Don't Name Mass Shooters! Stop 24-hour Shooting Media Coverage!

"Active shooter research data shows the increase in these events. By encouraging the media to focus less on the suspects and more on the victims, it is hoped that future events can be prevented. 

The Don't Name Them campaign is a coordinated effort by the ALERRT Center at Texas State University, the I Love U Guys Foundation (founded by John-Michael and Ellen Keyes), and the FBI.  

Family members of the victims of the Aurora Colorado movie theater shooting have also been challenging media and public information officers to not name the shooters through their "No Notoriety" campaign. 

The focus of the campaign is to shift the media focus from the suspects who commit these acts to the victims, survivors, and heroes who stop them.

• Some suspects are motivated by a desire for fame, notoriety, and/or recognition.

• When the media focuses on the attacker, they provide this fame, notoriety and recognition. 

• This focus allows the attacker to accomplish one of their goals, and validates their life and actions.

• Media coverage can create a contagion effect producing more shootings.

• Some shootings/attacks may be prevented by removing one of the incentives.

• We encourage the media and others not to name the suspects or focus on their lives.

• The shooters/attackers should be as unrecognized in their deaths as they were in their lives.

• Media coverage should focus on the victims and the heroes."

Lives Cut Short by Yet Another School Terrorist Attack

Those poor children, the teachers, and their inconsolable families! 

RedState has a tribute to the victims.

https://twitter.com/KoltenParker/status/1529327303838285824?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1529327303838285824%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fredstate.com%2Fnick-arama%2F2022%2F05%2F25%2Fhere-are-the-victims-in-the-uvalde-shooting-n569591

Sabotaging Our Country

Bonchie at RedState says It Sure Looks Like Joe Biden Is Trying to Purposely Destroy the Country. I've been feeling the same way myself.

"The last several weeks in the United States have been a wild ride. Everything that could go wrong, short of a full-blown apocalyptic situation, has gone wrong. The stock market is currently in the midst of a collapse, with the Dow Jones losing nearly 5,000 points over the last 30 days. Inflation clocked in at 8.3% for April, representing another crushing blow to Americans. Of course, gas prices continue to break milestones on a daily basis.

Meanwhile, the border crisis is completely out of control, with the only somewhat positive news being that a court blocked the Biden administration’s push to lift Title 42, which could take the already record, overwhelming numbers to double what we are currently seeing. But even past that, things you don’t normally think about are occurring, such as the massive wildfire currently engulfing parts of New Mexico.

With all that in mind, you’d expect the current administration to be scrambling to fix things, or at the very least, soften the blow. Instead, it sure seems like Biden is purposely trying to destroy the country.

For example, in the midst of exploding gas prices and a diesel shortage, which exacerbates inflation because products have to be transported, the administration decided to cancel more oil and gas leases."

--------------------------

In the same vein, Sen. Sullivan Lists What Biden Has Done Just in Last Three Weeks to Block Oil Production.  Why would you sabotage your own country?

A Window on Antisemitic Murders

Well, this looks all too familiar, doesn't it?

French police – No antisemitic motive to murder of 89-year-old; Jews not convinced.

"The Jewish community has doubts, as René Hadjadj was pushed out a window like the late Sarah Halimi.
French police have ruled out an antisemitic motive in the murder of an 89-year-old Jew in Lyons Tuesday, but the Jewish community has its doubts.
René Hadjadj was thrown over a 17th floor balcony after a dispute with a neighbor. His body was found by the police around 8 p.m.
French media reported that the police have arrested an unnamed 51-year-old suspect who said he pushed Hadjadj after an argument. The elderly man lived on the second floor of the building.
While booking the suspect for intentional homicide, the public prosecutor’s office and police 'mentioned' the possibility that the murder was motivated by Jew-hatred, but then dismissed the idea.
Jewish media outlets as well as posters on social media have questioned whether the authorities are not rushing to this judgement too soon.
The Tribune Juive pointed out that 'the neighborhood in question is part of the Lost Territories,'  a term used for areas in French cities that have large immigrant populations that do not acculturate into French society and where violence is prevalent. According to an article by the French Jewish Defense League in Le Monde, the suspect is of Arab-Muslim extraction."

