“Wuhan Virus Watch: Leaked Data Shows China May Have 640k Coronavirus Cases, Not 80k As Claimed
PLUS: Could plasma from those who recovered from the coronavirus be used as a possible treatment? A few studies have optimistic results.”
“You mean to tell me that China’s claim of having only 80,000 coronavirus cases is probably a lie? I am shocked:
A leaked database from a Chinese military-run university suggests the country may have at least 640,000 COVID-19 cases — a figure substantially higher than Beijing’s dubious claim that it has seen just 80,000 coronavirus infections.
The virus tracker, compiled by China’s National University of Defense Technology and leaked to Foreign Policy magazine, appears to confirm fears that the nation’s Communist government is hiding the true nature of the outbreak that originated in Wuhan late last year.
According to the report, the virus tracker consists of more than 640,000 rows of cases in 230 cities ranging from early February to late April and confirms the location of each infection.
The data includes locations for hospitals, train stations, hotels, restaurants and schools and was compiled by a professor at the university that is run by China’s Central Military Commission, the report said.
Convalescent Plasma May Become a Treatment Option
Researchers at Mayo Clinic, Michigan State University, and Johns Hopkins University reviewed a study in which doctors gave patients suffering from the Wuhan coronavirus plasma from people who recovered the virus.
The doctors found using the plasma is safe without “an excessive mortality rate.” The results have the potential to expand the study and maybe use the plasma as treatment.
The plasma went to 5,000 hospitalized patients. The doctors “found serious adverse events occurred in fewer than 1% of the treated patients, and the mortality rate seven days after transfusion was 14.9%.””
“New York Admits Knowingly Undercounting Nursing Home Deaths After Quietly Changing Reporting Rules”
“The New York State Department of Health acknowledged that its recent reporting does not fully reflect the known carnage coronavirus has caused among nursing home and adult care residents.
The revelation comes as New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo is under fire for his policies regarding nursing homes amid the coronavirus pandemic.
New York is the only state with large coronavirus outbreaks among its long-term care facilities that doesn’t count residents who died at a hospital.
New York quietly changed the way it reports long-term care fatalities around April 28.”
—-
“New York has omitted an unknown number of coronavirus deaths in recent reports regarding residents of nursing home and adult care facilities, the New York State Department of Health acknowledged in a statement to the Daily Caller News Foundation.
In early May, those reports quietly began omitting long-term care residents who died of coronavirus in hospitals. Even so, New York still leads the nation with 5,433 reported deaths at nursing homes and adult care facilities as of Wednesday.
The revelation comes as New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo faces criticism for ordering nursing homes and other long-term care facilities to accept patients from hospitals who had tested positive for coronavirus. Cuomo rescinded the March 25 order, which experts say led to higher levels of death among nursing home residents, on May 11 to allow such facilities to wait until a coronavirus patient tests negative before readmitting them.
The NYSDOH confirmed to the DCNF that until around April 28, it was disclosing coronavirus deaths for all nursing home and adult care facility residents, regardless of whether the patient died at their long-term care facility or at a hospital.
But the department made a subtle change to its disclosures beginning around May 3, according to web archives. The NYSDOH told the DCNF its disclosure now only reports coronavirus deaths for long-term care patients that died while physically present at their facility.”
NEW: PBS partnered with CGTN, a Chinese foreign agent, on a pro-Beijing documentary airing this month.
I started looking into this after seeing an American businessman popping up in Chinese gov't outlets praising the regime's handling of coronavirus. https://t.co/YbuuFzD55k
“EU Paid Millions to Terror-Linked Palestinian NGOs, Official Israeli Report Says
Israel’s Ministry of Strategic Affairs: “Terrorist organizations are continuing to whitewash their activities through NGOs.””
“A new Israeli report revealed that the European Union continues to fund Palestinian NGOs, or Non-Governmental Organisations, affiliated to terrorist groups.
European aid worth millions of euros going to Palestinian charities and “civil society organizations” was ending up in the coffers of internationally designated terrorist groups, the report published by Israel’s Ministry of Strategic Affairs indicates.
The Israeli report takes the case of Palestinian NGO, Addameer, which has well-documented ties to terrorist group Palestinian Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). Despite its know links to the terrorist group — banned both by the United States and the EU, Addameer received up to 2 million euros in funding from several EU and European agencies, the official reports disclosed.
The 28-page report released on Wednesday “reveals the dangers of the EU’s transfer of funds and the methodology and guises used by terrorists under the cover of civil society organizations,” Israel’s Ministry of Strategic Affairs said in a statement.
Addameer, a primary recipient of EU aid, is led by convicted terrorists, including its board member, Yaqoub Oudeh. He was part of the “member of the PFLP terror cell that carried out the Jerusalem Shufersal supermarket bombing in 1969 in which two Israelis (Leon Kanner and Eduard Jaffe) were murdered and nine others injured,” the report revealed. “Addameer lay leaders and employees play a dual role – human rights activists by day and PFLP terrorists by night,” it added.
Here are the key findings of the official Israeli report titled “Blood Money: European-funded Palestinian NGOs and their terror operatives”:”
““[T]ies shared between certain terrorist organizations and various Israel-delegitimizing and boycott-promoting NGOs have deepened, and these terrorist organizations are continuing to whitewash their activities through NGOs that have credibility in the West. (…)
One of the best examples of the NGO-terror connection, and the focus of this report, are the ties shared between the European-funded NGO “Addameer – Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association” and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a USand EU-designated terrorist organization. This case study exemplifies the clear connection between NGOs and terrorist organizations, and the concern that some of the funds designated to such NGOs may have ended up funding terror activities. (…)
Addameer staff, members of its board of directors and general assembly were found to be PFLP operatives, some of which until recently. (…)
By portraying itself as a legitimate NGO, Addameer has been able to raise funds in Western countries, including from European governments. Over the last six years (2013-2019), Addameer received nearly €2 million in European governmental and public funding from Switzerland, Ireland, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, Sweden and Spain (Basque Autonomous Community and municipalities). (…)
The PFLP has warned that it is entered significant financial distress over the past few months. In light of such, there is a possibility that the organization will now try, even more than before, to increase its associations with civil society organizations. These include Palestinian NGOs such as Addameer and Al-Haq, which through their various ties to the organizations, may utilize to obtain financial aid. The fear remains that these funds will be transferred to PFLP-related activities. (…)
This report found that numerous members and terrorist operatives have become leading figures in NGOs which delegitimize and promote boycotts again Israel, while concealing or downplaying their terrorist past. Some continue to serve as members of terrorist organizations to this day.”
Newly released documents show he knew all along that there was no proof of Russia-Trump collusion.”
“Americans expect that politicians will lie, but sometimes the examples are so brazen that they deserve special notice. Newly released Congressional testimony shows that Adam Schiff spread falsehoods shamelessly about Russia and Donald Trump for three years even as his own committee gathered contrary evidence.
The House Intelligence Committee last week released 57 transcripts of interviews it conducted in its investigation into Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election. The committee probe started in January 2017 under then-Chair Devin Nunes and concluded in March 2018 with a report finding no evidence that the Trump campaign conspired with the Kremlin. Most of the transcripts were ready for release long ago, but Mr. Schiff oddly refused to release them after he became chairman in 2019. He only released them last week when the White House threatened to do it first.”
So it looks like the partisan hack pretending to be a fair judge in the Flynn case has some explaining to do. And if the past statements of his friend are any indication, he has no choice but to toss it.
Note the SC decision he’s ignoring is a only week old, and was unanimous and the decision was presented by Ginsberg, and was designed to stop exactly this type of judicial activism.
This took the better part of the day… Breaking down the Motion to Dismiss in Michael Flynn’s case: https://t.co/TuDVDBGasI and Judge Sullivan‘s decision to effectively appoint his own prosecutor. Share away! I don’t think enough people fully appreciate what happened to Flynn pic.twitter.com/c0o3bsMhqB
“…as a matter of established law, the judiciary is not to second-guess the Executive’s decisions of “whether to initiate charges, whom to prosecute, which charges to bring, and whether to dismiss charges.”
“The DOJ filed the motion that clearly lays out an entrapment plot. It’s so damning that even liberal lawyer and law professor Jonathan Turley said that there could be grounds for a malicious prosecution lawsuit against the FBI. The prosecutor for the case resigned. The DOJ wants out. Everyone wants this case to go away; no one has opposed the motion to dismiss. And yet, Sully has decided to tap a retired judge, John Gleeson, to fight the DOJ motion and—get this—see if they can file perjury charges against Flynn for his coerced guilty plea. Is this the United States or North Korea? It’s absolute garbage—and you don’t need a law degree to see that.
