine, a precaution after being potentially exposed to Wuhan coronavirus at CPAC. My brother and I both attended CPAC, of course, and while we are not aware of any direct contact with the person from New Jersey who later was diagnosed as a COVID-19 patient, it was nevertheless possible we were exposed. Having passed the 14-day incubation period, then, we have some sense of relief, although I was not worried because I have a robust immune system.

Sunday, Italy reported 368 COVID-19 deaths in a single day. That was two days after Newt Gingrich (whose wife is U.S. Ambassador to the Vatican) published an alarming report on conditions in Italy, where the pandemic has hit most severely. While I still believe Americans are panicking too much over this virus, Gingrich notes that we are fortunate President Trump took one crucial step very early:

President Donald Trump was right to cut off travel from China as soon as it was clear how big the pandemic was going to be. He saved American lives and bought time for America to be more prepared as the pandemic developed.
When you realize that the current 1,016 deaths in Italy with a population of 60 million would be the equivalent of 5,400 deaths in the United States instead of the 41 deaths we have had so far, you can see what milder, slower and less aggressive responses might have cost in lives. Then we would have needed to move to truly draconian measures of isolation and shutdowns.
By the same standard, Trump was exactly right to ban travel from Europe. In fact, he was following the advice of his best medical experts.

Almost no one in the media is reporting the demographic factors involved in Italy’s pandemic disaster, and I can’t vouch for this “alternative” source’s account about the way manufacturers in Northern Italy brought in thousands of Chinese laborers to work in the leather and textile industries. Nonetheless, seems plausible, because it resembles the way Mexican and Central American laborers have been brought into the United States to work in, for example, meat processing plants.

Precaution is not a synonym for panic. To respond rationally to a genuine risk requires facts and arithmetic, because risk is always a matter of statistical probability. China deliberately suppressed the facts in the immediate aftermath of the Wuhan outbreak, and Italy’s government made the mistake of trusting China. By the time they realized how serious the COVID-19 danger was, it was too late to halt the contagion. Last night, I did some quick math and discovered that, a week earlier, there had been more than 500 reported cases of coronavirus in the United States with 21 reported deaths. As of Sunday night, there were about 3,500 reported U.S. cases with 65 reported deaths. This provides us a benchmark estimate of the rate of increase. By next Monday, I would expect around 20,000 reported U.S. cases with about 200 deaths.

WHY THIS MATTERS:
If the number of reported U.S. coronavirus deaths next Monday is significantly less than 200, it will mean our health system is functioning effectively to identify and treat infected people. If the number of reported cases is significantly less than 20,000 next Monday, it will mean that the precautions taken so far are effective in preventing the spread of the virus. Having extrapolated what the expected numbers would be in a week, these provide a benchmark by which we can tell whether we are winning or losing the fight against this disease.

My hope is that we will be winning, but what’s important is to establish a metric by which we can measure success. Meanwhile . . .

My 19-year-old son’s university canceled on-campus classes for the rest of the semester, so he booked a $49 flight to Florida, where he’s doing his coursework online and babysitting his nephews. My 17-year-old daughter is out of school for at least the next two weeks, and she informs me that her friends on social media are calling this holiday their “coronavacation.” Whether or not school cancellations will do much to halt the spread of Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) is a matter of speculation, but officials everywhere seem to have decided to err on the side of caution. Thus all Americans are affected by this disease, directly or indirectly, without regard to whether or not we ever actually were at any risk.
Blame the media, but also blame the tort lawyers. Imagine you were a university president, and suddenly cable TV news networks are warning of a deadly pandemic, with some experts offering estimates of millions of infections. The president announces a White House Task Force, and it seems as if we are on the verge of a virus-induced apocalypse. Other universities begin announcing that they will suspend classes, and what are you going to do, Mr. University President? Even if you are skeptical about the worst-case scenarios being discussed 24/7 on CNN, there is the problem of liability. See, if you don’t close your campus and even one of your students comes down with this disease, you might face a multimillion-dollar lawsuit, charging you with negligence for failing to take precautions.
Speaking of precautions, how much toilet paper do you have? . . .

Read the rest of my latest column at The American Spectator.