Sadly, throwing elderly Jews out of windows to their deaths seems to be a popular killing method by French Muslims.

Gas Rationing Again?

Do you remember the 1970s and gas rationing? Why would you want that? And why would you want oil from Venezuela rather than U.S. or Canadian oil?

Steven F. Hayward writes that Biden’s road to record-high gas prices may soon lead to rationing. "Gasoline prices at the pump have always fluctuated within a regular epicycle of global oil prices, but the Biden administration’s every policy choice from its first day in office has contributed significantly to this week’s news that gas prices exceed $4 a gallon in all 50 states. President Biden and the Democrats seem determined to repeat every policy mistake of the 1970s, and it might not end until Biden attempts to impose price controls and rationing.

Start with Biden’s cancellation of the Keystone XL pipeline on Inauguration Day. This act was more shocking than merely the loss of unionized jobs and an insult to our largest trading partner; it is the first time to my knowledge that any president has canceled a private-sector project that was already under construction.

It is one thing to block a permit; the government does that all the time. It is another thing to revoke a permit already granted absent some malfeasance, and there was none by Keystone alleged."

"Democrats on Capitol Hill are dusting off Jimmy Carter’s playbook and calling for an “excess-profits tax” on energy companies as well as price controls on gasoline and diesel. Plans for rationing will come as night follows day. These are the same people who just a few years ago said we couldn’t “drill our way out” of our domestic oil supply shortage only to see the nation do exactly that under President Donald Trump. President Biden, who was in office during the 1970s energy crisis, obviously learned nothing from the experience of the last 40 years."

Disappointing American Response to COVID

How do you just pretend that COVID is over? If it weren't for other people feeling the same way I do, I'd think I was imagining things!

Daniel W. Drezner has written an opinion column: "Why don’t Americans care about the pandemic anymore?  A million have died of covid-19. But the country is ready to just move on?"

Dr. Topol was on the PBS News Hour to talk about Why the fight against COVID appears to have stalled in the U.S.. Here's an excerpt - but read the whole transcript.

• Dr. Eric Topol, Scripps Research Translational Institute:

  "Well, Bill, good to be with you.

  The problem we have is this illusion or deception that the pandemic is over, when, in fact, these variants that we're seeing are coming at a much faster clip. There's an accelerated evolution of the virus. And these are more troubling variants. They're not more mild.

  In fact, they have more immune escape. So they're transmitting at levels that is really inconceivable and starting to approach the level of measles, one of the most spreadable pathogens we have ever encountered.

  So we have trouble right now. As you mentioned, we are seeing at least 600,000, 700,000 real cases a day, and, likely, it's going to continue to increase in this country as we confront this so-called BA.2.12.1 variant, one of the several of the Omicron family."
  

Important COVID Stats & Maps for Americans Who Care

I subscribe to Dr Eric Topol's newsletter Ground Truths, and his article, "The COVID Capitulation",  is an important read for those of us who know that COVID isn't over and that we are being badly misled. Here is an excerpt:

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

"The United States is now in the midst of a new wave related to Omicron variants BA.2 and BA.2.12.1 with over 90,000 confirmed new cases a day and a 20% increase in hospitalizations in the past 2 weeks. That belies the real toll of the current wave, since most people with symptoms are testing at home or not testing at all; there is essentially no testing for asymptomatic cases. The real number of cases is likely at least 500,000 per day, far greater than any of the US prior waves except Omicron. The bunk that cases are not important is preposterous. They are infections that beget more cases, they beget Long Covid, they beget sickness, hospitalizations and deaths. They are also the underpinning of new variants."

"Meanwhile, the CDC propagates delusional thinking that community levels are very low (as my friend Peter Hotez called the “field of greens”) while the real and important data convey that transmission is very high throughout most of the country. Not only does this further beget cases by instilling false confidence, but it is conveniently feeding the myth that the pandemic is over—precisely what everyone wants to believe."