Yet, the fallback for liberals desperate to keep the Trump-Russia collusion carcass from totally falling apart is the line, “but Flynn pleaded guilty. Why would an innocent man do that?” My eyes cannot roll any harder at the naivete at this, but here we are. Well, since liberals think government can do no wrong, let’s shred that silly talking point right now. They can and they have done so—many times, even before the Trump presidency. Second, for liberals who are supposedly criminal justice reform advocates, are they just ignorant or plain stupid regarding the shocking number of false guilty pleas that are floating around our justice system. It’s staggering, and the New York Sun’s editorial board aptly noted that Judge Sullivan was ignoring this aspect regarding the Flynn case:
The fact is that it’s by no means rare for persons to plead guilty to crimes they didn’t commit. Some are scared. Others confused. Some lack the intestinal fortitude or financial wherewithal to stand up against the warnings or threats from the prosecutors. What’s so unusual in the Flynn case is that the Democrats and liberals are siding against the poor schlepper caught in the prosecutorial vice.
It turns out that one serious liberal institution, the Innocence Project, maintains a whole Website devoted to persons who plead guilty to crimes they didn’t commit. It’s called GuiltyPleaProblem.com. The first click on it brings up a headline asking the question, “Why do innocent people plead guilty to crimes they didn’t commit?” The Website offers illuminating background to the problem.
Some 95% of felony convictions in America, the Website notes, are obtained through guilty pleas. Among persons known to be exonerated, it reports, a staggering 18% pleaded guilty to crimes they didn’t commit. It is a humbling statistic for those of us who cover the courts. The filing of a guilty plea by an innocent party occurs at a pace that leaves GuiltyPleaProblem.com saying: “there’s no telling how many are behind bars as a result.”
So where are the liberals now? Where’s the logic of Judge Sullivan getting up on his high horse over the idea that someone in his court might move to withdraw a guilty plea? The idea that General Flynn was uncomfortable with his own plea deal can’t be a surprise to the judge. It was already in the air when the judge erupted at the general at a now-infamous hearing in open court back in December 2018.
The publication added why isn’t the judge, after seeing the long history of prosecutorial misconduct and overreach at the DOJ, looking into the allegation that Flynn’s family was threatened with total destruction? That’s the real crime here. Instead, the myth-peddling continues because they hate Trump and most of all, they’re lawyers. They’re arrogant—and the prosecution, which Sullivan has indirectly joined with these puzzling moves to outsource the prosecution to the wingnut lefty fringe, never wants to admit they’re wrong.”
So House Democrats want a Christmas in July Day for all their liberal benefactors, and fund a bunch of favored stuff they can’t normally get thru that has nothing to do with Covid 19, or helping Americans, and they’re taking a paid vacation until July now.
“House Democrats signal they could recess until July 21”
“House Democrats are preparing to pass a resolution Friday that would set up a recess lasting until July 21.
Lawmakers returned to the Capitol for only the third time since mid-March, when the House recessed due to the threat of the coronavirus.
They will vote on a $3 trillion economic aid package as well as a resolution allowing virtual committee business and proxy voting for the next 45 days unless renewed by Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat.
The measure includes a provision “that allows the House to remain in recess until July 21,” a Republican leadership aide said.
The language is included in a resolution dictating the rules of debate. It allows Democrats “to declare the House adjourned to meet at a date and time to be announced by the Chair in declaring the adjournment,” from May 19 until July 21.
A top Democratic aide said the provision was needed to block lawmakers (likely Republicans, who oppose the recess) from calling up votes during the pro forma sessions held every three days.”
I mentioned a few weeks earlier that totalitarian regimes do not disclose the nature of any tragedy for fear of losing face and credibility. The Chinese numbers are extremely suspect and they now only report cases they can trace to foreign travel. The Russians reported a massive increase in deaths due to pneumonia in March, its only been recently that they have reported more reasonable numbers. Brazil, Iran and India are also playing with numbers so right wing leaders don’t lose face.
The number game is played in democracies too. Mostly not to save face but for money and to avoid oversight. 80% of Cdn deaths due to Covid occur in long term care homes most of whom are private for profit. They, especially in Quebec, tried to hide these deaths or mislabel them as old age etc in order to avoid inspections or tighter regulations. I’m sure NY homes have similar motivations. Remove the profit motive and perhaps the numbers would be accurate. In Florida two different state agencies had widely disparate numbers with one agency not reporting deaths of winter residents.
However, whatever the Chinese numbers, the Americans numbers and its gov’t response is not flattering.
I realize most guilty pleas result from plea bargains and some in fact are coerced. However, Flynn is not a scared 19 year old with an incompetent legal aid lawyer trying to close a file. Flynn has years of experience in both politics and the military and had the best legal team money could buy, I find it hard to believe his guilty plea was under duress. If so, he should be filing civil suits against his legal team.
Pelosi seems to be taking a page from the McConnell book — obstruct, delay and don’t govern. 100s of House bills die in the Senate before even seeing the light of day because McConnell wouldn’t rather not deal with it. Doesn’t excuse Pelosi but again here we see a federal state unable to work in the middle of a crisis. The federal US state seems to be nothing but a shell with a military but no inner workings.
“Editor’s Note: Timothy Craig Allen, MD, JD, contributed to this column.
Over 86,500 people have reportedly died in the United States from the Coronavirus, and the fear generated by those deaths is driving the public policy debate. But that number is a dramatic overcount. Our metrics include deaths that have nothing to do with the virus. The problem is even worse as the Centers for Disease Control over counts even some of these cases and the government has created financial incentives for this misreporting. Relying on these flawed numbers is destroying businesses and jobs and costing lives.
“The case definition is very simplistic,” Dr. Ngozi Ezike, director of Illinois Department of Public Health, explains. “It means, at the time of death, it was a COVID positive diagnosis. That means, that if you were in hospice and had already been given a few weeks to live, and then you also were found to have COVID, that would be counted as a COVID death. It means, technically even if you died of clear alternative cause, but you had COVID at the same time, it’s still listed as a COVID death.”
“Medical examiners in Michigan use the same definition. In Macomb and Oakland Counties, where most of the deaths occurred, medical examiners classify any deaths as Coronavirus deaths when the postmortem test is positive. Even people who died in suicides and automobile accidents meet that definition. ”
Still, these broad definitions are not due to a few rogue public health officials. The rules direct them to do this. Unlike other countries, “if someone dies with COVID-19, we are counting that as a COVID-19 death,” as Dr. Deborah Birx, the White House coronavirus response coordinator, recently noted.
Classifications go beyond even these broad categories. New York is classifying cases as Coronavirus deaths even when postmortem tests have been negative. Despite negative tests, classifications are based on symptoms, even though the symptoms are often very similar to those of the seasonal flu. The Centers for Disease Control guidance explicitly acknowledges the uncertainty that doctors can face. When Coronavirus cases are “suspected,” they advise doctors that “it is acceptable to report COVID-19 on a death certificate.”
That isn’t just a theoretical issue. On April 21st, when New York City’s death toll rose above 10,000, the New York Times reported that the city included “3,700 additional people who were presumed to have died of the coronavirus but had never tested positive” – a more than 50 percent increase in the number of cases.”
But the problem is worse than this broad definition implies. Birx and others believe that the CDC is over counting cases. The Washington Post reports they are concerned that the CDC’s “antiquated” accounting system is double counting cases and inflating mortality and case counts “by as much as 25 percent.”
There are additional reasons for concern. Some doctors feel pressure from hospitals to list deaths as due to the Coronavirus, even when they don’t believe that is the case, “to make it look a little bit worse than it is.” There are financial incentives that might make a difference for hospitals and doctors. The CARES Act adds a 20 percent premium for COVID-19 Medicare patients. “
“Fury in Germany as thousands join protests across country over lockdown measures and a vaccine plan by Bill Gates as Angela Merkel’s popularity falls
Thousands of protesters have gathered in Stuttgart, Munich and Berlin
What started off as small protests against lockdown measures have grown”
“Thousands of protesters gathered again in Stuttgart, Munich and Berlin on Saturday, with police out in force after some protests turned violent.
Germany newspaper Die Welt said that well over the 1,000 limit of people went to Theresienwiese to demonstrate against the coronavirus measures in the country.
After the area that the police had cordoned off had filled, the police tried to send people away. Instead, hundreds of people lined the pavements, filling the area.
When Police announced that people should leave, they were met with boos from the crowds, many holding banners, with slogans like ‘freedom instead of coercion’.
Thousands also gathered at a demonstration in Stuttgart, with police limiting numbers to 5,000 maximum. However, many people gathered outside of the area designated to them by police.
Frankfurt city centre saw counter-protests against the protesters, with one woman holding a sign that read ‘Conspiracy theories can be fatal’.
At protests in Berlin, police could be seen using heavy-handed tactics to remove protesters who breached the coronavirus measures, or the rules of the protests.”