 

Category: China, Health Care, Italy

Rule 5 Sunday: Joy Harmon

Posted on | March 15, 2020 | 1 Comment

– compiled by Wombat-socho

Joy Harmon was an actress who had small parts in a dozen movies from the late 1950s through the 1960s, and continued to appear in several TV series through the 1970s. Her best known role is as the girl washing her car in Cool Hand Luke, from which this pic is taken. Later, she developed her hobby of baking into a highly successful commercial business, providing cakes, cookies, and other sweets to local studios and businesses.

Hot and wet, but not bothered.

Ninety Miles From Tyranny begins this week’s cavalcade of pulchritude with Hot Pick of the Late Night, The 90 Miles Mystery Box Episode #923, Morning Mistress, and Girls With Guns. At Animal Magnetism, it’s Rule Five Job Killer Friday and the Saturday Gingermageddon.

EBL circles the wagons with Lennox & Franklin, Shakira’s “Gordita” (thanks!), Holi Festival 2020, Asparagus Season, North – Nex In March, Johnny Appleseed Day, ZeroZeroZero, Sophie Trudeau, Rita Wilson, Yifei Liu, “Torn”, and Pi Day.

A View From The Beach serves up The Girl Who Broke Wikipedia – Denise Milani, Are Maryland’s Chickens Coming Home to Roost?, That Seems a Little Extreme, Thursday Tanlines, Spring is Sprung, Tuesday Tats,  Longnose Gar Sets New Maryland Record, Another Muddy Monday, They Hate You and They Want You to Die, Palm Sunday and DNA Confirms Viking Warrior Woman.

Proof Positive’s Vintage Babe is Pamela Hensley, and Red Pilled Jew has Pretty Faces for your consideration.

Thanks to everyone for all the luscious linkagery!

Amazon Warehouse Deals
Visit Amazon’s Intimate Apparel Shop
Shop Sex & Sensuality Gifts




Category: Rule 5

Wuhan Coronavirus Panic Continues

Posted on | March 15, 2020 | Comments Off on Wuhan Coronavirus Panic Continues

 

On Saturday night’s episode of The Other Podcast, Dianna Deeley was discussing the reaction to the Wuhan coronavirus in Georgia, where she lives, and I cited the number of actual cases in Georgia: 66 so far, with exactly one death, in a state with a population of about 10.5 million.

Anyone may offer speculative estimates of how far the virus will eventually spread, but so far, the danger of contagion in Georgia is infinitesimal, with the majority of the cases in three metro Atlanta counties. Math and logic, however, are powerless to stop hysteria:

Georgia elections officials postponed the presidential primary scheduled for next week because of the coronavirus pandemic, becoming the second state forced to push back a vote in the race for the White House due to the outbreak.
The state rescheduled the presidential vote previously scheduled for March 24 until May 19, the same date as the regular primary for a U.S. Senate seat and many other offices, elections officials told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution on Saturday. “Events are moving rapidly and my highest priority is protecting the health of our poll workers, their families, and the community at large,” said Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger.

This is arguably unnecessary, and its efficacy as a public-health measure is dubious, but the new rule is: EVERYTHING MUST BE CANCELLED!

As a matter of speculation, let’s just suppose that by March 24, Georgia’s Wuhan coronavirus cases quadrupled: 264 cases, four deaths. Still, in a population of 10.5 million people, such a number would not be a crisis. If 11 people died, that’s still just a one-in-a-million chance, and you might as well wager a month’s salary on the Powerball lottery, I guess.

Mere statistics cannot prevent panic, however, when the cable-news networks are now 24/7 in their reporting of the DEADLY PANDEMIC! People are reacting on the basis of emotion, not reason, and yet I feel the need to continue citing the actual numbers, so that those who have not yet succumbed to hysteria will at least have access to information that contradicts the media’s incessant drumbeat of doom.

So far, 2,826 cases of Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) have been reported in the United States, with 59 deaths. State-by-state:

Washington State …… 642 (40 deaths)
New York ……………….. 613 (2 deaths)
California ……………… 286 (5 deaths)
Colorado ……………….. 101 (1 death)

These four states have more than half (1,642, or 58%) of known COVID-19 infections, and 81% of the deaths reported from the virus. The rest of the country, 46 states, is comparatively unaffected in real terms, yet schools are shut down, the NBA is cancelled, and people are stampeding stores to buy up all the hand sanitizer, bottled water and toilet paper.

