Free Republic

Coronavirus is dealing a gut punch to the illegal drug trade, paralyzing economies, closing borders and severing supply chains in China that traffickers rely on for the chemicals to make such profitable drugs as methamphetamine and fentanyl.

Despite an economic slump due to tens of millions of Americans being furloughed from work after coronavirus-related business closures, the Republican National Committee says small-dollar donations continue to pour in. “It has not dropped at all, the small-dollar [donations], through the digital and the mail program,” RNC Chairwoman Rona McDaniel told the Washington Examiner Friday. “And, we’ve seen some pretty big days of fundraising as well.”

Walt Disney will stop paying more than 100,000 employees from this week as it struggles with coronavirus closures. The world's biggest entertainment group operates theme parks and hotels in the US, Europe and Asia. Stopping pay for almost half of its workforce will save Disney up to $500m (£400m) a month, according to the Financial Times. Disney made operating income of $1.4bn for its parks, experiences and products in the last three months of 2019. The company said it will provide full healthcare benefits for staff placed on unpaid leave and urged its US employees to apply for government benefits...

By Dr. Liji Thomas, MDApr 19 2020 The COVID-19 pandemic is still spreading around the world and affecting nearly 2.4 million people, with over 164,000 dead so far. With neither vaccine nor proven therapeutic drug being available so far, the need of the hour is for effective treatment. Now, a new study reports the potential usefulness of a combination of hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin as a treatment in mild cases of COVID-19 infection and urges the need for further evaluation and widespread use if its findings are confirmed. Why do we need a COVID-19 cure? COVID-19 began in December 2019, caused...

SEATTLE — Thousands of people gathered at the Washington state Capitol to protest Gov. Jay Inslee’s stay-at-home order designed to combat the spread of the coronavirus. In Olympia on Sunday, some protesters wore masks, while others waved American flags. The Washington State Patrol said an estimated 2,500 people showed up to the protest. No arrests were made.Tyler Miller, one of the organizers of the event, had said rural areas should be treated differently than more urban locations with more coronavirus cases. Earlier Sunday, Inslee decried President Donald Trump’s call to “liberate” parts of the country from social-distancing decrees, saying Trump...

ENFIELD, Nova Scotia -- A man disguised as a police officer went on a shooting rampage in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia, killing 16 people Sunday, in the deadliest such attack in the country's history. Officials said the suspected shooter was also dead. A police officer was among those killed. Several bodies were found inside and outside one home in the small, rural town of Portapique, about 60 miles north of Halifax - what police called the first scene. Bodies were also found at other locations. Overnight, police began advising residents of the town - already on lockdown because...

  Our Troops Rock!  Thank you for all you do!   For the freedom you enjoyed yesterday... Thank the Veterans who served in The United States Armed Forces.   Looking forward to tomorrow's freedom? Support The United States Armed Forces Today!     ~ Hall of Heroes ~ Marci Hodge Info from here.             "In this job, you find out what you're made of; if you can hack it or not."Recently promoted to Major, Marci Hodge knows a thing or two about what she's made of. She's spent ten years in the Army; 5 years on...

... while the rest of the world has been shutting down schools, shops and restaurants, banning non-essential travel, and sending the police to shout at those who dare to dawdle in their local park, Sweden remains largely open for business. Our schools are full of students, and I can still visit restaurants in Malmo, where I’ve lived for more than 20 years. I’m working from home, but many offices remain open. I can have friends over for lunch. Should I want to, I could drive to the countryside for a weekend away... People say we are putting the economy ahead...

Criticized for refusing to lock down, Sweden’s top health official says herd immunity is inevitable and took credit for the slowing of coronavirus numbers. “According to our modelers, we are starting to see so many immune people in the population in Stockholm that it is starting to have an effect on the spread of the infection,” Anders Tegnell, who led the charge to keep Sweden open, told local media. “Our models point to some time in May.” Despite social distancing guidelines from the World Health Organization, Sweden has resisted lockdowns, instead keeping open schools, gyms, bars and restaurants and relying...

Not Desperado, but still a great song.