“I strongly encourage you to read this very-long-but-worth-it Pro Publica investigation if you can spare the time, as it attempts to solve two of the great mysteries of the coronavirus crisis.
One: Why did New York City get hit with the viral equivalent of an atomic bomb while San Francisco escaped almost unscathed?
Two: Why do people remain under the impression that Andrew Cuomo has done a good job handling the epidemic?
Right, sure, it’s no easy feat for a governor to hold down the death toll from a highly infectious novel disease while shutting down commerce among a population of 20 million people. But Gavin Newsom had to manage a population twice that size and did pretty well, and yet there’s no chatter about swapping out ol’ Joe Biden for Newsom as the party’s nominee as there is with Cuomo.
If fans want to qualify Cuomo’s failure by acknowledging that he had a herculean task, that’s perfectly fine and fair. But let’s at least acknowledge the failure.
Here’s a tease for you from the Pro Publica piece. In some respects Cuomo was in even deeper denial about the threat from COVID-19 than Bill de Blasio was, and de Blasio was in deep denial. So deep, the story notes, that by mid-March de Blasio’s own health department was sufficiently enraged by his dawdling on shutting things down that they hatched a plot to stage a sort of coup, in which “one of the department’s most senior leaders [would] effectively dare the mayor to fire him by going live on television and expressing the urgent need to close schools and issue more serious restrictions immediately.” It turns out that even de Blasio grasped the need for a lockdown before Cuomo did, though.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, however, reacted to de Blasio’s idea for closing down New York City with derision. It was dangerous, he said, and served only to scare people. Language mattered, Cuomo said, and “shelter-in-place” sounded like it was a response to a nuclear apocalypse.
Moreover, Cuomo said, he alone had the power to order such a measure…
“No city in the state can quarantine itself without state approval,” Cuomo said of de Blasio’s call for a shelter-in-place order. “I have no plan whatsoever to quarantine any city.”
Cuomo’s conviction didn’t last. On March 22, he, too, shuttered his state. The action came six days after San Francisco had shut down, five days after de Blasio suggested doing similarly and three days after all of California had been closed by Newsom. By then, New York faced a raging epidemic, with the number of confirmed cases at 15,000 doubling every three or four days.
Had Cuomo and de Blasio moved even a week or two earlier to shut things down, the death toll might have turned out to be half of what it ended up being according to one model. But that’s the tip of the iceberg. Pro Publica describes other mystifying failures, from poor advance planning in keeping New York State’s PPE stockpile full (Cuomo’s been governor for nearly 10 years, remember) to his state health department cutting off information-sharing with NYC’s health department to Cuomo treating the early outbreak in Westchester County as some sort of freak isolated incident instead of a harbinger of how bad things were about to get in NYC.”
“Two Coasts. One Virus. How New York Suffered Nearly 10 Times the Number of Deaths as California.
California’s governor and San Francisco’s mayor worked together to act early in confronting the COVID threat. For Andrew Cuomo and Bill de Blasio, it was a different story, and 27,000 New Yorkers have died so far.”
The Pro-Publica piece is long, but worth the time and loaded with facts. Pesky things those facts…..
—
“But the timing of New York’s shutdown undeniably played a role in the dire human toll the virus has exacted. In April, two prominent experts said in a New York Times opinion article that their research showed that had New York imposed its extreme social distancing measures a week or two earlier, the death toll might have been cut by half or more.”
“It’s an assessment shared by Dr. Tom Frieden, the former head of New York City’s Health Department. “Days earlier & so many deaths could have been prevented,” Frieden tweeted in April.”
———–
Quick! Someone remind me how this is Trump’s fault…..
“The official asserted that, from the discovery of the first positive COVID-19 case in the state on March 1 to the shutdown on March 22, New York had acted faster than any other state.”
—
“By March 5, the number of COVID-19 infections in New York City were doubling every five or six days, and officials within the city’s Health Department had become increasingly frustrated at what they regarded as the mayor’s failure to comprehend the size and nature of the crisis. That day, he’d issued a press release expressing confidence that the city could still “beat this thing.”
—
But……
“But a range of health officials and scientists interviewed by ProPublica say creating such timelines misses the central issue: No later than Feb. 28, federal officials warned the country that a deadly pandemic was inevitable. It is from that point forward, they say, that any individual state’s actions should be judged.”
———–
While they dallied, and failed to follow federal advice, people died. “Not the President’s call” was their refrain. “It’s up to the Govs and Mayors” they said…..
But now they want to blame Trump and the feds since they failed to listen. They were on power trips and couldn’t be bothered.
Most political leaders have increased their popularity even if their jurisdiction suffered terrible losses due to Covid 19. Even the Italian and French gov’ts have reached record highs in the polls. Merkel reach almost 80% approval by mid April. I’m sure Germany has its share of idiots but most Germans know Merkel has the science background and because she is retiring at the end of her term also know she has no political motivations.
NYC and to a certain extent New Orleans are the least American cities. The NYC population density is unlike the rest of the US and sometimes even the NY gov’t forgets this. Cuomo may have done an inferior job but like the Italian gov’t, Cuomo still benefits from the “rally around the flag” crisis bounce in the polls. Trump, Abe from Japan, and the Brazil president are the only ones whose popularity has not risen. Watching Trump in a press conference its not hard to see why — he appears self centered, angry and has none of the Clintonian “I feel your pain”. Its not whether the president, prime minister or governor is doing well but its their ability to project empathy and competence. Trump doesn’t do that well. Personally I’m impressed by the governor of Michigan just because she won’t be intimidated but my personal favorite is the NZ prime minister — in one year she dealt with a terrorist attack, a volcano, Covid 19 and did a good job all while taking care of a 2 year old.
“Colorado has made a stunning and significant change to the way it counts COVID-19 deaths that reduced the statewide figure from more than 1,000 to 878, according to a report.
The change came after Colorado’s Department of Public Health admitted that its COVID-19 death toll was counting those who tested positive for the coronavirus but had died of other causes, Fox 31 Denver reported late Friday.
The department now says 1,150 Coloradoans who died had COVID-19 but only 878 of those deaths were “due to” COVID-19.”
——–
“Fox News on Friday reported on one of those stories as part of a report that found that the hodgepodge way states counted COVID-19 deaths was a reason why some people believe the U.S. COVID-19 death figure was exaggerated.
The story involved a 35-year-old man from Montezuma County who died May 4 of alcohol poisoning but whose death was counted in Colorado’s COVID-19 death toll.
“The state is reporting that death as a COVID death, but our health department wanted to let people know that even though the person did have the virus, they did not die from it,” the Montezuma County Health Department said about the man’s death.
The national COVID-19 death toll climbed to 87,568 Saturday with the deaths of 1,662 more people due to the virus, John Hopkins University data showed. But that latest number does not take into account Colorado’s amended figure, listing the death toll at 1,150.
France blamed the confusion on the National Notifiable Diseases Surveillance System that states use to report COVID-19 deaths to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.”
——–
If Colorado and NY are any indication, the “death toll from C-19” would drop by 30% at least, if accurately reported.
“In Michigan, Gretchen Whitmer has attempted to parlay her oppressive dictates into becoming a vice-presidential contender. She has gone so far as to extend her stay-at-home orders another month in a state with mounting anger towards being kept from their businesses, with a legislature fighting back at her power grab. Whitmer, like so many of her Democrat demagogues, is freely imposing rules which have no bearing on public safety.
Gretchen has been bolstered by a fawning press corps, operating under the belief that her tactics are warmly received. She initially was combative with President Trump over relief aid supposedly denied to her state only to have it revealed that her office had failed to fill out the basic paperwork to apply for FEMA aid. She has forced most businesses closed, and even went so far as to mandate that those stores remaining open had to limit what items were available for sale. The locals are becoming fed up.”
Protests have been staged at the state capitol already, and the pushback in her state is growing. She thinks that it is a strong move to go after a local business that is defying her executive order, but the local law enforcement divisions are resisting the command to shut him down. It has not occurred to Whitmer that in a state where the people want to return to life, the optics of her bringing the force of government down on a 77-year-old barber are not a good look for her. A judge also thought so, overruling the governor’s order to close his shop down.”
——-
She’s not a leader, she’s a hack of the highest order. A real leader would know how the system works and did what was necessary to get funds for her state. But she’s a hack, so she did nothing but whine and attack her betters.
When a leader is confronted with angry armed men at the legislature yet sticks to the science, I’m impressed and so apparently are the people of Michigan where her approval ranking is 57% compared to Trump’s 44% with only 37% disapproval. Trump would love those numbers.
The Kiwi PM is something else — gave birth while prime minister, breast fed her daughter in both the parliament and the UN assembly. I’d love to see one of those right wing clown show populists — Italy, UK, Brazil, Hungary, Poland and the US — even try to accomplish what she has managed to do — deal with terrorism, pass gun control legislation (in a country which loves their guns and hunting), volcanoes, Covid -19 all while balancing a coalition gov’t.
