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My first post here and vanity, I hope it's in the right place. Be gentile. I can't contain my frustration any longer. Rant on: The late, great George Carlin had a part in his skit where he said: "think about how dumb the average person is, half of those are dumber than that!" The quote is close enough for my illustration. Anyone remember the great American lock down of the 2009 Pig Flu pandemic? No? Me either. There wasn't one. Obama eventually called a state of emergency after he got off the golf course. There was not wide breathless-media panting...

the city council of Bellingham, Washington, will vote Monday on various “emergency” proposals that include a curfew; banning the possession, transfer, and carrying of firearms as well as banning alcohol sales; closing city streets, businesses, and community buildings to the public; and prohibiting the sale of fuel in any container other than a fuel tank properly affixed to a motor vehicle. . . . Most disturbing of all, the meeting notice declares, “There will be no public comment taken at City Council meetings until further notice.”

A man in Germany has been arrested on suspicion of attempted murder after allegedly loosening bolts on a high-speed railway track. The stretch of track affected was just before a bridge outside Frankfurt. A train driver noticed "something unusual" while crossing the bridge early on Friday. Several trains had already passed over the section before the issue was discovered. Rail operator Deutsche Bahn described the incident as "sabotage". . . . According to German news site Der Spiegel, the rails were five centimetres further apart than usual. This could have caused trains to derail and even send them plunging off...

Posted on March 21, 2020March 21, 2020 by Msgr. Charles Pope I Went, I Washed, And Now I See – A Homily for the 4th Sunday of Lent In today’s Gospel, Jesus, the Light of the World, brings light to a man born blind. If you are prepared to accept it, you are the man born blind, for all of us were born blind and in darkness. It was our baptism and the faith it gave that rendered us able to see and to come gradually more fully into the light. The man in today’s Gospel shows forth the...

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Joe Biden slammed President Trump Saturday over his failure to contain the coronavirus crisis in a new digital ad. The Democratic presidential front-runner detailed Trump’s statements downplaying the severity of the crisis even as the pandemic spread across the globe. “Donald Trump has failed the American people,” Biden wrote on Twitter. Trump says he has done a “tremendous” job mobilizing the nation in the face of a crisis that no one could have seen coming. But Biden and a chorus of critics say he ignored warnings and stoked doubts about the severity of coronavirus until it was far too late.

COVID-19 can be especially dangerous to people who have a compromised immune system. People with diabetes can fall into that category. “They don't have any special risk of actually getting the virus,” explained Dr. Philip Jameson who is with the American Diabetes Association. “They have the same risk that everybody else does. But that because of diabetes, they have a higher risk of complications. Complications could mean, that besides having the lung infection, they could have effects on other organs, and that's just something that has been seen. Part of it is because people with diabetes often have related heart...

President Trump on Sunday said the National Guard had been activated in New York, California and Washington and that the federal government would provide additional resources to help those states combat the coronavirus. “We’re dealing also with other states. These states have been hit the hardest,” Trump said at a news briefing at the White House. Trump said the federal government would fund “100 percent” of the National Guard units carrying out approved missions in those states. The order will provide additional manpower and resources to the three states grappling with some of the worst coronavirus outbreaks in the U.S....

Thanks to all of you numbskulls who bought a million rolls of toilet paper in the last few weeks, some California towns are experiencing sewer problems because people are using disinfectant wipes, paper towels, and even shredded T-shirts and then flushing them.

As the entire world has struggled to cope with the fallout from the CCP virus, all eyes have remained fixed on Italy, where the virus is reaping its most awful toll. Deaths in Italy from the virus have now surpassed the official count claimed by the Communist authorities of China. As of March 22, China has acknowledged a total of 3,261 deaths from the disease called COVID-19, while Italy’s toll has far surpassed that at 4,825 and is climbing rapidly. Another of the hardest-hit countries is Iran, which claims 1,685 dead, although as with China, there’s good reason to believe...

Former CNN reporter Jacki Schechner is comparing President Donald Trump to Nazi Germany’s sinister scientists after he announced he supported the government testing an anti-malarial drug as a potential treatment for coronavirus.

