Tag: Vaccines

California’s War on Vaccine Skeptics

 

It is now approaching three years since the advent of COVID-19 in March 2020 provoked the most comprehensive and coercive response to a public health crisis that the United States has seen. From the earliest date, that policy has included lockdowns, social distancing, masking, and mRNA vaccines—all to stem the spread of the disease throughout the country. These tactics have long been opposed by many who think that more focused responses, which seek to isolate and protect the most vulnerable populations, offer a more tempered and effective response to the disease—a position well-expressed in the Great Barrington Declaration of October 4, 2020, which the conservative Brownstone Institute a year later observed “shattered the notion that there was a scientific consensus in favor of lockdowns.” Many other physicians have also expressed their uneasiness about COVID vaccine mandates, even as the federal government issued its own vaccine mandate in the employment context (it was struck down in January 2022 by the US Supreme Court in NFIB v. OSHA).

Nonetheless, public officials have continued to take strong exception to these dissenting voices. One recent piece of legislation in California, AB 2098, which took effect January 1, was written to allow California health officials to stifle dissent by revoking or suspending the licenses of those physicians who take issue with the official line of support for mRNA vaccines. The legislative findings relied explicitly on the work of the CDC and the FDA to conclude that “the risk of dying of COVID-19 for unvaccinated individuals is eleven times greater than for vaccinated individuals,” and that the spread of erroneous information “has weakened public confidence,” especially by licensed professions, thereby placing lives at risk. The payoff:

Section 2270—Dissemination of misinformation or disinformation related to the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus, or “COVID-19,” designated unprofessional conduct.

Two Must-Reads: Politics at Health Agencies and the Emerging Democratic Train Wreck

 

Remember when the Democratic partisans and the media (but I repeat myself) complained that President Trump and his Administration were politicizing important health agencies, like the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), National Institutes of Health (NIH), and Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Good times!

“’I’ve been following health regulatory decisions for decades and have never seen this amount of White House arm twisting to force agencies like FDA and CDC to make decisions based on political pressure, rather than the best science,’” said Jerome Avorn, a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, who decried the ‘routine policy distortions we now see nearly every week,’” exclaimed in an August 2020 op-ed in the Washington Post (also appearing in other newspapers) during the Covid pandemic.

Then there’s Dr. Richard Besser, a former CDC director who now is CEO of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in New Jersey. Here’s what he told the taxpayer-funded Public Broadcasting System (PBS) “News Hour” two years ago (July 14, 2020):

Join Jim and Greg as they assess the newest poll on the Florida governor’s race that shows Ron DeSantis with a solid lead. They also cheer as D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser drops the vaccine and mask mandates amid economic pressure and low COVID numbers. And Biden Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm refuses to answer questions about her stock holdings because, “The planet is warming faster than ever”.

Some Doctors Will Fight … for Me, Anyway

 

In a dramatic five-minute phone call, the game of telephone with office staff has been ended.

My hematologist said that of course, he would have no problem writing my exemption letter.  While vaccines are great and all, not everyone can have them and he agrees that it would be a bad idea for me.  Of course, he could never prove exact causality, etc, etc.  He recalled investigating hypercoagulability, the various tests, all of them being negative for any other reason.  All of that being true, he agreed to write the letter.

Small, Inspiring Victories, Part 2

 

Like most of you, I found myself in the doldrums about our current state of affairs in this country. So a few days ago I wrote a post on the importance of appreciating those positive decisions, events, and victories that are happening, so that we might be uplifted and energized. For at least one more week, I decided to list some more “victories” so that we can also celebrate our progress.

Join Jim and Greg as they welcome new Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin and applaud him following up on his campaign promises on his very first day. They also credit the FBI for a successful resolution to the hostage crisis at a Texas synagogue on Saturday but then fume as the bureau, the media, and the president claim the motive for the incident is a mystery. And they hammer the Salt Lake Tribune for suggesting the national guard should be called in to make sure the unvaccinated never leave their homes.

 

[Member Post]

 

https://twitter.com/ellymelly/status/1481035540963426306?s=20 The premier of Western Australia our dear Emperor our lord and Savior our most sacred state daddy Mark McGowan has decided to help Aboriginal Australians by releasing a video so patronizing that they will surely overcome their distrust of the white fella and will stick an experimental drug into their arm.  Preview Open

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On Thursday, Jim and Greg will welcome their first-ever guest into the 3 Martini Lunch. Don’t miss it! Today, join Jim and Greg as they welcome the news that President Biden is withdrawing his Marxist nominee to be Comptroller of the Currency. They also fume as the Biden Administration is more than a week late in issuing a report detailing who exactly got evacuated from Afghanistan and what the vetting process was like. And they pound the table as at least one school in the Los Angeles Unified School District allegedly vaccinated students and told them not to tell their parents.

 

Inventors Who Got Their Ideas from Sci-Fi

 

American inventor Simon Lake was captivated by the idea of travel after reading Jules Verne’s “Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea” in 1870. He built the Argonaut, the first submarine to operate successfully in the open ocean, in 1898. Verne congratulated him.

Igor Sikorsky invented the modern helicopter, inspired by Jules Verne’s “Clipper of the Clouds.” He quoted Verne: “Anything that one man can imagine, another man can make real.”

Join Jim and Greg as they react to Gen. Milley and Gen. McKenzie telling lawmakers they recommended keeping 2,500 U.S. troops in Afghanistan to avoid the very debacle that ended up happening – a recommendation Pres. Biden denied just last month.  They also hammer New York Gov. Kathy Hochul for forcing health care workers to lose their jobs unless they got vaccinated by midnight.  In addition, they cringe over Hochul saying that God wants everyone to be vaccinated her urging supporters to be her vaccination “apostles.”  And they sigh as Biden suggests we need a 97 or 98 percent vaccination rate to get back to normal.