I’m watching how female leaders deal with a health crisis than watch the right wing populists (including my own premier) fail miserable — I’m voting for a woman til my dying day.
Reporting Covid numbers are interesting — do you over count to scare people into compliance and get more money? do you under count to look like an effective leader? or do you tell the truth?
I can’t help feeling that most leaders and the scientists are doing the best they can when counting and rely on local health authorities. My dad’s friend died of pneumonia after 2 years on an oxygen tank. Did he die of long term lung disease? pneumonia? maybe Covid? or maybe just old age (over 90)? The coroner is just doing their best guess.
The problem is that people often die of a condition that is either brought on by, or exacerbated by, a given disease, so “cause of death” can be a murky thing. My husband technically died from a pulmonary embolism, but he most likely would not have developed that except for the complication his cancer was creating. So we consider that he died of prostate cancer.
“When a leader is confronted with angry armed men…”
No armed person got within sight of her. Stop with the drama queen act.
———
Kizzie,
“The problem is that people often die of a condition that is either brought on by, or exacerbated by, a given disease, so “cause of death” can be a murky thing.”
Yes, but when a person who died from alcohol poisoning or suicide is counted as C-19 because they have a positive test, C-19 was clearly not the cause of death.
And unlike your husband’s case, no coroner worth spit would say they died of complications from C-19 if suicide, poisoning, or a car accident were the cause. In your husband’s case there’s a clear and direct tie. His cancer caused the embolism. No such tie exists when car accidents and alcohol poisoning are the cause. They have nothing to do with C-19.
“Michigan salon owner on getting cease-and-desist order after reopening : ‘It’s definitely a scary situation'”
“A Michigan salon owner who was issued a cease-and-desist order by local police after she defied the state’s stay-at-home order amid the coronavirus pandemic by opening her business said she had to reopen or else she would “lose everything.”
Speaking on “Fox & Friends Weekend” on Sunday, Sarah Huff, the owner of Ardor+Grit Salon and Lounge in Holland, Mich., added that if she did not reopen her employees would “also not have a job to go back to.”
“They also have bills to pay,” Huff said. “They have a family to also support and feed. They also have their own mortgages and I have mine.”
In an emotional Facebook video Huff posted on Thursday she said, “How do you deem ones life essential over another? Please tell me that… I will lose my house, I will lose my business, I will lose my freaking livelihood if I do not go back to work.”
Huff received a cease-and-desist order after she reopened her salon on Friday. Huff said the entire salon was sterilized the day before. She said she is only allowing two to three people in the salon at a time to adhere to social distancing guidelines. She said she was also wearing gloves and a face mask all day and had some available for her clients as well.
“Hundreds of protesters once again descended on the steps of the Michigan Capitol last week to protest Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s stay-at-home orders during the coronavirus pandemic.
Despite the mounting unrest in her state, Whitmer has held firm on her stay-at-home orders – telling ABC’s “The View” on Wednesday that the protests make it more likely that her orders will have to be extended past the May 28 deadline.”
—
““My license could be taken away, I could go to jail. I believe it’s up to a year possibly in jail,” she continued. “It’s not who I am. I don’t go against the grain. I am not the type of person, I do not like to get in trouble so this is not who I am, and it’s definitely a scary situation.”
“Physicians Slap Whitmer with a Coronavirus-Related Lawsuit”
“Grand Health Partners, Wellston Medical Center, Primary Health Services and patient Jeffery Gulick on Tuesday filed a lawsuit against Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D), State Attorney General Dana Nessel and State Health Director Robert Gordon over the state’s stay-at-home order.
According to the plaintiffs, Whitmer has continually extended her stay-at-home order to “flatten the curve” from the Wuhan coronavirus. The group believes Whitmer continually extending her stay-at-home order – without approval from the state legislature – infringes upon individual rights and liberties.
“Many decisions made in immediate response to protect against the COVID19 threat and the dire, potential public health crisis resulted in severe restrictions on the rights and liberties of both private individuals and businesses,” the lawsuit states. “Michigan was no exception.”
The plaintiffs also believe Michigan has succeeded in flattening the curve, a sign that so-called “elective” medical procedures can continue.
“Since early March 2020, Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer has taken drastic, unprecedented, unilateral executive actions in an effort to address the spread of the virus that causes COVID-19—declaring a state of emergency in the State of Michigan and justifying her restriction on rights and liberties based on the very important goal to ‘flatten the curve’ and avoid overwhelming Michigan’s healthcare system and hospital,” the complaint states. “Thankfully, the goal of flattening the curve has been achieved, and the dire predictions of overwhelmed hospitals have not come to pass.”
The state originally anticipated 220,000 hospitalizations as a result of the Wuhan coronavirus. As of April 27th, that number sat at 3,000, making it less than 1.4 percent of the projected hospitalizations. Michigan is prepared should any additional cases come forward, with over 2,400 ventilators available, almost 1,000 ICU beds and more than 7,000 unoccupied hospital beds.”
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A petty little tyrant who has grossly exceeded her authority, and even now threatens further retaliatory actions if her will is not heeded. She’s abusing her office.
And note how the Gov and her “experts” were only off by about 98.6% in their “expert” predictions and advice. That’s not even close to accurate.
“The state originally anticipated 220,000 hospitalizations as a result of the Wuhan coronavirus. As of April 27th, that number sat at 3,000, making it less than 1.4 percent of the projected hospitalizations. ”
————
She is destroying lives and businesses without evidence to back her extreme measures.
“Not only has this shutdown harmed my employees and my practice, but it has put my patients directly at risk,” said Warnsholz. “These oppressive executive orders are meant to save lives, but instead, they are endangering many of them.”
First responders saw the towering explosion at 327 E. Boyd St which rumbled throughout the block, charring a tall fire ladder, blackening a fire engine across the street, and damaging other equipment, per Scott
Even NYers are growing tired of the overbearing leaders thing.
This is #NYC tonight. Manhattan, not a right wing backwater. People are ready to start reopening and our businesses and workers need it. We need to see some urgency – not blue ribbon commissions, business czars, & bureaucracy – just reasonable guidelines that we can safely follow pic.twitter.com/ZLzuMmafFK
People on the Upper East Side couldn’t go inside the bars to drink yesterday, so instead, they gathered and drank them on the sidewalk. 🤦🏻♀️ pic.twitter.com/GxspTyljWv
question: does @MayorBowser order matter if not enforced? There are cops at DC stores enforcing physical distancing. National guard troops at Lincoln Park. And yet, a giant party on Capitol Hill East where cops, well, show off their lights and leave. https://t.co/PvnwdFnQKr
When a young black man is shot by police, you frequently hear people say — why didn’t the man just comply with the law? The same is true and even more so with the people who are breaking the public health safety laws at this time — why don’t they just comply?
The science told us that if we didn’t institute public health measures there would “x” amount of death or infections. We put the health measures in place. Now people say the science was wrong because “x” didn’t happen. Umm no, “x” didn’t happen because we listened to the science. Countries that listened to the science the best — NZ, Germany, — fared the best.
An order is not a law. A law is an act of the legislature, starts as a bill, gets debated, voted on, sent on for the Govs signature or veto. Then it must withstand court challenges and judicial review.
An order is an executive action from one official, without debate, without a vote, and with no review as of yet. She doesn’t even have an appeals process in place to even give the appearance of fairness.
The difference is clear.
Her order is an overreach, that’s why the police won’t shut down the barber. They don’t think her orders will survive a legal challenge, so they don’t want to jeopardize their own depts and open themselves to lawsuits for her rights violating overreach.
Wandering Views 
For all the leftists who keep claiming the US leads in cases……
And a yes to the second part, because I’ve seen it done, and it’s working.
https://legalinsurrection.com/2020/05/wuhan-virus-watch-leaked-data-shows-china-may-have-640000-coronavirus-cases/
“Wuhan Virus Watch: Leaked Data Shows China May Have 640k Coronavirus Cases, Not 80k As Claimed
PLUS: Could plasma from those who recovered from the coronavirus be used as a possible treatment? A few studies have optimistic results.”
“You mean to tell me that China’s claim of having only 80,000 coronavirus cases is probably a lie? I am shocked:
A leaked database from a Chinese military-run university suggests the country may have at least 640,000 COVID-19 cases — a figure substantially higher than Beijing’s dubious claim that it has seen just 80,000 coronavirus infections.
The virus tracker, compiled by China’s National University of Defense Technology and leaked to Foreign Policy magazine, appears to confirm fears that the nation’s Communist government is hiding the true nature of the outbreak that originated in Wuhan late last year.
According to the report, the virus tracker consists of more than 640,000 rows of cases in 230 cities ranging from early February to late April and confirms the location of each infection.