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You’ve also might have heard a lot of inaccurate statements, like the coronavirus came about because Chinese people eat food that Americans consider strange, like bats or civet cats. You’ve might have heard the coronavirus started in one of the so-called “wet markets” in China where live animals are kept in close proximity and sold outright or slaughtered on-site. You’ve could have heard Trump imposed a travel ban to China: foreign nationals who’ve been in China within the last 14 days won’t be allowed to enter the US. And you’ve heard jokes, seen memes, or made comments about the Chinese...

U.S. stock futures opened sharply lower on Sunday night as Wall Street waits on Washington to agree to an economic stimulus and rescue plan to combat the giant economic blow from the coronavirus outbreak. Dow Jones Industrial Average futures fell more than 900 points, or 5%, to hit their “limit down” level. S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 futures were also down around 5%. Downside limits to futures contracts are implemented to ensure orderly market behavior. U.S. crude futures also slid by more than 4%, adding to last week’s massive losses. Futures could be highly volatile as headlines come out of...

“Lost” star Daniel Dae Kim believes the anti-malarial drug touted by President Trump was the “secret weapon” in his recovery from the coronavirus. The 51-year-old actor praised hydroxychloroquine as being “critical” in the treatment that has left him now “practically back to normal” just days after confirming he had been infected. “Yes, this is the drug that the President mentioned the other day,” Kim said in an Instagram video Saturday, noting that Dr. Anthony Fauci had cautioned that supposed success stories were “only based on personal accounts.”

Disgraced movie mogul Harvey Weinstein has tested positive for the coronavirus in prison — and most likely contracted the disease at Rikers Island, an official briefed on the matter told The Post on Sunday. Weinstein, 68, is being held in isolation at the Wende Correctional Facility near Buffalo, where he tested positive on Saturday, the official said. The state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision wouldn’t confirm or deny Weinstein’s condition, citing federal health-care privacy law, but said that two inmates at Wende had the coronavirus.

As the United States enters a critical phase in fighting the coronavirus pandemic, the country’s leading public health agency, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, appears to be on the sidelines, with its messages increasingly disrupted or overtaken by the White House. Neither CDC Director Robert Redfield nor Anne Schuchat — the principal deputy director who has played key roles in the agency’s emergency responses stretching back two decades, including the 2009 influenza pandemic — have appeared on the podium during White House briefings by the coronavirus task force for more than a week.

Israel: Muslim MK who called jihad murderer a “hero” vows to divest Israel “of its Jewish and Zionist existence” MAR 22, 2020 3:00 PM BY ROBERT SPENCER Heba Yazbak would doubtless have no problem with Israel becoming an Islamic state. Her statements reveal the deceptiveness of the Palestinian Authority’s recognition of Israel’s right to exist. The PA’s recognition of Israel is a sham anyway, a semantic trick. The PA has never recognized Israel as a Jewish state. “We will never recognize the Jewishness of the state of Israel,” said Mahmoud Abbas in 2014. The PA recognizes Israel as having a...

Harvard University Professor and Two Chinese Nationals Charged in Three Separate China Related Cases The Department of Justice announced today that the Chair of Harvard University’s Chemistry and Chemical Biology Department and two Chinese nationals have been charged in connection with aiding the People’s Republic of China. Dr. Charles Lieber, 60, Chair of the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology at Harvard University, was arrested this morning and charged by criminal complaint with one count of making a materially false, fictitious and fraudulent statement. Yanqing Ye, 29, a Chinese national, was charged in an indictment today with one count each...

Farmers markets are still considered an essential business in California, but big safety changes have been mandated. "I've been coming every Saturday for the past 38 years. I don't buy fruits and vegetables anywhere but the farmers market, never will," Ruth Vivenzi, a farmers market shopper. The California Department of Food and Agriculture said people won't have to venture elsewhere for local produce shopping. It's allowing farmers markets to stay open during the COVID-19 pandemic because they provide essentials, but that also means they have to make some changes while operating. The Aptos farmers market started making those changes Saturday....