"As of last week, 43% of new cases were attributable to BA.2.12.1 and this subvariant had reached dominance (>50% of cases) in only one region of the country. BA.2.12.1 is out-competing BA.2 with its 25% higher transmission rate, which foretells its further rise to dominance across the US in the days and weeks ahead."

CDC U.S. County COVID Tranmission Map!

 

Here's that CDC county transmission map of the United States, a far cry from the "COVID is over" green map they have been using!

Coldblooded, Racist Killings in Buffalo: Another Domestic Terrorist Strikes

What an unspeakable horror! This killer of at least ten black people travelled for hours to commit his massacre, which he actually livestreamed! How do you become this evil this young?  I hope he'll be charged as an adult and swiftly executed for his crimes so that the grieving friends and families get some small measure of justice.

"Ten killed in mass shooting at Jefferson Avenue supermarket; officials describe attack as 'hate crime'
The gunman is 18 years old. Authorities have not identified him, but he was set to be arraigned Saturday evening.
As he moved through the store, he was dressed in body armor and armed with a high-powered rifle, police sources said.
Police and prosecutors said they suspect the shooting had a racial motive.'It was', Erie County Sheriff John Garcia said, 'straight up, a racially motivated hate crime.'"

----------------------------------------------

This mass murder reminded me of another: the 2021 killings of 10 people in a King Soopers supermarket in a Jewish neighborhood in Boulder, CO. That terrorist was Syrian, he was also heavily armed, and he too traveled from miles away just to attack this particular store. The killer was found "incompetent" to stand trial, even though he was competent enough to plan the attack and slaughter innocent people!

COVID Cases: Out of Sight, Out of Mind

Dr. Eric Topol tweeted: "Nothing to see here.  11 May: 159,000 new confirmed cases and 800 new hospitalizations, both the highest we've seen for a day in many weeks; deaths almost double 7-day average".

Dr. Jonathan Reiner told Don Lemon, "Instead of relying on the number of cases, #CDC looked at hospital capacity. Overnight, the map turned from orange and red to green. The only term that comes to mind is gaslighting. We've been gaslit."

(Image seen on Twitter)

A Terrible Statistic: 1 Million U.S. COVID Deaths, 9 Million Grieving Souls*

YORK, May 11 (Reuters) - The United States has now recorded more than 1 million COVID-19 deaths, according to a Reuters tally, crossing a once-unthinkable milestone about two years after the first cases upended everyday life and quickly transformed it.

The 1 million mark is a stark reminder of the staggering grief and loss caused by the pandemic even as the threat posed by the virus wanes in the minds of many people. It represents about one death for every 327 Americans, or more than the entire population of San Francisco or Seattle."

The deniers who claim that the pandemic is over should review this Reuters photo essay in order to remind themselves of the horrors of the past two years. Then they should get vaccinated, put on a mask, and have some consideration for others!

---------------

(* See "For every COVID death, 9 close family members may be grieving: study")

Good Man!

We could sure use more dedicated workers like him!  From CNBC: "This 100-year-old man just broke a record for working at the same company for 84 years—here's his best career advice"

"Throughout his 84-year career, Orthmann has also learned that the secret to success is focusing on what's in front of you.  'I don't do much planning, nor care much about tomorrow,' Orthmann said. 'All I care about is that tomorrow will be another day in which I will wake up, get up, exercise and go to work; you need to get busy with the present, not the past or the future … Here and now is what counts.'

In Case You're Wondering, COVID Still Isn't Over

Are there any people besides me who are still keeping up with the latest COVID news in order to educate ourselves so we can prepare for the future? It feels as if most people simply don't care any more -- to their own peril.

Here's some important news from Israel: Israeli researchers warn of new international COVID wave, driven by Delta comeback; Omicron didn’t wipe out the previous variant, which is super-resilient and could reemerge with a vengeance, according to peer-reviewed study based on cutting-edge sewage monitoring.