The data includes locations for hospitals, train stations, hotels, restaurants and schools and was compiled by a professor at the university that is run by China’s Central Military Commission, the report said.
Convalescent Plasma May Become a Treatment Option
Researchers at Mayo Clinic, Michigan State University, and Johns Hopkins University reviewed a study in which doctors gave patients suffering from the Wuhan coronavirus plasma from people who recovered the virus.
The doctors found using the plasma is safe without “an excessive mortality rate.” The results have the potential to expand the study and maybe use the plasma as treatment.
The plasma went to 5,000 hospitalized patients. The doctors “found serious adverse events occurred in fewer than 1% of the treated patients, and the mortality rate seven days after transfusion was 14.9%.””
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Once again, NY is fudging the numbers.
https://dailycaller.com/2020/05/15/new-york-coronavirus-reporting-nursing-home-deaths-undercounting/
“New York Admits Knowingly Undercounting Nursing Home Deaths After Quietly Changing Reporting Rules”
“The New York State Department of Health acknowledged that its recent reporting does not fully reflect the known carnage coronavirus has caused among nursing home and adult care residents.
The revelation comes as New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo is under fire for his policies regarding nursing homes amid the coronavirus pandemic.
New York is the only state with large coronavirus outbreaks among its long-term care facilities that doesn’t count residents who died at a hospital.
New York quietly changed the way it reports long-term care fatalities around April 28.”
—-
“New York has omitted an unknown number of coronavirus deaths in recent reports regarding residents of nursing home and adult care facilities, the New York State Department of Health acknowledged in a statement to the Daily Caller News Foundation.
In early May, those reports quietly began omitting long-term care residents who died of coronavirus in hospitals. Even so, New York still leads the nation with 5,433 reported deaths at nursing homes and adult care facilities as of Wednesday.
The revelation comes as New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo faces criticism for ordering nursing homes and other long-term care facilities to accept patients from hospitals who had tested positive for coronavirus. Cuomo rescinded the March 25 order, which experts say led to higher levels of death among nursing home residents, on May 11 to allow such facilities to wait until a coronavirus patient tests negative before readmitting them.
The NYSDOH confirmed to the DCNF that until around April 28, it was disclosing coronavirus deaths for all nursing home and adult care facility residents, regardless of whether the patient died at their long-term care facility or at a hospital.
But the department made a subtle change to its disclosures beginning around May 3, according to web archives. The NYSDOH told the DCNF its disclosure now only reports coronavirus deaths for long-term care patients that died while physically present at their facility.”
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Your tax dollars at work……
Spreading propaganda for the Chinese.
————
————
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Shocking no one…..
https://legalinsurrection.com/2020/05/eu-paid-millions-to-terror-linked-palestinian-ngos-official-israeli-report-says/
“EU Paid Millions to Terror-Linked Palestinian NGOs, Official Israeli Report Says
Israel’s Ministry of Strategic Affairs: “Terrorist organizations are continuing to whitewash their activities through NGOs.””
“A new Israeli report revealed that the European Union continues to fund Palestinian NGOs, or Non-Governmental Organisations, affiliated to terrorist groups.
European aid worth millions of euros going to Palestinian charities and “civil society organizations” was ending up in the coffers of internationally designated terrorist groups, the report published by Israel’s Ministry of Strategic Affairs indicates.
The Israeli report takes the case of Palestinian NGO, Addameer, which has well-documented ties to terrorist group Palestinian Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). Despite its know links to the terrorist group — banned both by the United States and the EU, Addameer received up to 2 million euros in funding from several EU and European agencies, the official reports disclosed.
The 28-page report released on Wednesday “reveals the dangers of the EU’s transfer of funds and the methodology and guises used by terrorists under the cover of civil society organizations,” Israel’s Ministry of Strategic Affairs said in a statement.
Addameer, a primary recipient of EU aid, is led by convicted terrorists, including its board member, Yaqoub Oudeh. He was part of the “member of the PFLP terror cell that carried out the Jerusalem Shufersal supermarket bombing in 1969 in which two Israelis (Leon Kanner and Eduard Jaffe) were murdered and nine others injured,” the report revealed. “Addameer lay leaders and employees play a dual role – human rights activists by day and PFLP terrorists by night,” it added.
Here are the key findings of the official Israeli report titled “Blood Money: European-funded Palestinian NGOs and their terror operatives”:”
““[T]ies shared between certain terrorist organizations and various Israel-delegitimizing and boycott-promoting NGOs have deepened, and these terrorist organizations are continuing to whitewash their activities through NGOs that have credibility in the West. (…)
One of the best examples of the NGO-terror connection, and the focus of this report, are the ties shared between the European-funded NGO “Addameer – Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association” and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a USand EU-designated terrorist organization. This case study exemplifies the clear connection between NGOs and terrorist organizations, and the concern that some of the funds designated to such NGOs may have ended up funding terror activities. (…)
Addameer staff, members of its board of directors and general assembly were found to be PFLP operatives, some of which until recently. (…)
By portraying itself as a legitimate NGO, Addameer has been able to raise funds in Western countries, including from European governments. Over the last six years (2013-2019), Addameer received nearly €2 million in European governmental and public funding from Switzerland, Ireland, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, Sweden and Spain (Basque Autonomous Community and municipalities). (…)
The PFLP has warned that it is entered significant financial distress over the past few months. In light of such, there is a possibility that the organization will now try, even more than before, to increase its associations with civil society organizations. These include Palestinian NGOs such as Addameer and Al-Haq, which through their various ties to the organizations, may utilize to obtain financial aid. The fear remains that these funds will be transferred to PFLP-related activities. (…)
This report found that numerous members and terrorist operatives have become leading figures in NGOs which delegitimize and promote boycotts again Israel, while concealing or downplaying their terrorist past. Some continue to serve as members of terrorist organizations to this day.”
———
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Scathing.
And a completely accurate final sentence from the WSJ Editorial Board..
“As for Mr. Schiff, no one should ever believe another word he says.”
https://www.wsj.com/articles/all-the-adam-schiff-transcripts-11589326164
“All the Adam Schiff Transcripts
Newly released documents show he knew all along that there was no proof of Russia-Trump collusion.”
“Americans expect that politicians will lie, but sometimes the examples are so brazen that they deserve special notice. Newly released Congressional testimony shows that Adam Schiff spread falsehoods shamelessly about Russia and Donald Trump for three years even as his own committee gathered contrary evidence.
The House Intelligence Committee last week released 57 transcripts of interviews it conducted in its investigation into Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election. The committee probe started in January 2017 under then-Chair Devin Nunes and concluded in March 2018 with a report finding no evidence that the Trump campaign conspired with the Kremlin. Most of the transcripts were ready for release long ago, but Mr. Schiff oddly refused to release them after he became chairman in 2019. He only released them last week when the White House threatened to do it first.”
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So it looks like the partisan hack pretending to be a fair judge in the Flynn case has some explaining to do. And if the past statements of his friend are any indication, he has no choice but to toss it.
Note the SC decision he’s ignoring is a only week old, and was unanimous and the decision was presented by Ginsberg, and was designed to stop exactly this type of judicial activism.
———-
As for his friend….
“…as a matter of established law, the judiciary is not to second-guess the Executive’s decisions of “whether to initiate charges, whom to prosecute, which charges to bring, and whether to dismiss charges.”
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Now as for the latest leftist narrative and talking points about how “unprecedented” this is……
Boom. Blowed up.
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2020/05/15/ny-sun-judge-presiding-over-flynn-case-turns-blind-eye-to-disturbing-trend-regar-n2568897
“The DOJ filed the motion that clearly lays out an entrapment plot. It’s so damning that even liberal lawyer and law professor Jonathan Turley said that there could be grounds for a malicious prosecution lawsuit against the FBI. The prosecutor for the case resigned. The DOJ wants out. Everyone wants this case to go away; no one has opposed the motion to dismiss. And yet, Sully has decided to tap a retired judge, John Gleeson, to fight the DOJ motion and—get this—see if they can file perjury charges against Flynn for his coerced guilty plea. Is this the United States or North Korea? It’s absolute garbage—and you don’t need a law degree to see that.
Yet, the fallback for liberals desperate to keep the Trump-Russia collusion carcass from totally falling apart is the line, “but Flynn pleaded guilty. Why would an innocent man do that?” My eyes cannot roll any harder at the naivete at this, but here we are. Well, since liberals think government can do no wrong, let’s shred that silly talking point right now. They can and they have done so—many times, even before the Trump presidency. Second, for liberals who are supposedly criminal justice reform advocates, are they just ignorant or plain stupid regarding the shocking number of false guilty pleas that are floating around our justice system. It’s staggering, and the New York Sun’s editorial board aptly noted that Judge Sullivan was ignoring this aspect regarding the Flynn case:
The fact is that it’s by no means rare for persons to plead guilty to crimes they didn’t commit. Some are scared. Others confused. Some lack the intestinal fortitude or financial wherewithal to stand up against the warnings or threats from the prosecutors. What’s so unusual in the Flynn case is that the Democrats and liberals are siding against the poor schlepper caught in the prosecutorial vice.