BRILLIANT, A MUST WATCH! @RepDanCrenshaw A video put together by Rep Dan Crenshaw destroying the left's criticism of President Trump's handling of the Corona Virus.

An acquaintance of mine made what I think is an astute observation when he wrote that “Politicians and bureaucracies tend to respond to crises with theater. After 9/11 it was airport security theater. Following Corona it was lockdown theater. There’s some utility to it, but only some, there is much more hoopla.” I agree, except for the “there’s some utility to it” bit. In my view, the TSA is 100 percent “airport security theater.” If we really wanted to be secure airline travel, we’d allow passengers to carry concealed weapons. A baddie pops up with a box cutter, pow, Mr....

If you're bored, here's a video about 'the most unusual musical instruments in the world'. I'm a fan of Ben Franklin's Glass Armonica, and of the Hang; but I had never seen most of the others. (I'd really like to know what that fourth instrument is, after the Kalimba - it looks home-grown; and would like to have seen a didgeridoo and a steel drum.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCYHMVlQezAhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass_harmonica#Franklin's_armonica

We are the richest country in the history of the world, but at a time of massive income and wealth inequality, that reality means little to half of our people who live paycheck to paycheck, the 40 million living in poverty, the 87 million who are uninsured or underinsured, and the half million who are homeless.

Breitbart News that Congress had reached a $470 billion deal to fund the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), offering his remarks in an interview on SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Sunday with host Joel Pollak. The funding bill includes $250 billion for the Paycheck Protection Program — $60 million of which will go to community banks — $65 billion for disaster loans, $75 billion for hospitals, and another $25 billion for testing.

The 32-year-old marketer took sheltering in place to the next level when he became trapped in a California ghost town he recently purchased. The problem is: There’s no running water and a snowstorm has him trapped. Plus, it may be haunted. “When I first got out here, I was in a T-shirt and enjoying myself,” Underwood tells The Post. “And then it snowed for four days straight and now there’s no way to get out.” He bought Cerro Gordo, a former silver mining town with a murderous history, for $1.4 million in 2018. Aside from monthly visits, Underwood has largely left it in...

Neiman Marcus Group is preparing to seek bankruptcy protection as soon as this week, becoming the first major U.S. department store operator to succumb to the economic fallout from the coronavirus outbreak, people familiar with the matter said. The debt-laden Dallas-based company has been left with few options after the pandemic forced it to temporarily shut all 43 of its Neiman Marcus locations, roughly two dozen Last Call stores and its two Bergdorf Goodman stores in New York. Neiman Marcus is in the final stages of negotiating a loan with its creditors totaling hundreds of millions of dollars, which would...

The World Health Organization (WHO) is claiming that there is “no evidence” that natural antibodies can protect individuals from coronavirus, setting the stage for a widespread vaccination push as the only solution to the pandemic. WHO leaders are telling governments across the world not to rely on tests that indicate whether or not an individual has contracted coronavirus at some point because they believe theses people could be reinfected even after they had the virus previously. “Nobody is sure whether someone with antibodies is fully protected against having the disease or being exposed again,” said Mike Ryan, the executive director...

I don’t know why everyone is freaking out. The flu kills tens of thousands of people each year, and no one is shutting down borders because of that. Sound familiar? It’s a common refrain from the past few weeks as the novel coronavirus, also known as COVID-19, made its way across borders from Wuhan, China. It’s something I (now shamefully) admit to saying, myself, when this all first started. And the confusion is understandable. So why is this one causing so much panic? “We are familiar with coronaviruses because, for a long time now, strains of coronavirus have circulated...

Seth Aldridge was at the tail end of a 12-hour night shift when he got the call at 6 a.m. The voice on the other end said he had just lost his job as an oil field pumper for Occidental Petroleum in the Permian Basin. “It was a shock to get the call, for sure,” said Aldridge, a 34-year-old resident of Lea County. “You see it coming, but you never really think … or you hope it’s not you that gets that ax.” The ax is falling throughout energy-rich southeastern New Mexico as crude prices have plummeted amid the COVID-19...