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (WSFA) – There has been one confirmed case of the coronavirus in Montgomery County, and after health officials say they anticipate the virus spreading quickly in the coming weeks, locals are stocking up with supplies if they need be quarantined.
Household items like toilet paper, hand sanitizer, and bleach are flying off the shelves. Customers are desperate to stash up, leaving stores in Montgomery noticeably empty.
“There is no toilet paper on the shelves so I just got the paper towels and hopefully that will suffice,” said Walmart shopper Vanessa Ball.
Some families are even having to preorder their toilet paper because it is such a hot commodity.
“I feel lucky and probably like we need to get it in the car before we’re mugged or something for toilet tissue,” said Walmart shopper Steven Smith.
But toilet paper isn’t the only supply running out, says Renfroe’s Market Store Manager Clark Psalmonds.
“Disinfecting sprays, wipes, sanitizers are unheard of right now,” said Psalmonds. “You can’t find a sanitizer nowhere in the area.”

Ain’t none of them dadgum sanitizers nowhere in Alabama!



 

Category: Health Care

First Russia, Then Ukraine, Now a Virus — ‘The Walls Are Closing In’ on Trump!

Posted on | March 14, 2020 | 2 Comments

 

One symptom of mental illness is magical thinking, “the belief that one’s own thoughts, wishes, or desires can influence the external world. . . . People with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) engage in a type of magical thinking. . . . People diagnosed with schizophrenia and delusional disorders may also experience bouts of magical thinking.”

What drives the schizophrenic mad is a sense of helplessness, a lack of agency, the feeling that external forces are controlling their lives. In this condition, they resort to child-like fantasies of omnipotence, where they have the power to fulfill their desires simply by wishing the desired outcome into existence. Such delusional thinking is evident in the behaviors of those afflicted with Trump Derangement Syndrome.

The disappointment of Hillary Clinton’s 2016 defeat had a traumatic psychological impact on Trump’s enemies, particularly in the media, who experienced the election result as a loss of power. Immediately, the anti-Trump media began seizing on anything — a scandal, a poll result, Russian “collusion,” etc. — that might rid them of this demonized figure whose political success symbolized to them their own failure. Thus was born the “walls are closing in” meme of liberal media fantasy, where the latest “bombshell” was always “the beginning of the end” for Trump.

 

Never mind that 63 million Americans voted to elect Trump, and never mind any evidence of his success in office, the liberal media cannot accept the possibility that they are wrong. No one they know voted for Trump. Everyone whose opinion they respect agrees with them: Trump is Hitler, everyone who voted for Trump is a racist, and therefore, in order that Good triumph over Evil, the walls are always closing in on Trump.

Consider this outburst from #NeverTrump intellectual Peter Wehner:

It took until the second half of Trump’s first term, but the crisis has arrived in the form of the coronavirus pandemic, and it’s hard to name a president who has been as overwhelmed by a crisis as the coronavirus has overwhelmed Donald Trump.
To be sure, the president isn’t responsible for either the coronavirus or the disease it causes, COVID-19, and he couldn’t have stopped it from hitting our shores even if he had done everything right. Nor is it the case that the president hasn’t done anything right; in fact, his decision to implement a travel ban on China was prudent. And any narrative that attempts to pin all of the blame on Trump for the coronavirus is simply unfair. The temptation among the president’s critics to use the pandemic to get back at Trump for every bad thing he’s done should be resisted, and schadenfreude is never a good look.
That said, the president and his administration are responsible for grave, costly errors . . .
Donald Trump is shrinking before our eyes.
The coronavirus is quite likely to be the Trump presidency’s inflection point, when everything changed, when the bluster and ignorance and shallowness of America’s 45th president became undeniable, an empirical reality, as indisputable as the laws of science or a mathematical equation.
It has taken a good deal longer than it should have, but Americans have now seen the con man behind the curtain. The president, enraged for having been unmasked, will become more desperate, more embittered, more unhinged. He knows nothing will be the same. His administration may stagger on, but it will be only a hollow shell. The Trump presidency is over.