It turns out that one serious liberal institution, the Innocence Project, maintains a whole Website devoted to persons who plead guilty to crimes they didn’t commit. It’s called GuiltyPleaProblem.com. The first click on it brings up a headline asking the question, “Why do innocent people plead guilty to crimes they didn’t commit?” The Website offers illuminating background to the problem.
Some 95% of felony convictions in America, the Website notes, are obtained through guilty pleas. Among persons known to be exonerated, it reports, a staggering 18% pleaded guilty to crimes they didn’t commit. It is a humbling statistic for those of us who cover the courts. The filing of a guilty plea by an innocent party occurs at a pace that leaves GuiltyPleaProblem.com saying: “there’s no telling how many are behind bars as a result.”
So where are the liberals now? Where’s the logic of Judge Sullivan getting up on his high horse over the idea that someone in his court might move to withdraw a guilty plea? The idea that General Flynn was uncomfortable with his own plea deal can’t be a surprise to the judge. It was already in the air when the judge erupted at the general at a now-infamous hearing in open court back in December 2018.
The publication added why isn’t the judge, after seeing the long history of prosecutorial misconduct and overreach at the DOJ, looking into the allegation that Flynn’s family was threatened with total destruction? That’s the real crime here. Instead, the myth-peddling continues because they hate Trump and most of all, they’re lawyers. They’re arrogant—and the prosecution, which Sullivan has indirectly joined with these puzzling moves to outsource the prosecution to the wingnut lefty fringe, never wants to admit they’re wrong.”
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So House Democrats want a Christmas in July Day for all their liberal benefactors, and fund a bunch of favored stuff they can’t normally get thru that has nothing to do with Covid 19, or helping Americans, and they’re taking a paid vacation until July now.
Nice.
Talk about tone deaf.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/congress/house-democrats-signal-they-could-recess-until-july-21
“House Democrats signal they could recess until July 21”
“House Democrats are preparing to pass a resolution Friday that would set up a recess lasting until July 21.
Lawmakers returned to the Capitol for only the third time since mid-March, when the House recessed due to the threat of the coronavirus.
They will vote on a $3 trillion economic aid package as well as a resolution allowing virtual committee business and proxy voting for the next 45 days unless renewed by Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat.
The measure includes a provision “that allows the House to remain in recess until July 21,” a Republican leadership aide said.
The language is included in a resolution dictating the rules of debate. It allows Democrats “to declare the House adjourned to meet at a date and time to be announced by the Chair in declaring the adjournment,” from May 19 until July 21.
A top Democratic aide said the provision was needed to block lawmakers (likely Republicans, who oppose the recess) from calling up votes during the pro forma sessions held every three days.”
———–
This is total BS.
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I mentioned a few weeks earlier that totalitarian regimes do not disclose the nature of any tragedy for fear of losing face and credibility. The Chinese numbers are extremely suspect and they now only report cases they can trace to foreign travel. The Russians reported a massive increase in deaths due to pneumonia in March, its only been recently that they have reported more reasonable numbers. Brazil, Iran and India are also playing with numbers so right wing leaders don’t lose face.
The number game is played in democracies too. Mostly not to save face but for money and to avoid oversight. 80% of Cdn deaths due to Covid occur in long term care homes most of whom are private for profit. They, especially in Quebec, tried to hide these deaths or mislabel them as old age etc in order to avoid inspections or tighter regulations. I’m sure NY homes have similar motivations. Remove the profit motive and perhaps the numbers would be accurate. In Florida two different state agencies had widely disparate numbers with one agency not reporting deaths of winter residents.
However, whatever the Chinese numbers, the Americans numbers and its gov’t response is not flattering.
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I realize most guilty pleas result from plea bargains and some in fact are coerced. However, Flynn is not a scared 19 year old with an incompetent legal aid lawyer trying to close a file. Flynn has years of experience in both politics and the military and had the best legal team money could buy, I find it hard to believe his guilty plea was under duress. If so, he should be filing civil suits against his legal team.
Pelosi seems to be taking a page from the McConnell book — obstruct, delay and don’t govern. 100s of House bills die in the Senate before even seeing the light of day because McConnell wouldn’t rather not deal with it. Doesn’t excuse Pelosi but again here we see a federal state unable to work in the middle of a crisis. The federal US state seems to be nothing but a shell with a military but no inner workings.
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The count is a pile.
But this is what happens when you incentivize the death reports with free money….
“The US is Dramatically Overcounting Coronavirus Deaths”
https://townhall.com/columnists/johnrlottjr/2020/05/16/the-us-is-dramatically-overcounting-coronavirus-deaths-n2568925
“Editor’s Note: Timothy Craig Allen, MD, JD, contributed to this column.
Over 86,500 people have reportedly died in the United States from the Coronavirus, and the fear generated by those deaths is driving the public policy debate. But that number is a dramatic overcount. Our metrics include deaths that have nothing to do with the virus. The problem is even worse as the Centers for Disease Control over counts even some of these cases and the government has created financial incentives for this misreporting. Relying on these flawed numbers is destroying businesses and jobs and costing lives.
“The case definition is very simplistic,” Dr. Ngozi Ezike, director of Illinois Department of Public Health, explains. “It means, at the time of death, it was a COVID positive diagnosis. That means, that if you were in hospice and had already been given a few weeks to live, and then you also were found to have COVID, that would be counted as a COVID death. It means, technically even if you died of clear alternative cause, but you had COVID at the same time, it’s still listed as a COVID death.”
“Medical examiners in Michigan use the same definition. In Macomb and Oakland Counties, where most of the deaths occurred, medical examiners classify any deaths as Coronavirus deaths when the postmortem test is positive. Even people who died in suicides and automobile accidents meet that definition. ”
Still, these broad definitions are not due to a few rogue public health officials. The rules direct them to do this. Unlike other countries, “if someone dies with COVID-19, we are counting that as a COVID-19 death,” as Dr. Deborah Birx, the White House coronavirus response coordinator, recently noted.
Classifications go beyond even these broad categories. New York is classifying cases as Coronavirus deaths even when postmortem tests have been negative. Despite negative tests, classifications are based on symptoms, even though the symptoms are often very similar to those of the seasonal flu. The Centers for Disease Control guidance explicitly acknowledges the uncertainty that doctors can face. When Coronavirus cases are “suspected,” they advise doctors that “it is acceptable to report COVID-19 on a death certificate.”
That isn’t just a theoretical issue. On April 21st, when New York City’s death toll rose above 10,000, the New York Times reported that the city included “3,700 additional people who were presumed to have died of the coronavirus but had never tested positive” – a more than 50 percent increase in the number of cases.”
But the problem is worse than this broad definition implies. Birx and others believe that the CDC is over counting cases. The Washington Post reports they are concerned that the CDC’s “antiquated” accounting system is double counting cases and inflating mortality and case counts “by as much as 25 percent.”
There are additional reasons for concern. Some doctors feel pressure from hospitals to list deaths as due to the Coronavirus, even when they don’t believe that is the case, “to make it look a little bit worse than it is.” There are financial incentives that might make a difference for hospitals and doctors. The CARES Act adds a 20 percent premium for COVID-19 Medicare patients. “
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Huh. And yet I’d been led to believe they were doing such a great job…..
Many of their citizens seem to have a different opinion.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8325909/Fury-Germany-thousands-expected-protest-country-lockdown-measures.html
“Fury in Germany as thousands join protests across country over lockdown measures and a vaccine plan by Bill Gates as Angela Merkel’s popularity falls
Thousands of protesters have gathered in Stuttgart, Munich and Berlin
What started off as small protests against lockdown measures have grown”
“Thousands of protesters gathered again in Stuttgart, Munich and Berlin on Saturday, with police out in force after some protests turned violent.
Germany newspaper Die Welt said that well over the 1,000 limit of people went to Theresienwiese to demonstrate against the coronavirus measures in the country.
After the area that the police had cordoned off had filled, the police tried to send people away. Instead, hundreds of people lined the pavements, filling the area.
When Police announced that people should leave, they were met with boos from the crowds, many holding banners, with slogans like ‘freedom instead of coercion’.
Thousands also gathered at a demonstration in Stuttgart, with police limiting numbers to 5,000 maximum. However, many people gathered outside of the area designated to them by police.
Frankfurt city centre saw counter-protests against the protesters, with one woman holding a sign that read ‘Conspiracy theories can be fatal’.
At protests in Berlin, police could be seen using heavy-handed tactics to remove protesters who breached the coronavirus measures, or the rules of the protests.”