Lying by Omission or It’s What They Don’t Say that Counts

 

No one will argue that the surge of illegal aliens at the southern border is a disaster. And in the face of Joe Biden’s trying to mandate the Covid-19 vaccine to American citizens, he’s giving the migrants a pass. Especially interesting to me was\ the presentation of the data (or the lack of transparent data) for assessing whether the influx of illegal aliens (who are not mandated to receive the vaccine) is a problem for the country. The Delta variant in particular is especially contagious. But regarding the unvaccinated migrants, no one seems to care.

So I have been parsing articles that ridicule or understate the spread of Covid-19 by migrants. And as long as we are flooded with migrants, I believe we should be very concerned about the spread of the disease. I’d like to share what I’m learning from those people who prefer to play down the presence of Covid-19 in the illegal alien population, the lack of testing, and the lack of vaccinations. Remember, these people are free to travel wherever they wish or are being sent all over the country without notifying governors in advance.

The illegals are demonstrating “vaccine hesitancy” when offered the vaccine, even though Covid-19 cases are surging in the detention centers:

Brave New World – Part II (Emphasis on Brave)

 

Writing this on the eve of 9/11, like all of you, I feel like I am in a brave new world. We just came from a so-so Mexican restaurant..  My first choice was a fresh grouper basket with slaw, but the tourists are still here in droves, and we couldn’t inch our way into any place serving seafood. Our naturally pretty Hispanic waitress had multi-colored hair wrapped in braids – pink, blue, purple, and yellow. Her arms were heavily tattooed, going up her neck. The tattoos were not new, yet she looked too young to have aging tats.  My new neighbor across the street has the same rainbow hair. I looked it up – a) rebellious b) fashion statement c) relating to the LGBTQ agenda d) signaling a multi-gender identity. Ok.  We now have a brave new world where gender is being questioned on birth certificates, taught to kindergarteners who know nothing except innocence.  Disney has even released a new Cinderella that features a fairy godmother that is essentially a gay man in high heels and a dress. Brave – cough – new world.

I wasn’t eavesdropping on the booth behind us, but it was a pile of kids and I couldn’t help hearing their woes about being stalked on social media by a loose character they all had to block.  A world lived online – people behind a wall – lots of opinions – harassment. Anonymous. They were laughing about it, but the conversation was disturbing.  Brave new world. 

Fauci: ‘Nothing Is Over Until I Decide It Is’

 

A sullen Nancy Pelosi is demoralized about the increased public focus on Covid outcomes rather than Covid case rates. Dr. Anthony Fauci enters and attempts to rally her and the political consultants seated around her.

Fauci: Hey!!! What’s this maskless B.S.?

Pelosi: War’s over, man, Pfizer-Moderna dropped the Big One.

Join Jim and Greg as they dissect Pres. Biden’s attempt to declare the withdrawal from Afghanistan an “extraordinary success” while also trying to blame President Trump for things going wrong and throwing out his bogus straw man arguments yet again for the decisions he made. They also welcome the scathing critique of the withdrawal from former Democratic Sen. Jim Webb, who is demanding vigorous oversight of the exit from Afghanistan. And they discuss the resignations of the two top vaccine officials at the Food and Drug Administration and how little the media seem interested in the news.

[Member Post]

 

From what little I can gather (or guess), the Powers That Be decided to handle Covid with a policy of Lockdowns, Vaccines, Masks, and Nothing Else.  I propose a new word for LOckdowns, VAccines, MAsks, and NOthing Else: lovamanoe, pronounced “lo-va-ma-no.” That the Powers managed to institute lovamanoe without the cooperation of the President of […]

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I Stand as an Ally to the Vaccine Holdouts

 

I’m vaccinated but I don’t ask, as have many vaccinated Facebook users, that you “respect my decision.” Vaccinated people like me get plenty of respect already, thanks: from public health officials, the political class, employers, and the media, just to name a few. No, the lay of the cultural landscape makes it abundantly clear that it’s not the vaccinated but the unvaccinated who aren’t getting enough respect.

At the end of the day, each individual must make a cost-benefit analysis based on a constellation of variables such as age, health, pregnancy, family history, science, and, yes, anecdotes from sources you trust. Different people will come to different conclusions and behave accordingly. This is how it should be – must be – in a free society.

People question the vaccines for a whole host of reasons, some of them legitimate in my view, others not. I don’t think the vaccines’ image for being safe and efficacious – again, justified in my view – is burnished by shaming those who question them, those who take a wait-and-see approach, or decide to avoid them altogether. This is to say nothing of mandating them.

On this episode of “The Federalist Radio Hour,” Federalist Staff Writer Jordan Davidson joins Culture Editor Emily Jashinsky to discuss the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s flip-flop on masks, the Biden administration’s endorsement of the new guidelines, and how fed-up Americans are pushing back.

Join Jim and Greg as they cheer the great story of an Iranian defector dedicating his silver medal to Israel. They also fume as the CDC and the Biden administration force vaccinated people to wear masks again. And they slam President Biden for nominating someone who doesn’t believe in prosecuting drug dealers and other crimes to be a federal prosecutor.

Jim is back! He and Greg get a kick out of Democrats already blaming voting reforms in red states for their forthcoming losses in 2022. They also groan as American optimism for the next year plummets over the past three months and President Biden seems poorly positioned to address the many concerns. And they throw up their hands as the Biden administration continues to hold the door open for COVID-positive illegal immigrants but refuses to allow vaccinated Europeans into the U.S.