And from CNN:  Newer, fitter descendants of Omicron variant begin to drive their own coronavirus waves.There’s no denying the numbers: Even with spotty reporting, Covid-19 cases and hospitalizations are rising again in the United States.

"Spotty reporting". At this point, I'd rather trust the researchers in Israel and South African than the CDC with its green map.

Overturning Roe v. Wade

Last night's news brought news, via a deliberate leak, that the Supreme Court has voted to overturn Roe v. Wade.  The SCOTUSblog tweeted "It’s impossible to overstate the earthquake this will cause inside the Court, in terms of the destruction of trust among the Justices and staff. This leak is the gravest, most unforgivable sin."

Well, we can just kiss the regular news cycle goodbye. Not that there was much COVID news coverage anymore, but we were at least hearing about the wretched economy, inflation, higher  prices for rent, food, gas, and cars. Now it will be all-abortion, all the time.  Last night 's news about the disgraceful Supreme Court leak is a gift to Biden, who can now focus on the "necessity" of abortion for women and will see his popularity rise.

I've always been against abortion. They act as if abortions are as essential as food or.water. They talk about women's rights. What about the right of their babies to be born instead of aborted?

If women don't want the "inconvenience" of children, why don't they just get sterilized instead? Wouldn't that be more humane?

As for the leaker, s/he should be publicly named and shamed. The Court should have met last night to condemn the leak and then announce passage this very week of their bill to overturn Roe. Then we wouldn't be held hostage any longer than necessary by extremists in the Democrat Party.

COVID News for Americans Who Care

This piece is by Maryn McKenna at Wired:  "When the Next Covid Wave Breaks, the US Won’t Be Able to Spot It"

"Lab programs are closing. Home testing has shrunk the pool of publicly reported data. Will we still see the next surge before it arrives?

Lines on charts can tell you something about the state of the Covid pandemic in the United States. Deaths: declining, even with the looming milestone of the millionth US death. Hospitalizations: at historically low levels, but ticking back up. Cases: rising, particularly in the Northeast, reliably a harbinger for the rest of the country.

What you can't do with those lines is use them to map your way forward—because at this point, we’ve reached the choose-your-own-adventure stage of the pandemic. Most mask mandates have been lifted. Testing programs have been cut back, here and in other countries. Congress has declined to fund big chunks of the White House’s Covid agenda. Knowing where you are at risk is more confusing than ever, and likely to get more challenging as predicted new variants arrive.

All the indicators suggest the US is likely poised for a new surge of Covid; in some parts of the country, that surge may already be arriving. But in our zeal to declare the pandemic over, we may have maneuvered ourselves into a position where it is now harder to detect a coming wave. 'More and more, the relaxation of public health requirements, mandates, has placed responsibility on the individual and the employer,' says Saskia Popescu, an infectious-disease epidemiologist and an assistant professor at George Mason University. 'But I've noticed that when we relax these mandates, we're doing that at times that are really inopportune, when case numbers are already increasing.'

And cases are increasing in the US."

===============================

I came across this article on Twitter. The nightly news programs rarely discuss COVID any more, unfortunately, so Twitter has become a good alternative for information.

From Fortune:  "BA.4 and BA.5, two new Omicron variants sweeping South Africa, detected in U.S."

"BA.4 and BA.5 appear to be more infectious than BA.2, also known as “stealth Omicron,” which was more infectious than the original Omicron, BA.1, Bloomberg reported Thursday, citing South African COVID expert Tulio de Oliveira, the head of the institutes at the universities of KwaZulu-Natal and Stellenbosch.

The two new variants have 'mutations in the lineages that allow the virus to evade immunity,' he told Bloomberg. 'We expect that it can cause reinfections and it can break through some vaccines, because that’s the only way something can grow in South Africa, where we estimate that more than 90% of the population has a level of immune protection.'

Cases are surging in South Africa despite the fact that almost all South Africans have been vaccinated or had COVID, he said, signaling that these strains are more likely to be capable of evading the body’s defenses."