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HRW,
“the Americans numbers and its gov’t response is not flattering.”
——–
I agree, in some cases, like these. 30% of all deaths, in one state.
https://hotair.com/archives/allahpundit/2020/05/16/must-read-cuomo-de-blasio-botched-new-yorks-response-coronavirus/
“I strongly encourage you to read this very-long-but-worth-it Pro Publica investigation if you can spare the time, as it attempts to solve two of the great mysteries of the coronavirus crisis.
One: Why did New York City get hit with the viral equivalent of an atomic bomb while San Francisco escaped almost unscathed?
Two: Why do people remain under the impression that Andrew Cuomo has done a good job handling the epidemic?
Right, sure, it’s no easy feat for a governor to hold down the death toll from a highly infectious novel disease while shutting down commerce among a population of 20 million people. But Gavin Newsom had to manage a population twice that size and did pretty well, and yet there’s no chatter about swapping out ol’ Joe Biden for Newsom as the party’s nominee as there is with Cuomo.
If fans want to qualify Cuomo’s failure by acknowledging that he had a herculean task, that’s perfectly fine and fair. But let’s at least acknowledge the failure.
Here’s a tease for you from the Pro Publica piece. In some respects Cuomo was in even deeper denial about the threat from COVID-19 than Bill de Blasio was, and de Blasio was in deep denial. So deep, the story notes, that by mid-March de Blasio’s own health department was sufficiently enraged by his dawdling on shutting things down that they hatched a plot to stage a sort of coup, in which “one of the department’s most senior leaders [would] effectively dare the mayor to fire him by going live on television and expressing the urgent need to close schools and issue more serious restrictions immediately.” It turns out that even de Blasio grasped the need for a lockdown before Cuomo did, though.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, however, reacted to de Blasio’s idea for closing down New York City with derision. It was dangerous, he said, and served only to scare people. Language mattered, Cuomo said, and “shelter-in-place” sounded like it was a response to a nuclear apocalypse.
Moreover, Cuomo said, he alone had the power to order such a measure…
“No city in the state can quarantine itself without state approval,” Cuomo said of de Blasio’s call for a shelter-in-place order. “I have no plan whatsoever to quarantine any city.”
Cuomo’s conviction didn’t last. On March 22, he, too, shuttered his state. The action came six days after San Francisco had shut down, five days after de Blasio suggested doing similarly and three days after all of California had been closed by Newsom. By then, New York faced a raging epidemic, with the number of confirmed cases at 15,000 doubling every three or four days.
Had Cuomo and de Blasio moved even a week or two earlier to shut things down, the death toll might have turned out to be half of what it ended up being according to one model. But that’s the tip of the iceberg. Pro Publica describes other mystifying failures, from poor advance planning in keeping New York State’s PPE stockpile full (Cuomo’s been governor for nearly 10 years, remember) to his state health department cutting off information-sharing with NYC’s health department to Cuomo treating the early outbreak in Westchester County as some sort of freak isolated incident instead of a harbinger of how bad things were about to get in NYC.”
———–
More……
https://www.propublica.org/article/two-coasts-one-virus-how-new-york-suffered-nearly-10-times-the-number-of-deaths-as-california
“Two Coasts. One Virus. How New York Suffered Nearly 10 Times the Number of Deaths as California.
California’s governor and San Francisco’s mayor worked together to act early in confronting the COVID threat. For Andrew Cuomo and Bill de Blasio, it was a different story, and 27,000 New Yorkers have died so far.”
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The Pro-Publica piece is long, but worth the time and loaded with facts. Pesky things those facts…..
—
“But the timing of New York’s shutdown undeniably played a role in the dire human toll the virus has exacted. In April, two prominent experts said in a New York Times opinion article that their research showed that had New York imposed its extreme social distancing measures a week or two earlier, the death toll might have been cut by half or more.”
“It’s an assessment shared by Dr. Tom Frieden, the former head of New York City’s Health Department. “Days earlier & so many deaths could have been prevented,” Frieden tweeted in April.”
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Quick! Someone remind me how this is Trump’s fault…..
“The official asserted that, from the discovery of the first positive COVID-19 case in the state on March 1 to the shutdown on March 22, New York had acted faster than any other state.”
—
“By March 5, the number of COVID-19 infections in New York City were doubling every five or six days, and officials within the city’s Health Department had become increasingly frustrated at what they regarded as the mayor’s failure to comprehend the size and nature of the crisis. That day, he’d issued a press release expressing confidence that the city could still “beat this thing.”
—
But……
“But a range of health officials and scientists interviewed by ProPublica say creating such timelines misses the central issue: No later than Feb. 28, federal officials warned the country that a deadly pandemic was inevitable. It is from that point forward, they say, that any individual state’s actions should be judged.”
———–
While they dallied, and failed to follow federal advice, people died. “Not the President’s call” was their refrain. “It’s up to the Govs and Mayors” they said…..
But now they want to blame Trump and the feds since they failed to listen. They were on power trips and couldn’t be bothered.
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Most political leaders have increased their popularity even if their jurisdiction suffered terrible losses due to Covid 19. Even the Italian and French gov’ts have reached record highs in the polls. Merkel reach almost 80% approval by mid April. I’m sure Germany has its share of idiots but most Germans know Merkel has the science background and because she is retiring at the end of her term also know she has no political motivations.
NYC and to a certain extent New Orleans are the least American cities. The NYC population density is unlike the rest of the US and sometimes even the NY gov’t forgets this. Cuomo may have done an inferior job but like the Italian gov’t, Cuomo still benefits from the “rally around the flag” crisis bounce in the polls. Trump, Abe from Japan, and the Brazil president are the only ones whose popularity has not risen. Watching Trump in a press conference its not hard to see why — he appears self centered, angry and has none of the Clintonian “I feel your pain”. Its not whether the president, prime minister or governor is doing well but its their ability to project empathy and competence. Trump doesn’t do that well. Personally I’m impressed by the governor of Michigan just because she won’t be intimidated but my personal favorite is the NZ prime minister — in one year she dealt with a terrorist attack, a volcano, Covid 19 and did a good job all while taking care of a 2 year old.
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Lol. Good point on the Kiwi.
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If the states would stop intentionally miscounting, the death toll would be far lower.
https://www.foxnews.com/us/colorado-lowers-coronavirus-death-count
“Colorado has made a stunning and significant change to the way it counts COVID-19 deaths that reduced the statewide figure from more than 1,000 to 878, according to a report.
The change came after Colorado’s Department of Public Health admitted that its COVID-19 death toll was counting those who tested positive for the coronavirus but had died of other causes, Fox 31 Denver reported late Friday.
The department now says 1,150 Coloradoans who died had COVID-19 but only 878 of those deaths were “due to” COVID-19.”
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“Fox News on Friday reported on one of those stories as part of a report that found that the hodgepodge way states counted COVID-19 deaths was a reason why some people believe the U.S. COVID-19 death figure was exaggerated.
The story involved a 35-year-old man from Montezuma County who died May 4 of alcohol poisoning but whose death was counted in Colorado’s COVID-19 death toll.
“The state is reporting that death as a COVID death, but our health department wanted to let people know that even though the person did have the virus, they did not die from it,” the Montezuma County Health Department said about the man’s death.
The national COVID-19 death toll climbed to 87,568 Saturday with the deaths of 1,662 more people due to the virus, John Hopkins University data showed. But that latest number does not take into account Colorado’s amended figure, listing the death toll at 1,150.
France blamed the confusion on the National Notifiable Diseases Surveillance System that states use to report COVID-19 deaths to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.”
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If Colorado and NY are any indication, the “death toll from C-19” would drop by 30% at least, if accurately reported.
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“Personally I’m impressed by the governor of Michigan just because she won’t be intimidated”
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She’s a power hungry hack on a power trip. Of course the left would be impressed, they love overbearing rulers.
https://townhall.com/columnists/bradslager/2020/05/16/democrats-drunk-with-pandemic-power-could-be-undercutting-themselves-come-november-n2568927
“In Michigan, Gretchen Whitmer has attempted to parlay her oppressive dictates into becoming a vice-presidential contender. She has gone so far as to extend her stay-at-home orders another month in a state with mounting anger towards being kept from their businesses, with a legislature fighting back at her power grab. Whitmer, like so many of her Democrat demagogues, is freely imposing rules which have no bearing on public safety.
Gretchen has been bolstered by a fawning press corps, operating under the belief that her tactics are warmly received. She initially was combative with President Trump over relief aid supposedly denied to her state only to have it revealed that her office had failed to fill out the basic paperwork to apply for FEMA aid. She has forced most businesses closed, and even went so far as to mandate that those stores remaining open had to limit what items were available for sale. The locals are becoming fed up.”