This is “magical thinking” in action. Because Wehner wants the Trump presidency to end in failure, the coronavirus must be a catastrophic pandemic, and therefore he and his anti-Trump friends are doing everything possible to incite public hysteria over a disease which, as I explained Friday, has so far infected only a tiny fraction of Americans, in comparison to the many thousands afflicted in China, Italy and Iran. As of noon today, the Wuhan coronavirus had caused 1,266 deaths in Italy (population 60.4 million) and 191 deaths in Spain (population 46.8 million), compared to the 49 deaths in the United States (population 327 million). The situation in Italy appears to be spiraling out of control, but the number of U.S. cases (about 2,400) is fewer than in either Germany (4,174 cases in a population of 83.8 million) or France (3,667 cases in a population of 65.3 million). How is Trump guilty of “grave, costly errors” when Americans appear to be so much safer from this disease than are people in many European nations? What happens if the coronavirus panic turns out to be overblown? What if, under Trump’s leadership, the impact in the United States proves to be much less severe than in those European socialist countries that liberals are always praising as superior to capitalist America? Isn’t it possible that the American people will figure out that Democrats and the media (but I repeat myself) were deliberately trying to incite a panic for political motives?

Peter Wehner and his friends have not considered that possibility, because they are emotionally invested in the worst-case scenario as part of their “magical thinking” delusion. What they seem to forget — Trump Derangement Syndrome has impaired their memory — is that elections are a choice, and you can’t beat somebody with nobody. Does anyone really believe Joe Biden is the man who will save America from doom?

Spare a thought today for our moral, ethical, and intellectual betters in the press. They’re going through a lot right now. In 2016 they sacrificed what was left of their dignity to drag Hillary Clinton across the finish line, and she failed them anyway. Now they’re expected to spend the next eight months cleaning up after this doddering old fossil, who makes Hillary look like a paragon of competence and health. No wonder they’re so grouchy all the time!

(Hat-tip: Ed Driscoll at Instapundit.)



 

Category: Health Care

Fear and Loathing in South Beach: Florida Democrat ‘Rising Star’ Found in Hotel Room With Meth and Gay Escort

Posted on | March 14, 2020 | 1 Comment

 

Typical Democrat behavior:

Andrew Gillum, a married father-of-three who narrowly missed out on becoming Florida’s first black governor, was too ‘inebriated’ to speak when cops arrived at the ritzy Mondrian Hotel in Miami’s South Beach party district.
He was inside the room early Friday with two more men, one of them a 30-year-old male escort named Travis Dyson who was being treated by paramedics for a suspected drug overdose.
Cops found three plastic bags of suspected crystal meth and the third man present, Aldo Mejias, 56, told officers that Gillum and Dyson had been ‘under the influence of an unknown substance’, according to a police report . . .
The report also noted that 40-year-old Gillum, a former Tallahassee mayor and regular CNN contributor, was seen vomiting in the bathroom and required a welfare check to see if he was okay.
Police are not pressing charges over the incident and Gillum denies taking drugs, however he later issued a groveling apology over his behavior. . . .
Miami Beach resident Dyson describes himself as a trauma certified ER nurse on social media, where he posts photos of himself working out in the gym, partying at gay nightspots and lounging on luxury yachts.
But DailyMail.com can reveal he also posts explicit photos and homemade porn movies online and has previously had a profile on the Rent.men website, which advertises male escorts and sex workers.

More details at Heavy.com.

Credit is due to Candace Owens for digging up a lot of material on this case. Gillum claimed his Miami party was celebrating a wedding, but the gay escort said he didn’t know anything about that. Deborah Heine notes:

Gillum and his former campaign treasurer Adam Corey were both the subjects of a Florida ethics investigation and an FBI corruption probe, stemming from his time as the Mayor of Tallahassee. Gillum, who is married, and Corey were rumored to have been in a long term intimate relationship.

As my brother Kirby said: “Ed Buck could not be reached for comment.”



 

Category: Democrats, Florida, Gays
« go back — keep looking »

    About

    This is an area on your website where you can add text. This will serve as an informative location on your website, where you can talk about your site.

    Subscribe to our feed

    Search

    Admin