Protests have been staged at the state capitol already, and the pushback in her state is growing. She thinks that it is a strong move to go after a local business that is defying her executive order, but the local law enforcement divisions are resisting the command to shut him down. It has not occurred to Whitmer that in a state where the people want to return to life, the optics of her bringing the force of government down on a 77-year-old barber are not a good look for her. A judge also thought so, overruling the governor’s order to close his shop down.”
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She’s not a leader, she’s a hack of the highest order. A real leader would know how the system works and did what was necessary to get funds for her state. But she’s a hack, so she did nothing but whine and attack her betters.
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When a leader is confronted with angry armed men at the legislature yet sticks to the science, I’m impressed and so apparently are the people of Michigan where her approval ranking is 57% compared to Trump’s 44% with only 37% disapproval. Trump would love those numbers.
The Kiwi PM is something else — gave birth while prime minister, breast fed her daughter in both the parliament and the UN assembly. I’d love to see one of those right wing clown show populists — Italy, UK, Brazil, Hungary, Poland and the US — even try to accomplish what she has managed to do — deal with terrorism, pass gun control legislation (in a country which loves their guns and hunting), volcanoes, Covid -19 all while balancing a coalition gov’t.
I’m watching how female leaders deal with a health crisis than watch the right wing populists (including my own premier) fail miserable — I’m voting for a woman til my dying day.
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Reporting Covid numbers are interesting — do you over count to scare people into compliance and get more money? do you under count to look like an effective leader? or do you tell the truth?
I can’t help feeling that most leaders and the scientists are doing the best they can when counting and rely on local health authorities. My dad’s friend died of pneumonia after 2 years on an oxygen tank. Did he die of long term lung disease? pneumonia? maybe Covid? or maybe just old age (over 90)? The coroner is just doing their best guess.
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The problem is that people often die of a condition that is either brought on by, or exacerbated by, a given disease, so “cause of death” can be a murky thing. My husband technically died from a pulmonary embolism, but he most likely would not have developed that except for the complication his cancer was creating. So we consider that he died of prostate cancer.
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“When a leader is confronted with angry armed men…”
No armed person got within sight of her. Stop with the drama queen act.
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Kizzie,
“The problem is that people often die of a condition that is either brought on by, or exacerbated by, a given disease, so “cause of death” can be a murky thing.”
Yes, but when a person who died from alcohol poisoning or suicide is counted as C-19 because they have a positive test, C-19 was clearly not the cause of death.
And unlike your husband’s case, no coroner worth spit would say they died of complications from C-19 if suicide, poisoning, or a car accident were the cause. In your husband’s case there’s a clear and direct tie. His cancer caused the embolism. No such tie exists when car accidents and alcohol poisoning are the cause. They have nothing to do with C-19.
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Here’s more of your hero’s work HRW.
She is nothing but a petty tyrant.
https://www.foxnews.com/media/michigan-hair-salon-owner-says-she-needs-to-reopen
“Michigan salon owner on getting cease-and-desist order after reopening : ‘It’s definitely a scary situation'”
“A Michigan salon owner who was issued a cease-and-desist order by local police after she defied the state’s stay-at-home order amid the coronavirus pandemic by opening her business said she had to reopen or else she would “lose everything.”
Speaking on “Fox & Friends Weekend” on Sunday, Sarah Huff, the owner of Ardor+Grit Salon and Lounge in Holland, Mich., added that if she did not reopen her employees would “also not have a job to go back to.”
“They also have bills to pay,” Huff said. “They have a family to also support and feed. They also have their own mortgages and I have mine.”
In an emotional Facebook video Huff posted on Thursday she said, “How do you deem ones life essential over another? Please tell me that… I will lose my house, I will lose my business, I will lose my freaking livelihood if I do not go back to work.”
Huff received a cease-and-desist order after she reopened her salon on Friday. Huff said the entire salon was sterilized the day before. She said she is only allowing two to three people in the salon at a time to adhere to social distancing guidelines. She said she was also wearing gloves and a face mask all day and had some available for her clients as well.
“Hundreds of protesters once again descended on the steps of the Michigan Capitol last week to protest Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s stay-at-home orders during the coronavirus pandemic.
Despite the mounting unrest in her state, Whitmer has held firm on her stay-at-home orders – telling ABC’s “The View” on Wednesday that the protests make it more likely that her orders will have to be extended past the May 28 deadline.”
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““My license could be taken away, I could go to jail. I believe it’s up to a year possibly in jail,” she continued. “It’s not who I am. I don’t go against the grain. I am not the type of person, I do not like to get in trouble so this is not who I am, and it’s definitely a scary situation.”
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Petty. Little. Tyrant.
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And she’s gonna have to answer to the courts again, like last time. And she’ll lose. Again.
Now, you were just saying something about-
“I can’t help feeling that most leaders and the scientists are doing the best they can when counting and rely on local health authorities.”
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/bethbaumann/2020/05/17/why-multiple-health-care-facilities-slapped-michigan-gov-whitmer-with-a-lawsuit-n2568936
“Physicians Slap Whitmer with a Coronavirus-Related Lawsuit”
“Grand Health Partners, Wellston Medical Center, Primary Health Services and patient Jeffery Gulick on Tuesday filed a lawsuit against Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D), State Attorney General Dana Nessel and State Health Director Robert Gordon over the state’s stay-at-home order.
According to the plaintiffs, Whitmer has continually extended her stay-at-home order to “flatten the curve” from the Wuhan coronavirus. The group believes Whitmer continually extending her stay-at-home order – without approval from the state legislature – infringes upon individual rights and liberties.
“Many decisions made in immediate response to protect against the COVID19 threat and the dire, potential public health crisis resulted in severe restrictions on the rights and liberties of both private individuals and businesses,” the lawsuit states. “Michigan was no exception.”
The plaintiffs also believe Michigan has succeeded in flattening the curve, a sign that so-called “elective” medical procedures can continue.
“Since early March 2020, Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer has taken drastic, unprecedented, unilateral executive actions in an effort to address the spread of the virus that causes COVID-19—declaring a state of emergency in the State of Michigan and justifying her restriction on rights and liberties based on the very important goal to ‘flatten the curve’ and avoid overwhelming Michigan’s healthcare system and hospital,” the complaint states. “Thankfully, the goal of flattening the curve has been achieved, and the dire predictions of overwhelmed hospitals have not come to pass.”
The state originally anticipated 220,000 hospitalizations as a result of the Wuhan coronavirus. As of April 27th, that number sat at 3,000, making it less than 1.4 percent of the projected hospitalizations. Michigan is prepared should any additional cases come forward, with over 2,400 ventilators available, almost 1,000 ICU beds and more than 7,000 unoccupied hospital beds.”
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A petty little tyrant who has grossly exceeded her authority, and even now threatens further retaliatory actions if her will is not heeded. She’s abusing her office.
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And note how the Gov and her “experts” were only off by about 98.6% in their “expert” predictions and advice. That’s not even close to accurate.
“The state originally anticipated 220,000 hospitalizations as a result of the Wuhan coronavirus. As of April 27th, that number sat at 3,000, making it less than 1.4 percent of the projected hospitalizations. ”
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She is destroying lives and businesses without evidence to back her extreme measures.
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From an actual doctor….
“Not only has this shutdown harmed my employees and my practice, but it has put my patients directly at risk,” said Warnsholz. “These oppressive executive orders are meant to save lives, but instead, they are endangering many of them.”
And you praise this woman?
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https://twitter.com/seanmiura/status/1261834618182877184?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1261834618182877184&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thegatewaypundit.com%2F2020%2F05%2Fbreaking-massive-explosion-los-angeles-multiple-buildings-burning-230-firefighters-responding-ten-already-injured%2F
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Even NYers are growing tired of the overbearing leaders thing.
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Even VA is tired of it.
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And MD.
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When a young black man is shot by police, you frequently hear people say — why didn’t the man just comply with the law? The same is true and even more so with the people who are breaking the public health safety laws at this time — why don’t they just comply?
The science told us that if we didn’t institute public health measures there would “x” amount of death or infections. We put the health measures in place. Now people say the science was wrong because “x” didn’t happen. Umm no, “x” didn’t happen because we listened to the science. Countries that listened to the science the best — NZ, Germany, — fared the best.
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AJ – My comment about cause of death was related to the last paragraph in HRW’s comment right before mine. I wasn’t referring to those other matters.
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HRW,
An order is not a law. A law is an act of the legislature, starts as a bill, gets debated, voted on, sent on for the Govs signature or veto. Then it must withstand court challenges and judicial review.
An order is an executive action from one official, without debate, without a vote, and with no review as of yet. She doesn’t even have an appeals process in place to even give the appearance of fairness.
The difference is clear.
Her order is an overreach, that’s why the police won’t shut down the barber. They don’t think her orders will survive a legal challenge, so they don’t want to jeopardize their own depts and open themselves to lawsuits for her rights violating overreach.
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